{"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/Richmond_Planning_Commission_April_17_2013/Richmond_Planning_Commission_April_17_2013.mp3", "text": "Good evening, everyone.Thank you for coming tonight.I apologize for the delay in getting started, as from port forum and other venues have discussed, we're a little short staffed and we technically don't have a forum for our planning commission meeting, but we can talk about this and just a general open conversation and hopefully lock who's traveling from out of state will be back in time for conversations later.Basically what we wanna do is there are some information brochures on the back.There's a summary survey that we ask everybody to fill out if you could and hand in at the end of the meeting.Kathleen is gonna go through a brief presentation of these three changes we're considering implementing.And then we'll open it up to a general conversation preferably about just these three sections that are out here for the time being.And then once the conversation has moved through this and we've answered the questions that have come up, we can open up to a more broader discussion of zoning and planning commission goals in the long run.So I think on that note, I'd like to turn it over to Kathleen.Okay.Thanks Mark.So as Mark said, I'm gonna just briefly talk about the sections that the planning commission's been working on and has prepared some changes to.So those sections include the flood hazard overlaid district section 6.8, section 3.5.5, which is the village commercial zoning district parking in the upper bridge street area.Section 5.7, which is the sign section directory signs specifically for a railroad street Angelina court.And then there are a few changes in definitions.So why are we making these changes now?The planning commission believes that these changes do help residents and businesses in a number of ways.For section 6.8, helping streamline the process and clarify the process for development in the special flood hazard area.Section 3.5.5 helps commercial property owners in the upper bridge street block expand or change uses by eliminating the requirement for parking spaces.And section 5.7 improves visibility of businesses who are located down a railroad street and Juliana court by allowing directory signs at the bridge street intersections.So the background for these changes last fall, as you probably all know, voters defeated the proposed zoning and subdivision regulations.Oh, great, welcome.Those proposed bylaws represented a major set of changes within a unified bylaw and there was general support for certain elements in the proposed bylaws.And specifically for these three sections that the planning commission has been working on the last several months.Therefore the planning commission is poised to move forward.But first wants to hear from folks in town about whether you agree that these are changes that should move forward right now.So I wanna talk just briefly about the FEMA flood insurance program.This is a part and parcel and important element that Richmond has to follow for properties in the floodplain and the flood insurance, National Flood Insurance Program provides insurance that isn't covered through standard homeowners insurance.This began in 1968 by Congress and Richmond does participate in the National Flood Insurance Program.We agree to adopt and enforce the ordinances that meet or exceed the FEMA requirements to reduce the risk of flooding.And Richmond has participated since 1982 in the National Flood Insurance Program when we adopted the flood hazard area development standards.And we have adopted the minimum MFIP requirements into our zoning regulations.Richmond has gone beyond the minimum requirements.We'll talk about that a little bit more this evening.Until tropical storm Irene, we were not aware as were many municipalities that FEMA requires property owners to apply for local permits for any development, which FEMA includes minor repairs.And that's at least what we were told by folks that we worked with at FEMA. And so Richmond's regulations were modified to help people through that process.We hope to make it less cumbersome.FEMA ultimately reviews and decide whether to approve our proposed bylaw changes and we have to have FEMA approval for the bylaws to remain in the FEMA National Flood Insurance Program.Right now we're in good standing and FEMA approved our last set of changes, which were done in 2009.So just wanna talk about a summary of the major changes for section 6.8. It has it overlay district.It does allow for streamline zoning permit process for many repairs, whereas the owner needs only to get a zoning permit.And expands exemptions from getting a zoning permits at all for low cost repairs, lawn and gardens and repairs below 500.In our proposed bylaws last fall, we did use the threshold of $1,000.FEMA instructed us to reduce that to 500.That's something we can continue to talk about, but that was what FEMA indicated to us.Our bylaws proposed bylaw changes also eliminate the current requirement that when an area of land development is within 100 feet of the outside edge of the FEMA special flood hazard area, then the owners have to demonstrate through a jurisdictional determination that the land is not inside the flood plain.A lot of people have found that requirement to be onerous and they should be sets of changes would eliminate that requirement.And the reason that was enacted in our bylaws was because the current maps that we're using, which are the 1982 maps from FEMA includes a fair amount of error.And so in a real effort to be cautious, the planning commission wanted to ensure that properties that even if they were outside the flood plain, they were still possibly going to be at risk for flooding that they would fall under the jurisdiction of section 6.8. So we are poised to receive new maps soon, we hope from the FEMA will approve our appeal for new flooding insurance rate maps.And as soon as that process has concluded, we won't have to use the 1982 maps anymore.So for making repairs in the FEMA special flood hazard area, now there's some new exemptions added.So any building contents, lawns and gardens, mailboxes and newspaper delivery boxes, repairs, we talked about up to a $500 in costs.Any reroofing where the roof line itself isn't being altered and any maintenance of outside areas would all be exempt.You wouldn't have to get a zoning permit at all.So we have expanded the items that would be allowed through a zoning permit by the administrative officer.Right now, these have had to go through the development review board and this will simplify that process substantially.So repairs for any items over $500 in costs, any residential scale playground structures for a single family house or a duplex and any improvements outside of the floodway that don't qualify a substantial improvement.And that's 50% of the value and that covers substantial damage as well over a three-year period.So again, these are an quite a few changes that would help expedite permitting for folks in a flood plain, 'cause they would only have to get permits from the zoning administrative officer.So, there are still activities that do have to get approved by the development review board.And these are just some new items, playground structures for multi-family or non residential uses, moved decks, porches, detached garages and non-conforming structures and uses.And within the floodway, there are no changes to the items that have to go to DRB. So we've already talked about how a number of items now will be shifted to the zoning administrative officer.The development standards are reduced for those applications and rather than having to provide or meet the development owners that you would for a project that goes to the DRB, it's a much smaller list of items, which are in the bylaws.We can talk about those when we finish.Now, one change that was made with the proposed bylaws was that accessory dwellings could be allowed in the flood plain, but they would have to be attached to an existing principal structure.That is you couldn't add a principal dwelling in an accessory structure.And so that change is also included in this set of changes that the planning commission is considering.Another change that I think will expedite the process as well, is that only certain applications will have to be sent to the state agency of natural resources.And that will be for new construction, substantial improvement or any development in the floodplain.Right now, our bylaws say that any development within or under the jurisdiction of section 6.8 has to go to the agency of natural resources.So that's an extra 15 days to any application.So this will help quite a bit.The planning commission talked at length about some of the key provisions that are in our current bylaws and that they would like to keep in our bylaws.Richmond does not allow new residential or non residential principal structures in the flood plain.And the planning commission believes this is an important provision and important policy by the town and is important to saving taxpayers and owners a lot of dollars later because inappropriately we've allowed structures to go in the flood plain.And then based on our experience with Irene, the planning commission has convinced that we should continue this policy.Richmond could certainly simply model or adopt the FEMA minimum standards.And there are a couple of reasons why as we move forward, we may wanna keep our standards that are above the FEMA minimum.And that is we're looking at participating in the community rating system, which is a FEMA program whereby by having standards that are beyond the fee FEMA minimum, and by agreeing to do community education and other activities, we can have a lower set of insurance rates for residents of Richmond.So that's something that the town's looking at doing in the near future.And then Vermont act 138 is a law, pretty sweeping law that was passed a couple of years ago now that relates to improving water quality around the state.And there are many incentives within that act to have bylaws that are above the FEMA minimum.So just want people to be aware of that.And there've been a shift to talk about the other elements of the proposed changes.So, as I mentioned in the village commercial zoning district.For owners in the upper block and we actually have a list here of the properties that would be affected.These parcels would be exempt from providing parking spaces for new land development.Right now the DRB can waive parking requirements, but this is a better approach that makes it very clear to those business owners.If they want to go to a more intense use on their parcels, they wouldn't have to provide parking spaces.And so it will certainly help going through the DRB process because parking is a problem for businesses in that area.So briefly just wanna talk about the signs.Again, the bylaws would allow for directory signs on railroad street, Angelina court, that would abut bridge street and would allow businesses or organizations on those streets to be advertised.And we have the prototype right here.Actually this would meet the standards of that new bylaws section.And this came to be due to a court case.And through the court case, it was determined what the sign would look like in terms of the height and the width and how many panels could be on the sign and it's working well.And we think a similar sign would work well on Angelina court.So that's what's in the bylaws.And then they're just a number of new definitions that support the changes that were made.That's it for the formal summary of the bylaws.So the planning commission, the scorn review comments that you make tonight and consider whatever revisions they want before setting a public hearing date and send your comments to me.And we'll keep trying to let folks know through front porch forum and other avenues.But there is no date for the public hearing.And the select board will also have to have a public hearing for any zoning changes in there.There's no date set for that.Hopefully by June, that would happen.There might be, as you know, in the fall, there was a public vote, town-wide vote.And in talking with the select board on Monday night, that's something that the select board would certainly be thinking about, whether they would like to have a town-wide vote for these sets of changes as well.So that that discussion will continue with the select board.And so with that, I think we're ready to...Open it up.Open it up folks.So I guess we'll start with questions and try to work it through.Maybe we'll start with the flood hazard and try to address the questions as they come up in the order that Kathleen presented the summaries.Are there any questions or comments about what we're thinking about doing with the flood hazard over district?I'm just curious, in November when the ability to only have to pay 1,000 royalty, was it the trigger for replacement or repairs was $1,000.I could see the regulation that suggests that it's...That you have a scanner that says you can reduce that amount of $500.To me that's increasing the regulations, increasing the cost and the trigger amount for putting a new door on my house or water heater in the basement?So that's for more.I agree.We received letter from Mid Swanberg with the state is the gentlemen who represents FEMA for the state in opposition to go through.If it's a regulation though, shouldn't there be something that says this is the amount, there's no regulation.If you have a communication, that's different than something that is in the regulation.They do not have regulations that say this is the dollar amount to trigger it.That is a good point.If you have it, I'd love to see it.And perhaps -- - I would love to see it too, but the point is that he told us that we would be in violation if we went to 1,000.Only 500 would be acceptable to FEMA. - By its very nature, the flood insurance, my experience is it's a big fat scam and it really isn't a lack of matter.My family has had flood insurance since 1982 and every year when they pay the checks payable to the outfit that gets the money, the money had to be there.We refinanced our house, the year before the flood.The flood insurance rate went from $400 a year to 2,500.The next year, before they get paid a nickel, it was 2,671.And now with the condemn property, I still have to have flood insurance.And this year my bill was $3,001 and they have not completed anything.The flood insurance, you have to have it or they foreclose on your mortgage.So this is just a big joke.We have the need to set of standards.And when I sent in the check for it has to be paid a year in advance.It's not like something that you can pay on installment.I think there's other people in here that pay flood insurance, so they're aware of it.When Kathleen said, we participate in the community rating.The insurance rates are gonna go down to what?It's just like a piece of paper that somebody sends you and said, \"Oh no, we don't want that number.\"You have to have this number\".It is an organized program that talks about reducing the rates for NFIP. That is a program that they have and there's ways that we're looking into participating in that and being an active member and trying to get the lowest rate possible which you clearly higher brought up the example that they're getting astronomical.So anything we can do to bring the rates down for you and everybody else is a good thing.And if that means that we have to have tighter standards, than what the bare minimum FEMA regulations are.And that would put us into this program, which would reduce your flood insurance.That sounds like the right path to follow.Which is why we're following it with the guidelines from pretty much the only people that we have experience with, which is the folks at the state who represented FEMA, who had given us direct feedback and said, this is what's acceptable.This is what's not acceptable.$500 is as high as we're going to approve you for.So, I'll give the floor back to whoever wants it next, but that can't be applied right now.What can't be.The community standard?The community standard to lower the rates, it can't be applied.We don't know enough about it.It certainly is an important focus of what we wanna do.We have to apply.We have certain elements that we would decide...It's a point based system.We would decide what types of activities we would like to pursue in order to qualify for the community rating system and then we apply to FEMA. - And when that chamber law happens and those rates come down and there is another situation that presents itself, is the planning commission or the select board going to say, \"Look, these people comply.\"They did what they were supposed to do.\"Pay up\".'Cause now I have two lawyers.I think it's horrible what you've had to deal with with the flood damage that you've suffered and a lot of other folks have suffered in this room and in this town, it's tragic.I'm not sure how much here tonight we can do about that or even going forward, I think...Participating in lowering...I can't control what the insurance company -- - Somebody here has to have teeth.The is ineffective, they can do absolutely nothing.And they've told me that on repeated times.Banking insurance has no authority over a federal program.Thank you.I certainly sympathize.I hope you don't take offense at my chuckling.It was sort of an ironic chuckle to the trouble that you had to suffer through.Yes.I wanna follow up on my understanding of what I just heard.You've adopted these floodplain regulation since 2009.They are part of our zoning regulations at this time.The program that you're talking about point based community, point based system has been around for how long?Why are we just talking about entering into it now?And even if we prove these new regulations changes, we already eligible to participate in this program with the current regulations, which will be more restricted, why aren't we in it after?I don't know, don't have an answer.It's a very good question.We certainly something we wanna move forward.Can I answer the question?Yeah, please if you have - Caroline Bounty.We've known about this program since we known about the problem with the floodplain maps that were provided to our community in 2009.In 2009, we had documented the regulations that stood for flood planning regulations because we were going proactive rather than reactive.We needed to update our regulations when these new maps are going to be put in effect.If I'm saying something incorrectly here, I hope planning commission members who were in their seats in 2009 could correct me.But in 2009, we pushed to have stronger regulations than the known requirements of FEMA. It would make us eligible for this program and we've been told about for years.We've never pursued that.Pursuing it means applying it, it's simple as that.We had to review the floodplain maps and we were supposed to do that as a community, but we were misinformed and we were told that we were only allowed to correct titles on the maps, rather than truly look at the base flood elevations and analyze how it affected each property, as property owners were you affected or not.The planning commission then at that time when adopting these new regulations put in that extra 100 feet beyond the BFE that was established by FEMA, we're gonna put it out there an extra 100 feet because we think the maps are wrong.In 2009, they thought the 1982 maps were wrong.And they are right.And they thought that 2009 maps were wrong.So they put this buffer in with put the onus on the practically on her to prove not just the federal government's flood playing BFE for the town of Richmond's additional 100 feet.So this program is out there that we could participate in in the last we're now in 2013 last I checked.So it's not just been a couple of years out, it's been many years out that we could participate in this program, but have never chosen to do so.So to put that carrot in front of us, let's have stricter regulations so we can participate in this program.We should just be participating now rather than dangling the carrot.I'd like to address a couple of issues in the regulations.I'm not arguing for new development in the floodplain.I have participated in numerous planning commission's hearings.I've participated in select board meetings.I've gone to work sessions and been told we're not taking comments from the public.I've met personally with the chair of the select board, Gary Dresser and Kathleen Jenn, to try and work on these .The planning commission, sorry, Kathleen Jenn and Gary Dresser.I went to the federal government, I got the regulations.I understood the regulations and I helped make some of these recommendations that the planning commission did adopt and putting these regulations, but they're not listening to everything.So my comment is going with these regulations is illusion of making things better for folks who are in the floodplain.It's an illusion because you still have regulations in here that I think can be tweaked more.And an example is the federal government does not require you to track three years worth of permitting on every single structure in the floodplain.Meaning if somebody decides to replace three windows in their house, that's gonna cost over $500, they have to get a permit for it.And within that year, if they keep doing minor repairs to the structure.They found that find a rotten porch that they need to fix something, things like that.The town of Richmond having been through numerous zoning administrators has decided that they're gonna attempt to track permits on structures in the flood plan and estimate costs of repairs.The federal government does not require that, they look at it at a year by year basis where you substantially damage or are you doing substantial improvement to have that 50% threshold.That is an excellent point.That is something where Richmond has gone beyond the standards.The thought behind that was that, first of all, the definition for substantial development is...It's substantial damage or substantial improvements.All right, it is 50% of the net value of the home.Correct, the net value of the structure.Okay.So if you were doing something in the course of three years of investing, 50% of the worth of your building, your home in upgrading the planning commission thought then that you should put the efforts into flood-proofing that home too, which is the whole concept behind substantial development.Can you explain what flood proofing of structure would be and can I give you an example?This is how the planning commission didn't think through the process as far as its zoning minister.First of all, you have to make sure all the zoning administrator before you have practiced properly.Second of all, you have a property that's in the floodplain that's owned by one owner that might just do repairs to windows and door that then sells the property to another property owner.The third year out, it's actually a totally different property owner then decides that they want to repair their furnace that just got in.In year three, you're going to make them flood proof, their home potentially.You bring up a good point.I mean, that can happen for six months.May I finish.In year three, you're going to require them to flood proof their home.And if I asked you right now as a planning commission member, I'll bet money on this table that you don't know what that means for them to have the flood proof their home.Is a considerable investment.I know.No, what does it mean?'Cause the community needs to know that by you tracking their activities for three years, on the third year, they might not be able to repair their furnace without flood-proofing their home.And that's a lot of money.That could need elevating their structure, their first floor of their structure to be one foot above a BFE. That's pretty significant for anybody in the floodplain.And I want everybody in this room to know and everybody on the videos that I do not own.My primary residence is not in the flood plain.I am here speaking on behalf of any flood victim or future flood victim or future floodplain individual that does not comprehend 18 page section that just refers to them.And they've gotta help the latest zoning administrator comprehends that 18 page section as well.So there's a couple more tweaks that need to be done to this floodplain section before it should be put back out to vote because it's not good enough yet.I'm not saying it's not .I appreciate that and you brought up the certain point that three year window is an acceptable.The last question I have for your emergency repairs.Is there anywhere in the floodplain regulations that discusses emergency repairs, because you had to adopt from zoning for when a natural disaster actually occurred.You had to hurry to the select board to get into zoning adopted emergency repairs, could address emergency repairs.That's another excellent point.Thank you for that, that's a great idea.There's something that could easily be slipped into it.Didn't come up before.I wish somebody had brought it up when we were working on this.I think we would all agree that -- - I have.I'm sorry I didn't hear it, Cara.I'm not speaking -- - Now I've heard it, I think we have all heard it.It's an excellent idea, it seems like.I requested Kathleen asked that I put things in writing.I have put things in writing before.There've been notes from happening to the planning commission about numerous areas of this section that could be tweaked.I asked her to pull that back up and provide it back to you so that prior to this, going to a vote, those areas are addressed.Emergency repairs tracking, and there's multiple other things along with, I would like to see the $1,000 repair.You can't get anything done for $500.You cannot, I really truly believe that at the state level, somebody spoke to somebody at the FEMA level and this $500 number got passed out there.There are towns that don't make the property owners get a permit for repairs, and there's not a town in the whole nation that FEMA has gone after or has revoked their MFIP status for not requiring repair permits being issued.If you can find that out, if the federal government has gone for one town and broke their MFIP status, I would eat my words.Are you suggesting we ignore the FEMA standards.There is no FEMA standard waiver of repair fees.There's no fees for permits.There's no documentation that FEMA says that they require a permit.Correct.They require permit for repairs.Kathleen just said that require permits for anything.So how would we even put in the $500?I think it's a number that somebody said, we're not gonna fight you with can put in 500 or less.But I really think in today's day and age, $1,000 is a realistic number for somebody to be able to do some kind of repairs or proxy.And then in the city of Berry was allowed by FEMA for use the $500 threshold.And that's what FEMA has indicated to us that we should use, but it's up to .But there is no federal government regulation with the dollar amount on it.That's just somebody saying, let's just pick a number.So I said, Richmond, pick $1,000.I pick $1,000, why not take .So you wanna waive repairs completely.Waiver perfect apartment for repairs to your store.I'm not saying that I'm asking the question.I'm not sure, but I'm asking the question.And how do we determine that?We determine that by what we hear from the FEMA representatives with is the folks at the state who review our plans on behalf of FEMA and approve them.We approve them by town.These are town bylaws.These are town bylaws but whether or not we're in compliance with FEMA standards is not determined by us, it is determined by folks at the state.So my question to you guys to find out is have they ever involved MFIP status for a town that did not issue permits for repairs because that's all we're talking.I just think people would have a house need to be able to do repairs to their structure.I'm not talking substantial improvement and I'm not talking substantial damage.I'm talking everyday repairs.Everyday repairs is permitless.Could you reiterate the three points that you make sure I have them in terms of here's the $500 repair.There's the longitudinal tracking.And the third -- - Emergency repairs.Separate apart from the $500 -- - Correct, your furnace blows in the middle of the winter.Do you just call the repair guy to have him come and bring you a new one or do you have to go get a permit town office and wait.Now roofs are totally separate and I'm glad Richmond built-in the federal government regulations and the federal government is who says you don't need to get a permit to repair or replace your existing roof.That's one of the things that the planning commission did listen to me on.There's a couple of other things and we brought the word that word snapped, and I was able to prove it to the planning commission, so they built it in.So thank you, I appreciate some of the changes.And thank you.Name's Robert Allen.I live with .We went through the flood.Two things, we're talking about the town putting more regulations in place for the floodplain.I would just say that because of the community rating system, I would think that you would like to focus on their points for any of those substantial changes.Those are what they call above and beyond changes because that's the thing that's gonna benefit us.I have read the community rating system book, sort of.But there's specific points that they rate you on.So if you're going to do things beyond what you have to do, make sure they're for that.I don't know about the three-year thing.That's news to me that, that I didn't read that regulation, but I would just encourage you to think about the one thing that's gonna benefit people in the floodplain is reducing the flood insurance.That program's supposed to be able to reduce flood insurance up to 50% the way I read.The other thing is none of this stuff is cast in stone.If you pass what you have right now, and people go, \"Well, $500, isn't a reasonable amount\".That doesn't mean it can't be changed.But what I will tell you to save this, let's not argue about it for three years.I have things I have to do to my house.Get something that's better than what we have, because what we have is as restrictive as can be.We're talking about kind of minor changes to it and really some good points that they give.It's not the community rating system to be three years out on this.Why do it?That's not beneficial to anybody, but if it does, then you consider it.But what I wouldn't wanna see here is let's drag this out for three or four more years.This would be a really good thing because I'm one of the people that has to deal with it.Thank you.Jennifer Van, town manager suggest that in terms of the substantial improvement threshold, that there could be mitigated by some sorts of discretion at the board level for the DRB, where instead of the regulations just automatically triggers it.Maybe there's a waiver process where somebody could take a look at it and say, \"Well, this home had 20 windows custom made.\"Maybe they shouldn't have to flood proof just for that\".Although if somebody was adding on a third story or expanding certain amount that somebody could say, \"Well, this was what we had in mind\".Good point.And you'd be on previous years.Well, it would essentially be within that three-year window.You're looking at dollar figures only.There could be at the board's discretion where they can take a look at it and say whether they felt the improvements really a substantial alteration or whether they were just expensive improvements on a low cost house.Jeff, can you describe a variance process?I mean, is there any precedent for that that you know of and improve on?I do have .I think he talked about it in the waiver.As opposed to a statutory defined variance, we could call it a waiver from that position.A section of a essentially homeowner could say, \"What I did in my house doesn't trigger a flood proofing\".That's an interesting point.I'm not devil's advocate, but how would that work?I mean, this scenario of some new buyer in year three and in the first two years that they're tracking the other previous owner has done some repairs and it triggers this substantial improvement dollar amount.And then the development review board has to go back and analyze what exactly the nature of the improvements were and whether or not it was something that triggers, \"Oh, well this was just a flake.\"This was just an expensive granite countertop\".Do you understand what I'm saying, how would the developer or your board actually split those hairs to say, well, no, this dollar amount of these dollars actually triggered that you have to do these flood -- - Maybe they probably you're looking at whatever was having to happen in year three.And by then didn't deem whether that's significant or critical and then just wave whatever happened before.I mean.that it seems kind of a little loosey goosey potentially and that then you're left having to come up with a whole list of other things that are...The only time the DRB grants a waiver it's a little loosey goosey, there's no doubt about that, but we have to have some faith in the judgment of the DRB. They grant a lot of waivers.I think you're gonna start playing with the definition of substantial improvement or substantial damage.And that is truly information that's more defined by the federal government than a local governments.And I even recommend in your definition area where you talk about substantial damage, whereas talk about 50% of fair market value.And then later on in section 6.8.16, you actually talked about that it could be fair market value by an independent appraiser or tax assessed value.That tax assessed value needs to be part of your definition for substantial damage.Could you repeat that again?You know how we -- - We just want to send an email.It sounds like a very clear.No, it's not, it's very basic.Right, I know.In your definitions.How you calculate substantial damage where substantial improvement is what your zoning administrator is gonna determine whether it triggers going to a DRB or not.Yes.Okay.In your definitions, that has to be clearly defined how to do that calculation.So any new zoning administrator.And the recommendation you're having to change, what is defined now.You can only have it defined as fair market value when it's fair market value or tax assessed value.Because nobody wants us to have to spend $400 to have their house appraised to know that they're spending $20,000 per repair that's only a certain percentage of their post structural value.And that comes into play your tracking and Jeff's idea of waiving certain improvements, that would be a whole nightmare for you because you'd have to list what improvements are that exempt from this calculation.And it would become very loosey-goosey.The better avenue to take is stop tracking three years, federal government doesn't require you to track three years.It saves the property owner a lot of nightmare, it saves the zoning administrator a lot of nightmare and it stops having you having to worry about a waiver of what's substantial improvement -- - I don't get it, can I ask Angela and Carrie, so what you're saying is, as opposed to having the DRB with some latitude, you'd prefer to have it in the regulations, clarified in the regulations?The DRB doesn't have latitude but -- - Which I assume that Jeff was saying is, with the waivers, there would be some latitude.We're arguing that we don't have latitude on waiving a $500 repair, when it comes anywhere near substantial damage or substantial improvement, that is truly federal government regulations.And the DRP will not have the ability to waive that calculation.I think that might be imposed by FEMA far before $500.Because they really care about substantial damage when a flood has occurred that you have to repair to protect yourself from flood.So Carrie, you're articulating that the waiver route is unacceptable?I don't think it's gonna be realistic.Thank you.I agree, by the way.Thank you.June Hesting, I will have probably a follow up question, but will you talk a little bit about your process of determining the three years for the 50% of substantial damage?That's funny, I was about to say that before I called on you.But our process for going to three years for that, and I will tell you that I was in favor of it, was that development in the flood plain is an expensive proposition for our community and for people in general.The less intensive development in the flood plain, the less added costs are gonna be the next natural disaster that happens.So if it's a little bit harder to continue to massively invest in properties in the flood plain, I'm not saying not maintaining, I'm not saying not improving.I'm talking about adding extra rooms and third floors and all these other things that are going to add costs the next time Irene hits and we end up having to pay.I know they say the National Flood Insurance Program covers those costs, but in reality, they don't.The federal government has to pitch in money in emergency funding to deal with the costs that are associated with heavy flooding.And that is a real societal cost, and that's why we went to three years.Can I explain one thing?The properties in the floodplain and I'm gonna speak as a Richmond lister right now in the sense of property values.Property values for the town of Richmond located in the flood plain are not high end property values.The neighborhoods are not high end value neighborhoods.So repair work in those neighborhoods tends to get closer to a substantial damage number than say your higher end neighborhoods.And I'll use South Gray Stone as examples.Those property values have structured themselves, they're at a higher level.So if you had to do a major repair or major improvements to those structures, you wouldn't hit your 50% number.But you take a $100,000 structure that has had flood damage in year one, and just wants to then reside in year three -- - And that's a good point, but I'm personally kind of glad to hear that buildings in the flood plain aren't on the higher end market value.And I think we'd like to keep 'em that way.Correct, and I don't believe based on our historical pattern that you are going to have because we, we'd like to encourage less, we're not having any new development in the flood plain.We're not encouraging any new development in the flood plain.So all of our flood plain regulations aside from development need to be very careful in realizing the impact you have on those property owners.Just to let you know, as far as bio spill in the state of Vermont, only three of them had closings.Only three have occurred.I participated in one of them and there is still extra funding available for more properties to be bought out.So if anybody in this community would consider being bought out, and would like to be because they've had more than two flood events or more, think about it because I'm just putting it out there -- - That's great news.That I know you wanna stop development in the flood plain, I really think that you are going to encourage less people to maintain their properties by over-regulating them.And overregulating by three-year tracking.Thank you.I'm Marcy Harnett, and I would just like to thank the chair for his comments about the public policy considerations regarding a three-year period, and just generally improving properties in the flood zone.I agree with you that, I think from a public policy perspective and cost to the public, we should be cautious about regulations that would be relaxed for improvements, significant improvements, whatever you wanna call them, to properties in the flood zone.Thank you, and I think Jeff's addition of the concept of availability of a waiver for previous, if the immediate expense is something more urgent, is a great concept that we can incorporate that helps create that balance.I would like to second Marcy's appreciation for the efforts that you put in, and your transparency to the thought process.I like hearing .Any time.Excuse me, you're trying to stop this development in the flood plain and reduce it.But the one thing I find notable and Carol, I'm sorry, I forgot your name.Cara.Cara, pointed out that, basically the people historically that have been living near the flood plain don't really do this.Go drive around out by the river, it's easy.You don't have to look far, you don't have to go very far.You don't find any really great homes there.I challenge you to find them, come to think of it, I'm sure you will.So you're curing a problem that probably doesn't exist.Show me where it exists.Doesn't happen.Just thought I'd point that out.I was thinking about it.Then it doesn't have any harm in being in place.Can I ask you one question, Mark?This three-year tracking exists now can I ask you if all the permits issued for the IOU flood damage has a dollar value attached to it and you would be able to identify each permits dollar amount right now?You see the permits more than I do as a lister.For each, actually we do have that information in every zoning permit file.And for Irene, they're also in the notebook.So they're in multiple places.So, in the zoning files right now, for all the permits that were issued for Irene, we would know the contractors' estimated price and actual price of repair.I don't believe that's a correct statement because I've gone through those zoning files.You might be right.You gotta think it's a good faith effort.I mean that was a pretty crazy -- - No, it's a requirement by your current regulations that I'd like you to remove because you don't even go by it.Maybe we should work harder at going by it.Well, that's what FEMA, FEMA requires us to track that information.It's your regulations that requires you to do it for three years.And if you pulled your files right now, they don't even have what happened in Irene in them.But for each permit, that's the goal of tracking information.We do require estimates and if there were volunteer activities provided and the zoning administrator tried to do the best possible with Irene there, but the goal has been to get estimates for every permit that was granted.Stephanie Douglas Hughes.I live next door to and my house was flooded.And I just wanna say, of course we need to be cautious and we need to think ahead.We do need to prepared if this ever happened again, but it was 90 years ago it happened.And my house has been there a long time, and I do intend to give it a lot of care over the years that I live there which hopefully are many.And I just wanna, have you think about that and put it in some perspective that I'm imagining that when you live in a flood plain that has never destroyed homes, that has not been an issue before, not for a long time.And I just want you to think about that too.Any other...Marcy.I'd like to come back to this community rating issue and say that my recollection is that in 2009 when the planning commission adopted the last set of regulations, I was on the planning commission at the time, we were very definitely aware of the community rating program.And we looked at it some, and felt that at least at that time, and this of course was pre-Irene, that it would take a lot of work to be part of the community rating system.Maybe the system has changed since 2009, I don't know.Maybe others, Lou or Gary who were on the planning commission may have some recollection of that, but I'd love it if somebody, Jeff or Kathleen and Mark could kind of articulate some of the requirements of being part of that program.Because my sense was, it's not just an application, you've gotta do work, you've gotta do, you have to take steps to try to minimize future damage to properties in the flood zone, by enacting stricter regulations or whatever, I don't know -- - Community outreach, education.There's all sorts of different, and we looked at it briefly too although certainly it wasn't our intention when we were writing these regs to apply at the same time for this bypass.But it was certainly a picture that we discussed and it has a whole series of different things.And maybe that would be a great opportunity for a, kind of a subcommunity that the planning commission and the select board or somebody could put together and investigate it further with folks who are very knowledgeable about the flood plain regulations.I think that could be a very interesting thing, to find out just the bare minimum what is we need to satisfy this improved rating system.And I still would argue in some cases for things like the three-year window, just for the general good sense of the three-year window, but also then look for targeted ways at what accomplishments we need to achieve to actually qualify for this program.And it would be quite an undertaking.I don't know if it's something that this, the planning commission intends to do, immediately in and of ourselves, but it certainly would be exciting if we could get a group of people who could delve into it further.Any other questions about flood plain?Yes, I have one.It's in regards to what you just said.You put some guidelines for what you want from people.Do you have a way to tell people?I thought about this, doing some of this, I have no idea how to do it.I've read the thing, this whole point system.if you do this, you get this , you do that, you get that.So you really wanna pick and choose what you've done already or done.So I don't know what you people would have in mind from a committee.Well, rather than doing it in the select board and planning commission's blocks of time, perhaps together with the select board, we can nominate a group of people who are well-educated, who are informed about these regulations and plans and then build towards them.I think that would be very exciting.And after we begin, and then we could come back and revisit this.I mean, first of all, I think what our main goal here is tonight is to take some very good points that have come up and consider them in the brief time that we have before we actually move this on to the select board for approval.But what we have right now is really, really bad as you've already stated.And just because we change it doesn't mean that whatever we change it into is going to be locked down.That's not the way it's gonna be.If we change it and make things immediately better in the next two months where people are putting in swing sets in their backyards, then that's great.And then this committee gets together and makes some more points, learn some more stuff, takes more valuable input from everybody.And then we can maybe make some additional tweaks to this.I don't think that what we have here proposed is contradictory to where we're headed.We may not be where we're headed, but it's a step in the right direction in a lot of ways and more importantly, is away from what we have now, which is our goal.I think we can look at the issue of the community rating system again.We did, we have a couple of times, and I think as Mark said, we determined there was not an insignificant substantial amount of work that we'd like to work toward, but given everything else we were working on, it wasn't something we could .So we could discuss it again, and figure out an easier way to do it with perhaps public involvement or subcommitte, that kind of thing.Any other questions about the flood plain?Thoughts?Yes, Jane.Just one comment to Hesting.I hear what you're saying, care about the 50% over three years.But whether you live in a flood plain, or you live in South View, 50% is 50%.It's relative to whatever you can afford to buy.So if you have a $150,000 house, you're gonna do $75,000 of repairs in three years.Even if you live in South View, that's a lot of money.So we're talking about such a small percentage of homeowners that would even be able to do that, spend $25,000 a year in upgrades or improvements over a three-year period that I think we need to keep that in perspective.Right, but my comment wasn't about...My comment is that third year, they've already done that amount of money worth of improvements.And then by the way, you might've done them all wrong or should have changed them all.The planning should have happened in year one, not year three for flood proofing.If you're gonna elevate a structure, if you're gonna put a new foundation under it, if you're gonna relocate where the utilities are, they were in the basement, and now they're coming up to the first floor, all of that planning should have occurred in year one, not in year three.So year three, when they just need to replace the furnace, you are going to tell 'em no, not until they elevate their structure and not until they relocate their utilities.So my point is this backwards planning.And we're talking about -- - Versus no planning, which is one year and you start all over again.So at least we're trying to go somewhere -- - Well, do the one year.In that one year -- - And then go back to 40% improvements every year, and potentially massive development or improvement of structures in the flood plain, which is what I was saying I was opposed to.And, going to the whole thing of it's this whole thing about the FEMA funding and homes that are getting damaged in the flood plain, that's only coming out of their own flood insurance that they've paid for, just to let you know.And FIP flood insurance program, the funding for that comes from people who are in the flood plain, who are paying for that insurance.And so when those repairs, when those flood damage claims go through, they're taking it out of that insurance pool that they've been paying into.That's where that money comes from, is folks who aren't playing with flood insurance, who are outside the flood plain, who when they get flooded, and FEMA cuts them checks from that insurance pool, which happened within five days of Irene, Irene people who were not part of the NFIP program, were cut checks for $30,200.And people who were yes, had insurance didn't get checks for up to six months later.I'm sorry, I can't fix the NFIP payment program.Yes, but you're requiring people in the flood plain to go beyond NFIP regulations and harming them in possibly year three.They can do repairs they can't do in year three.That's my point.Well, I think Jeff brought up an excellent, and around if those repairs were actually required in year three, that there would be a, we could incorporate something that wouldn't be in violation of FEMA and allow a waiver that would allow repairs in year three, not to trigger this program if the repairs in year three are critical as interpreted and deemed by the DRB. - If they're in violation of FEMA, they're in violation of Richmond regulations.Yes, I know that.Marcy.I think it's up to landowners to understand the flood plain regulations here, and to understand the risk that they're taking if they make substantial, if they make large dollar amounts of improvements in one year and then again in the next year that maybe in the third year if something happens, that they may have an issue.And I really think at some point you have to hold land owners responsible for understanding.If they live in the flood zone, there are risks, and they need to be willing to accept...Harlan Stockwell, I do live in the flood plain.I did lose my basement and my neighbor lost hers.When I went to get the paperwork done, I told them how much I spent on my basement.They did not like the amount I told them.They wanted to know how much labor I spent when I did it myself with my brother's help.They wanted to know how much it would have cost to have it done, or how much labor I put.And they wanted me to put a dollar value on my labor.So, if you're tracking for three years, I'm screwed because they made me do some stuff that I didn't pay for labor.I got materials at a decent price 'cause my brother could get 'em, and they just didn't like the answers I gave 'em.I gave 'em the honest, the value that I paid for the blocking and the cement.And we were also told, I live on the Street, and my neighbor's next to me, we couldn't raise our houses any higher than the original basement.And my neighbor had to put four walls on there.And we were told we could only go as high as what our original basement was.And we wanted to put it higher.You mean you wanted to flood proof your home and -- - She wanted to raise it up a little bit higher.And someone told you, you couldn't -- - We were told we had to go the same height the basement was when the flood hit.Was that the NFIP insurance or was that something else?'Cause that sounds crazy.The town told us this.I went through hell with the town, right from day one, with this mess.I was told, I couldn't even put a basement wall back under my basement until I had a permit.Well, we certainly don't want that.And you know when -- - In emergency, and I think the points brought up about some sort of -- - But they wanted prices that weren't fair.What I paid, even the prices I paid, they did not like that.Well, I can see that as an issue just because there are certain costs associated with something.If you can do it for a lot cheaper, I mean, that's great, but it's still a fundamental value cost that you're adding to the property.And I have to imagine that that's what that interpretation was based on, is that even though it only cost you $10,000, you did $50,000 worth of work, which is good for you because you're a capable and handy guy who can do it on the low, but you're still adding $50,000 worth of value or repairs to your home.So it came out economically good for you but those values are still those values.You're not adding to that -- - I didn't add any value, I fixed my basement wall so my house wouldn't fall -- - That's right, and so it went on the permit as part of the permit process where everybody's trying their best to report the cost, which is Cara, you were concerned that that wasn't happening.It sounds like whoever was processing that was trying to get an actual cost reported that reflected the actual -- - Yeah, so now if I wanna put a refrigerator and a stove in my house, I'm screwed.Not under the new regs 'cause they're furniture and you can do that.If you go ahead and approve these regs, if you don't fight them, and push them through, I'm not saying they're perfect, but they're better than what we have.'Cause right now you do have to get a permit.I think right now -- No, okay, good.You need no permit for contents under current regulations, under future regulations, under any regulations.You need no permit for contents.You do not need to get a permit to bring a new bed to your mom.Awesome.And it's the bylaws that specify that you're supposed to get an estimate from an outside contractor, which is probably why the zoning administrator You are upset because of the value .And we did clearly, I know we clearly defined the contents to make sure that that type of thing was, and you'll see, that's one of the definitions we're having, so forgive me if I misspoke by saying otherwise, but the reason why we put that to help define what was exempt, property.Anne June, I'd like to address your added value to a property.There are certain things that add value to a property and there's other maintenance repair work that does not add value.If you replace your roof on your home, it doesn't add a value as far as, you're tax value because as soon as you have a roof anyhow, unless you go from a shingled roof to a standing seam roof.So adding value to a property versus just maintain a property is what's key, and I think it's very important.Fixing your foundation, it's only adding a post-value.It's not adding a value because you originally had a foundation.And Harlan speaks clearly to my biggest concern with any regulations that they be clear and precise and not have a bunch of wavery options because what's good for one neighbor should be good for the next neighbor.And that concerns me that different zoning administrators could interpret the language differently.So that's why I want tax assessed value put in there as opposed fair market value.That was an excellent point, thank you for that.Any other questions about flood plain?We've got a couple more and then I did wanna leave time to open it up to other roles that the planning commission may wanna focus on.Yes, the other sections.Any questions?Going, going, gone to Village parking requirements.Any thoughts or questions about what we're proposing in waiving the parking requirements for businesses just on the upper block?Heidi , I'm the chair of the economic development committee.I just wanna emphasize, we are the ones that actually brought this before the planning commission.And that's why you're seeing this on this document.The thing that we noticed in the planning and zoning bylaws is that you are required to have certain amount of parking spaces on Bridge Street.And when reviewing Bridge Street, there are only 16 parking spots, one being a handicapped, and reviewing the document that you need on 6-1-2 see the requirement numbers of off road and highway parking spaces shall be the following.The eating and drinking establishment, you need 20 parking spaces per a 1,000 square feet of gross floor area.We do not have that.So in order to actually be in compliance, we really are not able to do it.So that's why we're asking for the waivers on Bridge Street to enhance businesses being able to potentially come in, ones that are here, they can either expand if they choose to, and this doesn't hold them back.So that was one of the main reasons why we did ask for this to be, these waivers to be lifted on Bridge Street.So, thank you, Chair.Thank you.And we all sat down on that.Great, any thoughts or comments about the signed section that we're proposing, which basically just legitimizing what's already there.Yes -- - Sure.One question we do have, and maybe you can explain to us, first proposal from the Economic Development Committee was from the railroad to the stop light.And I'm wondering if you would be able to explain why the dentist office NOFA and TD Bank North were left out of that decision.I was one of the folks who thought that they should to be left out of that.And my thoughts on that were that, this was kind of a novel concept, the idea of waiving parking requirements altogether on businesses where generally you require parking for a certain, any type of business that's in there.It's kind of a crowded area as it is.And to waive these parking requirements like we suggested could cause all sorts of havoc that I don't know any of us can foresee.And so I suggested, I think, and came to consensus that we limit it to the buildings of the businesses that are most severely impacted.Also coupled with the purchase of the parking lot or the approval of going ahead with developing the parking lot should also significantly reduce parking constraints for any other businesses in the area.And so, those two hand in hand, I think are gonna go a long way in allowing businesses to develop in the upper block without, and hopefully it won't significantly impact traffic and parking issues on residential areas, that kind of thing.Yes, Cara.My understanding on the intent behind not waiving parking requirements for those structures were because they actually own land with the structures versus the businesses along Bridge Street having to use public parking because there wasn't land that went with the structure.Like TD Bank North has its own parking lot because the land goes with the structure.NOFA has its own parking because it has land to go to the structure and the same with the dentist office, they have land and parking that goes with the structure.And that's why -- - That certainly was another argument, absolutely.So in case those structures wanted to expand in size and rather than use, they take and use their own parking spaces and put structure there instead, and then force the parking to go, their own business parking to go to public parking, thus not having as many spaces right in downtown.Absolutely.That's what I was told -- - It's a perfectly good reason too, absolutely.I think they go hand in hand both of those explanations as to why we left it where we are, but who knows.Maybe this is gonna work out great and we'll be able to expand this and it will be able to benefit other businesses in town but let's take a slow approach to it and see where it leads us.Okay, Heidi.So the one thing that I really wanna emphasize, I am so appreciative of the outreach that came in the mail.So thank you.The second thing is Burlington is actually doing waivers also on the waterfront, according to Saturday's news.So this is happening in Burlington.Waivers or zoning modifications?Waivers to parking.So that's the DRP -- - So we're ahead of their town.That's scary.Just a curiosity, what's your projected outcome?You project six more businesses moved in with X amount of traffic.Nope, nothing like that.There were no formal studies or anything done that way, which is why we, I was in favor of it as much as possible, yeah.So does that new regulation allows zoning for signs and say resident parking only for everybody that lives around it?I mean, isn't that what's gonna happen when you don't have enough parking spots?Well, that is going to be, that is gonna be a very interesting perspective.I am considerably more at ease with the expansion of the parking lot, which hopefully will negate that.But yeah, there is the potential for that.It's a very real potential, which is why zoning has parking requirements.There's a reason for it, it's a good one.This is a little bold, but that is a very unusual situation in Richmond.And we thought that if it could help businesses, it would be worth experimenting.And really that is very much what it is, it's an experiment.Robert, my position was with the Depot parking lot, was very integral to the discussion with a number of business owners in that upper block.And from my standpoint, I felt that the infrastructure that the community could provide with the passage of the Depot lot, may in fact release development activities in the upper block that had been restricted as a result of the fact that many of those buildings did not have any opportunity to provide additional parking onsite.Just to comment on the parking and the possibility of no parking signs going up for resident parking only.That's okay though.The reason people are putting up signs that say, resident parking only, is because they've experienced to somebody, I'll just use the market, for example, because the market is pretty well attended and I'm so glad for that.But if folks along Reverend Street are experiencing folks from the market parking in their driveways, they should put up residential.Just like when I have my land posted, I shouldn't go out on my land and find anybody other than my family.So, if they own property or if they're paying rent there, they should be able to park there.And if folks need to be reminded that it's resident apartment only, it is private property and they certainly can put the signs up.Maybe the new parking lot will alleviate some of that.Okay.Any other comments on science?Okay, great.Sorry, my name's Marshall Paulson and I...Could you just speak briefly on any sort of requirements, regulations or oversight having to do with the sizes of the signs and any lighting, especially lighting at night on signs for these projected signs that we're talking about?Okay, well, first of all, they're not at all projected.They are actually there in .It's the one on Railroad Street, and all we're doing is allowing a identical sign on Jalina Court, which would help enable whoever's looking to develop the Cranberry parcel.One of those limitations they're looking at is okay, I don't have street front exposure, how's anyone gonna know I'm here?I'm not gonna buy this property and develop it.By us allowing a sign similar to one, which I think has gone through considerable debate and has been approved on on the other side is a reasonable allowance.Well, I think so too, but to address my -- - The lighting questions?Specific questions, lighting on signs.We didn't touch lighting.Lighting is defined in the current regs and we didn't touch lighting at all.The proposed regs that were defeated, there's a whole lot on lighting.We did not incorporate any of that into the proposed regs.It is exactly as it is now, for better or worse.Are there any other thoughts anybody would just like to share with the planning commission for goals and objectives that we should be focusing on?I have another question besides that.What's the proposed timeline for this?This proposal depending on what we've heard here, we're gonna go back and talk about it, and maybe tweak it a little bit.And then we have to go to a public hearing.We have to warn that public hearing.So if we go to the first meeting in May and we come out of our first planning commission meeting and say, yeah, we made the tweaks, they're nice, let's go with what it is, and let's warn a public hearing.15 days later we have our normally-scheduled two-week planning commission meeting.So then the question is, do we have a special one?Do we postpone it to get the hearing?And now the hearing is a formal hearing where it has to be warned, it's broad...It's put in the free press, it probably not gonna pay for another flyer.The flyer that went out today or for this meeting was put out there so that people would know about our discussions and be able to give great feedback and input on things before it was kind of locked down.Because once we go to hearing, we're not really allowed to change it.We can tweak it just tiny bits, but we can't make major changes.So then it's just a way of letting everybody know what we're thinking.And then we give it to the select board.Now, the select board of course can tweak it, and they have that right to do that with anything that we give them.But then after they're done tweaking it, they go to a formal hearing.And that's where they basically offer the printed document and say, okay, this is it, this is what we're giving.They can get some feedback and do very minor tweaking, Jeff, correct me if I'm wrong, but they can do minor tweaking.And then they can either decide to put it to a public vote or certainly in this case, we are hoping that they just go ahead and approve these changes because they truly are the least controversial and the most beneficial to those involved.So our goal is to get a finished document to the select board at the end of May if we're willing to make special planning arrangements, to get a hearing in, and to the select board for their review in June.And from there, I'm not sure how long they'll take to review and have a hearing for it.But I would be hopeful that we have these regs adopted by mid-summer, July, end of June, end of July.I think that would be great.I think it would help a lot more people and hurt very few.For these three issues.For these three issues, yeah.That's all I'm addressing at this point.Yes?Hi, I'm Anna O'Brien and I'm here with a group from the Richmond Senior Center board and interested parties in Richmond Senior Center development.And it's late now, so we won't take a lot of time, but we did come before the planning commission a few months ago to ask for the change in the zoning to village mixed use for the Creamery parcel because there's been many conversations at many levels with many developers about the Creamery parcel.And we were disappointed that our for changing that to village mix use was not included in this document.And so we are here, and we have a letter that kind of explains our position, but we're here basically to ask you to please reconsider that again for this round of zoning improvements, so that we hadn't moved forward on the development of the Senior Center planning.You wanna just present them the letter, or should it be ready?Why'd you get up?Hi, I'm Mary O'Neil and I have the honorable position with the aging of Richmond being chairman of the senior center board.This is a letter to the Richmond Planning Commission from the Richmond Community Senior Center board.And it's in response to the April 5th flyer sent to Richmond residents, which describes the revised proposal and changes.We appreciate the challenging work that you're doing on revisions, but we do have some concerns.As a board who is committed to the development of a senior center in our town, we are very disappointed that the Creamery parcel zoning changed to FBMU is not included in the list of proposed changes.The primary parcel has been zoned commercial.Since the cheese plant left years ago, it has not been developed.It is a hazardous area which needs to be cleaned up, and it's an eyesore in town.Developing the area with mixed use housing, commercial business, and a senior center, would benefit the entire village.By adding to the water and sewer use, it would generate property tax income and increase property values.We would ask if you'd please consider allowing the Cranberry parcel change to go into mixed use so that we can move forward on the evaluation and planning for the possibility of locating the Richmond Community Senior center on that side.As a 501CS rate, we serve seniors in our communities, including Richmond, Bolton and Huntington.We have some of our members in that at various times, since we've been doing this for seven years now, with a town planner, town administrator, who's was now the town manager, and we've had ones with the planning commission.We were under the impression following our meeting with the planning commission several weeks ago, that there was support for senior center planning to move forward.The Cranberry site plan by David Rafiel, and for property owner Craig Castle which includes mixed use of commercial housing and the senior center is the vision we have been working towards.Just briefly, the benefits of having a community senior center in Richmond include, building community and socialization for individuals who live independently at home.And there are many in Richmond, and Huntington and Bolton.Providing programs for seniors for entertainment, wellness, and lifelong learning, providing meals to supplement senior nutrition, and finally bringing the seniors who don't live in the village into town to shop and use services.There are other Richmond organizations who are supporters of the Richmond Senior Center.The Beacon , the Richmond Historical Society and Richmond Terrace Senior Housing are all very much interested in developing this, the development of the senior center.So we ask for your support and consideration for the change in zoning for the Cranberry site to village .Thank you very much.This is signed also by the vice chair, Catherine And Neil O'Brien, secretary.Thank you.I'm glad you had the opportunity to say that for the camera and for Richmond on a larger scale than sometimes the opportunities you have with just the planning commission.Because I think it's very important to have community participation and action towards this.To give an answer as best we can as to why we don't have the village mix incorporated now, is there were several factors that came up over the course of this winter that made it impractical for us to get the village mix pushed through along with these.One is, the controversial nature of changing the commercial district as it is now to something that satisfies the particular developer who owns that property now, because the planning commission historically has been under the impression that the only way to develop this property is to allow the changes as guided, as worked through with the developer.So we made these changes in our zoning or village mix.I wouldn't say we made 'em changes, but the village mix was already very compatible and the proposed regulations with what he wanted to do.We worked with him back and forth on changing a couple of things, allowing slightly higher residential density that would make it viable for him to develop the property because we were under the impression that is the only way this property could ever be developed in any way.There's several things that have come up recently that have got the planning commission convinced that that's not the case.That this property could be developed without the village mix.So we had that factor going on, coupled with the fact that the village mix is very involved process, because what we tried to do is take what we had spent in a unified buyer off and spent three years crafting so that it interconnected with all of these different components of zoning and pull it out of where it was, which was, nestled amongst and connected with everything and take it and cut it and paste it into what we have now for current zoning regulations.And there were an awful lot of nuances and connections with that that would take quite a bit of time to work through.Obviously we all know about the changeover in the planning commission and how there's been a lot of new people, loss of a lot of great people.And the concept of where the planning commission envisions this property going hasn't been as uniform.And we've certainly heard from not just, not just the planning commission itself or from outside sources that say, hey, there's things that can happen here that don't have to involve implementing the village mix.So we were here, we had all these great rules about the flooding, the signage, the parking, they're clean.They're extremely, I would think if supported, there may be things that could be tweaked and improved on, but I don't think there's too many people out there of anyone who's gonna say that what we're proposing is worse than what we have.It maybe could be better, but there's no way it could be worse than what we have.So this could move forward I think very cleanly, and the planning commission believed that it could go forward very cleanly by itself.So we spent a couple of sessions.Time flies when you only have two sessions a month, and we put these together, put all the finishing touches on them, we're presenting it here, we like it.Now, the question is, what is our next step?What is the planning commission's goal going to be?Certainly...Go ahead, Heidi.So I'm very much appreciating the whole process here and how much work it is, and the fact that there is a huge process.Some of us were disappointed in the vote because we would have been, moving right along with the senior center, had the original zoning changes, change that to village mix use and the developer being able to...We could have clipped along and done the application for the grant for planning.So it kind of put a stop point in the senior center board's process.And we feel like now we're just sort of in limbo.So our appeal is to keep moving with it, and we wanna keep moving with it.Right now, it's just in limbo and we can't keep moving with our own grant applications because of this question.So with all due respect to your process, we're just really like how much more waiting and seeing, and how's it gonna go can we do?And if there is a way to work together toward meeting the goal.I would just say from our perspective, and we've done a lot of talking about this as a board, that site has been zoned commercial and sitting there a long time.And I have met with, and we have met with several developers who have looked at it and contemplated it and walked away.It's really a very challenging site.And the mixed use offers an opportunity that I think some of us at least believe is a really good opportunity to improve the village center, and to make that site really awesome.And so we would just urge you to reconsider moving that quicker so that we can be moving.I would just add that by not including the village mixed use in this package, my perspective, a statement or a lack of endorsement, or you're not appreciating all the work that the senior center has done.I think we've all agreed as we looked at the various plans, and it's a great idea to a patient or like, I can just speak for myself.I think the commission in general, they were like, that was a great plan.The current zoning does allow for a combination of commercial and residential use.So it does allow for a certain amount of mixed use.And question is whether or not the village mixed use as we proposed it would, would be a significant...Would offer a significant additional options for use of like the senior center.But ultimately it's up to the owner of the property, whether it's the current owner or any future owner.And that's been, I think, discussed whether or not there may be a transfer of ownership at some point, but it's up to them to decide what mixture is gonna work for them.So I think we're sensitive to that specific use and would like to do what we can to facilitate it, but there may be options.I guess my point is, under the current zoning or some modification of the current district, rather than going to a completely new district, which we were discussing this, Mark said, it's a much larger proposition in terms of creating that new zone that's what's integrated with all the other zones that were being proposed.So maybe there's a sort of middle ground that could be developed where the existing village commercial district could be amended.And if there are specific changes to the existing zone that maybe could facilitate the location, the senior center, that's something which we might hear from you as well.Cara -- - question 'cause I'm not familiar with the whole Senior Center wanting to be in a area.What's the square footage that the senior center would take up in whatever might be constructed over there?The current model that we are looking at is the Shallot senior center model, and it's about 6,000 square feet.And what would be the total square footage of the whole property?So the project, see, we're just one element of other planning.So we aren't really involved in the whole thing, but the owner and developer people that we've recently been talking to say, the math really works to have this mixed use and have the recent housing, some commercial and a senior center as a...Because the 100% commercial actually, and this has been verified for us by three -- - I wanna just understand one thing.You are not looking to be residential?No, we're looking for a non-residential -- - So your use would fit with what it's zoned for right now?It's just the developer wants to add more residential use than what the zone allows right now.So by putting you in there with them, they're convincing the town of Richmond to get rid of commercial usage and bring in more residential into an area that's zoned commercial.I think that's a fair summation.You could characterize -- - I just wanna say thank you for trying to preserve some commercial space in town because that would help the tax base.I do support a senior center.It's too bad there wasn't any other area in town that that could go.I do know that that commercial property has sat in the market for a long time because what the purchase price and what the current sales price, were pretty extremely different.So when you're trying to make a lot of money off of an investment, sometimes you sit on that investment for a while before you sell it.So I just wanted to say, thank you for trying to preserve some commercial space and not go completely residential, because they wanna be non-residential.The problem with it really is that it is a brown field, low level, but it is a brown field that needs to be cleaned up.And that's the key problem with the site because of the cost.So, the various models, we don't need to take much more time here, but there are many people who have modeled a few different scenarios there.And when you look at the various models, including residential, as of one-third of it, commercial, residential, senior center, it actually, the math works better about getting to the end goal.So I'm not a developer, but I've met with a lot of people about it.And I think, you could think that they're just twisting us into getting residential in there, but actually if you really meet with various people who are development of all sorts, they look at it and they say, oh, if this could have a residential component, we could do this.Well, the cleaning up of the brown stone, whether as a residential component or not is still value.So the goal is to get somebody to own it with them, like a municipality or somebody who can get the state and federal funding for cleaning up of brown stone and that's the key to it.So brown stone has always...That has always existed over there.And so as a whole, just to make sure people on the flood plain, that everybody's paying the bill for when they get flooded, I don't wanna pay the bill for some commercial property to need to be cleaned up that we've known has always needed to be cleaned up.It's an investment for somebody else, and it's somebody else's responsibility to -- - Their argument had been that the residential would be seed money that would allow further development of a commercial that may not have pay off right away due to the lack of tenants and interests in the commercial side of the development.So that's always been the take, and it's something that we still need to discuss.And I frankly would love to have lots of input on it.When I was on the planning commission, we did hear that the owner of the market here feels he's outgrown that space already and looking for a bigger place, and there aren't any other places in there in the village.So I feel strongly that we do protect the commercial space, the types of commercial space we've had.I'd hate to see our market be on the outskirts of the village, further just because we've given up a perfect site for a move like that.Are there any other specific comments that...I've got something I'd just like to sort of maybe close out with, but I want to see if anybody else has any comments, questions, thoughts.Just quickly, don't forget to take a survey.Thank you.Mark.Take your time to do that.And I was gonna stand at the door but...We actually hope to get it out on SurveyMonkey too now.We're going high-tech and see if we can't get out.Lots of participation, lots of feedback from lots of people.Actually, it's already up on SurveyMonkey if people want to fill it up.A link to it, yes, we'll put a link up there.Someone posted, so people can go straight to SurveyMonkey for .Mark, if I could.I'd like to applaud all of you for coming to see me.I'm embarrassed to say I sit here as a result of the fact that at the very 11th hour of an extended amount of effort on the part of my colleagues here, et cetera, I vigorously fought the proposed zoning and I guess contributed to its defeat in some respect and found myself having to apologize to those members of a committee that I didn't engage earlier in the process.And from my standpoint, I have sat here Wednesday night after Wednesday night after Wednesday night with an empty audience, save my friend, Ellen Ward and struggled with, especially the flood plain, because I felt, and as a result of some neighbors saying to me, you owe it to your neighbors to sit on this board and try to bring the community back together, so to speak.And so from my standpoint, I would encourage you, send us emails, send us notes, capture us in the market and talk to us because the number of evenings I sat here and had to turn to a solitary neighbor, Ellen Ward, and say, \"Ellen, what do you think\"?I don't live in the flood plain.\"What do you think these individuals \"who are struggling post-Irene need\"?And more often than not, I came up empty handed.And I said, I don't know what would be in the best interest of these individuals who are suffering, and at the same time, the broader notion of my community and the broader notion of what's best for a community.So I applaud you for coming.I would encourage you to come here and put your petard in the ground and say, \"Dammit, I want this, I want that\".And that helps us, informs us to make better decisions for the entire community.The democracy doesn't work when the three of us sit here and have a private conversation amongst ourselves.So please, next week or next Wednesday or two Wednesdays from now, at least half of you show up, do a tag team.Sit there and say, \"Okay, you going tonight\"?\"No, I'm gonna go next week\".Please help us.I mean, now that Ann at least has said, what's the next issue after flood plain, after the parking, after the signage?What is it that you want us to deal with?Cara, quick comment?Thank you for stepping forward and I just want them to realize flood plain isn't just their latest , it's an unnamed -- - It's Hillview.It's Hillview, and people in your community and this community don't realize what the flood plain is.So you, as the planning commission, please look over the appeal flood plain maps that the town's engineer, Cas has now redeveloped for the river, but understand that the flood plain maps for the streams and brooks are estimates and aren't even actual numbers.So your decisions impact people on streams and brooks that don't even know it.I'll be brief.Mary, yes, of course.If you folks get a chance, please reply and watch the from Monday night, because the defeat of the zoning document, which was quite a democratic process, which you identified was termed by Chris Gray as malicious mischief.And there's a big difference between the video document that you think is a problem and malicious mischief.I believe malicious mischief is a chargeable criminal offense.And I think democracy is not malicious mischief.Thank you for being on the board, all.Thank you for stepping forward.Well, if I could just close this out again by, I think...I'm sorry, did you wanna -- - No. - By saying thank you to all of you for coming tonight.And for those who may watch this at home, I really appreciate that.And this may spur some of you to offer more opinions and thoughts, but a quick, very brief vision of what I have for the planning commission's actions are consideration of the Creamery parcel certainly.But I still believe that the heart of the zoning regulations that were defeated in November were good.And I think there was an awful lot of good things in that document.I think there was a huge fault in a lack of communication, that we didn't, we thought we were reaching people and explaining and getting participation and we weren't.And we wanna address that.But I think that the concepts, the basic concepts that we're putting forward, I personally think are important to the town.And that is decreased density in the rural areas, increased density in the village areas, a unified bylaw that consolidates development and zoning regulations, and potentially even ordinances, et cetera, into one document so that people who are trying to understand what's going on aren't flipping back and forth between contradictory documents.One's telling them that the DRB is looking at one document and saying, you can do this.And then they're looking at the other document, and the zoning regs and say, no, you can't do that.So you can put it in there and develop it, but once it's there, it's not compliant.Things like that are kind of crazy.And there aren't a lot of those, but there's enough that are worth fixing.And if we go forward with a unified document, we would be able to address those issues and there would only be one.For better or worse, it would be one.Now that one could always be changed, but if you change one without changing the other, then you're back to square one.So as long as we stay two separate documents, we're going to have these conflicts and issues.As far as the number of zoning regulations or zoning districts and those kinds of things, I think they were important.We did this with the best intention of trying to make compatible communities and neighborhoods that were compatible at that time as they were, and allow businesses and uses that were in that area, legalize them in essence, make them nonconforming as much as possible.That was our goal in trying to resolve so many of these different districts, which is why we went to so many different districts, 'cause certain neighborhoods are particularly different and don't belong in a larger subset.So that's where I hope that we go forward as a planning commission with a lot of feedback from the community on the things that they think are most important and the changes that they want to incorporate with those fundamental core changes that we talked about and the best way to go about them.So, I don't know if there's anything else.Thank you guys for staying so late tonight.Mark, could you just reiterate again for everybody what the next steps are?In other words -- - The next steps are -- - We need to have a public hear...The next steps are a public hearing to approve these regulations after we have a session within the planning commission.Then we'll pass that onto the select board and the select board should approve it sometime.And should they make any changes after a public hearing, should adopt these without a public vote in July.And the reason why is because a public vote is really, really expensive, which is why we tried to take out as many controversial issues as possible.It's really expensive to put one on, and these things could go through very quickly.And I think again, have a lot of support.So anybody disagree, please let us know.Please share your thoughts with the select board, and actively participate.Thank you.Thank you.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Richmond_Planning_Commission_April_17_2013.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Richmond_Planning_Commission_April_17_2013.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Richmond_Planning_Commission_April_17_2013.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/Richmond_Selectbd_5-6-13/Richmond_Selectbd_5-6-13.mp3", "text": "Welcome to the May 6 meeting of the Select Board.I will start by opening it up to public comment if there's something that's not on the agenda.Okay, moving on to Planning Commission interviews.We have Mary Hull, Bruce Debounty, and Earnest Kelly on the agenda.So Mary, we can start with you.Come on up and join us.Thank you.Jerry, before we begin, I talked to Mark Fossil at the, just this afternoon at the Planning - Yeah.Commission and just about process and everything, and he requested actually that we not make final decisions as to appointees tonight, and he's actually asking that that new members of the Planning Commission not be seated until I think what was it?It was the June...The count now, either the 5th or the 19th, or the 5th or 19th meeting, because they've got important business at the next meeting.He wants to take care of that with the current board, because he wants to devote an entire meeting to orientation of the new members.Okay, so we'll know what date he wants?So was that.Yeah, I believe he's planning - And we have others that can't make it tonight - on attending tonight, so.for interviews who applied before the May 3rd deadline, but can't be here tonight?Right.Okay.You can make a decision to make an appointment and ask that whoever you appoint just not attended until, so that your decision has been made.Yeah.And then -- - And we are, we did ask about increasing it to seven, and he wants to give it at five for now, but that doesn't mean for the next year.They want to evaluate that.Is that right, Jeff, and determine whether or not a couple months down the road to increase it, is that right?I spoke to Mark .He said that he wanted to keep it at five so that the new members, which are gonna be two and possibly three, get a chance to get acclimated before they expand back to seven members.Okay, all right.Great, thank you.Mary.Hi. - Tell us why you would like to serve.Well, I have served on the Planning Commission before.I served for six years on that commission, and it was a very busy process, and it was believe it or not more work than the Select Board.Reading the background information, researching, and I think that the, although I haven't attended the meetings, I did attend the meetings before I was on the Planning Commission just to get a sense of how things are going, and I think I would bring back some information to the Planning Commission.I really have a good attendance record at those things, and I do my homework.Excellent.And one quick question, because I know you'll know the answer to this.Is there any sort of state statute that says as a lister, you can't serve on the planning committee?There is none.Okay, thank you.Other questions?I wrote down your questions from the last time if you forgot.Well you answered one of the ones that I had was do you know what the level of commitment was?And obviously, because you've served on it before, then you also answered it in your first, when you did your intro, so.Okay.Yeah, mine from last time, yeah, - Town plan.it was about the town plan and where we're at with zoning and the town plan.I helped formulate the last town plan.I wasn't on the original town plan formulation, but I worked very hard.Transportation and energy were my two areas, and a lot has changed in both of those areas in the addition of solar panels, the addition of wind, and I think another technology that should be looked at and invited into the town is water energy.So as it relates to transportation, I think the issue of the bridge has come and gone.But as we heard at, I believe it was the last Select Board meeting three weeks ago, there's, transportation issues are always in the forefront, and alternative energy sources can assist with transportation costs and needs and so on.And I think that that's something that does need to be looked at in more detail.And what happens with a town plan is a town plan is written and then the zoning comes into sync, and then there's a new town plan, and this comes into sync, and both of those are always changing.Everything is in a fluid state.Although they're constant for a little while, the town plan can be renewed, and I think the legislature needs to make the town plan a 10-year event.I believe that when we paired down the last town plan, we brought it into measurable goals, a reasonable set of criteria for the town to follow, and I think the legislature really needs to take a look at that.When they combine the CCRPCM, the Metropolitan Planning Organization, that's the Board that looked at everybody's town plans to say, \"Well, how's feel about it?And how does your neighboring community feel about it, and how does it fit within the community\"?I think that because that Board has been paired down and combined, I think the legislature needs to make some action about making it a 10-year town plan.And that way, you don't have a, \"Oh, hurry up, we gotta renew it, hurry up, we gotta renew it\".Because once you have - Right.a good town plan set forth, it should be the plan that is for your future goals.Right.Other questions?I want to ask the question about developing.Are you a developer?Go ahead.I'm not a developer, but I am a private landowner, and I feel that private land owners who have paid a share of taxes on their property shouldn't necessarily be, oh, boy I can develop everything that it's one acre, because the land itself tells you whether or not you can develop it.And if you look at the not too recent history, a lot of farmers sold off chunks of land, and I know that this was poo-pooed at one point on the Planning Commission with some folks who were on that Board that farmers had sold off a phase chunk of land and left the reserve of the land in the background.Well if you take a look at smart planning, leaving a large reserve of land in the background is smart for watershed, for deer yard, for recreation, and perhaps making little chick let lots in the front and reserving the back is the more reasonable way to approach development.And I think the lay of the land, the flood plain, pretty much dictates what Richmond can and can't do with the property that's here.The slopes decide a lot of things.Right.Other questions?Taylor, do you remember your question?I didn't ask any questions.Oh, you didn't?Go ahead.Give me a shot.I have no questions.Okay.That's it.All right, thank you Mary.Yeah, didn't you want to know if I have any questions for you?Do you have questions for us?Well, I think as it relates to the document, I was distressed that...Chris had what he had to say about the document.I think that an act of democracy is defeating something that you don't like.I think it's not an act, anything other than that, but I do think that this document is a bit lofty, and I do believe that this document needs to be written by the town of Richmond residents, which is not to be written so that, you know, if you read that document and saw the zoning districts, you would ask yourself, \"Wow, this is a, you know, huge community that you're looking at\".If you read that document and try to place it somewhere, it's almost as if it was for some community in Connecticut.It's not for Vermont.You read that document, and you go through the Board, and that's not the language.I know it has to be professional language, which it would be if it came from the citizens on the Board, but it almost looks like every word on that document and in that document was written by a consultant.I don't think it should look that way.I don't think it should have that flavor.I think it should reflect more of the citizens and the town.And I do not believe the document as it was put forward, the one that was defeated, reflects that.The Select Board can waive any one of those requirements they choose.When someone comes in and says, \"Well, I'd like this development passed,\" and you have the ability to waive sidewalks.They've been waived in development.South Union, when it came through here, I think phase two and three, sidewalks were waived, and now side, you know, you should have sidewalks.You should encourage walking.So I don't think something like that should be waived, but the Select Board can waive any single or multiple items that are brought before you and say please waive this.That's it for me.Okay.All right, thank you.Yeah.Thank you Mary.We have Bruce Debounty here with us.Sorry for the attire and the hat.Coming from a baseball game, so.No problem.No problem.Replete with the sunglasses.Yeah, the sun was pretty bright over there..be back lit.I know, you might need to put those on.Yeah.So tell us why you're interested in serving on the Board.Well, I grew up in Vermont, grew up in Essex Center, lived in Richmond now for 25 years, have had three different houses in Richmond.I think I would like to make rules that would allow my children to live in Richmond, and that's why I want to do it.I think if we restrict too much, it makes land a lot more valuable by restriction, and younger people can't afford to live here.I'm not in favor of huge growth, of turning this into Burlington, but I do think that there's, steady growth is healthy.Great, thank you.So you're aware of the time commitment?I know I asked that because, - I am.because it's such a huge, and I think that's why, so we have so many vacancies on so many committees, because I think people don't realize what they're getting themselves into.I am aware of the commitment.I mean, the document that the voters has voted down, I read from front to back.I do come to a lot of Select Board meetings.I just think, I volunteer a lot of time with youth sports.My son is now in the seventh grade, and I don't have as much opportunity to volunteer for, 'cause he's playing for school teams and things like that, and I have some time to do other than volunteering for coaching that I could give some time back to the town.Okay.The development one, do you have land that you're planning to build?I have done some small projects in Richmond.At this time, I don't have any going on.I have some vacant property, and I own, my house is a 20-acre parcel.By the regs that there are now, the only thing I would do is split off so my kids could have property for them when they want to build a house in Richmond.That's my only plan of doing anything in the town.At the last meeting, you and I had an exchange about a comment that I made, and I hope that I made it clear that I wasn't criticizing the outcome of the vote or opposition to the vote, but the process, and that I felt that the public discussion had my opinion reached an unproductive stage.But I just wanted to hear your thoughts about it and about the vote and how it went and is there anything that you would hope to do, make happen differently if you were on the Commission?It's very typical of what happens.I mean, the Planning Commission went through many, many meetings that people could go to, and there's some people that go to those, but the majority don't, so it's always seemed like it's a firestorm in the last month before.And that's, I think that's what some of it happened was it started in a little firestorm there on \"Front Page Forum\", and people were going back and forth about the zoning, and I don't know if there's anything better that the Planning Commission could have done.I think they tried to have tons of neighborhood meetings and to get the word out of what was going on is this people didn't attend to it.I don't know what would work better.I mean, look at how many people are here tonight.It's really hard to get that, get public input until it's on the doorstep of a vote, and I would love to brainstorm with them to see how we could with everybody to see how we could get more public so that we would know that you're doing the right thing by the majority.Unfortunately, I don't have an answer to say how we do better.Well, I mean, you already thought about it though.That's what I wanted to see.Yeah, I don't have an answer either, yeah.I mean, I don't think they did a bad job of it and of getting, trying to get the word out there.Just, it's hard to get people to give up their time to go to those meetings unfortunately.Right.Any questions?Well, I'll do the town plan question, but I was a little broad with it, but just do you have thoughts on the town plan or where we're at with zoning relating to the town plan?You know, I don't know the town plan real well.I'll be honest with you.Yeah.I know what the document that was proposed pretty well.Yeah.I think that there was things in that document that were a little bit overstepping the boundaries.I don't agree with, again, I'm a big proponent of being able to have, everybody needs a place to live, and everybody needs a place to live that they can afford.And when you put into a document that you have to have a front porch, well, you know, unfortunately, everybody can't afford a front porch, and those types of things were what bothered me a lot of almost like a micromanagement thing, you know, almost telling people how there had to build, what they have to build, and I don't think we can do that to people.I think people need to build what they can afford, and you know, simplify it, make it so it's easy, so if I hand anybody in this town a document and say, \"If you follow these rules, you can build a house,\" they need to be able to read it.You shouldn't have to have a lawyer to have to read town documents to cipher what they can do and not do on their property.Right.Okay, questions?Do you have questions for us?No, I don't, thank you for your taking the time with me.Thanks Bruce.Thanks.Okay, Ernie?Hello.Hello.Okay, we'll start the same question.Why are you interested in serving?I really first became interested in it, because I was asked to volunteer by several members of the community.And to be honest, I hadn't given it a lot of thought before that.I have pretty much stayed on the sidelines of diligent town politics over the 22, 23 years I've been in town.In general, have been pretty satisfied with the way things have gone.But in light of the blow up over these zoning ordinance last year and the divisiveness that that appeared to bring from certain entrenched camps shall I say, to me, it kind of begged for somebody coming in who didn't have a dog in the fight so to speak.I don't own land in town other than the lot that my home is on.I'm not a developer.I worked for the Department of Environmental Conservation, so I've got a very good idea of a lot of the points that Mary brought up that in many cases, the development potential in town is limited by topography, proximity to rivers, things like that.On the other hand, there needs to be a very careful balance of the vested interests of existing land owners.There needs to be a very careful planning process that Richmond stays Richmond.It doesn't turn into South Burlington or Williston.And I think that's important.I kind of see Richmond as being, you know, the first outpost on the frontier in many ways as you move up from Burlington, and you know, to a large degree, that's part of the unfortunate part of the vested interest is that, because it is that that first really rural community, land prices are going up, and that drives that need to where you get to situations where people need to be able to subdivide to their kids, because there's just not land available that somebody just starting out can buy.It's great for somebody who's established and has a career and has, you know, good income and things like that.But they're perfectly correct in the fact that it's very tough to get established in this town if you're a young starting out type of person.So I think the overall whole planning process needs to kind of bring that more into balance.I think that what was said here earlier was right.It was too polarized.The plan, the zoning document reads like the code of federal regulations.It's black and white with no room for any kind of wiggle room really, unless you have to go through the entire variance process.I think it needs to be a little bit more flexible, a little bit more lenient in some of its approaches, but how you do that and how you balance it, maybe it's just a different way of looking at it, and that's kind of what I hope would bring to the process.Great, thank you.And I'm deeply involved in planning and working.Yes I understand what the implications of the work there are.Am I that predictable?She knows what we do at work.Yes, Ernie and I work on the same floor, - Same floor, different programs.but pretty much every 150 people work on the same floor, so.Other questions?I'll ask the same question I asked of the previous candidate.In terms of the process, and I appreciate the comments you already made about the last vote, but what do you think we can do better next time around?What would you like to, what changes to the process would you like to make to makes things go smoother?I think you need to, in a way, I think we need to harness the outrage that was generated over it and focus it to where, I mean, you're both correct.The ultimate resolution and the ultimate solution is you get more people involved earlier in the process.And you know, unfortunately, maybe we've gone a little bit too long to harness that and really be able to focus it and bring more people in.But I firmly believe that the earlier you can get information out there, and even, to be honest, I didn't pay a lot of attention to the developmental stage of the last ordinance.I certainly paid a lot of attention when it came down to the vote time.But off the top of my head, I don't recall there being frequent updates as to what was going on.I don't even know if Front Porch Forum was in existence really in the infancy of that whole process.But certainly that's grown.There's a lot more people that are now subscribed to it.So I think there's an opportunity now to be able to get some of these concepts out there and ideas out there, \"hey, we're looking at this, hey, we're looking at that,\" seeking comment from the people and trying to get whatever kind of feel you can from the majority.Hopefully, you know, get a good sense of what the majority of town is looking for.And it's got to be a compromise.You can't go to one extreme, you can't go to the other.You've got to find that happy medium, which is not an easy thing to do.Right.Other questions?Do you have questions for us?No, no.No one.Shielding my eyes.Did you say, have you served on any other town committees before?I haven't, no.Okay.And you did say you're not developing any property?No, no.Okay, that's it.Well, thank you.Very good, thank you.So the process for all of you who are here now and who, the people that were here last week, we have had two last, I mean, last meeting two that interviewed at the last meeting, three today, and then we have one or two others who have put in their application but couldn't be here tonight.One.One other.So my thought is that we will interview that person at the next meeting, and then I think because Mark, you've sat through the interviews, it would be great to get your input as well before a decision is made on filling those vacant seats on the Commission.So if you would be willing to do that.Great, all right, so at the next meeting on the 19th, we will interview the other candidate and then will the decisions be made at that meeting, or?That's up to the Select Board when you want to appoint.Okay.Well, I know I can't be at that meeting, but I don't want to hold up decision-making, but I also would like to be involved in decision-making.So can I at least have a conversation with you, so you know where I stand before, and maybe you Mark?Sure, you could do that.I mean, if you wanted to put something in writing that I could.And that's allowed for me to?Or you could tell me what your thoughts were, and I could, yeah.We set up a conference call for you.I'm in a meeting at that time, so I won't be able to do that.You can write, you can send us a letter with your thoughts.There's nothing wrong with that.Otherwise -- - It's a public record, but you could, - Okay.write a hundred memos to us if you want.I, otherwise, - You can tell them it's not happening.yeah, otherwise, it would put, yeah, June 3rd would be the, - Right.And I know that you also have, well, you actually are thinking June 3rd.Just before.Well, I'm not quite sure what our timeline is, but I kind of like to get through, we just went through a public meeting for the flood hazard overlaying the parking.The folks that, you know, there's only three of us, but we're all pretty familiar with that and trying to bring somebody new up to speed on that decision-making process in the final tweaks that are involved with that, I'd just as soon get that taken care of with the staff that we have, and unfortunately at that time, Lou will be finishing up, ready to pass on this final version on to you.He's intending unfortunately still to step down, which would mean that we could bring in three new people all at the same time and do an introduction and start from scratch with a new topic and a new agenda, and it would be much cleaner.So that's gonna take at least one meeting, and then a forum, a public hearing, but possibly two.So we may not have a public hearing to pass on any information to you until the middle of June - Okay.when we pass it on, so two , - Okay, so.for that one, but there's no burden on your part .All right, so no earlier than June 3rd would we vote?Right.Okay.That makes sense.So then you can be part of the discussion it sounds like.Yes, very good.Excellent.Thank you very much.All right, next on the agenda, Governance Committee.Well, we received two emails of interest, one from Fred Barrett and one from John Cart.I'd put two postings on \"Front Porch Forum\".Haven't heard anything from anyone else.The original proposal was to have five citizen voting members.It's like four plus the chairperson.Or would Taylor be the chairperson?No, it was, it should have been five.Okay, yeah.That chairperson is intended to be a member of the Committee, yeah.Is the, okay.So you want to go back out and dig some more, or what would the Select Board like to do?It's taken us a month to get two members.A month already.So digging for another two weeks, I don't know what it will do.I think this is a non-issue for the town, because they're not volunteering to serve on the Committee to ax the listers.So if they really wanted to do it, they would all get on board.In lieu of getting rid of the Governance Committee, we could reduce it to three members and probably someone will pop up.I'm thinking that that probably is a better option, because I think the fact - Yeah.that people don't show up doesn't mean they're not interested in it, and I think that our zoning regulations were a good example of that, and I think in the process, they weren't showing up, but at the end it didn't matter to them.And so I think that if we can reduce it to three, and I don't think we're looking to ax, unless there's, I think this came up, and I also feel like if we have, if there's, I mean, it's going to a vote, so in the end, it's presenting something.We don't make that decision.We're not gonna, a recommendation can be made, but it's not something that we can just put into place.Well, yes and no.I mean, there's legislation out there that the governor, I don't know if it's passed yet to be honest, but that would allow the Select Board to make the decision to, I mean, it's not, I don't think it's as black and white as it's going to a vote, and we don't make the decision.I mean, this is a more complicated issue than put it, slap together a committee, and get a recommendation.I mean, at this point where we don't even, we don't even have to vote on any, I mean, - Right.there's not even a proposal to vote.Right.The floor motion was to put a committee together to potentially make a recommendation.Right.So at this point, we don't even have, there's nothing that we're reacting, that we have to vote on.Yeah, okay.Right, right.What I'm saying is the end result is if we had that committee put together, if they made a recommendation, if we accept that recommendation, - Okay, then we would have to.we wouldn't just put that into place.That would be -- - Right, we would discuss it and make a decision.Right.I don't know what we're talking about right now .I guess my proposal is to lower the membership to three members of the public.I will move to lower the membership of the Governance Committee to three members of the public.That's it.Okay.Who will second?Second.Any discussion?That seems like the best option at this point to, you know, to try to keep moving ahead, but yeah, okay.I'll try to get us one more.Great.All good.Aye.Aye.Aye.Any opposed?The ayes have it.Appointment of Paul Hoff to the Economic Development Committee.There was one more opening.So yeah, it's a committee of eight, so he's the eighth.Okay.So yeah, wasn't sure what we need to do to.We have to vote,.Yeah.Just a motion to appoint and a second and then vote.Okay.So who is this guy?Lives in the village and, I don't know, was interested in what the Economic Development Committee is doing and got in touch with Heidi and me and to see if there was space, and there's an opening for one more.So it brings it, it fills it out at eight.So we started off with eight, and somebody had dropped out, so we have a vacancy.So yeah, I move to appoint Paul Hoff to the Economic Development Committee.Is there a second?I'll second.Any discussion?All in favor?Are you gonna give a quick report on, on what's going on with the Economic Development Committee?I'm just checking the agenda, - Yeah.I didn't .I could, should I do it during the reports time, yeah.Yeah.Sorry.Okay, any further discussion?All in favor?Aye.Aye.Any opposed?Ayes have it.Policy discussion.Madam Chair, could we take Eric Sandbloom - Yes?since he's here for his item?Thank you.Absolutely, we can do that.Eric, come on up.Absolutely.The sun's gone down, so you .We're not torturing anymore, so.You have the air conditioner in.It blows right on you.Oh. All right, I heard that at the last Select Board meeting, our last invoice was discussed, and I think actually Bruce via Kara gave me a call, so I'm hearing this like fourth party or fourth time, and I just happened to notice on the agenda this morning when I was looking at \"Front Porch Forum\", it said KAS bill, I'm like, I called Jeffrey and said probably a good idea for me to come over, and so that's why I'm here.I just, what I really wanted to do is, you know, formerly request that you reconsider the decision that was made last time and give me a chance to kind of explain what happened.Absolutely.So with that and in interest of, you know, time, but most all of you have been involved with, you know, the work that we did or are familiar with it, so I'll start with in March when we presented the preliminary results of our analysis of the flood mapping, where it looked like there were some, you know, fairly significant irregularities, or you know, it wasn't really right.And we did our preliminary coordination with FEMA and with their consultant CDM, and we thought we had a clear picture of what was gonna come.And so we developed a scope of work based on that.And we worked up to the April 10th or whatever the deadline was, you know, it was coming up pretty quick, and it was a quite a bit of work that needed to be done in order to complete the model and to complete all the paperwork for the, what it was as it was an appeal, and a LOMR, a letter of map revision.And so that went in, and what, really, what happened since from that time is that the, the FEMA contractor from CDM who was reviewing the data, they assigned it to someone who wasn't familiar with the original model.We were originally working with someone, but basically what it was, it was kind of like what FEMA did to the state of Vermont, and they had these one people saying one thing, and then they switched it to someone else, and he said something else.And not only that, they weren't as familiar with the model.So Steve who was with me during the presentation before, he really handled all the technical aspects of it.I'm not nearly as familiar with the hydrogeologic model as he is, but he really had to spend a lot of time bringing this guy up to speed.And then we were originally led to believe that the appeal in the LOMR would be reviewed simultaneously, but the way they actually did it, that did not occur.And what they did is they had the appeal reviewed by one consultant and the LOMR reviewed by another consultant.And that other consultant told us that we had to do all the mapping, which originally we were told that we would update the model, provide all the data, provide all the elevations, and that they would do the mapping, and that was really the vast majority.And I knew we were taking a risk at the time, but we wanted to keep this thing going.We wanted to be able to meet the deadlines that they had come up with each time we got a letter of information request, or even if it was just a phone call, it's like, you know, \"We need this in addition to, or modified\".So in developing that map, it really, it's, because it's such a large area, you know, it took hours and hours and hours.I mean, if, I don't know if you had a chance to look at our invoices, but we, you know, we detail every bit that's done, you know.We try to put as much explanation on as possible.So what, you know, what came out of, the vast majority of the extra work we did was related to that.That was submitted, and then we got information back that there was a mistake, and you know, we made a mistake in the mapping part of it.So we made that correction.And if you look at our invoice, it's, I think it was originally for like over $5,000, and we took off...$2,100.Yeah, so it was like for four, it was like for $4,500, and we took off $2,152, and you can see the actual time that we took off.And we felt that wasn't fair to bill a town for it, because it was based on our mistake.But everything else that we did was, you know, had to be done in order to complete this.We weren't spinning our wheels with the exception of what we deleted.And it was just a matter of, you know, we were able to see clearly to that April 10th mark when we submitted the paperwork, and things kind of unraveled from there.So, and then in addition to that, just this is minor, but you know, Jeffrey wasn't able to go to the Williston meeting, so we went to represent the town of Richmond in order to get Williston to sign on board, because Williston and Jericho needed to sign on board.And then we also needed to do some additional mapping for each of those two areas, paperwork and things like that.That wasn't very much of the extra, but that's just one other item there that was requested of us.So I mean, that really, that's the nuts and bolts of where we are now and why we're there, and it's not over yet I'm sorry to say.When we sent this letter with our invoice, we said, you know, we probably expect a little bit more coordination with them, and sure enough, March 26th, I don't know if you've seen this or Jeffrey, you should have a copy of this March 26th letter - Oh yeah.for additional information.And again, it's, they indicated to this, it has to do primarily with the transitions at Williston and Jericho, and I think also upstream for Bolton, that the, you know, when we check, if we prefer to change the model in Richmond, obviously, there's gonna have to be some kind of transition.And they said don't worry about it.We'll work that out.And so our submittal followed our, the direction that they gave us, and so the lines, you know, they do this, they're in Bolton, they're way up here, and they go, and you know, just to make that adjustment, because now they're not lining up.And part of this is to revise the mapping so that there's smooth transitions.They need a certified copy of the mapping itself, PE stamped, which we're prepared to do.And you know, so here it is, and for that, our estimation was correct.I think we said a day's worth of labor is what it's gonna take, $640.I still think that's about where we're at.So I'm asking the Select Board to reconsider, you know, approving this invoice here for $2,534, and so that we can finish the job another $640.And I can tell you from experience in working with other large engineering companies that are under the STAR program, you know, the CDNs, the STANTECs and that, no town would receive what we've delivered for less than about $90,000 or $100,000.And I'm proud to say that we were able to cut through a lot of that, you know, administration or whatever, you know, these big companies do.And not only that, I mean, we were way ahead of the game just in being here.You know, I live in Richmond, so I know the ground, I know why there were errors in the model, and I was able to help Steve through that.So I really think this is, you know, a value to the town.It's good work that we did.And we'd really like to get paid for it.Okay.Thank you.Do you have questions?I guess my main question was going back to the beginning, so then what was the, was it originally contracted at a fixed price, or how did, it was before my time, how was it?So it was originally something that -- - Our agreement was that it was a probable estimate of costs is the way it was presented.Okay.And that our proposal was that it would be time and materials, and it had our rates right in there.Right, okay.My recollection, part of our discussion, correct me if I'm wrong, was that the invoice was for services that had been delivered significantly, there's a significant time difference between the services delivered and the invoice, .That was one of the concerns was that some - Last week or last meeting.of those expenses occurred in our previous fiscal year.They're services from April.Oh right, yeah, and I mean, that's just a matter of the process being dragged out.April 8th.I mean, all the back and forth, and I mean, we didn't wait.It was, you know, we did wait for, you know, our responses from FEMA and from their consultant, but, you know, I think this was, we kind of got caught up at the end of the year with end of the year stuff, but this was pretty much addressed at the beginning of January.I think we were working on it in December.But some of the billing that's listed is from April and May from, - Right before July 1st is what we're talking about.Right, right.I see.So that's were we got stuck.Oh, right, right.year-end, so that's an expense from the previous fiscal year.Does that need to be divided out, or?I think, what happened in the last meeting, and I'm remembering some of my own comments is, well, first of all, I do similar kind of work to what you do and work with public sector clients, and I think that there's always the danger when you have a scope creep, which is essentially is what you have in, you know, in a project like this, that if there's not effective communication back to the client and timely invoicing for changes in the scope of work, you know, you're gonna get questions asked, and that's what we're doing.Also, there's just the timeliness matters you know, in terms of, you know, where we can take money from to pay and what's like that.And so this was not on the quality of the work and not on the need for the work, but the management of the invoicing and the communication with us as the client I think is what you're hearing.Okay, and I hear that loud and clear.And like I said, you know, we took a risk when we went forward and wanted to, you know, just respond to the information requests, and you know, I will admit that, you know, I didn't have a tight handle on what Steve was doing.He was pulling ahead.I mean, he was doing good work, but you're absolutely right, Chris.I mean, there could have been a much better degree of communication earlier on.Well, that does concern me.Well, and I think just the billing frequency is, 'cause am I right, are we seeing this bill for all of this work done on January 3rd, 2013 from nine months earlier?I mean, are we seeing a bill nine months after the fact that the work is done?In this one, yeah.Is that normal business practice?I mean, it would seem to me that, you know, - Well, I mean, I'd say it's not normal business practice - Right.and , that's sort of what we're bringing back to you, and it's not something that we can work with very well .Sure, I understand that, and, you know, you know, I can say that it really depends on the project, and this one, you know, would have periods of time where, you know, we were waiting for a response.We probably should have been, you know, invoicing more frequently at that period.But honestly, we didn't know where we were going yet.It was still, we're trying to figure out.Oh, I agree.I mean, there was communication with Steve and I, and Steve had told me that he was starting to put more time in what they talked about, but there wasn't any discussion about billing, but I think that they, he didn't know how far CDM was going to go with requesting changes.I think by the end of August, it got to the point where it was something that we just couldn't disguise any longer.But there are two separate things I think we're talking about here.One is that there's the unknown about a project that has open-ended aspects to it, and in that case, I think what any client would expect is for your firm to come back and let us know what you don't know, and then when you get information that seems to indicate that additional expenditures are gonna be necessary to make that known before those expenditures, that time is spent, that's number one.But then when we were talking about before about invoicing for time that had already been spent significantly before, you know, that's gonna be, if I'm understanding, you know, correctly, you know, seeing a bill for time spent nine months before in an invoice that hadn't appeared before, that, you know, with that kind of delay makes it impossible for us to do our financial management.So basically we have no real idea how much the project is costing with that kind of, with both of those things going on.At least that was my concern - Yeah, and I recognize that -- - characterizing the situation?No. - I recognize that's something we could have done better.Mary.If I may, and this isn't gonna be popular, and I really don't care, but I'm known for that.I think it's interesting that a member of the audience was the person who communicated with Eric and that when Chris is talking about communications, that's a two-way street, and then Eric read on \"Front Page Forum\" that his bill was being discussed.I think the ball was dropped on one side as well.Thank you.Thanks.Well I for one would be willing to reconsider, because I know that you were communicating with Jeff along the way, saying we're not done.I do think that we could have done a better job.I know in my organization that if we're coming to year-end, and we haven't seen a bill yet, we are on them, so that we know that everything is covered before our audit.So I think there was, there were more then, there were a number of balls in the air, and a number of them were dropped.So I do think there's responsibility on both sides, so I am willing to reconsider.Other thoughts?I certainly want to maintain a good working relationship, and like I said, I haven't heard any complaints about the quality of the work, but I think we need to take care of the situation would make it clear that that can't happen in the future again, because your point's a good one Jim, but we, it's not clear to me that there's anything that we could have done to have known about this, and I .Well, we knew that we were having a service provided, and we knew that there probably was going to be a bill coming.But did we know that there were services that we hadn't been invoiced for months before that then we were gonna be invoiced for?You know, we have so many services that we get provided by the time.I don't think it's our responsibility to go after people to send us bills.I think that's the responsibility of the business owner is to say, \"I need my money, pay me\".And if we don't pay them, then it's their responsibility to come to us and say, \"Hey, why aren't you paying me\"?We can't go down our list of warrants and say, \"Do you have anything outstanding?Do you have anything outstanding?Do you have anything outstanding to us\"?I mean, that's what a business owner has to do.I'm split between the two of you on that particular one.But I mean, I think it is a two-way street, but I think there has to be a, you know, basic minimum amount of good business practices.And I do hear you loud and clear.You know, my relationship with the town, business relationship, and the fact that I'm part of this community is very important to me.And I'd like to be able to continue to provide service for the town, whether it's on a business relationship or you know, some of the volunteer work that I do, and I definitely hear you loud and clear, you know, as far as, if there are any other future opportunities.So, and then again, what are we looking at moving forward, this $640 - Yes.coming up and then, are we anticipating - And that's it, I mean, I have -- - anything else, or?No, we've got what we need right here.You know, at first it was a guess, you know, a day's worth of labor.Now we know what we have to do in writing.And that's the last thing we have to do?That's I mean, they're asking for, I know, I know, I understand where you're coming from on this.I can't speak for FEMA or for CDN, - Right, yeah, yeah.but I can also tell you that we are not going to proceed with anything in the future without communicating.That's the key thing.And I think, I would be satisfied and pay the outstanding bill with that, and then the other thing is just an understanding that we in the future won't pay for any services rendered in their invoice more than 90 days after the point that they're delivered.That's fair.How's that sound?That sounds like a good plan.I think that's a good plan for all of the people who provide service to the community.Any further discussion?Only that I agree if somebody is on the agenda, we should make sure we call them and .Right.Yeah, yeah, sorry about that.Sorry about that.Well I would have come to the last meeting if I had known.Yeah.Right.Okay.Do we have to vote on that, or is that just been the conversation?Well, right, since it's not on the warrant, - Warrants?we have to vote on it separately.Okay.That would be charged to administration legal services.Okay.Or you could vote on that now if you like.Would someone like to make a motion?I would like to move the payment in the amount of $2,534.50 for services rendered by KAZ Incorporated, - KAS. - KAS Incorporated, invoice dated January 3rd, 2013.Could you add that we're also agreeing to pay $640 for services outstanding?And additional $640 for services outstanding.Second.Any further discussion?All in favor?Aye.Aye.Aye.Any opposed?Ayes have it.Thank you.Thanks very much.Thanks for coming in.Thanks for coming in.Okay, great.Back to...The race policy.There was only one, and this is just a grammatical edit, crap, where is it?It's under the Round Church, ah, - under section two, race provisions, A, contact with the Round Church.So the first sentence under A, it says, \"The Round Church often hosts a weddings\".Just a minor grammatical error.Okay.What I didn't see in here was notification to area residents, and we did, did I miss that?I think it's.Section, section two.Yeah, down, third page, near the bottom.3B. - Yeah, that's to the town manager.Last page.Yeah, third page.\"Send letter to residents along racecourse\".Okay, I think I probably just got to the end, and I was like it's fine.I would like to add something down at the bottom where it says post event cleanup that we will bill your event for what we have to clean up.Oh. If it's not clean.If it's not clean.Yeah.Would it be prudent to take a deposit in situations like that?Yes, if we're gonna, yes, it would be, because if you're, you don't have anything to bill, unless you make a deposit.Exactly, right.Lik even if it's something, and I mean, I'm just making up a number of $100.Yeah.You know, I mean, I don't know how much it costs to pick up and dispose of trash, but maybe that money is a deterrent for doing it.I'm just making up a number.Well, that also makes, adds a little weight to the actual application process to.Right, right, exactly.Exactly.Yeah, 'cause I mean, I can tell you your point's a good one, but fining after the fact that.Right, yeah, it's difficult.How we gonna enforce it?You know, take it to \"People's Court\"?\"Judge Judy\".\"Judge Judy\"?The only thing I think that we should at least consider is it says, \"Leave it better than you found it\".I think we should leave it as you found it.Like, we don't really expect them to mow the lawn - Right.and plant a few things.Yeah, exactly, exactly.Leave it as you found it.You know, I did take a little umbrage with, on section two, race procedures one, \"These procedures have been developed to serve as a guideline,\" blah, blah, blah, \"strict adherence to these guidelines is not required.However, if unfavorable situations develop, the Select Board may impose conditions on future events\".I feel like if we're gonna be putting in the effort to do this, and we're, I feel like there should be some, like, this is, these are our policy, this is our policy, and either you follow it or you don't.I mean, these are not egregious requests.They're pretty basic requirements to do, and I feel like that that's something that if you want to hold a race here on our property and inconvenience some of our residents, that these are what you should be expected to do.I agree that sentence doesn't make sense.True, because we can just take it right out.Because if that's the point, then why have these recommendations?Why have this policy if we're not gonna, if we're not gonna enforce it?Yeah, right, right.Because of what separates the people from who apply and go through the process than those who don't, and we should probably also have to have a discussion about what we do with people who don't do an appropriate.I think that's what that was trying to allude to, that if you don't follow these guidelines, then you won't be welcomed back.I think that's the message it's trying to put out there, but you're right, it's like, we're putting guidelines together, and we're telling you you don't have to follow them.Right.Yeah well, that's where the deposit can come in too.We can say - Right, right.what you just said and also that your deposit may be forfeit.Right.And then the next question is how do we crack down on those folks?I mean, like Mary's in here, sometimes every Select Board meeting, talking about a race that happens all the time in front of her house, and how do we, I mean, we've talked about, you know, getting the word out on other \"Front Porch Forum\"'s or other town managers or other things like that.How do we do that?And I don't have a good answer for that.Well, you know, I think that the issue that Mary, correct me if I'm wrong, that you're having is that these are, these are impromptu gatherings as opposed to the scheduled events where they have to be -- - There's also on the bicycle club has time trials, and they'll throw up a sign on the property road at the beginning and end, of each end, and that's for 80 bicyclists on there.Right.Yeah.We can contact the group if we know who it is and that they regularly.Right, right.Hi, my name's Hailey.I live in Round Church neighborhood, and you can do whatever you want with the guidelines.However, I have not seen trash when the racers leave.Good to know, thank you.I mean, I think we don't want to discourage people from coming and biking here.And I don't think these services are .Right, yeah, yeah.No, for any kind of, yeah.And I was trying to remember why this stalled out when we were doing it before.I think it just -- - And I didn't remember, but we're we gonna add a form to fill out, or do we have a form that people fill out that gives all their contact information?No we don't.Oh yeah, we should have that.Is that, were we gonna add that to this?And maybe just like a, sorry.Like this is, well, it could be like here's our policy.It could be a signature line on here that they're signing that they've read this and they know what we're asking them to do.Yeah.With a line of like we've received your deposit, and it's being held, and.Right, and then we get their contact info, need their contact info and whatever else.Yeah.That's a good idea to add it right to this, and then when we have them - Yeah.signing off saying they know that this is the, what we're asking them to follow.Because there's no reason to create a new form when all the the information's right on it.No, exactly.Right, right, yeah.Okay.I'd be in favor of that.Bruce?Is there any way to add the website so that you had a calendar that ?Oh, a website.Yeah.The whole .All of the, that would be so great.And yes, not the current one, but the new one.Soon.The once and future website.You know, that, it's something like, I don't live on Cochran Road, but if somebody lived on Cochran Road, and they were planning on their own gathering, that, you know, - Right, right.Yeah.look on the calendar and say, \"Geez, there's gonna be a hundred bicyclists on here, maybe we oughta put it on Sunday instead of Saturday, our gathering\".Right.It would be beneficial too for the historical society to put weddings on there that have already been booked, and yes, absolutely.Yeah, yeah.Yeah, there are many options for different types of calendars in the variety of website options we're looking at.Great.And it's definitely on the priority list for the new website, like yeah.One thing on the website.It seems to be with the small number of towns in Vermont that there could be one template for the website, so if you wanted to go to Williston's website or Shelbourne, it's the same website.Yes.You're gonna have pictures that are different, the names are gonna be different, but if the base, you know, it's like how you set up a dictionary A through Z. - Right, well, there is a template that many Vermont towns have used, - And we're looking at it.and that's one of our options, but if you look around, because I've been spending some time on recent towns, looking at their water and sewer rates, and every town is different, because of their size.And so the needs of Williston are gonna be much different than our needs.So maybe their website, which I think they use Gov Office, is much more in depth than what we may need.But yes, there is a template that is available to -- - Point your horse in the direction it's going, you get farther.Okay, do we need to vote on this?It's gonna be still revised and come back to us?It's not ready to be voted yet.Okay, perfect.Public works spec.Like yeah, no kidding.Anxious.Sorry I mentioned something, yeah, I can see why nobody wanted to deal with it, - Yeah, I don't want to deal with it.but what's the use .Yeah.Thanks.I was like, why are we talking about us?It's your fault.I was saying, yeah.Doh .Okay.Right, the bulk of this document is supposed to be technical specifications on public improvements or improvements in the right of way, whether they're the installation of gas lines or water lines or sewer lines, thickness of pavement, any kind of repair.Also, it'll specify culvert diameters and those sorts of things that the state of Vermont requires whenever you redo a road, you upgrade.In the beginning of it, it looks sort of like it's supposed to match up with some of the planning and zoning documents, because there's the potential that whenever somebody puts in a new development, they're going to put in improvements that'll be taken over by the town at some point, whether it's gonna be a road or a storm water system or what have you.So these have been in development for about five years.Right now, they're still stuck in planning.It's been a couple of years I think since Kendall and Pete Goslin took a look at them.This is, one of my goals is to restart the review and final approval of this document.The current public works specs are on our website.They look nothing like this.They are essentially a hand cobbled collection of documents that's been photocopied a million times, and it's pretty sloppy.Even though this is quite a hefty document, it's a lot more professional than what we have.So you get an idea of what it is we're trying to do.I'm not expecting you to look at it and comment at this point.If you do want to look at it and read it and comment, let me know, but this would come back to you after everyone else is passed off on it.Okay.Whose comments did you say are on there now?The planning commission.Okay.Is this the type of document that other towns have?Yes.Did we liberate some of the information from other towns?I'm not sure.Okay .I'm not sure where - Some of it's definitely from somewhere.the basic part of it came from.Okay, sorry.I'm just thinking like, why invent the wheel, and some are bigger.Great..The thing about the taxi lane idea.Okay, yeah.Yeah.Okay, so there may be some striking of unnecessary information that we liberated from larger towns.Wish I had known this was the first draft before I read it , but once the process , - It's riveting though.Yeah, it's interesting.What's the process for, how does this, like, it sounds like it's going to the department heads, then back to the Planning Commission, and then to us.Yes, and then the Planning Commission, yup.And then it would be adopted as an ordinance.Cool.I was trying to figure out how, you know, how it goes together - Right.with zoning and which comes first, you know, we're -- - It's sort of the detailed, - Overlapse.but there is a lot of overlap.Yeah.So it's sort of the detail, for my interpretation, it's like the detail of the zoning that's not in zoning, but there's a lot of detail on here that you would assume would be in a zoning regulation.Yeah, and it seems like some of it would be, some of it comes to us with the access permits, but then some of it is DRB. - Well, those sections are not good sections though.Right.That's the thing.Yeah, there is, well, it's good to know that someone else is gonna be looking at this and then coming back to us, because a lot of these comments are definitely relevant.I guess they just haven't been addressed since they were put in here.And so I'm guessing that these comments are related to the, to our current zoning since the date on the document is 2007.Right.Okay.All right, well, we'll let them work on it and then.But it does seem like having better standards that are consistent is a good thing.Seems like a good thing.Yeah, and this should be updated along with the, - Yeah.zoning document.I mean, I hate to make it bigger, but maybe it would be part of the zoning.Well that be done, because we've already heard, like, Ray, 60 some odd page - I know, I know.zoning document.This is sort of the, the details of putting it together.Right.So I wouldn't have 150.Right, 'cause that would definitely scare people.I guess we'd keep it separate.Yeah.You know, okay.Yeah.What is your goal with this timeline?Well, ideally, I'd like to have something in front of the Select Board by the end of the year, by December to be able to be voted on.Okay.Yeah, I agree with that, because I don't think it makes sense to keep, I went and looked for the old regulations, and they don't really make sense, and it doesn't make sense to keep building without a unified code, whether the zoning laws have been updated or not.I think you could obviously look at it either way, the inside-out or the outside-out.Right, and maybe the, maybe it'll get the planning and zoning folks a little bit more oopmh when they're looking to do some of their work.It says, well, the road standards are this, and so those are passed, - Right, exactly.and those are set.But then the things like Mary was talking about earlier with, you know, sidewalks, - Right.do they need them, you know, if we can get some clarity on that with this.Right.Yeah, I think that in the five years that it has been since they've been reviewed, a lot has happened, so some of this, the questions are answered, like, you know, there's a section on the pedestrian and recreation paths.I mean, maybe not answered, but there's at least more of a in town now regarding that.So we'll let them look at it, and then we'll look at it again.Bam.Anything else on that?No. - Okay.I guess just one quick question.Should we if we have the extra time look at it, and if we have comments, make it, or should we just wait until there's a more refined version of this before we spend our time on it?I would say don't spend any time on it, but if you want to, that'd also be.No, that's all I need to know.I didn't know you if were.You were so enthralled.Like with the comments that were made.Okay.Yeah, parts are very good.Absolutely.Yeah, yeah.The one sort of, there was one comment about the fact that what was in there was not at all legal.It was just sort of some comment about, \"We think this is what should happen on,\" and I, and that definitely should be counted so.So we'll let them do their job, and then we'll take a look at it.Bruce.Can we make that available to the public?I think so.Jeff, can that be, the working document be on the website?It can be if you want it to be.It won't be updated as they go through it probably.They're not gonna post it every time we, - No .this one document?If it's a coincided thing with the zoning document, I mean, we just got to throw, talking about how we didn't get that word out there, and you know, anybody that's thinking about doing a development, and you're gonna put some new road standards in front of people in December, I think people ought to know about it.Yeah.You know, if anybody's in the works, as of right now, the DRB keeps waving all the private road specs.So I think if you can get it done sooner than later, maybe stop them from waiving it.I just think anything that should be available to the public should be, so if somebody has a comment on it, that's constructive comments.Right.And who's the current owner of this document?Is it the Planning Office?Right now, it's in the Planning Office.Okay, okay.Mary?An offshoot of what Bruce said.We've been reviewing some of the Development Review Board decisions, and I'm surprised at some of the things that are required by our zoning document, and they, liberty of the DRB is the waive them.There's a lot of inconsistencies there.Something that's supposed to be good for Southview, that's good for Graceville and Pint, you know, if it's consistent, and I don't think it's right for folks to always assume that the town is gonna take over a road.I think that's, the planning shouldn't be that if I'm gonna build this, the town's going to take it, and I'm never gonna have any responsibility for it, because every time we take a road, I think we get a lot as an asset, because perhaps there's high value homes there, but I don't think it should always be that the town has to take over all the, you know, if you had to, if the town had to take over the responsibility for all common land in town, for example, that's pretty fierce.And that means you have the responsibility for after a wind storm or a snow storm to get the widowmakers out of the trees.I don't think that's a good policy overall, but if the DRB is consistently waiving requirements, and if the applicant doesn't get what they want waived, and they come before this Board, and they make their appeal, they say, \"Well you know, we need this, and I can't put a development of The Cheese Factory unless you wave A, B, C, and D\".It's just, you know, that there's so much inconsistency, and finding this in some of the recent DRB decisions, it's pretty stunning.Thank you.Thank you.And just about posting this document, I agree with Bruce in principle, but I would suggest that we actually postpone that it doesn't have comments in it, unless we have the permission - Oh. - of the person that made those comments to make the comments public.I think it was the whole.Was it the whole thing?Well, 'cause we got that other memo that is the PC Subcommittee Comments, 2011.Right, that just spells out the comments.Right, right, so it was -- - The other document that was -- - It was a subcommittee of the committee.I mean, I think it's much better with the comments, - I agree.than putting it up without the comments, and people are gonna get all freaked out.I'm not arguing with that.It's just, it's just the context, where they're made in a context where they were expected to be made public and so .And I think it -- - I'm not really sure that, I mean, this could be requested of us now, so, - Right, it's public.but putting it public in there, also there's no names on it, so.Right, and it's, - And .and the other document just sort of lists all of those changes - Right.that have been highlighted in this four-page document.So. - So yes.So I can post it with comments then, is that the?Yes.Could we update the due date for this to fall of 2013 to take a first look at?Sure.It came out in 2007 or 2008.Work in progress.Okay, approval of the minutes from April 15.Any comments?I move to approve the minutes from April 15th.Second.Any discussion?I did have something.I didn't have anything.Oh, you know what?I didn't have anything either.I think the only thing was just in the, under the members present, just fixing the, fixing the titles.Oh, yeah, I see that.Oh. - To you and vice chair.Right.I've been demoted.Right .Whatever .I call the question.Okay, all in favor?Aye.Aye.Any opposed?Ayes have it.Okay, let's see.Oh, does anybody want to report on Select Board committees?Well, I could give a little a rundown just on Economic Development activities.So somebody from the Committee's on the Water Restructuring Committee.Water Rate Task Force.Water Rate Task Force.So I think, or what do you, we thought the best thing that Economic Development Committee can do is just spread the word, about, right.Spread the word about the significant rate increase, Yeah.Yeah.And about the annual meeting in May, so the -- - Next week, yup.Next week, yeah.But I'm not sure what else - Well, and, just to, yeah.we can do except make sure people aren't surprised, or, I mean, they may be surprised, but at make sure they know about it.And to connect the final dot in the way to control rate increases in the future is by adding more customers to the water system, and that means developing the village.Yeah, yeah.Which leads into another thing that's kind of bumped up as a priority, which is what kind of clean up can happen on the Creamery site.And that seems to be the issue that has been slowing anything down there for years and years.And so some people are looking into, have contacted people at the state to, I sent you that email chain, right?Just to figure out how we can kind of move that clean up along.The brown fields?Yes, yeah, yeah.Because I think I recall it's like the municipality has to be the applicant, right?I think there are a couple of different scenarios.Okay.It could be partnership or possibly even a private owner if there are funds available.Okay.But so the Economic Development Committee, that has kind of bumped up as a priority of, because it's the thing that slows everything down.Right.And it's really a big hurdle, and it's not entirely clear what's there right now.Are there, you know, hazards that we need to be looking at more closely to see what the status is.There's some tanks over there.We should know that regardless of a cleanup conversation, - Yeah.just because it's a safety question.Exactly.And if we have knowledge that it's there, and we don't do anything, then that's not a good thing.Right, so we need to figure out what's there, at least figure out who knows what's there.Right.Right, there is a report from the Regional Planning Commission that details what - Oh, yeah.contamination they found.But it just, you know, if anything's gonna happen there, that's the first thing that's gonna have to happen is moving on some kind of clean up, which will bring in more people to the water system, cycle, right?And then the other thing was we met with Jeff and Mike Weisel, the town engineer, last week and a few people from Economic Development, and who else?Oh, and Christy Winters and Kathleen Christie talked to us last time about the rain garden, - Right.potential there.So Jeff pulled everybody together to get some input on that with the town engineer, and so he's got a rough design.Took some input about just, you know, whether it's 90-degree parking or angled parking, where, you know, how the traffic flow will work.And he's, the engineer's talking with the railroad about some of the, where we have bought their land, and that seemed like a great conversation.Right, what we trying to do is hammer out an idea this is what we're gonna proceed with, and you know, there's been a lot of suggestions, and it's come down to the time where I have to say enough suggestions, start making decisions on what we're going to do, and he's still got some issues with the railroad right of way that he has to clear up, but, and then we have to submit an application to the Development Review Board.So there's a lot that has to happen before we can start constructing anything.Yeah, and there, I think the idea was to get a pretty solid draft that then people can still comment on, - Great.and we're gonna make sure we contact the neighbors down there too, just so that they have some input on it.Great.But thanks for pulling everybody together Jeffrey.It seemed like a really good thing.Excellent.When's the next meeting?The third Friday of each month, - Right, .at Richmond Cafe, 7:30 a.m, Richmond Cafe.Okay.Can talk about a little bit about website and water sewer.So website first, because that's more exciting.Jeff and I had a conference call with a gentleman from, was it City Plus?Yup, Civics Plus.Civics Plus, which is another web developer for, they specialize in strictly municipalities, government websites.They do hosting, they do tech support.We can update it ourselves, like all the stuff we want, and they are looking to get into the Vermont market.They don't have a town in Vermont yet as part of the repertoire.And of course I was like, \"Does this mean that we can get a discount\"?And he's like, \"We can negotiate something\".And I was like, \"Oh, okay\".But it is expensive.And so I told Jeff that I would work on the pluses and minuses of going high tech versus low tech, and I need to get through the water rate and meeting before I can really concentrate on spending some time on this.But basically, it's gonna come down to do we want to invest in our community and maybe that's gonna bring more business here, maybe that's gonna bring more people that live here.I mean, Richmond's already a popular living destination.People want to live here.But we need to improve the business climate.So do we want to invest, or do we want to go baby steps?And so it's really gonna come down to the pluses and minuses of how much we want to spend and what do we want out of it.And the guy was willing to do a Go-To Meeting for a demonstration of their websites, how to use it, how the, services that they provide, kind of all the fancy add-ons and that we could do at our leisure, or we could all be at work or at home, as long as it was at 3:00 p.m. on a Tuesday afternoon, we could all get invites and do it on our computer.We don't have to be altogether, so.Well, except that constitutes a meeting.Oh right, so it's.So it would probably have to be, if we're -- - If we can't talk with each other?Usually, so it depends on, if it's set up so that we can communicate, which often you can on Go-To Meeting, because there's a little column, you can say I have a question.Right, right.Yeah.So that would constitute a meeting, I think.All right, yeah, no, if we could communicate with each other, that would certainly constitute a meeting, but if we could only communicate with the presenter, would it?But I think we're still a little ways away, because I wouldn't want to pursue that if we weren't semi-serious about going high tech, and I don't know if we're there yet.Right, and high tech meaning, what are those things that the other website - Exactly.Right.isn't going to provide, and are those cool to have or necessary?And that's the goal of my pluses and minuses.Great, that's great.Okay.So. So Water Rate Task Force.The task force has met weekly since the end of March, so we've met four times, and then we had a special meeting last Monday, which Amy and Chris were at, 'cause it was a water, we invited the water and sewer commissioners to hear kind of our conversation about our decision-making process and the difficult decisions that we've had to make, which are not easy.The things that are impacting the rates currently are misallocation of septage revenue, meaning that septage revenue has been taken from wastewater and applied to water to artificially lower the rates for many, many years.We have declining septage revenues, which are influencing the rates.We have debt payments that are coming due that are primarily driven by Jericho Road.But we also did Browns Court.We did the lining of the sewers for, you know, I mean, we've done a lot of improvement projects over the past couple of years, and they're necessary, and they're prudent, and they're responsible, but they're expensive.And lastly, we're fully committing to funding the capital plan.We fund the capital plan and the general fund, so we need to do that on the water and the wastewater side.We have been slowly eating away at the amount of money that we put into capital to the point where we've depleted our capital funds, to the point where, in my opinion, they're not unsustainable.If we had, if right now, we had a major break or a major situation, we would be in trouble, because we do not have the funds in reserve to cover that.So those are the influences that are driving a significant and really doubling of water and sewer rates.And we talked a little bit, because I know that there were some concern after the last meeting about the tank, and that you're trying to raise a million dollars by July.Can you talk a little bit about timing so that people have a sense of what you're looking at?Yeah, so the water rates right now are not currently being influenced by Depot Street, East Main Street, the new tank.The tank is still in its preliminary planning processes.We need a new tank, because it's passed, it's way past its useful life.The people who inspect the tank no longer guarantee that it will last there, because often tank companies will go in, and they'll be like, \"You got another 10 years.You're good for another 15, 20,\" you know.They're at the point now where like we were willing, they were willing to not come and do an inspection on it and take that money and apply it to a future contract, 'cause they're like, \"Basically, we can't do anything.It's beyond repair.It's beyond maintenance at this point\".We chose to go through and have the maintenance done, because we wanted to know what we were really looking at, but, so past its useful life, past being able to be repaired, it's undersized for the demand of the system for fire protection and just supply, and the biggest one, and this is really the driver, I mean, not that useful life isn't a driver, but we're under a state timeline to address low pressure issues in the higher reaches of the community including the schools.And that's really the biggest thing is pressures are routinely below what is acceptable in the water supply role.And if we don't address those, those could potentially lead to enforcement actions, which means you're gonna have to do the work, but you're gonna have to pay a penalty.So that's what's driving it.So the plan?So the plan is we're in preliminary negotiations with landowners for a tank site.We don't have an answer yet.We'll do planning through the summer, including surveys and survey of the land.We'll get final numbers from our engineer and probably do a vote as early, and I don't expect it to happen, but November with construction not even happening until the following summer, and then the bond payment wouldn't come due for another two years after that.So we're still three years out from having to really pay for at the soonest for a new tank, and that gives us an opportunity to recruit new businesses, get more connections to put some money away into capital so that perhaps we can take some of that capital money and apply it to have a conversation about sharing the costs on the entire community of some of these capital improvement items.That's another goal of the Water Rate Task Force Committee is to brainstorm and potentially propose ways to share the costs of this benefit to the town among the town, so.Okay, thank you.And I have to say that, and I've said this in the water, in the task force meetings and at the last special meeting, but the task force has been really wonderful.Not everybody's gotten what they wanted, but we've had very candid discussions.They've, we've all been willing to compromise, and we've been very forthcoming in our opinions, and it's been a positive experience for me.I was very nervous going into it, knowing what needed to be done and knowing it wasn't gonna be easy, and it wasn't gonna be popular, and it wasn't gonna be fun, but the people that I've been working with have, it's been great.We've had great conversation, so.Great, thank you.So I want to thank the Water and Sewer Task Force Committee.Yeah, thank you.Thanks.Department reports.Right now, we only received the planning report this time.Like to also note the Richmond Rescue quarterly reports.Right.If anybody has any questions or comments on those, we can go over that, but otherwise, they've been submitting them.We had a meeting with the Richmond Historical Society about certain changes to the Round Church Green and also trying to address some of the neighbor complaints there.There are two issues.One happens to be the weekly gatherings on the weekends of bicyclists and joggers that tend to monopolize the parking on Round Church Road beginning very early in the morning and ending late at night.And also the upcoming bicentennial celebration that's going to put a big concentration of activities and people on the green that how do we address the two residents, or the four residents, the two families that live on Round Church Road.So we're sort of trying to come up with some ideas to manage the ongoing problem, which is probably going to be, start out with raising some awareness with either small signs or flyers or having somebody down there sort of walking on the weekend to let people understand they're people that live there and to be courteous.And also how we can manage to get the Richardsons and the Shermans in and out while keeping other people have that space at the same time.Essentially closing the road, so it's pedestrians only, except for the people that live there.For the celebration, not .Oh, okay.Yeah, and their conversation was closing one end and then keeping the other end open for the neighbors to go in and out.Is that right?Partially open.Partially open, yeah.But there would be a road closed sign so that it wouldn't be open to the public for the celebration.Right.And I do have one item, a couple of meetings ago, we came to you with a work plan, Chittenden County Regional Planning Commission Work Plan Proposal to do a traffic study for the village.It actually extended out to Route Two when the, we had talked to one of the Regional Planning Commission's sort of retained engineers that work on these projects, and they happened to be STANTEC, and they put together a budget of $40,000.The project was approved at $20,000.When we talked to STANTEC to find out what we could get for $20,000, and Kathleen and I feel that what we can get for half the amount of money is not worth.It essentially do sort of some problem identification but not any analysis of alternatives.And we already know what the problem is, - Right.is there's traffic choke points here.Right.Without any discussion of what to do about it as the town grows, it's a wasted effort.Right.Our recommendation is to try to pursue this next year, 'cause there's also a secondary issue that as this came up, we had finalized our budget, and we didn't have the matching funds in next year's budget.So I would like to revisit this in the fiscal year '15 budget and include the match in the budget, so we could pursue it at that time.Okay, okay.Any discussion?Does that follow along with, 'cause that came up in the meeting regarding Route Two pedestrian bike route.Oh, that bike path that was not gonna be with the road, but it was gonna be kind of parallel to it somewhere?No, there, well, all options are on the table right now, but part of it was the fact that there's gonna to be repaving of Route Two in between, from Bridge Street out to the interstate, sorry, or just beyond to 117.Is that right?Right, it'll be to essentially the new bridge.I think they're probably gonna do a stretch from the bridge through Williston also.Oh, they are, okay, so.When is that gonna happen?2014?Well, the summer of 2014.It will be after they do the parking, the I imagine.Right, right.Yeah.And so in that conversation, they want to know what the issues are with, you know, traffic in Richmond, and a lot came up at the meeting about the lights in the backup, and the turning, you know, on red when the pedestrians have, you can walk some so.Right, five beeps.Yeah, come up with the time you get to go across.Yeah, yeah, yes.Yeah, you have, yeah, no time to get across, so.To cross.So this, the answers to these questions are gonna have to be answered before that, we get to that point on a study, right?Right, not only that, but some of the other issues, I think this grew out of some of the concerns that has, you know, there's an issue with the market and Railroad Street already, and as the Creamery gets developed, will there also be an issue with Jolena Court and their offset, so do we have one light, do we have two lights, do we have any lights?Is there a way to manage that as well as how else traffic gets around from outside of Richmond going through Richmond.Right.And so it's, you know, was supposed to be a much bigger project rather than just saying do we need a light at Railroad Street?Because that only answers one part of the prompt.Right, okay, all right.And then Jeff, as far as the light, it sounds like they fixed something.Something was off with the timing.Is that the most recent thing, - Right.and they came and fixed something?Periodically, this light up here will reset its clock is what I'm told is, and it goes to essentially what the very early warning timing is, which favors Route Two.And what they have to do is come back and reset it to the correct time so that between 7:15 a.m. and 8:00 a.m., it's on a totally timing schedule.And I have the contact information for the gentleman that does that.So it was the first time I'd spoken to him actually, and he said, \"Anytime it happens, contact me, don't contact District Five, don't contact the secretary of AOT, you know, just contact me, I'll come out and do it\".Okay.So we shouldn't have to suffer through it for three days at a time.Do you know if it changed anything when they fixed it, did it?Yup, well the on \"Front Porch Forum\"'s gonna be, \"Oh, whoever did something, it's much better now\".Yeah.Right, well the, this is, the way it works is the early morning timing, it's like essentially a seven second green, which is not enough time for Bridge Street.Right, right.The normal timing, it actually does have a delay at the end where Jericho Road stops first, - Right, right, okay, and they can still.and Bridge Street gets four seconds clear.Exactly.Now I never knew that, but I think a lot of people don't know that.A lot of people don't, because if you're coming down Jericho Road, you have the red, and they're going like, \"No, I have red light\" .Right, because they're still using.They think that they have green, so they think you still have a green.Right.And so people do not know coming up Bridge Street that that turns green, and Jericho turns red, so that they're still -- - Right, the delayed green.Or .Yeah.It's a mess.Right, so normally, it's not really that bad unless the timing goes off, - Right.or unless sometimes you'll get two school buses together that for a variety of reasons, they have to, they get backed up one behind the other, and they have to wait a full bus length before they cross the railroad tracks, and you get two buses that have to do that, it can add a lot of time, - Right.But you know, there's no doubt there's bad traffic there.But I think the light is doing the best it can right now, but whenever it resets, whether there's a power surge or, you know, the wind hits it just right or something, you can tell, it's like a seven second light, and that's just not enough time to get anybody through.And I still do think that something needs to be done about the fact that when people get the cross sign, the pedestrian cross sign, the traffic that's going in that same direction gets a green light, so if you're taking a turn, you're turning at the same time someone's crossing.It is really dicey.So that needs to change.There needs to be five seconds or 10 seconds or whatever it is - When nobody can go.when nobody can go.Four-way red.Right.And only the pedestrians can go.Right.Yeah, I've encountered that in the mornings, and I'm like, \"I have green, like I, why are you going\"?Exactly.\"Oh, you have walkie person, so all right\".Okay.I just want to say that the Richmond Rescue Quarterly Report was excellent, and I love getting those reports from them.Looks like they are definitely moving in the right direction.That's good to hear, - Yeah.because where they were a year ago, I mean, that's, it's a long year.It's, definitely, absolutely, and they've made a lot of .Organizations have difficulty changing, and yeah.and they've done a great job of it, so.Anything else on department work reports, or?Just one thing that several of us did get CPR training and training on our defibrillator.We have the defibrillator mounted on the wall out here.So I got certified, and then got certified, Martha Lang, I forget who the fourth person was, but.Excellent.So that I think it was Kathleen.So that during a meeting, one of us could operate it if we needed to.And we got that, thanks to Richmond Rescue, got there as a grant, donated to us.That's excellent.Good.Hopefully we never have to use it, but it's good to know that it's here.And for anyone who has never been trained, you can open it up, and the instructions are there, so don't hesitate if no one trained is around.Look at the AED, read the directions, follow the directions, and you could save a life.Right, it won't work - Right, if you.except when it needs to work.Right.You can't push it and shock somebody.It's a computer, and -- - Yeah, it knows exactly what it needs to do.It speaks to you, it tells you what to do.In, if it's not right, or if it senses the wrong heart rhythm, it won't work, so.Wow, I experienced one of those, not personally.So that's good, excellent.Consent agenda?The Air 1-058 payment amendment.Right, this -- - Should we move to the consent agenda, because isn't that the goal of the consent agenda?Oh right, and the highway access permit.So I move the consent agenda.Second.Discussion?The payment schedule reflects what should be the final payout amount, because we use 99 point something percent of what we're supposed to, we never took the full amount, so this amends it down to what the final, final loan is supposed to be.And this was the ERA money that we did the sewers and the storm sewers, which was 50% loan forgiveness, 50% forgiveness and 50% loan.So it was, - You'll never see that again by the way.it was $691,492.76.This was the work we did in 2010.And our repayment amount is $345,746.38 with a 2% management fee to the state.It's not called interest.It's called a fee.That's good.So this is essentially slightly less than what's in the budget, but.And this has been accounted for in the proposed budget.Excellent.And then the access permit is on Thompson Toad.It's for Gary Bresser.He is proposing to build a duplex with some agricultural improvements at Betty Preston's barn, that property that he bought last year, and he's proposing an upgraded access to Thompson Road.Right now, it's just the dirt lane, and this is his request for real access.Okay, did you move it?A second?Any further discussion?Mary?During the process of taking pictures today for our listers updates, I know I said there was activity on this lot without an access permit, and we do not have a set alteration permit or any kind of a permit for activity on that lot in our files related to TR-0069.And outside of that, I don't know if this highway access is supposed to be some sort of a first attempt at a remedy, but there's site alteration work, and believe a bucket loader was over there after we took pictures of the site alteration.So I just don't know why there's not a permit issue or activity on this law - Okay.I don't know why either.Jeff, can you check - Stuff's going on.into that Jeff?Sure.Thank you.Thank you.Any other discussion?All in favor?Aye.Aye.Any opposed?The ayes have it.Approval of warrants and purchase orders.So on the warrants, there was one mistake.It was on the payments.So the Department of Health regarding the Bordeaux property.The payment is $506.It should actually be $566.It was really hard to read the person's handwriting when they wrote it out, but the email very clearly shows it should be $566.Okay.Thanks.I could have been there.Okay, I just, it's perpendicular, and I wrote it on that warrant.just sign there.You can.And .Okay.There you go.All right, so warrants are good.Will, do you have those to pass around?So you'll, so we can approve these that we're gonna put them with the changes, will change?Yep.Okay.Just mark that change and we'll.Yeah, it's marked.Okay, doing that.Is there a need for executive session tonight Jeff?No. - Really?Okay.Are there items, other items you want to talk about being put on the next agenda?Who's gonna do warrants?Yeah, let's talk about that.I haven't done it for awhile, I'll do it.Okay.There you go.All right, soon as we get done signing, is there a motion to adjourn?Oh actually, you know, I actually can't make it to the next meeting.Oh, you're not gonna be able to make it to the next meeting too?Afraid not.Okay, so.When's the next meeting?The 19th.I mean, I'm always here.I mean, I don't go anywhere.The 20th.I forgot about that.It's the only thing on my schedule.I'll be here.Ann, you'll be here?I'll be here.Okay, so we have a quorum.at the airport.Okay.Yeah, that's the after graduation weekend.I'm going to be working all weekend.All right, so we will have a quorum for the next meeting, so.Yeah.Okay.Who's volunteering to do the warrants?Who is volunteering to do warrants?Taylor, you can.Taylor, I'll do it.Taylor was just volun-told to do the warrants.Volun-told, bam.Have you done it yet?It's really fun.Not yet.Did you say it's really fun?So can we get two people to do it next time with Taylor, because he hasn't done it, so he just doesn't do it.I can do it.Thank you, that would be great.I promise I'll do it .Just go through with them, since it is a learning process.There are some special invoices that we get that sometimes you have to do a little digging to understand why we're paying what we're paying.All right, I'll entertain a motion to adjourn if there's nothing else.So moved.I'll second.All in favor?Aye.Aye.Any opposed?We are adjourned.Thank you.I noticed in the last couple of meeting minutes that I'm on --", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Richmond_Selectbd_5-6-13.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Richmond_Selectbd_5-6-13.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Richmond_Selectbd_5-6-13.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/Richmond_Selectboard_5-19-14/Richmond_Selectboard_5-19-14.mp3", "text": "Let's call the meeting to order.We're going to proceed in a...Without our Chairman tonight.And as Vice-Chair, I'll take over just to get myself moving here.Thank you.Maybe he's out on a call.Yeah, I don't know.Emergency.While I'm waiting for the agenda to come up, would like to start with a...commendation to the girls varsity lacrosse team at MMU, which remains undefeated, 16 to 10 against Rice tonight.- Did they lose one?I don't think so.Maybe one.Maybe they tied one.So do you want to do Public Comment?Yeah.Let me just, let me just get my act together here.Sorry, I just didn't quite have the agenda up in front of me.Darn it.Why don't, why don't we start Public Comment, any, any comment from the public?Thank you.Prior to diving into the agenda?Anybody?Yes, sir.I'm here about the supposed to be on here for today.It is.It is.It is...Where is it?Oh, it's under outstanding zoning issues update.So it's in the, in the first little bit there, it's that item 1-B and I apologize for the sunlight.- Yeah, time heals all wounds.Okay, let's get going here.First of all, we're gonna start with the Will's Farm Conservation Reserve Fund Purchase.Jeff, you want to set us up there?We're, at the last meeting, we heard a presentation from the Richmond Land Trust and the Conservation Commission about the purchase of about 22 acres of land, which is just to the east of the farm barn in the old house, which we're calling the Will's Farm property, as part of that old farm, that's been subdivided.The Richmond land trust has plans to use two funding sources to purchase that, 64,000 from the Conservation Reserve Fund and the balance from a State Grant, which we'll hear about later in June.They plan to preserve the parcel, and use it for recreational purposes.They mentioned they were willing to give part of that parcel to the schools, to advance...Youth sports, for the schools.And we discussed, you know, pretty much the, the...What the property looked like.We arranged site visits.I know that three select board members toward the site.Taylor's not here.You, Arnold...I think those are the only ones that made it.And the Health Officer also.Also.So the question remains, the request is $64,000 from the Conservation Reserve Fund.We can get into this now, after some discussions, the town would like to see two things on that property.One is some sort of reservation for an area for water and sewer to go through because there's been a request from the Reaps, that own the former barn and farmhouse that...That they get municipal water and sewer that's really been in development.There's no concrete plans yet, but that's something that the town, the Water Commission would be willing to see happen.But that has to cross school property to do that.And then also cross this property to do that.And the second thing was, you've got an email from Fran Thomas that explains the issue for a long time.There had been a thought that there could be an evacuation route from the schools down the route 2, and that there's any number of directions I could take.But again, there's nothing concrete.There's never been any design for that, but we'd like to see a reservation with that.I think that we can approve the request if the board wanted to approve the request, subject to negotiating some sort of reservation for both of those items.And I'd like to hear what the Conservation Commission and the Richmond Land Trust feel.Any questions from the slow court?Those, personally I think, those are reasonable requests.It's about preserving options.Yeah, though, the cost of some of those is unclear.There's no way to really resolve anything- - Well and that's why it's just kind of holding it as a, you know, reserve an all.Just to be clear.It's not possible to make a firm commitment for any one of those three different neighbors, both the water sewer, which have different issues based on flow and direction.And then the road based on the slope is a substantial project.But if we don't, if we don't do first in, then we may lose the potential for, for the future.So the benefit is if we hold this and it's a hold, it's not a commitment- - Right.It's more of a potential commitment for the future.It's, it's the opportunity.Exactly.But not a obligation.Yeah.I support both.I strongly support support secondary emergency egress from the school.Congress person board, from the public, and the school.Yeah, thank you.I would just like to say if this does go through that, Both of those asked for our Reserve, without cost to the reefs and also without cost to the school or the town.We're already billing up a 64,000 from the Conservation Reserve Fund.And then the second, please...How has the acquisition and upkeep going to differ from other parcels that Richmond Land Trust currently owns?It brings to mind, when Mr. Vegans came in last year and had a complaint or a- - Yeah.I think it was about a year, maybe a year and a half ago, a complained about a trespass on his property, from the folks who were using the path and just trespassing on his land.And the other end of that stick, if you will, is that there's trespassing on my land, and there was supposed to be some action from the Richmond Land Trust to stop that, it has not happened.So what's going to be different from the acquisition and upkeep from this parcel, that's in a highly visible location, from the lack of maintenance and upkeep on areas where they can't be seen as easily.So I would like, and I do not believe that those are unfair questions.Thank you.Any other questions from the public?Why don't we have the, the Conservation mission.Were they prepared to come up and present on the project?I know Ernie's here.Okay.Ernie, would you like to- - I might not have anything to present but I'm happy to.Well look- - Well this might be a better question for the Richmond Land Trust then, because we're talking about reserved property, not necessarily conservation commission.Would anybody from the Land Trust like to talk about Confused access, I guess is the - Yeah, I'm , by the way.I'm here of the Richmond Land Trust.And in terms of the first two comments issues...We supportable for those constraints.You know where we can get money from Conservation Trust Fund.We've contacted, and we have that in email and we'll get in writing also, their agreement that, right away as being reserved for water sewer, and where we see egress ...Defined with design.And he envisioned that it would be done with, at no costs for the component that belongs to the Land Trust.this purchase goes through.can't speak to adjoining manuals of school, of course.And in terms of concerns about controlling access.I can only speak to that, parcels that we seek to have the parcels on well signed.All of our preserves, whether it is not intended to be accessed to the adjoining parcels.We have summons in place.I think, as far as I know, on the , I think it is concern.We have no parking signs about parking.I think that is relatively mitigated.Obviously we can't control even woods.Everybody who might walk through the woods.I, myself, live across from the woods.And yet people walk through it without asking.And, but certainly it's our commitment that we want to be good neighbors and do our thing to control access to their neighbors without going to have egress from our parcels, to get to parcels.So, we'll put those things in place for this parcel.Upkeep of keep with the question.Yeah upkeep is, I mean, the signage, and then we can do the control, so there's not unwanted trespassing on the adjoining parcels.The original land owners wouldn't want that.So I get the signage and upkeep.What's the other issue?How else would somebody prevent somebody going from this land to the adjoining piece of land?I'm not sure what that question...Some of it is up to the neighbor where, you know, whoever the neighbor might be.Our lands are typically open to the public and oftentimes boundaries are known.Sometimes boundaries are not clearly defined and certainly enforced by state law.People have a right to walk from one parcel to the next.I think we have my correct science have been made for the back of the parcel of various questioning to the installment.Some additional signs that they're made to assist the adjoining landowner, where there's a fair amount of wine nonwhite activity on Brian Hilton.With the beneficiaries of that mountain biking, you know, sometimes it's fine.Sometimes it's not fine.We don't support it's use on some of the properties, but it does take place.The, the two easy ones that will potentially be on this property for water and sewer and the road at some future date.It's contemplated that they will be up buying the interstate.And at least that's the conversations we've had with broth as a conservation board that the, that access and the logical access is up against the interstate fence, which seems big when we mark the site makes a kind of sense, at least for water and for the road sewage or setback, it seems less clear in terms of, you know, slope, which direction things flow.What about the acres of the actual site?Who's gonna do the lawn mowing, the snowplowing?Who's gonna pay for that?Well you'd need to go back to build on that a little bit to, to make that site into a, a sledding that will require the removal of a fair amount of trees and brush.And I would imagine that you have a plan for getting it to the, that final vision and then maintaining it is crucial.Yeah, I think our plan for the improvement of the parcel or the, of the parcel is to raise the funds required to do so.And the benefits of the project.If in some instance, you are not able to raise the funds to make it a cycle of life and you would and you would have the same parcel that provide all benefits to the school with due egress to the fields.We think for all purposes of the conservation funds, that would not that just not feasible the project and we wanted widespread community support for the project.We're optimistic that we can get that down to that favorable costs.You're saying it involves - We, we need all our parcels.We plow saffron preserve it's part of the budget, the funds that we raised, we all feel their upkeep all across.One comment that I've heard is a question about safety.And while there is a fair amount of dispense from the bottom of the go to the, the paved road, thinking how 12 year old voice Any thoughts on, you know, what the engineering that looks like, like how likely is it then a kid on a sled in the right place that can get issues could get that far and avoid getting any - put up a fence seasonal or year-round fence to prevent that possibility.The reason there's quite a long run out from the hill to, to, to, to, with a slight update at the end, I think a fence will be adequate for anybody who's pushing that in fact with.So I guess I'm, I keep coming back to the fact that while the conservation commission saying, wouldn't it be nice to have a sledding hill?This is 20 plus acres of, of a piece of property that has come into the come into the village is one of the first things you see.And, and whether they put a sledding hill on it or not, they still want to conserve it.I, I don't want to be belaboring the points of the sledding hill and, and miss the forest for the trees here.As it were.As it were.I think that that we're getting stuck on, on minor details.And the fact that if there is a sledding hill, there's not going to be a driveway.There's not gonna be a parking area, I think, but even still, I mean, this is that it's, it's, it's not the, it's not the purpose of the property is to be a sledding hill, the purpose of the property is to conserve it.If we can deal with that provisionally, throw the sledding hill improvements into the other provisional items, including the road water, so where those were ideas, but not currently concrete.So what you're saying is that the project should, and does stand on its own merits as a conservation project.I agree with that as well.Actually, the reason that I asked the sledding of the question initially was because there's something funky going on with erosion.At least there was during my vision, there's very broad dispersion of sediment that was coming from somewhere.And it would be good to understand that completely before removing a bunch of trees.It seems like anyway, it certainly does seem to, to be a, a valuable conservation project from my perspective, either comments or questions from the public or anybody else.I would just remind folks that the, there were folks in our last meeting, including representatives from the schools.And we've also received the email from a middle school teacher who has ideas about how to use some of that land creatively.So I'm going to make a motion that we authorize the use of $64,000 from the conservation reserve fund to be granted to the Richmond land trust for the purpose of acquiring and conserving 22 acres of the former former Willis farm on route 2 in Richmond.Can we have the caveat.oh, Of course, friendly amendment or addition to my motion with reserve the right of right of ways for water and sewer and an egress from the school through the property.Subject to an agreement to do.So subject to an agreement to do so.And we're still assessing all right.Any discussion?All right.All in favor.Aye.All opposed.You guys have it.All right.Moving right along outstanding zoning issues update.Thank you.Thank you very much.Thank you.Thank you.So, should we handle these one at a time Jeff?I think so.Sure.What order would you like to do that?First, I think we should take the issue that we have support for, which is the boundary line between the Curly's and the O'Brians county road.I will say that this afternoon, Denise Curly came in, and filed an appeal of the notice of violation to the DRB. So we can't impose any comments at this point until that's disposed of.But going revisiting this.And you'll see the Neil Lightener has a pattern of attachment, which is an explanation of his history with this Two neighbors on Huntington road have tried to use the town's zoning bylaws to force property boundary dispute.So the town is sort of forced to try to identify zoning violations and go after somebody to issue findings.When in fact the, the property line is ambiguous and it remains ambiguous was even though things have been surveyed, there are accusations that people have agreed to things that the other party denies.And it's really gotten to the point where we can't make any determinations.And I think our zoning officer's stymied, he was stymied all last year and we tried to get tough and say, bring people in, but it just is not cleared up.So you can see the outstanding history of this.And it's really gone back and forth as to who did what without a permit who needed a permit, where the property line line is, we can't get an agreement.Zoning doesn't make people agree where the property boundary is.It really only will put the talent environmental court or where the violation, but the issue will still be the same in front of the judge.Where's the property line who owns this site, and who owns that site?That, that does nothing to console either the Curly's or the O'Brians.And it's unfortunate, but it's almost to the point where it's beyond our ability to make any headway at all.So. - So really the options are the homeowners either mediate this themselves, or they, one of them takes the other to court, or the town picks a side and goes to environmental court and does what what's required for there.Wouldn't that be contingent also on clear accepted property lines, surveyed property lines is that an issue of dispute?Where the- - It would have to be accepted by the town in order for the town really go after it.Yeah.You guys have interest where it's...Marked surveys, marked up the lines therein for them.And they pulled up the pins.Robustly clearing the marked up the line which, I was there when did the survey.And I asked him to put several pins down through, and he did.Those are gone.And if you look at their survey in, at the back of the survey, they specifically said the stone, they dug that up that up through that, off to the side.I was told I was going to be fined a hundred dollars a day, per not moving my shed 10 feet off the line, where I didn't know where the line was because they moved the pins.They put the fence up, as clearly marked by buttons, that you guys have pictures on .We never asked you.I was told that I said would be fined, a hundred dollars a day when my shed was 10 feet off the line.But yet they're fenced clearly on my property by the pictures.Neil see, Neil even came over.I think he's the one that took the pictures.house, of the 10 feet of my property.You know, and I don't understand why I was told that, \"you move your shed, you're getting fined $100 a day, if you don't\".And as soon as I moved my sheds, they pulled the fence off, and moved it onto my property and that's what she done.There has to be some process for resolving this.And, and.You know, I just want the fence on the line.And I agreed to survey.I'm not skipping your survey.They don't know where it is.They stuck a pole in the ground, tied a string to it, created a fence that was there over top of my shed.Through a Maple Tree, to the edge of the road.and that's the boundary, and that's what they think it is.Okay well, let's, let's walk through...A process that would get us to a resolution, in truth, so it seems the thing that, that we can't, that nobody can do anything about...Without is it final determination of where the property line actually is.That's correct, Yes sorry.That's where you have to start.And there has been a surveying of that property line, and I'm not gonna, I wasn't there.I don't know what happened on the ground.Thank you for bringing that forward.But a professional surveyor has surveyed the property line.This is- - Excuse me I think- - Have there been two different surveyors?Yes.Okay and have they both come up with the same result?Within a few inches.Okay.Okay.and I'm not disputing their surveys.They're disputing their own surveys.Just to establish facts.So is there any way that the town can accept those two surveys, as the defined property line and go from there?If they are in fact the same property line, I think we would need to talk to the surveyors directly.Yes, we could.I would say we would have to use Chris Hagody as a witness.Either going in front of the DRB or not.The...Also the problem is, even though...And I'm getting this from you, I haven't talked to Chris Hagody in .Chris Hagody found a line that he says agrees with Rubenstein survey from 2003.It's not where Denise curly says it is.So the dispute is really a refusal to acknowledge what had been surveyed last year.So, the surveys are definitive then, is what you're saying?Well, we can, we can assume that, you know, I can't sit here and tell you that for sure.I can, you know, Chris mark it out.So that'll go.We can defend that decision in front of the DRB because I could see it going to environmental court, and it being very good.And again, we can have testimony from Chris Hagody on whether or not...What he did to survey the line.And the judge will make the determination.That'll at least, possibly set...Have a court decision on where the line is, possibly.It's not guaranteed.but it's, but do you agree that, that, that some way of determining- - And I think that going to court is the best way.The question is, how far does the town get involved in that?Because our attorney is going to be prosecuting or defending the appeal.Right.Well, I mean, I don't really see any other...because as we can tell them the timeline here is, the Curlys are now disputing the shared property line.They applied for a zoning, a construction permit because one of their structures is on the opposite side of that, or runs through it, Not just the fence, but, but a front porch setback and the DRB or somebody did not...Okay.So the zoning and construction permit was denied because they don't meet the setback requirements from the, from the- - There's also other zone violations for a second story addition that they put on Tuesday.Okay, so they, in addition to not meeting the current setbacks from, from the, the approved line for the fence, there's this shed, they got a denial of the source construction or the zoning construction permit.So they're appealing it to the DRB. So the DRB now has to make a determination.So it's that.So depending on what the DMB determines, then they would appeal to the Environmental Court.If you did go their way, they'd have that option.And there's another piece of the puzzle.Which Denise curly claims that, Mr. O'Bryan has signed a document, agreeing that the line is where she says it.Where the Rubenstein Survey says it is, not by what she says.By the Rubenstein survey, which I had no problem with, doing surveys.Because that was the other gentleman who did the survey.Yes.And it was within a couple of inches.Yeah, I have no problem with Rubenstein's surveys within a few inches of a Chris'.They don't remember their own surveys.That's the problem.And the only issue is they put a fence up without a permit and it needs to come down.So. The next step, I, it sounds like the next step here is to allow us to go to DRB and for the DRB to act.And then do we need to decide what we want to do contingent on the DRB decision at this point?No, it's premature to discuss that.So the next steps are DRB and what, do we know the timeframe for that?She did get the appeal in, in time for the June DRV meeting, Neil sets a schedule there.So he, he should've scheduled it for, for June.So, could this court revisit the issue after that?I recognized been going on for a while, right?So like after some number of months or years.Like when I go out for the weekend, I come back and I never know what to expect going on in there, 10 or 30 feet on my property next time around.Right, so the question for the Select Board would be.In this case, are you going to impose fines for a hundred dollars a day for not complying with the notice of violation?Since it's been appealed, let's moot at this point, And it could go on for quite some time if...If the notice of violation was upheld by the DRB and the Curlys appeal appeal to the environmental court, you could still not issue fines, but considering if you had a favorable to the town judgment in court, then you could talk about whether or not you should impose fines at that time.But this could be many months from now, if all of that comes to pass.Let's make sure that it stays on the agenda, as appropriate, contingent upon action by the DRB and what happens next.Mary?Yes.Surveys when they are recorded, surveys become legal when the surveyor their stamp on there, that is the official document.And the survey of record is the most recent survey.That is on file in the Town Clerks Office in the vault, and they're recognized by the DRB. And they are also required the survey to define the lines for subdivisions, for the transfer of property.And the fallback is always the needs and bounced description, the deed.So the survey of record should be recognized as the most recent one, if it's been recorded and should it have to go to environmental court, then the button survey will be there, hopefully.And the Rubenstein survey will be as a reference point.I don't think the button survey has been reported yet.Okay.It's going to be a three or four block road.And if it's a poor off road, it puts it back within 12 feet and pulls the pin right down my driveway.But this is the pin that you say is no longer there anymore.But one of the things that, whether its this road or that road you owe it to build a road.so your road frontage whether its or the interstate, you still owe the seventh road.Okay.Sometimes.Sometimes no.Okay it could be surveyed differently, like different.So the question I still have is if the, if the, if that second survey hasn't been recorded, is it- - Its not invalid its still an official survey.So, If I could interject, if Chris Hagody had surveyed it, he hasn't completed his paperwork yet, but his testimony could be, he found all of the pins on the Rubenstein survey, which would likely to be that in which case his testimony would say that this, the Rubenstein survey is accurate.The question is where on the ground is the law?That's really what's being disputed.Yeah.It was clearly marked out.If you look at the surveys road scheme, it specifically says, the stone in the bag, you put a pin next to it.He couldn't put the pin where it needed to go because the stone was there.The stone ones was three pieces of slate it looked like, whoever did it put some time the senator had pointed that it had came off.That's probably what a near to 1800 or 1700 And I consider that a historical mark that was tampered with, that they dug up and thrown away.And I think something should be done about that.It should be replaced.Well, I think, I think the pertinent for this evening, unfortunately, there's nothing we can do right now.Well, what about the fence being my property I was, I was told while I was in the meeting but people came back and told me, that they said you guys can fine me $100 a day for having a fence on my property, that didn't have a permit.oh I remember that.\"We can fine you for their fence being on your property\" - It wasn't the fence at that time.No but I do remember the conversation saying that there's because now the, the.fence is on your property.Even though I remember this conversation.But you have received a notice of violation for the shed.I did for the shed.For the shed yeah.We haven't.So we're not issuing you.No, no, no.When I was told I had 20 phone calls, 30 Hey Jim, we went to the meeting, we see a lot of people there saying that they are gonna fine you $100 a day.unless you move your shed 10 feet off the lawn.So Neil told me not to move the shed, because we didn't know where the line was.That sounds like we're still.Jeff said that he didn't have the right to say that.And this is what really pissed me off, Jeff says you're going to move the shed or you're gonna be fined $100 a day.Well, now there's a fence on my property, it's been there for months.It's, you know it's in violation with no permit.They need to be fined $100 a day or take the fence down.Except the challenge is that it's not actually on their property.So would you write me a letter saying I should hold my own fence down then?If it's on my property?I'm not advising that at all - I see the point that you're making too close to the property line, but on one hand, property line is that April gave you any of that fence.So it's a, it's a catch 22.I'm smirking at the irony of the situation.I'm not trying to be...Well at the time when we were discussing the $100 a day fine with Mr. O'Brien.Chris Hagody had not yet completed a survey.So we didn't really have a lot to go on.And shortly thereafter, Chris had staked everything out and said, look, this is where the line is.Okay so Can we suspend the $100 a day fine on the shed in question, just to make everything, - that was already So nobody's being charged fines at - Correct.So what we need to define is there's a pending survey, which I understand has not been fully filed.So that survey help centers, the most recent surveys, the formal survey, the definitive survey, right?Recency and surveys is present.Once it's complete.Yes.So if we look at, and just confirming the facts of where is the boundary, from the most recent survey and from the facts of where the survey is, we then say, this is the official line and whatever it has to move or be set back or request variances.We do that there.But it just seems to me without being friendly, declarative, where is the line?Yeah we can't do anything without starting the survey and Where's the question.Yeah well, the DRB is going to have to him.That's correct.Because the town's involvement in this issue is zoning based.Right.And that has to go through first Neil lightener and second the DRB and possibly third, two environmental court.And that's where the, the line of appeal is.Near?I would ask that you might consider talking to whoever has been appointed fence viewer.I believe that's also the way or cold.But I think that might be your accountant and your accountants understand the survey's pretty darn well.I believe that too.And I think what he can do is, he look at the survey and get the owner here.And the owner would say, yeah is the survey.And that might remove the need to go to environmental court.But the purpose of a fence, viewer is.Is to be you - There you go.Its worth a try.Like said, Chris went to talk to him, tried to explain and told him it is where it is.So...so it's a reasonable suggestion.Well let's, why do you think it's beyond the, - because we're...Maybe it's not worth an attempt by the fence for you to at least address the issue.Because they're, they're not surveyors.They're going to have to convince someone that a property line is somewhere where that person doesn't believe it is.But that's kinda what this is all about.It's people have to agree or they have to be made to agree legally.Correct.And so we're also books being suggested, which makes sense to me is it's given a try of getting people to come to a common point before going through all the riggermerall of going to court.And the cost...For everyone.So is it worth the effort to mediate.And it may go nowhere.They may say...I think it's worth a try.Yeah.Well, when health officer goes out to a place he mediates and does the best possible he or she can possibly do before it gets to a point where it does go to court and then involved with lawyers, and...Yeah exactly.Well, we could try to mediate.Now we'll contact the fence viewers if the select board wants, but you're not going to mediate a property line - No, that's, it really is sort of a due diligence.Like give it a shot.That's one level, if it's unsuccessful, the other process and timeline continues regardless.Right?And frankly, this...When this surveyor says they put in pins to show - Well, and I think we need to move on to the next item on the agenda here.But, but I think what, this has been a very confusing process for everybody involved and what I'm hoping we can get a new face in, give them a full understanding of what the process to come is going to be and give them the charge of communicating that to both parties so that they know what they're, what what's going to happen next.Maybe that will inspire rethinking of, of positions.I don't know.I don't, I don't hold great hope, but it's worth a try so.But we're still gonna let it go to DRB?What was still, yeah, we still, I mean, there's been a, there's been an appeal...so we don't get in the way of process.I think we do need to move on because I think there's not a lot, I think, I think that would you please contact the fence viewer and, and do you feel like.Carol for an old contact for both.Okay.You have adequate guidance from us about what needs to happen there or anything, or...I, I'll advise the fence viewers on what we'd like to see.I personally question whether it's within their ability to, to get it done, but you know, we're gonna try, we'll do our best.There'll be a nice write up in The Towner after this.Alright.Let's, let's move, move along and thank you for bringing in materials and everything.Well, the fence, the fencers are going to come, come to talk to you, come to talk to the, to the curlys.We don't know what the outcome will, that will be, but let's say that that nothing.That doesn't resolve in...Resolve the issue, the, okay, let me make sure I've got this sequence here.The DRB is going to hear the appeal of the notice of violation, and that is most likely going to resolve in a, in a non resolution situation because of the fact that we don't have a property line defined.And so the next step would be the Environmental Court.But there's a survey, there's both an old survey and a pending survey.So the DRB could find, could could the DRB find on the basis of those surveys?- Right, well not it's...Again, it's not, it's not the survey that's in question.It's the line on the ground.So what you mean testimony from Chris Hagody that says, \"I surveyed the, the results.I came up with the same thing as Rubenstein and I, here is pictures showing where the stakes are, showing it on the ground\".Right.Okay.- Okay then, what about the ?The DRB has to make a decision as to whether, on what side of the line it is.And if it's on the wrong side of the line, they'll order her to remove it.- Correct.And if it's...They might actually removed it if there's no, if its not permitted.She put it anyways and there was no...There's no permit to put it up, it shouldn't be there.Its existence and its location.Shouldn't be there, period.But then of these are .And the DRB meeting is?It'll be, I think.June 10th.So let's revisit this in our subsequent attending- - They we meet on Wednesdays?Or the 11th.11th, June 11th.The meeting after that, when...Our meeting after that we get an update from the DRB. - If they have issued with the a decision, yes.Or even if they're still looking into it, just a status report, it's either a decision or status, recognizing that the people are frustrated with this being going on for a long frame.Okay.Thank you.All right.So let's go on to the, the next...Wait we have another zoning issue?We have two more, I think there's one person here for the next one, which is, the Harrington's own property at the top of Wolf Lane.Are you there?Here for them?I'm just observing.- I don't have a lot to add.Do you have a survey?- So. The issue came to my attention last summer, for a couple of reasons, but mainly the, the Harrington's own property at the top of Wolf Lane, the Harrington live on lane.And so the property's above.A very large property and there has been some clearing up there and a little other work done, but...Typically not much that the town would get involved in.They are also, they have a logging operation.I don't know if they have a file plan.It's not regulated by the town.Forestry is not regulated by the town, but they also sometimes have parties up there.And I, I guess the, the parties have generated noise complaints and other complaints, from some of the neighbors.There was a party up there last summer where it was alleged that somebody had shined a laser at an aircraft.And many law enforcement agencies responded to that.And there was a big uproar and it made the news and so forth.So naturally the residents have contacted the town and ask, what can we do?There was a saying that there was something up there that the kids were staying in, that it was an occupied dwelling.It was unpermitted, We've researched it.It appears to be something like a large shed.The owner says it's a sugar-house but won't produce the State paperwork saying it's structure.So we've issued a notice of violation on the shed because it doesn't have a design permit.So that, it's as extremely minor issue compared to really what the big problem is.Right.Which is disturbances at the top of the hill.that are largely unregulated by the town, but are quality of life issues for the surrounding neighbors.Some of the neighbors have talked to me and said that the logging operation is altered drainage patterns and lead to erosion during last year's rainstorms.I, I don't think we have...the town doesn't have any direct evidence of that.The rain was certainly extraordinary last summer.But Let me ask you a question, I mean, this is in the news right now, not around here, but in Washington state.Somebody must have jurisdiction- - Stormwater.Stormwater?Really for- - Oh, I had, you know, the nonsense, that's going up over on Governor Peck Road?I talked to some of my colleagues at the state, and I was like, Stormwater, You guys have...'Cause if it crosses a river or if it impacts a navigable river, it's considered Stormwater.And so you can call the County Forester and they can come up and what's, see...I mean, it's been almost a year, so it might be, it might be moot at this point, but, but Stormwater has an interest in what goes on in logging operations, especially if there's a stream crossing.So if we take these one at a time, one is the logging and condition to the land, which right properly goes to the State as either a violation.You know, are they damaging things?Then there's the shed, which is the construction.Sugar-house either, it's a sugar-house where it's not.It's a sugar-house, they need to, to show us evidence.If it's not a sugar house, they need a permit.- Right.Which they've likely bought.Right and, but you said that they've been issued at an alleged noticeable edge violation.A notice of violation for constructing a structural account.And they could correct that.How long ago was that notice, do you know?A few months ago, I don't have the original data on that.So we need to follow up?So the issue now is, will we go to environmental court to seek penalties to enforce that notice of violence?Yes.I think as a principal- - Why do we have rules if we don't- - They have to either address it, take it down or go through the process, right?It's gotta apply consistently.So those are the two things.And then the third, I'm going to hazard guess, It's not Mr. or Mrs.Harrington, but the younger Harringtons, that we think are responsible for this, just guessing.Well, not the logging, but I mean the use of the shed.Oh I think probably the logging too, knowing one of the I think the logging thing might be a younger Harrington.Okay.So, but probably the appropriate thing, as far as that goes, is to refer the parties have concerns about the drainage to the appropriate state agency, because that's not, even in our jurisdiction.Interestingly enough, the person for the Stormwater section in Chittenden County is a Richmond Village Resident.Patrick is already weighed ib on this.We've had watershed consulting, who came out last Friday to some research on our permit.But Patrick had told us that because it was a logging operation that it's not under Stormwater it's under the State.I think that the consultant that came out on Friday is, he thinks that some of the culverts and ditches that were put in around the logging road are redirecting the water and they probably need to be improved, but probably not the single source of all of the damage that we had last year, that was because we had so many rains last year.So I guess the short is that Patrick had told us last...It is part of the Stormwater permit, that upper lock, but it doesn't fall under the jurisdiction of Stormwater because of the operation.If that makes sense- - But the County Forester can be, I believe that any Forester can be contacted.So here's a factual question, who is responsible, overseeing responsible logging in the state.And I'm sorry I don't know the answer.It'd be a regional Forester.The County Forester.I can get the name.I can check.Try Snyder.I'm sorry?Snyder.Regional Forester I think.Is he the County Forester?Yeah.Chittinden County Forester?Yeah.Oh you're...Yes I am.You have him on speed dial?Arbitrary Enforcement Council.Okay.Don't they make, if there are problems, they say you have to abate this or correct them.Well, I'm also wondering if this gentleman knows, was it current use that you were talking about?not Stormwater with current news because current news does talk about forestry plans.And the forestry plan has to be approved by the County Forester.And usually gets every 10 years that there's a recommendation that the plaintiff's redo the forestry plan that comes to current use for approval.And a forestry plan is brought to the county Forester when that plan is approved.So I'm not aware of any informal forest planning or what what's been- - Currently used property, if it's doesn't have to have a plan.Okay.I had no idea if there's any plans, formal plan, this, I thought that the scope of this was limited only to the small household or whatever building it is.Just thinking that that's all this had.This was when- - Again, this is another issue that has a lot of different parts to it.And the town was focused in on one, one piece.So the town can act as a conduit for contacting other officials and trying to resolve some issues.But at the heart of it, our involvement is Zoning.Which seems to be - Before we move on from this the county Forester for Tiffany Thompson, according to the department of somebody, pardon me, wait for it.Its probably forest and parks.Forest parks and recreation, she's at the Essex junction regional office.So at this point, if, if we are serious about enforcing the notice violation of society, to ask for vote, to enforce the companies, you know, talk to more experienced.Move To enforce the violation of penalty or violation of- - There is a Violation.Alright any discussion?all in favor?Aye.Opposed it's unanimous.But then the broader question you know, beyond the fifth place there.Is the question of parties or quality of life issues, I think the only way to deal with those in the moment.Yeah.Yeah.I noticed the noise complaints and law enforcement shows up to see who's there, what they're doing, how old they are.I think that's improved a lot over the past year.I think outstanding meetings we have right now is the impact of the clearing on the volume of water and whether or not that is being redirected away from retention ponds.And we've had somebody who is in the party has certainly much less - Hopefully continues to get state.So we see you at the end of June.So did we cover all the relevant issues here tonight?Yeah.Okay.Why don't we move on to- - Do you wanna do mobs?Can I just have an update on mobs.I've dealt with this?I think you've dealt with this several times.And we actually went to court, and that's why we're back here.'Cause we wanted to impose penalties.And we're at the cusp of imposing penalties.There was a court hearing that.Actually Jeff just wait, Jackie, were you waiting for something specific?I'm sorry, you were being so patient.No I just, I just wasn't there...I didn't want you to have to leave if you were, expect...if you were wanting to address something specific.Oh no, thank you.Okay.Sorry Jeff.Thanks for coming - So we even had a court hearing about imposing penalties and the judge basically said, you've got one more chance to figure this out.And Neil Lightener went up and visited with his mobs and actually was able to do an inspection and said, Hmm, it, it barely meets any qualification for a separate living unit because it has a very basic kitchenette, which consisted of cabinets.Didn't even have a sink.It didn't have a bathroom.Oh my God So how does that mean?So the, when, when you rent to somebody not related to you, they're supposed to have a separate space, I guess, unless you're subletting, which is probably different.Somebody who's gonna have the master lease the property.But if you, if you're an owner occupied unit, you should have a separate apartment.And that apartment through the health code has to meet certain minimum qualifications to be accepted as an apartment.And this unit does not get, it was being rented as an apartment.So when certain issues would come up, the tenants would call right Preston and say, it's a landlord tenant issue because it doesn't meet the state code for this to be habitable or whatever, whatever the terminology might be.So that's how we got involved, which is, if you're going to have an apartment, you have to get a permit.The structure is capable of being permitted as an apartment.There's nothing in our bylaws that would prohibit that.All it would take is a building, a building and a zoning permit to get it done.So the issue was, are you gonna file this and get this legal or not?Neil spoke to her, offered to fill out the paperwork, come have her sign it.He did that when we went there, she said, no, I refuse to sign it.I'm just going to remove the cabinet and it will no longer be rented.So that's where we stand.So Mike Marksbury has written a letter that says, you have to show proof that this is no longer that the cabinets are removed within two weeks or we'll go back to court and there's a status conference- - checkup on it?Yes - So let me understand, even in spite of state code or anything, so somebody can rent an apartment that doesn't have a functional kitchen, and call it an apartment?if you're renting it to family, - Right, I don't know all the rules, but, and I'm sure people break the rules all the time, but it's gotta be some sort- - Well this the outcome that we wanted.We wanted it to not be in a, like, we really kind of, - Well we wanted compliance one way or the other.I mean she could, she could either upgrade it to code and continue to rent it or, or, or not rent.Well that's where I was going.Upgrade code means upgraded it to have a kitchen or not.Yes.Yeah.And, and there might've been a couple of other things there.I think there- - It was up upgrade to the minimum requirements for a rentable apartment, apartment, family, or to stop renting it.And she chose chosen the latter.The problem is, is that the, this we've gone through this before.Yes.And so the point is, is to make sure that this actually is no longer rented.Right?So to date, we've spent $1,260 in attorney's fees, which includes court and Sheriff's fees.That's why you can't just issue $100 a day.You have to have costs.So these are really our costs.So if we were going to, if, if we were going to input, if she doesn't do do what she says, she's going to do within two weeks, we can start imposing fines, - right.To recoup essentially our investment in going to court.Correct.And also enforcing our rules.I mean, - Yes.Yes.Okay.Alright.I'm sorry so we've been through this before.Yes, last summer.Well, the first violation happened in 2011 and then Ms. Mobs wasn't there anymore.I believe her son was living there.Everything was fine for a while.And I think we had a couple more problems.Then she came back and then a couple of more tenants had issues.The original violation was also for the debris in the yard.Also.It was debris and evidently they couldn't, you couldn't maintain a habitable temperature in the unit, in the middle of the winter.No different.Okay.Yeah.But no, this is not the first time we've seen this.Yeah.Alright.But I think we're done with this one for now.Alright so let's move on to the cell tower update.So the, on just a quick update on detail that I had said that the hearing is scheduled for the week of June 11th, but not final.Now it looks like it's going to be the week of June 16th.It's still no final date.It's probably going to be the 18th.I will be the town's only witness.I think we're, there was no additional pre-final test to no testimony from the applicant.So I think the only thing we have left is to do a rebuttal to what they filed with their application.And then we'll have the hearing.They intend to rebut some of the things we've said, when we have the hearing, it'll essentially be like, like a trial and will be witnesses will be examined the cross examined.And then there'll be that On At and T the hot issue is Jericho road, 1925 Jericho road.The they're proposing a tower.We heard this at the March meeting with, At and T. It's a standard 140 foot tower.I think one person at the hearing objected to it.I've put several notices on front porch forum seeking comments, and those comments are attached.It quite honestly is hard to find a line of objection to this tower.The decision is really the same issue as with VTL. It minimizes our zoning regulations and takes the control away from the municipality and gives it to the public service board, which is an entity of the state.But that's not a failure of any of these applications.That's something we object to in the way that the state has chosen to proceed.It's already pressed, there's legal precedent for upholding the not honoring a town's zoning regulations.Unfortunately, yeah.Well, I'm looking at the comments specific to this location.People, at least a small set of people are saying, they want the tower.So I'm not sure we're looking for reasons to oppose it.If people are in support of it, what the issue is.The principle of her son.Well, but yeah, but this is, this is where things get sticky because Jeff, I believe you said there was one person who objected to it.Yes.What level of public opposition to something do we need to see before we take actions, spend down money and et cetera, et cetera.I got...Now the longer this goes on.And the more we learn about the public service board's unwillingness and frankly, refusal to honor local governments opinions and not even hear, like they're like, we don't even want to hear anything that has to do with zoning because we've already made a determination on that.So you have to come up with some other reasons.That issue is moved.And what is that other reason?It all comes back to zoning and aesthetics.Well, all right.But one person's aesthetics is another person's, whatever I'm, I'm frankly tired of spending money on this.Then give up.I know two months ago I was like, we gotta do what we did for one, we have to do for another.But now that this is starting to get more and more expensive, I'm getting, I'm just, I'm feeling like we're fighting a losing battle and there's no hope in sight because the legislature has, didn't make any changes to the act, to the statute.And we're at the end of the legislative session nothing's changed.And these are going to be decided in 60 days.I'm done.I think we have to acknowledge that, that we have not been completely unsuccessful in that we at least have standing at the upcoming detail here.I agree.I don't think we're going to get anywhere, but I don't know until we go through that, that we know that everything is quite as moot as we're assuming that it is here.Is that fair to say?That is fair to say.We do have a deadline this week to request a hearing and raise a substantial issue on this town.On the retail one?No, no.That one was already going to a hearing if we want to- - You mean on the 18 ?Yeah, on the Jericho.This is the thing that makes me crazy.But we can't...The substantial issue can't be zoning.Well, well, I think...Well, it can be actually they, they consented and that really is the issue we've got.It's whatever got us in the door before.I think the way we were talking about this is is do we have a mechanism for getting in the door?Then...The basic issue of the superseding of our local zoning is sort of the, the core bug in our ear.If you will.Now, whether we act on that or not is another question, but do we even have a, a route to, to remediation?And the, the short term answer is, yeah, we do.You know, within that, we have here, - How costly is- - Well, that's the question asked now, recently we've been thinking that if we did it once we could kind of cook, you know, cookie cutter it and just, more or less, do global search and replace.fetal for ADND and send it in again, but, - Well.I think you'd save upfront time because we filed two letters for detail, which were substantial investment by the attorney.If we filed one for, for this one, we would probably be a cookie cutter of the substantial issue letter.But going through this, I've seen what we have to do, which is we have to develop our own pre-filed testimony, which may be similar, maybe not.We have to rebut their arguments.We have to spend time reviewing their testimony and then we'll have a hearing in some hours- - Before we even get to hear- - yeah.At this point, if you, if you look at Jeff's memo, we're spending close to $8,000 just on the retail one.And, and believe me, I mean, you know, where I was coming from originally on this, I don't want to spend money on a wild goose chase.It's just that I think we have a responsibility to make sure it's a wild goose chase.It would be nice if we could figure out how the pre-file, how the hearing goes before we made a decision, but it sounds like we can't.Well, we can put the letter, but we don't have to follow through with it, right?Well, you can file your objection.I think you reserved the right to withdraw that later time.Yeah.I just, I'm...So does that keep us in the game until after the 16th?At low cost.And the principle here is our local zoning, but I'm with you, you know, I'm really reluctant to spend $6,000 again, that we've already lost.And that's no way taking a stand on the appropriateness of any of these towers.It's do we have the means of effecting a change?Yes.Regardless of what that changes is.I'm less and less convinced we do.And I, as am I. - Responsible use of our resources.Exactly, exactly.I think we're all kind of in the same general direction.And I'm also, this is tempered by we're getting, we don't have a group of people saying, absolutely.Don't put that cell tower in this location.We have people saying, do put that cell tower in this location.Yeah.But, and that, and just, just to cover everything again, it's the principle.A break.I said, there are two principles there.There's the aesthetics, the neighbors that sort of the citizens opinion.The zoning principle is one, but if we don't, if the zoning principal is doomed to failure and we don't have a group of citizens.Right.Well, in that case, let's say this worked out much better than we can possibly expect right now.And on the 16th for the retail one, we actually...Prevail.Prevail.Well for the 18th one there's no reason that we couldn't go in and say, no problem.Go ahead.Go through our zoning process and- - Or even, or even, yeah, whatever.But, but it's defending the principle, and the right to, to affect the decision.And okay.I guess, yes.But on the Jericho road one, separate from the Beetle and the Cochran road, which we haven't made a decision on the Cochran road and the Williams hill road is, is that we don't have the objection to it.So what is the, why are we objecting to it?Why are we bringing up a concern when we have, and I'm not to dismiss the one gentleman who, who made, who made the point, but, but the overwhelming majority of people is saying that they're in support of it.So are we with the minority, the very small minority.Well that's, but that's and I see where you're going with this.and that's a really good question to ask, but it's a process.And what I'm saying is, is we may find out after the 16th that we don't even have to worry about that because we're not going to get anywhere.So I, I have no problem with submitting a letter.It basically a carbon copy of what we submitted, period.And then we take the net step.Whatever the lowest cost way of keeping in the gates.So you're willing to request intervention status, and raise a significant issue of our zoning, similar to detail?And that's as far as we will go, pending further information from the other process.And what's the estimated cost of doing that?Is that something we need to- - Well the estimate the cost of filing the letter will probably be in the neighborhood of $600 to $700.Outside of 34-35 hours.That's...Even though it's essentially the same letter that's already been drafted?Well, I'm asking for the attorney.I- - We're still gonna have the peripheral stuff to do.You can't just say, here you go, change the line.Yeah.Alright.So anyway, I know, but I think that is the, I mean, I'm feeling that's the appropriate course of action.And then after the 16th, hopefully we will, it'll be very clear what we need to do.Yeah.The focus of this letter is we want to enforce our Zoning , And if our zoning process gets high again, what's the point of spending money fighting more and more fights about losing.Ms. Cayman - The public service board is bullying us.It's also bullying towns with housing.With the front desk coming from Canada.I don't think we should spend a lot of money, but do you think that if we fight back a little bit, the Public Service Board will notice?you know, they're noticing Middlebury and Cornwall and Shoreham and Monkton, and maybe they don't care.Maybe they're arrogant and they don't care what we do.You know, they're so corporate minded, but, I don't know.Well, they're are noticing, and we do have the, just like they've had those hearings in, in Addison county.We got, we had a hearing on the first one, which is good, but we may find, I think like the folks are finding that it's...You get a hearing, but you don't get to change.Right, so I think we have a very high bar for what a significant issue is.It should be noted that that 248 process was set to expire at the end of this June and the legislature voted to renew it.I believe the governor, if he hasn't signed it already.So it's our legislatures we can, legislators that we can now blame?The state is reaffirmed its stance that the state should be in charge of issuing certificates of public good for these projects and not, not the towns.There is a theme across this, with our, you know.Do we need a motion to, for you to do the thing?I would like a motion for an additional $2,500 on detail and for $600 on a check over- - summer.Seconded.Any discussion?all in favor of, I think we just are talking about approving $3,100 combined for the purposes of pursuing these issues.Please say, aye.Aye.I'm sorry the amendment, I don't want to bleed over.I want like a real tight limit on the Jericho road.I don't want to spend more than- - Yeah $600.I think it was- - Okay fair enough.It was $2,500 for VTL and $600 for- - I mean, it was just kind of hold our feet to the fire.Okay, good.So as amended all in favor, please say, aye.Aye, aye.Post it's unanimous.And just for the benefit of the public, there's been no movement on Cochran road that I've been made aware of.So there was nothing to report.Alright, moving right along, the town center parking lot paving.I feel like all we do is spend money.Well that is all we do - I have an old plan of fitting the parking lot with gold.Or so I thought.What was that?I said I had a bold plan to pave the parking lot with gold.Yes I was impressed.So to redo the town center parking lot, which serves a town center, Chittinden the school district, the post office and the library, it's going to be about $180,000.I was hoping for $100,000 but the reason it cost so much is because there is no real base.The asphalt has been laid directly over the original ground and it heaves in the winter, we're in the spring actually and breaks apart and creates dangerous safety conditions.And we've been battling it for many years.So both Pete Goslin and Mike Wisell tell me the only way to correct that is to excavate a foot of material out of there, replace it with a good bed of road, gravel, compacted, and then pave over top of that.They did something similar out in front here in front of the post office where the, that, that area used to look a lot different, had different concrete panels and they dug out there and even into the entryway where the asphalt is put down road gravel and compacted it, you can see it's remained mostly very stable since they did that.So obviously that's a solution doing that adds an additional $100,000 to the cost of just paving it.But the kicker is we don't have that much money in our town, seven rent fund.We get about $11,000 a month.But right now we only have about $109,000 We do have some expenses that are going to come out in June.So in order to do that project this year, I would have to run into deficit for about nine months or take out a short-term loan.Alternatively, I talked to Pete Goslin and he said that we could use 50,000 of the town's paving, paving budget for the parking lot.And that would reduce the burden on the town center rent fund.But the taxpayers generally would be paying for the upkeep of the parking lot at that point.And where, but he needs $50,000 to do paving.So would it just be, oh, it would over the winter, it would go back into his fund.Does that how we would have- - No, no, no, not a reimbursement.I mean, we could talk about that.We could reimburse later.Yeah.But he's really going to do good to be done with this payment.Yeah.Yeah I...keep it clean.I'm also just worrying about wondering about the timing of this, because there's been some discussion of with, with the development of the Creamery parcel of, of having an access to the parking lot here.And I'm just wondering if it makes sense for us to go and do this now, as opposed to waiting in maybe having that be part of whatever larger deal is on them.It's a negotiating point that could be used with whatever developer finally picks up the project.Oh, sure.I can appreciate that.My concern is the parking lot is in rough shape that continues to get worse.I'd say, you know, we could maybe hold off one more year, - patch it up and hold off for a year?We can patch it up.It won't hold.It'll be a hot patch and It might last until March- - I mean, I, I, Chris, I totally totally understand where you're coming from, but I don't think we're going to get a developer to go ahead and throw in $200,000.Well not the whole amount, but I mean, some kind of.Plus the plus the plan to do it, I think is what Chris's big point is I mean, if we pave it one way and then there's a proposal that slightly alters it, we lose that opportunity- - So can we, can we, cause we're going to be getting bids probably the goal is to do it before winter to do this before winter.Correct.So can we, can we put a timeline on this and say, I'm just throwing out an idea that if we, you know, if by late July we don't have any proposals, then we'd go forward with this.They'll give us a couple more months to have some, some more reserve funds in the bank.proposals for the cranium parcel- - Proposals for the cranium parcel.If we don't have proposals from the cranium parcel by X date or late July, early August to, to evaluate.Then we, then we go through and because we still will have until the end of October, November, to get this done and it will give us more months.That'll give us six more months of revenue from the post office, which means the less money we will need and it loans and loan or short-term interests to pay for it.But is that going to drive up the cost of the project if we do paving then?No, I don't think there's going to be much of a difference.So Mike Wiser still has to design the project, take him for a while to do that.You know, to the end of June, I can come back to, or just the bid spec.There's not a lot of engineering.It's just to get the bid spec ready and ready to go to bed.I'll bring it back.First meeting the July for authorization to issue the, the bid.We'll put it out for a month.We'll get proposals.We could award in August similar to Depot street and do it on the same timeline.How upset are the post office and the other tenants about the current condition?I've had several complaints.I mean the post officer office postmaster has talked to me regularly about the condition of the parking lot.Actually I think his section there is really the first section of the entire parking lot.So the library doesn't complain, - somebody who fell and broke their leg or something, or any other notices being pointed out that it's deficient.Well, I know people have fallen.They haven't made, made any claims, but I know personally people have fallen on- - Okay.So, so if we hold off on putting out bids until the end of July early August, that's just a month later, then the time when you just said, can we do that in hopes that maybe we'll get some, some cranium parcel stuff.We'll know more, we have more information, - If cranium parcel stuff looks like there's going to be an egress there.Then we - we'll talk to that end.We'll talk to that end, yes.If this goes out to necessarily being able say, this is the timeframe that we're looking at, so that either you have that, right.Well, I think the concern is we wouldn't do the project if it looked like there was going to be a proposal to alter the traffic pattern here.Well you've already had the objection by some of the neighbors about allowing a pass through here.But we still have the ability to make a decision on that too I mean I'm- - You'll be able to make a decision on a lot of things.But if this is going out for proposal, which I would hope rather than the town for doing this, when you had suggested the date later, so that they can just say, this is the date we're looking at right here.My only, my only reason for wanting to push it out a little bit is in, is to account for maybe changes to the design based on Cranium Creswell design.That that was my not, not for starting or stopping.I recognized that you could put a bed out in June and say, we're not going to start it yet until October.No, that's what, my thinking was, was to account for any other proposals that may be out there to make adjustments, not for- - access.If it needed several loud, has to go through some massive change.Absolutely.Oh yeah.And so that would be the only consideration, would be if somebody, if a developer and there may be myriad options and one of them that includes it and six of them don't.Is that we could say oh, well, it's just not an option.We're going to go forward on ours, on our timeline period.And then if a contractor wants to do something, then it's on their .But I agree.This is a tough area to potentially have, in an egress, although it could turn into another green State, when people are trying to avoid the light.Yeah.Yeah.So are we done with this for tonight?I think there's this.Is this worth our signature?Do you need this to do anything?I mean, it is what it is.I'll authorize Mike to design it and I'll bring him back at the end of July and we'll talk about it again.Okay.Let's move on.RBHLP loan referral.- Well, we say it easily look for last, right?So David Sandra and I have met twice since town meeting with firms and it was with the Champlain Housing trust, to discuss them the broader issue, of which is very clear.For them it means a 15 year deferral at a minimum and nothing less.For us it means, the political objective of saying we, we promised our town, we would have a Revolving Loan Fund.We're not convinced why that cant happen.So, you know, I remember looking somewhat closely at this and I had a couple of questions having to do with their, how the sort of present the financial presentation worked.Some of the facts that they presented were low occupancy, but it's currently a hundred percent, that they previously had high heating costs due to fuel oil, which has now been moved since November, due to gas.So those things seem more relevant in the past than the future.There's the modest valuation of the pieces of property, was something like $62,000 per unit, which I don't know how the formula works, how that set up, but that seemed like modest contribution to tax rules.And then there was the depreciation, which I wasn't, I wasn't clear how that was managed.And I don't remember- - Remember these auditing And budgeting and listening and appreciation.Which, let's be honest, is a tax credit given to them by the government.They're listing that as a cost.So I'm not comfortable.Which, frankly, if I actually...When I work with water systems and I see them listing depreciation as an expense and they're actually funding it, I'm cheering because that means they're actually putting some little amount of money into cap, into reserve funds.You know, they're accounting for future needs.But the reality is, is that a lot of systems, a lot of entities won't actually have cash on hand equal to depreciation.So that means they're eating into their going over budget every year.Well, so if you showed the depreciation as a cost, then where's the money?It's, it's, it's an accounting term.No, but then that the question.Did they have a fund?Did they have a capital fund that they were- - Putting that depreciation .So then- - The Reserve funds are below their budgeted fund.Exactly.So that means the depreciation is they're not actually taking it.They're not actually expensing it.They're, it's, they're eating into their budget.It's showing it's a way for them to show that they're not in the red.But where's the money going then?No but they're counting it as an expense, but the money isn't showing.It's going into paying for maintenance, it's going to- - Not evidently, yeah.The exhibit we saw and maybe I misremember this, was it looked like it was an expense and it was expensed out, but there was no balance of a fund balance.So either it goes somewhere else, not to this organization, this site, - But they were, they were showing the loss.Right.They do have- - After depreciation, they showed a loss?Yes.Yes.Before depreciation is my question.It before depreciation, they'd show the...If nobody has it handy, I've got the- - Do you see where I'm gong?Depreciation is money that goes, if you're showing that as a cost then it's going somewhere.It's not here.I'm right there with you.Right, so is it cash positive or not?Exactly.It is is cash positive.Yeah.So I just still have questions.I am very strongly in support of affordable high quality housing.Our discussion of the apartment recently is instructed, I don't want people renting- - I don't think that's the issue here.Without kitchens, but yeah.I think we're all in supportive of, of high quality affordable housing it's it's.But I think, I think there was broad consensus that there was a commitment made to the town at the time that, that we'd re-enter into this arrangement and that the, that the, that this was a, a grant that was to be used in used again for, in order to maximize the amount of high-quality affordable housing that was available to town residents.And the question before us is, is by turning over, basically agreeing with, with the request, does that best serve that purpose?And it's not clear to me that it does.It's not clear to me either.Well, I'm frustrated by this.I'm frustrated.- Fred Thomas as well had June Heston had volunteered to work on a committee to talk about this, have they gotten together?So they could tap this resource to work with this project?No they haven't.Initially David and I offered to, to meet, see if we could understand the issue better.Wait, I'm sorry.I wasn't aware of that.Maybe that was before- - I think Jared had offered before she left the county.and Fran...I think you may have been granted.I talked with Fran, I've heard from Fran.I think it's going to be really difficult for us to get us through this and negotiate something without Champlain here.I think it means some envoys with some continued work.I still was sort of stuck on the depreciation on one hand and also the idea of the money coming back for other purposes.One of the concerns I've heard from folks outside the room was is the money going?It might not be a bad thing, but my revenue is coming out of this project going to another part of Chittenden county, which is not a bad thing for Chittenden County, but may not be particularly helpful for Richmond.So, so perhaps it is prudent to, to see if folks other than us who have a lot of work to do and regular meetings to, to, to work this out, to come to some kind of conclusion, because I think we're all not comfortable with a 15 year deferred or indefinitely deferred deferred program.But we also, we also are uncomfortable with putting a, an affordable housing company, for lack of a better term, in jeopardy.So, so we need...it needs more than what we can do in a half an hour, once a month.Correct.There may be other, I don't know if compromise is, but other things that might be negotiated, what else could they as an organization do?I feel they can we.Chair can, we- - What can be legally described as affordable housing sets, rates for record?and the rents there already at the upper end of that bracket.They're saying we can't pull enough money out of this to pay this long, without raising the rents, which would put them out of affordability practice.I'm not convinced seeing the numbers that they gave for industry to fees, salaries, expenses.- We don't have a, we don't have sufficient information at this point to make a determination about the long-term viability is project.As it was presented to us back when we approved the use of the initial funds so that we do need that additional input.So I'm with whoever said it, that we should call on on Fran or June to see whether they are willing to fulfill that initial offer and do a little followup there.Because what we've did is- - - A new status of well-paying lawyers, well paid lobbyist, well-paid CPAs, and you know, they can, they can put these figures together, put it right back in our labs saying, these are our numbers showing you that this won't work.Can I see it first?So I feel like we have a year because didn't, we just extended it for a year.We have seven months.Okay.So we have until next March, but January next January to do this.'Cause remember, they came to the light board late in the year, and this is again in April.Right.Before they would get their final yearbook.So this needs to, we need the results this this summer.Okay.Can we, can we ask June and Fran and maybe there are others who are interested.Okay.You did just great that was fine.Alright so can we go to reports?Yes.Unfortunately I was not able to make the economic development committee meeting last Friday.I did not have an update.And I was invited, but I also couldn't make it.I had to be at my office at seven 30 in the morning, which is the same time, but I will go with the next time.Great.You think that's going to be a problem on a regular basis.I don't think so.Paul sent me an email and he was like, we're meeting.And I told him I couldn't go, unfortunately, but I'll plan for the next time.Please note the financial reports.We are still trying to reconcile the final taxes.Taxes are still coming in.That will be final final until the end of next month, but it looks like the collections are going to be higher than what we thought from last year.And not by just the little.There's, there's an issue with the homestead rebate.And we issue, we set the tax rate in July, goes on the tax bills and then the home state rebates get finalized for individuals.And it, it looks like more people are paying the non-homestead rate than what the tax rate predicted.So it goes to our favor and we don't owe it to the schools we keep.I don't think so.Cause Connie looked into it.She's talked to people at the state they've assured her that that happens sometimes.But I don't have the final answer on it.And our CPA is aware of it and it looks like we're going to be collecting more than we anticipated.Which is better than- - Well, I mean, this is the thing is when I added the delinquent tax amount into the collections and then compare that to budgets 20% that, you know, I mean this assuming that we do recoup significant amount of the liquid tax, which is higher than expected also.I mean, that's a, that's a lot of money.It's not going to be 20%.And on the overall rate, I think we're looking at more like maybe five to 6% when all is said and done.I think this still needs to be cleaned up a little bit.Sometimes it's very difficult to pull apart.What's what's going on in the computer system until.Does effectively increase the number by 20% - The next time I wasn't there, I was like, just happened?Do you want to, do you have any, any comments about the delinquency rate?No. I think the overall delinquency rate is about on par where it's been, which is running their belt three to 4%, which is not, not bad at all.Okay.It's slightly higher.So when you collect delinquent taxes, it's doesn't have anything to do with the delinquency rate.So the delinquency rates only what's on the current taxes and you don't really see that because they're not delinquent until the end of the year.So it's hard to show you what the delinquency rate is until it's closed.So when you're collecting delinquent taxes, you're, you're not affecting your delinquency rate.You're just collecting what's due, - It's present going back or just - Delinquent could really just- - Really just collected.Right.So when we talk about the rate, it's how, how would the percentage on collected for the current year.So even though you've gotten outstanding primary balances, it doesn't add up to what we talk about when we say the rate, Otherwise with the budget.I think that we're, we're doing okay.Again the big over expenditures are with the, some of the town of administration line items for professional services and legal highway has some high expenses.The, we had two claims for federal highway, which is a, is a change from prior years last during Irene, all the highway damage was covered under FEMA. This time they split it out, we had to apply to federal highway for aid for $90,000 of damages.I don't know if we'll collect that this year.I said that 90,000.I'm sorry.It's more like 20,000.I don't know if we'll collect that and this year or whether that will be next year.So we'll have an outstanding receivable on that I think.Okay.Otherwise I think operationally speaking the towns doing very well.Is there any other questions on the financial documents?I don't think so.It'd be great.We should look at it more closely.Yeah.Yeah, definitely.Alright.Well, let's move on.Department reports.I think the only department report again is the police report.Did you have an entertaining police report?I know, I was like - We did get a grant from our insurer, which is a property and casualty insurance fund.That's run by PLCT that's for 50% of the cost of replacement, flotation devices at the water treatment plant and some other safety gear.Because it was noted a safety inspection two years ago that they were deteriorating and needed to be replaced.This is in case somebody falls into the wastewater.Yes.Well, because of the turbulence of the activated sludge operation, you could sink.Yeah.It'd be very hard to stay afloat and it's not a pretty way to go.And we are going to have a regional concerns meeting.Now I should have written down the date it's in June.I think it's the fourth, Monday in June, the Snipe Arland broke the bridge on route two.Over the sniper went broke is due to be replaced.Not this year, probably 10 this year, two to three years from now, haven't designed it.They've got several options to holding a meeting.It will be in our library.They'll talk about the design options and traffic flow and what they need to do and what the community's needs are because they could either shut down the road, detour down Cochran road, or they could do a temporary bridge.And the needs of the community are really going to dictate where they go with that.Okay.And we'll be updating more on this, but you'll see in there, they've made several amounts months to have a lot of interested people that are concerned about route to traffic flow, come to that meeting.Okay.And so just to clarify, this is the bridge replacement and, and the effects of that are a couple of years out, the repaving of two in that section has now been moved up to - Well, the, what there, they call them maintenance code, which is just an inch over the top to smooth it out will happen this summer.Okay.I've been assured that by several people, including representative Anna Brine, - And that'll be fast.I mean, they move quite quickly.I mean, they're not grinding anything, right?It's just an overlay, the larger work, which will be similar to what they're doing in Waterbury now are going to be doing in Bolton this summer.Won't happen here for at least another two years.So I think in my, in my wisdom, I would say they should replace this bridge at the same time they do the major workup to if they're going to shut it down.But I don't work there.It's complicated.You know, there are things that we don't know about have different contracts.And finally, I get a good news.On Richmond Rescue.Won the, 'Ambulance Service of the Year Award'.This week is EMS week on Thursday.We're going to go off to Montpellier and receive that award.I think that's a good pat on the back for them.They've worked hard to improve their operation, Get things straightened out.Keep it well-run well-maintained and they get this award.If it's- - That's very nice.Congratulations.Well Taylor called me today saying, He might not be able to make this .Well a cat in the the award.- - Okay, great.And that's all the reports I have this evening.Nobody have anything else pertinent?Have we heard anything about the new signal?I've actually used it.I've used it also, - it's been re timed.There's a much longer, it's probably twice as long, which is not terribly significant, but seven or eight seconds, as opposed to three seconds.There's a delay.So when you push the signal, everybody stops and it does feel subjectively different to me.But I'm wondering if we've heard anything.I haven't heard anything from any residents, although I'm sure people appreciate it.It does provide for a stop pattern so that you get more than halfway across before traffic starts coming at you.That's always a good thing.Do you have something?Well, it was the loan pay, executing the loan, but you probably have to do that and can we, do we do it tonight or?If you want to push it?I don't want to push it, but I'm just wondering if we, it's because it's on the agenda.So at our water and sewer commissioning meeting, we have this, we have this loan for the final design of the Chlorine Contact Time.It's a loan that we need to execute.So we have to sign it.And we didn't feel like the water and sewer commission had the authority to do that.We thought it was the Select Board's authority to execute a loan.So we differed in our water and sewer commission meeting to the Select Board to do it.And this is...This is so that we can seek reimbursement against expenses that have already been incurred and, and expenses that have already been approved by the state.And this will all go into the bigger, this all goes into the, the loan.Right, right.So Chris, hasn't seen this, you can take a look at it.The loan amount is for.It's more than 20 right.$84,157.So what that includes, is that includes, reimbursing the big loan from a many years ago, the appropriated portion of it that was used to do preliminary design pouring contact time.So that's a little bit there.Some of the money that's already gone into designing the storage tank and the approved final sort of construction phase engineering on the, it includes the Chlorine Contact Time Tank, right?Yeah, the Chlorine Contact Time Project.Does this have the effect of moving.Yes.Yes, it will be reset the date, but fortunately, it will reset the date, so instead of 2015, that we'll have to start repaying.It'll get reset two years after that's substantially complete.So 2016.We'll get a year.I'm loving him for more, but being the person who's in charge of the program.All right insider- - I don't know how much, we have so.So you want to, you want to move, We do sign on this?I move, we execute R3302, in the amount of.$84,157 - And.Any discussion would be?All right.All in favor?Aye.Aye.All opposed?Okay you have quite a bit of signing.Get your- - Can I sign first?I don't know but 10 minutes should be good.Yep.Let's, while we're doing that, why don't we move ahead to minutes.I was not here for this one and Taylor is not here.So I guess we get, I got bear...Barely large enough group to, to approve these.Does anybody have any comments or changes on the minutes of May 5th, 2014?Something like that.I'm gonna move the minutes of May 5th, 2014.Second.All right.Any comments or questions regarding saying?Hearing none.All in favor of approving the minutes of May 5th, 2014 for the Richmond Select Board, please say, aye, - Aye.And one abstention and they are approved.Then we've got a couple of purchase orders or a purchase order.Is that right?It's actually two purchase orders for the same issue, which is tri-axle dump trucking to move the gravel plan forward, but it's under two different lines.So I have there to do purchase orders to the same company, but using two different fundings.Why, why is it?He's using equipment rental and gravel plant.Oh, okay.I think he probably could have done it under one and just listed the account separately, but he chose to do two purchase orders.Do you have, Sorry to pile it all, the a cover page do you want us to initial these?Well, what you do is you take a look and if you agree, then you would make a motion to authorize signing a purchase order 2383.to Newton trucking in the amount of $11 000.For tri axle trucking.And if it's approved and Chris signs it.Good.Good.Go ahead.It's a good thing to get used to doing it.All right.So a motion to approve the purchase orders to.That's different.Newton Trucking Construction.One is 13 and one is 11 000.Could you list the numbers?2383 is- - 2385, for $13,000 for tri-axle trucking to remove the gravel.And then there's a second one, 2383 for a $11,000.For the same purpose.So he's made a motion for both.All right.Any discussion on either purchase order?Alright.All in favor of approving a purchase order, 2383 and purchase order 2385, please say, aye.Aye.Aye.Opposed?Both purchase orders are approved.and I will sign them as soon as I'm done signing this thing.All right.End of year policy and prior year charges.Give me one second.I need Ashley to sign these items from prior meetings.Why didn't I cover it in this space?Well, they were, this one is a service officer from that came up and we will ask me, these are the two policies that should have been.I didn't circulate them.Am I the only one?No, nobody's signed.Oh. - So everybody has to sign.Okay.And then for you.So policy on, the end of year policy has to do with...How we handle charges from this fiscal year.Once we roll into the next fiscal year.And this policy basically says between July 1st and August 31st, you're allowed to charge prior year expenses to the prior year account and then it'll be closed.So this would be for things like utilities or prior goods and services that we buy in June.The bill doesn't come in until the end of July.You don't want to charge that to the next year's fiscal budget.We want it to go to fiscal year 14.The accountant makes those adjustments, but you have to have a cutoff date.And we're sorry that the cutoff date is going to be the end of August.And I think that's proven because sometimes we don't pay June bills until August.Makes sense to me.Any thoughts?Well, you know, I'm just, I'm wrestling with cash approval, sort of approach.And so I haven't really thought this through.I don't see the downside, but.It's something we've been doing anyway.It's always happened, but we never had a policy that specifically, well, it fits any parameters.Okay.So it's basically - okay, what's your pleasure.You want this, are we just putting off the inevitable?What do you mean?I mean, this is what we do.Are we planning- - Are we just putting it into alright, well, why doesn't somebody move it?So I'm sorry.The dates again, Jeff.Well, essentially the policy.Which should have been, I'm sorry, here.It says invoice is paid after July 1st with dates prior to July 1st will continue to be entered utilizing the last year invoice procedure until the second pay period in August Or when our trial balance is given to the auditors.Whichever comes first.So moved?Second discussion.All in favor.Aye.Aye, yes, Sorry.Yes.I just have one question, jumping back to the conservation fund, that payment for the conservation fund when they do the final the purchase.You're not paying that until their due date, right?We're not paying this in the town until they had made their other deadlines.'Cause they're also applying for a matching funds from the community housing, something or other.So if that falls through, then the essentially the deal falls through is - so they don't get any money until they're ready to go.Yeah that was my understanding of the - Sorry guys I gotta go.Okay well we need you to ensure we have no executive session.And there's three of you to sign the warrant so - Right We can do it.So everything's copacetic?I assume - There's a 50 cent error in one item, which I corrected and I mentioned it to Jeff - I'll have conduct correct that too and - Okay, good catch.Is that the only, - Yeah, it's all covered for the package.Here's the clip that goes with it.I'll ask Ashley another time, but gentlemen, do you know your summer vacation plans?If you had such at this point, would you mind sharing with me?And the reason I'm asking is, you know, besides idle curiosity, it's just anticipating that we may have something of the interim zoning quote who might later in the summer.Are you planning on missing any slight board meetings in July and August is what I'm getting at?Let me go through that one.No, no vacation.Wonderful.June 23rd, but that's that's my it's the 16th.Yeah.I'm sorry, I'm just skipping Monday to Monday through my cramped screen, - My screen was stolen with the rest of my iPad.Oh no really?I saw that from sports - Oh, I saw that too.Yeah.That's that's awful, - Its kinda my fault I left the car unlocked but - Still, yeah, - It was right there.Where was the car?Jada's covered Jeffersonville.It was where?Jada's cover after Jeffersonville.I went in for fresh donuts and a sandwich after meeting with Ashley on Saturday.Yeah, I'm not gonna miss any meetings I did my vacation in February, so I think, - So we don't know.This is just being prepared.We don't know.Sounds good.So are we all set here?Don't hit yourself.I think we are discuss any items for next agenda.We have a follow-up depending on the Dr. The toning issue that we discussed earlier.Well, that won't happen until - It's just like a ways away.Yeah, at the earliest, what else We have coming up that's timely or anything we want to just, note before we depart.The public hearing on the changes to section 6.8 are going to happen at the June 2nd meeting.This is regarding?That's the two minor amendments to the floodplain regulations.At some point over the summer, I expect the full rewrite of the zoning regulations to come to the select board.Again, you'll have to go through the same procedure.Okay.Yeah, It's likely to be more dense.Yeah.It's a complete re rework of the sections.Okay.And then as things, if, if when we get action on the criminal recusal.Yes.That may have to be handled in special meetings.I would recommend it because it will essentially be like a DRB hearing.You'll you'll have a public hearing.You'll take comments.You'll take testimony from the applicant.Chris think we're going to get some of the members of the interim zoning committee together to help Claire rock, write the staff report.And we can talk about opinions on not only how well it fits with the zoning regulations that are in place, but how well the project fits within the community as a whole.And what, what sort of the community member reaction from the village might be?I want to also mention, we did appoint two members to the recreation committee, Robin Isabel and Rabideau.And they're been working on trying to put together a plan for a tennis court.And she had wanted to speak at the June 2nd meeting.Well there was some conversation about the Browns court fields was - Yes.The Brown's court ball field has been a ball field for over a hundred years.There is some surplus space there, although I'm not sure how much space there really is for a tennis court.It might mean a redesign or a conversation about what we can do there.And they are looking at that.In my memory, there was some substantial workup there to bring, can I say the softball field closer to the standard of the baseball field in town?It was in my, within my sort of kids career.I'm playing softball.So it wasn't that long ago.So that's my only sort of caution.I'm a fan of tennis, but I don't want to do it sacrifice the interests of softball to the fields.Right.But you know, how are we sort that out?Well It's good again, to have a conversation because we need people to look at these issues or else they don't get looked at.And the larger issue is really we, we have in the general area and not just Richmond, but Huntington, Bolton, Richmond, maybe not Hollinsburg I don't know, but everything in Jericho is full there's.There's just no facilities.There aren't enough ball fields around there aren't enough soccer fields or somebody who wants to play in the lacrosse.They get, they don't get a chance and other sports as well.There's just not the opportunity.There's no basketball courts and, and volunteers green is out because the floodplain regulations that are in place now that have to be there prohibit any kind of development or that sort of thing.Yeah like soccer and- - So we, we need more land for facilities.What do we do?Just food for thought.And you don't have to.Yeah, I'm taking him to the school area right now, actually in the back, middle school, elementary school.If they expanded fields, they don't have a flood problem.And there is potentially space up there.It's just.I may suggest we adjourn and continue that discussions after.So somebody wanna move.Alright, all in favor?Aye.We are adjourned.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Richmond_Selectboard_5-19-14.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Richmond_Selectboard_5-19-14.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Richmond_Selectboard_5-19-14.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/Richmond_Selectboard_Gateway_Zoning_Hearing_12-11-14/Richmond_Selectboard_Gateway_Zoning_Hearing_12-11-14.mp3", "text": "Okay, good evening.Good evening, and thank you all for coming out in the snowy weather to this public hearing on Gateway rezoning.Before we begin, if you haven't just found these they're over by the table, and you should have the proposed changes discussion, which is the actual language of what will be on the ballot if this goes forward.And then also, kind of a question and an answer section.So, if we wanna go there first, we would like to open the meeting just by turning to the second page, and discussing what's on this, and why we're doing what we're doing.The Gateway zonings questions and answers, right?What the community wanted to be said.I can give a little, I can give a little history on why we're doing this.Perfect.And then, we're gonna add in with the different expertise on the select board.So, the primary reason for some of the amendments that were proposed really had to do with the water extension, and really, the combination of the two at the same time.As many of you know, those in town, their water rates have increased.There was a creamery site and the system used to have a creamery that used to use the water, which balanced off the rates and kept them lower.And for the last 20 years has been closed, and there's some big adjustments had to be made.And we're kind of at a point now, we have an opportunity maybe to increase the water line out to Route Two.In order to do so, though we also need users to come onto that line.So, there's a combination of wanting to work with the town people and those on the water to really look at how we can make it more affordable.Not just now, but in the future, and in doing so, how do we also ensure that we can have more water users?And in doing so also, there was a lot of time that was taken by the Planning Commission to look at the current zoning laws.Look at the town plan, and be very thoughtful over the last six months, about how they can make some changes to encourage some business that still fits with the character of our town.But also, would bring some economic development in a zone that's zoned, the Gateway zone.And there's definitions of it in here, is zoned for economic development in certain areas.So, they did talk to some different people that were interested in developing, and there's only a few areas that can be developed.And some of the suggestions that they gathered from that and other people really helped them inform them on the changes that we're gonna be talking about today.So, this was a two-pronged approach.It's really looking at the burden of water costs on people in town, and how can we look towards our future?How can we increase the water line in an area where we know we have an opportunity for some economic growth, in a very thoughtful way?I wanna be clear that it says in the zoning that any development needs to fit within the character of our town.So, that leaves a lot of leeway for the review board, Development Review Board, to ensure that whatever does go out there, does fit with the character of our town.So, there's a lot of thoughtful, a thoughtful process that it did occur.There were public hearings, but we understand there's a lot of people here that we need to listen to some more of what people in town have to say about the proposed changes.And there's also some misinformation out there as well.So, we're hoping tonight we can inform people more about what the changes are, what they might mean, and have a real fruitful discussion about where we go, because what's great about our town is people are concerned, and they're so involved.So, that's really why we moved along this path, I think, and maybe Jeff, you can talk more to the water, and the reasoning behind the two kind of going along the same path, and wanting to do them along the same time.Because it makes sense financially, if we're gonna expand the water to also do some of the rezoning at a parallel track.So, that's kind of why we're at where we're at.And we realize too, and I have to tell you, I learned a lot about the Gateway in this whole process, and I know, even starting from where is it, what is it?Has it been zoned for commercial?Right now, it can be used for commercial and residential currently.A lot of the things that we've heard that people are nervous about could already go in right now.So, we wanna have...Provide information and have a discussion about some of those very specific changes that were suggested.So, if you go through the Q and A, number two, we kind of skipped forward to number two.And it really talks about the primary purpose of the amendments is to increase the potential for commercial development within the mixed use zone.And that's allowing for some increased flexibility, and location of new buildings.And we're not, the Planning Commission is not proposing changes to the overall boundaries.So, the Gateway isn't expanding in any way.It's just within the Gateway, there's some expansion.Do we wanna talk a little bit more about it, can you- - You might just point to the map and- - Okay.A reminder that that's the Gateway.So, we put up some maps up here and we had hoped to pass them all out, but at least they're up here.So, you can see where it is and can someone describe, it goes all the way over to the mobile home parks on 117, or- - Well, not really.It goes out to the park and ride, essentially.The park and ride.So, it's between the old meter machine and up to the park and ride essentially.Okay, and just along with that, when we talk about water, and those two are together in this, we're proposing that would go along, the extension of the water line would go along that too, all the way up to the mobile home park, which I mentioned.That's 117.Yeah.It is important to note that it's only that green area.So, if you're coming into Richmond, it's on your left.If you're leaving Richmond, it's on your right.None of these changes affect any property.That would be those fields, or about three acres where the chiropractic office is right now.So, are there any questions just about what area we're talking about?Okay, and then if we just move onto number three, these are the specific changes that are being recommended by the Planning Commission.So, the maximum building size, and right now the square footage maximum size was 10,000 square feet, and it's increased to 17,000 square feet.If the setback requirements are met, and there's quite a few setback requirements.I don't know if they have the setback requirements right in here, but I think they have some people from the Planning Commission.But for the 17,000 square foot building, if someone should build something like that, I believe it's 200.200 feet.200 feet that it needs to be setback from Route Two.So, just to clarify, and I want...Yes?footprint, I thought with the entire building.Okay.That's perfect, yeah.Thank you.And please, if I misrepresent something, please raise your hand and add in, so- - Can you clarify that?Yeah, so the footprint would be the size of the building on the ground.You would have the possibility of building to 35 feet.So, you could have 17,000 square foot on one floor, and then 17,000 on another floor.The two stories.Two stories, correct.The two stories is the limit.So, reminder that height limit is partly based on fire protection in the absence of a man, or a truck in the town of Richmond.Correct, yeah.We sometimes forget, that is one of the limiting factors.Is there, can you tell us, only 17,000 square feet is?We will, why don't we just walk through these and then we'll come up to those pictures over there with a...And I just wanna clarify, there's currently only two locations that could likely have a building of that size.So, we'll talk about that as well.And then, there's removing of the 5,000 square foot maximum requirement for light manufacturing, business and professional offices and research laboratory.And then, the 5,000 maximum is retained for retail and restaurant uses.And there's a statement in there which remains a statement of prohibiting of big box stores.I think, that's a big concern for all of us and that remains in the zoning, that that's not allowed.So, when you increase the square footage, I think there was concern, but we still maintain that no big box stores.If you go onto the next page, we talk about the roof pitch.And I just wanna add a little, and I have been learning as I go as well, that in talking to some developers, if you do have a seven, a building over 10,000 square feet, or a pitched roof, is really not, I don't know, economically good idea, or, you know?So, as you get bigger, to have a pitched roof is not something really that's reasonable for a developer that maybe wanna build here.But there are setback requirements, and if you have a building closer to the road, you still have to have a pitch roof.So, you have to follow the setback.So, anything that's up closer to the road has to have a pitched roof.And I think, it's 5,000 feet and less has to have a pitched roof.10,000 feet.Or 10,000, sorry.10,000 feet or less.So, if you're over 10,000, the pitched roof requirement is you do not have to have it, but 10,000 and under remains pitched roof.The exterior building, it was required, wood, or brick, and now, it's the appearance of wood or brick.And I just wanna use the Richmond Market as an example.That is not wood, or brick.So, in trying to make sure we don't get certain things, sometimes we may hinder development.We still have the character of the town and we can still include the appearance of wood and brick, but that came up as there are some other materials out there that look nice, but they're not wood, or brick, or less maintenance and such.Commercial development, lastly, the new development must have at least 40% of the gross floor area in commercial use.Residential development, it only is no longer allowable.And there's been this kind of falls in line with the commercial development for this area in the town plan.So, it more aligns with the town plan, but I do also know, when you do residential roads, and you don't have any commercial to balance it, sometimes that can cause a problem with just providing the regular services you need to provide to new residents and families; and not having the additional income to do so.So, there was some consideration I believe, to ensure that there would be some commercial in that area.So, there's additional conditional uses, business yards, food processing establishments, repair garage, private club, and tavern have been added to the list within the district.Do we wanna open it up for any comment, or?Like those other comments from the select board.Yeah, let me just go to the select board first.Chris, did you want to...I'd like to say a couple of quick comments.I think, that and please, I wanna hear from people who may have been involved in issues with the Gateway in the past, probably for about the last 10 years.The reason that the Gateway looks the way it does, and there's been relatively little change there, is probably primarily due to three things.One is the poor state of the economy, at least after 2007.The current zoning and the lack of a connection to the town water and sewage, meant that anything that went in there had to have a septic system, and that was a limited size.So, one of these factors is changing now, we see the change in the economy.There's renewed interest and the reaps purchase of the Willis Farm property, and they're bringing this issue to the Water and Sewer Commission.The select board is a really welcome sign that the economy is picking up, okay?But probably the most profound thing is if we extend water and sewer out there, it's gonna make it possible to put all kinds of buildings there that just haven't been feasible in the past.So, if we do that, it is probably important to change the zoning so that we don't end up with things that people don't wanna see there.And I know that this has been a topic in the past, but just to sort of put that in context.I see this as a very positive discussion for the town.It is one of the last areas in the town where we can add significant development that has the potential not just to have the benefits that Ellen described for the water and sewer system, which honestly we need, but also they add to the tax base of the town as well.I guess, my caution is that we need to be realistic about the market as the economy picks up.And whether we like it or not, I think, the real estate industry sees Richmond as bedroom community.And demands what developers wanna build in Richmond is more housing.And it's not clear to me that there is...That there are...That there's a clear advantage to commercial development, over residential developed, additional residential development of the town, Remember, we have declining population in our schools, which has tended to make them oversized, and has been a contributing factor to the cost trends there.So, it's not a black or white situation to me, but obviously, it would be great to have a mix if we can get it.But I think, flexibility and being able to respond to the developer community and to be a good partner so that we end up with development and businesses in the Gateway that people are proud to drive by as they come coming in out of town.And really contribute to the town would be a very positive outcome, and possible outcome of this process.Thank you, Chris.Anything, do you have anything?No, okay.So, before we move onto...I'd like to take us step by step through the changes, and invite questions and comments, but before we do that, Claire, if you would do your thing.You have some pictures here.You have some pictures here for us, and if you could just kind of talk about the process the Planning Commission took and tell us what you have.And for people who don't know, this is Clair Rock, the town planner.Yeah, thank you.So, I guess, really I'll start over here and just talk a little bit about some of the information that the Planning Commission would have, and has provided at the public hearing.Had a clear conversation is the Planning Commission and a development for this evening is that the zoning changes that are being put forth have to conform with the town plan.And so, the statement from our town plan includes basically then this paragraph, which references the Gateway area, which kind of sets the vision for the Gateway area.And that's where it includes information about including commercial, and residential development.The size and the shape of the buildings will reflect those down in the village.Urban and suburban strip development of big box stores will be prohibited.So, that's some of the guiding information that is being used to guide the zoning.And when the Planning Commission draws up the changes, they have to ensure that it conforms with the town plan.So, that gives some parameters to what we have to stay within because that's our kind of guiding document.The town plan language was written back in 2007 and the town plan was readopted in 2012.Just as a side note, we will be updating our town plan starting next year, and we've received municipal planning grant funding to do so.We intend to do a big public outreach process of we're actually looking for volunteers to serve on the steering committee.So, if any of you are at all interested in helping guide the new town plan, and ensuring that we get a lot of participation, please contact me, cause we are looking for volunteers.So, that the map here is the Gateway district.As I mentioned, the Gateway district is from the mobile station down to basically, the last property there is the multi-family unit building.That's undergone a renovation recently.So that's the last property in the Gateway.Based on the analysis we did, we found that there's about 26 acres of developable land that's in the Gateway.So, that's about the amount of land that could be developed.And predominantly that land is within this, within this area.The mobile sits within the flood plain, so they have restrictions on any new development they can do there.And then, there was a...gonna be conserved by the land trust as a sledding hill.So, that would be...This property here will be conserved.And then as you move down, you have the two cemeteries, and then a couple of smaller parcels.So the land, I think, the prime focus of where our future development could go, predominantly looking in here, there was the mention of the 200 foot setback.That if you are 200 feet back from the road, you could have a larger 17,000 square foot building.So, this dashed dark line represents that 200 feet, and that'll give you some sense of back distance that I'm speaking of.There was a question about how large the building was, and this, this rectangle here represents 17,000 square feet.It's to scale with the map.So, that'll give you a sense of how big of a footprint would be able to go out along on these properties.This one here is about 10,000 square feet.So, it's just reference.I'm gonna jump over here, these pictures.The 10,000 square feet is approximately the size of the market that's here in the village, and we did look at some other buildings.I think, Harrington's is actually over 20,000 square feet.So, there are other large, larger buildings and so I'll just step over here.But these were some associations of building sizes, not necessarily building style.And when we were looking at, well, what does big box store mean?And that can be some guiding information that you've used to kind of judge, are we staying within the vision of the town plan?Based on this diagram here, a big box store would be considered this size, which is the size of the Home Depot.And then, the 40,000 square feet is this red box.And then, 13,000 square feet is this smaller box.So, I think, for the purpose of the Gateway, a little bit bigger than this blue box is the size that we're looking at compared to what's generally considered a big, big box.So, that there are some labels here looking at general sizes.This is a 17,000 square foot, two floor building.This is a 4,500 square foot building, and it's a picture of the village market as the example.And then we did some modeling where we were looking at this is the reap property in the front, and like a bit is called the little...The cottage, the Thompson Thomas Cottage, and this, this represents a 15,000 square foot building.And kind of giving a sense of if you were kind of on the road, what that size would look like in compared to the farmhouse in the front.So, that's some of the information that the Planning Commission has used as they went through their process.Can I ask a question?Related to the pictures?Yup.Okay.Thank you, I just wondering if it would be helpful for me, by the way, my name is Marshall Parson.It would be helpful for me in terms of putting pictures and boxes, and squares, and rectangles in context to just test what's the footprint of the bar that's on a property now?You know that 600 square footprint.So, the is 6,000.Correct.Yeah, but what's being proposed is this the footprint of the bar is potential.Did you have a question about pictures?Yes.Okay.So, if you showed us that big square in the upper corner, that is the Home Depot size.Mm-hmm.And you said that the red one is 40,000, but you didn't give us an example.Oh, okay, so an example of, so yes, I have mentioned that this teal box is the size of a Home Depot.This 40,000 one is a large supermarket.And then, when you come down to the teal one that's with 13,000 square feet, that's your average size of a chain drug store.How big is the building?I believe that was over 10,000, but not greatly over 10,000.Other questions about the pictures, we're talking about sizes?And just, before you state your question, if you could just state your name, please?John Mollard, is that structure two stories?Which, which one?Being the one that was using the model?Yes.It is, that was modeled, well 30 feet.So, that would be two stories.So, that's the national size of that teal model?35.That's two stories out of 10,000.Well, we don't define number of stories, we just say the building cannot exceed 35 feet.So, generally speaking that equates to- - 3,427 height.Two stories, yeah, in this picture, yeah.These are three stories into that height restriction.Thanks.Sure.Any questions about the pictures?I'm Jason Camp, just to get a better sense, do you know how big this building is that we're in right now?Yes, that was and I think we looked at that, and it was just over 10, I believe.Right, this footprint is roughly 10,000 square feet.So, that's the turquoise, or the...Right, we're more of a rectangle that...Yeah.So, when you're looking up there, it leads into here, yeah.Yeah, thank you.Any other questions about those?Thank you.All right, so next what we'd like to do is go to your changes.So, that's the one with the cross outs, it says Gateway commercial district on them.And we thought what we'd do is we'd go step by step through them, discussing the changes, and requesting your comments and questions.Before you make a comment, please state your name so it is on the record and tonight, we'll keep it for the two minutes, and then once everyone's gone, we'll come back and let you go again.Oh, Taylor, do we set a time for when we're gonna...How late we're gonna run tonight?We have not set a time how late we're gonna run.Should we?Would you like to?Just in the interest of public safety and avoiding exhaustion and everything, I would propose that we plan to run for 90 minutes total, and if we're still, if everybody still wants to go and we're hot and heavy, we can reconsider, but shall we try and keep it to that?So, that gives us approximately- - No, 90 Minutes from the beginning at 19:00, so try to go to 20:30.Is that- - Yeah, yes.Okay- - It's good.All right, so there are no changes in the first section, we're looking at 3.4.1. So, that's allowable uses on issuance of a zoning permit.The big change, there are changes in conditional uses.So, that would be uses that must appear before the Development Review Board for approval, and those were already listed for you.They include addition of business yard, food processing establishment, garage and repair, private club.And if you flip the page, tavern provided is associated with an onsite distillery, brewery, or winery.And just to speak to a couple of those reasons behind them.Business yard, I believe in the Planning Commission, or Claire, you can stop me if I'm wrong, but this is what I...Or you can stop me if there's another opinion on it, but business yard is used often by construction workers, construction companies, other companies that may have large pieces of equipment.And at the time there was a discussion about having the state use the property for their equipment.So, that is something that would need to be included in the area.Food processing was one of those water, sewer uses that could use a lot of water, sewer, of water mainly, that was added.Garage and repair was kind of the same thing as automobile service station when you look at the definitions in our zoning bylaws.And then, the tavern, the tavern was added, and I skipped one private club.I can't speak to private club.Private club is like a tavern, but for private people.So, that would be like an Elks club?So, that Elks club.The VFW. - The VFW Hall.The Eagles.The Eagles.The moose.The Elks.The difference there, sometimes you think of that as a restaurant, but this, the private club would not have the same restrictions on size as a restaurant would in this, in these zoning proposals.So, restaurants currently at 5,000, a private club might be bigger.And then, the last one was tavern, and the Planning Commission actually took a second look at that and added a sentence provided is associated with the onsite distillery, brewery, or winery.That was actually a very good addition and really would hopefully be in the character of the town, and provide that kind of more of a destination versus just parking a bar out on the Gateway.So, I do invite any select board members who want to chime in on those, and then we'll go to the public.Anything from us?Questions and comments about the proposed changes, or anything in the allowable uses?Yes, sir?Glen Lester, the addition of the business yard.Yes?I have a concern there because there is nothing, when you talk about setback screening like that, but there's nothing for the business yard.The business yard was .You don't know if you got building.A business yard can change from one day to the next, and it can get very messy.So, I'm not saying it's not conducive, I'm saying there's nothing in here that I see that requires any kind of setback, or screening.Correct, yeah, I mean, the screen, that would be included would be with the normal screening.So, there is a 50 foot, if we go to the next page, that would be a 50 foot lot frontage, correct me if I'm wrong, Claire.So, is there a buffer?There is a buffer.For a yard, or just parking?No, I'm just saying that the only buffer would be the buffer required in the parking.So, there's a 50 foot requirement from the...There's a 50 foot setback requirement, that includes a landscaping requirement, but that would...You're right, would only, would be the only buffer for that, for that business here.These are all uses that would have to go before the Development Review Board and meet the conditional use criteria.So, within the conditional use criteria, one of those does include screening and landscaping.So, there are additional standards that all projects that go for conditional use, regardless of their district would have to meet.So, that would be something the DRB would look at.It's not necessarily specifically stated, or doesn't have its own specific standard with that, within that district.Claire, maybe if you could expand just a little bit on conditional use, and what that means.Claire, can you sit at that table with that mic there?Sure.So, the conditional use is a specific approval that has to be sought by the Development Review Board.And that requires an applicant to submit a conditional use and site plan application to the Development Review Board.It has to be publicly warned.All the neighbors have to receive notice of the application as a public hearing.So, any application that would come under one of these conditional uses, would be reviewed by the board in a public hearing, where neighbors could come and voice concerns, or support for a project.And then, following a conditional use approval, the DRB would issue their decision.And from there, the applicant would have up to two years to then seek a specific zoning and building permit from the zoning administrator to actually physically do what they received the approval from the Development Review Board to do.So, there is a another layer of criteria and public hearings, and review that goes along with any application that would come for review for a conditional use.Thank you.Yes, sir?So, Mike Walleden, to my meaning though, that 50 foot buffer is for structures, so that there is a question.I don't see that they're given an answer about any screening, or setback.Is there one?I question to me is that fill it up, up to the road, it's not a structure.It doesn't have the minimum screening and setback.Is that true?In which case, even though it goes before the DRB it's still not complying with all the other structured uses of the job.So, that, the business yard would have to go before DRB- It would have to meet the building setbacks.Right, it would have to meet those setbacks.But the yard part.That's what she said, so the yard part would also have to meet the building setbacks.It does that?Yes.That's considered a structure?It's considered one of the conditional uses that has to comply with the other rules, of the others.I don't see a five, the entire setup structure, limitations for structures with receiver limitation survive 3.4.3. I don't see that it has - Doesn't have setback screening.Yeah, I think, it comes through in the parking lot requirements that are in the parking section of those zoning regulations, which in that section, it does state that all parking areas do need to meet the district setbacks.So, if an application was to come to the Development Review Board, and there was a business yard, which would essentially the basis of that would be a parking lot, then it would be required to meet those standards, which have to meet the setback requirements.I just have a question, if you were to make a minor change, would it be considered minor to add?Just clarify that.To say that the limits of the construction yard- - Would follow the parking.I think certainly, the intention was that the setback requirement would apply.But it's a good point, okay.I mean, I would consider the uses in 3.4 .2 to all be subject to the other, the other requirements in the document.And just because it's a yard, doesn't necessarily, just because it looks like a yard doesn't necessarily exclude it from these other setback requirements.Nah, I mean, I think, it's a good point if there's ambiguity about it, but if you go down to 3.4.4, that's where we're talking.That's where we're getting to the setbacks.Right, and I think, you'll find that across the entire zoning document.So, you could clarify it in the Gateway, but that ambiguity would still remain in all the other districts, and that would be an allowable use, so.Okay, but it's a good point.Yeah, okay.Thank you, yes?I have a question.What is a business yard definition?Define, I understand what a...If you are a business, you have a yard, but if you're a contractor, you have a chance for a clean operation.You have a couple of trailers and it's a clean operation, but versus you have some backhoes, you have manholes, you have sulfite.Is there a clear definition of what a business yard is, versus...What would prevent someone from putting a bunch of backhoes and we'll say Caterpillar moved over there, and then, J. Prescott put some pipe there, and what would prevent that?So are you...Do you have the zoning on your- - Yeah, I was looking for it.Yeah, it's in the definitions.Right.And I can go and get mine if that'll be helpful as also, but within the definition section of the zoning regulations, it provides definitions for the uses.So, the business yard does have a defined use.So, we have something to look to to say that's what it is.Okay, so by backhoes, could I that...Claire, do you wanna read- - So, I'll read it out loud for you.Okay, so this which operates out of the yard, which may include structures, indoor and outdoor storage of materials, equipment, or vehicles.Customary accessory uses for the business are small office space, and vehicle, or equipment repair.A majority of the business activity shall take place off site.No assembly is involved or allowed.So, then to answer your question is, yes.You can store backhoes.You could store pipe, you could store other construction equipment.I'm a contractor, I think, I don't want a store there, I don't think the reaps intend to do it, but I think having that in there as an allowable use, might not be something you wanna consider.With the DRB moving across- With the character of our town, are there some other mechanisms in place that might prevent certain things again?I think, it goes back to if all the conditional uses do have to adhere to the conditional use criteria, which is a different section.And then, that conditional use criteria screening is one of the conditional use criteria that an applicant would have to demonstrate appropriate screening.So, they would look at that when an application is before them.Are there any other questions on that section, on any of the other uses?Can I ask- - Yes, you can go ahead.Mike Holler, can I ask why that was inserted?That's the first new edition, instead of- an insert.And what was the intention, and besides the intention, what are your odds?So, this came from somewhere, and I think, we ought to allow what we wanna allow if we want it, but this is not clear.So, why does that happen?Mark, do you wanna speak to that?I may be able to answer that.And one of the things that came up, there was two properties, or two development options that had come up in discussion about the Gateway.One of them was a laboratory for the State of Vermont, DC, which would've been nice, but the zoning wasn't in place to allow it.Previously before that, there was inquiry's, I dunno if it was before, or after the reaps purchase property, but a development of the state police barracks there, which required a business yard.Second.So, those two options, I thought were both good assets to the town that we thought were reasonable assets to the town, considered them a possibility.Mark, is it fair to say that in the zoning commission's deliberations that on one hand having a commercial component requirement, on one hand there was an attempt to balance that by giving flexibility to the types of commercial businesses that could be cited there?Again, given that the propensity of developers is gonna wanna be put residences on that.And what you wanna do is make it as open to different kinds of businesses as falls within the guidelines of the town plan.That's certainly part of the discussion.Thank you, Mark.Any questions, yes?Please state your name.Gary so, I think, it's a double J. So, it's not- Community owned, inaugurated institution facility that allows for us...Can someone explain to me why the state- For a definition under that section.I think it was the building size.Well, it wasn't for you.I mean, that stuff to you.Right, well specifically with a state lab that state facilities can go in there, and they could be defined as a state facility, but then looking at well, what about private lab?And being able to allow for that also.Other questions on these uses?Yes, sir.Yeah, I'm still on the business yard.I'm listening to Mark, he said that one of the reasons that came into being was the possibility of the state police going in there.Well, I...State police, I mean, they usually have a parking lot.When I think of a business yard, I generally think of construction, and as this gentleman here mentioned, to be all kinds of equipment there.But also, there can be a collection over time of broken down equipment that worked the other day and it didn't work today.I mean, okay, six months from now, it still isn't working, and it's still there, or materials that are coming off site from somewhere else, being temporarily stored there.And without any kind of setback, and I don't think, 50 feet for something like that is adequate for screening.If there was screening there, I really wouldn't have a problem with it.But from what I'm hearing here, the reasons for this are a lot narrower than witnesses allowing.Thank you.Yes, sir?My names John .I'm not necessarily so thrilled with the idea of the business yard is sort of open, so open as that.But in section 3.4.5, the second last line of that section, subsection F, item three, it says, \"There must be landscaping between the floating and Route Two of 50 feet\".So, there is a landscaping piece there.So , here's some...There's a statement there about screening.I don't know if that means that two foot high hedging s that look really dumb.Right.But if it's filterable, if there is some lining that could be improved- Thank you.Any other comments or questions on this?Yes?Yeah- - Marie Thomas, and I've gone to a number of meetings with the Planning Commission and stuff , and I've been watching this.And I've been actively thinking about it as I drive up and down Route Two every day.And if you look at it, especially with that 200 foot line there, this what 26 acres overall, when you take up.Does that include the area that's been given, the conserved area, no.No. - Claire?No, that certainly doesn't include the conserved area, but what you're talking about basically are, there's three parcels, and there if you look as you drive up and down, there are a number of places.The little wetlands and things in there, so there's really a very, very limited area that we're talking about.We're really talking about two major landowners there.And then, there's three small parcels that currently have single family homes on them, that are very, at the very narrowest part there.So, I think, everybody's got concerns and that's appropriate that people have concerns if people pay attention, but we're really talking about a really small area there.And I find when I'm driving in from the interstate, your eye is not looking at that side of the road at all.And I bet you, if you canvas everybody in here, you couldn't even describe what all the buildings look like there because there is a lot of landscaping.That's one of the things that's preventing not driving right to there.And when you're driving out, once you get past the cemetery, you see the Willis House, which is 50 feet off the road.Okay, that's about 50 feet off the road, the Willis House.You can barely see the Thompson Cottage.You can't see the towing place cause it's way up and back.And then, you really, you might see one of the other houses there.So, to me, it's not, none of us want us to have this place to come every place USA. We don't wanna get off the highway and have a McDonald's, or a Burger King.If you're keep thinking off getting off of Littleton and New Hampshire, and you go, and it's like, it's McDonald's, it's Burger King.It's- - Dunkin Donuts.It's three, there's three Dunkin Donuts.There's three stores, what do you call them?Drug stores, I mean, we don't want that up, and it's very clear that we don't want that, but I think we'd be hard pressed, even if somebody did try to put that in there, doing that there.And since the biggest parcels owned by people who have a lot of investment in this community.Mm. - And who are known entities, I don't think that there's a lot of risk.So, that's just my perspective.All these people have lived here for awhile.They've proven that they have all the...The main landowners are here, they've proven that they- in the community.So, I don't...I'm not all that nervous.I would be nervous if we had some big out of town developer coming in and just wanting to push through.I mean, we all saw what happened in Willesden.I don't know if anybody was here in the 70s, they built Willesden days.And everybody tried to fight it back then.That used to be beautiful farmland there.We certainly don't want to be Willesden.I don't really think that that's...That could happen here.We've got the flood plain zone, can't handle there.Remember years ago, there was a proposed truck wash there?And that can't happen.You know, in reality, the local station shouldn't be there, but that was done years ago.So, I'm not all that nervous, and I think, it's important for us to keep it in perspective as to what really could happen there.So, that's just my- It's a small place.We don't have very many places to go.I feel really bad, I don't live in town.I don't have to pay those high water rates, but I feel really bad for everybody who does.And I don't think that the cheese plant is gonna get redeveloped anytime in the near future.And it's not, definitely not gonna take up the kind of water that it used to, and we need to do something.And we have some businesses there that could generate some jobs, then there'll be people to eat in all these wonderful restaurants that we're gonna have here now.And we have a wonderful downtown, we have what other places don't have.We have a wonderful downtown.Jericho doesn't have that, Round Hill doesn't have that.The Waterbear is close to having it.We have a nice little walk over downtown here.We've got some great places and great businesses.And I don't think, I think, this can only enhance it.I don't think it's gonna detract from it, and there has to be some development somewhere.And frankly, I'd rather see jobs come in out there, than see a whole bunch of houses built.Thank you.Further dissecting our farmland out there.So, that's just my few words.Thank you, Marie.Quickly, do we have any other discussion on 3.4.2. Yes?On principle, I tried never to disagree with Marie Thomas.And I'm not going to, I mean, I think that you...I'm just gonna speak for myself here, and the rest of the select board can do that, but I think, part of this is that the select board would like to encourage some kinds of commercial development in the Gateway.That's one of...That's why we're having this meeting.Well, that would be.And consistent with the town plan.And that would be consistent with the town plan.I'm going to move us along just because when the lights go out, we don't have a lot of time before there are literally no lights left, and we can't exit safely.So, if we move onto section 3.4.3, which is dimensional requirements applicable to lots in the Gateway district, there were no changes to this section from what currently existed.Is there any comment or question on that section?Okay, in section 3.4.4 dimensional limitations for structures on lots in the Gateway district.This is where there were two changes.The first is the 10,000 square foot building, and the 17,000 square foot building.So, I'll read that out loud, \"No building shall have a footprint exceeding 10,000 square, with the exception of buildings that are setback more than 200 feet from the edge of Route Two right of way, and 30 feet from the edge of all other right of ways.Building setback more than 200 feet from the edge of the Route Two right of way and 30 feet from the edge of.All other right of ways shall not have a footprint exceeding 17,000 square feet\".And then, the second change was the next one, which is the residential mixed use requirement.In the Gateway commercial district, at least 40% of the gross floor area of new development must be in commercial use.So, just for point of history, that new item F is a new item, but also, it was modified from 50% to 40%.Correct.Within the last month.Questions and comments on those, on that section?Yes, sir?The general, open questionnaire, cause I'm not sure it's real specific to that.Perfect.So I'll hold that- - Perfect.And focus on- - Okay, other questions on that?Yes, sir.Yeah, Brad .Do you have any bit of sense of how many people could be employed in say, the footprint 17,000 foot story?I'm assuming it could go three, cause there's a peaked roof and it's leaning to that size, so.But it can hold too .Cause it's only 35 feet high.Can't you get three stories on the 35s?Three times- - No. - No?It's just highly unlikely.So, if you do have a question about , you just shot your hand up.Well, at the time when the agricultural laboratory was moving towards the space, and with a 17,000 square foot footprint, two story building, they were saying that they would have 50 employees.15.50.Oh, 50.You staying out of it.shifts there.Yeah.Yeah.I'm thinking cubicles, I don't know.Right.guys, trying to get a sense about the traffic impact.Right.With people going in.Marie's made the point about commercial being as better than residential, but all of a sudden, with 10,000 people working out there, which I know is a ridiculous number, but if there's a bunch of people out there, that is gonna put more pressure on housing stock.We could only the one acre zoning in town that's very easy to, you know?A lot of people that move in and the cost of town services will go up, and taxes are great, so.So, that they call it also a topic as such.There is a new- Where if an applicant is seeking to either put in a curb cut, or I think, this would also apply to modifying an existing curb cut.So, you're switching a curb cut from residential use to a commercial use.They have to go to the Agency of Transportation because this curb cut was on a state highway.And so, there's a new requirement, which states before the local board would review it, they have to go to the state and get a state preliminary approval on that curb cut, and that access point before the issue of the local approval.And I think, that's just to make sure that the state is overseeing traffic flows on their own highway system.So, that would be a form of a checks and balances for any major development on the Gateway.They would have to get the blessing of Agency of Transportation to ensure that there wasn't gonna create any traffic, severe traffic impacts.Yeah.Mark?I just wanted to make another comment I had to the concerns about traffic, and the location where that property is.If you think about the jobs that would be created there, and the traffic impact from that, I didn't have the strong sense that that would be great.I didn't run a study or anything, but that that traffic would be traveling in the opposite direction.The current flow of traffic now to Richmond.Richmond's already there, the community demands on development for housing are already there.And those aren't going to be radically changed by a building going in off of Route Two, but the traffic, the flow of employees going to that building would be coming off of the interstate and going towards town.But not all the way into the four corners intersection that is such a mess.Traffic for residents in town, or in Bolton, et cetera, are already gonna be moving out towards the interstate anyway.So, those increases wouldn't necessarily be impacted by construction, or commercial development off of Route Two.And construction or commercial development in town might actually promote residents and people living in the town to take alternative.They wouldn't necessarily be compelled to take a vehicle if they could bike to their job, on Route Two, a mile away on Route Two, and so.Now, there is studies and Route Two is in the midst of...We did a study on...There was a study performed on , improving traffic flow and alternative transportation along Route Two, out to the parking lot.It didn't really come up with a practical alternative.However, the state is intending to do significant work on Route Two.And I think, it would be in the town's interest to encourage the state in lieu of a formal alternative path, but to widen Route Two as much as possible, and promote if not, formal bike lanes, because those aren't legally wide enough on stretches of Route Two.But there could be significant improvements to bike travel along Route Two, that the town should be pushing, besides, above and beyond what we're talking about here with this development.I just wanna add, I think, is there a new park and ride going in at Willesden, or is there another- - A 2.15.There is, yeah.I'm just thinking, the adjustment here has to do with maybe some of those people would lose the Willesden one.It's just another additional decrease- Okay.Thank you, pardon?Marshall Paulson, just curious about it, maybe it's a developmental, procedural question looking at 3.4.0- To the last item there.There isn't mixed piece requirement.Just out of curiosity, it says that there's a 40, at least 40% gross area development must be in commercial usage.The Gateway is a whole series of parcels.How's that done procedurally, if say someone comes in and says, I want to develop and do 100% commercial.The next persons come online, have a skewed for their development proposals, or a skewed to maintain this national 40% figure.How's does that work?Chris, Chris will talk about this.We've had a very sturdy conversation about this.Good question.It is a great question.So, the way that this has been interpreted is that any individual development in the Gateway, must meet this requirement.So, and we tend to think of it now as the existing parcels, but suppose a developer comes in and buys up a number of those parcels, and consolidates them.Well, then that would...And what if it's a zoned, I mean, a phased development over time?There are issues with actual enforcement here.And we were getting into thinking about tradable development permits, where you know, and all kinds of things that basically, I have no idea how we would actually administer.So, I think, what this is gonna come down to is that when a developer brings something to the DRB, this will be something that gets put...It's leverage, it's basically leverage for the town to get a commercial component to any specific development that goes in there.Does prohibit a single family residential owner selling their property to someone who also wants to build a single family residence on a single parcel?It does now.Right, so you could- - So that this go further.No, but it wouldn't preclude you from selling your single family house to a new owner.So, that selling of a single family house to a new owner can still happen.And you can still make modifications to a single family house, where you couldn't build a new, single family house out there.Without adding a business.It's 40%.Even if you use the same code.You couldn't do a tear down and build a single family house without adding a business.Well, in that case, I think you could.You could because you have a...There's a provision in the bylaws that says like, say, if your house burns down, you have the right to rebuild it on the same foot.Oh, I stand corrected.So, you could take a three acre lot, and split it into three separate one acre lots, and build two additional homes.Right, I think, in keeping with the town, they were trying to keep some of that area commercial, given the limitations on commercial and our town.And that not having a bunch of new residential developments, when there's other areas you could do that with.And there was some discussion if I'm...Just even given where it's at, it might not really be prone to big residential communities, because of two and then 89, really cutting it in that little triangle.So those, there was some thought into why the encouragement for commercial was important there, rather than somewhere else, where maybe residential would be better suited.So, but Mark, some of the other people- - Can I just ask one follow up and then I'll have that confirmed.Follow up.One follow up.Yeah.So, just to play this out, the 50,000 square foot building potential, that's all commercial.What does that do to the rest of the property?What 17,000?Well, our 17,000- - 17,000.Give or take.So, okay, all right fair enough.Just seeing if you're awake.So...So, how just getting that out, that does, or does not negatively affect other potential developers along the parcel with their opportunities for being next to commercial.I guess, it could from the competition, the point standpoint of competition, right?So, the first person to build good commercial space might lock up that commercial space, that market.But that as far as...As far as the whole Gateway is concerned, that doesn't- - But that doesn't- No, that doesn't preclude another owner from also developing that type of building.It says that police, Marshall.Yes.But to be clear, we're talking about maybe two parcels that have the potential to do so, but I think, it's a good point.Thank you.Yeah, yes?Krista Kemp, I'm wondering where the 17,000 number came from, if it was based on the agricultural lab, or just a random number you chose, or...Sure, Mark?Yes, I could attend to that.Yeah.It did come pretty much from the...Yeah, the agricultural laboratory.Their requirements were for 15,050, or something obscure like that.It's on the Planning Commission decided to put a little bit of elbow room into that 15,000 plots, and that is the 17.It's certainly wasn't a hard scientific number.Just something that would satisfy what the DDC lab would want, and it seemed reasonable.One of the...Another one of those kinds of flexible numbers, where between 10,000 and 17,000 feet, we felt that was something adequate to build good commercial space, or put some sort of use that we're allowing into it, but still restricted from being the size of Home Depot.Yes?Guy Heards, I have just a question about, not necessarily the corner space, where the routes are, but the spaces further up.Assuming that at some point, those did get joined together at some point.The restrictions here talk about 40% of the area being used for building structures, pavement, et cetera.Would it not...There's nothing here that restricts numbers of buildings necessarily.So, you can almost see somebody stacking two or three buildings immediately adjacent to each other- Sidewalk include on some of those sites up to there.Is there no thought to try and restrict the building density more than just by saying 40%?So, the building densities were also governed by the setbacks at three foot in the next section, but other than that, you're right.There could be...You mean like, more 5,000 foot buildings.Correct, yeah.When I look at that, and you look at the topography over there.Yeah.I think, that restricts, that also restricts it.So, - - So, if you go past the Thompson House to where Blackfork Towing is, the topography there very much restricts the type of building, and the places you could place other buildings.In addition, you come up to the highway there.So, that moves buildings forward, and you end up with a fairly narrow area to build.And the need for parking there.And the need for parking, yeah, that's a good point.Are there excavation restrictions?Sorry?Are there excavation restrictions?In terms of?Could the walk side- - Yeah, could you just- All of a sudden I had a development behind me that couldn't have been there had there- - Right, there's no specific excavation requirements, or- - Limitations.Limitations rather requirements.So, you're right, there's the potential to fill in say, to find things out, but again, the topography out there, if you walk back there, we're talking about rock and we're talking about some pretty narrow areas to combine lots and stuff like that would work for building, for squeezing a lot of things together.And I dunno if there's a lot of residential that would maybe be impacted by it, someone- - But- - As opposed to, but it could impact those that are currently there.So, it's a good point.But yeah, I don't think you're wrong.In long-term, that is an option under these rules.Anything else?Other questions or comments on that?Great.I was just wondering, is anybody here specifically not know the committee, is that ?Yes.What kinds of businesses have expressed interest coming to a community that far?So, talking to seeing it get interest from businesses?So, there was an evening, where they had a tech night, where they had some tech people come.Mm-hmm.And that was more entrepreneurial type business.We do have the Greensea in town.We did get feedback that, that their experience when they first tried to open up in town was...Could have been better.So, we're trying to be in some ways more welcoming when someone is interested in doing a little economic development within our town.As far as the creamery sites concerned, there were some conversations with the developer and some interest.And that was really being spearheaded by a nonprofit, the senior center nonprofit, and at this point installed.So, I don't have any updates.Our next meeting I'm hopeful, is on the 17th, that we will have some- - We have some really nice businesses in town, like the Goodwin Baker Building, we've got the Rainforest Alliance, the HMC. Bluehouse Group, and .With Greensea here, we've got some really nice small businesses.And I would think that that would attract even more of that kind of business.I think, we can be smart about who we do approach and attract, and there is some benefit to the Economic Development Committee.And the select board supporting it, that we do attract what we want, and I think that's possible.Can I just give you a list of people who have approached us.Yes.For property - Okay.There is a ski boot manufacturer, a brewery, a preschool, a cabinet maker.Nice.An office use that wanted 10,000 square feet of space.I mean, these are the people that have been talking to us, and one of the first reasons that we came to the Planning Commission asking them to change.First thing we asked for was get rid of the 5,000 square foot business limitation.So, I mean, there's interest.That's good.And I think that every year- I think it's nice to have people that know the character of our town.Also being approached by certain things that might fit.So, I do think we can zone out a lot of things.We can think of everything we don't want, and we could have really big zoning regulations, but we may miss some opportunities for some things we do want.So, it's trying to get that balance, and then hopefully that's what we'll get, yeah.John?Mr. Chair, just as a point of process, are we still going through the changes, because we are literally out of time for the meeting, and I think, there's a couple members, people that wanna offer some ideas.Sure.So, we need to get to that.Sure, are there any other questions on this section we're in?Which is 3.4.4. - 3.4.5 coming up.So, the next section is 3.4.5, and this has to do with parking, so changes are on A, where parking located to the...Must be located aside, or rear of the building with the exception of buildings that are setback more than 150 feet from the edge of Route Two.In which case, parking can be in the front of the building.And then, the next change is down to F, number two, the roof pitch requirement may be waived for buildings with footprints that exceed 10,000 square feet.And also, striking structures shall be built up, or have the appearance of wood, or brick.I just wanna make a comment that one of the change to that I, the first subsection of F. - Oh, yes, sorry.A single principle structure must have an entrance, or windows facing Route Two.So, before the change was, there must be both an entrance and windows facing Route Two, and now, it's one, or the other.Questions and comments on those?The town plan says that the building shall be in character of what's found in the village.Mm-hmm.I don't have a problem with 17,000, 20,000, 25, because I think there's a sufficient amount of land there that could fit, but I do have a problem with flat roof.If you look at the underwear factory, that's sloped, even Harrington's has sloped roof in the front.So, I would like the Planning Commission, and the select board to consider adding a requirement that it be a mansard roof, or something.I just think, if you're driving by in the state, you're gonna see rooftop units, you're gonna see it's not the character.And the only flat roof building is probably on Main Street, and it's the main block, but all the other commercial, even the grocery store is sloped.And to me, a roof is a big thing, and...So, that's my comment, and I'd like to thank you guys for all the work.And especially Mark.I haven't attended all the meetings, but I appreciate all the work.I think, getting business in town is great.And I appreciate what the reaps are doing, but roof, and I'm a little concerned about taking wood or brick.I'm fine if you people, like the grocery store, I think is great, but I'd hate to see a nin tin .Right now, there's nothing that would prevent a tin building with a one and a half on 12 roof.There's nothing in here that I would see that would be preventative.Why couldn't I put a caterpillar building down here?And think, that would be wrong.Thank you.Thank you.Other comments, or questions in this section?I just have a question about where that part about the doors and the windows came from, what that's all about?Yeah, so from me in discussions with the Planning Commission, and Mark, you can jump in.Is that with parking requirements, mostly on the side of the building anyway, that it was cumbersome and burdensome to have to add a door and windows to the front side of the building, where in my opinion, windows look kind of the same as if you have a door in there.So, I think, the original, in my opinion, the original intent was to kind of preserve that character of an actual building and not a huge monstrosity.And I think that it can be done with windows, or with doors, or one, or the other not necessarily requiring to be there.If it's not going to be used, why do you need to put the door over there?No, I- That's kind of the way...They've done what is in...Why it's usually driven out, I believe.John?John Park, I guess, there's three answers here I'm serving up.First the free parking, moving the parking from where it had to be at the rear, to up front, and think what sort of gives an area strip development feel, more than anything else is the sea of parking lots at the front of a building.It sets up, it sets the framework for the whole development in a bad light.And I would much prefer to see parking in back.I think, that's a critical change that should be, or that this change should not be adopted.I'd also say that it'd be completely waiving the materials that would be developed and used for development, is that Warren said, whether it's the roof and additional materials alone will have a big effect of what you put there.Yes, there could be some other good materials to build with beyond- So, they should be added, not to breech the rules, cause we could all visualize other materials would be good.But we could also think of that fact that cheap stuff to building, and we have development there that will quickly lose value and set a bad precedent for the entry of our town.Thank you.Thank you.John, the same question?Yes.Correctly just to clarify, so the dotted line on the map is the 200, the 200 foot limit.So, this would be for buildings that are to the left, right?Well, yeah.So, you do the parking in the front.To the- - On the road side.So, the parking setback to that allows...That allows parking.The building setback?Yeah, sorry, the building setback that allows parking in front is 150 feet.So, it's stretched out.it's smaller.Right, it's closer to the road.And then, the parking lot would be between that- - And the red.Red line down the road.Correct.So, parking presumably could be...Would be within that 100 and...It would be closer to the road.140 feet.Yes, yeah.And we have examples currently there with parking and- Complexes that have them there already.Already there?yeah, it's they get clearance permits, from right out of the front.Yeah.So, there are examples.I think, the stand though is pretty different, though.I mean, the parkings really, there are a few cars there all the time.There's a building that is 70, or 50 markers.Mark, you want to provide any insight from the conversations that you folks had on this topic about parking.Oh, well, I think, the Planning Commission's perspective on that, and they're gonna consider it to be a that at 150 feet off of the road as it is, then there is a bit of a setback.There's not as many buildings that would go that far back in the first place.The 50 foot buffer of landscaping, I think, with the intent of hiding parking goes a long way in eliminating that strip mall development, that folks would be concerned about.That's the very specific language about shielding parking.So, that wasn't as big a concern, and we wanted to allow some flexibility to develop .So, I do understand that a lot of the things that people are concerned about aren't necessarily changing, but once again, the line is drawn in that this is a big change.I don't think that's a reason not to be concerned about it, just because it's already there.Until now, with not much has happened there because of water and sewer, not because of planning limitations.So, when water and sewer goes down there, everything's gonna change.Willesden was a town much like Richmond, until water and sewer got pushed around the streets.So, I think, it's great to hear some nice cabinet shop wants to go in and stuff, uses that we would all love to see there, but really what's gonna happen is that the deep pockets at McDonald's are gonna buy those lots on the end.We know that when the sewer goes out there, the water and sewer, the hookup fees for those families is gonna drive some of those families out of there.So, who's gonna be there with the deep pockets to buy up those lots and combine them.It's not gonna be some little Richmond business that wants to be out there.So, I think, overall, what I see here is a huge missed opportunity to stand back and look at this as a piece of land, 26 acres.It's gonna undergo huge changes, not the changes I think, that the reaps are gonna do, I have less concerns.Those lots, they're farther out, they're more appealing to franchise restaurants.More appealing to the same hotels we see at thousands of inter changes as we drive around the country.And I just feel like we're being terribly naive about what's gonna happen there.I don't know if the Planning Commission could talk, because about the limitations on square footage to prevent certain things that we don't want there.It did come up before, cause I know we were concerned as well.When you talk about a big hotel, and things of that nature, can they really fit the 17,000 square foot?Right, too big a hotel obviously wouldn't be able to fit beyond that 200 foot buffer, but certainly, in some of our where those are very real concerns here it has.And then, it's just something that that are not easily, tritely addressed in any zoning regulation.But what we did want to do is encourage the type of development of business offices, and those kinds of things, and facilitate that type of development to make it preferable to some of the other possible developments that could come in there.There is no current zoning in Richmond that bans franchises, those types of things.Those are zoning changes that are fundamental to the core of the town, that maybe could be addressed in a rework and revisit of the town plan, which we will be doing.And are certainly hoping for a lot of community participation there, but isn't something that the Planning Commission was ready to go full barrel down the path of doing that.We spent a lot of time discussing that and the zoning regulations that were discussed.And we had some that were eventually defeated and we had some town based guidelines for that.But to try and piecemeal that together into a specific zoning regulation, we thought was beyond the bounds of the scope of what we were trying to do with this district in the short term.If we had 10 years before we had to decide, maybe would be a great thing to fully revisit the town plan, structure all of that, and then, only change zoning regulations on the revision of the town plan.But I don't think that current circumstances allow that kind of window of time.We just don't have it.We don't have the opportunity.As much as we reached out to the community for feedback and guideline in the six months that we were focused on this district, we didn't go that far because we didn't have the impetus.But the directive from the town to take it that end level.So, we did try to maintain a lot of the zoning that was there now, and make moderate changes that we hoped wouldn't be too controversial, and still held to a lot of the vision of what the town plan is, and what the current zoning regulations are.That's well, first of all, I think we should do a time check just to- - Yes.Do you wanna see whether we should continue, or?Yeah, I mean folks, we stay and talk?Absolutely, yes.Okay.Yeah.Okay, all right.The point that I, and Gary raises an important point.Without going through the whole history of how we got to where we are today, the Planning Commission was given a charge by the select board several months ago in order to meet a schedule, which they did.And many thanks to them, but at...I was at our last meeting where we discussed this, I pointed out that due to changing circumstances, in fact, the urgency about, at least in my opinion.The urgency about putting a vote on the proposed zoning changes before the voters on at the March town meeting, is no longer there for a variety of reasons.As I said at the beginning of the meeting, I believe that if we do extend water and sewer service out to the Gateway area, we probably definitely do wanna revise the zoning, because the current zoning, if left the way it is opens the door to all the kinds of things that everybody's said that they don't wanna have.But that's not gonna happen overnight, folks.I mean, it's gonna take two years to build water and sewer out to that area.If in fact, though, the Water and Sewer Commission moves forward on that, which I think, there's a good chance that they will.And that gives time for the process that Gary described to take place.And that was...Then still, I would have to say my preference, however, the...You also have to, and I do, respect that politics is messy, and that a lot of people spend a lot of time working on this already and it's never gonna be perfect.And another way to look at it is we could do this now, and then improve it over the next two years too.So, it's not...It's not an either, or situation, I guess.And what we could do is see this as the beginning of a discussion, where a lot of these issues get brought out, but then we continue to work on moving forward with that.And without throwing the baby out with the bath water, and just saying that we're going back to the square one, and we're not gonna do anything until we get the town plan done.I think, doing the town...Redoing the town plan is important, and that would give us the opportunity when that's done to make further revisions in the future.Well, of course, I've felt similar to you, that this might be the beginning of changes, and this has actually been a great discussion to bring so many people out to hear some of the things that weren't even addressed in this.That once we do the town kind of revisioning, that could then go back to the Planning Commission.And if this is a first step to some of those other things, we've got a great start to that.So, that's how I'm looking at it.Yes?Okay, while we're talking about the sewer being extended out, we live adjacent to the mobile home park.And I was wondering whether that could potentially change their expansion, or not, based on their own sewer capabilities.Now, I don't know if that's a limitation on them, or whether you guys could maybe address that?Yeah, just a point, not to get too far into it, but essentially what the Water and Sewer Commission looked at is a number of different scenarios.And the one that makes economic sense is to build water and sewer out in the mobile home park so that it can expand.If they don't expand, it sort of borderline and probably still makes economic sense.If they do expand, it has potential lower rates for everybody on the system, because of the extra flow, and the hookup charges.So, that would be ...That's one of the...So, Greg, are you saying that they would expand size-wise?Yes.Well, they could.So, the economic tipping point on the extension of the water and sewer lines, cause they're kind of separate.But if you extended both, the economics really balances when you get as far as the existing mobile home park, because you get a large number of users in one location.Once just the conversation we already had, once you build a line, and you have excess capacity, anyone along the line can ask to hook up for additional use.Up to our 80% maximum capacity.So, there will be excess capacity to be used somewhere, whether it's in town, in the Gateway, or on the other.I guess, my question was more, is the limitation on what the mobile home park, is it purely sewerage and water, or is it something else?No. - No. - So, no.No, so they run their own plant, and I don't wanna get back to this, but they run their own water sewerage system now.They could expand that water sewer system and add units now.I don't know that that's actually...That's accurate, that's 100% accurate, that they could add.They could add units now.So, that's kind of where we're at with that extension, do or not do.pay us, or do it yourself kind of thing.That's where I'm at, and yeah.So, it's related, but...Yeah.Right, got it.Back to zoning anyway, yes?Carey , I think, everyone here tonight is concerned about how the big wave looks, and probably the approach the original looks, and we've spent a lot of time talking about 10,000 square foot buildings, 70,000.I think, the big deciding factor was whether the water goes out there, or not.And they don't put water up there, none of this really matters.There isn't any kind of pressure.There's no, I mean, look what's happened in the last eight years.Nothing's been built out there of this size, but if we put the water out there, then Richmond exchanges are very desirable location to build.And that's when we determine the look of Richmond much more than these rules about building sites.So, the question is, and I know the select board wants and the town plan states we wanna encourage commercial development in that area.And I guess, I'd like to hear from maybe , cause it's your area maybe.Why buildings like Richmond would want to extend our commercial area to increase the size.Will it decrease the tax, property taxes for people in the village, will it?I've heard from the Planning Commission that the water line would not pay for itself, and it wouldn't reduce the water bills for the Richmond residents.Are we looking for more services for the people in town to have, or so why does the town, why would a town want to get bigger and deal with the growing pains that that brings with it?I feel like so, there's several issues and I'll address, I'll ask Jeff to also add in as well, as far as the tax space is concerned.But whenever you have residential, you always need to balance it with some economic development for your tax space.As far as just town services are concerned, I think, when you have more children going to the school and things of that nature, the taxes tend to increase on the property value taxes.I dunno if I- - Can you put...So, the idea was, there's very few areas, and the Economic Development Committee doesn't necessarily want to increase the areas of development.They would like to just find the right kind of development in the areas that are zoned for economic growth, that haven't been developed.And may bring, help support the town, the future of the town, increase the tax rate.So, maybe we could reduce some of the sidewalks and really have some additional funding to make our town look the way we want, in the character that we want it in.So, there isn't some rush to really grow the town.It's really about what have we been doing with the areas that are zoned for economic development?And we haven't been able to develop those.So, we're charged as with the Economic Development Committee to really see if we can attract those businesses that would support our town, and also maybe even bring in more business into town.So, some of the people on the Economic Development Committee have businesses in town.So, are there things that could be out there that may attract more business into town during the day?So, if you did have, I think, the Vermont State police, the thinking was they'll come get their haircut, they'll come to the restaurants, and then they'll leave.But it's how do we do things in a way that meets the character of our town, but also, in those zoned areas for economic development, that we'd actually developed something.So, that was kind of our thinking as the Economic Development Committee.And can we do a better job that the Economic Development Committee just started up again two years ago.It has a history of existing and not existing, but how do we work with our town plan and do something, where we do take the input of the whole town, and we do honor the character.And develop it in the way that we want it to.I mean, if you look at the Richmond Market, if you look at some of the restaurants here, I'm very proud of what we have here.And I don't think anyone wants the strip mall, the McDonald's, and all of those other things.But we also have heard from some business developers that sometimes it's very difficult to develop in our town, and it...And for multiple reasons.And can we balance that in a way where we get what we want, and we're reasonable about it?So- - One other comment about- There was a question buried in your question, was a fair, a question about the water sewer extension not paying for itself.Oh, that's not ac...Well, you can go ahead, yeah.So, that's where I'm going.Yeah, okay.That we've had several scenarios about it gets really into the weight.So, I'll try to skip over pretty quickly.A phase one, phase two, and phase three development extension.Absolutely, if we extended phase three, all the way to the mobile home park, it reduces rates on current users, as well as future users.And that's largely because we have excess capacity in both sewage and water.So, you have to have enough users when you get out there to more than pay for itself.A clear majority of the Water Sewer Commission will not approve extension of the lines if it raises rates for current users.So, the only reason to extend it is to from the Water Sewer Commission perspective is to reduce rates in the near term.Yes?So, there's not a lot of talk about that we're concerned about the look of the town, and we wanna develop it the way we want it to be.But Gary's point really kind of raised a lot of red flags for me.And do we really...Does the Planning Commission, the DRB whatever, really have the control?They can't really pick and choose, can they?If McDonald's franchises, or whatever, hear that in Richmond, yes, the water and sewer line is going to be extended, can they just go in and start making very attractive offers to land owners, and go ahead and buy property before the line is even laid yet?But what's to prevent that in cabinet town committees, say, if they meet all these different criteria can the town say- Yes, you meet all those, but no, that's not what we're doing here.I think, that's an excellent question that we actually haven't gone through it.That pardon me, if Claire could walk us through, let's play that out.Yeah, let's say McDonald's decides they want a site in Richmond, what would happen?Currently, the way our zoning is written, and the way the laws are written is that we cannot deny a permit to somebody just because of their franchise name.And if they're meeting all the other requirements in our zoning regulations, we...That's what the DRB is required to base their decision on.So, if they're meeting all the requirements, and if it's McDonald's versus Joe's Diner, we can't pick or choose one, or the other.That permit, if we did deny them purely because we don't want a McDonald's would be appealed and it would go to the courts, and they would win, and we would get the McDonald's anyway.Well, in my understanding, this is how we got Cumberland Farms, and this is the point I was making about what you said earlier.Our use, it's gotta be something that's consistent- - Yeah.Because we don't have the ability to pick and choose.But so, if it was a McDonald's, it could be in a small house with a pitched roof.And they wouldn't...I mean, and they won't do that because they have a certain corporate look that they insist upon.McDonald's has- - But I don't know if we generate the kind of...I mean, there's certain areas and communities that get one that looks like that, but- - But it has to be in keeping with the town plan, it talks about the character of the village, and McDonald's is not in character with the rest of the village.Yeah.They would have to- - Yes.Make it and the only place I know they've ever altered their design is Stove.Yeah, but let me just...Let me just add something quickly before we...So, we've uncovered there's a lot that we are concerned about, about our zoning that has existed a long time.So, what we've done is some amendments to what currently exists and what was brought up as these amendments may not be the biggest concern we're hearing right now.So, the amendments now are what we're talking about, but we're hearing, and which is great, because we're gonna be doing our town planning.If we want other changes, we can do that.That's not what we can do right now.We can't, we're not right now, that'll take another process of, and I think, we're at the beginning of maybe starting that process.Are we okay with these amendments?And are we now identifying some other things that you'd like to bring back to the plan, the zoning, planning, sorry commission?And that we need to start a new process to look at some other things before some of these other things can happen.And I think, that's what's coming out now, but it's not so much 10,000 square feet, or 17,000 square feet because those...Those franchises could have come in prior to this, so this is not...This is I think, a good process and good points brought up.John did you wanna?Yes?I'm .So, if we can say we don't want big box stores, how come we can't say we don't want franchises?How come we don't do that?Well, I think there are franchi...There are many franchises out there that are franchises that we would probably like, because like the...I'm not sure if technically the market is a franchise, but they have other stores in other towns.And there is a local pharmacy in a town that I live in, and you love your local pharmacy, but they actually own stores in other towns.And so, there's also, so it's one of those things where franchises, I think, can take on many different faces.And some of them may be things we don't like, but there are probably franchises that are owned by local people then, and they're a great local business.So, that's not something we could say, no franchises.So, what you're saying, so because personally for me, I'd give up some of those other things if we could just keep out McDonald's, and chicken wing, because I don't really want that in Richmond.I think Gary is right, I think that this could happen now.The sewer line goes out there and it's gonna happen fast, and we may not have the luxury of going through this whole process to make it better.And so, what...Could we not do that?Well, with the statement of the prohibition of big box store, that is a...You can make a regulation where you say we're not gonna allow buildings over a certain size.And so, big box store tends to have it's...That's the base on a building square footprint.And we have the ability to regulate building square footprint.But that's not what's in there, in that sentence, we don't want big box stores in the regulations.Right.Right, and so the way that we don't have big box stores is because we have limited the square footage of the size of a building.Right.And that's regardless of what type of store it is, so that's like a defensible zoning regulation you can do if you're just saying square footage.So, we can have the 17,000 square foot Home Depot.If that is a workable business model for them.Gary, you got it Gary, can't say enough.So, we're gonna go to Gary.So, there's a proposal, I mean, from a couple of years ago, and that would be the Planning Commission tried to deal with this issue by not allowing franchisees to come in, but it could be, if you change the name, come in, for example, Parkside and Kitchen Table.You could say it's a franchise, it's two businesses by the same owners, but it has a different name.And we thought that would keep out Dunkin Donuts.They're not gonna change their name to come to Richmond.Right.Mm-hmm, okay.I said, no drive-thru, that would...I think, there's a lot more we can think about.Yes.I'm Christi Winters, was there any consideration given to eliminating the conditional uses of restaurant and retail business?It sounds like those are two uses that would be promoting like the Panera that Claire has as an example, is 5,000 square-foot restaurant.For a retail business, that's gonna add a lot of traffic along Route Two and pull away from our downtown.Do we really want restaurants and retail business out there?We're really looking at businesses.And was there any consideration for that?Cause it sounds like that would address a lot of that strip mall, franchisee development.So, Mark we can go to you if you wanna talk about it.For me, the discussion was, do we...Do we eliminate the malling, or do we continue to restrict the size?So, a lot of the 5,000 square foot sizes were removed for other things.And I thought, personally I thought that it was appropriate to leave the restrictions and size in there.It's also my belief that there's not the market for certain franchise, like Panera Bread in that area.So, that's where I would stand with that.Yes?I've got a procedure question.Yup.It's my understanding, or I thought I heard a rumor that the select board could approve these zoning changes, but not go to the voters.So, that's number one, and is that...And can the select board make changes and just make minor changes, and just go ahead and review it?We should lay out for everybody exactly where we are in that process.Sure, Jeff, do you wanna jump in?So, the schedule from two years ago, when we did the big zoning rewrite, we wanted to put those in front of the voters, and we had a specific deadline.We were under the impression at the time to have an Australian ballot.We had to have a special meeting to make it Australian ballot.There's an additional deadline for that.For the Gateway zoning this year, I went along the same path, and we were on a deadline to warrant a meeting for considering questions as Australian ballot on January 14th.And that would have made the deadline to make any change to approve the ordinance, December 15th.Now, after going through the location change for this meeting and talking to the attorney this afternoon, he's pointed out a section in the law.That basically says a bylaw, or an amendment, or a repeal shall be adopted by a majority of the members of the legislative body at a meeting that is held after the final public hearing, and shall be effective 21 days after adoption.Unless by action of a legislative body, the bylaws are worn for adoption by the municipality, by Australian ballot, at a special irregular meeting of the municipality.And the attorney says what that means is that the select board could approve it automatically for a vote of the municipality by Australian ballot.So, there's no longer that interim meeting step.So, we actually have a few more weeks to be able to make changes, warn another public hearing, and move the measure by to town meeting to be voted on by Australian ballot.So, we could potentially do that in early January, or if you don't want to make any changes, you could move it forward now, or if you don't like the measure at all you could wait a longer period of time, or not enact it.Right.So, you basically have 120 days from November 17th to be able to make that decision.So- - Chris.That's the legal analysis and the political one is that after the defeat of the omnibus zoning proposal two years ago, I certainly made a commitment to Richmond voters that if we were gonna consider significant changes to zoning, and significant, I know is open to...It's in the eye of the beholder, but that it go to popular vote.And we have the...The select board has made, has voted to make some specific changes mostly about the flood plain, which I think was appropriate.But something like this as numerous people have talked about, raises all kinds of questions about the town plan and the revision thereof.And definitely to me, seems like something that's appropriate for Australian ballot.And the question is how, to me, in the role that we have is to bring it forward in such a way that it is...That there's clear support from the town in Australian ballot.I think, something like this, you don't want it to be close.You don't want it to be contentious.You want it to reflect the will of the town.And the worst thing that could happen is for this...For everybody involved, the reaps, the other developers is for this to go up too soon and be defeated, because if it's defeated, then doing the right thing becomes almost impossible in the timeframe that we're talking about.So, that's it all on the table from me, and that I think, we're headed in the right direction, but our...Do we have time to get to where we need to be politically for there to be the kind of support that I think, the town needs to have for these kinds of changes?So, I just want to add to that before- - Oh. - I was under the impression that it still impacts potentially, the water onto in some of the development that would make, really support those water users and decrease, help decrease their rates.So, I guess, I wanna hear from Jeff, or if anyone can tell me if that's no longer the case, that those are kind of a parallel track.And then, my other question is the last time the zoning was defeated, wasn't there a really long process to public hearings prior to the zoning?Am I wrong?Was that...I guess, I...There are two different questions, but first of all, what's the impact if the zoning amendments do not, are not brought forward at this time?Right.Yeah.So, sorry, you're correct in...Our original plan was these were on a parallel track that if we were gonna extend water and sewer, it made sense to be able to allow the potential users to take advantage of that through additional development, partially to offset the costs.As that idea has developed, we've discovered...Alter what's in the Gateway.So, yeah, if these zoning methods aren't really considered at this point, will it impact current development opportunities?To current of that development.Well, potentially it could, and we've talked to the names, and they have to have a plan for private homes, for public water and sewer.They're really the only ones that have any play.That's different though, what you're saying, and I would like to invite the reaps to comment on this too, is that the reaps need a decision about whether water and sewer is being extended out there.The question about whether zoning gets changed in that is different.It obviously affects your planning as well, but it's not that immediate one about investing in water, or how you invest in water and sewer.So, I agree with that mostly.If they don't have the ability to have more development on their lot, the public water and sewer becomes less attractive to them.So, even if it ran by their property, it may not be financially feasible if they don't have the sort of commercial density to be able to take advantage of it, because it's expensive.And I think, the value of that public water and sewer goes down, if you're not allowed to take advantage of that.Because I would say it's single family homes, I have said this before, I don't think there's any value for them to put on right now, if all of a sudden it's gonna be as a single family home.So, we decided to write a letter to the select board rather than to see about every position that you've all brought up.But I clearly would like everyone to know that we didn't ask for all of these changes.There were many changes that were added, and we never asked for them.So, it's not all about our property.It wasn't us.We've had people literally stop our employees in the airport and say, \"Oh, the route's gonna turn into Willesden\".This isn't about us.We didn't ask for a lot of these things, and actually, we don't want some of these things to happen.So, if you voted in- They're aware of the things that we think are troublesome for our development.And actually, we think that in some ways, the Planning Commission went too far, and we saw that at the meeting.So, a lot of you weren't there for those, but we just wanted everybody to know that's how this all happened.It wasn't all us, so.Yeah, we tend to pick on the reaps for better or worse, but this- - Yes.This is the way that things change.It's because somebody takes an interest.This is the way it's supposed to happen, I guess.Mm-hmm.So. - I just was thinking, what we're doing here tonight is what we're seeing is an opportunity that we...That's in many ways a great opportunity for development in this area, but the zoning it always goes too far, and in other ways, it doesn't go far enough.And to source it, I think we'd like to see it, I think what I'm hearing in general is that there's maybe a two phase approach is appropriate.Where some of the restricts, some of the current zoning changes are tailored a little bit more towards this project, assuming that the water is sort of can go forward.But then in light of the fact that with water and sewer going forward, we could see an intense pressure, an opportunity for additional development in the Gateway, that would require a lot more definition of regulations.And in line with the town plan for the most part.So, to some extent, I think, there might be a lot more comfort if people knew that phase one is to basically find out what is required to develop this one piece of property that's actually an opportunity for us in many ways.And if phase two, is very quickly before...If it turns out that water sewer is feasible, that there is commitment from the trailer park, et cetera, to be participating in this, then we instantly, immediately begin another round of regulatory changes for review.Does that make sense?I think, that makes a lot of sense.I mean, I would like to take a look at the recommendations that are prohibited, and if we do have another meeting, can we...Are we allowed to make some of those- - Yes, we are, so go ahead, and then I'll speak.So, I was hearing Chris say earlier that the worst thing is to push this through, and have it get defeated.And so, maybe the town needs more time to talk this through.And if it's gonna go to Australian ballot, it doesn't have to be at the March meeting, right?It could be in November.Would that be?I mean, there's other options.It doesn't have to be decided by the March meeting.Correct, it doesn't have to be on the time meeting date ballot.I'll just observe, there are some timing issues on a specific, on the reap property.Right.There are issues for them, they will face forks and roads.So, if you're a developer, you ain't gonna sit on a piece of land for three years, while the town sorts it out.So, I guess, I would observe that if the reap zone is property, they're either working on the current, under the current zoning, and that has certain implications.They operate under these revised rules.Those are really the two options right now.In the near term, I don't see another approach given our political process through the Planning Commission to come up with a new idea, that's gonna be refined, and vetted, and voted on in the next few months.But isn't it the case that the most important factor is whether or not water and sewerage gets extended to the property, and that that's at least a year until that...If it is extended until that- - It'll take a while.Yeah.And the planning process for any developer probably starts before that.Oh, of course.Yeah.Yeah, yeah.But can I just ask a question?Yeah.You, and correct me if I'm wrong, you have the ability to make some changes, hold another hearing.Correct.And then, I'm not sure how that fits with the time, other timing.Correct, so I mean, basically the opinion from the attorney this afternoon is that holding another hearing in January, if we made changes say on Monday, or the next meeting after would be an appropriate time to hold that hearing, and again decide, is this going to the March ballot, or is this not going to March ballot.So, given the time, and it feels like we've exhausted comments from the public right now asking the board if they would like to drop this onto our agenda on Monday, which is our next scheduled meeting to discuss many of the ideas that have come forward today.Or the other two options are to drop it all together and to bring it up after March.Well, not after March, but without the implication of still considering the March timeline.So, basically the question is, do we talk about it on Monday with the intent of considering changes and staying on the March town meeting day ballot timeline, or do we decide to drop that timeline?And really, there's no...There's no reason not to stay on the timeline if we can do it in a thoughtful way.And I think, that we're doing that right now.Okay, can I ask a question, sir.Yes.A clarification though, the ability to have an additional meeting in January, it's essentially an additional meeting in January, right?In order to stay on the March timeline.Well, it could be on our regular meeting, yeah.Yeah, but that wouldn't allow us to do what Gary was talking about, and sort of engage in the revision of the town plan.Right, that's like a three year process, though.That can still happen.That will still happen.Yeah, I'm not sure you'd need to revise the town plan to extend some changes.They would still fit the town plan.The only question I have is the town meeting is when most people vote, and we wanna get as many people voting on something like this.So, if you do a separate vote, you may not get a full town in, and then you'd have to probably wait another year before you present a total rezoning with somewhat more significant changes.The reason I'm committed to the March timeline is that there's going to be development out there, and I think that the changes, many of the changes that have been proposed today are good ways to properly utilize the land that we have out there.And to blow through that timeline, I think, would be the wrong thing to do because the changes that we have made again, are the best use for that land out there.And I would hate to leave old rules that don't allow us the flexibility of good and smart economic development, and then have developers out there run with them, so.And the additional things you brought up, I think, can still happen when we talked about two phases.Whether we make some changes now that allows for some property to be developed, but then continue on the path of making additional changes, that can be presented again to the town.It'd be an ongoing process.Right, and in the next few days, we can have that discussion, are we...Can we narrow the focus of these changes within what has come from the Planning Commission to achieve that?Or is there another way to achieve that?Thank you, Mr. Chair.John.I agree, and I support trying to work in some of those suggestions today, and we would like to see that.I think that this commitment to bring in a town vote is causing you more troubles than it's gonna solve.I'll say, I the last big zoning polls like I voted down.Let's say in the days, and they were...The Planning Commission held many meetings, neighborhood meetings, they went in person to different land owners.Did a lot of those things, and in the few...In a couple of weeks before the vote came, we saw a sign saying ups going up, saying, \"Vote it down, less regulation\".When some of the proposals...Part of that proposal was gonna reduce the levels of regulation.When you bring something complex like this to the public, it's gonna be boiled down to a lot of misinformation comes up.People are voting on it sed on who posts something extraordinary to the front porch forum.You're not gonna be helping the public, or meeting their needs by trying to cook something up and bringing it to them to vote.The reason the select board is given the power to approve zoning changes is because like with the legislation, we don't ask our state.We don't vote on bills that our state legislature wants to approve, because it's too technical.It's too detailed.You're the ones who have the oversight and responsibility, and the opportunity for oversight, cause you have the responsibility of going a little deeper.The public is not gonna do that in the vote, and I think, you could accommodate some of the requests here.We can hopefully get this thing moving quickly so that the reaps aren't held out, dangling for longer.You can meet some of the desires for water and sewer development, if you...If you go through a process with the Planning Commission as well.And then, you guys make the final.Let the Planning Commission give you a proposal, you guys debate it and make a decision.But the months you have to wait for a public vote is gonna cost you, and the decisions can be made based on hearsay.And then, you end up not on the subject, thank you.I agree.All right, so we're coming up here.We're gonna go one, two, three, and then the board's gonna make a decision here.Yes?I'm , to that I would just add that I think, possibly you could get consensus and you could actually avoid this innuendo here.Is if it's carefully presented and with all due respect to the town, the Planning Commission from a businessman's perspective, the amount of presentation of this information has been very, very small.Where is the budget?Just where are the justifications?Where's the assumptions that have been written out for us to actually drive this?I mean, the last Planning Commission set itself up, or the last Planning Commission hearing kind of set itself up or a firing line, because there wasn't enough information for people to actually digest.To actually be able to see, oh, here's what the intention is.So, I would ask you very, very carefully.If you do put this up for vote, write out all those things, those assumptions, and those justifications so that we know what the subset actually is describing.Yes?What are the appropriate forums for the two underlying issues, the one that probably would have the most immediate impact is the sewers?Is the water gonna go out there or not?What determines that, what's the inquire?I think, that's gonna have the single biggest change on what this looks like.Changing from a cat plant and a parking lot, to a cat plant, parking lot and a bunch of other stuff we don't want.So, what's the forum for that, and what's the plan for the general plan the Gateway, and do we wanna put there this, someone said a different town plan.Is that a separate issue, or who's the body that we should pay attention to, and feed into regarding development?Depends on the select board, and the Planning Commission .I just don't know where that input should be, but I think, the water, since this was parallel with the water.I thought naturally, this is where it came from, and I thought that this is the exact forum, or this is how we found out about the sewer line.So, where do those two things pass through?Okay, so the water, sewer planning, the extension is still going on at the Water Sewer Commission.Those meetings happen an hour before each select board meeting.It's definitely appropriate to discuss them there with the select board as well.Since, as you can tell, they're very much related.One goes in hand with the other.At this point, these zoning changes are with the select board, and they're gonna stay with the select board until the end.Comments, questions should all go through Jeff.And then, they get...If you wanted to address the entire select board, send your comments to Jeff, he forwards them onto us.Please come to our meetings.Our next meeting is on the 15th, which is on Monday, at 17:00 PM here.Can I just add that the town- - Sure.The town website does have a lot of all the postings of the meetings.And there are a lot of different committees that meet, and they're really looking for public comment.So, depending on what you wanna comment on.Yeah, it happens most of them are - - Right, sure, sure.Okay, so if you have more information you need to send our way, all our contact information is online, and also go through Jeff.He'll get it out to all five of us.Okay?I just say, my name is .I really think this needs to go to a public vote.It's just too important, and I don't think it's...It's not like it's a 50 page document.It's three pages, the public can understand three pages.Thank you, okay.What does the board wanna do here?I would suggest bring this to Monday's meeting.Yeah.So, what does the agenda look like on Monday?The agenda has mostly budget items on it, and a couple of group contracts.All right.I think, we are obligated to do it, and it's fine to let it season for a few days, and say how are we doing.Like we have a couple of decisions to make.Okay, both content and concept.Right, I agree.So, no action to be taken today.In that case, the only matter of business is to close the public hearing.Is there a motion to do so?Is there a second?Second.All that's in favor, say aye.Aye.The hearing is closed.Thank you, everybody.Thank you.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Richmond_Selectboard_Gateway_Zoning_Hearing_12-11-14.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Richmond_Selectboard_Gateway_Zoning_Hearing_12-11-14.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Richmond_Selectboard_Gateway_Zoning_Hearing_12-11-14.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/Richmond_Water_Sewer_Cmsn._3-16-15/Richmond_Water_Sewer_Cmsn._3-16-15.mp3", "text": "Good evening.Good afternoon.It's 5:30 on March 16th, 2015.Time for the Town of Richmond Water and Sewer Commission meeting.Hello.Welcome members of the Commission and members of the public, and members of the town staff.Before we get underway tonight's agenda we have an executive session to talk about the- Yes.Before we get underway I'm walking through the- - Oh, okay.Agenda though.Potential contract with Riverview Commons.The other business is a West Main Extension, Bormann water allocation.I don't know if we should be calling it Bormann or a brewery but for now we'll call it both.We know what you're talking about.State planning, loan and water storage tanks, superintendent's report.Review the budget and annual meeting, any sewer freezing issues.So we're gonna follow up on that.Approval of warrants.Has anybody had a chance to start looking at warrants yet?Any volunteers?Whoever Jeff says.And then the next agenda and adjourn.So back to the top.Public comment.Any comments from the public?Yes, please.Maureen .Can you hear me really?Absolutely.Okay.With power comes responsibility.How on earth can people living in the mobile park homes be expected to come up with the incredible fees associated with hooking on water and/or sewer?We the village people, could not afford the increases in our water/sewer bills, and many of us live on our own patch of land.Thank you for that excellent question, and that is in fact, the subject of negotiations with the mobile home park.So, we'll see.It's not lost on us, of course, that the mobile home park has a water system and a sewer system.It's not clear that they can afford what they have, as opposed to the alternative, which is hooking up to the town.So, it's not a question of nothing versus something.It's a \"something they have,\" versus hooking up with us.And the details remain to be seen.If it's not affordable it, in my opinion, won't happen.Other comments from the public?All right.Our first agenda item.We have scheduled half an hour to go into executive session to discuss, in fact, Maureen's comment about the potential contract with Riverview Common.So I'll entertain a motion to go into executive session.We're going to executive session.Second?All in favor?Aye.Aye.It's unanimous, we are now in executive session.We will be in executive session with extended staff, including Pete Poshop, Taylor Yates, who is also a representative on the negotiating group, and Jeff and Kendall.For those of you who weren't here, we were in executive session to discuss a potential contract with Riverview Commons.I will now entertain a motion to exit executive session.So moved.Second.Aye.Should we go back here since we have- Or are we still doing these- - Did you say \"aye,\" too?I did.Thank you.Sure.So we exit executive session.I will just make a comment then return to any other public comments that we continue negotiations with the mobile home park in terms of affordability feasibility.This is, for those of you who followed this, the full Phase 1, 2, 3 extension of water/sewer.And we remain cautiously optimistic that we'll be able to execute a contract, but we won't know until we get through the details of negotiation.It really hinges on the details, including costs.Maureen asked a question in an earlier public comment about how they can afford it.The wild card for them is they currently have a water system and a sewer system, which have had some deficiencies in the past and represent some costs to them.So the cost of those systems compared to the cost of hooking up to the town.We are negotiating the costs of hooking up to the town, but we're in a position of not knowing what their costs are in terms of operating their own systems, so.I think it'd be fair to say it's gonna cost them a little bit more than it does now.Well, we don't know that.It's gonna be unfavorable.It might be less, more, the same.So, it really is just a wild card.That's the down card in their hand.And we don't know what the value of that card is.All right, let me return back to- are there public comments before we get back into the agenda?All right.So that was essentially the West Main extension update, includes that element.And for those of you who know, did the bond pass?Is there any news on the bond recount, Jeff?A recount was requested late Friday afternoon.Our attorney Mark Sperry says that there's no hour set for the end of the day, but the common consensus is that a day ends at midnight.So, we're considering the recount request a valid request.It was timely.Friday was the last day to be able to enter it.Linda has scheduled the Board of Civil Authority to meet this Thursday evening at six.And the recount will start at 6:30.And they'll do a hand recount to look at every ballot.They'll see if it's a yes or a no.Come up with another tally.They'll probably count and recount and check and double check and come up with an end tally and that'll be the result.What time does that start?The recount starts at 6:30.The BCA is reorganizing at six.I thought we dodged that bullet.Well this is a recount, not a re-vote.Yeah, I know.So it was a close vote, clearly.There were mixed opinions in the town.It wasn't a hundred to zero or zero to 100.So this was the next step.Jack?What is the mechanics of this?Do they have to get a certain number of people that ask for the recount?Or just one person out of the blue comes in and says, \"I want a recount\".You got it.One person out of the blue can request a recount.Jack, could you tell us your name again please?Oh, excuse me.Jack Flynn.Are you writing my name down?So, yeah.Are you taking comments on the- - I'll take comments on anything.Welcome to public comment, revisited.Yeah.What's your name again, sir?Terry .Nice to meet you even though I've never seen you before.I have some questions that I hope that you will answer.A tough one.And I'd just like to lay out some of those questions.Because there's things that I'd like to know before you sign the contract with the park.And my concern is that long-term, we may be reducing our chances to have a really vibrant village if we take on the park now.Maybe not for 10 years or something.So, from what I learned recently from the state is that it may be very difficult to expand this plan for what we need moving forward.And even though it looks like we have way more well capacity than we want to have, I think we should find out if that's true.What I learned is that under the new regulations with cleaning up the lake it may be very difficult to do upgrades on plans.And if we did get the permission to do it, it'd be a multimillion dollar upgrade.So I guess, here's just kind of a list of some things I'd like to know.The questions about the mobile home park is the need real?From what I was told from the state was that the problem is the design was a bed design rather than a trench design for the septic.Because about the trench design, allowing oxygen in in the spaces where there aren't trenches, is sometimes there is a problem.But the fix might be to put in a new trench system.Either dig out the bed system or find a new location onsite.So it'd be nice to know if we're solving a problem that can't be solved there, or whether it's a real need that we take this on.I'd like to know what the increased cost on the mobile home park users gonna be.And the flip side to that, is I'd like to know what the new current users are gonna be paying to allow that lower rate to go to the users down there.I don't think many people in the village can take on what to me feels like a subsidy to support what might be a good cause, but - - Can I answer that one?Which we addressed I think in our last meeting.Which is, we passed a resolution that we would not extend the line unless it represented a rate benefit to the existing users.But see, that's two different things.I think it should be the same rate down there as it is for us.In terms of one mobile home versus one apartment here.Those people should pay the same rate.So if there's a deal, I really doesn't know what that deal is, and have a chance for public comment before you sign it.I think all the terms of the contract in terms of length of agreement, whether it's permanent or termed in years, how future entries are gonna be handled, how bonds are gonna be handled, should be answered.Questions about the sewer plant.Again, we do go over the 80% load of the phosphorus.I was told by the state it could be hundreds of thousands up to maybe 1.2 million to do the phosphorus upgrade.Terry?I'm sorry to interrupt, but we had like one minute for public comment.Are there a lot more?I'm sorry to interrupt, but - - No, I'll try to do it quicker.Let's see.So I guess my real concern is that if we use up space down there, we may find ourselves we can't expand in the village.We can't take care of the future needs of the village.The one thing I think to analyze is to look at what are the foreseeable future needs?And I think we should hear from people like- what's the future needs of the Gate Line?What are the people that own that property thinking they need?What about potential projects in the village?Whether Peach wants to develop a space behind the rescue project.Whether they have an interest in developing?Can we predict how many houses are gonna be flipped into duplexes?What's going to happen to The Creamery?Is the brewery likely to expand down the road?And how much reserve capacity should we be looking at keeping before we commit to somewhere, like putting it in the mobile home park.I'll stop there.All right.So it's obviously a range of things.So, if you have it in written format and you want to give it to us, I can share that with the rest of the commission as well.Are there other public comments?Yes, in the back.Can you tell us who asked for the recount?Friskie Whitters.Thank you.You have a question, ma'am?Yeah, I'm on the Conservation Commission.I second some of Gary's concerns, particularly about infill, whether that would make more sense from the economic strength of the village.And also I have concerns because I live adjacent to the park and I'm not a big fan of Peter Brown.Or just to scrutinize the contract and consider things like the inevitable costs and other things.Thank you.So, we have heard- And then saw the contract.And sort of transparency, accountability.And that would be our intent.You know, the executive session is til we get to the point of a contract that we're both willing to sign.And at that point we'd be able to talk in more detail.So, a couple of concerns and then just one other response.It is interesting to me that in my relatively short time on the commission, people have been talking about the significant need to get more users on after the closing of The Creamery 16, 17 years ago?And sort of get more users on now to alleviate rates.You know, we were talking about the basic ways that we can alleviate rates for the current users.It's stop spending money, find free money somewhere, or get more users on.To get more flow, more users.And so the mobile home park and The Gateway were viewed as two different ways of getting more users.And you write the comments, reflect that there's somewhat different goals in mind.The goal for the mobile home park is somewhat different than a goal of supporting responsible development in The Gateway.And perhaps other areas in town.But Kendall, maybe illustrate again where we are with current water/sewage capacity.What percent capacity we can use and how far we are from that?Maybe just put that on the record.Roughly 35%.And at 80% you're required to claim for an upgrade.So you've got- is that 45?So not just 100% of maximum engineered capacity, we were less than 50% of the allowed capacity currently.When was the last time we were close to capacity?The Creamery, way, way back.Which is one of the things that's driven rates again, with a modest number of users paying for- with a modest flow of paying for the entire system.So there were some tensions here.If we raise the flow by 150 To 250 users, how close are we gonna be?According to Pete's?I guess I'll say I can't quote that off the top of my head, but all those numbers that are in the report is on the website.And I think that was discussed in other meetings, also.I think that again, I can't remember off the top of my head what those numbers were, I apologize.I was hoping someone would remember them.Yeah, I know.I don't have that with me, but- - It seemed like we had plenty of room, though.Yes, correct.So that's my question.If we do have 200 more houses.250, yeah.Or 250.Is there more plenty of more room in capacity?There was still headroom according to the report.Well, the state told me that we'd probably have to reduce septage intake.So that is one of our headroom capacity is to reduce septage intake?Which is voluntary, not required?So when you figure out the count relation, you've got to factor in the septage intake.Which has been lucrative.Yeah, I know.And it doesn't affect the bottom line.There's another, back here?Was that something that's always been consistent?Yes.Predicted.If we got closer to where we're reaching a capacity, perhaps there would be an incentive for using less water.There's no incentive for me to cut down my water usage right now because of the way the bills are set up.And if we were reaching that capacity, then the local users could really make an effect by putting low-flush toilets and have less use.But I have no incentive to lower my usage.I feel so high on the- Not the usage part, but the other part.The base rate?The base rate, yeah.And all that's changed, though.Yeah you know, you'd have to look at individual bills to figure out the base versus flow rates, and I'm not prepared to analyze any individual bill.And there's commercial.Commercial rate structure is different from residential rate structure.That's true.So, we've just accomplished what might be the West Main Extension update.We continue negotiations with the mobile home park.It's only two weeks or so since the bond passed.And so we maintain cautious optimism that we can negotiate something that's mutually beneficial for Phase One, Two and Three.If we're unable to do that, we'll revisit.Are there possibilities of making this work through just Phases One and Two?Any other comments, questions?All right.Let's move on.Item B is Mormon Water Allocation and Brewery.We have talked about this so maybe if you want to come forward and we can talk about why you're here and what the context of conversation is.So if you could introduce yourself and what you represent.Bret Hamilton, Stone Corral Brewery.Thanks for coming.And thank you for having us here.So where to begin?The wastewater permitting process we're currently in with the state, has been a little bit on the dynamic side.Things are developing as we all learn about the project and learn about state regulations.We're going to need, according to the state's engineers, we're going to need more wastewater allocation than we currently have.We understand that there's also concern about concentration of waste water from the treatment perspective and wanted to address that.In part by introducing at least the philosophy and some of the basic mechanisms in our wastewater reduction plan.If that would be a good place to start.There are a lot of folks on the commission.Maybe back up and just describe the effluent of brewery and what might anticipate comes out of the brewery, as opposed to, I think we all understand generally what comes out of a residential user septic system.Yep So, traditionally brewing is a very water intensive process.There's a lot of cleaning that happens.And in the past almost all of the cleaning water has hit the sewer drain.In more recent times, that's improved.But this can include everything from- Basically when you're making beer, the very first thing you do is steep grain in water and it basically makes a very sticky mess.You run water through that into another kettle.And from there into a heat exchanger into another- So there's a whole series of tanks.So you can basically picture sticky sugary, liquid flowing at different temperatures from tank to tank throughout the process.If there's no wastewater management, either in architecture or planning in place, then there's a lot of sticky, sugary water that can get washed down the drain.And it's at a very high concentration, or high demand for BOD. Basically capacity on the wastewater treatment plant to the tune of tens or even hundreds of times the strength of regular household waste.Could you, just for clarity for folks, what BOD stands for?It's biodynamic oxygen demand, is that correct?Close enough.Thank you.It's essentially the amount of oxygen that's required to metabolize for the bacteria and treatment plant.To metabolize the waste into something that's less harmful, less harmful in the environment.And the reason that we're concerned about that is because we're dumping that waste into a waterway.It's gonna deplete the oxygen in the streams or the rivers, which is gonna basically kill wildlife and include the water.So we want to avoid that.So, I understand you met with Kendall earlier today to review your design and what would come out of it.Do I understand correctly that one of the things you do is create infrastructure to reduce both volume and density or the quality of the effluent.Yeah, absolutely.There are architectural or mechanical strategies.There are philosophical strategies.And then there's sort of daily operating procedure.Stone Corral Brewery was begun essentially in a sugar house where we move water by the bucket.Water and wastewater, both.Personally, I've spent my entire adult working life working in energy efficiency and conservation.So philosophically doing less with more, protecting the waterways and saving energy are all part of our core operating philosophy.Architecturally, there are two strategies in our wastewater management plan.Well, three actually.They're worth mentioning here.One is that we want to divert all of our high strength waste offsite, basically to farms.There are spent grains, initial washdown of all of the sticky sugary mess that I described earlier.All that has high value as nutritious animal feed.There's another solid waste-ish flow, spent yeast and, and actually, what otherwise might be considered spilled beer can also be directed toward farms for either soil supplement or animal feed.There are a number of different acceptable uses for that waste stream.The architectural components have to do with the fact that the brewery equipment doesn't have physical connection to a drain.It's not possible to empty a tank by opening a valve and have the contents go straight to the city drain.There either has to be a hose involved or a person to actually connect the hose and direct the waste where it's gonna go.So, in terms of accidental discharge, if there's any accidental discharge, it's going to be on the floor before it's in the drain.The next architectural, in terms of engineering architecture, our strategy.Kendall and I have been brainstorming a little bit on good ways to avoid what might be considered a worst case scenario.Something goes horribly wrong and we need to empty a tank, quickly.And a tank full of beer.So in terms of BOD. If we can go back to the technical piece, household wastewater has a BOD of 300 milligrams per liter.Just remember the number 300.Beer has a BOD impact of 60,000 milligrams per liter.So, if you go home in the evening and take a lesser quality fermented product and decide to clean the drain with it that content has a high impact on the wastewater treatment plant.So, strategy that we worked out with Pete and Heidi Bormann and Kendall, was we're going to actually locate a 500 gallon- we're calling it a calamity tank on the site.So, if we need to empty a tank quickly, it has a safe place to go.And so, that volume of material could then be stored until it can be safely, either removed from the site in a truck to a farm, or even dosed into the septic system at an acceptable rate over time.Nice.There was, I think, one other strategy worth mentioning here.Those are the main things.Philosophically we're really into conserving water and reducing waste.We want to redirect our high strength waste offsite to places where it's a lot more useful than in the city plant.And, you know, we want to have a sound plan in place for unforeseen events.This sounds great.Kendall, anything you want to add as the operator?Just that this is exactly what we're looking for.I did send out an email.There was a lot of discussion about the high strength waste and the potential for, you know, potentially 10 times or more than a domestic waste.But as I mentioned in the email, the current structure does not differentiate between office buildings, or restaurants, or any of the other facilities.And a well-run brewery can easily meet a 1500 value for BOD, which is comparable to your restaurant.So, the way that he's got set up, I think he should probably not worry about high strength waste to begin with.Additional load, if you want.Additional charges or fees to start with.Probably part of their permit will involve some sampling in order to check the actual strength of separate wastewater pumps in the facility.And we can always test it for a year or so.And if his operation is as proposed, there will be no problem.It'll be just like everybody else.If it did turn out that he had high strength waste, at that point, after they've had their business chance to get up and going and get established and stuff, we would talk about additional surcharges.Okay.Just curious, what kind of scenario would cause you to dump a tank?Yeah, I mean, if there was a safety issue with a failed hose or failed valve, certainly if there were a vessel of hot liquid that was leaking, we'd want to deal with that quickly before somebody got hurt.Spoilage happens.So if there's something that's just, you know, unacceptable from a quality control standpoint, that's a brewer's calamity.It's a calamity.I think those are the sort of the major- Equipment failure and contamination.You know, if somebody drops the wrong chemical or something in the wrong place, and it ends up somehow in the product.With the pressure, yeah.So at a previous meeting, we had approved a water allocation.So the request tonight is this: for additional water or for water treatment or sewage?Sewage.So we're allocation.So the specific request?Do we know?Well, so the state has told us that we need 1,100 gallons of wastewater capacity.This assumes that we basically do all of the steps of brewing from grain to glass or grain to keg, in one day.Because that's how larger breweries operate.Yes.They're basically doing everything all at once.With the space that we have realistically and the market that we have, to be frank about it, we're going to start out brewing one day a week.We might eventually be able to get up to where we're brewing three days a week, but we're not bottling and doing wash down and cleaning out fermenters and dumping yeast all at the same time that we're brewing.So first of all, I guess I would challenge that assumption that 1,100 gallons is the right number.The second thing is, is what I alluded to earlier which is, we have a pretty efficient process where we were have been located because of necessity, frankly.If we generate a lot of wastewater, we have to deal with it.Our projections for longterm, for wastewater, are a little over half of what the state is saying.So they say we need 1,100 gallons per day.I think we're fine at about 600 for the brewery.And then another couple of hundred for wash water for the tasting room.We're already there.So I guess what we need to come to terms with is, is what's the right number?If we assume that as I tend to, that everybody's wrong and that models are bracketing reality somehow, my guess is that what we need is something like, in between where we think we'll be and where the state says we will be.If we split that we ended up with about 900, which I think is where we are.Is that correct?985, something like that.So I think part of this conversation is about what's the right number?And as Kendall said, we're open to the notion of metering.And if we find that we're going drastically past, measurably past what we're allocated, we'd be open to revisiting it.We just would rather not have to pay up front for water and wastewater that we're not going to use and generate.Are there issues with our allocation, Kendall, and are we driven to allocate what the state has said we should allocate?Okay.And if we had metering and BOD testing, that would influence future permits?I would think so.I mean at this point, I think you're going to have to talk with your engineers and have a good conversation with the state.As far as the state says \"X,\" and we say \"Y\".And unfortunately these conversations are happening in parallel.Sure.So do we need to make a decision here today?The commission?I guess my two cents would be to get them an approval for the allocation they need, if it turns out they need more.Well, additional approval?Bob doesn't want to give them a blank check.This is a question to the board and to you.Could we do an addendum to the allocation?You must have everything you just said to us summarized in writing, correct?I do, yeah.If you could do an addendum to your allocation with the supporting documentation of that report with a clause in there that you would be responsible for any cleanup costs for high BOD discharge.Is that something we can do?I don't know.I'm asking the question generally.Well, it strikes me that the catastrophe tank is intended to avoid that.Right.So, we're not looking at a catastrophic influx, heavily loaded.So you have to have that in place.So is there something beyond that?Yes, no, maybe?Don't know.Well, initially the request for allocation was the state said he needs X gallons more in order to proceed with his permit.You're contesting that.Our issue is that we allocate their formula.That basically we're doing this every day.So in other words, we're going to be taking in and putting out that same amount every day, that much.And we just don't need that much sewer.Yes.So, that's what we would like to have addressed.Just that we don't need that much allocation.And that would be measurable if do we know what's going in off the water?Exactly.Well, we talked a little bit this morning about actually metering the sewer?Right.Because our sewage is gonna be a much smaller volume than the typical user, with relation to our water consumption.Because most of our water consumption, almost half of our water consumption will be leaving on trucks.Either to a farm or to a distribution.Yeah, exactly.We might have to revisit this down the road.You might need more allocation.Heck, yeah.So I guess what we're looking for is something concrete between the currently approved number and a blank check.So how about that 1,100 number?Could we get a sort of conditional approval or a provisional approval for the 1,100 if it's needed?Well, how about if we did this?A provisional- What's our current approval?Remind me.It's somewhere around 95 or 96.Pretty close.So 1,1000 additionally?120 gallons, yeah.Yeah, it's not a big difference.That's not a lot.And then we can revisit it.If it proves to be easier to just buy the water allocation than fight the state, then we'll probably just come back and do that.I mean, let's just being pragmatic about it.Okay.So Kendall, you know far more about breweries than anybody at this table, are you comfortable with the data?Yes.Okay.Yeah.I sent out a note to Bart and the manager to that effect.So what I have here in paper is graphic heavy and data light, but I can provide the supporting data behind these graphs.I think we tend to rely on Kendall for the professional opinion here.If you're supporting the 1,100?Yeah, the issue is not with the allocation.We have it.I mean, he has a pretty good case that he might prevail with the state.Because the state does use an industry standard.So if we're looking for an 1,100 approval, and then we'll revisit this in the future when this dust settles, so to speak?How's that?I just want to comment that I think- - Could you state your name?Bob wants to know who you are.I just want to say I think it would be great for our community to have a business like this.Especially the impact that it will help with the water and sewer.And I just would like to see the board work with them and be easy on them.Because I think all businesses that come into Richmond really have to jump through all kinds of hoops.That's my feeling.And I'd like to see new businesses greeted with a \"We'll work with you\" attitude from the Board.Thank you very much.I want to say I appreciate your good stewardship and coming to us with the issues as you see them.And being a good neighbor.Thank you.Thank you.Yes, sir.Kendall, are you finding, in metering sewer and waterwaste, if he has a pretreatment permit in the industry, they probably will require metering?But I would think, to be fair to him, if we meter his sewer and his water, and there's a significant difference, we're getting a better deal.You would be doing his sewer as we need to.Right.So the water is the water and the sewer is the sewer.Okay.So with that caveat, maybe we put this in the form of a motion 1,100 with the water and sewer meters associated.Does that makes sense?It does.And how it would cost to the system from the sewer meter?He's gonna have a pretreatment permit, probably from the state, that's gonna require testing and sampling and a contingency plan and a whole bunch of stuff.Right.And if we grow down the road, that's going to get a lot more complicated.Yes.And we wish you well.Yep.Life gets more complicated.So do you need the motion?Yes we do.To approve the 1,100.If I could propose, the motion would be to move that account allocation, that sewer allocation, up to 1,100 gallons per day provisionally.If not necessary, it'll be returned.If it is necessary, they'll have to pay for it.The state says they absolutely have to have it.I'll second what he said.Sure.Well, you have to do first at first.I'll first it.First and the second.Do you need- - Further discussion.Any allocation for water anymore?I guess it depends whose numbers you believe.I can't imagine finding enough places to wastewater to use- I mean, if we use the sort of the city formula, like if we know we need 1,100 gallons of wastewater and then if there's a multiplier to get to water.Or actually it's the other way around, water to wastewater.We'll have more water than we know what to do with.And Kendall, is our main big enough over there?Six inches.So are we ready for a vote?Ready.All in favor.Aye.It's unanimous.Thank you very much.I appreciate your reaching out to Kendall and getting her done.Yeah.I think we should distribute it to Ward.So we wish you the best.And please keep us posted on your progress.Thank you.Thank you.We're running short on time.We have about 11 minutes and about 25 minutes of topics.Can we do, Pete you're here.Yeah.The next item is state planning, loan water storage, tank construction, engineering, GME, 10 minutes.So basically we have two contracts from GME. The first is the construction engineering, the inspections and that sort of thing for the water storage tank.That agreement is $99,700.This would be covered under the loan that was approved recently.So, we really should authorize that.And then the second contract we can talk about is the contract for the preliminary engineering report that's required for the USDA loan.Okay, do you want these informs of motions one at a time?Well, the first one I think is pretty simple because we've been rolling on that for awhile and there really shouldn't be any questions on it.So the Board of Contract for the construction phase engineering for the water storage tank.Okay.Motion to infer?And the loans are at, it's all been negotiated?Right.We were approved for the loans through the state- - The reduced- - Right.And was there any grants that came in on that?There's no grant.It's partial forgiveness.Partial?Because of the negative interest loans.Okay.They pay us to use their money.Okay, yeah we did get that.Yeah.All right.Further questions or discussions on this one?So we want to approve this.How do we want to phrase this?Jeff, help me out if you would.It would be a motion to approve the construction engineering contract with Green Mountain Engineering, an amount not to exceed $99,700 for the water storage tank.Anybody want to move that?It's instruction.We've already spent it, we just need to- - I'll second it.I'll move it.We have a first and a second.Any further discussion?All in favor?Aye.It's unanimous.Thank you very much.That didn't feel good?All right, our- - Second half.Yeah.So help me out with the second half again, if you would, please.Pete, do you want to explain that?The planning loan?We're in process right now applying for planning loans as part of that process.The engineering agreement for the planning portions of that loan.And I also had to put the construction portion for that loan together, too.Right now I'm asking that you approve for the planning loan.Do you have that number?This is the preliminary engineering?Preliminary engineering, right.So there are two parts of it.There's a water and a sewer part.And the water phase is $5,410 And the sewer phase is $10,425.So that's basically $15,835.And that needed to be split up because it's two separate plannings.One for water and one for sewer.And that planning loan, we've discussed before, is a five-year no interest loan if it doesn't get lumped into the rural development funding.Who wants to be first?Not me.On the money we just spent?No, it was close.Well, we have to vote on it.Yeah.Yeah.Bruce, I think you're set.Sure, why not?Bruce, you move to 50, you need 35.Big spender.Do I have a second?Second.That's what I'm saying, let's take some of that.Further discussion?Yeah, really.And that may come at a future date.Yes.That's going to be part of a future date.Almost guarantee it.When the dust settles.All right.Any further discussion?Move to a vote?All in favor say, \"Aye.Aye.So it's $15,835 total?Yes.The motion passes.Unanimously.Thank you, Pete.And Green Mountain Engineering.Thank you.We are pretty short on time.We have a superintendent's report, the budget and annual meetings, sewer freezing, approval of warrants.So, do we need to set the annual meeting date today?We're getting pretty close.I think if we said the second or fourth Monday in May, that would give us enough time.All right, let's say the fourth Mondays.Going to be Memorial Day, correct?But the third one didn't.Select board meetings.We're looking at April.May, May.The 11th through the 25th?The 25th is Memorial Day?That's Memorial Day.So we're talking the 11th?May 11th?And we should, just for the record, have the time.Why don't we say 7:00 pm?Is that here?Next door?The school?I will have to see if I can reserve the library.If I can, it will be there.If I can't, it'll have to be here.Okay.So we'll have to work more on the agenda for that.Yes.Let people know.So we have a date anyway.May 11th, 7:00 pm.Any big leaks?Nope.Okay.My peers are quite upset with me.Who is?My peers are quite upset with me.Now I'm probably going to suffer for saying that.Yeah, there are leaks everywhere, but we have not had any more lately.Richmond once again is lucky, lucky, lucky.Jeffersonville, not so much.No, everybody.Everybody.Essex.And whoever sent that rumor around last week, do not stop running your water.Yeah.Do we believe that the trickling of water had a positive effect?Absolutely.We should put that out for the folks on the TV audience.That trickling had a- - To stop trickling the water.It's just gotta be warmed up a little bit.How are we doing with sewer precincts?Actually, we've had just the one foresting issue.That's still frozen?Yeah.Okay, we transitioned into that real quick.Yes.So because of that frozen sewer, we've made the offer to pump their tanks.They essentially have a septic tank that once it raises to a certain level of pump, pumps it into the force feed on Cochran Road so that it's all frozen.We're fairly certain it's a power force main that's frozen and it's causing them the problem.So we've offered, as of a certain point, that we were going to pump those tanks until it thawed.Essentially once a week, for three to four weeks.They had some costs to try to thaw their private sewer lines first.And a few homeowners, or actually two homeowners have said they want us to pay for those thawing attempts and pumps prior to us making our offer.And that's really what's in front of the Board.Okay.Did you review those deals?The warrants?Yes, but we're not there yet.I know, did you see as far as- - The email threads, yes.What these people had gotten charged?Yes.I thought it was a little bit much for not doing- Granted, they didn't fix the problem, but it was come back, \"Oh yeah, it's fixed.Come back.Oh yeah, it's fixed\".And then all of a sudden- And it's not these people's fault.I just didn't like what I saw.And I guess we're stuck in it, I don't know.Somebody's stuck.Somebody's stuck, either them or us.And I believe it's a force of nature.It's beyond anybody's control.Right.And I'll speak up and say that we should cover them.It's kinda like when it was an emergency.It's been an emergency and all across the town, and it quickly became apparent to most of the town that if none of the towns took the position of, 'Well, it's yours and it's not ours\".It was just a very short period of time before all the towns and the managers and everything were saying, \"Just take care of a problem\".It's irrelevant whether it's private or public.So any of these costs, my feeling is the town should cover them.In light of those comments, might I ask that we bring that forward as an agenda at our next meeting to entertain that as a topic and potential motion?Do we have the luxury of waiting?I don't know.I don't know if they've already paid these or not.What bills I saw said, \"Paid\".Paid, yeah.I'm inclined to think we're going to end up paying them anyway.And I am very impressed that the tone of the correspondence back and forth.It wasn't, \"It's your problem, deal with it,\" it was, \"This is what's going on, can you help us\"?Okay.Just, and I'm thinking in terms of time, so to get into the detail, then we could have it organized and be able to carry it forward as a motion.Then the next meeting?Is that reasonable, Kendall?May I ask you and Jeff to do that?It's not just the pumping cost.There was also some plumbing work and people really panicked.Yeah.There's significant costs here.There are significant costs, yeah.Kick it into the next meeting?Yeah.Do you think they'll do the same with that, or should we do it tonight?I don't want to discuss it anymore.What else we had, although we're out of time, is the review to review the budget again.I think we're going to have to kick that forward.We have annual meeting set.Anything else from the superintendents report?And why don't we pass around the warrants for approval?Are we hearing anything else from him?Just to keep your water running.Just a trickle.Has anybody here done a water temperature test lately?Where?I do it every now and then.My house is right close to the main.We're running 40 degrees console.Mine's been 33 degrees, 33.4, 33.6 for three weeks now.33?See, I've got a lot of water running by my house.A lot of stuff logged downhill.A lot of stuff downhill, too?Any questions on these warrants, David?Nope, they look good.All right.I think we got through everything, even though we were kind of rapid on the last couple of items.Jeff, anything else from you?Kendall?Any comments on this?All right.If there's nothing else, I guess we'll entertain a motion to close the meeting.It's a vote.Second.All in favor.Aye.That was unanimous.Thank you.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Richmond_Water_Sewer_Cmsn._3-16-15.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Richmond_Water_Sewer_Cmsn._3-16-15.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Richmond_Water_Sewer_Cmsn._3-16-15.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/SC2016April25/SC2016April25.mp3", "text": "The family and medical leave policy, student activity accounts, and long range strategic planning.8:20 pm, the Bi-County Collaborative quarterly report of Ms Fanelli.8:25, acceptance of donations.8:35, the school committee will go into executive session for the purpose of discussing negotiation strategies with union personnel, the Foxborough extended day staff.The committee will return to open session.8:50, we will return to open session, vote on the proposed 2016-2017, Foxborough extended day staff memorandum of agreement and then 9:00 p.m., other matters.Before we go on to visitors, first we would like to offer our condolences to Joseph Garrity in the loss of your Mimi.I speak for the whole committee, I'm sure, in saying we offer you our sincere sympathy and deepest condolences, Joe, on your loss.Thank you.You're welcome.This one?Maybe we could take a brief moment- - I know it's just been a hard week for all of us who knew Pat very well.And certainly, Joe, you've been conducting yourself just wonderfully.And you have so many people here that care about you and the whole town, so...It's been a hard thing.Maybe a brief moment of silence, please.Okay.Now, do we have any visitors who wish to be heard?Seeing none, we'll move on to approval of minutes.Maybe we should take them in date order.We have the April 4th, 2016 minutes.Janet has put a corrected version on the table of a couple of corrections on page two.So we gonna have any?No, I recommend that we accept these as presented.Okay, did you have any?Just- - No, I was gonna second, no I was gonna second.Just one thing, I think it's a spelling thing on page three under the FY16 budget update.Second sentence from the bottom and courier vehicle, is that- - The C-O-U. - I know that some of us are a stickler for spelling and- - I don't know, how'd that get past me but I'm so glad you're fixing that.It's courier.It's courier.With Beverly's motion as amended, I don't know if we can proceed.I know, just need a second, but thank you for pointing that out.Marilyn seconding.Marilyn seconding?I did.All right all in favor of approving the minutes?4-0.I should say Mr. Gardner is unable to be here tonight, I forgot to mention that at the start of the meeting, but since I'm here in his chair and he's not here, he's unable to join us tonight, so I will be running the meeting.All right, so those are done.The next meeting minutes of the April 12th, 2006 policy subcommittee meeting minutes.Does anybody have any changes?Rose?If you'll accept as presented.I second.Thank you Marilyn.All in favor?Aye.4-0.All right.Dr Baylor, are you ready?Teaching and learning highlights.I'm actually gonna move over to the guest table so I can access the laptop there.Fabulous, give you a moment to get over there.I also had the pleasure of attending the district wide parent technology night and that was very...The fifth one I thought it was wonderful.Me too, I thought it was the best ever actually.Yes, I would agree with that.And one of the things that I thought was definitely one of the best ever, I'll wait till she gets set up.But I thought, which is why we kind of wanted to show this tonight is the video, this is the, part of the welcome in the auditorium.But I thought the whole welcome was among the best so I give Amy all the credit for that and Erin Hier, our tech director.And I will just have one thing to say 'cause there's so much that you can say after, but I felt the difference between the first few and this our fifth, was that the first one or two, and I said this to Amy, on the evening, that the first couple of years we spent a lot of time in that introductory message saying, we wanna highlight all the good things we're doing related to technology integration and how technology supports the learning, the teaching and learning.but I felt we were still apologizing for we weren't.And so we always had to offer the caveat, okay these are all the great things, but here's also where we're going, and we know we need more of this and we know we don't have any mobile devices, and we know, so I felt the first two years we were still offering that balance of what we have that we're proud of, where we honestly acknowledge where we need to go.And I think that's what really struck me in Amy's introduction was, we don't do that, we're not doing that any more, we're actually just highlighting the wonderful ways that technology supports our staff and our students in the process, so for me that was the big takeaway, but Amy did all the work, so I'll let her talk to you about it.Well, it took a village truly to put it together, and what I wanted to just recap was the PowerPoint presentation that we had in the auditorium, just a couple of slides to set the stage here.But again, back to Debbie's point, is the video that was put together.Because the point of the evening really is to show how we're using technology in classrooms.And it's what the teacher is doing with our curriculum.And we always go back to the strategic plan and our technology plan being really the purpose and the intent.And focusing on what our goal was, which is really to show how we are leveraging technology in the classroom to improve student learning.Simply stated.Our vision really is to make it to where it is a compelling learning environment and one where kids are engaged.And they're able to think critically and collaborate with all of the tools that we have through Office 365 and to communicate and to have all that creativity with being able to produce things, not just consume.So speaking to where we've been in the last five years, this was our fifth annual technology night plan for parents.We had more teachers involved with more students involved down to first graders showing how they're using interactive whiteboards in their classrooms to high school, as well as what it looks like in the AutoCAD and then classroom as far as computer architecture design to physics software that we're using.So many different pieces.And based on all of those different ways that technology is being used, we wanted to try to capture that across the district.And we've spent the last several months, our three technology integration specialist, really capturing snippets of video from elementary classrooms, middle and high, what it looks like on a daily basis and how it really does spread across the curriculum.So when we look at our journey and what that looks like in the classroom, it really does come down to carrying out that vision, we needed to increase our network infrastructure where the community and this committee has been so supportive in order to be able to have the capacity to do what we needed to do, building human capacity with our three technology integration specialists, now having Darlene Reed at the elementary level, Deanna Brosio at the middle school and Julia Greenstein here at the high school and being able to work daily with teachers and how they're integrating technology in their curriculum, again, that supportive community, and truly it is the collaborative nature of this district and the teamwork to be able to bring it all together.We focus on technology integration, the actual standards, but it is embedded within our current curriculum, so it plays out daily.Promises there...And before I get to the video to show what this looks like across, I think that this one particular quote here from Bill Gates, actually, where technology is just a tool, in terms of getting the kids working together and motivating them, the teacher is the most important.And that's what we see each day.And that's what parents were able to see whether they visited the classrooms for presentations or whether they came in here into the media center and visited poster sessions where they could see snippets of what takes place in classrooms.So just to fast forward here to the video, again, this video was captured over several months.It was captured from our three technology integration specialists as well as some of our teachers coming together.And Deanne Ambrosio, our middle school technology integration specialist, took all of this raw footage and put it together in a video and I think that you'll be quite amazed of what is taking place across the district.Welcome to the fifth annual parent technology night, thank you for coming.The Foxborough Public Schools envisions a compelling pre-K to 12 wearing environment, in which students and staff have access to technologies that promote 21st century teaching and learning.This environment leverages technology to provide access to authentic learning experiences that maximize student achievement and prepare students to be productive citizens in a competitive global society.Bring your own device, also known as BYOD, allow students to bring personally owned mobile devices, including laptops, tablets, and smartphones to school for educational use.This is what I'm gonna bring to school today.I have all my school downloaded websites on here, I have all like Office 365, it's extremely helpful, it's really good to get homework done and stuff.It works on all the wifi here, it helps me get stuff done faster, I really like carrying it around.The device is in the class in one sense like if they were to drop the ball, seeing how high it bounces back up next to a meter stick.It gives them a really good accurate measurement if they do it in slow motion to see exactly how high by the ball comes back up.And I liked it for getting good accurate measurements, if I've got a survey in class or kind of an exit ticket, we can do it digitally.And the kids will type in their answers on their devices.They show up immediately instead of having to wait till they get home.Sixth grade students use their own devices in my class and has filled public service announcements on the ramifications of the dangers of bullying.We took a runner-up award for Massachusetts Aggression Reduction Center, and I'm very proud of the kids.Office 365 provides our community with Office applications such as Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote, Outlook, and Suite.These apps can be installed across multiple devices including PCs, Macs, tablets, and phones.In addition, Office 365 provides online storage with OneDrive and video call if you use Skype.Office 365, in case like you want in literature, or a question on homework or anything like that, and then you can use OneDrive to going and seeing projects, you can just see them on there, and do it, but you can access it on OneDrive, on anywhere.My dream, instead of having it paper filled in, is to have a wonder notebook filled with all of your ideas, including pictures that you have your own, something you can keep forever, and hear about science forever!Let's you have a giant screen to work on and then you can paraphrase in the margins and they don't run out of room in the margins in their paraphrasing.So they have a giant, like a giant mural to work on.This is all gonna look amazing I must say.What we're doing is we're trying to place QR media codes over the school so we can have a bit more of a schedule.One of the online platforms that I enjoy using for my class is called Tablet.And I use it as online bulletin boards, chat rooms, online work submission as well as web classes, they just double click and then they're able to submit files from their computer or links on their computer.I like to use a group in my classroom because I think it's a great way to have the kids be engaged in their own review for a test or grades.What's great about the group is that does give us a nice data analysis and breakdown, they are actually getting quite competitive for the digital scoreboard.And what I focused on, very pleasing is that some of the most struggling students end up seeing their name up before other...It's a wonderful tool to help them get these - Thank you, that was really special.So there's lots of different ways technology is used from the instructional videos, from recording for fluency, and when the first graders are there recording their voices and reading, and they hear themselves, they go back and wanna read again and continue with that.So it is engaging.It's exciting for them, what they're learning in different classrooms.Some of the parents that evening would ask questions, is this going on in every classroom?We teach the same standards and grade levels but how we approach that is different.We might use technology in one way in one classroom and meet that same standard a different way in another classroom.And the beautiful thing about that is they're exposed to different ways as they go through each of the grades to technology, and really become proficient and so many different tools, as well as software programs.The one that you saw at the beginning where it was the, they were creating badges.So when you think about online and the badges that you can earn in different ways, whether it's social media or different games and things, those are the things that our students are doing and here at the high school.So it really is some amazing things that they're exposed to and then what they end up creating in the end, And it really is what's enhancing learning.Does anyone have any questions, comments?Very impressive.Giant leaps.Giant leaps.I agree with the giant leaps, I mean having gone to all five of the last five parent technology nights, the progress from the first year to this year is just amazing.Even the difference in what my now tenth grader was doing in eighth grade, and what my now eighth grader is doing in eighth grade, with the same teachers, same curriculum, but the technology has evolved so much in two years, it's very exciting what is happening, I think, on a daily basis.And you know one of the things that makes me the happiest is that not only have we really come leaps and bounced, thanks, really to this committee and the community who has supported all of our requests to add technology in different pieces, but we've done all that while preserving our focus on teaching learning.We didn't just say we needed a new initiative called technology, we're gonna buy stuff.So by maybe taking it a little bit slow the first couple of years, back before, say going over the last nine years, that taking a little bit slowly really helped us preserve that idea that it's to serve up the curriculum.It's not a means or an activity or an initiative in and of itself, that we really have achieved that goal, over time.Well, I think the committee has supported, you know, the last few years, the addition of the technology integration specialists and the supervisor, and that has really led our teachers to be able to blossom in their use of technology.So adding those positions has really been critical to maximizing the potential...Right, that's actually- - It's not just the things.Yeah.It's the human resource support that must come with the efficient and effective use of the things.Not make it to something new like here you go, when I see Tom, I know Tom's been around for a while and that's what we didn't do, which I think is a mistake often that's, 'cause it's kind of exciting and interesting and we didn't make that mistake.It might've taken us a little bit longer than we'd hoped, but we got to where we wanted without selling our souls of what we believe in.So I think that's, I couldn't be prouder.Yeah, Debbie Spinelli brought it up earlier, but I think it bears mentioning again or more, that aside from the curriculum that we've done in the excellent work of the implementation and hopefully good adoption among the faculty.I think a lot of credit needs to go to Bill Younker and to Aaron Heier, who are under your administration, who've produced a lot of the behind the scenes, very important and highly technical and sometimes financially complicated implementations of this, these laptops don't grow on trees and we have to be able to buy them and we've been able to get there, and in the absence of our chair, Mr. Gardner, I'm sure that there's more to do, but this has been a remarkable three years or so in this process.And there's always more to do, but you made me have thought actually that because they have a vision, hearing bill for the procurement of the things that we need, we actually haven't increased our capital technology, we've just repurposed it more flexibly so that we're not buying as many as what you would think of the standard desktop, but we're buying the things we'll really use in the capacity that we believe they should be used.So I think that's important to know, it's not that we've necessarily asked for extra on top of what we already have.We're just using the funds that we are lucky enough to get each year in a different way to achieve our goals.So it definitely, that is a big part of it, is to have that vision of what is the priority and what can we do without, or how does that philosophy shift, what we hope to get versus what we've traditionally purchased, So that's been a big help.Thank you Amy.That was great.Yeah, thank you Amy.We appreciate it.The work of many.It was a great night.Thank you.Really a great night.It sure was.Do you wanna stay there?Or wanna join me?Hurry up.Have a seat.So as we know, Mr. Murray is our department chair for social studies, but for high school.Welcome Tom.Really see if you...Yes.I'm here to ask for a new textbook adoption for the AP European History.This has been proposed from two summers ago when we finished off the social studies evaluation, and one of our needs was to find a European history textbook.Mr. Todd Kayes has been teaching this class for over 15 years now, I looked up that number, since Kevin McCarthy left, he's taken this class and he's done some great things with it.He's been using the same textbook throughout.And when he went to a conference, a one week conference two summers ago, and he met a lot of people, he got five or six, I think it was five different textbooks we looked at, and this is the final one that he and I came down with.And the reason why this is gonna be such a great textbook is they adopted this textbook as they made the changes to the test itself.So there's some great resources that go with it.The professor who wrote this, actually, Mr. Kayes is our head as a professor at Penn State University, which was only a coincidence, but the fact is this is an outstanding textbook, we're very excited to hopefully adopt this for next year.And going back to that K-12 social studies review that we did two years ago, actually when you go back to the timeline that we had proposed for this text, it would have been last year.And I think that speaks to being really thorough and thinking through what exactly do we need in order to make sure that we're best meeting the needs of the students and we're doing it in a timely fashion, but we're not jumping into it at the same time, based on the changes that have happened with the AP college board now.Yeah, very thoughtful process.Absolutely.So the total cost for purchasing 50 copies is 6,048...Yes it is, yeah.And that would be the high school textbook.That's why 16, why.All right.Anybody have any additional questions?Comments?No, I'll make a motion that we appropriate $6,048 for the purchase of this, of the 50 copies of the new history textbook, advanced placement European history textbook.I'll second that thank you, Marilyn.All in favor?Aye.4-0.Thank you.Thank you.Thanks, guys.Thanks, Tom.Thank you.Exciting.And thanks again for the technology, because as a classroom teacher, I can't say enough good stuff, it changes the whole dynamic of the classroom.When the kid's excited, we just got to presidential, who is the best president.We started with McKinley.We went right up to the present.It's just, the kids are actively involved, and the kids get vote through Kahoot!So every kid is involved in this whole process and it's not me who's making the decision, it's the class who's making the decision, and it's really been a game changer from that to PowerPoint, when one person who's helped develop a PowerPoint and everybody else would take credit for it, it's totally different now that everybody actively participates and everybody, because it's online, so you can't kind of fight your way out of it.Everybody has to be involved.Yeah, you know what?The student engagement comes a little bit more naturally without the teacher having to work hard on student engagement, harder than you have to because they want to be involved.Everybody's getting like, we did one with seniors in pre-economics and they were reluctant at the beginning then when they were excited, because look, I gotta do my part of it and that's really a nice thing.That's a great point.Great.Thank you.I'd be interested if they did think who was the most effective president.It was concluded, it was John F. Kennedy.And I didn't think, I thought it'd be Teddy Roosevelt, personally, but it was the kids who did it.And the kid who ran with it, he was awesome.That's great.Thanks Tom.Thank you.Thank you.Thank you.All right.We're a little ahead of schedule, but that's all good.We got lot of policy coming up.So our next agenda item is the first reading of three policies.The first one is policy GCCC GDCC. I don't know who titles these, family and medical leave.We'll thank MASC for the lettering process on that.We don't know who else to thank.So that is the first one and you have in your packets the current policy, which is quite short, and, Debbie and I met and discussed this and went through the very lengthy family leave policy.I think it looks to me that when the policy handbook was initially adopted, this was probably put in as a placeholder, it sort of just references the Family and Medical Leave Act.The new policy really delineates exactly what our employees are entitled to Family and Medical Leave Act.So, Debbie, do you want to start with...I will start.All right, suggested new policy, GCCC GDCC, family leave policy, family medical and small necessities leaves of absence.A, purpose: The Family and Medical Leave Act, FMLA of 1993 allows eligible employees 12 weeks of unpaid leave, 26 weeks for military caregiver leave per year under the circumstances outlined below.Employees may take leave for the following reasons.One, to care for the employee's child after birth or placement of a child with an employee through adoption or foster care.Two, incapacity due to pregnancy, prenatal medical care or childbirth.Three, the employee is needed to care for his or her child, spouse or parent who has a serious health condition.Four, the employee is unable to perform the functions of his/her position because of a serious health condition.Five, the employee is next of kin to or needed to care for a covered service member who incurred a serious injury or illness in the line of duty, up to 26 weeks of leave.This is an exception to the 12 week maximum referenced throughout the policy.Six, the employee needs leave due to a qualifying exigency arising out of his, her child, spouse, or parent who is also a military member being called to or serving on covered active duty.B, use paid leave first.Employers are required to use certain types of accrued or available paid leave first as part of the FMLA leave, before commencing the unpaid portion of the leave.Employees who take leave because of birth, or placement of a child, or to care for an ill spouse, parent or child, must first use all accrued vacation and personal time in that order.Employees would take leave because of their own serious illness must use all accrued, sick, personal, and vacation time in that order.Debbie, hold up.Mrs.Panelli pointed out that somehow in our transition, we dropped out a sentence that is important to include- - There is one sentence missing, the next to the last sentence should say, and the reason I know...Before employees who take leave?Correct.So this is a policy recommended by your own school attorney, and the sentence that is missing says contractual family sick leave must be used if an employee is out to care for an ill family member.Contract, again, so...So it addresses, and that comes before...The boys who take leave because of their own...Their own serious illness.Could you do it once more please?Sure.Contractual family sick leave must be used if an employee is out to care for an ill family member.That's a good cash and it must have just dropped out in our editing, but I'm so glad that you remembered that.Thank you.Janet, do you have that?Yeah I do.I have that copy.Thank you.I see you typed the note.Okay.Debbie do you want me to take over the next bit of reading or should you like to continue?Well why don't you do and then we'll swap back and forth.No kidding.One voice will not drone on.Okay, so we are on C. - It is C. - C, eligibility, 1,250 hours in previous 12 months to be eligible for leave under this policy.An employee must have been employed by the employer for a total of at least 12 months, and must've worked at least 1,250 hours during the 12 month period preceding the commencement of the leave.Certain exceptions may apply if an employee has had a break in service with the employer totaling seven or more years, unless the break was due to certain types of military leave.D, conditions, one, 12 weeks.Employees may take no more than 12 weeks of leave in a 12 month period.The 12 month period is a rolling 12 months, beginning 12 months prior to the proposed commencement of the requested leave.If both spouses are employed by the employer, they are together entitled to a total of 12 weeks of leave for the birth or placement of a child or care of a sick parent.Two, notice, employees wishing to take FMLA leave must give 30 days notice for leave involving foreseeable events.If the events giving rise to the need for leave is not foreseeable, then the employee must give such notice as is practicable under the circumstances.Employees must schedule planned medical treatments with due regard for the employer's operational needs.E, definitions, healthcare provider, a doctor of medicine or osteopathy who is authorized to practice medicine or surgery as appropriate by the state in which the doctor practices or any other person determined by the secretary to be capable of providing healthcare services.Parent, the biological parent of an employee or an individual who stood in loco parentis to an employee when the employee was a son or daughter.Reduced leave schedule, it leaves schedule that reduces the usual number of hours per workweek or hours per work day of an employee, secretary, the secretary of labor.Serious health condition, an illness, injury impairment, or physical or mental condition that involves inpatient care in a hospital, hospice or residential medical care facility or continuing treatment by a healthcare provider.Child, a biological, adopted or foster child, a stepchild, a legal ward, or a child of a person standing in loco parentis, who is under 18 years of age or 18 years of age or older and incapable of self care because of a mental or physical disability.Spouse, an individual's legal husband or wife.Covered active duty, in the case of a member of a regular component of the armed forces duty during the deployment of the member with the armed forces to a foreign country.And in the case of a member of the reserve component of the armed forces, duty during the deployment of the member with the armed forces to a foreign country under a call or order to active duty under a provision of law referred to as section 101A 13B of Title X United States code.Covered service member, a member of the armed forces, including a member of the National Guard reserves, who is undergoing medical treatment, recuperation or therapy, or is otherwise in outpatient status, or is otherwise on the temporary disability retired list for a serious injury or illness or a veteran who is undergoing medical treatment, recuperation or therapy for a serious injury or illness, or who was a member of the armed forces, including a member of the National Guard or reserves at any time during the period of five years proceeding the date on which the veteran undergoes that medical treatment recuperation or therapy.Next of kin, with respect to an individual next of kin is the nearest blood relative of that individual.Qualifying exigencies, excuse me, may include attending certain military events, arranging for alternative childcare, addressing certain financial and legal arrangements, attending certain counseling sessions and attending post-deployment reintegration briefing.Serious injury or illness in the case of a member of the armed forces, including a member of the National Guard or reserves, an injury or illness that was incurred by the member in the line of duty, on active duty, in the armed forces or existed before the beginning of the member's active duty and was aggravated by service in line of duty, on active duty in the armed forces, and that may render the member medically unfit to perform the duties of the members' office grade, rank or rating, and in the case of a veteran who was a member of the armed forces, including a member of the National Guard or reserves, at any time during such a period.A qualifying, as defined by the Secretary of Labor, injury or illness that was incurred by the member in line of duty, on active duty in the armed forces or existed before the beginning of the member's active duty and was aggravated by service in line of duty, on active duty in the armed forces, and that manifested itself before or after the member became a veteran.Whew!Okay.It's not for the faint-hearted.No, but it really does spell it all out.It's right there.If anyone has a question about how we would deal with these issues, it does delineate everything.F certification, employees must provide sufficient information for the employer to determine if the leave may qualify for FMLA protection.In the anticipated timing and duration of the leave, employees requesting FMLA leave must provide medical certification to support a claim for leave for an employee's own serious health condition or to care for a seriously ill child, spouse, or parent.The medical certification must set forth the date on which serious health condition commenced, the serious health condition commenced, the probable duration of the condition and the appropriate medical facts within the knowledge of the healthcare provider regarding the condition.In its discretion the employer may require a second medical opinion and periodic recertification at its own expense.Employer responsibilities, the employer will inform employees requesting leave, whether they are eligible under the FMLA. The employer will also inform employees, what, if any, additional information is needed to process their request.Employees will be notified of the approval or denial of the leave and the reasons therefore.The employer shall not interfere with, restrain or deny the exercise of any right provided under the FMLA and shall not take any adverse employment action against an employee for posing any practice made unlawful by the FMLA or for involvement in any proceeding under or relating to the FMLA. Debbie, you wanna take over?I will to take over.H, intermittent or reduced schedule leave.If medically necessary for a serious health condition or qualifying exigency of the employee or his or her spouse, child or parent, will maybe taken on the intermittent or reduced leave schedule.If leave is requested on this basis, the employer may require the employee to transfer temporarily to a position with equivalent compensation, which better accommodates recurring periods of absence or a part-time schedule.I, benefits.One, health coverage.Employees on leave are entitled to the continuance of group health coverage under the same conditions they received coverage prior to the leave.Employees who contribute to their health insurance premiums via payroll deduction must arrange to pay the premium contributions during the period of unpaid absence, if they wish to retain coverage.In the event that an employee elects not to return to work upon completion of an improved unpaid leave of absence, the employer may recover from the employee the cost of any payments made to maintain the employee's coverage, unless the failure to return to work was beyond reasons of the employee's control.Two, other benefits.Benefits based upon the length of service will be calculated as of the last paid workday prior to the start of the FMLA leave of absence.Employees do not accrue sick, vacation or personal time while on leave in excess of 30 days.Employees will not forfeit any employment benefits that accrued prior to the start of the FMLA leave of absence.Under J, sick leave, workers' compensation leave, or other absences.Employees who are out of work for reasons that would qualify for leave under this policy, irrespective of whether the leave has been requested under this policy, are required, upon request, to provide to the employer the information and certifications required by this policy.The employer shall designate all such qualifying leave as family and medical leave, which shall run against the 12 weeks allowed under this policy.K, return to work.Employees returning from FMLA leave in accordance with this policy will be restored to their original positions or to equivalent positions with equivalent pay and benefits.Employees should contact the personnel department and their supervisors at least two weeks before their return date to make arrangements.Employees may be required to provide a medical opinion from a physician, certifying their fitness for duty.The employer reserves the right to send an employee to the employer's position for a second opinion regarding the employee's fitness to work.L, procedural requirements.Employees returning, requesting, excuse me, I'm beginning it, employees requesting an FMLA leave must submit the request in writing to their department head.Request should be made 30 days in advance of the commencement of the leave, but in any event, as soon as practicable.The employer will provide an employee with a certification of health care provider form.The employee must return the completed form to the employer within 15 days from receipt.Want me to take over?Sure.This one's a monster, it's just long.Rules specific to teachers.Leave taken near the end of an academic term.The following rules shall apply with respect to periods of leave near the conclusion of an academic term in the case of any eligible employee employed principally in an instructional capacity.Leave more than five weeks prior to end of term.If the employee begins leave more than five weeks prior the end of the academic term, the employer may require the employee to continue taking leave until the end of such term, if the leave is obvious at least three weeks duration, and the return to employment would occur during the three-week period before the end of such term.Leave less than five weeks prior to the end of term.If the employee begins leave with less than five weeks remaining in the academic term, the employer may require the employee to continue taking leave until the end of such term, if the leave is of greater than two weeks duration, and the return to employment would occur during the two week period before the end of such term.Leave less than three weeks prior to end of term.If the employee begins leave with less than three weeks remaining in the academic term, the employer may require the employee to continue to take leave until the end of such term.Intermittent or reduced leave, reduced schedule leave.In any case in which an eligible employee employed principally in an instructional capacity requests intermittent or reduced schedule leave that is foreseeable based on planned medical treatment, and the employee would be on leave for greater than 20% of the total number of working days in the period during which the leave would extend, the agency or school may require that such employee elect either to take leave for periods of a particular duration, not to exceed the duration of the planned medical treatment, or to transfer temporarily to an available alternative position offered by the employer for which the employee is qualified and that has equivalent pay and benefits and better accommodates recurring periods of leave then the regular employment position of the employee.And small necessities, one, The Small Necessities Act, Massachusetts General Law chapter 149, section 52D became effective on August 4th, 1998.Two, an employee shall be entitled to a total of 24 hours of unpaid leave during a 12 month period, the 12 month period is a rolling 12 months, beginning 12 months prior to the proposed commencement of requested leave, in addition to leave available under the family and medical leave act of 1993, for the following purposes, A, to participate in school activities directly related to the educational advancement of a son or daughter, B, to accompany the son or daughter of an employee to routine medical or dental appointments, such as checkups or vaccinations, and C, to accompany an elderly relative of the employee to a routine medical or dental appointments or appointments for other professional services related to the elder's care.Three, employees who have accumulated sick, personal or vacation time must choose such time as part of the 24 hours before becoming eligible for unpaid time.The employer will not provide paid leave in any situation where it would not normally provide such paid leave.For at least seven days in advance, the employee shall submit to the employer a written notice of his/her intent to take small necessities leave and the date and expected duration of the leave.If seven days notice is not possible, the employee shall give notice as soon as practicable.Reference is 29 USC, section 2601 at seek, 29 CFR Part 825 at seek and Massachusetts General Law chapter 149, section 52 D. Any questions?I just have one, I'm sorry.No, don't apologize.On page two.B, one.So they're saying if a husband and wife had a baby, they can only do a combined four weeks.Like, why don't they get the individual?That's the way the laws is- - The State law?Yes.Okay.So four is the rule.Is the rule of the law.That is true.They must share the available time, if they're both employees.Right, at the same employer?Okay.Thank you.I wanna clarify that.That's good to clarify, Steve?Yes, This is rich and thorough and thank you for all the work you both did on it.I have no criticism of it at all.I just have a couple of questions.Page one, letter C, eligibility, like, and we can answer these later in another reading or whatever- - We can answer them now.Pin anybody down, but when it describes the number of hours, in this case, 1,250, since we have a school year, is it the contracted year of say some members of our school system say the union members versus non-members, 'cause you have breaks, right?Right, but they're actually employed.Are they accumulated, okay that helps.The contracts are year round, it is just that the work year is shorter than the contractual year, but this actually is the federal law that you have to have been employed for at least 12 months and have to work at least that minimum number of hours in order to be eligible for FMLA. - Thank you, I think you got me right in there, Debbie.Right on to answer my question, the other page two, if I may, Madam Chair?Sure, go on Steve.Item two...Under D?Under D, yeah this is based on my inexperience with this law.Is there flexibility with, say, the administration, whoever is the stakeholder on helping the employee work through what scheduled planned medical treatments are with regards to the employer's operational needs?So I'm not gonna mention any fictional medical conditions, but there's gotta be something in the human condition where the person has to go for it.And is it captured somewhere else, or I don't know...I don't know that it needs to be because we have several people, a few people a year that get FMLA, and the way it actually works is more straightforward than some of the detailed language may lead one to believe.But basically what that section says is that, about scheduled planned medical treatments, that if you have a need or an immediate family member has a need that you know the scheduled, what the schedule of treatment is, then yes, you work with the employer to say, okay, that's actually a better situation than sometimes not knowing what is being faced, so, because then you're a little more predictable, about what's gonna happen and have a little bit more of a plan to cover.So in other words, we're on top of it.So thank you.Yes.That was a good question though.Because FMLA has been a federal law for a few decades.So as you can see, so it is, it's just that our policy sort of just referenced it.It said we'll comply with it.And so if you were an employee looking to see what the benefits were, you would have to then go somewhere else.So the benefit of having it all here, as you can see it right in the Foxborough school committee policy manual.Steve, on that one though I think we need to, your question on the last sentence, planned medical treatments are like if I'm gonna have knee surgery, where it's at my schedule, my wish to have done.I see, elect the- - Right, it's not talking about an emergency surgery or a need to have one.Got it, thank you.If it's a treatment where you're gonna be ill for a few days each time, for example, maybe, 'cause I've been through that.Then we wouldn't necessarily wanna schedule it on a Monday and then you would only come back in on Friday.so typically people will pick a Thursday or Friday.So it's kind of those situations that, it's mutually agreeable, like this would work for you, this would work for us, let's come up for something, that seems to be of mutual benefit.Sure, and then finally Medicare, page five, letter, item L, it references that the request should be made 30 days in advance with the commencement and leave, but in any event, as soon as that practicable, and the employer will provide...Oh, I know, is there any language that we need or have already that once the employee submits whatever submission it is to the administration, that the administration is required to act within 24, 48, 36 days, weeks, hours, or whatever?Yes, we cover that one.So it doesn't sit in an in-basket somewhere and...Oh no, the cover form says, you are or not eligible.The minute we get it we send it right on.Okay.And it says, you are or are not eligible and it's, and then it's sent back.Great.Thank you very much everybody, appreciate it.All great questions.Great questions.Yeah, Really.And what this does, it is our old policy that we're getting rid of said...Well we're not getting rid of it but we're amending, like I said, the superintendent shall issue, and from time to time, amend regulation, setting forth the rights and procedures granted by the app, that's really what we're doing.It took a little while to get there.This was 08 and we're in 16, but I think this is a thorough delineation of everybody's rights.No, that's a heavy lift.You did a lot of work, thank you.So with the inclusion of that one sentence, I think we've gone through and vetted the new policy.Correct.And that is the version that your attorney is recommending, that's right, for your consideration.Okay.We vote on that tonight or- - No, this is the first reading.It was the first reading?But what I would like to do is I'd like to make a motion that we move this policy, family leave policy as amended forward for a second reading.Yes.Thank you.Second.Would anyone like to second that?I will.Thank you, Marilyn, all in favor?Aye.4-0.All right, so we'll move that forward for a second reading at our next meeting.The next policy is student activity accounts.JJF. You may remember that back in December, Mr. Youther brought to our attention the need to set some limits on the funds to be included in the student activity accounts.And we voted in December to have a $25,000 limit at the high school and $20,000 at the middle school.The MESC had some policy suggestions, changes based on the Massachusetts law, so Bevy and I took a look at the MSAC suggested changes and have incorporated those into our policy on student activity accounts, and it's not quite as long, it's a little bit long, but it's not quite as long.And these regulations have changed.They have changed.Become a little bit more- - That's right.If I could speak more eloquently, definitely have become more regulated and more accountabilities built in in more clearly defined requirements.I think that's reflected in what the suggested language from MAEC is.And so I asked Bill to take a look at it, and give us his thoughts tonight.And I guess we'll just start.Debbie, do you want to start?Sure, and this one is the long range, to do the plan?Student activity accounts.Student account activities, File JJF, student funds may be raised to finance the activities of authorized student organizations.Student activity funds are considered a part of the total fiscal operation of the Foxborough Public Schools and are subject to policies established by the Foxborough School Committee and of the office of the Superintendent.The funds shall be, this is added, only for the benefit of the students and, that's inserted in our old language, managing accordance with the sound of business practices, which include accepted budgetary, this is new, and internal control practices.The Superintendent will ensure that annually all principals and student organizations receive a copy of this policy, as well as a copy of established procedures for control of receipts and expenditures that meet or exceed DESE guidelines.In compliance with Massachusetts General Law chapter 71, section 47, the Foxborough School Committee, one, authorizes the principals to accept money for organized student activity organizations, which currently exist, or, as from time to time, it may be revised.This is new, quote, all funds received for the student activities must be deposited into the student activity agency account, and no funds will be directly deposited to a student activity checking account, except for the student activity agency account, end quote.Two, authorizes the town treasurer to establish and maintain a student activity agency account or accounts, which is to be audited as part of the town's annual audit.The interest that is earned on such accounts shall be maintained by the agency account and distributed annually among the student activity checking accounts, as directed by the regulations established by the Foxborough School Committee policy.Debbie, I'm gonna jump in, with this next one, because Bill had given me a couple changes and I've had them on my copy here, so I might as well jump in with the reading, three, authorizes student activity checking accounts for use by the principals with specific maximum balances established by each school, for each school by Foxborough School Committee policy.This is new, payments for expenditures shall be made whenever possible by check, debit or EFT directly from the student activity, that should say agency account, not checking, agency account.So agency...Should say student activity agency account.Thank you.That was a good catch by Bill.Reimbursements to personal credit card holder shall require the prior authorization of the superintendent.Signatory authorization for student activity checking accounts shall be restricted to the principal, and it should say assistant principal, and then strike the parenthetical reference to superintendent or treasurer.So, okay.The principal and assistant principal.Period, and then that parenthetical should come out.Okay.Student activity checking account shall be audited annually in accordance with DESE guidelines.Four, directs principals to provide the treasurer with a bond in an amount agreeable to the treasurer.Five, this is new, shall annually prior to the start of each school year vote to establish or change the maximum balance that may be on deposit in each student activity checking account.Oh, so I have a question.So this should be on our radar for annually?Annually.Annually you're gonna review, sort of like you do the curriculum, like you're gonna revisit what are the maximum balances allowed on each student activity checking account?Do you wanna keep them the same, do you wanna expand them or do you?So every year they're going to revisit that.But it does say prior to the start of each school year, again, this was the recommended language based on the changes in the law, so we should put it on our calendar for the end of August.And I mean, as long as Bill is satisfied that the two recommended amounts of 25,000 and 20,000, if something changes over the summer, then we can revisit those amounts then, but that's a good catch.For accounts with limits that exceed $25,000, the Massachusetts department of education recommends that districts consider an audit constructed by an outside, conducted by an outside accounting firm.My eyes are failing me.Strike two to it just every three years.So I now have another question.So just as a matter of, that language was always in there?That language was always in there.Just as a matter of being consistent.The Massachusetts Department of Education is now called the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education.Yes.So we should say D. - Elementary and secondary education.We can read these things over and over again.Well, I have read this once a night, but as you're reading it out loud, I hear it.It makes me think so...Well, this was the 2008- - Skim over familiar words...Nope, that's perfect.So change Massachusetts Department of Education to DESE because that is what we've referenced.Spell it out fully- - Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education.Well, we should probably spell it out in the first reference, which is up at the top, in the first paragraph.And then we should meet or exceed Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, parentheses, DESE. And then we can just refer to DESE. - Great.That's...Right.Throughout.That's perfect.Oh, thank you.Madam Chair?On the same item, if I may, and Bill, maybe you can answer this.It says, whatever the name of your organization you just changed, I'm sorry, I'm a little blurry on that one.They use the verb, recommends that the districts, my question is, do we do that or are we going to do that?Or do we not know yet at this time?The guidelines basically state that to do an internal review for the first two years.And then on the third year, the outside auditing firm has to do the audits.So effectively it's being audited each year.It's just one every three years is actually done by an outside firm.Okay.I didn't know that we have to- - So, we haven't done an outside firm yet.Because the policy basically for us has just been put in place.So we won't do that probably for another year.Okay, thank you.It does not force you to do it though.It's saying it recommends that you consider.And so basically what they're saying is this is good practice.If you don't do it and you have a problem, it's on you.So that's really what they're saying.That's why I called every three years.But ironically, they also put it, if you don't do it, they'll put it in your annual audit.It's now gonna be a footnote that you're not doing it.Oh okay, so the- - But we are doing it, so...So the law in itself doesn't force you to, but what they're saying is you better do it.I was just bringing it home.Thank you.No, good point, Steve.This whole next section is new and was recommended by MASC, graduating class funds, funds held on behalf of graduating classes are to be held within the student activity checking account for the high school.Such funds shall be designated by the class's year of graduation, such as class of 1998, except once a class has graduated from high school, their fund should be removed from the high school student activity checking account no later than two years from the date of graduation.It is the responsibility of the class officers to arrange for these funds to be removed from the high school activity checking account.When requested, and once all outstanding financial obligations of the graduating class have been met, the remaining balance should be removed from the fund by check transfer a payable to the class of XXXX. Checks payable to individual members of the graduating class are not permitted.Should the class officers not request to have their funds removed from the student activity checking account within two years of their graduating, the funds will be forfeited by the class and transferred into the general sub fund portion of the student activity agency account.These funds will then be allocated by a vote of the school committee.The source is MASC, March, 2016, the legal references are Mass.General Laws, chapter 71, section 47, as amended.And this should say as amended by chapter 66 of the Acts of 1996.You skipped one last sentence there.I did?Yeah, the class officers.The final sentence.Class officers should be given a copy of this policy during the course of their senior year to ensure their knowledge, and their obligations to perform under this policy.I was working off a different copy.I don't know why.Or you are just getting tired then?No, I actually don't have that- - So Bev read it in, is that right?Class officers should be given a copy of this policy during the course of their senior year to ensure their knowledge of their obligations to perform under this policy.Thank you, Deb.We have too many different, I don't know how that happened.I had a different copy that I was working on.That's okay as long as we all are aware of that.Yep, no that that's the one we should be.All right.One more question, Madam Chair, for the subject matter experts, probably Bill or Deb, is there any language we need to have, or is it an accounting practice already in place that defines the accounts that the monies are held in, so that say, principal being the monies are not at risk for loss, like, instead of investment accounts or something like that, just as checking, but...All well, the two funds that exist.One is the agency fund, which is actually controlled by the town's treasurer collector.It's not controlled by anybody on the school site.That is where the primary source of money is supposed to be.That's where all deposits go to.The student activity checking account is what's actually under the control of the principal or assistant principal within the building.And that's the one that has the limitations of the 20-25.That is strictly in a checking account, that's interest bearing not being invested other than...Just the principal- - No, however, the other money is co-mingled with all town revenues and sources, so therefore, if they're investing the money out, they're investing in this money as well out, but they always obviously keep the liquid portion for us.Thank you.The only comment I will make on this, that I'm uncomfortable with, but it's state law, so we will obviously have to deal with it.And I actually think, and I apologize 'cause they don't have my copy with me right here, but I don't believe the state law allows for the two year holding of the money.I believe it's actually down to either six or nine months.But the problem I have with that is in many cases we have graduating classes that are graduating with $5,000 to $10,000, which they are specifically graduating with to have for their five-year reunion.And I have a real problem, personally, giving five to $10,000 to a 18 year old that basically would have to open an account under their social security number, because it can no longer be under any of the, the town valued accounts and just dispersing it.So we typically have seen that the funds stay in our accounts for the five years and at the five-year time they usually clear them out, because that's what they're using to do as their seed money for their reunion.At which point, obviously I have no concerns that it's gone.It's not in our control any more.But I think the state law really does not anticipate that some of these classes will have the size balances they have.It'd be different if it's a $500, $1000 dollar account, but I have seen $10,000, $12,000 still in some of these accounts.So what do we do with that?I've actually put a call into our state legislators just to say, you really need to really think this one out, because I think this is a problem.Absolutely.Personally I don't think that you're, if you were thinking that these kids are graduating with a $500 thing, that's not the case, and that's not, in fact it was not unusual.This is, I've talked to a lot of the people, the towns around us, and they're the same exact situation.And I'm sure it's sometimes a far more than that.So, you know...This was the language that was recommended from MASC. - We currently have nothing in our policy on graduating class funds.So I think for, I mean, at least absent a change in the law, this is, and maybe MASC put the two years in thinking along the same lines that you did.I think for now, at least, this is a good way to go, but we should keep an eye on it and make sure we're giving our students the best advice possible when they graduate.Isn't it under our purview, if we realize that is really happening, that we could recommend under this particular circumstance that it stays until the five year, no?Well, what's interesting is I think you might get away, and I kept rereading this when you get to it, but where it basically says that you will take control of it and put it into a general sub fund portion of the student activity account, which technically doesn't exist by state law, but anyways, we'd put it there.You could decide not to do anything with it for five years and then disperse it.So you could effectively use their own wording, if this is valid, you could use their own wording to just keep it there.Just, you know, wouldn't be under the class of '98, but we would keep track of what the class of '98 had type of thing.So we could, we can work around it for the benefit of the class?I, with this wording, you could, I think.Okay.Well this is our first reading.So we'll maybe all give this some more thought.The mattress strategy - The mattress strategy, put it in your mattress.So far it's been really fun, so you know.I just don't think they thought through the individual, the effect on the individual.It could even affect someone's financial aid, for example, You don't know, so I think that that's definitely part of it, that, until the scenario has actually happened.And I think at some point they'll say, oh, oh gee...We need to fix this, right?Well, at least we have the phrase that, of the sub, whatever it was, the sub-account.Well, we can massage that- - We move it from high school and take possession.Right?So we can massage that a little bit.Maybe we could get some feedback from our student, our class advisors.Well, I was gonna say the class advisors.I think as long as it's the state law area, I don't think we'll do any good because we already feel that way.So I just don't know.That, I'm sure they will agree with us.I think it's just questionable, let us do a little bit more digging about how other people are handling that and how do you advise the kids, how to best take control of the money without impacting yourself as an individual college student.So, we will have more information a month from now, but I just don't know if people figured out that...Well this is the recommended language.Yes.All good points on that.We have one more policy.Well, actually I would like to recommend that the policies, the student activity accounts file, JJF, be moved forward for second reading with the additions of our corrections and amendments.Thank you.Second.Thank you, Steve.All in favor.Aye.4-0.Okay.One more.This one's short and sweet.This was just something, this is a housekeeping matter that as we were flipping through our policy manual, we noticed that our policy on long range strategic planning was not up-to-date with our actual practice.So that's, we're just trying to bring this policy in line with what we have actually been doing over the last five years now, I think?Yeah.Five years.So this is file ADAA, long range strategic planning.The key element of effective management of a school system is the use of long range plans.Long range strategic planning is strongly supported in the research related to the management of education.The Foxborough School Committee and Superintendent share the responsibility for setting direction for Foxborough Public Schools.Long range strategic planning is the primary process for effecting long-term direction.The Foxborough school department is committed to the concept of Long range strategic planning.This planning is focused on the major components of the school system as recommended by the superintendent.This concept will be implemented in the school system as a result of the following process.A long range strategic plan will be developed to include a three, changed from five, to three year period.The plan will be prepared by the superintendent, recommended to the Foxborough School Committee for approval.And when they're gonna strike the sentence, the plan will be reviewed revised yearly.The Superintendent will provide the school committee with an annual update on the plan's progress.The superintendent will ensure appropriate staff and community participation in the development of the plan.The timeline for development, presentation and approval of the plan is as follows.I'm gonna strike the original A and then insert A, six months prior to the expiration of the current three year plan, the Superintendent will form a strategic planning work group, consisting of administrators, staff, and community members.And we'll strike the second, the B and insert B, a draft will be submitted to the school committee for review and final approval.And that is that.And we'll strike C. Basically A, B and C had to do with five-year plans, which were not working.I mean, we're not doing, because we went to the three-year plan, which is working for us, I think, a more effective way to plan for it.So does anybody have any questions?I think that it's just tweaking.It's a housekeeping thing and a tweaking just to make sure what we say we're doing is based on what we're actually doing.I move to accept the long range strategic planning with the amendments made.To move it forward for a second reading?Yep, please.Do we have a second?Second.Thank you, Steve.All in favor.Aye.4-0.Okay.Well, we're done with the policy portion of the meeting, moving on to the Bi-County quarterly update, Mrs.Pinelli?Okay.So four times a year, hence the name quarterly update, we get an update from Bi-County Collaborative, which is our member collaborative for special education programming that we do send a few kids to every year and we are a member district.So this particular update contains information regarding referrals and enrollment, status of the budget for Bi-Co, FY16, parent information events, regional training, and an upcoming transition expo.So just to elaborate on a couple of those there, referrals and enrollment are continuing to increase for the backup in terms of the Collaborative to where they typically are at this time every year, which is close to 200, they have 196 students.They have had more growth in the elementary programs that they run.They have been providing, which I think is a really good thing, they were expanding other services to districts other than just here are some programs, and the student, you pay us tuition, which is the traditional bulk of the activity, but they really expand things in the area of home-based services that are really, have helped the districts, afterschool programing and kids who need that, that's for an extended day, and professional development of interest to the member districts.And some examples of that have been that they've been providing some sheltered English immersion training, special education content training, and other similar things that our faculty is looking for as well.They have tried to begin some parent education programs, which typically doesn't exist in a collaborative that big, but they, for example, they mentioned signs of suicide information, which is a program that's used in most of our schools, us included.And they are now using that for that.And I think particularly interest of families of students with disabilities is that they're gonna be holding a family financial planning night on April.Oh, that was April 6th.So this has already gone by.To help families really with topics about guardianship, preservation of eligibility of government benefits and entitlement, building financial solutions and legal planning.So I hope that they do run that every year, because I think a lot of people are interested in that, and they do get that type of information when we have transition night that we run, they are running their own transition night, as you also see, but we do transition night in collaboration with area districts as well.So those are very helpful family events, where you can learn about all kinds of things that you need to set your child up for adulthood and transition to future career.And I think those things that they've been doing certainly have expanded the services for all of us who belong.So that's great.Great.Do we need to move to accept this?Yes.Accept.Could I just ask a quick question?Of course.The last item was the transition's expo.Are we participating in that as a school district in any way or attending it?No, because we have our own, this is Bi-County has, well, we had, there's I think 18, at this point maybe 17 member districts, is quite big.So this is the first time they're co-hosting their own, with their own vendors and everything, but Foxborough actually runs their own and we move it around, sometimes it's in Alborough or Norton, Foxborough.We host a lot.We do all the group setups.We often run it here.So we already have our own.And they have, rather than relying on all their member districts to have their own transition night or in partnership like we do, regionally, they are now starting to run their own so that they fill the gap in case they've member communities that don't need families that need that information.It's good to see other organizations, again, rise to the Foxborough standard.Yes, it is.So I think if some families could have made ours, it could go to this one?But it's typically for families of students who are attending the Bi-Co program, although we have our own and they can go from the company.Thank you, Madam Chair.Thank you, Deb.Well, we have a motion.Do we have a second.Thank you, Marilyn.All in favor?Aye.Thanks, 4-0, to accept the Bi-Co quarterly update.Thank you, Mrs Pinelli.Okay.We are back on schedule.We are.On our agenda.Awesome.And we are at 8:25, acceptance of donations.We have several.We do have several and several of them from the Partners and Patriotism Funds.In fact, this was on me.I forgot to ask about the first one, maybe, oh, it says recess equipment.Thank goodness.The checks, that's what it is.So this is, I'm asking the committee to accept a donation from the Partners and Patriotism Fund in the amount of $500 to the John J. Ahern Middle School for recess equipment.And that would be going into the gift account.Motion to accept with much gratitude.Its- - Oh, we're doing all three?I would do them separately.I think we just accept them separately, yes.I second.All in favor.Aye.4-0.Thank you for the donation of $500 for recess equipment.All right.Also from New England Patriots Partners and Patriotism Fund, a donation to Foxborough High School in the amount of $3,400 for their tower garden project.So many of you are familiar with the tower garden project that we have at the Taylor school, where we're growing our own food, all should go to the Taylor school and see it.They've been doing that for almost two years now.So they're growing their own greens, vegetables and all kinds of things right in the cafeteria at the Taylor school, and our goal has been to increase this to other schools.And we actually did get a donation of some of the towers about a year ago from Patriot Place, who used to have them up near where Tastings used to be, and they weren't being used.So they actually gave us five towers, which we happily took.And now this is also, there are other equipment pieces needed for the tower.So this is to help with the garden project so that we can start growing food at many or most of our schools.Anything else?Did I leave anything out?And that's, that grant was written by Alison Johnson, our food service director.I move to accept the check in the amount of 3,400 for the tower garden project from the Partners and Patriotism Fund with gratitude.Second.Thank you, Steve, all in favor.Aye.4-0.Thank you.So just for example, certain specialized lights are required, so the towers have been great, we'd have to purchase them, but as we all know, green things require light.I remember the potato things.I thought that was fascinating.Yeah, that's awesome.Very generous.So once again, from the New England Patriots Partners and Patriotism Fund, they have made a donation to Foxborough High School and the amount of $1,000 to the Foxborough High School theater guild.We're also formerly known as the drama club.For their METG performance.That the one that just went on?That's the competition, the performance, yeah, I just don't know what...I feel like I should know what the letters stand for, but theater guild is, you know what I thought?I think that's something Massachusetts, is something of theater guild.It's this, anyway, it's a theater guild.I just can't call up the E. Usually I'm good at acronyms, but...Deb, we know what that E is?I'm sorry.Massachusetts.If Miquel was here, she could- - Something of theater guild.That would be good.Massachusetts Educational Theater Guild, and it's on the internet, so it must be true.Thank you.Thank you, Steve.That wireless is just coming in handy.I never thought of that, actually.Do we have a motion?I will motion that we accept the $1,000, so graciously donated by Partners and Patriotism for the Massachusetts Educational Theater Guild.I'll second that.All in favor.Aye.4-0, thank you.Okay.Just before we move on, those three alone from Partners, it's so nice to see how many, what a variety of things they support.So they'll support theater programs, they support healthy foods in our food service and recreation to recess equipment.It really, they really are very generous in a variety of things.And in our students, in DECA, we accepted a very generous donation from the Partners and Patriotism Fund for that.So I think- - Do what?I think appropriately.Yes, exactly.We all do.Very generous.Speaking of generous.Yes?We have a donation from the Raytheon corporation in the amount of $1,000 to the John J. Ahern Middle School, for the, it says, they, they don't, it says, this is in honor of, they didn't specify exactly what it's for, but Diane McDonough, and she actually has received an award in the past, Diane McDonough, one of our middle school science teachers, was one of six finalists for the 2015 STEM, Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics Teacher of the Year.So this is an honor of that.So it's donated to her school, where she is a member of the faculty, for their use, if, for whatever way the school would like to use that to honor her.The letter says, the finalist, that $5,000 will be used for the STEM, for STEM education.So I...Doesn't say, it doesn't specify STEM education for this, but it does say the...That's the winner though.Right?The winner will be announced and then honored.She wasn't the winner, but she was, I guess we maybe consider it a semifinalist.Yeah.So I think so the winner clearly got $5,000, but the semifinalist, if you will...Their school gets a donation.Of a thousand.Right?Well, I'd like to accept with gratitude the Raytheon donation of $1,000 in support of the STEM program at the high school.I second that.Is that okay?Yes.All in favor.4-0.And you know what would have been nice if I thought if I'm gonna read, Diane McDonough, we know she's a very creative science teacher.She has been teaching in Massachusetts for 13 years.She teaches sixth grade math and science.If you remember her, she was in eighth grade science and she moved down sixth to do both math and science at the middle school.She co-foundered her school's robotics program, and the Lego League competitive team.She is also a STEM instructor at Milton Academy Saturday program for gifted and talented students in grades four to eight, and she was the 2013 Norfolk county teacher of the year.She is quite a talented individual.It's very impressive.So...Congratulations to Ms. McDonough.Terrific.And thank you Raytheon for the donation.All good.Okay.All right.It being 8:30, now entertaining motion to go into executive session for the purpose of discussing negotiation strategies with union personnel, Foxborough extended day staff, the committee...I'm sorry?Roll call.Yes.Roll call.Yeah, yeah.We'll be right back.Roll call vote.Roll call vote?Debbie.Aye.Aye.Aye.Aye.All right.Committee is going to go into executive session.We will return to open session.Around 10 of nine, something like that?Around 10 of nine, depending on- - Well, depending on...The length of our...We'll be back.Awaiting us.We shall return.Okay.Right.Are we ready?We are ready.Okay.So we are still in session and we are back from our executive session.Do we have to have a roll call vote, I forget.Do we have to have a roll call vote to reopen?I make a motion that we return to our open session.Second.To continue it.Okay.Roll call.Aye.Aye.Aye.Aye.We're back in.We're gonna have a vote on the proposed 2016 to 2019 Foxborough extended day staff memorandum of agreement.Would anyone like to make that motion?I will make that motion that we accept the contract as agreed upon between the administration and the extended day staff.I second that.Any discussion?None.Okay.All in favor?Aye.Where's yours?All right.Thank you for all your hard work on the contract negotiations, Mrs.Panelli and Bill Hickner.And we actually should compliment our extended day staff representatives who give up their time as well to come and do that.So they're, it's an important program that we run, an extended day, important for families, important to children, for the continuity of their day, the safety of being in one place.So I can't say enough about the program.I think it's terrific.And I think they do a great job.I agree.Other matters.Mrs.Panelli?The last superintendent's evening coffee of the year is tomorrow night, Tuesday, at the Boyden Library in the Fuller room.And we're gonna switch it up to cold drinks and some pastry rather than the decaffeinated coffee and the donut hole.So, come one, come all, actually, so Dr. Burleson and I always do that together for whoever wants to show up from our parent family group.And we are gonna have our guest, Alison Mellow, who's our K-8 math science director coming tomorrow night to follow up on some of the subjects from the last meeting and offer a little bit more detail about that.So- - That's at 6:30?It is, 6:30 to 8 o'clock at the Boyden Library, Fuller room.We hope to see you there.All right.And I just have Steve.I thought you did some those.I had a couple other things.Bevy, I'll let you.Okay.I want to thank the world language staff for their world language and culture night, which was the most successful one yet.And they were up to 19 restaurants and food places around that helped contribute to that.It seems to get bigger and better every single year.That is very true.It was wonderful.This one is definitely bigger than any other year.I know, it grows every year.And then I also...I think I would like to compliment Kathy Laden, for putting together such an incredible expanding horizons enrichment programs.There were a couple of things I wanna sign up, I think I've aged out, though.It's a fabulous program.My kids did that several years when they were first, well, kindergarten through fourth grade.No one can say that Foxborough does nothing for enrichment for their young people.This is the time where I say, oh, thanks for you for remembering it.I'm sure I'll be seeing it too.I think you can, I'm glad you brought that up because I think you can see that we're running the math camp, that we have for many years now, but we're also for the second year in a row running our computer science summer camps, which we started last year, pretty excited about that.I've been back and forth with them, and they are running...You actually are gonna have a choice of two different weeks this year.Oh, that's great.And if you have someone at the beginner level, which is age 7 to 12, video game design, and they're gonna have a Star Wars theme one week, July 18 to 22, and they're gonna have a superhero theme the second week, July 25 to 29.And then, hmm...I thought we were gonna flip flop morning and afternoon, but I'm looking at this and I don't see that.So maybe they decided not to flip flop.Remember we talking about flip-flopping morning and afternoon?And so the intermediate level, 9 to 14, 1:00 to 4:00 PM, Minecraft modding, and that will run, you'll have a choice of those two weeks as well.Sounds great.And then I did have one other little thing.On the math camp, I think we were, I'm sure we're gonna bring it in as a donation.We did get the donation.I noticed that there was no tuition here.We weren't sure- - Have we accepted that donation yet?No, it hasn't come in.But every year they have generously supported the math camp, and as you know, companies change and grow, and we weren't sure if that would continue and it is gonna continue at least this one more summer.Very generously, but, hmm...I'm just now going back to that whole morning after we flipped.So I guess we're not flipping, 'cause I don't see it in there.So...It could be they missed it on typing.So...On the registration?Yeah, they might have.But this is what went home to families.All right.Well, anyway, we're running computer science camp two separate weeks 'cause we had such great interest.Very good.And throughout the year.And I wanted to compliment, once again, the art department on this incredible Monumental.Art show, and I mean, they carry the whole theme totally through and the Monumental award certificates match the artwork!It's just amazing.So we have nothing, nothing at the school committee can go up and destroy that?Oh no.We will look at student artwork, forget our blue for a few weeks.Marilyn, do you wanna give us an update on the DECA?Have you heard from your son?I've heard from him, they're having fun, Lauren Alaina from American Idol did a concert for the 18,000 students.Oh, wow.They're there and, yeah- - Can you imagine the enthusiasm with that?And I don't know how the competition part's going.He's just telling me all the fun stuff.Those few little words I get here and there.I saw on Twitter, the opening ceremonies was, looks so exciting.It's- - I didn't get that.I have to show it to you.Yeah, you need to.It looked so exciting.So 18,000 students there?Right.And it looked it.And I know that...It looked like a rock concert.I'll show you.Yeah, that's probably the Lauren Alaina...Amazing.Perfomance.And I just wanted to thank everyone for a wonderful year and I'm hoping to get reelected next Monday, because I don't want this to be my last meeting.So...Okay.We'll see how it goes.Well, good luck to you and all of the other candidates...All of the candidates.All of the candidates, it's an exciting election year.Marilyn and I will be attending with Mrs.Panelli the mask day on the hill tomorrow.Oh, it's an excellent lunch.We had a phenomenal lunch last year, where we went.so it's a good day.So actually several important updates this year on charter school funding on transportation bills on chapter 70 funding and what's happened with that up and down and what hopefully will be happening on pre-K and kindergarten funding.A lot of really things that do impact our district as well as any district.So it'll be interesting to see what they have to say tomorrow as to the latest...And you'll hear about it at our next meeting.That sounds great.Steve, do you have anything for other matters?No, this is my last meeting- - Yes, you're on my list.And I would just like to sincerely thank the public for electing me and...That was a big win!Huh?It was a big win!The ticker tape parade was the most exciting part, through Mansfield and Foxborough, but it truly was one of the most meaningful things that I've ever been able to do in my adult life.It really was, for me and my family, and the heart and soul and character in this town is incredible.And what we've seen over the last three years with students and faculty that have come and gone is, a lot of people in the public don't see what goes on in the background, all within propriety of ethics, but there's a lot of heart in this group and I can't thank you all enough for the kindness you showed me and my family when my parents passed, and I will really miss this group a lot.Thank you, all.But you can still come talk to us.Thank you, Steve.Thank you, Steve.Thank you for doing this.Thanks very much.It's been a pleasure to talk to you about issues important to our kids and I'm sure we still will.You all care and the qualities of schools are why I'm here and why other people come here.And that's why we moved here.It was for the schools.And a lot of regional ice coffee stores that are very close by.Very important.But thank you all.I love you all very much and thank you all very much.And to Janet, the quietest member at our table, who does so much for all of us in the background, professionally, and Bill, and the other team, and Joe...Oh, Joe...It's not gonna be the same, seeing you all the time, my friend, but we love you here, very much.Thank you.All right, buddy.Thank you.But I wanna thank you.I've I have had the pleasure of sitting at a table with you for the last seven years, three on the advisory committee and the last three here with you.And I am going to miss your valuable input, your questions, your sense of humor, and I thank you for your dedication and hard work on behalf of our citizens and our school children.Thank you for everything.Couldn't have been more of a pleasure.I wish Bruce was here and I'll give him a call, not in a serial fashion, but I will give him a call.Bruce has been an excellent chair over the years and an excellent contributor to our town.And I'm sorry, he can't be here tonight, but he means a lot to me too.Well, thank you very much for all of your service.I just had a couple other things to add to the other matters.I saw that the borough school is doing a walk-a-thon tomorrow to raise funds for DIPG research and to honor Danny Nickerson.Yes.And I just thought that was...Yes.They decided to do that annually instead of other community service type things that the school did.And I think that's a great way for his school family to remember him.Yes.I agree.And I just wanted to mention that, because I thought it was a very wonderful way to recognize their classmates and to do community service.And I also, our history department trip to Italy and France was a success from my sources tell me, they had a wonderful time, I know we talked a lot about that trip and they went, they came back, they had a great time and it's all good.Yes.That's all I have.So many good things.The music department...They're leaving on Wednesday.They are.It's the Festival of Music.It's this week.No, no, they're leaving Wednesday, this Wednesday, the 22nd.They are coming back.Oh, they come back and then they go to- - Again, I'm thinking about the Ellington leave day.Two trips?I honestly can't keep up with that.Yeah.A lot of good things going on.Yes.And they went to the symphony between the last meeting and that one?They did, and the symphony on April 16th, our Ahern school students and our high school students, it was magnificent, I was there.We have a lot of good students doing wonderful things.All right.Amy?Anything?Bill?Janet?Well, I am gonna say this evening that Steve, I will miss you as well.You've been a true gentleman, thank you.I'll miss your little left-handed backward checks on all those warrants.It's nice to know that they were well vetted.Yeah, they can still, I can still make that stuff happen.All right.And thanks to our friends back there.Absolutely.Who keep the show on, keep the show going and keeping the records.They do a lot of work before we get here, and after we get here, and while we're leaving here, so thanks to our friends at Foxborough Cable Access.Steve, do you want to make a motion to adjourn?Motion to adjourn tonight's meeting.All in favor.Aye.Goodnight.Bye, everybody.All right.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/SC2016April25.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/SC2016April25.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/SC2016April25.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/SCAug26/SCAug26.mp3", "text": "Good evening.Calling this Foxborough School Committee Meeting to order tonight.A regular meeting August 26, 7 o'clock, here at the Foxborough High School media center.And our agenda for tonight is, it's a revised agenda.7 o'clock visitors.7:10 approval of minutes.7:15 teacher and learning highlight, proposal for FHS senior project, Ms. Diana Myers-Pachla, Laureen White and Ellen Pillsbury.7:30 timeline for special education director search.7:40 summer facilities work and technology update.7:50 school committee vote to approve 2013-2014 school district goals.8 o'clock other matters.8:10 executive session.We are going to be going into executive session for the purpose of discussing negotiating strategies for non-union personnel, superintendent of schools.The committee will not return to open session.We'd like to start off first.Oh, I'm sorry.Just one moment.I'm sorry.Just one moment.I'd like to start off just by welcoming Janet Grass.Gracia.Gracia.Thank you for the pronunciation.Welcome to your first meeting.Glad to be here.Glad to have you here.Welcome Janet.So if the public doesn't know, she's superintendent's new administrative assistant and the new secretary to the school committee.So that's been great.Great to have on board for the last couple of weeks.Okay, so now visitors please, come forward and just state your name, address for the record.Hello, my name is Joseph Garrity and I'm a student at Foxborough High School.And I wanted to let the committee know that that the Ahern middle school, the three elementary schools received the salad bar and smoothie grant and the Foxborough high school received that last Jan.And this year they received a new modern oven pizza.And then I was gonna say to you guys that Misty Mike Yang left.Okay.We don't, we don't talk about, we don't need to announce personnel stuff though.I was going to let the committee know that.Right.He's not like a big director all right.We don't need to talk about people who work here or don't.Sorry.But that's okay.Those are good updates on the food service.Thank you for those updates.Are you looking forward to the new pizza oven?Yes I am.Good.Yes.Me too.Maybe, maybe we could get some samples sometimes.Ooh, maybe we can.I don't know.We already had some.Oh yeah, that's right.We did.Yes.I was thinking more that brick oven or that the oven but no.Thank you so much.Anybody else for visitors?Okay.Seeing none.We're going to go.We're going to move to approval of minutes.Please look in your packets for the August 5th minutes.Are there any additions, revisions, changes that we want to make on that?Okay.Seeing none.Do I have a motion to accept the minutes as presented?I have a motion to approve the minutes.Second.Any further discussion?Okay.Seeing none, all those in favor or zero.Thank you.Okay.We're going to move to teaching and learning highlights.A highlight proposal for the FHS senior project.Ms. Benneli.Right.So as you know, the last two years, we've had teaching learning highlight at the start of every school committee meeting and we're committed to continuing that as part of your school committee goals and our school district goals that we share together.And it's just a great idea to start each meeting with something exciting that's happening for students or for staff, or even if it's for staff, it's for students.So our proposal for August, since we don't have kids back in school yet, where we're able to bring some students to the meeting to showcase and highlight what they're doing, I would like to bring forward Mrs.Myers-Pachla, the principal of Foxborough High School, Laureen White, who's the director of guidance.Ellen Pillsbury, school to career coordinator, can not be here tonight.And we have Sue Carle, math department head and Tom Murray, the social studies department head, if you could all just bring chairs up.So if you recall, while they're doing that, last spring when they were here for the guidance update, Mrs.Myers-Pachla, briefly described an idea that they had, that they were starting to work on about the senior project, which involves a lot of experiences for students.And the committee was interested in hearing more about that.So we thought that they come back to you pretty early before the school year even starts and talk to you about their proposal, so that if the committee, if this is something that committee is interested in supporting, then they can start moving forward with their plans.No time like the present.So I'll turn it over to them.I'm just going to do a very brief intro and then I'm going to step back so that these three could really come to the microphone.Once we had presented this idea of a senior project here to the school committee, the conversation quickly began and a team was put together this summer to explore this further.And Laureen White, who's our director of guidance has been a part of it.Sue Carle who's our math department head and Tom Murray, who is our social studies department head along with Ellen Pillsbury, who is our, our career person here that we have in the building.And I'll let them tell you a little bit about their process.We did take a look at other schools and what other districts have done and are currently doing.And from that, they put together this particular draft plan for what we think would be very beneficial to the students here and very doable for our students here in Foxborough, giving our seniors, that opportunity, to go out into work in the community.It is not for pay.It is for experience.And it might be in an area that they have a, a very strong interest in.It could be an area that they're hoping for a career in.Or it could just be an area that they'd like to do a little bit with.So I'm going to just kind of sit back so that they can have the microphone a little bit closer and they'll explain to you a little bit more about this packet that they have put together.Feel free to move the microphone around a little bit.It does sound a little clunky from home but we can deal with that.So what we did was, we looked at other school districts in the area, including Duxbury, Xaverian brothers, Catholic Memorial, amongst others to figure out how other schools are doing this currently, how seniors are going out to the community and doing these externships.So we're looking in and we hope to recruit about 50 students who might want to do this and might want to stop going to school around April 1st.So, at that point, they're going to go out on an externship where they won't be paid for this but they're going to get real community, do community service, do something that they're giving back to the community.It could be a mural that they're working on.It could be a working in an automotive shop and getting the real life experiences.Because many times and we've done this in the past in terms of some of our students go to the classroom and they go on out for one period a day and they're having an incredible experience.But do they really understand and walk the teacher's shoes, okay?And plan for a whole day.It's very easy to plan for 45 minute lesson as opposed to a whole day.Somebody sees Dead Poets Society and wants to become a teacher.And it's awesome.But at the same time, it's a very different job than Dead Poets Society.So this gives them an opportunity from April 1st and there's a whole rigor that goes with this.So we're really excited about this opportunity for our students.And we really feel like it ties into our core values in terms of lifelong learning.All right, they're going to go out there.And what were their takeaways?What did they learn from this experience itself?Did anybody have any questions about the packet?I know we were able to get the packets to you guys ahead of time.And we're really excited about offering this to students with school committee approval, that we'll be able to offer this to the students at the beginning of the school year.Have some meetings with our students and tell them that if you decide to do this, there will be a commitment that goes with it.It's not just showing up and I get to leave school and I'm done with school on April 1st.That's not the case.Could you explain the process?Right.The process.And I think one of our questions, one of my questions is, who would be eligible to participate in this and who would not?Well there is some criteria in here.And some things that are difficult to work around are the students who take several AP classes.So we looked at that.And students who take several AP classes might find it difficult to go out on this because they would be required to come to school for their AP class.Okay.So that would limit their availability to do it.If they take one or two AP classes, it will probably be good.But if more than that, I think they would find it difficult.So those would it.So that's what we're answering, who wouldn't be able to just.So the other thing, there's attendance and there's teacher approval.So the attendance has to meet the criteria and the teachers that they currently have, have to sign off that they are, they can leave the class for, starting April 1st.So any senior in the school is able to apply.And then they have to go through the different steps.I just have a question about the classes.So a student is taking five classes.Right.And maybe two of those are AP. So greater, greater than two, those students wouldn't be eligible.How does that work with the absence from the classroom in relation to participation in this project, in terms of the commitment to the courses that they're taking.They would, they would still need to go to their AP classes during the day.So they can, they're not stopping their AP classes until after the AP exams.Okay.Okay.So if they have two AP classes, they would be in the building for two hours a day.Then during those other hours, they pop up and do this externship.We would reduce maybe the hours that they used to spend in the externship because they need to study for the AP classes and stuff like that.But they still will be required to do a certain amount of hours.What if they weren't taking AP classes?What if they were just taking honors?Essentially they're ending April 1st and that will count for their school year.Third quarter is when the grades would close.We have many seniors who get this \"senior-itis\".Really?I've never heard of that.It's hard to convince them, that academics is still important at the end of the year.So this is another opportunity for them.And we've seen successes at so many different school systems who are currently doing this.And kids who are coming back from these externships and saying, \"wow, that was awesome\".And then have to do a presentation.So there will be a blog.There's going to be a blog or a journal writing that they're going to have to do on a daily basis about what did they do at work.And it could be somebody who works at a bank and customer relations and, how did they use how to win friends and influence people?And how did they do these different things?And again, it's really, we look at it as an opportunity for that lifelong learning.That they're gonna have these different skills that they're learning in a different way from April 1st, till the end of the year.They'll have to give a presentation to a core panel of us.And could be a kid who was an at-risk student who wants to get on the auto body and he's going to go out there or she's going to go out there and work at a garage, not get paid for this, but at the same time, take away a lot of different skills and how to deal with people and how to work with different types of machinery.I thought this booklet was great.I thought it was just so, explained all of the different questions that you might have.I like the way it's, every page has got like a different title.Thank you.It's concise.And Pillsbury, who's not here today.She was instrumental within this whole process.I just had a few questions about the student, the classes and all that, but it sounds great.I love the idea too of them having this oral evaluation or presentation.Yeah.Right.Which speaks to the High School school-wide rubrics actually.And gives them an opportunity to demonstrate that in a larger forum, rather than with each teacher actually.I agree with you.The booklet is very well thought out and I thought it lays everything out so clearly.And you can tell you've all put a lot of thought into this.And also, I mean, I know you said grades would close at the end of the third term, but I think that it's clear from this, that this is not a frivolous month that they'll be spending, and it's a very serious academic or work experience that they will have to take away significant knowledge from their experience and show that they've learned something in the process.I think it's fabulous.I think it's a great opportunity.And they will have a grade that goes for that senior project as well.And colleges are very amenable to this.I mean, if anything, I think in some ways it's almost that in the workplace too, because you've got that experience.You're already building a resume behind you, but gives, I think in many instances, kind of that one up, what sets you apart.We know that the competition between colleges and jobs is so difficult right now that you can say, yes, I've learned a bit from, especially if it's an area that you want to continue in and if it isn't, then that's also a great learning experience.It's a great takeaway for our students as well.It just, it speaks to again, I think in so many different levels that we talk about from elementary level up, the real hands-on experience of education and learning and reminds me also of the internships now that a lot of colleges are going towards, so that students do have a chance to really experience what a particular profession is.And to do that at the high school level is wonder.I think just a great opportunity for them.It's an opportunity for enrichment and challenge in an area that the student is seeking knowledge about.That might be their passion.That might not be an area that we cover at the high school, which I think is fabulous.I did have one question.Have you talked to businesses within the community or do we have people within the community who are excited and eager to participate in this opportunity?Absolutely.Ms. Ellen Pillsbury.She's our go-to person with this.And we have such a plethora of resources right here from the stadium right down the street to working within the town, how they can help within the town itself.The mural that's being painted over in Mansfield currently.That something like that could happen here.And that person has this and they look back and I remember when I was in high school, I worked on that project.So it could be really something that can build from year to year as well.That's great.So if a student is interested in doing this and has a particular interest in a particular profession, but may not know exactly where they should go for this internship, not internship, for this project, will you be able to assist students who express an interest but may not know exactly?Or is it really going to be up to the student to kind of seek this?No. We'll be there working with them.And again, Ellen, that's really one of her specialties.Right.I know.And if she doesn't have that person, she knows that there's other people who are willing to help out too, including this group.We're really excited about this.They're going to have a member of the staff as a mentor as well, to help them that they can go to as a point person to try to provide guidance if they're running into difficulties.When we talk about college and career readiness, and this is really a concrete example of an experience that would really boost that exposure.Yeah.Great, great program.I read through the whole book and wished I was back in high school.Two questions.Do you need any pilot tools or monies that you don't have yet to get this thing off the runway?And then my other question was, if you could just explain to me, 'cause I'm not very bright, how the senior project grade is not factored into the GPA, but if you drop out, you get an F. Is it factored?I just want to know what the risk is for the students, either on an upside or a downside.Well, we have applied for a grant.I'll start out by saying that.There is a department of education grant that is out there.We're not sure how many schools are in competition or what amount of that we may have.I think we'll have a little bit better of an idea as this plays out for us in some cases.And this was one of the pieces I've been involved in senior projects in some of my past experiences.And in some cases, students had some very interesting ideas that they wanted to paint or create.And we said to them, okay, how are you going to then raise the funds to be able to get the materials that you need?So that is something that we're going to need to see how that plays out.In my particular experience, the students were responsible for that.In our experience, we may say, no, we've got some money that may be available.I don't have that right now, but I'm just saying that that might be something that would play out.We want to take a look at what this is going to look like.And depending again, upon what the grant does, we're not holding to the grant.The grant, I think will just allow us to do some things that, to expand this a little bit more than what we were initially perhaps thinking that we could do.And we'll go from there.A little bit more training.Because there's some other things that, that the state can provide as well.So we're not looking like this is going to be anything huge or any large budgetary item for this year.I do know that I probably will be putting in for some funding for this to be able to continue as we go along with it.And I would say, especially for, whoever the person is that's going to be coordinating this.The facilitator.The facilitator.This will be taking time on their part.I mean right now it's kind of a collaborative effort.But you really do need, we really need to have that point person to be that particular individual to do that.And so that may mean some money somewhere down the road.Because it's hard to tell how this is going to take off.This is part of our budgetary proposal for next year.Assuming this goes.I think one of the benefits of being here so early for your questions and consideration is that they will then have time as we go through the fall to really figure out if there are budgetary implications in the first year and what those would be.And to answer to your grades.Yes, the grades will close quarter three and the GPA will be configured at that point.Then, if they do the senior project, let's say they get an A, it's still will not alter their GPA, but it will show on the transcripts, so the college will see that.If they don't do it and get the F, it's still not gonna go into their GPA, but it will be shown right there on the transcript where again, colleges will see it.But GPA will close at the end of third quarter for these students.Thank you.So just point of clarification.You talk about the facilitator.So are you talking about an identified educator on the, on the staff of Foxborough high school that will be paid like a stipend?Is that what your?I don't know what we're going to do for this year.'Cause we, we want to see what happens tonight, what your questions are.Okay.I'm just going to say this.This is only me and my head.This is not a conversation that we've had.But you know, in the summer, we were talking at our goals meeting that we almost want to sort of revamp how we approach school to career services and how valuable they are here and how much she does.So, you know, currently under the Attleboro partnership, she's really employed four days a week.So it's sort of part of our plan and conversation to say, can we expand the available time for the school to career coordinator?And maybe that's a solution.So there's just some ideas out there that, that might be part of what you might see in the future, but that's a start.And whether there would be, whether it's too much for one person, which maybe, someone else involved, we haven't gotten to that point yet in planning.And we don't, we also don't know our numbers either.We don't know if there's going to be 4 kids who are really excited or 140 which really scares us.The latter.We think kids will.We think kids are going to want to do this.But some of them, because of academics and because of the AP and because of other commitments, they're not going to be able to do it and add something else to their plate.Well other ones might start it and then we have a certain cutoff date and they're going to say, \"look, it's not for me.I'm going to finish off the academic year\" and that's okay too.First I want to applaud you guys for bringing forward this kind of a program.I am a big, big fan of, maybe what I'll call non-traditional classroom type learning.And I was the one pushing at our summer retreat about career and just continuing to enhance our career offerings.So I thank you guys for bringing this forward.Number two, I'm delighted that Laureen and Tom and Sue are big proponents of this and been involved because I do have a lot of confidence, as I know we all do in our department chairs.So that gives me a real great feeling of trust.My questions are around implementation.And I have three questions just based on your comments so far.And maybe you can just expand.First of all, why 50?How the number of 50 students?We don't know where to start.So are we willing to take more?To our conversation we're just having?We're willing to take more?Okay.So we're not capping.We're not capping anything.We just don't know what the, what kids are going to want to do.'Cause there are certain deadlines that they're going to have to follow.And so, like I said, we don't know if.So 50 is just a placeholder.Yes.Okay.All right.My second question, Tom, you talked about whole day versus one period.Have we thought about flexibility in that?I mean, I'm still confused personally about the comment about the AP kids, how they might have a hard time.Do we have flexibility in models?If some of the AP kids, for example, wanna participate.It's hard with a rotating schedule but not impossible.And especially because of technology and education where the teachers and Sue teaches AP, and she can speak to what she can do.It's going to be a really case by case.And it might be teacher by teacher, course by course, in terms of what kind of flexibility.There may be days.I've got AP statistics.So there may be days where, a student might not need to be in the classroom.Could make up the work and that would still be okay.But maybe in AP chemistry, they need to be there for all the labs and missing it really isn't an option.I'm sitting here with a school committee hat on, of course, and I can picture parents saying, I want my kid to be able to participate.And I wish there was a more flexible model.So the more you can think about that, I think would be valuable for us.Well, I think it also depends, sorry, on the position they decided to take for their externship because if their position allows them flexibility during the day where they can come to classes and they don't start their externship till two in the afternoon or three in the afternoon, we're fine.They have to put in the hours and get approved for the externship, but it doesn't have to be from seven to three.So that's an important clarification.We're flexible.They don't have to do their externship during school hours.They have to get the hours in.But yes, we are flexible with that.We were just saying with the AP, 'cause they're, the classes are so rigorous and intense and that a lot of them have other commitments.And some may choose out.And that's great.But I think for those who want to, if we offer them things like, if they can find an externship that's after hours.My last implementation concern is around, if I heard you say right, the way that we would choose the kids or review the kids who want to participate is attendance and teacher recommendation.Not really teacher recommendation.It's more teacher signing off that it's okay that they leave the class on April 1st.Teachers don't have to recommend the student.We'll go through the whole process.As long as their attendance okay and their teacher's okay with them leaving the class, then that's what gets signed on.Usually about a C average that teachers take a look at and say yes, I'm comfortable with this student signing off.So that's one piece of it.You have to show that you have that, really that commitment to be in school so that you can also continue with us outside of school when there's perhaps less of the more formal constraints like we have and you've got to get yourself to work and back or wherever this place happens to be.So you need to show good standing in academics, and good standing in your attendance.But then the students also have several steps that they also need to fulfill as well, finding their mentor outside of school.And again, with help, if they need it.Being able to make their project, make a presentation as far as what they're going to be doing and what they leave behind is going to be and how that's, how they're going to work toward that.And so in some cases, some students, as Tom has said, will get to a point and say, I don't want to go through it.I'm just not going to.I will stay in classes.But I do know just in my own experience, I have yet to have or have had the experience of a student receiving an F because they chose not to do the senior project.Once they got into the senior project, they were into it.And I have not had any person ever come back to say that this was the worst thing I could've ever done.They've all come back to say that this was the best thing I could have ever done.Whether they truly enjoy the experience or this was a decision that I don't want to go in this direction and I'm really glad that I did this.Or that this is the best thing since sliced bread and I want to go in this direction.So that they all really enjoyed that time and came back and said, if I could tell seniors one thing, it's to do this.Yeah.Once again, I'm a huge advocate.I say, let's go forward right away, more kids, the better.I'm just trying to think through potential hiccups or pitfalls.And as you were going through the description, the one that, just the last one that gave me pause for thought was this teacher recommendation part.And I don't know if it would make sense maybe.I didn't read it as a teacher recommendation because I think the important detail in that conversation based on the question you asked was that this is initiated by the student who applies.So, if a student is motivated to apply for it, then, if their attendance is fine and the teacher is okay with it, based on the student's ability to demonstrate that they are doing okay in the classroom, then it would go forward.So I see the teacher, not really as recommending that a student do this, but as almost a little, one of the two gatekeeper stops along the way.But it starts really with the students initiating on their own to go ahead and apply.So, that's why we're not sure of the numbers the first year, because without this having been tried, how many students are going to go forward into the unknown and apply to do this?I would imagine after the first year, when there's so much positive buzz about the experience, next year you'll probably experience more kids willing to go ahead and meet that application deadline.So I think that that's what would happen and really relying on Diana's past experience with this in another community.I think is important that the positive notes that came from it really outweigh any of the glitches that we could overcome.So it isn't, as some of our other initiatives are where teach us to recommend, it's really initiated by the student, which it should be, on your way out of high school.So I think that's one of the important details.The other thing we haven't discussed is students who play a spring sport, who are spring athletes, may not be able to participate unless they can figure out how to do it during the day.So if you have to be at AP courses during the day, and you're playing a spring sport, it starts right after two, that may sandwich you in too much.So I think Sue's point that it really has to be case by case is probably the way it's going to play out.Not only the first year, but in years after that, depending on what they, what extra curricular.Last, last question for me.Do you think there's any reason that why we should maybe review a list similar to how we do field trips or anything?Or do you think it's something that we should just leave with Diana and you?I think we just have to leave it to see how they proceed.You know, Diana has done that at another high school.So I'm pretty confident when she first said last year.I give a lot of credit firstly.She said, I'd like to do a senior project.Like great.I love it.Bring it forward.Very good.Thank you.So I think we just have to wait and see.Steve.So this is a draft.I understand that.And item eight on the parental signature form talks about the FHS cannot directly supervise each student and that etc, etc, we're not liable for any injury sustained as a result of the project.So my assumption would be there would have a go, no go during the qualification process of the project so that we make sure they're not testing bungee jumping courses.Right.Right.Or something like that.We'll have all that in order, I would imagine.And it had one parent's signature name as opposed to multiple parents that might have to sign it or, or guardians or something like that.I just wanted to make sure that the students and the families and the district are all safe from liability exposure and that we are keeping an eye on safety.And can veto the project if it seems too dangerous at the outset.Absolutely.Thanks.So what is it that you need from the committee this evening to proceed?We need a vote that you would like the high school to proceed with planning for our senior project.And then they'll go ahead and do it.Like we do everything else.So they come back to.We would come back when, probably closer to the application time when to let you know how many kids have applied and where we are, maybe a mid-year application point check-in.I think that would be great.I think the other thing to note too, is that sometimes when you hear that it starts on April 1st, given that we ended solely in June, this past year, it feels like they're going to miss three months of school, but in actuality, the seniors get out a lot earlier.So the, what do you estimate the length of year?Six weeks.Six weeks.So if that feels a little bit better to people.It does feel like April 1st, they're going to be gone three months.They're really are not.April vacation you have there too.So that's just the right time I think, to get into it.So I'd like, I'd like to make a motion that we approve the senior project as presented with a second review with the school committee may be in the March timeframe or February timeframe, whatever the committee thinks is.Second.Further discussion.Seeing none, all those in favor or zero.Thank you.Thank you very much.Good job putting the proposal together and so early.It's not like I have anything else to do this summer.Ellen is incredible with this too.Thank, Ellen.I'm going to be meeting with her next week anyway.We have a lot to talk about.But thank her, this is great.So nice job.Yes.So this gives the seniors the earliest look at it as well.So I give them credit 'cause they just said we would like to do ours early as possible.And that doesn't always happen with people ready to go with something before school's even started.So that just goes to show you the energy these people have.When would be the right time to come back do you think?And just tell us a little bit more, March or February?Yeah.February.I'm thinking February because then we should know which students are going to be part of it.Yeah.I think that'd be great.Thank you for all your hard work with this.This is awesome.Thank you for your support.Thank you all very much.We're going to move on to the timeline for special education director search.Yes, Benelli.We talked about this briefly at another meeting.As you know, Arlene Gruber on October 1st will become the executive director of the Bible collaborative of which Foxborough is a member.So she'll still be bringing good things and programs to Foxborough students as the executive director of our area, special education collaborative.So that means we will be, we are in the process of a director of special education search.And so you see the timeline in front of us.We advertised the position on July 24th.It's been great that we had a lot of notification for her transition.She's still here working very hard.And we posted on our professional association websites as well.The applications just closed last Friday.When I looked, before they completely closed, we had about 33 applicants, which is actually pretty good for director of special education search.We were happy with that.How many did you say?34?33.I'm not sure that's entirely accurate.I think that was the morning of, because I knew it was closing and I was briefly taking a quick peak.So as all of our administrative searches, the very capable Dr. Amy Burtos, our assistant superintendent, will be chairing the initial screening and search.I do not chair that.The candidate will come to me afterwards.So Amy will be conducting the initial screening and interview team, convening that team, selecting candidates, talking about interview questions on September 18th.Our tentative dates for candidate interviews would be September 23 and 25, within the same week timeframe.And hopefully by the end of that week, there will be semi-finalist's names sent to me.I would then conduct a second interview with those candidates.And as you know, this is one of the school committee hires under Massachusetts regulations.So this is one of those, if you remember our workshop we just had a few weeks ago, this is one of the positions that you hire at my recommendation.So we'll be bringing a candidate hopefully to you as a school committee in the first week of October, on October 7th.We do have an interim candidate in place, for however long it takes, because we don't know the notification of whoever might be the final candidate.So I do have experienced special education director who's retired, who is willing to come when Arlene is leaving and she will stay as long as we need her to.She was the former director of special education in Medfield and other places.Okay.So I know the last time I had actually served on this search committee and we had two school committee member representatives.So I guess I'm looking for some feedback from people this evening, if they have an interest in participating in the survey.That's great.Okay.I'd be happy to help out.That's fine.Okay, great.So perfect.We've got our two representatives.Amy, we'll be in touch.And if you could let her know if the, if these dates work for you and she can go from there.And if I remember correctly from Glen Kocher.We do not need a vote.This is not one of your subcommittees.This is actually, you don't need a vote because this is actually a superintendent's committee.And you're sitting to assist me in the search.So as such under the law, those meetings are not your meetings and don't have to be posted.So that's the way we'll go.But it's good to be open and transparent about what we're doing.It seems like we have a consensus.So great.If I could ask a question?So first of all, I think it's nice for our district, that our people continue to be wanted elsewhere and do well elsewhere.Good for Arlene.I know this position of special ed director is so important to so many of our parents.Sure is.Do parents have an opportunity in the process?Are they, can they be part of the committee?Yes they are part of the committee.So that's another reason.I'm so glad you asked me that question.That's another reason why we did not want, even though we've known this since June, we didn't want to conduct the search in the summer because parents aren't widely available staff.So we would have on this, not only the school committee members, but we'll have a few administrators as we do.We'll have a few teachers and we will have parents from the special education pack.So we're assuming this timeline is good for the committee.Then I will then reach out to the special ed pack and invite them to participate.So if parents are interested, who are listening or reading, they should talk to the special ed pack or talk to Dr. Burtos?No I would, I would certainly just call the superintendent's office or the assistant superintendent and call the central office and indicate you'd like to have your name put on the list of people, of parents who are interested in serving in the search.And then sometimes we get just the right amount.But sometimes we get too many people and we usually just draw names out of a hat and try to have everybody's representation at the table.Great.Thank you.Joe, I think you've got a question.Her name is Mrs.McArdle.Okay.All right.I think we can move on, right.Looks great.Thank you.Thank you.Thank you for volunteering.We're going to move on to summer facilities, work and technology update.Let's turn it over to Bill.You've now got quite the busy summer.And instead of, at first, we were just going to have Bill give you an update of what's happened this summer, but there was so many things that I asked him if he wouldn't mind putting it all down on paper and he has willingly done.So there is the sheets that I handed out to you double-sided but the, basically we from the technology side, while there's only about a half dozen bullets, they're pretty substantial in, in volume of work that was required.As you know, the math department requested that we move from the Eno board technology, which we have throughout the district for our whiteboard technology to a smart board, which is really has more value in the math classrooms with its technology and its software.So we have effectively taking all of the white boards out of those 10 classes and reallocated them into other classes that didn't have them.So, number one, we're not wasting anything.We were also able to buy additional projectors for those 10 classrooms.So now we have 10 fully outfitted classrooms in the high school that we didn't have previously.We've also installed the 10 smart boards right at the beginning of the year here.The math teachers will have this as a new resource within their classrooms.The, as you know, Faces last year, one of the grants that they supported, which was a fairly expensive one, was the iMac video lab, which is right upstairs here.The lab really consists of, it's a three room setup.One is the control room and thanks very much to cable access who has done a tremendous amount of work re-developing how that room will actually control.There's a room behind that which is actually a video production room.And part of the grant was to acquire video cameras and editing equipment that goes along with it.And then the classroom side of it, there are 10 iMacs that are also brand new with all the software that allows the children or the students to basically do video editing with the work projects that they do.So they have cameras that can go out, not just within that lab, but they can go outside of the lab, actually trying to produce things.And as you saw last year, we have a lot of talented kids within the district that can do these things.And now we're giving some resources to do it too.So it's a next step beyond.We've had a minor version of this over at the Ahern from number of years.So it's actually been kind of a shame that it started there and then stops.And now, again, it's back in place here.So that was a major upgrade that's just been completed.The last, late last spring we started and they they've effectively completed at this point, changing all of the computers throughout the district from XP operating system to Windows.It's about 800 computers that were done.The only reason that your Ahern is not done at this point is that we, what we've done is we, first of all, used any of the new ones that we were deploying we bought with the Windows 7 on it.Other ones that we had just recently done in the last couple of years, we bought new licenses for, at the time when we bought those units, we knew we were going to Windows.So we already had bought the licenses.So we were able to basically reuse those and on the Ahern, we would have to go out and buy all new licenses for them.Those are the next computers being targeted for replacement.So we are looking to basically do that in a large swoop in this next level.Hopefully, if we don't make the decision to do it during the school year, we'll do it at the end of this school year and do all those same time.So the entire district will be Windows 7 at that point.You do recall you have three Ahern parents sitting at the table right now.Just a friendly reminder.Good progress, good progress.One of the things that we've also done was as we had committed to at the end of last year is, is the high school now basically is a wireless environment.We were able to deploy that capability throughout the entire school now.So every classroom has it, every major location will have it, the auditorium, the gym, the cafeteria, and they're fine tuning and working on that right now.I'm sorry to keep interrupting, but to me, that is just huge.I mean to have a wireless campus up here.That's great.That's great.But one of the things that we'll be going along with that, and we will actually be having discussions on the administration level very quickly here is two to complete all of our policies on how we're going to allow that deployment to work.There are a lot of issues.Because to give you an example, one of the major ones, a student walks in with an iPhone, an iPad and a laptop.Well, those are three devices that will immediately want to grab onto the wireless.If every kid did that, we would crush the network.So while we've got the wireless network out here, the next concern is obviously the bottlenecks that will be within, how our data can flow through.So we're also looking at how to upgrade that, to make that work as well.But we did a lot of upgrades, this summer, to go to a higher platform.We are now at one gig platform to pretty much every computer within the school.And we're looking to obviously upgrade the, the backbone for the wireless as well to do the same, which will be key.One of the other things we were able to accomplish because we got very aggressive pricing, when we went out to the wireless, is we actually have acquired already all of the IP address units that we're going to need for the seventh and eighth grade at the middle school.And so we actually are working this week, they're doing the wireless set up to get the units up in the classrooms.So we don't disturb the classrooms down.But the next step we will be doing.And what we're looking for is obviously a little bit more money within our budget.So we're going, kind of going through some of the things that we have to actually do some of the switch gear that will be needed for that as well.But our hope is that by sometime, mid to late fall, we will actually have the seventh and eighth grade up on a wireless network as well.So a little bit further than we thought we'd make it this year, but it's one of our goals.The other thing is in our typical mode, we upgrade about 250 computers a year.So this year was the, a few of the administrative ones in our office, the Taylor school, the Bural school, and also the high school CAD lab.So all of those have been upgraded with new computers.And again, obviously all on Windows 7 as we did it.And then we did obviously move a number of class room whiteboards from depending on how classes had set up.We had to change some.A class might've moved like a first grade class might've moved down the hall.Art class might've moved.So we had to do some changes within the elementary level and even in the middle school.So that's all completed as well.So that's technology again, it's a pretty, I think a pretty successful summer, as far as the number of items that we tried to accomplish.There are a couple of other large things that we are working on the technology side.One is a new phone system.We did upgrade the or put in what we as a group, which was Paul Bortolagi, myself and Randy Scones had chose a, the new phone system we think is going to be what we want to deploy.And because the library was at the right stage at the right time, we put the new system in there as our test place.It seems to be working extremely well.It's doing everything we hoped it would do.So if that deployment is completed.It is completed and up and running.But if we can kind of make sure we have everything the way we want it to, that will be what we use as we move through each one of the buildings.And we do have the funding already in place.It's pretty ingenious.So that's town and school, obviously.Yes, we will do all the town buildings as well as our school buildings at the same time.But we'll probably do, start with the schools because we have the most controllable environment right now that we can go through.On Tony's side with facilities.He really didn't have much to do this summer.So we threw a few things at him.The tailor generator unfortunately, did go out to bid early summer.It came in but because it was right in the middle of the summer, we really, we didn't get any bids at all.When we contacted the people that took them out was just that they just didn't have enough time.So we've put that back out to bid and that we expect to be in September 11th.We've gotten almost three times as many people already interested.So we'll get a good bid on it this time.It will just be a little bit interesting as far as the schedule and how I have to do it.'Cause obviously there is a cut-over at some point.And so it would have to be on a weekend or holiday or something.As part of our security system what we've gone through, you'll see on all of the elementary levels is we've installed keyless entrance locks.So that any place that a teacher has to come in or where they're going out to a recess area, instead of having keys, the teachers have their own codes.Each teacher has a separate single code for themselves.And so now we don't have the fear of lost keys or issues that way.And they're the only ones that can come back in that door.The door locks immediately when they leave, but they push their code and they come back in.We know who comes in and who goes out.It's a little bit, like I said, a part of our upgrades as far as all of our security side.But that's been done on all three of the elementaries.Also the elementaries, we're concerned about the, in their playgrounds, the level of mulch.The mulch is actually sterilized mulch.It's not the stuff that you'd use at your house that pads underneath all the equipment.So we brought in actually 180 yards of mulch and did all three elementaries.And I think we did a fairly good job as far as really beefing that up.So that again should be a little bit safer as far as the children are playing within those playgrounds.On the Igo, we've really gone through the, it's one of the older buildings relative to its heating and air conditioning systems.And we went through every single unit within that building and cleaned them by taking them totally apart, which was making a huge difference.And we're doing that through each building.Now we've actually gone through the Ahern and done most of that already.And we'll be going through building by building.The middle school.One of the, all these things that are bolded are the bigger items that are being done.But we ran into a problem late last spring with the hot water system.We noticed with one of our big tanks that was leaking.13 years old.10 years is usually kind of the lifespan of most of these.So we actually have replaced the entire hot water system this summer, with new boilers and new tanks and everything.And they're just about complete actually.They're wiring up the electrical tomorrow and so by the end of this week, that should be up and running a 100%.Very impressive system that Tony kind of worked out.It's the same manufacturer that manufactures all of our boilers that we go with now, which is a higher end, much more efficient unit.We really kind of looked at all of our gym floors.As you know, we have three schools that have wooden gym floors.The Igo, which we rent out quite a bit during the winter time to different organizations, the high school, which obviously has the large gym and the Ahern has to full-size wood gyms.We had been doing the high school because we had only replaced it a couple of years ago.We've been putting a couple of coats on it to try to build that up.But these other two buildings hadn't been done in years.And so this summer, we went through and did all three buildings.So all the gym floors really look fantastic.They're about as bright and shiny and clean as you can possibly get them.And they really have a nice surface to them again.So that, again, when you're playing on these things with sneakers and stuff like that, you want a certain level of grip and stuff, and you really will have that back now with them.On the middle school side, there was a lot of safety issues that were brought up by one of the insurance companies.One thing that kind of amazed me, and I guess I should take blame for it, 'cause I was involved when we built the Ahern, but none of the sprinklers in the gyms had any kind of safety covers.And so I'm amazed in 13 years that a kid hadn't figured out how to throw a ball and hit one of them.So we put safety cages on all of those.Those are on protected.We did safety straps on all of the baskets where the metal wires come down.Because again, if one of those broke, someone could obviously get hurt.So we would put the new safety gear there.In one of the inspections, the board of health picked up an issue within our cafeteria freezer, where the baked on enamel paint seemed to be starting to come apart.So we emptied out that freezer this summer and we had new panels put in on the ceiling there and put that back together.So that came up very good.The actual track resurfacing was scheduled to start today, but I think due to fears of rain, that backed off.But with a lot of issues, obviously between football games and other things that are gonna happen over the next couple of weeks, it's the intention is to have it done within the next two weeks.And that would be a repair of all of the bad spots and then a double overlay of the entire track.And then we paint it.One of the issues that we are going to face there, and one of the reasons I think the track, even though it's lasted quite a while, we really need to put some new policies in place because you know, vehicles drive on it.People are out there with bikes and stuff like that, things that really damage one of these type of tracks.So we're gonna get some new signage, try to do some more, you know, teaching as far as what will maintain that track and how to keep it in good shape going forward.The again, major air compressors and stuff like that.We went through and replaced a few of them to really kind of upgrade how the system works.And I think on the Ahern, the final thing, which is a pretty big item, was the keyboarding lab that we are totally redoing.All the equipment is in.And they're expected to be here on September 3rd.So probably that full week of installation and set up.It's a music lab.This is the music lab.Yup.And so hopefully, you know, we'd hoped to have it done before school actually started, but working with the music department, they had no concerns about the fact that the first week really wouldn't be as something that they would normally use the lab for anyway so.But when that's done, are we going to christen it or a sort of announce to the world that here it is?'Cause I know there's a lot of parents out there that were very happy about this.Well, I think typically what they would do is probably one of the open, the early open houses.It would be something that everybody obviously does see.I'm sure that the music department would love to show it off.Sure.And the music department has been very, very involved in this whole process as far as working out the spec and going through process.So they're, I think, very proud of it.And the equipment that's coming out of there, there are pieces of it that are still good, that will be coming over to the high school that they're going to supplement some of the things that they use here.So anything that's worth keeping will be kept obviously.Anything that's of a level that's not worth.And again, most of it's very old.So there are only certain components that will be worth bringing forward.On the high school, as you all know, and I've seen as you drive in the turf installation, the turf field is in process right now.They have pretty much removed all of the excess material, which has been put out back.So that will be used as part of the baseball field work.And they're still targeted for October 15th to be completed.We were very, very fortunate.The winner of the bid, actually the carpet manufacturer themselves has come up with a new product that is actually, it's a combination of the product that we picked and an another piece that's a little bit better in its fabric and how it will hold up.And they've only got one installation on the western part of Massachusetts.They have number of them across the country, but they only have one other one in Western Massachusetts.And they have basically offered to us to upgrade our entire field, which would be about a $20,000 additional cost to us to do it for nothing.So that they can use us as kind of a showplace or example of what this new turf would look like.The advantage to us, which I kind of remind everybody on our side is we did the same thing with Viessmann boilers, which we use throughout our district now.And Viessmann has been one of our best partners.They work with us on everything.If there's longer than extended warranties, they've done everything.This is something that we have no real knowledge on.I mean, I'll be the first one to tell you, I know nothing about turf and I'm learning everything everyday.Tony has better knowledge than I do 'cause he was involved in Hanover with their new turf field, but having the manufacturer willing to stand with us and know that if they don't really work with us on this, then it's not going to be the showplace they want it to be, I think, is going to be critical to being a successful installation.That's true.We're very excited about that one.As Joe already mentioned, we were fortunate enough to pick up a double oven pizza oven and our manager here after 30 years says she thinks she can finally retire, which we told her she can't now because this is the one thing that she's always wanted.And it's actually, we actually did do a small test thing with the manufacturer from original pizza and the quality of what comes out of this compared to what we were able to do in our old equipment is tremendous.Even the ones that are, oh, what's the, gluten-free pizzas, even those pizzas, which typically people don't really like were tasted decent.So I think it's really in the difference on how these ovens work that makes a difference.So that's installed and actually original pizza will be coming in, I believe, in the end of the first week.And they're going to do a thing for the students at the high school.So there'll be samples of pizza and stuff like that.So they're going to kind of re-introduce to the students what we are now capable of doing here.Nice.The, again, as I said, the gym floor has already been done here.And then as you probably noticed, or may not even notice because it just kind of blends nicely is we've repainted all the outside doors on the building and basically made them the same color as all the windows from the blue.So that really kind of all ties in now.Instead of the bright blue, which made it still look like the original building, which it is.But it really to me, just spiffed up the envelope with the school and made it look like, wow, it really was.I couldn't believe when I first drove up and noticed that, and I didn't even know they were doing it, but I'm, who painted the doors.So that's why they make a good team was Bill's idea and Tony's execution.And bam it had happened overnight.It's great.The other thing, thanks for your support.We did pick up the pickup truck for the maintenance department, which does have a full plough system.So I think that's going to be very handy during the winter months, when we do have the issues that way.The 42 two way radios are already programmed.They're outright now being engraved.So those will be pushed out throughout the district so that we have internal communications that is better than what we had.And when someone walks into this building, if Deb walks in with hers, just switches the channel and anybody that she wants to talk to within the high school, she'll have access to at that point as well.Huge part of our emergency plans that we went over last year.Eliminates the whole cell phone thing, which don't work well within these buildings.And then the final thing, we actually also, we've had some issues down at the bus yard and we were able to acquire a new shed from Reeds Ferry.So we have a really nice little office shed down there.Now the old one was falling apart and it really gives the bus drivers a place to pick up their stuff in the morning and kind of meet.And we're also going to be moving all the electrical services inside of that as well to make it a better down there.So as I said, Tony really kind of took vacation during the summer, but it was managed, managed to get a lot of these things done.So we're in good shape.This is a great list, but can you just distinguish the bold from the non-bold?The bold are kind of the bigger items.Meaning cost?Well, it's cost and effort to get them done.What's the minimum of the cost?Is there one regarding?No there was no real minimum, but they were, it was just as far as importance wise.Just moving classroom whiteboards is less important than actually doing the.Okay.So it's not a real distinction.Okay.All right.Great.Thank you.Thank you for that update.That's important for the public to know and understand what, what has been going on during the summer as all of these updates as students return to classrooms.Yeah, and I would be kind of remiss to say, this is on top of the normal work that's done.So as you notice, every single floor has been done.The custodial maintenance staff has done a phenomenal job cleaning these buildings all back up.A lot of painting has been done within different classrooms that needed to be touched back up or entire rooms that needed to be repainted.You know, every floor has been stripped, waxed.Carpets have been cleaned.So again, they do a phenomenal job when you consider the fact that we've got pretty close to 600,000 square feet of space that has to be done.That's all being done at the same time that obviously we're trying to do.This is kind of above and beyond list.Well, that was the word I was going to use.I mean, the longer you went through this.This is phenomenal.I mean, I was sitting here thinking, we're fortunate to have our press colleagues in the room.I mean, I'd love them to share with the public, a summary of everything you guys have done.I think to me, it's a testament of you being here, Bill with your background and having picked a great maintenance leader and Tony.I mean, this is.I wrote down four words as you were going through it.You've touched on technology, security, safety and facilities.And it's not just cleaning the floors.I mean, this is significant.I don't know if you guys feel the same.Oh definitely.I agree.Totally.I'm very impressed with this.So excellent job though.I think for me, one of the things I'm going to say tomorrow when our staff comes back is that, we talk about teaching and learning all the time, but we also care to the same level of detail, what the environment is like, what the physical.Is it a good place to work?Is it as psychologically and physically an exciting place for kids to learn and for staff to work?And all of these things matter, when it comes to that.And so we pay as much attention to detail in the area facilities than we do in instruction.I agree with you.I mean, if we're going to continue to ask more of our staff and expect more of our kids, then we owe it to them to have all of this there too.You have to give them the right tools to both to teach and to learn, and you can't teach and learn in an environment that is substandard and ours is fantastic.So thanks to Bill and his team.It's great.Thank you so much.All right.We're going to move to school committee vote to approve the 2013-2014 school district goals that everybody has in their packet.Yes, we spoke the other day.I spoke with Katie the other day because we, these are, this is the newest draft of the goals that you formulated in July with us as an administrative team.But one thing that's come to light since then is that the department of ed now expects us to put in ratings.Five ratings for every professional staff member, all teachers, administrators and other people that come under the new Massachusetts educator evaluation system.And so it's a rating on each of the four broad standards and then an overall rating.So what we discovered, they now have decided on a mid August deadline.So we had to put in ratings for all of our, all of our teachers and our administrators, by about a week to 10 days ago.Because of their timeline, the typical superintendent evaluation timeline is no longer going to work because I will be one of the few people that doesn't have any ratings this year in, because if you don't put them in, which I can't, because my evaluation isn't until September, then I forget whether I'm going to be listed as either not rated or not evaluated.I think it's not rated at this time.So the only suggestion I have, which has come to light since we met in early July, and I did think that maybe they would be, they would take the majority of all of our ratings and then after the fact we could just say, oh and by the way, here's the five ratings for the superintendent.But they are not flexible in that at this time, whatever ratings you put in, according to their deadline is that's it.And you can't access it after that.but this is the first time they've ever done that.So they too are on a learning curve with the new evaluation system and how they're going to collect their data.So if that turns out to continue to be true annually, then that last bullet under superintendent's performance, that really to be timely with the department of Ed's reporting mechanism, the overall composite would have to be done by June.And the public evaluation would have to be by July or a month sooner either.And so those two last months should either say June-July or May-June.So I think I put it out there for that before you vote.To vote on this with those changes.Otherwise.And this is not unique because most superintendents are not, the evaluation is not completed before school gets out, but you're going to see all of us shifting in the future to accommodate the department's timeline.So if we did June and then what, by July 31st, we'd be in compliance with.Yes, going to be in August.Amy worked pretty hard with Erica who does all of our data on the uploading of that.But there were, at the last minute, there were a few things that they have said no, they're not going to accept later.I would suggest the June-July.I just think that there's a lot going on with the elections in May and the organization.And if we don't really have this town meeting and I don't know.But I'm open.I just want to throw that out.I would agree with you that June and July seem to be a workable timeframe.There's a lot going on in May and June.So my evaluation does have to be public.So if you think about it, we only meet in July for our goal setting retreat.So we'd have to maybe shift that here and have the portion of the meeting televised that is my evaluation.So there's a lot of gears that we'd have to think about.Could we do a late July evaluation and have it be a separate meeting from the goal setting meeting though?It's up to you.Possibly think about that.Yeah.Because that would make it just separate.Yeah.What do you think, Steve?Just a question to your point about the June-July schedule.Deb, as the superintendent, what months are best for you administratively and your staff?We're busy all year.We all have vacations and staff has vacations.We are here all year long.I think that I. - Just a little inter interruption to the administrative work.I just was curious.There is little, I mean, the end of July is, is the best time for me I learned.I waited until August to take a week.It didn't work out quite great, but I was thinking of doing a little bit earlier, but it's up to you and we could set it for the third week of July.There's plenty of flexible time.It's really, I think you as a committee have to decide the way the year runs.How do you envision?I like the idea of the entire school year being done.And then I was thinking about how things have gone over the course of the school year.It's just my opinion.Right, because don't forget the composite is due by June.Which means everyone has to get those evaluations to me before June which means May.Or June 1, June 3.But I mean, yeah.Yeah the work is incumbent on us to do a little sooner but I don't know why we couldn't.And then maybe plan to present the composite.Toward the end of July.That'd be fine.Consensus of the committee.Do we need to vote on that or motion to vote?Well, you're going to be, you're going to be moving to approve your the school district goals as amended.So this will be one of the amendments.Does anybody have any other comments they want to make about the goals?Well if I may, I think the edits that we've, I mean, just for the benefit of the public, and I think I remember doing this in the past, we sit here and we talk about our goals, but the public doesn't have the access to the record.So I think what we've done is just kind of a quick review.So if I can just take a minute.I would summarize by saying our goals have not changed a whole lot from year to year.We're consistent.We have five categories.Communication, community relations, student achievement, financial management, policy development and superintendents performance.To me, Katie, some of the highlights, we're going to continue to maintain our annual school district report card plan which we instituted last year.I think that's great.If I recall the next one in mind that I remember we put a special emphasis on this year is looking at an updated technology plan and the implications for academic achievement.Generally speaking, I think the rest of our student achievement results or goals stay the same.I don't think I remember, Steve and Tina and Katie help me, I don't think I remember a lot of changes in financial management or policy development.And then we just talked about updated dates for superintendent performance.So I guess I would kind of summarize for the public if it ain't broke, don't fix it.I think our, I think our goals are pretty similar.We've updated a couple of key areas of emphasis.All right.That's great, Bruce.Thank you.I think that captures.Don't forget this will be posted on the website as well.Once it's approved, right?We always have our committee goals.Yep.As soon as you've got them, we'll put them right up.They will be accessible to the public.Any other comments about.Just to clarification, if I may.On page one last bullet, continue the curriculum review cycle to support student achievement and to ensure alignment with state and national standards.Progress report annually.I'm really happy with the goals because when folks get to see this, you'll see that we have a lot of either measurement goals and milestones written down right here, or if they aren't definite milestones or measurements, they're what we're calling updates.So that, that can be measured or be called out as being absent.If for some reason that they're not updated.I just didn't see a measurement or an update or don't understand when we do that.That is I literally don't know when we do that.Maybe you can help me.The curriculum review cycle?That one bullet that you.Yeah.Does that happen?Usually it's January or February.Amy brings the review cycle that was voted previously and either recommends keeping with it.If you remember, you might not remember, but people who are in last year, there was a change last year that Amy recommended, flip-flopping the science with the social studies because we're waiting for the science national standards to come out and social studies is ready for review.So that was her recommendation this past year.And that is much more timely.So even though you vote the regular six year cycle, every once in a while, something comes from on high at the state national level or from where we are in the process.And it just makes more sense to tweak it a little bit.So usually that's January or February.Yeah.Perfect.Thanks.Good point, Steve though, I think, about the measurement of our goals.Yeah, I marked them all.I think I have like eight on the first page and they're all over the place here.Great.Okay.So do I have a motion to accept the Foxborough public schools, school district goals for 2013-2014 as amended?I'll make that motion.Move to accept our school district goals as amended.And only because Mr. Udon's having a drink of water, I will second.Any further discussion.All those in favor or zero.Okay and now we're going to move on to other matters.Oh, I always have something on me.I'm going to turn it over to Amy in a minute because she has a really great overview of what's happening in the next few days for staff.But our opening of school for all of our staff is tomorrow morning.So we'll walk them all of our staff back here at the high school and the auditorium.And we always look forward to opening day.People come back kind of a lot of verve and refreshed.For the most part.It was a short summer though, I will say.And it's nice to see everyone again and start off a new exciting school year.So we'll see everyone here tomorrow.And the committee as always is invited to attend our opening day.And last week on Monday, we had administrative retreat and that is a day where our, we call it the full administrative team.So it's not just the central office and the principals.The assistant principals.It's the department heads.It's the curriculum directors.It's the team facilitators of special education.All of those, all of those people, which were about 30 actually, we go offsite for the day and we engage in activities that engage us in collective thought and planning for the future.What do we think?What are we trying to do?How can we best do it?It's a day where we usually get a lot done and we did.So for that, that was a week ago, Monday.I would like to thank the Kraft organization, Jes Stevenson who's their director of community outreach and new business.Dan Murphy who's a vice-president and Mr. Kraft.Because we didn't budget for something like this before.In the last couple of years, we've had to.And as you know, we invest in our staff and salaries and we don't have a lot of budget for this type of thing.So they really did step forward and allow us to use one of their suites for our ministry of retreat, provided breakfast and lunch at a really very, very low minimal charge for us.So they really worked with us to help support that.And I want to thank them for that.We have done that in the past.And we went back there again this year.So thank you to them.To the Kraft organization and also to CBSC because we had a small budget for teachers, new teacher orientation, but they have worked with, they really worked well with us to provide a really nice part of the professional development for the new teachers and orientation for them.And it's nice that we're able to keep those activities in town because that's what defines us.And many times in other communities, they have to go outside, I don't know a hotel, give them a cheaper rate for some of these things.And we're lucky enough to have the support within our own community to stay here.So I want to thank those organizations.So we had a great new teacher orientation and we welcome it.We are welcoming 19 new teachers, which is our biggest crop in the six years I've been back.And many more support staff, educational assistants and other people.So it's a nice refreshing time and they'll all be back for the next three days without children, as the students arrive after labor day.But we do spend these three days really preparing to welcome the students back, being ready to go.So three days of professional development, and I'm going to turn it over to Amy to tell you a little bit about what everybody's doing the next few days.It's going to be busy to start with.One of the things that all staff will be part in is a training on darkness to light, which is darkness to light stewards of children.And it's adults protecting children from sexual abuse.That is a training that everyone from teachers to educational assistants, to school bus drivers, crossing guards, everyone will be involved in that training.And that is something that we have had five of our own staff members become trained and they are going to then provide that training for the district.So that is part of our commitment to work in partnership with the community to reach the tipping point for the YMCA. And it really is a critically important program.So every staff member will have a half-day training.So out of the two days, the other side of that half day will be Pearson Inform, which you very generously supported, which is an electronic platform for really looking at student over time and monitoring their progress as part of response to intervention.And that is a huge implementation that will take place starting on that day.And we had 18 of our own staff members that were willing to be trained.They've come in the summer and worked with me.And in addition to that, and they are working with me to provide that training to all of our staff members.So it's really powerful when you have your own colleagues working with each other to provide that training.Because they're really the ones that know about all of the assessments that we use and how to drill down and look at student data in order to really change and do what's right for kids in classrooms.So those are something that all staff will be taking part in.In addition to that, there was a ton of curriculum work that was done this summer.So there's curriculum updates, we're in full implementation of the new common core state standards for math and ELA. Mcast reflects that.Now with that full transition, in addition to the curriculum work that is going with just the state standards, as you can recall, we have the new maths textbook that was going to be implemented grade six through the high school in order to meet those standards.So we have a lot of training that will take place starting in well this week with the math.And then there really are lots of other things that kind of tie into either the new standards or even the educator evaluation system.A lot going on.But I think that with everything that's new, it's exciting that we have so much of it that's provided by our own staff.And that really is a testament to the work that they do over the summer.It is enormous, the amount of hours that they put in for curriculum work and to be able to also step up and take that leadership role in training the colleagues, that's hard.It's hard to learn something new and then also be willing to take that risk and say, I'll step up and train my colleagues at the same time.So I really appreciate them stepping up for that.Amy, I have a question.Are they, once the staff members who are trained to provide this professional development, are they then available throughout the year, sort of as a sounding board or as a resource for teachers, if they have questions about that topic going forward?Yes.So as an example to that, the trainers that are doing the Pearson Inform, which is the platform, we will through the professional development committee, as well as the technology steering committee, talk about, well, how else can we support?It starts with the evaluation on Wednesday and Thursday.How can we the evaluation?How can we support you in the next three months?How can we support you over the course of the year?We take that feedback from them.And then we have what we call just-in-time workshops.I'm going to staff meetings as well to provide updates.But those people that are trainers are the go-to people.And then they'll also help with any just-in-time workshops that are after school hours that will provide training too.Great.Thank you.That's wonderful.I'm really impressed too, with this darkness to light training.I wonder how many other districts provide this kind of training, because, and to know that everyone, all staff are going to be trained in this because this is not always recognized in the classroom.And there's so many other areas that are our students are in.I spoke to Tony Kelsey, person at the YMCA for this just two days ago and I don't think many, I think some districts like us, this we've been in partnership with them for two years in this issue, but like us, we train some key personnel, the mental health services teams, school nurses, secretaries, administrators, but to commit to train all of your staff members is huge.And I think we might be the first in this area, but we're hoping that that helps other communities reach their tipping point.Because let's face it, we see kids all the time.So if anybody should be trained.And you never know who's going to see a sign or symptom that we previously didn't have the expertise to recognize.It's not always the teachers.It could be somebody in aftercare who we have already trained, by the way, it could be, the school bus driver.So we really believe that we need to commit to that.So it is, you can imagine our time for professional development is tight, but we felt it was that important that we should commit to it.And we committed to that last fall, that when we brought teachers back in August this year, we would do that.So that's, we were pretty happy that we're finally able to achieve that.I just need to commend Amy because putting that schedule together is monstrous work and making sure everybody's covered into something really productive and meaningful to do, especially in a year with that, we have defined as the year of focus, believe it or not.I mean, it sounds like we're exploding all over the place with things and we are, but for our administrative retreat, we actually read the book Focus by Mike Schmoker, which is elevating the essentials to improve, to radically improve student learning.And the essentials really are focusing on what we teach, a consistent rigorous curriculum, how we teach it, our instructional strategies and authentic literacy, just being able to read, write, speak and listen and communicate across all subject areas.So it was, we had a revelation during the administrative team retreat, where we parsed through the book Focus because everything, there's so much going on now, and most of the pressures are coming from outside our own organization.So how are we going to focus in the age of more and more and more?So we decided that this book was important enough by the end of the day, they said, do you really think we can do this?You really think we can pare things down and really focus on these?Because there's so much research shows if you focus on those three.Sounds like simple things.But the most important things that students really do well in an organization, really a school organization really does better.So believe it or not, it's going to be the year of the focus.And we're going to try very, very hard to pare everything down.So, for example, we talk about these new technologies, but if a new technology is not in service of those three things, those three areas of focus, then they're not for us right now.So we're going to use that focus to really make decisions about everything else.So that's what we came to the conclusion that we can pare things down.And if we have the will and the commitment, which we do, so we'll let you know how we do.Could be the year of a little bit more focus or could be the year a lot more focus.We'll see, but it's timely.So wish us luck.Good luck.I think, I think the schedule looks terrific.It's so impressive.I think you guys really do a nice job kicking off the school year effectively.And I think that sets the tone and having been at a few of these kickoff meetings and I will try to come tomorrow if I can.Wonderful.I just think you do a nice job, welcoming the staff back.And when they look at the professionalism of the agenda and the thoughtfulness, I think it's a, it does set the tone.So thank you, Amy.If I recall a couple of years ago, you started school with no power.We did.two years ago.We grew way ahead, knock on wood, - But it started with two days of no power.It wasn't my best look.Last year we did have power.So I'm hoping for two in a row.It looks like the weather forecast is good.So hopefully I haven't jinxed us.Thank you.Anything else under other matters for anybody.I just had one idea Katie.And Debbie brought up the krafts and how they've been such good partners of ours.And I know the town has its own issues at us to work through, but certainly from a school committee perspective and the school's perspective, they have continued to be great partners.And Bill taken us through an update earlier of the turf field.I just wonder if we might consider inviting them at some point to come and knowing that they help sponsor the NFL grant that's made this possible.We were starting to talk about, I don't know if you call it a ribbon cutting or an opening ceremony for the mini dedication.There is no dedicated.Let's say it's a ribbon cutting and definitely to invite Mr. Kraft.So we'll be getting that out.So when we have a better idea of when it would be, but it'd be good to give him a little notice and people in talent trips up committee who works so hard to start that initiative four years ago and school committee has so generously supported the majority of the funding for it.So I think we would like a public ribbon cutting for the new field, if you are so inclined.That's a great idea, Bruce.I mean, we can't do this alone.We have to partner with so many different entities and we do certainly appreciate and are thankful for all those willing participants out in the community that do help us be a better district.So thank you.I think that's a great idea.Absolutely.Okay.So good luck tomorrow.Thank you.Before we adjourn, sounds like it's going to be an exciting time.Unfortunately, I'm not going to be able to, to be there, but I know we'll have representation from the school committee.And I'm a very excited, very excited for our next meeting where we hear how the.We'll let you know how the opening went.Okay, so we are, being 8:25, we are going to be entering into executive session for the purpose of discussing negotiating strategies for non-union personnel, superintendent, superintendent of schools.The committee will not be returning to open session.So we need a roll call to go into executive session.Bruce.Aye.Chair says aye, Steve aye, Tina aye.Okay.Thank you very much.Thank you.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/SCAug26.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/SCAug26.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/SCAug26.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/gov.house.ogr.20100729.4/gov.house.ogr.20100729.4.mp3", "text": "Very poor in terms of meeting its obligations, fulfilling its commitments.So we remained skeptical about their behavior, but there's a difference between Iran and North Korea.It's important difference.North Korea's leaders don't seem to mind being isolated.In fact, they may believe that isolation is the only way their regime can survive.Iran has different priorities.Yes, they want to move their nuclear ambitions forward, but they also want to be seen as a respected member of the international community.They need commerce, they need trade.They need to engage with the world.We need to demonstrate to them that they can't have their cake and eat it too.They can't have their nuclear ambitions and have these good relations with the west of the world.Thank you.My time has expired.Mr. Chairman, I would at least take this opportunity to say I agree with everything that Mr. Einhorn said that they want to be respected.I would strongly suggest that as we continue looking at future sanctions, we recognize that as long as the world allows them to have embassies and allows them to hold our embassy hostage, that we are in fact, still allowing them to have normalized relationships with virtually every country on earth, and then hope that sanctions will work.I, for one, believe that we need to take another step and a step that is far greater than sanctions before we do military.But I certainly believe we need to take another step and I would hope that as we continue looking at this program, if we see it fail, that you'll join with me in trying to find additional steps to give pressure against Iran yield back, Mr. Chairman.Thank you very much.And that's the reason why we are having this hearing and no question about it.I now yield have five minutes to Congresswoman Marcy Kaptur from the great State of Ohio.In fact, my classmate.That's right.Thank you, Mr. Chairman.Very much glad to see you with the gavel.Thank you gentlemen for appearing.Now, Mr. Glazer, I just wanted to ask you to whom do you report at the US Department of Treasury?Who's your superior?My direct superior is Assistant Secretary Cohen and he in turn reports under secretary...Assistant Secretary who?David Cohen.David Cohen, what is his title?Assistant Secretary for Terrorist Financing and Financial Crimes.And he reports to under secretary Levy.He reports to who?Who under Secretary Stuart levy.Who's the under Secretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence.Thank you for placing that on the record.Let me just state that I believe history will show that since World War 2, US relations with Iran have been very counterproductive to our own interests, both in terms of the advancement of democratic ideals across at vast region, along with the lack of promotion of competitive markets for goods, sadly, so much of that history, I think will show that oil has been a great diversion for this country.I keep thinking to one of the commandments in my own faith, thou shall not covet thy neighbor's goods.My question is how does one implement sanctions in a manner that supports US democratic ideals and reform across an undemocratic and mercantilist Middle East?I think one can argue geo strategically the impact of current sanctions actually operates against us long term interests because what we're seeing is a backfill of connectivity by us, by China, by Russia, you've admitted in your own testimony about the United Arab Emirates.One can look at other countries, so it must be really frustrating for you to enforce a sieve.I also wanted to just place on the record for history sake back in 1953, since World War 2, really, our relations with Iran, we never seem to get it right.There was a coup back in the early 50s, when someone by the name of Mohammad Masadeck was installed, well, he had actually taken office earlier in a democratic election, but then in 53, by spontaneous combustion, he was removed and the Shabby ran when we were growing up, we remember him as children became head of that country.But the reason the other guy was removed is he was actually trying to change, attempting to reform the monopoly control that one company had over the extraction of oil from Iran.That company was called the Anglo Persian Oil Company, commonly known now is BP, BP. So I think it's important for us to remember a little bit of history here and through the decade of the 50s, 60s and 70s, the Shah's rule became more and more repressive.And I can remember the Slovak studying the Slovak when I was in college and try and understand what that was all about.Then in 79, some of us lived through the Uranian Revolution when the Shah was removed and US hostages were taken and the American people were just stunned by and Terry Anderson from my own state an ABC reporter was taken in that and ultimately released, thank God.But then after all that happened, and I remember those hostages were returned on the day, Ronald Reagan became president.Remember that?Some of the people here remember that, then for the next decade, we enlisted Iraqi dictator, Saddam Hussein to do some dirty bidding and there was a terrible war between Iran and Iraq, millions of people died.So, you know, there's a little backdrop to why the Iranians also looking through whatever lens they're looking through as they look at us and they look across that region might feel vulnerable.I'm not defending their government.I don't defend any government in that region.And I certainly don't defend the economic interests that try to exploit all of them.But in thinking about the future, if in fact we are to be a democratic nation, one that also believes in competitive markets, the report from the GAO shows that, well, guess who's got their fingers in the till over there?Halliburton, that's the largest.If you look at the amount of money that they get in government contracts, Halbert number of 27.1 billion, well, who's the big investor in Halliburton?The former vice president of our country for heaven's sake and their fingers aren't clean.It seems like the public and private interests get all mixed up here and then we try to use these pitiful sanctions, which look good on paper and look like we're really doing something, but they don't do anything to promote our geo strategic interest.They don't do anything to bring competitive markets.They don't do anything to promote democracy in that part of the world and I feel sorry for our country.I feel sorry for the road that we're on here because I don't see that it's really hurting Iran in any way and it's certainly most importantly, not advancing the cause of democracy.So in terms of two way trade, my question goes to the future generation.That is a literate country.There were hundreds of thousands of students demonstrating for democracy in that country.And there were some sanctions that apparently made it very difficult for them to be able to communicate with the West, with others in their efforts to try to democratize inside that country.And my question is, is the administration, or has the administration taken action to allow hardware, software and technology used to access the internet to be legally exported to Iran?How do we incentivize future democratic reforms and many of the literate people in that country that can connect to the rest of the world, who are part of the future.So they don't stub their toe and kill millions of more people as the last generation has done for 50 years in that extremely important, but troubled region.What are we doing to promote connectivity between those who love democracy?Thank you, Congresswoman.We very much support you are a strong statement of support for human rights in Iran.Very important to us.It's also important that civil society in Iran be able to express themselves that they have a free and secure access to the internet.The state department has worked very closely with the treasury department to ensure that US sanctions do not prevent access to tools that allow the Iranian people to freely access the internet, state did a waiver recently that enabled treasury to publish a general license in the federal register in March that authorizes US companies to make a mass market personnel, personal communications software available inside Iran.It's very important that they have the tools to communicate with one another.And we're trying to make that possible, and any adjustments in the sanctions laws that are necessary, we will seek to adopt.And, you know, I just wanted to say for the record, finally, Mr. Chairman, I represent many people who have immigrated from that part of the world.And, you know, this They always have mine TV and he goes to the UN and really doesn't do a very good job for his own people, but the people that hold the real power in their country are many of the clerics.And it just seems to me that anything we can do to bridge walls is extraordinarily important.I don't share many of my colleagues views that the answer to everything is military action against any troubled state.But I think that the power of literacy inside that country, unlike Afghanistan is so important.Anything one can can do to encourage kind of activity and enhance those individuals within that country that are trying to meet the rest of the world in a peaceful way is worth the effort.And I would hope you would think hard about that in the important roles that you have, and also on the oil side to promote competitiveness.General woman's time has long expired.Thank you, Mr. Chairman.I now recognize the gentleman from Illinois Counsel Davis, - Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.And let me thank you for calling the hearing.Mr. Einhorn, let me ask you, how does the state department measure success in terms of what would be a successful implementation of sanctions against Iran?Could you share that with us?I mean, ultimately the measure of success is whether Iran changes its behavior, that's what we're looking for.But intermediate steps involve putting a serious economic pressure on Iran so that it recompute its calculation of costs and benefits and realizes that the future is gonna look bleaker and bleaker unless it alters its behavior and stops its defiance of the international community.That's what we're looking for.So one could reasonably say that the purpose of sanctions is to change behavior?Exactly.Of whoever it is that's being sanctioned.Let me ask, are there any items that are not covered in terms of, what are we trying to prevent Iran from doing?The combination of the law the Congress recently gave to us as well as the recent security council resolution, as well as our own executive authorities.The combination of all those tools, I think give us what we need to pursue an effective strategy of pressure against Iran.Are there any items that we would say it's quite all right if we were to interact with those items getting into the country?There are many items, for humanitarian purposes, to deal with medical problems.They are all kinds of items that are legitimate.We're not trying to interrupt legitimate trade, certainly not trade having to do with humanitarian, civilian kinds of uses, but we're primarily going after their programs to acquire weapons of mass destruction, advanced conventional weapons and other sensitive items.We're not interested in a total embargo of Iran, that's not what we're trying to do.So there is a humanitarian component to the sanctions, especially as it relates to medicine or medical technology or life saving instruments or advances that may have been made in one country that have not necessarily been made in another country.We're saying that it's quite all right?That's right.We don't intend to block around access to those.Let me ask, and if each one of you perhaps would address this question, our government has awarded more than $107 billion in contract payments, grants, and other benefits over the past decade to foreign and multinational American companies while they were doing business in Iran.Is there any way that one could suggest that this is somewhat a conflict in terms of the overall purpose of sanctions to try and change the behavior of another nation?I mean, this development, these interactions were what led to an important provision of the new comprehensive sanctions law.I think it was Ms. Newrider who spoke to that and can describe to you what's involved.But the idea is to avoid such contractual arrangements between the United States government and these other entities that have dealings with Iran especially dealings that are sanctioned under our law.Mr. Davis, if I could add to that, that connection is changing behavior and I'll give you the best example, Repsol, which is a Spanish conglomerate had, based on our report, over $343 million in contracts with the US government, they also were investors in Iran's energy sector.They have since made the decision this week to pull out of this $10 billion South pars project and no longer invest in Iran.So we would agree though that this whole business of sanctions does have a level of complexity that sometimes the average citizen unless they take a good look, may not fully understand what has taken place in relationship to them and what they've actually accomplished and what they have actually met?Absolutely.And I would also note that one of the other decision that Repsol made was the divestment clause is in the new app.They were concerned about shareholders divesting in their firm as one of the reasons why they pulled out of the South pars project.Thank you very much.And that too is one of the reasons, Mr. Chairman, that I appreciate your calling this hearing to try and bring as much clarity to actions that are taken.So that the only way we experience this democracy that my representative friend from Ohio, Ms. Kaptur was talking about is that people be able to understand what it is that their government is doing, what it is that the government is trying to do and what the intents are.So I thank you again for the hearing and I yield back the balance of my time.Thank you very much for your participation as well.I now yield to the gentlemen from California the ranking member Counsel - Thank you, Chairman.Just to wrap up a little bit, Mr. Kristoff, in the committee's report, hopefully you've looked at it.Ms. Kaptur really sort of talked to this point when she said Halliburton 27.1 billion.First of all, just for the record, my understanding is the vice-president, when he became vice-president, relinquished all stock in the company, most of which all of which was not by purchase, but by having been an executive there and is not an investor, but not withstanding her, not understanding what an investor is, perhaps Halliburton's 27.1 billion that's how much they got for servicing the needs of the US government.Do you know what they received, some subsidiary of Halliburton received, for participation with Iran during that same period of time?I don't know those details, sir.So actually how much money somebody got from the US isn't particularly important at all, what's important is how important was Iran to these subsidiaries.And if I understand correctly under prior law, a subsidiary, wholly owned, not wholly owned, joint venture, controlled, uncontrolled, to be honest, they were allowed to do this.So everything, everything that's here about these companies prior to just a short period ago, they were doing things that were perfectly routine, legal and not prohibited by executive order or any other law.The new act has changed that, subsidiaries are now affected, but previously they were not.So back to the sanctions.And I've been very tough on Mr. Einhorn, but I want to go to you based on past performance, compliance with the past laws by companies seems to be reasonably good.And the past service and sales and how everyone was circumventing, they were simply complying with the law and using meaning their responsibility to their stockholders.Which haven't we with the last sanction regime changed the message to them relative to the best interest of their stockholders?You've definitely changed the message, I think, particularly with the divestment clauses, because they are hearing opportunities for shareholders to speak with their voices and pull out of those companies that continue to invest in Iran.Well, Mr. Glazer, I'm gonna close with just a question to you.The US financial system is a relatively open system.The Chairman, no, we might agree, but disagree with treasury on whether or not we've given you all the tools of transparency that we'd like you to have in the way of databases and so on, but the US companies, companies with a presence and reporting in the US, wouldn't it be fair to say that you get good transparency on them, and if they continue directly or indirectly to trade with Iran, you will be able to detect that and thus sanction them?In other words, you have those tools.Yes.I think that we know what's going on...In closing for me, our partners in Europe on this measure who have promised to do the same thing, do they have the same tools?And that's the final question if you answer that they do, is are they going to use them as aggressively as you will?Look, I've been at this for a few for a few years now.I really do think they have come a long...That's why you get to be here before us, we ask for experts.It's an honor.I think Europe has come a long way and I, again, this has been a very surprising six weeks, the UN went farther than I personally thought they would.The EU went considerably farther than I would have predicted if you had asked me three months ago, how far will the EU go.In all sincerity, I think there is a real growing international consensus that something needs to be done and that countries need to take responsibility.Does that mean we're not gonna have issues to work out with particular European countries?I was talking to Mr. Van Hollen about one of those.There's gonna continue to be issues, but I do think Europe is serious about this, and I think they've been a good partner.Thank you, Mr. Einhorn, the last word goes to you, as long as you include in it, letting us know how our former colleague Ms. Tauscher is doing.I think, look, you know, Ellen Tauscher, she's got a lot of spirit, a lot of fight, a lot of grit.You know, she's gonna have a rough patch, but she's gonna come out of it fine and I'll send to her your best wishes.Thank you very much, please do.Thank you for your...Please associate me with that as well.Let's close with you, Mr. Glazer, and I guess Mr. Einhorn and both, first of all, GAO has identified 41 foreign firms with commercial activity in Iran.Do you agree with that?41, the number.This is really something that is outside of the treasury department's jurisdiction, we target with our particular authorities entities that are engaged in illicit activity.Be it proliferation or terrorism.The treasury department is not keeping track of foreign companies that are doing business in Iran as a broad matter that'd be for the commerce department or others.Mr. Einhorn, do you agree with the numbers?I'm sorry, could you repeat that, Mr. Chairman.GAO has identified 41 foreign firms with commercial activity in Iran's energy sector, first of all, do you agree with the number?We examined all of those cases very carefully, and as I mentioned before, we winnowed that number down to less than 10.These are a number of entities that are very problematic.I have to say that a number of them have been engaged in sanctionable activity.But as I also said before, we're reaching the conclusion of this process, it's out for interagency views and secretary Clinton will make her decisions on this in a short period ahead.Yes.What can you do about these companies?Even the 10 that you...Well, it's important to recognize that a number of the entities in this small list have already stopped or are in the process of stopping their engagement in Iran petroleum sector.So I think what we found is the law is working, the threat of penalties has encouraged these countries to get out of the business of dealing with Iran.So it's quite effective.Let me just close by, is there anything more that we need to do on this side of the aisle, in terms of, from a legislative standpoint, in order to make this effective?I think you've just given us a big and important tool to tackle this threat.And you did that only less than four weeks ago.We have to work hard within the administration to figure out how best to implement this law to maximum effect.So for the time being, we have nothing else to request of you.Thank you.I agree with Mr. Einhorn.I think that you just passed a very important new piece of legislation.We're in the process of implementing that and I think it's going to have a powerful impact.Chairman, we're proceeding to implement the rule required by the act and we will do so.I would encourage vigorous and continuous oversight on the part of the Congress to ensure not just that the old sanctions are being enforced, which many had not been, but the host of new sanctions that are on the plates of the executive branch.Thank you very, very much for actually - Thank you very much.I really would like to ask Mr. Newton Garter and Mr. Kristoff, something that has come up throughout this hearing, and that is the report that throughout the last decade, GSA spent roughly 170 billion of taxpayers' money contracting with 74 companies doing business in Iran, at the exact same time, we were trying to put pressure on Iran.And my question is basically, how did this happen?Did the fact that these companies were doing business with Iran ever come up when you were reviewing the contracts or signing contracts in GSA?Did anyone from anywhere in the federal government point out that we shouldn't be giving part of our Federal procurement to companies that were really in direct violation of our stated foreign policy goals?Did anyone ever talk to you Mr. Newton Garter about these contracts and that they should not be getting a $170 billion in taxpayer money when we're trying to impose sanctions?The short answer is, no, I have not been involved in these matters.I will be happy to look into this and get back to you for the record.I returned to GSA two years ago as the Director of the Office of Acquisition and Integrity with my duties as suspension and debarment official.But before that, I was at HUD as the senior procurement executive and was not aware of any such matters at HUD, but I will be happy to look further into this for...If you couldn't get back to us, Mr. Kristoff, do you want to comment on it?How did this happen that we're handing out billions and federal contracts to companies in direct violation of our stated policy goals, foreign policy, and stated laws of the country?Well, first I would state that, as we all know, it's the responsibility of the executive branch to investigate companies, determine what is credible evidence and try to impose the sanctions.The number that I think you're referring to is a New York times article, where there was over a hundred billion dollars in contracts.When I looked at their list, many of those companies are companies that would not be sanctionable under what was then the laws of the land.Companies that were in the automobile industry, for example, would not have been...Would they be sanctionable now under this law?Not necessarily.Why not?Because it still doesn't cover items such as the automobile industry.And there was a lot of companies on that list that dealt in the automotive community.Well, maybe we should cover them with sanctions.I just want to mention, Mr. Glazer, that the treasury department has done a very good job and I compliment you on the work you've done.As a member of financial services committee, my time is up and we don't have time to go further.We have another panel, but I have a series of questions respectfully.I'd like to place in writing to you so that we can get these answers and I congratulate you on your work and also...That object is ordered.Also the state department your international work too, get compliance.Thank you very much.Thank you very much.And actually, let me just say to the members that within a few minutes, we will have two votes on the floor.So what I would like to do is to adjourn until 1:30 p.m and we will reconvene at 1:30 p.m. I'm sorry about that, but we have to vote around here and if we don't vote, they talk about us.So this panel is actually dismissed and the committee will adjourn until 1:30 p.m and we'll come back.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/gov.house.ogr.20100729.4.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/gov.house.ogr.20100729.4.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/gov.house.ogr.20100729.4.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/gov.house.ogr.20110420.2.3/gov.house.ogr.20110420.2.3.mp3", "text": "First is Mr. Andrew Reeves, who is the owner of Reeves Farms, welcome and thank you for being here today.Nancy Hourigan is the owner of Hourigan's Dairy Farm.Welcome, and thank you for coming this afternoon.And Mr. Tom De Maree is the owner of De Maree Fruit Farm, thank you very much for being here.As is the custom of the committee we'll ask you to please stand and be sworn in.Please, please raise your right hand.Do you solemnly swear, or affirm, that the testimony you are about to give is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?Please let the record reflect that the witnesses answered in the affirmative.Thank you.Again, we'll have each panelists give their opening statement, and then we'll take some time to ask questions.Mr. Reeves, if you would start.Thank you.Thank you.Distinguished members of the committee on Oversight, and Government Reforms Help Committee, and Regulatory Affairs Oversight Government Spending.Thank you for the opportunity to testify in today's hearing.If I could interrupt.Can you just move the microphone a little bit closer so we can hear your testimony.This any better?That's better, thank you.Agriculture is the largest industry in New York.Maybe the largest industry left in the United States.In order for agriculture to continue to thrive there must be a streamlined process to bring seasonal temporary labor when necessary.The H-2A program was supposed to be a tool for the American farmers put in place by Congress to expedite a legal temporary workforce.This program was supposed to allow farmers to develop a good business plan which ensures a plentiful supply of top quality produce without having to worry about a workforce.All of their businesses are able to grow and shrink markets in production depending on demand.If a worker leaves for any reason, ten others are always ready to fill the void immediately.These businesses are based on these variables.If you hire an American recruit for temporary labor they will be looking for another job with benefits and full-time, not seasonal status.Once another opportunity becomes available they leave or don't show up for work one day.As a result, you must spend an average of $650 per worker and begin a 10-12 week process to replace them with the H-2A program.The H-2A program should extend the same freedoms to American farmers as Congress originally intended.They should be able to expedite legal foreign workers after exhausting all legal local employment opportunities and options in the existing state.If an H-2A certification has been granted in a neighboring state, this would mean neighboring states have a shortage of eligible farm workers.I believe to have me advertise in these neighboring states and continue the recruiting process throughout half the life cycle of my contract period is ridiculous.For my farm not to be able to ask for experience when hiring is ridiculous.For me not to be able to ask for production standards without the challenge from New York, or the US Department of Labor is ridiculous.Any other business would not and could not operate in the parameters now set by the present H-2A law.The next problem that needs changing with the program is the length of the process.We used to be able to send an application to the state and Chicago for processing at the same time.We now send out one to the state first, and once they finish the process we then have the necessary order number to now move on to Chicago with a different form.Many times the state will approve something, but the US Department of Labor will reject.An example is work production standards.New York state will allow them, but the US Department of Labor won't.They get rejected and thrown back where either an appeal is necessary, or remove the standards and move on.If you appeal you have an 82% success rate, but you have put your process behind schedule.If you choose to appeal the US Department of Labor will no longer certify your order within 30 days of your date of need.New York state will not let me advertise asking for resumes, but the US Department of Labor says I can.After we have survived everything to this point we now have to keep records of all applicants who have requested an interview or job.We must document this for future audits and accept all applicants throughout half the term of the work contract.Because the job posting goes on a national site we're bombarded with applications such as a fishing camp cook with a degree in geography wanting to bop in and work for the month of May on his way to Alaska in June.He must know more about the free housing first.How about the family of Eastern Europeans asking if they can move the whole family here.How about the LPN wanting a job because she lost her license and needs a job.However, she won't work weekends.How about the lady from Manila.How about the kid from Auburn wanting a job loading.How about Berl asking what do I mean about resume.These are some of the example of resumes I deal with.How about the PhD from California who lost his job and applied, Dr. Kulzeemalmen.These are all lawsuits and possible litigations looming on the horizon because our present system encourages it.Now if everything is fine we have 30 days or less to finish the process.We now move from overnight replies from Government to snail mail.Homeland Security claims to turn your petition requests around in 3-4 days.This is not true.If you overnight your I-129 to California they stamp it on the day they receive it or the day after.A received letter with a next day stamp on it comes to you after the check has cleared.Usually the process with no problems takes 12-14 days from beginning to end.We now have 15-18 days left.Under the old process we could block schedule groups when the order had WAC number.Now we must wait until the acceptance comes.Next we must pay for Visa's before we can schedule interviews.We must email a request to CSC in order to get permission to access a site to schedule interviews.This takes 5 days if you make no mistakes in the requesting process.If you make a mistake you will be notified in 5 days of the mistake and you redo it.In 5 more days you will receive access or another problem.The site lets you electronically schedule, just fill out a spreadsheet and email.I suggest email, the electronic system is on it's third spreadsheet and if there is a specific problem you will receive a specific direction back with the email schedule.With the electronic system you will receive an error list without a clue of where to begin.There are no directions as to how the new system works, you attempt to understand and operate it.If you fail or have a problem, forget it.You will receive an email answer which will never answer the question you asked.I had a problem with an order which 18 emails were not answered, 11 calls were not returned.One day during lunch I found another CSC branch with names and numbers.A human resources manager from another division was able to make proper contact to their other division for me.He was amazed how it took 4 calls to resolve the issue, so we thought.When my workers interviewed it still required a call to consulate to inform them the order schedule and farm name were wrong.They as usual, were very helpful.The next issue I have with the H-2A program is it's adverse effects wage rate of $10.25 per hour.This is a 15% increase in labor cost from the program revamp during the past administration.The rate went up in these times from $10.16.This is an unrealistic wage for workers considered unskilled, not requiring any previous experience and work standards.We pay for Visa's, we pay for food and travel both ways.We take workers to the store.We must guarantee at least 3/4 of the total hours in the contract.We must provide housing and utilities at no additional cost.No taxes or social security are deducted.Many portions of their jobs offer them an opportunity to earn even more when performing piece work.When your slower workers are guaranteed a minimum of $10.25 an hour for piece work, your faster workers make considerably more because your production minimum standards are based on the slower workers.This is the reason we quit growing green and yellow beans, reduce acreage on peas, quit growing snow peas, and wouldn't raise blueberries if they weren't organic and brought a higher price.Lack of consistency is my final complaint with the program.I can send an I-129 with only 1 copy and get an acceptance.I've had a customer do the same and he sent, he was sent an approval request and a copy, to send another copy, and $404 with another form or they may not be able to schedule appointments in consulate.I have used production standards and then had customers denied standards.I've been told to hire Puerto Ricans and I have asked them to interview and submit a resume.I recently talked to a large orchard producer from Virginia.Their farm hires 178 H-2A workers.Last year they were forced to use a Puerto Rican labor force because of problems with the H-2A in Jamaica.I have the same labor reporting system as the grower.My vendor verified the orchard production was half last year of other years.This farmer was asking me if there was any way around the Puerto Rican labor situation.He said if he has to use Puerto Rican workers this year he will have an auction.How can you expect to tell a business owner how he has to run his business.No other business suffers these restrictions.Now I'll briefly review areas I believe need changed.Blow up form is the easiest.Apply to the state and US Department of Labor at the same time.Allow standards and experience to be included in job requirements.Revamp the recruitment process.Why advertise in a state which already has been approved for H-2A workers?Reduce the recruitment period until the time the H-2A workers arrive on the farm.If the number of workers on an order reduce because of referrals, these slots should remain open so the farmer can fall back on them if the referral workers don't work out or leave.Introduce a form of arbitration to resolve issues.Legal service attorney's constantly look for areas to litigate.The 30 day rule form the US Department of Labor is not adequate and encourages farmers to lie about their need date because the process cannot be completed, excuse me, in 30 days.Allow farmer to select where he gets his workforce, every other business has that freedom.Speed up the Homeland Security process or make them tell the truth.The US Department of Labor and the Department of State believe in this 3-4 day turnaround.Reduce the wage to a realistic level.The Bush order was the best system thus far.Repair the mess created by the new interview scheduling procedure.It was introduced before it was ready, and I guarantee it wasn't developed by CSC. They've always been a great company to work with.We must include the dairy industry.Ag jobs is a dead on arrival proposal.The change has been morphed into a bad deal for agriculture.Strive for more consistency across the board.State and US Department of Labor, state health department, Homeland Security, Department of State.Let the H-2A workers pay their own Visa fee.This is non refundable and they should have some skin in the game.I've aired my grievances and hope I was able to shed some light on the problems of H-2A. Ag jobs is not the answer either.Labor unions and legal service groups that killed the good in this bill already.I will not endorse any program with amnesty attached.The Amnesty Act in 1987 was another example of it not working.The workers moved up the ladder and left a vacuum which was filled with millions of undocumented workers in the United States.Most of the workers I recruit once spent time illegally in the United States.I've convinced them to go back and enter the legal H-2A program.I've convinced not less than ten farmers to convert to legal H-2A workers.These people should remain at the front of the line.What we now ask for is a program be developed which will partner with today's agriculture industry and finally address the H-2A needs of our dairy industry also.We need to work this out together for the salvation of the industry this country was built with.Lets once and for all do this together.Once, and do it right.Leave the unions and legal service ambulance chasers on the sidelines.We owe this to an industry already bombarded with new EPA and DEC regulations every year.We also have trace back food safety requirements whose costs are all the burden of the farmer presently.We are at the point of losing our producers if something isn't done.Washington needs to become proactive with this issue.Four different programs in three years are confusing.The lack of continuity necessary for agribusiness to develop and maintain a long term business plan.Thank you very much for your time and the invitation.Thank you Mr. Reeves.Mrs.Hourigan.Thank you for inviting me, to testify before you today.My name is Nancy Hourigan.And I am a member of Onondaga County Farm Bureau, and the Board of Directors of the New York Agricultural Land Trust.My husband John and I, and my son Matt work over about 8,000 acres of land in Onondaga County and operate a dairy farm.My family and I are proud of our farm and the time and hard work that we put in to the operation to make it successful and keep it growing.Our heritage and our roots are in the community and our farm.And we want to see this business succeed at what is our core mission, producing healthy local milk for our neighbors and fellow citizens of New York state.Our milk is sold to Byrne Dairy, doesn't get much more local than that.But the family farm has changed significantly over the years.As we've had to grow in order to keep up with ever escalating regulatory burdens and a price received for our milk that is at the mercy of global market conditions.Even though our cost factors are particularly influenced by being in a state like New York where all businesses face an unreasonably high cost of taxes, energy and labor, and regulatory compliance.While I can and will expand upon some specific topics that are of concern to me, the single biggest point that I want to make at this hearing is that the amount of actual time that I and my family have to spend complying with various Federal regulations.And that has escalated to the point where I spend more time in an office on computer and filing paperwork than I ever did working with the cows, the crops, and the personnel on the farm.Each and every day I spend filing paperwork to comply with various Federal regulations.And each and every new piece of paper I have to put up on my central posting area on the farm has a cost to it that is profound and can never be recouped.The cost is my time and my husband's time.No amount of cows or cropland added to the farm to ensure our financial stability will enable us to recoup that time that we have to spend filing ever increasing paperwork, paperwork with various agencies.I do not believe that each Federal agency that we deal with has a comprehensive understanding of what it is like to try to farm in this environment.I have to meet mandates from the US Department of Labor, Wage and Hour paperwork, the Homeland Security Office, I-9 forms, US Department of Agriculture, Conservation and Sanitation issues, the US Department of Transportation, DOT truck numbers, hours of service regulations, the EPA for nutrient management issues, as well as the various state compliance issues.While President Obama discussed this issue in his State of the Union speech in January, I can tell you that on the farm itself we have not felt much, much of any impact from a lessening of governmental regulations and paperwork.Clearly we need to have Government engaged in ensuring safety for consumers in the food they purchase, the roads they travel on, and environment.However, the current emphasis on simply putting more and more regulations and paperwork on farms and small businesses like mine is out of control.I will never regain the time I lost and continue to lose in making sure that I am compliant in everything that I have to file.So how can the Federal Government help New York state farm families like myself?First and foremost, just stop imposing new mandates.Follow the spirit of the Regulatory Review Commission that President Obama discussed and actually implement the recommendations to reduce the amount of time that I spend filing paperwork.Secondly, I would also like to suggest that the Federal Government wrap up its activity in redirecting farmland protection dollars to New York state.As stated, I serve on the Board of Directors of New York Agricultural Land Trust.It is clear to me that with the vulnerability of New York's farmland to development, they are acute by the barriers placed on farmers, by the cost of complying with regulatory mandates, the existing funds from the United States Department of Agriculture have not been directed to New York state as they have been to other states where the farmland is not so acutely in danger of being lost to parking lots and housing developments.When farmland is conserved in the local community not only does the land provide wildlife habitat and improved water quality, it also ensures that a locally produced food supply is secured and a family farm can remain with the land.I would strongly suggest that the formula that drives the allocation of funds to the various states be reviewed.With an eye towards towards ensuring that farmland that is particularly vulnerable, Especially on Long Island in the city of Syracuse in the Hudson River receive a priority.Thirdly, I would like to discuss one issue of the EPA that has me very concerned because of the precedent setting nature of the agency's actions.A section of Onondaga County is located in the Chesapeake Bay watershed.My farm is not located within that watershed, but the issue is very important to me.As my family is connected to other farm families who are in the watershed and rely on our farm to provide cow feed and to do custom work in planting for them.And that allows their farms to prosper and grow.While I am certainly not opposed to improve, to improving water quality in the Chesapeake Bay it strikes me as odd that all the environmental stewardship practices that I have put in place on my farm, and other neighbors have put on their farm, were not originally recognized in the EPA's overly zealous desire to clean up the bay by imposing strict regulations on agriculture.On my farm alone we have spent tens of thousands of dollars constructing a nutrient management storage facility and we are a partner in a community digest to provide waste from our farm and several other farms will help generate energy to county facilities.As a family farmer I and my neighbors care about the environment that we leave for our children.We are not going to tolerate sloppy behavior, nor are we going to fail to do what is right on our farms to protect the environment.Even when such practices are expensive to implement and are not paid for by the consumer dollar.However, the EPA's over reach on this issue is frightening to me and my fellow farmers, as with one single regulation originally proposed in the draft TNDL the EPA was willing to sacrifice over 900 farms in the Chesapeake Bay watershed.I am pleased that the state DEC and EPA in consultation with New York Farm Bureau and others came to an agreement to accept New York's watershed implementation plan.But I realize this plan may still impose significant regulatory burdens on some smaller family farms.So I need to urge you to continue to work for conservation dollars in the next farm bill cycle for the on the farm environmental stewardship measures.But the main point that I want to make is that knowing that Federal Government can act this precipitously and unfairly and jeopardize my own and my neighbors farm operation by issuing one poorly thought out regulation makes me lose sleep at night and question the long term ability of my family to keep our farm in operation for the next generation.The last issue that I want to discuss, discuss, is the need for a realistic, and not clogged with paperwork, guest worker program that you have already heard about from Mr. Reeves.Thank you for the opportunity to speak with you today and present testimony from the farmers perspective of the serious and ever increasing federal barriers to growth.I appreciate taking the time to listen to me and your consideration of my own time as a farm family business in New York state to try and reduce the time I spend in compliance cost.Thank you very much.Mr. De Maree, you're up.Good Afternoon.I appreciate being given the opportunity to discuss apple industry and labor concerns.Thank you for your attention.I am Tom De Maree, and I own and operate a 200 acre fruit farm in the town of Williamson, Wayne County.I'm also the current President of New York State Hort Society, and a past board member of the New York Apple Growers Association.We grow over 100,000 ap, 100,000 bushels of apples, as well as processing peaches and a few other stone fruits.We also own and operate cold storages on our farm.Six people work full time or part time on our farm, an additional 29 people depend on the seasonal work available through our farm to support their families.According to the New York State Orchard Survey, over 42,000 commercial acres of apples in the state.In the past 20 years growers have renewed this acreage at about 3%-4% a year.More than 65% of the New York apple acreage is in the southern counties on the South Shore of Lake Ontario.In the past four years most of the fresh apple growers in these counties have been replanting at a rate of 500-1300 trees per acre, which costs between 16, $6,500-$13,000 an acre.This means that apple growers in these counties over the past four years have invested around 46 million dollars in new apple orchards alone.Twice this amount is likely to have been invested in farm machinery, equipment, labor housing and other real estate improvements, as well as apple storages, packing lines, and other profit or marketing facilities over the same period.Our own operation has invested hundreds of thousands of dollars in capital improvements over the past four years.We spend over $5,000 an acre annually growing, harvesting, and delivering our fruit.Eighty percent which benefits the local economy.This is our sixth year using the H-2A program.Securing H-2A labor is expensive and increasingly fraught with Government red tape and stress.The US Department of Labor and the New York State Department of Labor in Albany are attempting to make this program so difficult that no one would chose to use it.Growers, however, have almost no choice but to use this program if they wish to secure legal employees skilled enough to perform the required work efficiently and on time.The Labor Department tells growers what they must put on the work orders, eliminating the experience requirements, requiring employers to tolerate employees missing up to five consecutive days of work without notifying an employer in advance.How are growers supposed to harvest each apple variety in an optimum quality when the workers can miss work without notifying the employer?The Department of Labor in Albany has also been requiring referrers to Puerto Ricans to be interviewed within 10 days.When these referred persons often have no experience working on a fruit farm.Growers should not have to argue with or petition DOL employees with no practical experience in operating a fruit farm about the experience required for fruit farm employees in a business producing perishable crops.Thousands of dollars were lost in New York fruit farms and their local economies last year because of delays in securing farm labor.Fruit was picked late and had a lower quality, plus a lower value.The failures of secure labor, or the loss of skilled labor during a critical planting, crop protection, or harvesting operation, results in financial losses that are not only jeopardizing farm business but also the local economy.Losses in apple quality jeopardizes both year round and part time employees income.Fruit growers need employees familiar with their particular grades, the market requirements those farms are attempting to meet, to secure the best possible price for each variety of fruit.Fruit growers do not want to train new employees annually.They want to retain trained employees.Untrained employees make expensive mistakes that today's businesses cannot afford.Workers also prefer to work with the same farm year after year.As time goes on there are fewer skilled people who are willing to move from place to place every 6-10 weeks to harvest crops as they mature.Given a choice most people would prefer to earn a living in one place, clean and dry environment that does not require continuous physical labor.I know that these issues are difficult and controversial at times, but growers must have some assurance that they will have a consistent skilled labor workforce available to them that would be willing to retain trained workers.Congressman Slaughter has been recently working as a strong advocate on behalf of growers in contacting the labor department to solve some of these problems.I would urge you to contact her office to work with her to get the H-2A program to be more responsive to the needs.Thank you very much for your time.Thank you very much.I thank you to all of our panelists.I sit here and I listen to your testimonies and I shake my head and I wonder how did we get to this point where you're subject to both the state as well as the federal regulations board.I want you to know that we we're sympathetic here and we would like to work with you.The issue that is recurring and recurring and I hear it from both the agriculture as well as the dairy industry is this H-2A program.And I would like to ask all of you if you in, if you could imagine what the perfect H-2A program would look like, if you could tell us what that would mean to you, and what would and ideal H-2A program look like.To me it would be able to, at the same time, apply to the state and the Federal Government, same form.They virtually ask for the same information.It's a Federal program so I think the Federal Department of Labor, the US Department of Labor, should supersede anything regulated by New York state.And at the same time, Homeland Security would be your next step.If the process takes 12-14 days, then lets give more than 30 days to process from beginning to end and not lie about it.What I have to do, and I shouldn't say this, but I'll tell you what I have to do.If I need workers on the first of March I have to turn around and say that I need them in the middle of February, the first of February.Because if everything goes well there is no way with the new system from the time I get the certification out of Chicago to the time I interview my workers I can do it in 30 days.And in my presentation you'll see a day breakdown on it, it's going to take 12-14 days for Homeland Security.I'm going to spend the next 5 days, this is if I'm sitting in my chair, and as soon as I get a notification I'm on the computer and going to work with scheduling appointments.You know, there's no day in between.It's over night stuff, everything else.So the next thing I do is go to CSC that day and say hey, I want to be able to schedule appointments.So what do they do?Five days later, if I ask them properly, you know if I miss one number or something like that, in five days they'll tell me, hey you missed a number.So then I redo it again with the number, and then in five days they'll say Okay now you can schedule.What I need is top to bottom a program developed with the farmers input.The people that have to work with it, have to make it work.We're left away from the table.I went to a seminar in December in Atlanta on the new program.The guy that developed this new program for the Department of State didn't want to hear anything from anyone.This was his deal, he knew what he was doing, and this was the way all the conflicts were gonna be.And to sit there in the room, we had state, we had Homeland Security there, we had Department of Labor there, representatives of the consulate, and Department of State.And Department of Labor couldn't believe when I set up and said what do you mean it takes 3 or 4 days for Homeland Security to process.It takes 12 days to 2 weeks, and here's 2 Federal branches that said no it doesn't, it's 3-4 days.I said, they cheat on their stamp on the form, that's how it's 3-4 days.But it's a 12-14 day process and you've got 2 Federal agencies that are working together with this who are unaware of it.You mentioned in your testimony about the Bush Administration, was there a difference in the standards and now it's changed?You mentioned you were at a conference about the change.The changes.Three days before President Bush left office he did an Executive Order that changed H-2A. He rolled back the wage, he, there were some pluses and minuses to it but it still was the best program yet.He streamlined the referrals.When you have to advertise to take applications he made it where when they hit your farm you don't have to take anymore applications and keep a record of them because all this period of time like 75 days up to that point his administration felt was adequate time to look for referrals in US work house.And that was changed actually, that was changed three days before he left office.And there's been three other changes back and forth since that one.So in three years we've had four changes.And the funny thing is, if you're a farmer, how do you turn around and say well I'm gonna H-2A this year but what's the law gonna be?When I was down in Atlanta in December the only thing we were handed out was the agenda for the meeting.There was not any handout the program south of the border had changed, the forms north of the border had changed, not one agent or farmer was given anything but the agenda for the meeting because here it was December 6th, and they didn't have this program ready to launch January 1.But yet, January 10th it took effect.I mean that's just ridiculous.Have you received any specifics since the January 10th implementation?No, it's, my brothers will tell you that I've lived in my living room on the computer, trying to find rules and regulations on where do I get the spreadsheet, how do I get the spreadsheet.The first, the spreadsheet is on it's third copy now.The first one, I wanted to schedule 22 workers and I called CSC and said your spreadsheet won't work, it's not formatted properly to take more than 17 workers cause 5 of the 22 that it would take were formatted properly.They told me you don't know what you're talking about.Cut and paste.And come right down through the country names that they had there.So I cut and paste 33 on there and did it electronically and they crashed in the system and it took 18 emails, 11 calls, and the problem was once the system made them up we can't sort them out.And, so this was a two and a half week process that should have been three days, but at least now they have a spreadsheet that pretty much working.But it's the third one since January.Thank you.I'm way over my five minutes Mr. Kelly, I'll yield to you.Thank you.Thank you Ms. Burkle, have you, you can take as much time as you want.And really we need to hear you for as long as you want to go because I know how frustrating it is.And I'm trying to understand, and I'm going to ask it this way.What's the reason for the EPA?Is there anybody finding anything that the EPA does, that makes sense to any of us?Now we all have state DEP's, that should have the primacy over how that, I would like to think that the local folks know a lot more about what the local issues are than somebody in Washington, D.C. that's never been here.And doesn't understand what it is that you do, what any of you do.So, if you can't, I mean this EPA issue is huge.It is huge.It is shutting down America as we go across the board.And I'm not just talking, I just wish.Let's, I wish we could tell you that it's only in agriculture.I spent two days with health care providers.Their problem is they can't see any reason to stay in the business.You talk to people in the banking business, the regulations are so onerous they're afraid to lend money to anybody because they don't know who is gonna come in and shut them down.And if this is the United States of America and we're more worried about internal conflict and internal regulation, than outside then we've got a real problem.But tell me on this EPA thing because this is absolutely incredible, and I don't think the American public has any idea what you go through.You know what, they ride down the interstate and they see these beautiful farms and say God I'd love to do that.That's got to be fun.But, just from listening to you folks.I mean at some point there's an old saying don't worry about the mule just load the wagon.I think the mule's about ready to unhitch himself.The only thing I can say, all three of us here we do what we do because we just like to be farmers, bottom line.And we've just all been pulled away from what we like to do because of all these regulations and the paperwork and I'm sure his brothers are really ticked at him a little bit because he's not out there with them.Cause of the paper we're working.I'm sure hoping that you're listening and you can find answers for us because I certainly don't understand it all.It's just evolved in the last 10-20 years to such a, such a critical mass of paperwork and regulations and we're just not let, we just can't farm anymore.Let me ask you something, cause Ms. Burkle asks this question all the time.If you knew then what you knew now, would you be doing what you're doing?Well, you can see I'm not the youngest one here.I'm neither - We're starting to question if this is any fun anymore.And when my husband says it's not any fun anymore to farm.That's serious.That's a key phrase and I've heard from more farmers in the last 2-3 years.And my brothers and I say the same thing.The fun is out of agriculture.I mean, it used to be with the seasonal business you could go on vacation in the winter.Or, there is none of this any longer.You're just bogged down with regulations.You're bogged, we had DEC the other day with going through the DEC audit and that's another deal that's necessary, you know.It's an absolute necessary thing.But, also a lot of the regulations they're requiring out of you are absolutely absurd.And on, you know, on your sprayer you've gotta have a label in a bag on the sprayer, not only in the cab, because if you drive across the road and a car or something hits you.They have to be able to see what's in that tank and every time they're telling you about these regulations and these changes they're also reminding you what the fine is gonna be if you don't do it.And they seem more fine oriented than they are production oriented.And that's difficult for the agriculture mind to understand.We're not into do this or you're gonna get fined we're into lets take a proactive approach and lets get this done.I think there's an awful lot of regulation coming both from Washington and New York state combined.Doesn't matter which Government you're referring to.I've been in the business 30 years.Thirty years ago we could farm.And not necessarily doing anything that we're differently than we are today, but we have to certify it.We have to fill out forms.We have to follow regulations.It isn't changing anything that we're really, truly doing, other than we're spending time filing out forms to tell somebody else in Albany or Washington what it is that we're doing.And it's the same practices, the same things that we're doing, we're not, we're not doing anything different.We're not improving anything.There's no improvements to our fruit, or dairy, or vegetables, or whatever.But we're just having to spend more and more and more of my time, my wife's time in following paperwork.Following rules, doing things, doing things that somebody else says that we have to do.That isn't changing anything isn't improving how the fruit is grown, how the vegetables are grown, or how the milk is produced.It isn't different.It's all been the same and hasn't changed in 30 years.It's the same, and yet we're spending, I'm spending 10 hours a week just doing forms and reading new rules and regulations.Albany just came down with a new set of rules that you have to file a new form every time there's a change in an employee status.If an employee works, has a work agreement with us that says they're gonna work 45 hours.If you work 48 hours last week I have to get a new paperwork and fill out a new form because his hours changed.That's how crazy the system has gotten to be.Because some where along the line somebody got taken advantage of.Probably.I won't say that it isn't good, isn't the way that it should be, but when you start making everybody try to solve problems because of one incident the world is gonna come to a stop because you can't regulate everything.Every problem, every issue, out of reality, so.I appreciate your testimony because I find it absolutely intriguing that a business that runs somewhere between a trillion three and a trillion five a year in the red has the audacity to come in and tell you how to run your business My question really comes down to if any of these people that come in and set the bar, and I asked the last group this.The people that set the standards, have any of them actually done anything in agriculture?I mean actually been in farming.No, no.Absolutely not.Okay.So this is a software program that somebody puts on their laptop and tells you what you're gonna do.Absolutely.And as it was said a few minutes ago, the H-2A program that we're using to have labor that's legal, and I can sleep at night knowing that I'll have a workforce there tomorrow that ICE isn't going to come in and take them away because I thought it was legal.They showed me documents that determined to be legal, but they weren't.They can come in and take my workforce away and my crop will fall on the ground and I'll have no recourse.This is the program I'm using so that I can sleep at night knowing that I can get a crop picked of apples and yet we have all kinds of problems trying to secure a legal workforce.And no body wants to hear when you try to talk to somebody about what's been said, no body wants to hear what your problem is.Absolutely no body wants to hear what your problem is.They know better in the agencies that you're dealing with than what I do when I'm trying to do my job.And that's a very, very frustrating thing.And we spend more time right now on organizations and telephoning the people that are sitting here.We spend more time in organizations trying, trying just to keep a toe in the door in trying to keep some of this regulations at bay and no body wants to hear us.Do you ever have an audience with any of these folks?This alphabet soup of people that show up, whether it's EPA, DED, whoever it is.Any of them ever give you the audience to sit down and discuss with you what your problems are and what the common fixes would be from the people who actually do it?No. So, other than seeing Ms. Burkle and myself you really wouldn't have a chance to talk to a Government that pretty much dictates how you run your business.I've been to Washington and the last Congress and the organization that I'm president of has been to Washington this year, and I've been there last year and talked about these same issues and it's just the same thing over and over and over again that we keep asking for relief and don't get anywhere.Every time, virtually every time they make the program different, they make it more difficult.They don't make it easier, they make it more difficult.Because, the mindset is that we're going to put, we're going to reduce the unemployment rate, so we're not going to allow foreign nationals to come in and work in this country.That, that's the mindset of what's going on in this program.That's where the whole problem with this program is.Is that the mindset is that we don't want this program, because we want to put US Citizens to work.My business and every body's business, is a short window of time that we need people.I can't hire somebody for 6-8 weeks or 10 weeks.Put on 30 employees for 8-10 weeks and then tell them that they can't work anymore because I don't have anything else for them to do.There's, who's going to come to work for me for 10 weeks for 40-50 hours a week depending on how the week goes.And then tell them at the end of the 8-10 weeks well I'm sorry I don't have anymore work.Where do they go?What do they do?How do I hire somebody that's only going to work for me for 8-10 weeks a year?That's my business, that's what I'm in, and that's what I have to face.And that's why this program gives me that opportunity to try and bring somebody in that isn't out of our country, that has people willing to work.And yet nobody wants to seem to help us make that system work at least reasonably well for us.Thank you.Safety's a big issue.And we're deep in the food safety with daily deliveries, fresh produce all the while.And fortunately this year, thank you, we're able to get 100% return workers from Mexico.What this does, and people don't understand it.The US Department of Labor and state doesn't.This is critical because our food safety program has standards, everything we harvest in the field has a written standard that has to be followed and inspected twice a year.Our workers return, they know the standard, it's the same thing, they follow the procedure, we go through the inspections, we do a great job of food safety.This is why it's critical to have continuity in your workforce, and not have to, I mean.Imagine having the same workers as last year and have to jump though all these hoops to try to get them back and hope that you get them back.And it's all tied in with everything else, the food safety issue.Life, wildlife, I have to monitor wildlife in our fields.On a daily basis and keep a log.If I see a goose I have to document where I saw it, and how I chased it off.Same with a deer.This is the safety, these are the food safety requirements that Walmart, Price Chopper, and Wegmans, and it's good.They're looking out for the consumer and we don't mind that.But there has to be somewhere, some one our side and a lot of it's our own fault.I think labor, myself, is the biggest issue in agriculture.Number two is perception.You know, the news media is as guilty as anyone else.Look at an agriculture commercial on television.Green Giant and here's five guys picking sweet corn in peach boxes.Here's a Stouffers commercial, I think it's Stouffers.Here's a guy growing peppers and on the other side of the fence is a dairy farmer.Now isn't that ridiculous?You can't have that anywhere near anything, and we tolerate it.PicRite, here's a company that's owned by a farmer.He's got an old John Deere 430 cultivating in a field and says that's my business manager, as soon as he gets finished plowing.I wrote him a letter stating this is bad for agriculture.We're high tech, we're an industry, an industry to be reckoned with.We've got to stop this.He sent me a certificate for a 12 ounce bag of frozen veggies.But, we are our own worst enemy.We are high tech.I'm proud of what I do for a living.I've worked in industry, nothing has been as challenging as what agriculture is.You do all this and you deal with the weather beside.We need to do a better job of advertising the technology in our business, the education it takes to run a business like this and run it successfully, and we need to pound it into the media also.Get out there on the farm and do a story.Follow though one of these audits in the field on food safety.Look at what we're doing in agriculture and we should not any longer tolerate these commercials that degrade agriculture and the farmers and make us look like a bunch of country hicks.Because no one is going to be successful in farming any longer if they don't have an education and they don't have the ability to put two and two together and take a proactive approach for the future.I guess they do.That's exactly, I mean it is exactly how so many of us feel and that agriculture today.That we're the Green Acres generation, back with the pitch forks and bib overalls and riding around, and you know, that's the perception that we work against.In, well, but it can be also in a regulatory agencies that we deal with.Is that the mind set is, is that agriculture in this country is run by a bunch of hillbillies.Pardon the reference to anybody that takes offense to it, but that's exactly how it's felt.As I said in my statement, when somebody else sitting at a desk in Albany or Washington can tell me how to fill out and what I have to put in my work order and what a work order can and cannot have in it.And is telling me that my business will operate because of what this work order has in it, how am I going to survive?I can tell you today that the generation that's working my farm is the last generation that's going to work that farm.I'll end by saying, and I told you our milk is sold to Byrne Dairy, which is a local business.I'm really glad these two guys are still in business because I appreciate local food.And I'm glad to know where it's coming from and how it's produced.And I hope all the rest of you do the same.Well I'm just gonna finish up now that my turn back is broke.Keep your passion and don't give it up.Because, I'm telling you, the way we'll fix it is by staying on message and not getting distracted.I know it's hard to do, and I know every day you wonder why I keep doing this and how much longer can I do it.Just keep in mind, if we don't get it fixed here there's no other place in the world it can be fixed.So, lets just make sure we all stay on target and we'll get this fixed.It's gonna take a lot of fight from all of us.Thank you for being here I appreciate your bravery for being here.And taking the time out of what you do every day and spend it with us.Thank you.Thank you.Thank you Mr. Kelly And I would like to thank all of you as well.I too would like to echo Mr. Kelly's comments.If you quit, they win.So this is about preserving all that you've worked for, we want you to know how much we appreciate your efforts and for you to be here today and to take time off from your busy schedules.We'd like to work with you.We'd like to continue this dialog.We'd like to take your message to Washington, which we will.I failed to introduce, we have members here from the Oversight Government Reform Staff, so they're listening and working with us as well.So we will take this message to Washington, it won't stop here in this room, we want to encourage you.Please work with us and dialog with us and lets continue to get this job done.Thank you all very much for being here.Thank you.Thank you.Thank you very much for your time.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/gov.house.ogr.20110420.2.3.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/gov.house.ogr.20110420.2.3.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/gov.house.ogr.20110420.2.3.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/gov.house.ogr.20110506.3/gov.house.ogr.20110506.3.mp3", "text": "Sure.In California, you talked for a minute about the tragedy with the BP blowout in the Gulf of Mexico.Being from Texas, let's talk a little bit about the Gulf of Mexico if you wouldn't mind.The us oil companies aren't the only ones drilling the Gulf of Mexico, are they?I don't believe so, but I have to be honest with you.Our purview includes only the Western United States, and I'm not familiar with who's operating in the Gulf of Mexico.I believe -- - As a lawyer, I don't ask a question, I provide the answer to.And you've actually got the China drilling off the Coast of Cuba.You've got the state oil company in Mexico that's drilling in the Gulf of Mexico as well.So regardless of what amount of regulation we put on our domestic oil companies, we're not gonna have any effect on what China and Mexico are doing.We can't change the way they drill.Would that be an accurate statement?I think that's correct, sir.I think that the chairman mentioned too, that while we are seeing the prices at these very high levels apparently related to the unrest in the Middle East, the longer term picture is the not just these other emerging economies are very actively and aggressively out in the world market looking for new production opportunities.They're buying a tremendous amount of oil and it's creating upward pressure.So, do you think a better regulatory scheme or better wade for the taxpayers to spend their money, rather than making it more difficult for y'all to drill in the gulf and compete and make permitting and all these regulations might be to invest a little bit of time and money in some response, training, and technology, so in the event, something happened in a well owned by or operated by another country, we'd be able to respond to that as well as if something happened locally?I lost the question, I followed up.I know.Rather than putting excessive regulation on our domestic companies, making it difficult for them to compete, let's say in the Gulf of Mexico.And where you've got Mexico and China also drilling.If something happens on a Mexican or in a Chinese drilling rig, and there's a blowout or a leak or something, wouldn't be better off rather than spending our time and effort regulating domestic companies coming up with responses that would benefit any worldwide oil company?I think the US oil and gas industry has led the world in developing those kinds of responses.In California, of course, we have a huge resources on standby, 24/7 to respond and have developed along with other regions of the country.This technology that really is used worldwide to respond to any accidents that occur.All right, well, I'm overtime.I'll let everybody else get their turns, but I would like another round of questions.I assure you, we will, as long as our witnesses are willing to indulge us, we would like to learn all we can.Mr. McCarthy.Well, I thank all the witnesses for their testimony.And it really comes down to why we're having the hearing, why we're having this challenge.We use more energy than we produce in this country.Having said that, that means we have to get it from somewhere else.So we pay for it's from where else.The challenge that I've always faced in this job is there's many times we think in California, we realize other states compete with us.We had the ability to say which state produces more than others.We watch every day, maybe a company leave California somewhere else 'cause they maybe get a little better place.We never really think that America competes with other countries, but we do.And energy is probably the number one industry that you can find that to happen.If we make it harder here, we will still buy it somewhere else.Now this country has faced a lot of challenges.And normally when we face a challenge, we meet a goal and we go forward.We've done that in World War II. We achieved our goal.When we found it that Russia went to space first, we made a goal for us in a decade, we will go to the moon.And we faced our attention on that.For too long in energy, we only face our attention when the problem gets too big.And then we'll put our attention there.Then we forget about it when it comes down so you don't have the ability to go there.If anybody's ever lived in a community that has oil, you've seen the booms in the bust.If you lived in this community, you watched a time where the cost to lift it was more than the barrel you could even sell it for, but you could not shut it down.So you had to maintain it.I have found that the country gets very divided.Now, a time that we all get united is usually during the Olympics.Why?Because we cheer for our country.We never ask them whether they're Republican or Democrat.But the other reason why we cheer so strong is because America gets a level playing field.If we do a hundred yard dash, we all start at the same starting line and we all have the same finishing line.So we've gotta think from that mindset too.When we make stuff more difficult here, someone else can still be drilling someplace else but have different protections on the coast than we would have.And so taking some of that, I thought some of this ability of what I saw here today, I loved the presentation where you actually shown how it was going.Now, technology has changed.And probably the best analogy I've heard from somebody, if you think of a bath tub and you fill it with water, picture that underground, that that's a natural resource.Our old way of doing it was putting a lot of straws into the bathtub and trying to get that water out.Horizontal is fundamentally different.Now we get to just go to the drain and use one.So that's one over the land.And that's one ability to bring it up in a different capacity.And it's environmentally safer.When oil was first discovered in Kern County, it was out in Taft.It was a lake.There's pictures of people in a boat, not of water, but of oil.It's a fundamental different place of where we have it now and how our protections.But I wanna take that technology a little further and I wanna follow up with Mr. Witson.When you do the fracking, you had shown in your graph 'cause there has been, some people bring up the issue about the water table and the protection.If you can walk me through that one more time to show where fracking goes and where the water table is and what protections we have and going using the technology.Great question, congressman.Water tables or the aquifers that are drinkable are essentially shallow and with very few exceptions, as I indicated, a few hundred feet below the surface.The States require, and we with our practices implement a very strict regimen of sealing off those water sources at the surface or close to the surface with multiple layers of steel and cement.And then the frack job is done through those layers that seal off the water.And when you normally do the fracking, how further down is that from the water table itself?Thousands of feet in most cases.Certainly 15,000 feet is not uncommon.We at Devon are doing eight to 10 to 12,000 feet.And so you're well below, far below the water sources.In Canada, I will mention too, and this goes to other things we're doing to try to protect both water quality and quantity and quality.We actually in our heavy oil operations in Canada have found ways to use non-potable water.So we use now fresh water to generate steam.And we're trying to find areas where we can do things like that all the time, because we are very much in tune with concerns that are very legitimate, particularly in the West about water issues.We also try recycling where we can.We do it where we can, and we also blend water.So we use flowback water to put in the next job, if we are able to do that.And we're making progress on that technology all the time as well.Now, we all know that one form of energy is not gonna get us out.As we also know that as advancements goes, we will have renewables that have great potential for the future, but we need that bridge.The challenge that we have is that we have to have a policy that allows us with the ebbs and flows of the cost to actually bring the cost down because our economy, 70% of is based on consumption.With the price of oil rising so rapidly, what happens is people are still paying that cost of the business and they're taking the consumption out of the economy.So our economy drops.But that price still goes someplace else and it goes out to another economy.So, Rock you brought up inside talking about the taxes that they are very similar in the same taxes based upon any other business.I wish if you could explain that a little further.Well, there's been a lot of discussion about whether or not oil companies received subsidies.And I was trying to make the distinction between a subsidy and a tax treatment.In fact, first of all, the actual components that are within the administration's budget that they wanna eliminate target independent producers, not major oil.So that's the first distinction.Most of those tax treatments are not available to the major integrated oil companies.They're only for the independence.But the second and more important point that I was trying to make is a subsidy is a cash payment from the government for doing some sort of activity.It's quite different if you are having a debate within the IRS about how to treat a certain expense.And we'd be happy to have that debate, but keep in mind the only way that you have this debate and the only way that you have these expenses, if you're deploying capital.And that's exactly what our companies are doing is they're deploying capital.And the question is how best can they redeploy the new capital?And that's what a lot of these tax treatments were designed for given the fact that this is highly risky.It's very expensive and our energy security depends on it.The taxes in the '10s and '20s, a hundred years ago were designed in order to encourage the rapid re-investment of this capital back into new oil and drilling programs.And that's exactly what we experienced.So, if you do not invest the risk, you cannot get the tax?That's correct.Governor, can I just add one point here, please, sir.Yes.We will just inject four for Devon.And we are a large independent exploration production company.The recent proposals by the administration just on the intangible drilling costs, which are the real cost as Rock has pointed out of drilling a well, it's clearing the land during the environmental remediation.If those proposals were put in place, it would cost Devon about a billion dollars in the first year.And that would equate to our complete drilling program in the Barnett Shale that I mentioned was where the shale revolution really started.And it's the most prolific area in the country.To us, we have to say, what is that all about?That looks to us like it is totally a wrong-headed policy that actually would penalize the companies that are most efficient at producing domestic resources that power this nation.I wanna go to assembly we've engraved because she has witnessed one and kind of all your presentation from the redundancy of regulation, not just with oil, with renewables trying to find from wind and solar out in East Kern.But from our own personal, in a business, finding out because of what California does, where you're setting a business in another state.I wonder if you could touch on, one, the redundancy that what you are viewing outside into the district as well for the our ability to produce more energy in America.Thank you.In all due respect, I'd like to address just one thing prior to, we talked about taxes or a tax that you guys were just addressing.Industry, meaning the oil industry pays an average of 41.4% of tax.And if California liberal politicians have their way, what we're fighting up in that building right now, and they get a 12.5% oil severance, tax it'll increase the industry's tax to 53.9%.Now to give that number some perspective, if you take Apple in 2010, they paid 28% of its revenue or profit to the government, Apple did.And while it generated more profits than Chevron.So in perspective, industry is being punished on a tax base than other employment agents or industries.And if you go back to Mr. Chair, you had a question earlier about the average products are good and profit.And those of us that have been business know that, somebody could say, well, you run a $25 million a year corporation, but after you pay payroll taxes, workers comp liability insurance, and you go down to the net profit, it's around a hundred thousand dollars, not in the millions.So if you take Apple, for instance, again, in a comparison, the average product sold are about 25% above the cost of materials and production for marketing and sales.And then if you use that for the same in comparison to with Exxon, Exxon's profit margins in comparison were about 8.7%.And that's hardly the windfall that people are proclaiming.If you take the oil industry as a whole, they have 11.5% basic on profits and making that 45th most profitable industry of the year.That is hardly close to the top 10.So just to clarify those two things.And then back to your question, Mr. McCarthy, I'm sorry.From a business standpoint, being a third sometimes fourth-tier contractor for the oil industry, the job multiplier that we have, and I ran on jobs.We have 2.5 million people unemployed in the State of California, which affects our federal revenue as well.And when I ran on jobs and you look at what industry can place in these jobs, you talk about the job multiplier.A lot of the individuals in this testimony have referenced the oil industry jobs, and I'm gonna name a few local companies.If you take one oil field job and a platform, you have engineers that and you have site engineers, you have chemical engineers, you have mechanical engineers.You have people that are the job multipliers, what I call 'em.If you build a site, you have an excavation crew, a site crew, a gravel crew.The gravel is produced someplace mainly in one of the facilities that we have, either on the Great Vine or in Mojave.You have a trucking companies that transport that gravel to the site.You have everything from all those companies that are supported by oil or big oil, small oil, independent oil.These are small businesses that thrive on this industry.You have people that supply more paper and pencils and product like from Stinson's or O'Leary's.You got simple things like Monuts, Speedway Market, where 90% of the people that go to work in the oil field stop and purchase stuff from her for their daily consumption of food and breakfast.So when you look at the small business that thrives on this industry, the jobs that are created and not created from private business, because of the limitations with permit delays and through the division of oil and gas, or I've seen projects delayed out in the oil industry where a blunt nose, leopard lizard is onsite and they cautioned tape it off, and everybody sits around and waits for this lizard to leave.Mr. Layton talked about a description of a job that's being delayed, where the activity of this blunt nose lizard is in certain times of the year.So you just have to stop working until this lizard finds its way to another location, or goes into some type of hibernation.Those things don't make any sense when it comes to job creation.The oil industry and job creators are very conscious of things that need to be done to protect our environment and our land, but California and Department of Fish and Game and federal EPA is way overreaching and have become completely unreasonable to the hindrance or full out assault against private sector job creation.Assembly woman, if I could follow up on that, is there really any difference in your estimation between the crazy or the excesses you're describing in oil and the same excesses that are occurring that are delaying green energy rollout?Because this is also an area of the state that has the potential to provide an awful lot of solar and other energy.Don't you find the same thing to be true, that the same self-inflicted wounds are hurting our ability to reach any reasonable goal of renewables?It's exactly true.And it's not only in renewable in the energy you take in East Kern, which I represent as well.There was a solar plant that wanted to put a solar facility in the Mojave Desert, where the Sun is.And it was not able to do that because of a Mojave ground squirrel.You look at industry, just private business industry across from development.I have a developer in Taft who's had a certain piece of property who cannot develop that property and provide affordable housing in Taft, where we have a large oil production area because of squirrels that live on that property.And he has to tag 'em and put a little Lantana on 'em and transfer 'em to double the amount of property.It's so the environment -- - We saw that on Animal Planet.It was very impressive, the tracking.Just not very productive for mankind, I guess it isn't.It is not, and not productive for job creation in our state and in our nation.I recently had the opportunity to go to Texas, and it was very interesting -- - You'd see the governor, I understand.I did.I got to meet Governor Perry.And what was interesting is that we talked to the department of railroad oversees their permit process in Texas.For some, I'm not really sure about that 'cause the railroad and the permit process.And I'm keeping the same environmentally protections, protecting our land and being conscious of our planet.They issue permits within two to five days, project permits, where we're sometimes delayed for up to years.That and then the environmental delays with species, endangered species on these projects and properties causes jobs that we desperately need here in our state and our nation to be delayed as well.Rock, you said something and I want to try to put it in the record in a way that people that are not involved in the oil industry would understand.I came from the electronics industry.We watched the government come up with is interesting one that our patents, if we had a patent and we went through and we paid the legal fees, we had to amortize the patent.Over the life of the patent, all the costs we paid to the lawyers.So you pay the lawyers today, you finally get your patent.And by the way, if they turned down the patent, you could write it off.But if you actually had something worthwhile, so you got it.You had to amortize all.Then if you had to sue somebody to defend your patent, you had to put all of that into if you will, a longterm depreciation schedule, because the government wanted your profits today even if you had spent them in trying to create profits for the future.Isn't that basically the same kind of wrong minded thinking that American companies are seeing, except in your case, it's a drill bit that when you double the drill bit and you break a bunch of equipment as you're drilling down and you set it aside, you send it off to salvage.It's gone, you've spent, you bought it, you paid for it, you spent it, and you disposed of it.They now want you to amortize that over the useful life of the oil well.Isn't that essentially what, 'cause you say intangible.And to me, money out of my pocket that I know I spent that they want me to pretend I didn't spend for 20 years.That's not intangible.Is that the intangible we're talking about here today?That's exactly right.We're talking about mud, cement testing, some drilling operations that you're talking about.All things that are happening before a well is completed or any production has come online.What's amazing is America is a funny place.We talk about how we support business.We really care about it, but people in Washington in my position have done some amazing things.I was in private business when NAFTA was passed.And whether you're for or against NAFTA?One day I found out NAFTA had been signed and I found out as a result of NAFTA, I was gonna have to wire transfer weekly.My payroll, withholding taxes instead of sending in a check.And the reason was because your predecessor, Bill Thomas and all the other guys, they had a couple of billion they needed in revenue to make NAFTA pencil out.So they got it by accelerating the speed with which every business in America would send money to the government.Now it only scores a one-time event 'cause they've just accelerated the speed, which they got it from a couple of weeks or a quarter for small companies to immediate.We're still doing that today.And it's one of the frustrations I have.I want your industry to expense everything absolutely, that is consumed.I certainly want you to capitalize your long-term assets.If you've got a casing there, it's reasonable to have it over the life, but I want your capital be put back to work as quickly as possible.I want Devon Energy to have a smaller bank line or put in more wells.And the amazing thing is I can't get my government to go along and I can't even get the ways and means committee to go along.But let me go to another question that I wanted to understand, because fracking, which is not new technology, isn't what we're talking about here today.What we're talking about is better fracking, is that right?That's correct.And new applications of fracking.And if I understood correctly, if we're concerned about the watershed, we've been concerned about it for 60 years because you've been fracking for 60 years.Correct.And we've sort of, we should know we shouldn't need Secretary Chu to endlessly study something you've been doing for 60 years.Let me understand something, when you go down once, but you go far further as far as what you yield, the only difference in that is that you only have one area of risk, which is that casing for far greater gain.Is that correct?The casing is placed for a couple of reasons.The one that we've been talking about obviously is to protect the water sources.That's primary and it happens in every well.There are other applications of casing to prevent the hole from collapsing and those kinds of things.But the fact is, and what I think you're alluding to is that we've been doing this for a long time.The technology gets better.The materials get stronger, the knowledge of how we do this and how many times we do it along that horizontal length of pipe, it all improves and we are seeing remarkable efficiency gains.And one more thing that that is really remarkable today is we're doing much more of what we call pad drilling, where we can actually do these multiple horizontal wells from one surface location so that we don't have to disturb the surface, multiple places around this gas field.So again, the technology just continues to improve.That's what I was leading to.And I appreciate your clarifying my question about question because this is something where I'm still learning what you've spent a lifetime knowing.You've got less exposure to the watershed because you're going down less times for the total amount you're getting.Correct.Your risk of course always is when you first drill through a water area until you get it sealed and you're comfortable, and all the tests have done, there's always some risk.Let's just say, hypothetically, that you hit oil because something, one of the occasions they're well much closer than you thought it would be.But you've eliminated all that risk before you start going horizontal.So in a sense, horizontal is getting more from this already mitigated small risk that you had when you first drilled what I guess in Oklahoma is, what is it?1.2 million wells they've drilled or something.We've drilled a lot of wells and fracked a hundred thousand of them in Oklahoma.But also the other point I would make to congressmen is that in these shale plays in particular, which is really the revolutionary thing now.Once we are there -- - It's heavy by the way.Anyone that didn't pick this up, when I send it back down, you gotta figure it, this is pretty darn dense rock.It's pretty amazing that we're actually getting the gas to migrate through that rock to the wellbore.And what I was gonna say is that also, when we are doing this in these shale plays, it almost becomes a in those particular areas, something that we can replicate with less and less, almost zero risk.Of course, there's always some, but I think in the Barnett Shale, I don't think we've had a dry hole in thousands of wells for Devon.But that's because we finally nailed this technology.It's right to your point that it's American ingenuity, it's innovation trying to put these things together in different ways in these different shale place.I'm gonna only have about two more questions, but they're gonna probably be ambiguous.So steer me through to the right answer on the question of a question.When you used to go down and try to find a pocket of gas, methane, et cetera, et cetera, all the combinations of what you'd find down there, it was hide and go seek.And when you found it, it could be quite a surprise.There was a risk because this is volatile.You don't know what pressure you're gonna poke into and so on.You're out of that business for the most part.You're going into a low pressure depth into rock rather than into big pocket of gas with this technology.Isn't that true?Well, the pressures do vary.There are some high pressure areas and lower pressure areas.And I would say too that as was mentioned earlier, along with the improvement in the completion techniques that the fracking and the drilling of the wells, we have had very significant and continue to have very significant seismic and geophysics type of technology improvements.And again, it's putting all that together so that we know where we're gonna find resources more accurately, and we can drill fewer wells to find them have more success.The reason I asked that question is like, most people who don't know your technology be watched TV. I had watched some years ago about what happens, if you hit that pocket and you shatter the impermeable layer that had kept it there for a long time, you can in fact, have natural gas flowing freely to the surface.And that has happened a few times in history, at least enough for television to capture it.In the case of this technology, you're going through the impermeable layer, through the sand that was already there, back into the core rock that had not released it.So in a sense, it's a much safer operation because you're you're not up against, if you will, the great protection against gas free flowing up.It's much safer.And it's much safer for other reasons as well, which is that our materials and our processes and our practices are so much better today as we've learned through the years because of the very incidents that you've talked about.Now, one last question for you and then Rock's got an answer for a question that I asked earlier, I think.This is a heck of a solid piece of rock.I looked at your presentation and as I look at you going diagonally here and then there, I get the feeling that there's no question, you're releasing more than otherwise was released.Is there available technology or available percentage you could give me?What did we used to get when we just caught what happened to bubbled up and was sitting there under the withholding chamber?What are we getting today when you frack typically?And how much is really down there if you continue to improve your fracking to where you can sort of get it all?Well, I don't know how to answer the first part of the question in a global sense, but if you look at that one slide, there's a very dramatic representation from one area.But I will say that the Potential Gas Committee, and these are the resource estimators that are the experts in this country and really known worldwide, they've just come out with yet another estimate of more natural gas that's recoverable in this country.Something on the order of probably in North America, 2,500 trillion cubic feet, and we use 20 trillion or so a year now.So you can see it's well more than a hundred years.It continues to grow with technology.And that's gotta be exciting for the country.Well, certainly for those of us who heard that we were gonna get our last drop of oil or our last drop of gas, and we were going to need renewables already because it was all gonna be gone to find out that there's plenty more.And obviously I'm excited about oil because I don't want us importing oil from unfriendly areas.But I'm even more excited about natural gas 'cause all the green lobbyists who have ever come to see me and many have, they all talk about how if we could just get off that dirty coal and get onto clean natural gas what the benefit would be.Thank you for what your company's doing to take us from X carbon per BTU, to a fraction of what it would be if we go from coal to natural gas.And Rock, you get the last answer to that question.Well, I just wanted to mention another application of the directional drilling.And that is offshore California.Offshore production is a very emotional issue on the West Coast.But I wanted people to be cognizant of the fact that you can utilize this technology off shore California.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/gov.house.ogr.20110506.3.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/gov.house.ogr.20110506.3.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/gov.house.ogr.20110506.3.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/gov.house.ogr.20110420.1.1/gov.house.ogr.20110420.1.1.mp3", "text": "Trying to pull them back a little bit.Lastly, I just want to touch on OSHA. OSHA has, in the past, been somewhat collaborative in how they work with employers to ensure job site safety.But they have very publicly advertised a much different approach, which is really enforcement driven.They're focusing on finding work site violations and issuing substantial fines, instead of working collaboratively with us as employers, to promote the overall safety of our workplaces.This is pretty clear, in the construction industry specifically.This new approach is just another costly burden that we, as a business, have to deal with.And it really creates a level of financial uncertainty for us, that really requires us to hold back in terms of any sort of expansion.The other issue is, right now, when OSHA finds a violation on a work site, only the employer, is fined, for that violation.I would encourage OSHA to look for collaborative ways to work with employers and employees, who do have a level of responsibility in their own safety and the safety of those who they work with, to come up with programs that will help to encourage that level of safety.Creating those types of programs, instead of seeking to financially cripple businesses to coerce safety.Really, I believe would result in safer workplaces, overall.So, I would encourage Congress, again, to look at ways to help OSHA to return to their collaborative and cooperative spirit of working with employers, instead of the punitive approach that they are currently taking.Again, I want to thank you for the opportunity to share some of these issues.I do just want to point out Vice Chairwoman, Berkel, you're my congressional representative, and I'm thrilled that you are.And I remember in your campaign, you ran on the statement that government does not create jobs, business does.And it really is paramount that government realize that they are there to create the type of environment that we as businesses need to grow and prosper and contribute to the economy.And I can't thank you enough for allowing us to bring some of these things to light in hopes that we can resolve them and work together to help to restore our economy.So thank you very much for the opportunity to be here today.Thank you very much for your comments.Mr. Pollock.Good morning.Good morning, and thank you for inviting me.I'm the President of Optimation Technology, which is a privately held ESOP owned company.And we are in the business of designing and building factories.So that puts us in the manufacturing sector.During the period from 2000 to late 2008, we grew the company from 50 employees to 350 employees.What we have discovered is that, even when manufacturing isn't as strong as it could be, if you have good automation and good tools, that you can keep competitive manufacturing going in the United States.And if you look at the statistic, of course you know that Monroe County is a great exporter of all kinds of manufactured goods around the world.We can manufacture at Optimation, things which are sold competitively all over China and Taiwan and Japan and Korea and Singapore and other places.So, it is a good place to be here.The difficulty, as you've asked us to talk about is, what is the government doing to hold us back?That's what I like to talk about a bit today.I can remember distinctly the morning of July 12th, 2010, and that was the morning I came into work early as usual, ready to get going.I opened my mail from the day before, and there was a registered letter there from the Department of Labor, the U.S. Department of Labor.And in the letter, they had lots of big words, and they talk about administration and enforcement and title one and how that they were established there to make sure that compliance was held.Now, it's not only the case, that there's plenty of compliance issues going on at the federal level, there's lots of audits going on at the federal level.This letter was announcing an audit of the Optimation technology, medical health care plan.The secretary shall have the power in order to determine which person, if any person has violated or is about to violate any provision of the title of a regulation.Now, when I read that, basically what it said was, that they were there coming to audit our health care plan.And that we had seven days to produce 28 documents, and answer four pages of questions.And of course, we buy the health care plan from MVP or Excellus.We don't create the health care plan.But now we have to take all the books, read through, become experts of the health care plan.And we have seven days to respond to this, or we're going to be subpoenaed in violation.We asked for an extension.We were told that three days was the maximum extension you could have.Now, at that point in time, when I got that letter, I will be honest with you, that was the first time I actually seriously considered throwing in the towel.And I sent an email to my vice president, saying it's really not worth it, we should just give it up.This letter was the seventh audit we have received from a governmental agency in 2010.And we're only in July.We were in the middle of an IRS audit, that had begun in May.And when the IRS auditor arrived, I said to him, first thing, we gave him 40,000 pages of transaction files.so he could peruse through and start looking for things.How long are you going to be here?He said, six months.And then began, We gave him an office.We gave him a coffee.We moved him in.Began the ordeal.Every day I go down and he would ask questions and we produce more documents.I will say at the end of the IRS audit, whilst partway through, I thought we were almost wrapping up.And he said, no, we've talked this over, we'd like to audit another tax year.They did stay for five and a half months.At which point in time we got a letter from them, which said that there were no findings and that everything was fine.And in truth, we got through the department of labor audit, as well.And all the other audits.We had no fines and no punitive actions.And in truth, these audits were put there really in compliance issues.They may have been looking to find money, as Becky has implied, but they didn't find anything from us.We are very good at responding to audits.We are very good at staying in compliance.We're very good at creating jobs and creating factories as well.But when our energy is sucked off to do things, which are counterproductive to the business, essentially audits are just there to poke around, and see what you've done wrong.And there's a mindset that's put into these auditors as they're trained, that businesses are essentially criminals.They must be doing something wrong.They must be abusing their employees.Otherwise, how could they be so successful?And I'll tell you that the reason we are successful is because our employees have my back all day, every day.And they do double and triple and quadruple what anybody would ever even consider reasonable, in order to maintain the company.But we have to deal with the Department of Labor.And these are at the state level, of course, as well as the federal level with the IRS. The risks of health care, with 401k audits, with ESOP audits, with the Census Bureau sending endless forms to be filled out under penalty if you don't.With OSHA and other regulations, Sarbanes actually has lowered down to very, very small businesses.We hired two accounting firms.One to provide counsel, so that we can make sure we're in compliance when the audit firm comes in.And then we have to have the two firms duke it out is what really says in the regulation.So, it isn't a simple business running a small business anymore.I estimate that even on that IRS audit myself, last year, I spent 200 hours of my own time.If that time had been freed up to do marketing and sales and work with clients, we could have created six, eight, 10 additional jobs, instead of just dodging government bullets.So I think the first piece that has to come down, you have to look at every regulation and say, is this reasonable?Is it practical?But then above and beyond that, how many others have been hired?How large has the government bureaucracy been grown, in terms of IRS and OSHA and other people, in order to force compliance.And how much of that money is being spent as counterproductive to growing the economy?Because, not only are those people, sucking off of tax dollars in order to get their paychecks.They are also sucking off of our backs and taking us away from the opportunity to grow our own companies and do other things.I appreciate your listening to us.I don't have any great expectations, but we're going to survive one way or the other.We don't ask for handouts.We're not asking for support above and beyond.Let's be a little practical about how we go about this.Thank you very much.And thank you to all three of our witnesses this morning for your very compelling comments.We have had a number of these hearings down in Washington, D.C., and I have been so, and I know my colleague, Mr. Kelly, as well, we've been so profoundly affected when you listen to a group of witnesses who have run small businesses.And the question was asked to all of them, if you knew now, what you, if you knew then what you know now regarding regulations and all of the impediments to job creation, would you have gone into business?And would you have done what you've done?And each one of the members of that panel said, no, we would not.And so we have reached a point in this country, and when I listened to your testimony, Mr. Pollock, what you went through with all of your audits, we begin to wonder what's happened to the United States of America and our free enterprise system and our capitalist system, where we have an understanding that the government can create jobs.It is the private sector, excuse me, it's the private sector that is going to get this economy back on track.It's the private sector that does the job hirings and expands businesses and buys more equipment and improves their technology.So, I want to tell you that this subcommittee and our entire Oversight Government Reform Committee, is committed to doing that.To recognizing and understanding the impediments that stand in the way of businesses and their success.And we will do everything in our power to help small businesses do what they do best.And that is to create and grow a business.To work hard and be successful.Because that's the American way.And that's the American dream for why many of you have gone into business.So, with that, I would just like to talk a little bit about your testimony.And then, so I will, I'd like to just start with the same question to all of you.Whether or not you would be in this business, if you knew now what you, if you knew then what you know now.You can all answer and you can start.Sure.The answer is yes, I would.And really the rewarding part is, the employees in the company team.I mean, everybody needs jobs.And if I can be a catalyst to help that happen, then I would.Thank you.Well, I am not the company owner actually, but I'll speak for him.And I don't think that he would not be an owner of a business, simply because of the ability that being a business owner allows you to contribute to your overall community, through job creation and things like that.I think, we as a company are very proud of what we do.We're just looking for some assistance in making it a little easier to do what we do.I think many people involved in small business are survivors and very creative and they're entrepreneurial.And that's why they're doing what they're doing.So, certainly no matter the odds, I think most would attempt to be successful.As the odds are stacked against them or those that are actually are successful, become fewer and fewer.And certainly, the migration of manufacturing jobs overseas, in this country is appalling.And certainly, manufacturing can be profitable and it can grow in this country.But we have to have some fortitude and we have to have some policies that help support that.Because manufacturing jobs are really generate on the order of seven other jobs.Once they're here, they're high-paying, Optimex has high paying jobs.These are career jobs.You can have cars, put your kids to college, those types of things, and they're not all gone.They are here and they're actually growing.But we have to support that.And it's not, we are not the adversary.And the adversary is the global market space.And we were competing against countries with policies that make it very easy to manufacture.And I certainly would be, I can speak for myself and my partner, we would absolutely do what we're doing with Optimex in spite of whatever the rules were, how ridiculous they were.But we created benefits to our growth and we may not be successful, but that's just the nature of an entrepreneur.Not because we're being asked to do it.Thank you.I just do want to comment, Mr. Pollock, if this gives you any peace of mind, the continual resolution, that we voted on last week, did stop the IRS from hiring 10,000 additional employees.So we were able to defer those positions.Thank you.With that, I'll yield my colleague, Mr. Kelly.Thank you, Chairwoman.Mr. Medina, I think it's important because the general public doesn't understand what we're doing.That's what I've done for a living.If somebody asked me two years ago, would you be in Congress?I'd say absolutely not, I'm too busy raising my family and running my business.So I have a little bit of an idea what it's like to deal with OSHA and everybody else that comes into our business, that has absolutely no investment, but is a partner that we really don't need to have on our back.This ITAR, because I've talked to other people in the same type of businesses.Kind of walk us through what ITAR is, and what you have to do in order to compete, and why it makes it so difficult for you.Firm in a foreign land beyond list.If we are not on the list, it's fine.But most countries are on the list.So Israel, I thought, they're on the list.When you define, explain what the list is.The list is now, puts you to another list of questions that you now have to go and process.This is for, we're only at the manufactures since we quote tanks so we went about 25% minimum to quote.We now have to decide if we want to quote something.So anyway there's a process, so now you have to decide if you want to do the work on 75% of inquiries that you know your not going to win.So if this is real, now I have to look at, go through the list and ask questions on What is the use of this content?So we have to go to our customer, and in the technology space, a lot of times they don't want to tell you because it's repetitive information.They have to say, what are you using this for what's the end product, who's your customers.They're wanting to know the customer, who's your customer, and what country are they in and what are they putting it in.That's kind of ridiculous.The idea is that if you would, because most people don't understand this, the idea is, at the end of the assembly, this product could possibly be used by a terrorist country or be used in a military special, right?So you're responsible for every little piece that goes out somewhere into the world as to finding out where its actual end use is going to be.Is that a correct example?That's correct.Okay.An example of that could be that it goes into a laser welding machine, that is made in France, only to be sold to China and use laser welding equipment to make weapons.So that's, if you just draw the dots, everything goes everywhere.So it's like, well ultimately, you can make weapons with a lot of things.You need rubber bands to hold the paper, just, where do you stop?And so you go through that prep.You ask those questions, you go back and forth to intimidate your customer and make them feel like they're having to divulge information they don't want to give you.And then you book the job.If you think it's, oh, then you can't actually get the license for it until you get the order.And then once you get the order, you then go on and ask for permission to sell if they're on that list.And they can say, no.And it takes four weeks.So meanwhile, you've gone through the whole dance of going back and forth, you've done the bid, you somehow miraculous got an order, they have to wait to see if you can move on the order.You don't have to wait till you can move on the order.And then they can say no.So meanwhile, your customer has gone eight weeks through a cycle and have to start over again because the U.S. government said that this manufacturer could not sell this to you.And how they make the decisions about what you can sell and what you can't, I really have no idea.And it's an absolute crapshoot.We have decided, we do almost $20 million worth of business a year.We do almost zero overseas, and we could sell overseas, we get inquiries all the time.And we've said, no, because we don't want to have to deal with the government or the uncertainty of the government.It takes way too much extra work on our end.And so it would probably $5 million worth of business a year that we're just turning our back on because of it.What agency do you work with this?Who is responsible for the ITAR?Who does it go through?It's the Department of Commerce or the..Oh there's a lot of them, I know it's hard.Yeah, I'm sorry.I'll tell you what, I was really fresh on this a year and a half, two years ago, when we decided not to do this.Because we're not doing it, it's out of my mind and I'm into growth in the domestic market space.And I think the bottom line of this whole thing is you're in a business that you have an opportunity to sell a certain product or pieces for a product that's going to be assembled.You now have, because of this overreach, have decided to not even bid that business, it's not worth the aggravation.I would assume that, in like everything else in business, time is of the essence.The process you have to go through, would be a lot different than maybe a foreign competitor would have to go through.And plus waiting for the licensing, waiting for the okay.It's just better for you.And see, it's the old story, don't worry about the mule, just load the wagon.I think at this time, they're most happy to walk away.Excuse me, but I appreciate your testimony, and I gotta tell you, the American public really has absolutely no idea what you're going through on this.Not only what you're going through with ITAR, but the other regulations.I think that's the one thing that we're finding out on a daily basis that we have to find some way of amplifying this problem so that people understand this isn't just you coming here and complaining because you can't compete.You're coming here and talking about the situation that makes it impossible for you to compete.And unfortunately, it's your own country.So I appreciate you.If I could add one more thing, there's another part to that restriction as to employment.We had 130 people working at Optimex, and one was a part-time consultant, Canadian.Because that person did not have a green card and was not a U.S. citizen, we had to put in lock cabinets and create a whole infrastructure of security for this dangerous Canadian consultant that we had working, otherwise we're in violation.The Canadian quit because she didn't feel it was appropriate that we go through all that expense in order to keep her employed.And now, most companies in technology, manufacturing companies, will not hire anyone who does not have a green card or is a U.S. citizen.There are a lot of very smart people, who don't have green cards or not U.S. citizens that could really help generate wealth in this country that we can't hire, because we would have to put these infrastructures in.And it's most technology manufacturers, certainly in optics, and many machine shops and other places, do some level of defense work.And if you do some level of defense work, you have this other barrier now that's in place.So there's a lot of cost around this.I would understand the reason for it.There is, certainly there's reasons for it, but the way it's structured is so ridiculous, it's actually impeding U.S. export.Yeah, I have friends in Meadville to do the same thing and they're going through the same process and the same problems.But I think what really disturbs all of us is, who is it that makes up these lists and what's the criteria for somebody being on the list or not being on the list.And it would be like me selling a car, and before I sell the car, I'd have to ask that person, Is there any time in the future that you think anybody could possibly be getting in or out of this car that could maybe be a problem for the country?And if I couldn't answer that I couldn't sell the car.So really, I get it.And I got to tell you, it is the scope of overreach and over involvement that's killing all of us.So I appreciate it.Please, don't give up, don't give up on us.We're not going to quit till get it fixed.Thank you.Thank you all very much.I have one last question then, I'm not sure if you have anything left.I do want to ask Ms. Spiking.I yield, go ahead, I'll yield to you.And I know right now because of the events in Wisconsin, and around the country, there's a renewed interest in and often has become too polarizing, between organized labor and the private sector.And I think that that's done a tremendous disservice to both sides.And I would certainly think that, for what we're interested in, I got to tell you, I have friends on both sides of it.I have friends that do both.The PLA's are something that a lot of people don't understand.I mean, the people understand Davis-Bacon.The fact, I think Bacon is a Republican from New York, and Davis was a Republican from Pennsylvania.So when people say, come on, these Republicans don't like unions.Those are the two guys that started it and they're both Republicans.But as we go forward, and I think we would all agree, that bargaining is part of the practice, but bankrupting that entity is not.And if you can, cause I know you're very concerned.And now Richard, your testimony with the PLA's, explain a little bit what that does to you and your ability to bid on a job.You can bid a job using Davis-Bacon, but with the PLA's, that's a little different, that's more exclusive, is it not?That's correct.And in fact, if we do bid a job that is a federal job, we're required by law to follow Davis-Bacon rules, which in essence means, that we're paying union scale wages and benefits.And the whole principle, of course, behind Davis-Bacon was to level the playing field, if you will, from a wage standpoint.So when we bid and perform work at the federal level, we do pay Davis-Bacon wages.You don't need a PLA to level the playing field from a wage standpoint because you already have Davis-Bacon, or if we're talking New York State, we have New York State prevailing wage.A PLA, literally, as I said in my testimony, tells me that I cannot use my own workers.And quite frankly, we have crews that are supervised by very experienced foreman, who work with these people day in and day out.They develop processes and procedures to make us the most effective and cost effective contractor that we can be.And when we have to put up people who have absolutely no vested interest in the success of our business, and in fact have a vested interest in the shutting down of our business to eliminate us as competition to their signatory contractors.I mean it's kind of like asking me to swim through a pool of alligators and hope I don't get bit.You know, it's ridiculous.And I will honestly tell you that if we see PLA language in a bid, we aren't going to take the time to even bid it.Can we bid it?Absolutely, we can.But it sets up a scenario, that from a business standpoint, is completely and utterly impractical for us.So we close the specifications and we throw them in the garbage.And unfortunately that takes away opportunities from our current employees and takes away our opportunity to grow our business using taxpayer funded projects to do it.Correct.Can I comment on that as well?Sure.We, like Radiac, are a non-union contractor.We have over 200 journeymen.We have a New York State certified apprenticeship program.where we're bringing up 24 young men and women into the trades.We're one of nine out of a hundred and something apprenticeship programs that's non-union in New York State.And we're one of the others.And our principle and practice based on the regulations is that we simply do not bid any governmental jobs, whether they're local, state, or federal, we find our business entirely elsewhere because the compliance issues are immense.It's not that we couldn't do it.It's just that it's not cost-effective to stay in line.And in truth, every single governmental job that we've ever done, someone has guaranteed that we were audited.The time spent was pretty humongous.And so we backed away from it.So our position maybe is different than theirs, but similar, we just find other work.And we do as well.But quite frankly, in this economy, the private sector has not been building as much as they used to.So in many cases, we're forced to look to markets that we might otherwise avoid, simply to stay in business.And the other thing, if you would just comment briefly, because I've been through OSHA audits, and again, it comes down to the public's awareness of what these mean.And I've always been a little bit disappointed.I've been through some MSHA reports.Remedial action would be something in my mind.If you find something wrong in my workplace, I want to make sure it's safe for my guys.One of the things that our guys are supposed to wear if a car's up in the air, they're supposed to wear a hardhat and goggles.And again, I don't know that you can mandate or legislate common sense in the workplace.I think you can set guidelines, but at the end of the day, I don't know how you get one of the people that works for you, to actually look out for their own good.So having said that, the remedial process is the one that I think is lacking in all these audits.And we used to have something called the voluntary protection plan, which makes sense when you sit down and you talk about these possible problems and how I would fix them.But I know with MSHA, when they come in and they do an audit, most of these things, there's no cost-benefit analysis.It's just, this is wrong, this is wrong, this is wrong.Fine, fine, fine.And it doesn't, I don't think it accomplishes the same type of effect that the insurance company coming in trying to help you to eliminate possible losses or dangerous situations in your business too, because they're actually there to do something with you to fix it.I get the feeling, when I hear folks talk, that the government comes in, the idea isn't to fix it, it's to fine you.So let me know, am I reading this wrong?In my little corner of the world, I knew it was right.You're reading it exactly correctly.In fact, and I will tell you that we recently had an OSHA inspector show up on one of our job sites.This is an OSHA inspector that we have seen on other job sites.And, you're absolutely correct.As an employer, safety is paramount to us.We want to make sure that every one of our people goes home every night to their family.Nothing is more important to us.We had an OSHA inspector who has been on a number of job sites, and we are a very safe contractor.We do not have a lot of issues, but this OSHA inspector confided in us that the directive from above, from Washington D.C., is that these inspectors are to go onto job sites and find violations that can result in fines.Because, my understanding is, that it's because OSHA is sort of self-funding and they need to generate the revenue to support all these additional inspectors and things that they have decided will be their approach to safety, as opposed to the programs like the VPP program and things like that.So it's a complete reversal from, quite frankly, what OSHA used to be, in terms of being a collaborative agency.They are now simply looking for ways to generate revenue.To me, that's counterproductive.Thank you.We had OSHA in and we did hear their testimony, and we were able to ask them the questions.And we were really struck by the fact that one of the people, one of the members from OSHA was there.And he had mentioned the fact that employers will comply with OSHA regulations in order to prevent a visit because they fear OSHA going onsite to visit their business.And I said to him, fear, this is the United States of America.We shouldn't be fearing government agencies.We should be working with them, as you said, that to find, to ensure safe workplaces for our employees.No one cares more about the employees than the employers, not OSHA, but the employers.So we were struck by the fact that it has changed from being a partnership where we're both trying to work together to ensure safety, to this punitive, trying to look for and find offenses.But I do think, to a certain degree, it goes back to the mentality that seems to be pervasive in government now that employers are bad and they are looking to profit on the backs of their workers at any cost.And I think until we change that mindset, quite frankly, partnerships and collaboration between government and business is going to be hard to accomplish.Well then I think a good way to end our first panel here is to say to you, to all of you, and to all of the businesses in upstate New York, that we appreciate you.We appreciate your sacrifice.We appreciate your entrepreneurial spirit.We know that you're the job creators, and we hope you'll work with us to continue giving us the information we need.So we can go back to Washington and begin to create an environment where businesses can do well, can be successful, and not be penalized for all of their hard work and their efforts.I want to thank of all three of you on behalf of Mr. Kelly and myself.Thank you for being here this morning and sharing your testimony with us.With that, we'll conclude panel number one, and we'll see our second panel this morning.Thank you very much.Thank you.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/gov.house.ogr.20110420.1.1.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/gov.house.ogr.20110420.1.1.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/gov.house.ogr.20110420.1.1.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/gov.house.ogr.ra.20110406.2/gov.house.ogr.ra.20110406.2.mp3", "text": "Good afternoon.We'll resume our hearing.I apologize for the delay for all of you.Mr. Holman, you're now recognized for your opening speech.Thank you.I guess sitting in for Chairman Jordan and members of the subcommittee, good afternoon, and thank you for giving me the opportunity to testify today.My name is Keith Holman, and I'm the deputy director of the National Lime Association.NLA is a trade association for manufacturers of calcium oxide and calcium hydroxide, commonly known as lime.Just to clear up any misconceptions, we're not the green little citrus fruit, and we are not associated with Lyme disease.For the lime industry, particularly we smaller companies, EPA's greenhouse gas rules are having a big impact.Lime plants generate CO2 emissions both from the fuel that they use and from what you could call the roasting process that converts limestone into lime.All lime plants are now subject to greenhouse gas permitting requirements when they are modified, so even though the GHG rules took effect only three months ago, we're already seeing a chilling effect on plans to modernize or expand lime plants, because of great uncertainty surrounding GHG permitting.The U.S. lime industry is comprised of some 20 companies operating about 50 commercial lime plants.Nearly half of NLA's members are small businesses.These small lime companies face intense competition, and they are particularly sensitive to increases in regulatory costs.For this reason, when EPA planned at Clean Air Act rule-making back in 2002 that would impose stringent new requirements on lime plants, NLA was able to persuade EPA to convene what's known as a small business advocacy review panel under the Regulatory Flexibility Act.NLA wanted EPA to have the opportunity to meet with small lime companies, understand their needs, and design the rule with those needs in mind.EPA convened the lime panel in January of 2002.Seven of the nine lime companies potentially affected by the rule participated in the panel process these small lime companies met with EPA twice including a face-to-face meeting in Washington, D.C. The companies were able to talk directly to EPA as well as with representatives of the Office of Advocacy and with the White House Office of Management and Budget.Because of the panel process, the final rule was tough but something that our small lime plants could live with.Several improvements to the rule were only made possible because small lime companies were able to meet face-to-face with EPA and provide critical information.Not surprisingly, when EPA announced in 2008 that it planned to regulate GHGs under the Clean Air Act, many industries, including the lime industry, wanted EPA to convene a panel.However, instead of convening a panel, EPA simply chose to have a public outreach meeting and only after it had proposed three rules under GHG program: the first, the Endangerment Finding; the Vehicle Tailpipe Rule; and the so-called Tailoring Rule.EPA argued that it was not required to conduct a panel for these rule-makings.Whether or not EPA could legally choose not to convene a panel, it was clearly wrong not to do so.EPA held a panel meeting in November of 2009, well after the three GHG rules had been proposed.The meeting was in reality little more than EPA giving attendees a broad-brush overview of the proposed rules.NLA and the other trade associations that were present had virtually no opportunity to have a dialogue with the agency about the actual design of the rules.NLA followed up the meeting with written comments to EPA about the design of the Tailoring Rule.The Tailoring Rule proposed to defer GHG permitting requirements for plants that had GHG emissions below a certain threshold.Because there is no known way to avoid generating CO2 when limestone is heated and converted to lime, NLA asked that EPA consider excluding these process-related GHG emissions from counting against the Tailoring Rule's applicability thresholds.EPA's single-paragraph response failed to meaningly respond to EPA's request.EPA's reliance on the public outreach approach as a substitute for the panel process is wrong for several reasons.In bypassing the panel process, EPA lost its best chance to meet with actual small businesses face-to-face and exchange information with them.The panel process also establishes a context for EPA, Advocacy, and OMB to meet, discuss the issues, and reach consensus on flexible solutions.The public outreach approach taken by EPA does not and cannot take the place of a panel.Many of the implementations difficulties now facing EPA, the state's , might've been avoided if EPA had taken the time to listen to small business before writing its GHG rules.Now the lime industry as a whole is reluctant to expand or modernize its plants until the permitting uncertainties caused by these GHG rules have been resolved.Thank you for the opportunity to testify today.I'd be happy to answer any questions you have.Thank you, Mr. Holman.Oh, okay, thank you.At this time, without objection, I'd like to enter into the record...Let's see, we've got testimony from the National Association of Home Builders, the Farm Bureau Federation, and the Small Business and Entrepreneurship Council, without objection, so ordered.At this point I'm going to yield myself five minutes and see if some of the other subcommittee members join us.And correct me if I'm saying your name incorrectly, mister...It's?Rajkovacz.Rajkovacz, thank you.In your testimony you mentioned the EPA taking a one-size-fits-all approach.I wonder if you could expand upon that a little bit.Yes, we fundamentally believe, without having included small-business motor carriers / owner / operators in the discussion...When I say they didn't include it within the regulatory impact analysis, they specifically stated that the rule-making would not have a significant economic impact on a substantial number of small entities.As we started looking at that, we were aware that they were talking with large motor carrier interests, and this gets to the heart of the problem in terms of looking at the trucking industry.The industry is dominated by small-business motor carriers.Nearly 95% of registered motor carriers in this country have 20 or fewer trucks that they operate.And yet, when ya go and talk to the largest of the large, who have very homogenous streamlined operational models; they run one truck, one type of trailer; it fails to take into count the multiple dual-purpose uses that small businesses actually engage in.We have many members that operate a couple of trailers.They may one day pull a dry van trailer, for instance, where aerodynamic technologies would be appropriate and work.We don't deny that these technologies will work where appropriate.But the next day, they're pulling a flatbed or a drop deck, and in that, now that technology's working against them.Thank you.Mr. Doniger, in your comments earlier, before we adjourned, you made the statement that you hoped that members of Congress wouldn't fall prey to the phony storylines of small businesses when it comes to EPA burdens placed on them.Could in expand.What were you referring to?If I may.I was referring to a phony storyline about small businesses that is generally told by others, by lobbyists for larger entities.And the common storyline is that EPA's regulations affect departments houses, hotdog stands, donut shops, small entities, and they don't.There's a specific exemption, as I explained and I'm sure you'll hear from EPA and as Mr. Kucinich explained, that the permit requirements don't apply to 95% of the sources in the country.They don't apply the kinds of sources that emit less than 75,000 tons a year of carbon pollution, and as a result this storyline that millions of tiny sources are being roped into a government bureaucracy is the very opposite of what's true.Thank you, I have about a minute and a half left, and I'd like to give each of the other three members of the panel the opportunity to respond to that.If the Tailing Rule is followed and allowed, it would provide an exemption for some small emitters of CO2 for a few years, but even the EPA says that eventually, it's gonna cover entities requiring...Just for Title V permits, six million new entities will have to be permitted, so the Tailing Rule is just putting it off for a few years.Thank you.Go ahead.As far as affecting small businesses, as EPA's rule-making goes through in its current form, there are millions, literally millions, of trucks that operate interstate commerce in this country.As I stated, most of 'em are small businesses.That means, eventually, this rule affects millions of small businesses.Thank you.Mr. Holman.Yes, I would agree that the Tailoring Rule is only a partial, temporary solution for small businesses.We don't know what EPA is going to do at the end of the period of deferral, which will end in a few years.We also don't know...EPA's interested in writing other programs that are going to apply to small businesses, so we're in a very large, comprehensive, and wide-reaching regulatory program in the climate arena.Certainly, from the standpoint of looking at what the impacts are of that program, EPA's done not a particularly good job.Thank you.At this time I'm pleased to recognize our chairman, who's Ohio.I yield you five minutes.Thanks, thank you, gentlelady, I didn't know if the ranking member was...He was in the room.We can certainly let...Well, I'll ask a few questions.I think Dennis will be fine, and we'll give him...If he wants a little-longer time, we'll be happy to do that.Lemme, again, thank you all if being here, and, I apologize, all my notes are at Ann Marie's desk there, but lemme just do a couple things.Dr. Kreutzer, lemme first ask you about the...Talk to me a little bit more about the cap-and-trade bill and what EPA may be doing and how that relates.You mentioned this some in your testimony.If you can elaborate on that, I'd appreciate that.And then, I do have a question for Mr. Holman and then a general question, I think.If you cut CO2 emissions, if you force them to be reduced, you are going to cut fossil fuel use.Fossil fuel is the affordable energy right now.50% of our electricity comes from coal; 20%, from natural gas.And in my written testimony, I did a cost comparison showing that the renewables are 80 to 280% more expensive.That restricts economic activity.It means consumers have less money to spend on other things once they've paid their utility bills.It means producers have higher costs of production.If you have consumers with less money, and you're forcing you have to higher-cost products, they're gonna buy less of it.Ya need fewer people to make that, so employment goes down as well.Doesn't matter if it's a tax that you do.It doesn't matter if it's a cap.It doesn't matter if you come up with a complex set of regulations to force the same reduction.You're gonna have those costs.With regulation, it's even more costly 'cause you have the compliance of the administrative costs as well, the six million permits that the EPA said they would have to issue for the Title V permits.Yeah, thank you.Mr. Rajkovacz.Is that pretty close?Yes.Lemme ask ya this.This came up in a hearing we had in this room a couple weeks ago.We had a Mr. Michaels from OSHA, and I ask him this question.In the course of the hearing, I guess, I picked up on this and asked him this general question.I'd like your thoughts as to how you see the small business folks that you work with, how they might feel about this.I asked the gentleman the question.I said: Mr. Michaels, would you agree with me that, the vast majority of cases, employers care pretty deeply about their employees.They invest time in training them.They're the key to their success, making a profit.They know 'em.They may live in the same community.\"There's always exceptions, but,\" I said: \"Wouldn't you agree that in most situations employers care deeply about the well-being of their employees\"?And I was struck by the gentleman's response.He said, \"I'd like to think so\".It just struck me that sometimes we have this attitude amongst federal employees who are supposed to, I understand, regulate business but also, probably, educate and help them, and yet, they got this attitude that somehow, the employer is the bad guy.Have you picked up on any of that in your dealings with the federal government, whether it be EPA, OSHA, or any other agency?Trucking is actually, I would argue, one of the most heavily regulated enterprises in the United States.Others might have a different opinion.I've been dealing with roughly 15 different federal rule-makings just in the last four months.It's somewhat overwhelming for a lot of us in the industry to keep up with it.It depends.A lotta times you do develop relationships with different people and agencies.That's a very important thing, networking with these folks and developing relationships.But when you don't have a lotta contact with an agency, you are an outsider, and it's really tough to crack that egg.Lemme ask ya another question.This came out in hearing a few weeks back.In the full committee, we had one of the members of the committee, a freshman member, Congressman Guinta from New Hampshire.He asked five business owners, and most of these guys started their business 25-30 years ago, all very successful.He said, \"If you knew then, what you know now, would you have started\"?relative to regulations, if you knew back then all the things you have to deal with.I think you mentioned 15 was the number of the different agencies you have to deal with.\"If you knew then what ya know now, would you have started your business\"?And every single one of 'em said, \"Wouldn't have done it.Would not have done it\".Has that been the experience with some of the folks that you deal with of their attitude?Yeah, what I hear from our members is they are basically on regulatory overload.I said 15 rule-makings in the last four months, and they are major rule-makings that will change the industry's productivity.People are generally fed up with what they think is an over-regulated environment.It is oftentimes under the guise of safety where that's appropriate, obviously.I didn't get to my question, Mr. Holman, but we'll have another round, and I'll get to that one next time, thank you.Thank you, Mr. Jordan.I now yield five minutes to Mr. Kucinich.Thank you very much, Madame Chair.Dr. Kreutzer, I read your testimony.I was particularly interested in the chart with the high cost of renewable energy systems where you chart the monthly and annual costs.My partner's discussion about regulation has always been that you can assign costs but if you wanna get a clear picture, you have to look at costs and benefits simultaneously.Otherwise, we're not really understanding the societal impact.When I look at coal, in particular, I don't think that anyone could argue that the use of coal in the burning of coal and the aftereffects on the environment of coal does have adverse environmental impact.In a way the sulfur dioxide by-products can exacerbate pulmonary problems.It's well recognized.Asthma/emphysema.The sulfur dioxide, when it travels over many miles...We know this question the Midwest, that coal-burning plants in the Midwest end up with the condensate polluting rivers and lakes in the Northeast, and we have a price of eutrophication there.You could actually monetize the costs in terms of adverse health and the adverse impact on the environment.I just wanted to share that thought with you because I think it's really important when we're in a discussion the essence of which is \"what does this cost\"?...And your chart, taken within its own context, you make your argument, but when you look at the cost of that technology, there is an expense that's offloaded onto the society.I just wanted to share that with you.I agree, and I don't think anybody here's talking about undoing the Clean Air Act back to 1966.What I'm addressing is carbon dioxide regulation.We already have extraordinary amount.Maybe we need more; I'm not here to debate that; regulation for sulfur dioxide and other criterion pollutants.If you want to look at the impact of carbon dioxide on a cost-benefit, I think some of the estimates have been exaggerated, but if you take the estimates of the social costs of carbon, add that to the coal cost, that's about two cents per kilowatt-hour.It's still much cheaper than wind or solar, all right?It changes the number some.It doesn't flip any of them around.We wanna look at the costs and benefits, what benefit in terms of global warming mitigation do you get from this?Even with a full-blown - - D'you think there is such a thing as global warming?Yeah, the world's warmer.I've just got a few minutes left, and I'm gonna go on, but I thank you.I'd just like to submit for the record, Mr. Chairman, a study that shows, in terms of benefits and costs, that the proposed rules that we've been promoting would avoid up to 17,000 premature deaths, 45,000 cases of chronic bronchitis, 11,000 non-fatal heart attacks.These are the benefits of focusing on protecting clean air, so I'd just like to put this into the record.In the minute that I have left, I just wanna ask Mr. Doniger: can you explain how the Tailoring Rule works to prevent harm to small businesses?Yes, thank you.As I said in my testimony and in response to Ms. Buerkle, the purpose of the Tailoring Rule is to focus the permit requirement, the requirement that big new plants and big expanded plants examine whether they have the opportunity to control pollution at a affordable and achievable cost.It limits this requirement to very big sources, and it excludes the 95, maybe 97, 99% of the so-called six million sources that Mr. Kreutzer and others keep saying would be subjected to Clean Air Act requirement.It just will not be so.My time's expired, but the Chair has just said that he's gonna ask one more question, and he's been kind enough to let me ask another question.I've got a follow-up to ask of you, Mr. Doniger, so I go back to the Chair.Thanks, Chairman.that would be great if I could.Mr. Doniger, we know that these exemptions are expected to be reconsidered by the EPA in 2013.D'you think the EPA is going to keep this exemption for small sources of greenhouse gas emissions?Yes, I do.I see no reason why they would take that exemption away.Could you clarify just once more; do any of the current greenhouse gas permitting regulations burden small sources of greenhouse gas emissions?No, they don't.The one thing that is in place that actually helps small businesses so far are these standards for vehicles, both light duty and heavy duty, that will save thousands of dollars for small businesses that buy cars and trucks.So, bottom line, what's the impact of the current greenhouse gas regulations on small businesses?It's probably helpful to small businesses as a whole.Thank you.Mr. Holman, would you like to maybe pick up where these guys just left off?Lemme start with you by asking this.You were former Assistant Chief Counsel of Energy and Environment at the SBA Office of Advocacy, is that right?That is correct.And you authored the comments that SBA submitted to the EPA in 2009 that expressed concern about the EPA's Endangerment Finding and greenhouse gas Tailoring Rules, is that right?Yes, the comments in 2008 and 2009.Both '08 and '09, good.Now, in your former capacity, can you give us some insight into the discussion that just took place and the impact that this stuff will have on small business?Seems to me you're pretty darn uniquely positioned to comment on the conversation we just heard.Well, I guess I appreciate that comment.There was a lotta discussion between the Office of Advocacy and EPA on the Tailoring Rule.There's no doubt that the Tailoring Rule is a help to many small businesses because it does delay the permitting requirements that would otherwise be falling on small businesses the way it has fallen on the lime industry even now.And I can first address what are those impacts this are falling on us and on some other smalls and this ultimately will fall on all small businesses potentially, and that is uncertainty because of greenhouse gas permitting.So imagine that you are required to comply with greenhouse gas permitting and you wanna do some sort of modernization or expansion of your plant.What it's gonna mean is that you have to go to get a permit to do that expansion, and in the process of getting that permit, it could be that every aspect of your operations will wind up being looked at by EPA or a state under what's known as best available control technology review.The concern by most of the industrial sources and even some of the small ones is that that process could wind up requiring you to install non-related things, things that have nothing to do with emissions but have to do with energy efficiency or some other improvement in your plant that would be very expensive.And it has a chilling effect, 'cause imagine you go to a bank and you say, \"I wanna get financing for a project that I'm gonna do at my facility\".\"Well, when do you have to put it in\"?\"I don't know\".\"What is it gonna be\"?\"I'm not sure.Because EPA can't really tell me what it is, we'll only know at the end of the process, and even then, we might not know, because that's subject to being challenged in court and potentially being changed\".So there's a lot of uncertainty just in terms of...This process is not cut and dried.Unlike the BATC process that has existed for criteria pollutants for 35 years, we're in a totally new arena here when it comes to greenhouse gases, and nobody knows exactly what's gonna be required.So when you say, \"What's the magnitude of this impact on smalls\"?the moment we don't really know.It's very open-ended, and that has uncertainty, which, as you know, businesspeople hate.From standpoint of the Office of Advocacy, we wanted a Tailoring Rule or something that would, at least temporarily, soften the blow.Tailoring Rule does that but not for everybody, certainly not for the lime industry, bricks, small utilities, municipal utilities, rural electric cooperatives, foundries.There are a number of businesses that are not gonna be entirely shielded by the Tailoring Rule.So when you put this together and you gave your comments and recommendations to the EPA, and yet, you just talk about entities who are, you think, impacted in a negative way, did you think EPA followed your comments?Did they follow the statutory requirements they were supposed to follow?Did they listen?Talk about that process.Speaking from my own perspective, as an individual, my sense was that EPA was in a rush to get this rule completed.As I mention in my testimony, we wanted EPA to stop, or to slow down, consider what the impacts were gonna be on smalls, and try to come up with a way to design the rules so that it would protect them.EPA was not really interested in alternatives, was not really interested in listening to what the smalls had to say.But what I wanna be clear on.In my understanding the law requires them to give serious consideration, due diligence, to your recommendation.Is that accurate?That is correct.And do you think that took place?That's the question.We were not satisfied that that took place, which is why we wrote four public letters to EPA saying, \"You must do a panel before you proceed with these rule-makings\".So in your role as advocate for small business in front of the EPA, they did not follow, in your mind, what the law requires them to follow?It was our belief that EPA did not follow the Regulatory Flexibility Act.They certified the rule and went with what they considered to be a compromise under section 609c of the Regulatory Flexibility Act.Had that ever been done before?No, it had never been done before.So didn't follow normal practice, took an action never done before on an issue that you told them was gonna impact small-business owners in a negative way, is that accurate?We told them at least four times.Four times you told them?In public documents.Okay, thank you, Mr. Holman, I appreciate that.We got one more round for Ms. Buerkle.Thank you, Mr. Chairman.Dr. Kreutzer, you had started to answer a question about global warming, and I have a feeling you didn't finish your answer, and I wondered if you could just- - Good job, perfect.Expand on that.I think I was responding to Congressman Kucinich asking me if believed in global warming, and I said, \"Yeah, we're warming\".The question, though, is more than \"are we having warming?And is it caused by human-made emissions\"?We're looking at a set of regulations, and if we're gonna do cost-benefit, we need to look at what's the cost of the regulation compared to how much benefit you get from reduced global warming.That's the problem with CO2 if there is one, and climatologists looked at the Waxman-Markey bill, which was more comprehensive than the current EPA regulations.Their estimates were that by 2050 if use the largest sensitivity of temperature to CO2, the high end, the maximum change moderation from Waxman-Markey...That is, how much would Waxman-Markey make?Thousandths of a degree in 2050, maybe a few 10ths of a degree in 2100.This will have less impact than that, so we can't compare the costs here to stopping tsunamis.We have to compare the cost here to what impact it will have on moderating world temperatures, and it's pretty minimal, in 50 years not even measurable.Thank you, in your testimony you talk about the costs cap-and-trade and the cost to our GDP as well as the number of employees.Can you comment in general; that's specific to that piece of legislation, but; what regulations are doing?Our country has had 20-plus months of unemployment hovering at 9 to 10%.We're concerned about that.We wanna get government outta the way so businesses can succeed.Can you shed some light on that?We haven't done an estimate on the impact of the most recent regulations.We're working on ones for the projected EPA regulations.But one of the things that happens when you have an environment where you say, \"We might impose this.We might impose this,\" it makes it very difficult to make investment.Now, someone on the other side would say that's why we need to have the regulations, but that's when ya say we know for certain it's gonna be really bad.When there's some uncertainty that's really bad, ya still don't wanna invest, but when it comes to horrible, that's even worse.Okay, so, yeah, we have a problem where to make the investments in power industry to build the power plants we're gonna need, firms that are in energy-intensive industries are reluctant to go forward if they think the regulations are gonna be burdensome.I just wanna go back to your previous answer, to the first question I asked you.In your opinion what is the connection between the CO2 emission and global warming?I'm not a scientist.I'm an economist.So it's close to a man-on-the-street interview now.There will be some warming from man-made emissions probably.There's some models that show some offsetting, but the CO2 by itself if it doubles will lead to a doubling, excuse me, will lead to a degree and a half of warming.The argument is all about \"are there feedback loops\"?The models have lots of them.The data so far, look at the last 15 years.We don't have accelerating warming.It's hit the 1999 level.It's been pretty flat, so we don't know for sure what it is, but more importantly, let's say it is the 4 1/2 degrees C that they're talking about at the high end of the IPCC model.What does any of this regulation do?If all it does is impose costs and make us feel like we're doing something but we're not, then we're getting the warming anyway and unemployment and lower income.So whether you believe IPCC or not, this is not a solution.Thank you very much.I yield back.Thanks, gentlelady.Gentlewoman from California, do you wish to ask this panel some questions?You're welcome to.Thank you, Mr. Chairman.Maybe California really is on another planet, but we did pass AB 32.There was an effort to repeal that.It failed miserably.Californians recognize that we all have a responsibility to be stewards of this planet.Having said that, small business in California has spoken up very strongly in favor of AB 32, which would limit greenhouse gases.Mr. Chairman, for the record, I would like to submit a letter the document from the Small Business Majority that basically says the following: our research has continually shown that the Clean Air Act is good for small business.A report we released in October of last year found that the benefits of the law have far outweighed the costs.The Office of Management and Budget predicts the total economic benefits of the Clean Air Act to be more than four to eight times the costs of compliance.Our report also found that the law has spurred important technological innovations such as the catalytic converter and exports of these and other environmental technologies were valued at $30 billion in 2004.These are encouraging numbers and cannot be ignored.Without objection.Objection.Furthermore, I'm amused because when the Clean Air Act, in 1990, was being considered, Ford Motor Company claimed that, quote, \"we just do not have the technology to comply\" and yet look where we are today.Ford Motor Company, Chevrolet, every one of the auto manufacturers are embracing all of the clean air standards and creating electric cars and hybrid cars, and the public is embracing them as well.So I guess my question to you is, Mr. Doniger, \"is there some level of exaggeration going on here\"?Thank you, congresswoman.It seems as though, wherever we are in time, the regulations of the past are embraced and the regulations of the future are treated like Armageddon.And then we move on a little bit more in time, and those regulations become embraced because, as your examples show, the benefits are proven, the economic costs turn out to be much smaller than were forecasted by lobbyists up here, and life goes on.The economy of the United States has tripled in size since 1970 while we've been able to cut the emissions of most pollutants by 60% or more, so we can do these two things at once.I would just call your attention to a study by three economists.Roger Bezdek is the first name.I'd be happy to supply this.For the record if I may recite just one paragraph of his findings: Contrary to conventional wisdom, environmental protection, economic growth, and jobs creation are complementary and compatible.Investments in environmental protection create jobs and displace jobs, but the net effect on employment is positive.Second, environmental protection has grown rapidly to become a major sales-generating, job-creating industry, $300 billion a year and five million jobs in 2003.Most of the five million jobs created are standard jobs for accountants, engineers, computer analysts, clerks, factory workers, et cetera, and the classic environmental job, environmental engineer, ecologist, et cetera, constitutes only a small portion of the jobs created.Most of the persons employed in the jobs created may not even realize that they owe their livelihood to protecting the environment.This is a big business, and it's a big contribution to our economy.Our economy grows because we protect our environment.Thank you, Mr. Doniger.One final question, and this has probably been addressed already earlier in the hearing, but this is supposed to be focusing in on small business and the impacts on small business.The EPA Tailoring Rule which has come forward would suggest that you have to spew out 75,000 tons a year to be subject to any kind of regulation by EPA. Are most small businesses spewing out 75,000 tons?No, they're not.Virtually all of them, the buildings, the small businesses that own those buildings, are untouched by this regulation.Several of the people here have suggested, \"Well, that may not be true in the future\".Well, if Congress was gonna do something that would be constructive and help create the regulatory certainty we need, it would be to lock in the Tailoring Rule the way it is now and take away any uncertainty about how it develops in the future.And that uncertainty exists only because there is a limit on how long EPA is allowed to make an exemption under the court doctrines that EPA is using to justify these exemptions.Congress, of course, can make those exemptions permanent.If you lock in the Tailoring Rule, we'll have the certainty to focus on the big pollution sources, get the technology on them, and leave the small fries alone.Thank you, my time's expired.Mr. Doniger, just let me follow up then really quickly.Which is it?Earlier you said that more regulation's been good, it's added to the economy, it's been growth, and now you're saying they should lock in the Tailoring Rule and take away any uncertainty and not expand it.So which way is it?The way it is, Congressman- - But your premise to the first question of hers was more regulation is good.Not all more regulation, sir.Oh, so it isn't all...So some regulation could be bad?Of course.Okay, but that's not what you said.You said regulation was good, it added to the economy, it was wonderful.I said the greenhouse gas safeguards that EPA's putting in place are a net plus.I think you said, \"Regulations in the past have been embraced as the good stuff but all the future one...Everyone always says they're bad\".And then you said, \"That's not the case.It's good\".So you made this general statement that regulation was good for business, good for the economy, and now you're saying, \"No, we should limit the Tailoring Rule, shouldn't expand it.We gotta take away any uncertainty out there\".I just wanna know: which way is it?I'm sure we can work out which are the positive economic-growth promoting health-promoting regulations and which are not helpful.I'm here to present the case that what's being done now makes perfect common sense.What EPA has done is to make sure that the small businesses are not burdened by the kinds of regulations that don't make sense.Any further questions for the first panel?I wanna thank you all for joining us today.We do need to move along, and I apologize for the schedule.It's, as I said earlier, just one of those weeks around Congress.We'll get ready for our second panel.We'll move to that as quickly as we possibly can.Thank you all.It's, I think, worth entering the record.It's what EPA relies on.Might be a good question for the EPA. Small Business Majority has leadership.In what?It ignores that of us, all those of us...It's a letter that she just entered into the record, and EPA's closing quote relies on the Small Business Majority.Oh, it dives.Welcome.Soon as we get you situated, we'll get started here.Okay, we're pleased to welcome our second panel of witnesses.We have the honorable Gina McCarthy, who's the Assistant Administrator at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.Welcome, Miss McCarthy.And we also have Miss Claudia Rodgers, who is the Deputy Chief Counsel at the Small Business Administration's Office of Advocacy.If you were here for the first panel, we have a practice here.Please rise and raise your right hands.Do you solemnly swear, or affirm, that the testimony you're about to give this committee will be the truth, whole truth, nothing but truth?Let the record show both witnesses answered in the affirmative.We'll go right down the row here.Miss Rodgers, you're up first.Go right ahead.Mr. Chairman, ranking member, members of the subcommittee, my name is Claudia Rodgers, and I am Deputy Chief Counsel for the Office of Advocacy at the U.S. Small Business Administration.I am pleased to have the opportunity to appear before the committee on behalf of Chief Counsel Dr. Winslow Sergeant.In the interest of time, I will summarize my prepared testimony and ask that my full statement be included in the record.Because Advocacy is an independent body within SBA, my testimony does not necessarily reflect the position of the administration or the SBA. Congress established the Office of Advocacy to represent the views of small entities before federal agencies and Congress.The Office of Advocacy is charged with oversight of agency compliance with the Regulatory Flexibility Act.The RFA, as amended by the Small Business Regulatory Enforcement Fairness Act, gives small entities a voice in the federal rule-making process.For all rules that are expected to have a significant economic impact on a substantial number of small entities, EPA must conduct SBREFA panels to assess the impact of the proposed rule on small entities and to consider less burdensome alternatives.Advocacy and the EPA have a long and productive working relationship.Since SBREFA was signed into law in 1996, EPA has conducted nearly 40 SBREFA panels to assess the impact of proposed rules on small entities and to consider less burdensome alternatives.These panels allow for small business to give direct feedback on the potential cost of the proposed rules and to suggest and develop less burdensome alternatives.Final panel reports must be signed by the Chief Counsel for Advocacy, the administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, and the administrator of the EPA. In 15 years of SBREFA panels, Advocacy has found that the panel process is a useful way for small businesses to provide valuable input into the rule-making process.In short, the panel process works.SBREFA panels have saved billions of dollars for small businesses due to changes and improvements that were made to proposed rules while still allowing EPA to achieve their statutory objective.While Advocacy does occasionally have disagreements with EPA on procedure and policy, we are also very proud of the work we have done with EPA to improve regulations and reduce the burdens on small businesses.We currently have five SBREFA panels underway on EPA rules, and we will continue to work with EPA in a constructive way to make sure the RFA and SBREFA are being followed and the impacts of regulations on small businesses are being taken into account.With respect to regulation of greenhouse gases, Advocacy disagrees with EPA on whether the impacts on small businesses were properly considered.Advocacy has been clear all consistent in its public comment letters and other communications with EPA about our positions on these issues.We believe EPA should've held SBREFA panels and conducted thorough RFA analysis to explore potential impacts of greenhouse gas regulations on small entities.In four years of greenhouse gas regulatory activity, EPA has not evaluated the economic effects that its initial Endangerment Finding and mobile-source emission standards have had on small businesses.Advocacy does not challenge EPA's authority to implement the Clean Air Act.However, we do believe a more thorough analysis was needed, including SBREFA panels, to fully consider the impacts greenhouse gas regulation would have on small businesses.These concerns were noted in Advocacy's four public comment letters attached to my testimony.In 2008 when EPA issued an advance notice of proposed rule-making indicating it might regulate greenhouse gases, Advocacy filed public comments asking EPA to hold SBREFA panels on any greenhouse gas regulation to ensure the effects on small entities could be considered.When EPA issued its Endangerment Finding in 2009, advocacy again filed public comments advising EPA to conduct SBREFA panels to explore potential impacts of greenhouse gas regulation on small entities.In EPA's subsequent proposed regulation of motor vehicle greenhouse gas emission standards and the proposed Tailoring Rule, EPA again certified under the RFA that such standards would have no significant impact on a substantial number of small entities.EPA did acknowledge some of the potential burdens on small businesses and established a phase-in compliance program with the Tailoring Rule.This action led to significant costs savings for small businesses, and EPA deserves credit for its implementation.However, advocacy believes EPA should have done a SBREFA panel, which would've better reflected the views of small businesses and improved the rule.In conclusion, while EPA has expressed its desire to reach out to small entities and has provided temporary relief to small businesses, Advocacy remains concerned that EPA has not fully complied with both the spirit and the requirements of the RFA on the greenhouse gas rules.EPA did conduct public outreach.However, public outreach is not a substitute for the concrete feedback agencies get from small businesses during the panel process.We look forward to continuing to work with EPA on these and other important regulations.Thank you for the opportunity to address such an important issue for small business.I appreciate your work in the Office of Advocacy, and I'm happy to answer any questions you may have.Thank you, Miss Rodgers.Miss McCarthy.Chairman Jordan, ranking member Kucinich, and members of the subcommittee, I wanna thank ya for inviting me here today, and I'm honored to be sitting here with Ms. Rodgers.I hear repeatedly from members that small businesses constituents are very concerned about EPA updating its Clean Air Act programs to address greenhouse gases, but when I listen to the concerns, I'm most struck by the fact that what they think we are doing bears little or no relationship to what we are actually doing.I appreciate today's opportunity to try to set that record straight.The agency is taking a commonsense approach to meet our Clean Air Act obligations to reduce carbon pollution.Our focus now is not on small sources at all but on the largest polluters.Perhaps the most repeated misinformation about greenhouse gas regulation, small businesses, relates to greenhouse gas air permits.Contrary to the most commonly heard claims, small sources are not currently covered by the permitting program.EPA adopted regulations last year that exempt small sources for at least the next five years, and we cannot include them absent a future rule-making with public comment that would do so.I know some of your constituents are concerned about what has been called a cow tax.Well, let me reassure you that the agency has no intention or desire to impose taxes on cows, pigs, chickens, or any other livestock, and while we routinely hear concerns that our greenhouse gas standards will cause incredible increases in gas prices and electricity rates, none of these estimates are actually based on the analysis of our programs.Instead, they're based on studies, and many of them are severely flawed, of economy-wide cap-and-trade programs that bear absolutely no relationship to EPA's actions.In sharp contrast to these concerns, the only greenhouse gas standard EPA has issued under its existing Clean Air Act authority will save small businesses money.The average American purchasing a new passenger vehicle that meets our greenhouse gas standards would net savings of $3,000.Our proposed standards for medium- and heavy-duty vehicles would net operators of semi-trucks savings for up to $74,000 over the truck's useful life.Misconceptions about the effects of EPA programs are, unfortunately, no surprise.Over the last 40 years, similar unsupported claims have been made nearly every time EPA has taken significant steps to protect the American public.In the '70s we were told that by using the Clean Air Act to phase in catalytic converters for new cars and trucks, that entire industries might collapse.Instead, the requirement gave birth to a global market for catalytic converters and enthroned American manufacturers at the pinnacle of that market.In the '80s people claimed that the proposed Clean Air Act amendments would cause a quiet death for businesses across the country, but instead, the U.S. economy actually grew by 64%, even as the implementation of Clean Air Act amendments cut acid-rain pollution in half.In the '90s when we took steps to phase out chemicals that deplete the ozone layer, a refrigeration industry representative testified that we'll see shutdowns of refrigeration equipment in supermarkets and air conditioners in large office buildings, hotels, and hospitals.None of that happened.Instead, the phase-out happened five years faster and cost 30% less.EPA is using the same Clean Air Act tools that we've been using for these past 40 years to protect public health to now address the public health threat that is posed by carbon pollution.These Clean Air Act tools have proven their worth over and over in these years to improve public health.In fact, Clean Air Act programs adopted since 1990 are expect to provide $2 trillion in benefits in 2020 alone, over $30 in benefits for every dollar spent.Just last year these programs are estimated to have reduced premature mortality equivalent to saving over 160,000 lives and to have enhanced productivity by preventing 13 million lost workdays.I'll close with a statement by the Small Business Majority and the Main Street Alliance: Any step to delay or limit EPA's ability to regulate greenhouse gasses and other pollution has negative implications for many businesses, whether they're large or small.It would hamper the growth of the clean energy sector of the economy, a sector that a majority of small business owners view as essential to their ability to compete.Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I look forward to your questions.Thank you, both, for your testimony and your time here.I'm gonna let the ranking member go 'cause he has to run to another meeting.And then we'll finish up.Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.Miss McCarthy, in a hearing about the impacts of greenhouses gas regulations, I think it's important to discuss the reason why these regulations exist.In his written testimony, Mr. Doniger cited the National Academy of Sciences, which concluded, and I quote, \"Climate change is occurring, is caused largely by human activities, and poses significant risks for, and in many case is already affecting, a broad range of human and natural systems,\" unquote.National Academy of Sciences continued to explain that the scientific basis for reaching this conclusion has, and I quote, \"been so thoroughly examined and tested and supported by so many independent observation and result that their likelihood of subsequently being found to be wrong is vanishingly small.Such conclusions and theories are then regarded as settled facts,\" unquote.Now, Miss McCarthy, as you know, the National Academy of Sciences is far from the only organization that has reached legitimate compelling scientific conclusions that illustrate the real danger caused by climate change.Entities including the World Health Organization, International Monetary Fund, and the U.S. Global Change Research Program, a program mandated by Congress to integrate climate change / federal research, all definitively identified climate change as a real danger.Now, Miss McCarthy, d'you agree that the science that provides the impetus for greenhouse gas regulation is indisputable, and if you do, why?I do, Mr. Kucinich.That is because the best available peer-reviewed science that we have found indicates that greenhouse gas emissions threaten the health and welfare of the American people.That is what the administrator said in making her Endangerment Finding.It is backed not just by EPA research but by the full breath of all of the agencies in the federal government who address these types of issues, including the National Academy of Sciences, including NASA, including NOAA. All of the agencies that we rely on to provide the science to this country and internationally have told us that the simple fact is that greenhouse gasses are endangering public health and the environment and it's time to take action now to reduce those pollutants.Well, did the EPA allow for comments from private industry including small businesses in a greenhouse gas Endangerment Finding?We did.It went through a rule-making process.It was one of the most thorough of the agency's.We had more than 350,000 comments, which we addressed individually.We had 11 volumes of response to comment on this rule.We believe we did the most thorough job that the agency could and that the science is indisputable.What d'you say, then, to the small businesses who are continuing to express concern that EPA is not paying attention to them and EPA is endangering their businesses?What d'ya say to them?I would tell them that the EPA understands that our obligation under the Clean Air Act is to regulate greenhouse gases and that they pose a substantial public health problem.I would tell them that we are taking reasonable commonsense steps to address greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act in the way that Congress intended in a way that protects the interest of the small businesses in a way that will continue to allow the economy to grow to continue to allow jobs to happen.We're doing the same thing to regulate greenhouse gases as we have successfully done with other pollutants under the clean air act, and we will look at the economic impacts.We have done that.We will continue to do that.We'll act deliberately and smart and use a commonsense approach.You heard the testimony of the witnesses in the previous panel, did you not?I did.I think we have to be concerned about small business communicating their difficulties.I know Mr. Doniger's testimony is that most of the small businesses...That the rules would not necessarily apply to them.But I think, for those to whom they do apply...They're looking for some words from you that would indicate that you're trying to do everything ya can to make sure people can stay in business, at the same time trying to protect the environment.Is that a fair characterization?That is correct.Okay, I wanna thank the chairman for indulging me with this opportunity to go first, thank you.Yield back.I appreciate the gentleman.Thank you.Miss Rodgers, the SBREFA act's been around for about 15 years, that right?Since 1980, 30 years.\"30 years\"?Okay, and how many SBAR panel- - I'm sorry, the RFA is 30 years.SBREFA's been 1996.1996, about 15 years, that's what I had.And how many SBAR panels have you been involved with with the EPA in that timeframe?The Office of Advocacy has been involved with nearly 40.I think that we're up to about 38 now.I think, in your testimony...Isn't it true you said you had, like, five underway right now.Yes, five currently.Okay, and you believe these have been positive.Yes, overall, actually, EPA is one of the better actors in terms of compliance with the RFA in general.When we were developing a training program back in 2002, we had to go to agencies to find out those who do it best to help us develop the program, and we went to EP- - You got a good track record with EPA in all these except the one that's at issue today, is that right?Yes, we are concerned about the greenhouse gas- - So, the normal process was not done with the greenhouse issue and its effect on small business.All the other times have been fine when you recommend it, when you went through it, except for this one particular one.We felt that, the Office of Advocacy, yes, felt that, taken as a whole or separately, the greenhouse gas regulations clearly had a significant economic impact on a substantial number of small entities and therefore a SBREFA panel should've been held.And is this a notable exception?Or is this the only exception?To when you suggested you move in this way and go through the process that the law spells out, is this a notable exception?Is this one of a few that's been done this way?Or is this the only one that's been done this way?It's one of a few.However, certainly over the years, over our 15 years and 40 panels, we're bound to have disagreements over their certifications on some rules, but it's really one of the very few.Okay, when Miss McCarthy answered the ranking member's questions about...There was a process that was undertaken with small business owners.It wasn't the normal process.Correct.Okay, and, Miss McCarthy, why?Mr. Jordan, I would just disagree with the characterization that it wasn't a normal process.I would emphasize that EPA certainly follows both the letter and the spirit of the RFA as it's been amended by SBREFA. - Just hang on one second.Miss Rodgers just testified that it's been a great relationship- - It has been.You've worked things out, process has been followed almost all the time, and yet, here we have a pretty important rule- - We do.Clean Air Act, greenhouse gas, pretty important stuff, that they feel's gonna have a real impact on small business.It would seem to me you would want to follow the standard procedure and go through what's been the custom and the practice, so why not in this situation?We did follow the appropriate procedure.I think where we disagree is that the Tailoring Rule, which seems to be the issue at hand, is a burden-reduction rule.Now, this is important.You keep saying ya followed the normal procedure, but Miss Rodgers says, \"Outta the ordinary\".The gentleman before...I assume you saw where Mr. Holman talked and said, \"Outta the ordinary, not the normal process\".There are a variety of ways to comply with the law.EPA generally goes above and beyond, and we always meet both the letter and the spirit of the law.In this instance we made a decision that we did not need to convene a panel, because the Tailoring Rule was a deregulation rule.In fact, it reduced the burden for six million small businesses to have to deal with greenhouse gas permitting, and in that instance we did not convene a panel.Now, we did get comment from SPA indicating that they thought we should.I believe the disagreement is one that we have had in the past before, in particular, as- - You believe?Or do ya know?Oh, I do know, yes.Let me explain when that happened.That had to do with the ozone and fine-particle standards that we issue in 1997.At that point in time, SBA also indicated to us that we should convene a panel.We indicated that that rule was not subject to a panel requirement.That was actually taken to court.The D.C. Circuit said that SBA's interpretation of the RFA doesn't carry any more weight than EPA's, and they disagreed with SBA and found that our interpretation of the RFS was persuasive.We actually won that case, and we have never ever lost a case in this- - Miss Rodgers, did you suggest a panel be convened for the Tailoring Rule and the Endangerment Finding and the light-duty truck rule?Yes, we did.Yes, we did, Congressman.So all three, and, Miss McCarthy, you declined to do it for each of those.Well, we explained each of those rules, and I can go through them if you'd like, but we still believe we took the appropriate action under the law.'Cause you talked about the Tailoring Rule and I didn't hear ya talk about the other two, so three times.I can talk about the Endangerment Finding.Endangerment Finding, okay.EPA looks at cost and looks at getting SBREFA panels together when there isn't- - Let's cut to the chase here.Why not on something this important, something of this magnitude?Why not do the standard practice?Why go through this, to cite this decision, that, and here's why?Why not just do what the advocacy group that's in the law and follow the process that's designed to be followed?We did follow the process that is designed to be followed.What I would indicate to you is that- - Well, again, we got the advocates for small business, both of 'em, saying ya didn't.I would disagree respectfully.Okay, we'll yield to the ranking member, or, \"ranking member,\" to the chair of the full committee, the gentleman from California.Excuse me.I was ranking- - Oh, I'm sorry.Oh no, you should take Miss Speier.I didn't see that you'd...I apologize, Mr. Chairman.I'm gonna insult ya twice in 30 second.Ladies first, please.But I figure we should go to use .I didn't see the gentlelady walk in from California, so California's gonna get covered nonetheless, one way or the other.Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you, Mr. Chairman.I would have yielded, but I have constituents who are waiting in the wings to talk with me, so I would like to take my opportunity now.Miss Rodgers, Chairman Issa circulated a dear colleague letter to House members yesterday, I believe, that cites a September 2010 report issued by the SBA Office of Advocacy, authored by Crain and Crain.The report estimated the annual cost of regulation was more than $1.75 trillion.That's kind of a staggering figure.Yet, in February of this year, Professors Sid Shapiro and Ruth Ruttenberg released a critique of the Crain and Crain study, calling \"Setting the Record Straight\".The Shapiro-Ruttenberg found that the Crain and Crain report had \"severe flaws,\" quote, unquote.One of these flaws, the study, was that they looked at costs of regulation without looking at the benefits.I think ya could make the case if ya look at the cost of running Congress...It's staggering, but some would argue that there's some benefit associated with running Congress.In any case...Unless you all wanna retire or resign at this point in time.Miss Rodgers, did the SBA Office of Advocacy contract with Nicole Crain and Mark Crain?And did they ask the authors to evaluate the benefits of regulation or only the costs?Thank you, Congresswoman.We did not ask them to evaluate the benefits as well, and the reason is this.This is the fourth in a series of studies we've done on the same issue, which is the cost of regulations and the impact of those regulations on small business.The purpose of the study is not to show regulations are bad and not to show that all of them are overburdensome for small business.The purpose was to show that small businesses feel the effect of regulations differently than large businesses.And the reason that was done for the cost and not the benefit's because the costs are what affect small businesses most and it's what the Regulatory Flexibility Act requires our office to oversee, which asks agencies to review the cost of their- - All right, how much did that study cost?Oh, I don't know that answer.I'll have to get back to you.Would you please provide that to the committee?I'd be happy to, okay.Another flaw in this study, identified by Shapiro and Ruttenberg, was that the SBA's Office of Advocacy never has access to the underlying data used in the report, a little astonishing to me.If ya can't look at the underlying data, then...Garbage in, garbage out is the way I look at things.Miss Rodgers, does your office have the data used in the Crain and Crain study?If so, will you please make that data available to us?I will check and see if our office has the data would make available to you.I'm told that it is available through Crain and Crain on their website or through their website, that they have made it available.When we contract out studies, our office is not required to ask for that data and make it publicly available.The author usually keeps that data for .Lemme suggest to you that, from a public perspective, if you're using taxpayer funds, we deserve to have the underlying data so we can in fact determine whether or not it's accurate.Miss McCarthy, if EPA funded a study, would the agency expect to have access to the underlying data?The agency would not only have access to it.The public would.All right, I think that makes sense.In addition to Shapiro and Ruttenberg, one of the peer reviewers, Richard Williams from the Merce...Mercatus Center?Raised concerns that the report's regulatory quality index may not measure what the authors say it measures and even if it does, it may overstate the costs of regulation when used in conjunction with other measures.Miss Rodgers, what, if anything, was done to address this concern that was raised during the peer-review process?We did have the study peer reviewed, and it came back with, actually, excellent reviews during the peer-review process.As I mentioned, it's one in four studies.Crain has been involved, the author has been involved, in many of our studies previously, which, and used the exact same methodology, have not had complaints before then.We've done it in 1995, 2001, 2005, and 2010.It's basically the same methodology, a new version of the same study with an updated cost on how these costs are affecting small businesses.Miss McCarthy, do you have any concern with the peer-review process used to evaluate the Crain and Crain study?I do, and I'm glad you asked that.As far as I know, the study was reviewed by two individuals.The sum total of one of the individuals' comments was, and I quote: \"I looked it over, and it's terrific.Nothing to add.Congrats\".If this is the quality of the peer review of that study, then I would suggest to you it's a study that EPA could certainly not put its weight behind.EPA is required to do peer-review analysis of its studies.It's required to have our studies have analytic consistency, rigor, real peer review, transparency.The last report that EPA went out and contracted for and worked through was peer reviewed by 34 economists and technical individuals.We had a thorough public comment process.What I have here, holding, is a double-sided copy of just their last comments that they submitted to us during the peer-review process.Two individuals does not make a substantive peer-review process when we have repeatedly asked for the underlying data and have not been provided it by Crain and Crain or by the SBA. - I thank you.Mr. Chairman, I know my time has expired, but I would just like to suggest to all of us that taxpayer funds should be spent on studies that really give us good data.And certainly, the data should be available to us and to the taxpayers of this country, so I would hope that as we look at ways of making sure that government operates effectively, that we require that moving forward.Thank you.I thank the lady.She makes a good suggestion.Following up on that, Miss McCarthy, in the closing of your testimony...I will close with the statement by the Small Business Majority.And you quote: \"The ability to regulate greenhouse gasses should not be limited\".D'you know what the membership is in the Small Business Majority?D'ya know that number?I'm sorry, I do not.Well, according to \"The New York Times\" story July 8th, 2009, Small Business Majority has no membership.Its founder, Mr. John Arensmeyer, says it can no longer objectively represent small business if it had membership.While the gentlelady from California's point is good, the close of your testimony cites a group, at least according to \"The New York Times,\" that has no membership and yet portrays itself as an organization representing small business.I think both points are well taken.You should make sure in your testimony ya quote from a source that actually might reflect something of the interest of small business.And with that, I would yield to the chairman of the full committee.Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I'm sorry that my colleague from California left.Lemme just make something clear for the record.Miss Rodgers, Miss McCarthy, you're both working for departments headed by President Obama political appointees, right?Yes.So when she implies that one side of your two positions must be good and the other is ill conceived and doesn't care about the same things that we all saw President Obama elected for, at least, Miss Rodgers, I suspect you object to some idea that you don't care to get it right or that somehow your mandate is different in some way.Wouldn't that be true?Yes, Congressman, I wanna absolutely object, and small businesses care about clean air and care about the environment.We might wanna make that point as well.Well, lemme ask you both a question.Isn't it true you could both be right?That Miss McCarthy with a mandate to, essentially, have the cleanest possible air and water can, in fact, in good conscience make every effort to be as pure as possible?We used to say driven snow, but I've seen what it looks like when it melts, so I won't go there.And isn't it possible, Miss Rodgers, that when you go out and you get a study that shows $1.75 trillion, that you're not saying that you can save all of it and still have the level of clean air and clean water the American people expect?Couldn't you both be right?I would absolutely agree.Now, Miss McCarthy, wouldn't you agree that somewhere in $1.75 trillion, if that's an accurate number, that some of that should be reviewed and reconsidered to see if, in fact, changes could save much of that burden and free up those dollars for other uses, even if their use is to help clean the environment?That not every regulation has accomplished what you wanted it to in a sound-science way?Wouldn't you agree?We are in the process now of complying with the president's executive order and doing a review of our regulation- - Yeah, but I actually was looking at the conclusion.Wouldn't you conclude that there's gotta be something there that you could relook at that would help get burden off the backs of small business, and maybe even not small business that, in fact, on a trade-off of cost-benefit, is not the best regulation out there?Mr. Issa, I would suggest to you that we continually look at those issues and we're working with the small-business constituents as we speak.Maybe you could explain something to me.In Boiler MACT you've got a standard that can't be adhered to, and you've gone to the courts asking them to give you relief, and they've said, \"We can't relieve you from your stupidity.Go to Congress\".Now, isn't that slight vulgar but pretty much the exact truth, that you've got something that does not exist, you've created a rule that cannot presently be done, you've gone to the courts trying to get temporary relief in hopes that someday it will be able to be complied with rather than saying, \"What is it that exist that can be complied with\"?Wouldn't that be a fair characterization?I don't believe so, no.Okay, what part of it was inaccurate?Tell me in specificity.The specific issue is the Boiler MACT rule went through a public process.No, I'm looking at the outcome.Is the science attainable today, according to your- - Yes.It is?Yes.Then why did you ask the court for relief?Because we believe that it deserved reconsideration because some of the legal underpinnings...During the public comment process, because of comments we heard from industry, many of them small businesses, we made substantial changes from proposal to final which warranted additional legal underpinnings through public comment process.We will do that.Why wouldn't ya just pull the rule?There was no need to do that, and we were under a court order to deliver a final rule within a given point in time, which we did.But we also amended- - So now we have something for which you've asked the court for relief, and they can't give you relief.No, what we intend to do is reconsider the rule.In due time we will respond appropriately.It will be legally sound, and it is already scientifically credible.But not currently available.Oh, it's actually a final rule.No, no, I'm talking about the actual technology.Oh no, I'm sorry.I believe that the requirements in the rule are achievable.Well, thank you.I appreciate your having that opinion under oath.The mandate for these impacts...It's probably been brought up, but I'll just bring it up again.Last year, I sent Administrator Jackson a letter requesting the EPA suspend finalization of its greenhouse gas proposals until after the agency'd complied with the Office of Advocacy demand.You sent me back a response on February 4th informing me the agency's decision was to move forward at that time.You indicated that your outreach under 609c fully satisfied EPA's obligation to assess the impact and actions on small business.D'you still stand behind that?Yes.Miss Rodgers, do you think that they've really lived up to the spirit of that?Unfortunately, no, we don't.609c of the RFA does allow an agency to reach out to small businesses, but we don't feel that this relieves them of their duty to hold a SBREFA panel.As I said in my testimony, outreach to small business is not the same thing as a SBREFA panel.The advantages of the panels that you don't get from outreach are at the pre-proposal stage, you have the three-member panel: our office, EPA, and the Office of Information Regulatory Affairs at the White House.And at the end of the process, you end with a panel report that has the recommendations from actual small businesses on various alternatives that get put into the docket.I'll add another question to this this round if I can since I think we've got a little time here.Section 317 of the Clean Air Act requires EPA to complete an economic impact assessment for any regulations propagated under section 202 of the Act, which applies to the car rule.Did EPA conduct a section 317 economic impact assessment before any of its greenhouse gas rulings were made?It did conduct a regulatory impact assessment associated with the light-duty vehicle rule.If so, did the analysis assess the following, which are required by statute?The cost of compliance?Yes.The potential inflationary or recessionary effects?I believe so.The effects on competition with respect to small business?The rule exempted small business, Mr. Issa, so we probably did not need to go into much detail there.Do you intend on always exempting small business?No, when it's appropriate, we do.No, no, do you expect that this rule would never change?That in some future time, you wouldn't do it?If the rule changes, we'll have to go through a rule-making process and conduct another analysis.You carved out small business in order to, essentially, keep yourself from having do that assessment?Or that assessment simply wasn't necessary and that was never part of the consideration?That was obviously...Part of the regulatory impact assessment was to look at all costs.What I'm explaining to you is that we did not cost small business.The reason I ask the question is you don't exempt anybody without a reason.Obviously, we don't want clean air and clean water only for big companies.We want clean air and clean water, so in your decision to exempt small business, wouldn't you need a cost reason to do so?Actually, we did provide a thorough assessment of why it was appropriate to exempt.Cost was part of the consideration.Lead time was part of the consideration because you're asking significant improvements in cars and many of the smaller manufacturers would not be able to produce and comply with the rules in the same way that large industries or large manufacturers are able to do that.The next test was the effects on consumer cost.Did you take that into consideration?Yes, we did.The effects on energy use, did you take that into effect?Yes, we did.To the extent that the EPA has conducted any economic impact analysis, I respectfully request that you provide that to the committee.Are you prepared to do that?Oh, we certainly will.Okay, I would very much appreciate it.That, in our opinion, has been requested previously and is long overdue.I'm getting head shaking.Oh .Christina, am I wrong?We have requested that.I'm not sure it's appropriate here, but we...I mean we've certainly sent EPA a series of letters.Okay, I think if you look through the series of letters, you'll find that that was certainly something we had expectation of getting we haven't gotten, but I appreciate your willingness to give this to us today and yield back.Thank you, Chairman.It is part of the rule-making that that is public information and is in the docket.Thank the chair.And it's on the web.I just have one other question and will be happy to yield back if the chairman has anything additional.In your testimony, Miss Rodgers, you indicated that the panels work, the panels work and you feel like you got a good relationship with Miss McCarthy and anyone and everyone else that you work with there, it's a process that makes sense and that has been effective.Miss McCarthy, would you agree with Mrs.Rodgers' testimony, what she said in her testimony, that these panels work and that it's a good process?Our relationship works very well.I would submit to you that we both are extremely concerned that EPA get appropriate information and feedback on small businesses and impacts to small businesses relative to those that we are regulating through a rule, yes.But to the specific question, the SBREFA panels work, the process works.It has worked very well, yes.Okay, now, I come back to what I asked you earlier.A rule of this magnitude, in light of the debate that took place in the United States Congress dealing with cap-and-trade, this issue that's been front and center for the American people, a process that you both indicate works, why didn't ya follow it for something, again, of this magnitude, of this importance, with the debate the way it is, with the concerns expressed by small business owners in front of this committee today?Look, I understand hindsight's 20/20 and all that, but if ya had it to do over again, would ya have convened a panel and went through the normal process?Let me explain to you, if I could- - Can ya answer that question.If you had a do over again- - No, no, I would not.I would do it exactly the same way, and that is because these panels are designed to address issues relative to our rule-making that sets a standard or establishes a requirement on a business sector, a small business entity.They're asked specific questions like \"what's a reporting and record-keeping and compliance\"?\"what are the federal rules that might duplicate it\"?\"what alternatives d'ya have to the proposed rule\"?We did not enjoin a panel, because the rules that you're talking about did not immediately or directly regulate small business.Well, wait a minute, but- - So there was no way in which we could apply this rule- - You just said ya had a great relationship.In those questions.Miss Rodgers is an intelligent lady.Her folks who work for her are intelligent people.They suggested that ya do it.They did.So you may not have thought it was absolutely necessary, but why not do it, again, when they're saying this makes sense to do and business owners are saying it makes sense to do?We've heard testimony of the concerns they have.Why not just do it?Why not be safe rather than sorry?On the Tailoring Rule, we did a voluntary program where we had an outreach with 23 SERs. We had a panel.We got their input.What we are not agreeing to is this rule and there is a requirement for panels to be developed when we have a rule, like the Endangerment Finding, that isn't directly regulating small businesses like the Tailoring Rule- - Miss Rodgers.That is deregulating small businesses.It doesn't mean we don't appreciate the input of small business, and we try to get that input into the process.Miss Rodgers, you understood when you suggested the panel that the EPA could, in fact, take the route that they took.You understood that?Yes.Ya didn't think it would happen, 'cause it's outta the norm, right?Exactly.Yet, you still said, \"This is important to have this panel\".Give me why you were so focused on that and why you've expressed comments after the fact why it was important to have that panel.I'd be happy to.One of the reasons...The Endangerment Finding, no, it did not directly regulate small businesses.However, it did set the greenhouse gas regulations in motion.The foreseeable impact of these rules on small businesses certainly were there.The next rule to come about was the vehicle emissions rule, of course.They were regulating large automobile manufacturers.However, just by beginning that process and starting to regulate greenhouse gasses under the Clean Air Act...And one part of the Clean Air Act automatically triggered the greenhouse gas regulation, or regulating greenhouse gasses, under the entire Clean Air Act, thereby subjecting small businesses to permitting requirements under the Clean Air Act.So you could foresee what was coming.Why couldn't they?I can't answer that question, but what I can say is by not hold- - And it was clear.Did you have any in your team who suggest this?Was there any disagreement as to...Was it unanimous \"we need to move with this panel\"?It was unanimous.Yeah, so it was strong.You had to do this?Yeah.You could foresee what was coming.Yes, we could.And you've proved right, based on the testimony we got from the first panel.We think we have.And yet, they just couldn't see it.Unfortunately, no.See we have no further questions for the panel.Wanna thank you both for attending today, and again, I wanna apologize for the schedule.We'll look forward to visiting again.We're adjourned.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/gov.house.ogr.ra.20110406.2.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/gov.house.ogr.ra.20110406.2.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/gov.house.ogr.ra.20110406.2.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/gov.house.ogr.ra.20110708.2/gov.house.ogr.ra.20110708.2.mp3", "text": "We want to thank everyone for their patience and the delay that we had because of votes.We appreciate your coming back today, and I like to reward people being on time and doing what they're supposed to do, so I think we'll go ahead and ask Mr. Alford if he now would present his five minute testimony.Thank you, Mr. Alford.Thank you.Committee chairs and distinguished members of this joint subcommittee, thank you for allowing me to testify today.I am President CEO of the National Black Chamber of Commerce, which represents the fastest growing segment of American small business, Black-owned businesses.At the inception of the NBCC in '93, there were 300,000 Black-owned businesses doing $33 billion in annual sales.Excuse me.Today, there are more than 1.9 million Black-owned businesses doing over $138 billion in annual sales.This fantastic growth leads to a growing demand for a larger educated workforce.By a study by Stanford University shows unemployment among all teenagers at 24.2%; among Black teenagers, regardless of gender, the rate is 41.6%; but among Black teenage males, the rate is a very dangerous 45.5%.Nearly half of that population is unemployed.The percentage of these young people who will be enrolling at the University of Southern California, Ohio State, et cetera, will be very small indeed.The best alternative is proprietary schools.The above is made all the more crucial when we look at the educational access.The Bureau of Labor Statistic's data shows that Americans with less than a high school diploma have an unemployment rate of 14.7%.Those with a high school diploma, 9.5%.Those with a associate degree or certificate, 8%.And those with a bachelor's degree, 4.5%.We can reach but one conclusion; It should be the primary goal of the federal government to provide as many young minority Americans as broad a range of educational opportunities as possible.Why is the Department of Education targeting for-profit schools with a vengeance that will harm a certain segment of our population?The gainful employment rule is a job killer.Incredibly, proprietary schools serve 52% of these high-risk students, while nonprofit schools only serve 9%, and public schools serve a paltry 6%.Furthermore, 49% of the students enrolled at for-profit institutions are low-income as opposed to just 18% at public schools.Also, 50% of the students attending for-profit colleges are minority students compared to just 34% at public schools.So the problem at hand is that minority students are already at a great disadvantage.And now, the Department of Education has made it worse by shutting down a major path to education and jobs.The Department of Education has drifted over into a lane reserved for the Congress of the United States: Making laws.That the department has created this rule is harmful enough.The process was definitely flouted, if not corrupted.We want to draw your attention to questions that beg your intervention.We know the secret meetings took place between department officials and Wall Street, short sellers that were placing heavy bets against the share prices of for-profit schools.What was going on?We know that the department is somewhat a covert group of allies, including former employers of department staff, short sellers, and competitors of the for-profit industry, and that they traded secret information against the code of the rulemaking process.The question is what was going on?We also know that department officials elicited negative information about for-profit colleges from the secret cabal and the information was provided even when it was deceptively collected.What was going on?We know that the department relied heavily on a now discredited GAO report, but never withdrew this report from their process of consideration.What was going on?We know that the department assembled a biased rule making committee, composed of a 16 to 1 ratio, meaning that there was no opportunity for the industry and the minority students they represent to have a fair voice in the proceedings.What was going on?We know that the department was intent on punishing proprietary colleges from the very beginning, even while America's higher education challenges confront every type of institution.So what is the joint subcommittee going to do to address student debt, academic performance, and occupational preparation in every college in our nation?In conclusion, the gainful employment rule is never the law of the land and will have grave consequences on hundreds of thousands of minority students.We want to remind everyone that to qualify for public assistance programs, proprietary schools must meet exactly the same academic standards set by the same accreditation agencies as Harvard or Penn State.The fact is that the opponents of proprietary schools are really trying to mask the same concerns that all colleges share, such as student debt, academic performance, and occupational preparation.The Black employers that I represent hope you will work together to find solutions to these vexing challenges rather than make a scapegoat out of for-profit schools.The bias and corrupt process, which produced this rule should be reversed through the congressional review act or some other means.Thank you, and I look forward to your questions and discussions.I yield 8 seconds.You get the star, the gold star for not going over your time today, Mr. Alford.Thank you very much- - Yes, ma'am.For your comments, and again, we appreciate your patience in waiting for us, and we're very happy that Mr. Kucinich has joined us.I just want to make a couple of comments, brief comments, and then I'm gonna ask a couple of questions, and then we will take turns as members of the committee asking questions of the panel members.I first want to read a statement that was in the letter from Congressman Towns, who asked us to have this hearing because I think it fits well into a comment that I'd like to make based on Mr. Carnevale's comments.In Mr. Town's letter, he says, \"Mr. Chairman, I know there's good-faith disagreement as to whether the GE regulations, as written, are right or wrong, needed or not needed, but there's one principle on which we all should be in agreement.And that is a rulemaking that allows non-elected government officials to establish policy and have the force of law must be fair, unbiased, and transparent\".And then he asked that we have this hearing as soon as possible.Mr. Carnevale, I was very interested.I'm a person who's had some experience in higher education, and I was very interested in your comments about the need to focus on programs and not degrees.I have long agreed with that.I very much agree, I think even more so that we should focus on skills and not necessarily on degrees.I don't agree with you that regulations make markets work better, necessarily, but I do think that having information is very important, which is a big point that you made.And it seems to me that if that is true for one sector of higher education, it's true for all sectors of higher education, that we need students to have accurate information about the return on their spending or their investment.I don't think government makes investments, but people make investments.They make investments in money and in time.And therefore, I think you made a great case for the fact that if we're going to have regulations like these, they should certainly apply to everyone, so I appreciate very much the comments that you made.Now, I'd like to ask Dr. Cortes a question.As you know, the Department of Education recently made a number of changes to the final gainful employment regulation.Do these modifications allay your fears that the regulations are going to negatively impact students attending proprietary colleges?Chairman Woman Foxx, I do believe that even with the redefined rules, the rule itself is complex.It difficult to manage from both ends from our institutional ability to carry the task of identifying and to getting the data correctly.I think it's also very difficult from the federal side to really able to coordinate the ability to gather all the data and then having a matrix that allow them to determine and make decisions for institutions without having all that's connected.So I do believe that the role, although it's more flexible than it was in the original, it still doesn't have the transparency.It doesn't have the connection that is needed for us in the trenches as educators to be able to spend, as I said earlier, significant amount of time gathering data and now concern about teaching and learning and providing the education that we need to our students.We have taken significant amount of time at Berkeley College, alone, to try to gather the details that we need by July 1st, to be able to comply with some of the rules that just come down.So I think at the institutions in our sector, in particular, have been affected by this significant targeted way in that not all institutions are treated equally, that this GE rule is only applied to the for-profit institutions.I think it's unfair and not equitable.Do you want to say anything more about the Social Security Administration data that the department plans to use?I mean, you touched on it in your comments and we only have about 30 seconds, so let you keep that in mind.Absolutely.I think it's not only the privacy of the data and the confidentiality of social security information, but again, as I said earlier, I don't see how that database along with the information that is being required is going to be able to be managed in a way that will maximize the ability to make choices by the federal government to our institutions welfare and wellbeing.Thank you very much.Mr. Kucinich.I'd like to recognize you for five minutes.Thank you, my friend, the gentelady, the Chair.I want to speak about the high default rates at for-profit institutions.Staff, could you put up display chart number two?It's available.Thank you.According to the February 2011 data released by the Department of Education, defaulters from for-profit colleges disproportionately account for 48% of student loan defaults across all higher education sectors.It's also true that 64% of the students at for-profit colleges are low-income minority students.Since these students are overrepresented at for-profit schools, they make up the majority of the default rates caused by for-profit institutions.Now, Dr, Carnevale, some for-profit colleges have argued that their high default rate is due to the fact that they disproportionately serve low-income minority students who are more likely to have financial stresses, and there's an assertion that that's the reason why you end up with so many defaults, but I'm just wondering if a more accurate description of defaults is that a low-income minority students at these for-profit colleges are more likely to default because for-profit colleges have tuition costs that are, in some instances, eight times greater than nonprofit public colleges, and thereby puts those minority students who attend them in greater jeopardy, just because of the sheer amount of expense and debt that they have to incur.I'd like your response to that.The social science on this is interesting and somewhat surprising, frankly, to me.We ran these numbers and expected to find as we did that there's a disproportionate effect on minorities and low-income students, but when you run a statistical test to figure out what the cause is, what comes through very clearly, and I, again, it surprised me, was that the cost and the low wage rate is the principle determinant of default.There does seem to be in some ways when data- - You want to explain that?When you say costs in a low-wage rate, what do you mean?That is the reason people aren't paying the money back 'cause they're not making enough money to do it, which I know is in some sense logical, but you never expect that in social science.So it was really very striking in the numbers.That is people, the fact that people don't repay is because they can't repay.But, you know, let's look at another variable here, which is a dependent variable because when you look at the fact of the cost of...That nonprofit colleges have foreign education, there's multiples of that cost as opposed to other colleges.I mean, wouldn't you agree with them?Oh sure.But one of the things that- - You may not be making enough money, but the mountain you have to climb with debt is much larger if you are going to a for-profit college.And the size of the debt does appear to have a direct relationship on repayment.That is, people are intimidated by the debt, I guess is the way to say it.But let's not miss the connection.The size of the debt comes from the amount of money that people are charged for their education.This is part of this whole discussion that really is sort of a couple horizons away.We're talking about in the end, in the short haul, whether the programs are worth it.But then there's a question that we haven't really addressed yet, is should the programs be least cost?That is you can get two programs that are essentially the same thing.One at a community college will end up costing you eight grand or nine grand, and a for-profit college costs you multiples of that.Should the government be concerned about the cost differential?That really hasn't come up much in this debate.But it's come up now.Yes.You brought it up.And I think that this committee is the proper forum for us to determine whether or not the low-income minority students who are experiencing these high rate of defaults are in a situation where they're boxed in by the extraordinary cost at for-profit colleges 'cause, you know, when you're coming from an inner-city background, that's where I came from, I can tell you that going to college is like a dream, and people will do anything to do it including, Madam Chair, taking on extraordinary expenses and getting over their heads and sometimes putting themselves in a position where they're in debt for the next 10 years or 15 years of their lives.But to the default rate, how do we deal with that?I want to thank the Chair for her indulgence and giving me some extra time here.Thanks.Thank you.Thank you, Mr. Kucinich.Mr. Petri.Thank you very much, Madam Chairman, and thank all the panelists for the effort that you made to be here today and to prepare your testimony.I had a couple of questions of Ms. Carpenter.First, I wondered if I could give you an opportunity if you had any reaction to the points made by your fellow panelists.I'd be interested in hearing them.Thank you very much, Congressman Petri.I do have some impressions as a layperson, a parent, a graduate.Clearly, I'm thrilled that there is more public discourse on the topic of educational reform as a whole.I think it's a vital vehicle by which Americans of all socioeconomic sectors in our society can use to attain their personal pursuit of the American dream.And given my experience in reentering the workforce in a dramatically changed economic environment, transitioning from an industrial-aged society of a more nationally oriented business economy to one that is far more global, more technologically advanced, clearly we're living in times of transition.And once again, as I stated in my testimony, we are now faced as a nation in addressing the appropriate responses in the educational forum to meet the demands and needs of our society and our economy.So thanks to all of you for giving very, very important consideration to what the best reform would be.Beyond that statement, I would really defer to other people who are more professionally invested in the process to speak specifically to the issue of what's before us for the gainful employment regulation.I'm not as well informed as others on the panel of who's given testimony, but clearly they have important input for the panel.When we met, and you participated in a little different panel in Madison, Wisconsin, you indicated that probably because your training at Herzing, but mainly because of your work with an international company where you are dealing with hiring and evaluating possible employees or current employees all over the world in different high-tech areas, your company was working computer programming and the like, you said people...It was a sort of a cry from the heart, if I remember, that people better start waking up as to what's really going on and not be too self-indulgent and assume that we will just continue because in the future as it has been in the past.I wonder if you could expand on that.And you and other employers who operate not just in the United States but in other countries have a perspective we ought to be learning more about because you're dealing with young people who are looking for jobs doing essentially the same thing, but whether they're from India or China or Africa or Europe.What's your perspective on how well we're doing, or whether that assessment is accurate, that we're a little self-indulgent here?There are certain skillsets that are in severe shortage within the tech sector in which I work, and so, yes, we do work with people in multiple countries in providing the research and development work that's necessary for my company, Quest Software, which is a publicly traded company on the NASDAQ based in Orange County, California.For them to be able to hire enough qualified employees, we do employ people from all over the globe.I personally work on a research and development group that writes enterprise level software.I have coworkers who reside in Russia, China, New Zealand, that I meet with weekly, sometimes daily, depending on where we're at in the development cycle.Many of these individuals are working for an American corporation speaking in a second language.English is our predominant language of business, layered on top of the very technical skills they've acquired.It's critical that Americans wake up to realize that in order to be successful in business, you will most likely be doing business with people as coworkers from all over the globe.Therefore, our skillset in language skills, cultural sensitivity skills, as well as the technical background is really critical for success.And how do we attain those things but through our educational institutions and in providing the curriculum and programs that are adept to train our workforce and still lead the nation in our economic and workforce development.Thank you.Thank you, Mr. Petri.Mr. Cummings.Thank you very much.I want to thank our witnesses for being here today.Your testimony has been extremely helpful.The thing that I, Ms. Carpenter, as I listened to you, first of all, we're very proud of you and what you have accomplished.You're not the person who we are most concerned about 'cause you've done well.It's the ones that don't make it.There's a scripture in the Bible, Jeremiah 15:9, that says, \"Her sun rose while it was still day\" meaning that...\"Her sun set while it was still day,\" meaning that there are people who have opportunities and they still have life, but something happens in their life that causes their dreams to die.Those are the people that were concerned about.The sun set while it's still day.And on that note, Mr. Carnevale, can you, you know, when I look at...It says both the Senate Health Committee and the Education Trust to report it, that for-profit colleges often have tuition rates much higher than those of local colleges.These for-profit tuitions can be as much as five times that of local community or four year public colleges.If a student chose to attend Berkeley, Dr. Cortes, a for-profit institution to obtain a two year associates degree, it will cost her about $41,400 in tuition and fees.However, if that same student chose to go to the City University of New York Community College in Manhattan, it would cost her $6,496 over the two year period for the same degree.I wanted to go to you, Dr. Cortes, and then I want to come back to you, Dr. Carnevale.Dr. Cortes, what justifies Berkeley's tuition costing nearly $35,000 more than a public community college?Thank you, Congressman Cummings, for the question.Absolutely, I think the value of a Berkeley Education consists of small classes, faculty who are practitioners in the field, students who have the ability to get a required internship as part of the requirements for graduation, the ability to be placed in the job, faculty, as I said earlier, that are faculty doctorally trained, the ability to have a small groups of students working together in order to engage in the graduation, but more important, I think, is the ability for institutions like ours in the private sector is about capacity.It's really to look at what President Obama have indicated that- - What do you do for retention?What do you do?Do you use any of that money that you make for retention?Absolutely.We invest over $37 million back institutionally to assist students through scholarships and grants to subsidize the additional money that they don't have besides what they get from Pell or TAP in New York or TAG in New Jersey.So we do invest significantly not only in our own income going back to the students because we know they need it.The average salary- - But is that what most of these schools do?Well, I can only speak for my- - Right, and that's part of the problem.I understand that.I appreciate that.Sure.But Dr. Cortes, you describe much of your student population as being at risk, is that right?Absolutely.The majority of our students need significant remedial work.We instituted, for instance, this coming year, a bridge program that we allowed students to take courses for a period of about five weeks.We don't charge any tuition.It's almost like a trial period.We allowed the students to make sure that they don't get into loans, that they're not paying tuition.But 51% of your students take on riskier loans, do they not?I'm sorry?51% of your students take on riskier loans.Is that accurate?Well, I don't know if they're riskier.They take loans, but you know, the difference between what they cannot afford between federal and state aid in the $37 million that we give, that's what their students need to- - Dr. Cortes, you understand what I'm saying, don't you?Sure I do.You understand that we are concerned about people whose dreams are taken away, and then they leave school with two bags, one with nothing in it, and the other with debt marked all over it.And then their dreams are not deferred, but they are killed.You understand that, right?Well, I understand.I can- - And there's a whole lot of them.So, you know, I hear people talking about minority students and how they feel so happy that all these opportunities, but for every one that graduates, there at seven or eight, that's fallen by the wayside, in many cases, never to return to college.Never.That's criminal.Criminal.Absolutely.I think it, yeah, you know, I'm a product of a public school, New York City education, and I'm a product of a community college.So I can speak from the real life experience.I do believe that what we do in our sector, we take students who are so much at risk.We're able to get students to a point of graduation.I give you an example: In the great city of Newark, New Jersey, with the high-school dropout rates well over 50%, if we can get 4 students out of 10 to graduate from that great city of Newark, we do a tremendous service to the city of Newark because those four students, without Berkeley in that vicinity, and that local area will not be going to college because they cannot go to a community college.They're not going into the private institutions or the publics because there's capacity.Thank you, Madam Chair.And the other six are left in debt.No, they're not.Well what happens with them?They're not.They either do not, they did not continue.They have to go back to work.Many of them are have to exist by working.So the debt is extinguished?No, many of the students who enter will be able to complete.If I give the example of the four that graduated, the other six will able to come back and return and finish their degree if they were able to come back.Thank you, Madam Chair.Thank you, Mr. Cummings.Mr. Meehan.Thank you, Madam Chairman.And thank you for the opportunity to participate in this hearing today on this.I think we all share the concern of trying to assure that the funds that are forwarded to the students are repaid, but I'm struggling with the issue here in which we are treating the for-profit institutions in one way, and we aren't really analyzing this same effect in the not-for-profit institutions.I, for one, have benefited from a number of college students who are volunteering to work in my office because they can't find jobs.And yet they are tens of thousands of dollars in debt.And so if we're going to use a standard, I'm struggling with the regulation.We've now come up with rules and we're going to hold people accountable to a standard.Mr. Carnevale, I know you've discussed this a little bit and tried to look at this issue.Is it fair for us to hold the not-for-profit institutions in a different category than the for-profit if we're making these analysis on a year by year basis first, and then second, a lot of kids come out, they struggle for a year or two, and then they get that first job.I mean, should we be doing this the next year?Or should we be waiting three or four years to make this calculation?The regulation essentially gives the institutions four years.That is so it extends over a fairly lengthy period of time.And the calculation in terms of loan repayment allows 10 years for AA and some college, 15 for a BA, and 24 selected programs like dental programs and so on.So in that sense, it is not one of the way, I think, especially the amended regulation here.The way to think about this, truthfully, is the brunt of this is aimed at program improvement.The penalty part of this is very marginal, frankly; It's only 2% of the total, it's capped at five.This is essentially a device for moving programs toward a higher labor market value, is in the end what it is.The other point, and is raised by Mr. Cummings, is that it is true.The institutions get three strikes on this.The students just get one.That is, if you end up with huge debt, first of all, whether you default or not, you're not likely to return to school.And they don't.We know that.And that relates directly to the size of the loan and the wages that the program leveraged that allows them to pay it back.So it matters which program it was.And then the other difficulty for the students is you only get one shot, one bite at the apple because you can't go back and get more debt to go to school.Okay.Mr. Alford, would you respond to this?Because I think that I have experienced, as I've visited institutions across the range, from community colleges, to my universities, to some of the schools, and the for-profit schools.Many of the students in the for-profit schools are non-traditional students.In fact, this is one of the rural opportunities they have where someone's reaching back to them and saying, \"I'm gonna give you a chance.I'm gonna give you a skill that you can then take and find a way to gain employment in a very, very difficult market.And what I'm concerned about is the potential that this higher standard may lead a situation where those kinds of schools will say, \"Fine.We're going to now stop reaching back to that student who's the least traditional, who's the toughest reach, because that's the most likely to fail.Let's just go find the safe middle\".Cherry pick.So would you please tell me what your perspective is?I think it would have a devastating consequence on the people I represent or businesses who hire, who try to hire people from these communities.There's two big problems with my constituents.One is management trainees.Our more successful businesses scour this nation looking for good educated Black talent.Secondly is labor, the lower level; trucks can't pass a drug test, and that's a requirement for any insurance policy.So those are the two major problems.And one thing that's unfair too, sir, private for-profit schools have higher tuition because they don't have Uncle Sam and the State government and local governments giving them subsidies, tax funded money.That's unfair to have a graph that shows all this high tuition, but they don't charge that much.If you put the tax subsidies in there, they'd probably be more expensive than for-profit schools playing with numbers.Thank you for making that point, Mr. Alford.Madam Chairman, my time has expired.Thank you.Thank you, Mr. Meehan.Mr. Braley.I would like to make it clear at the outset that the entire focus of every conversation we should be having about higher education is whether students are achieving progress toward a degree at a reasonable rate and whether the federal dollars being invested in any of these institutions meets the expectations of taxpayers who are providing that assistance, whether that's a for-profit college, a nonprofit college, a private college, or a public institution.My nephew has attended a for-profit college, got a degree, and is working in a job that he loves.And the question is not whether there have been substantial successes at for-profit colleges because, Ms. Carpenter, your very presence here shows that there have been.The question in this environment that all of us work in is whether or not for-profit colleges are providing the type of results for the investment we're making in them.So let's talk for a moment about that.My good friend, Senator Tom Harken, has been doing a lot of analysis of this issue on his Senate Help Committee, and as a part of the exhaustive study that his committee has done, there are some troubling findings.One of them is that 63.4% of associate degree students at publicly traded for-profit schools and 58% of bachelor degree students at these schools drop out within a year, and that almost every single one of those students, more than half a million in one year are left with substantial debt, and that a four month stay at a for-profit school can leave a student with 4,000 to $11,000 in debt.Now, these are the facts.Even though for-profit students make up only 10% of all higher education students, the schools receive 25% of federal student aid.Even more alarming is a fact I mentioned earlier that 48% of all student loan defaults come from students who attend for-profit colleges.And in many states, that rate is greater than 50%.Mr. Carnevale, are you familiar with the data that I've just cited?Do you believe that this sector that we're here talking about today, which has done good things by your own testimony, is doing a good job at being stewards of federal tax dollars given those results?I think the evidence that is, when you get past the anecdotal evidence, and there's anecdotal evidence on both sides, that is, they're wonderful stories, we heard Ms. Carpenter today, and they're awful stories.The data, which is more comprehensive, says quite clearly that there is an issue here with public funds.That is, government doesn't want to buy planes that don't fly and in this case, since the promise is an educational program that will get you a job as a sufficient wage to pay back the cost.In this case, there's a very substantial share of programs that simply don't do that, and those are highly concentrated in for-profit institutions at the certificate in AA level, frankly.Well, one of the other disturbing things that came out of those findings in the Harken Committee's investigation was that there were schools who were getting a large number of online students, which is great in terms of dealing with changing demands of students pursuing higher education, but they had 1700 recruiters working for those schools and one placement officer.Do you find that troubling?I know from relationships with particular for-profit institutions that naturally where they see growth in demand, I.e., when the military benefits went up in the past few years, there was a huge increase in recruiters for military personnel to move to for-profit colleges.In the end, my bias about that is if in the end they get a good education, a good job, I don't care.That's right.But there is an issue here that they don't.And I must say another thing that no one speaks to here today, but should be spoken to, is I went through the college on the GI bill, so did my two brothers.They're not included in this regulation, and one of the dangers in this is if, 'cause it is a private market oriented institution, it will take its profits where it can.That's the way it's supposed to work.So if we shut down using the current regulation, a lot of the expansion in these programs that don't pay among the regular population, there's a risk here that there'll be a shift to the military, and I personally have a problem with.I thank you.Ms. Carpenter, you mentioned you worked at Trek Bicycle CO. in Waterloo, Wisconsin, and I'm from Waterloo, Iowa, where you also mentioned the Decorah connection with Luther College.One of the things that's concerning to me is that the very school you attended and obviously got a great education, you're doing great things, and I commend you for that, but Herzing had a dropout rate of 53% for associate degree students and 48% of bachelor's degrees within the first year.Were you aware of that phenomenon while you were a student on campus?And what would be your explanation for why those dropout rates were so high?On my campus in Madison, Wisconsin and within my degree program, I find those numbers not to sync up with my personal experience, Very few students, if any, dropped out of my associate's degree program.As a matter of fact, I only had- - These were Herzing's own figures provided to the Senate HELP Committee, - Right.So I'm just asking you whether that was something that you were aware of when...Obviously, it was not.No, not within my degree program and for the group of students that I graduated with.That was not my experience.And one of the other disturbing things about Herzing's website is there's a link on it to tuition, and instead of talking about the actual cost of attending Herzing, it says, \"Unfortunately, a simple comparison of tuition price won't give you enough information to compare the true cost of attending school\".Is it all bothersome to you that your alma mater would not be willing to give students who are considering enrolling there an opportunity to make comparisons of the various cost of attending Herzing as opposed to some other school?I don't believe that Herzing withheld that information.They certainly would encourage you to come in and speak with an admissions counselor so that they could clearly identify the value for the tuition that you do pay.I was absolutely well aware as a consumer what the cost would be.One of the reasons that Herzing was a true value to me is that within my testimony, I had mentioned, I attained an associates degree within a year and a half time, as opposed to the traditional two years based on Black programming, based on the availability of coursework, so I think that Herzing is doing a very intelligent job of allowing themselves the opportunity, on a one-on-one basis, to sit down with prospective students and explain how their program is differentiated, how they are differently situated and valued, and giving potential students, prospective students, all of the facts to know what will my education at Herzing cost in comparison to other options, other institutions for the same types of pursuits, same types of degree programs?And the onus is on the individual consumer shopping for their own education, and I think it's an advantage, as I mentioned, that Herzing gives the opportunity to encourage their students to come in and talk about that one-on-one and not rely on face value information in a website that doesn't tell the whole story.Thank You.Ms. Carpenter, thank you very much.Mr. Braley, you get the prize for going over the farthest.Mrs.Biggert.Thank you, Madam Chairman, and I thank the witnesses for being here and your patience while we had those pesky votes, which seem to have taken an awfully long time.Thank you.My question, let's start with Dr. Cortes, I went to, you know, have gone out to visit several of the schools and gotten some information, but when we start, when this first came up, we were talking about why doesn't this disclosure work?Why, if you want to know how a program works in a school...For example, one of the schools I went to, and I don't have the numbers exactly, but they were all over 90%, and this was their school of nursing, and 92% of all those enrolled graduated; 96% of them passed the certification test; And 99 to 100% of those that had passed the certification found jobs.Now, this seems to me that this is, you know, this then gives a student or a consumer choice on where they want to go and, you know, looking at the programs rather than looking at the debt to income, determining whether there's a value to students.Is this something that you would see that would work or are there other things besides this, you know, the way that the gainful employment has been, I guess, described, and is there something else that you think would work?Thank you, Madam Biggert.I do agree.I think it's all about, to a certain extent, the consumer protection that we're looking at.If you look at Berkeley College today in our website, not only you'll get the full tuition clearly stated, we have every single indicator of graduation rates, debt to default rates, we have by degree, each degree, the level of graduation.We believe that transparency is very important in our sector.We make clear that we have a code of conduct that talks about not only academic excellence and student success, but then we put that information very clearly that everybody can look, and they can compare cost.For instance, in the state of New Jersey, for example, with the lowest, we have the lowest tuition increases of any of the institutions in the state of New Jersey.And in fact, we have one of the lowest tuition of all the private institutions in New Jersey, which include, of course, Princeton and other private institutions.We have the lowest tuition rates.So we do very clearly look at making sure that our students get the information they need to- - Well one of the things that really impressed me, too, at these schools is how they worked with the local businesses so that they were able to find jobs for the students.And the colleges had a rapport with these businesses.Could you address that?Yes, absolutely.We work very closely with the industry and the advisory from the corporate sector.Every degree has an advisory board, so that means that for fashion management or for accounting or finance or marketing, we work very closely with the business community for two reasons: We want input to make sure our curriculum is up-to-date, that we look at the changes in the global economy to make sure that we training our students to get into the marketplace, but more important, we making connections with them in order for our students to get the internships that I mentioned earlier, and also for the ability to get them placed once they graduate.As an example, someone mentioned that there were only one career placement at some institution.We have over 20 career placements professionals making sure that our students from the beginning, from the freshman experience, all the way up to the senior year, they get the level of advice and counsel to make sure- - Thank you.And I'd like to just ask, before my time, Mr. Alford, would you comment on this?Yes, ma'am.I think our biggest concern, National Black Chamber of Commerce, is the whole process of this and the singling out of for-profit schools.In a nutshell, what we want is a fair and a transparent process.And as I learned in the military, leadership 101 is fair and impartial treatment for all.And I think some are getting less evaluation, an unequal evaluation, if I may use that term, than others, and it's quite clear.Community colleges have a lesser graduation rate than for-profit schools, but you don't hear talk about that.I heard talk about the Senate hearing that quoted the false GAO report, even after it was divulged that it was false.So I think there's some...It's not the process that I think that makes this country great.I hope I answered you.I agree with you.I yield back.Thank you very much.Mr. Miller.Thank- Thank you very much.Should go to button pressing school.For holding this hearing, Madam Chair.And I want to thank the witnesses for testifying.Mr. Carnevale, I think that you sort of set the stage when you talked about the changes in the economy and in the workplace and then the requirements, that have taken both up and down, in terms of where you'd get your degree and certificates and the rest of that, and that's why many of us had been very strong supporters of the for-profit sector in higher education, and believe it, that they do fill a need for many students and certainly adult students as they originally start off, people who were had to work full-time and also try to secure an education to acquire new skills or a new job or what have you, that they saw on the horizon, but sorta like the old saying, friends don't let friends drive drunk, I have a lot of concern about a sector that I've been an advocate for for a very long time in my 37 years on the committee, that we've got some outliers here that are giving real heartache to the American taxpayer.And you can keep saying, not you Mr. Carnevale, but the panel and other members can keep saying that somehow this only applies to for-profit.It doesn't only apply for for-profits.Of the 55,000 programs Mr. Hinojosa pointed out, 37,000 are in public institutions and 5,000 are for non-profit and 13,000 for-profit.and for the public institutions, they're there because this is the first president that raised issues about the completion rates of two year institutions, which are abysmal.They're outrageous.But the suggestion that somehow this is just targeted for for-profit.I was one of those that went to the administration and said that the original ruling was wrong, but the point is that this is the question.Then the members of the panel suggested that this high standard, this high standard will force people to leave the field or to cut out non-traditional students.This high standard is that 35% of your former students are successfully repaying the principal on their federal loans in their third and fourth year after they leave the school.What if you were a used car dealer and you went to the bank and said, \"I want to borrow money, but 70% of my customers are gonna default\".I don't think you'd get a loan from the bank for your used-car business.But if you're in this business, 70% of your customers might default and you're okay for the taxpayer to put up the money.And you only have to meet that in one out of three years.One out of three years.And there's no penalty until you really screw up.And this is a burden that apparently this industry just can't suffer.Now, we're talking about maybe 2% of the programs are going to be implicated here.And I suggest, and as I had suggested to the industry, you might want to look internally and think that you've got some outliers here that you should have dealt with within the associate various associations here.This is not whether we support for-profit schools or we don't, 'cause all of us have had experiences in our own community, in our families of their successes.This is about what's going on with respect to the taxpayer.Mr. Alford, you asked about what's going on with the department and how they came about this rule.I just say, anecdotally, I don't know, we have an investigation going on what happened with short sellers and now with the inspector General's office.I'd say that the Congress had listened to the short sellers prior to the financial collapse, maybe this nation would be in a different place today, but I want to ask what's going on with an institution that says that they're gonna double the volume of the private student loans, as Corinthian College did, to $240 million, and they expect 55% of their private loan dollars to end up in default.And their default rate on federal student loans doubled between 2005 and 2009 to 21%, and they recently told their investors, not the public, told their investors that they're gonna manage their default rate by pushing borrowers, most likely to default into deferments, forbearance, and income-based repayment.I want to know what's going on there.I want to know when Bridgeport Education buys a college and it takes the price of the amount of money spent on education from 5,000 to $700 per student, I know there's great savings in the internet, but at the end of that process, 64% of their bachelor's degrees and 85% of associate degree students are withdrawing from that institution.What's going on?'Cause when they withdraw, they've already given over a part of their Pell, they've already given over part of their student loans.Their account's running down.I want to know what's going on with that same institution then, which gets 86% of its money from the federal taxpayers, has 30% profit and 30% on marketing.I want to know what's going on with the ATI Career Institute in Texas when the state work board found that 300 of their employed graduates had no jobs at all, and 427 graduates were not employed as the Institute reported they were, and the state cut off all of their WIA funding, but they're still eligible for Pell grants and for student loans.I want to know what's going on.I want to know when the repayment rate for four out of five of the profit schools receiving the most Pell grants and the GI bill is 37 and 31%.I want to know what's going on.It's not a question of whether I support private schools, for-profit schools or not.We sit on this side of the dais on behalf of the taxpayers who are on that side of the dais, and that's why we have these inquiries, and that's why we have a rule that probably does not much more than develop a lot of information, and I think it will cause some people swimming at the bottom of the pool to swim a little faster to try to stay off the bottom.But I think that's a minimum.That's a minimum that we can ask as members of Congress on behalf of the taxpayers.Madam Chairman, if I just might say, I would just say this, you know, we also want to ask what's going on when Indiana, Illinois, and California, Florida have joined to look at for-profit institutions there.Indiana attorney general asking questions about institutions.Florida investigating eight institutions on violating the unfair business practices.Iowa, student default rates.Kentucky, job placement, recruitment practices.Massachusetts, recruitment practices, and student loan practices.Mr. Miller, as you know- - There is an obligation- - As you know- - And I appreciate- - As you know, you can- - You've been very generous with the time, and I appreciate it.You can put whatever your comments are in the record.Dr. Roe.I've seen the record, it doesn't do so well.Oh, thank you.But I appreciate the offer.I think I won't give a speech.I'll try to ask some questions.I gave the speech already.I spent 24 years in school, not including kindergarten, so I basically overdosed on school, and all in the public school system; not in the private; not in the for-profit.And Dr. Carnevale makes a great point, is the whole purpose is to get an education and hopefully find gainful employment, once you leave, that institution that will pay.If the argument is here that it's too expensive to go to school, I couldn't argue with that more.I served as a foundation board president of the college where I attended and helped to raise money to help educate people that were lower income, as I was when I went to college.But to give you an example, if the gainful employment rule is to be applied to everybody, I looked at Georgetown, great university, just before I came here.$41,000 is the tuition and 58,000 to go there for a year.If you get a job teaching school somewhere after that's over, you can never pay that back.If you're a police officer in Johnson City, Tennessee, where I'm from, you can never pay that back.I had a medical student's dad call me the other day and said, \"Dr. Roe,\" he said, \"My son has $212,000 in student loans, and he's starting his residency and he'll make about $30,000 a year\".Just the interest on his student loan is $1,200 a month, just the interest.He didn't have any left to eat after that.So it's not just for-profit universities, it's everybody school is too expensive.And I couldn't agree with Dr. Carnevale; he makes great points.You should go to the school to get a job to pay for something.The other thing I think that's a little misleading, having been a foundation board president, is that when you compare the for-profits, the bricks and mortar are not calculated in those tuition fees.All those million multi-million dollar buildings, as Mr. Alfred pointed out, that's not amortized into that cost.So it is in the private tuition, that is amortized in the cost.Could you point that out?You made a great point a minute ago is that you're not really comparing- Do you agree with that?Absolutely, sir.Yeah, I think- - I envision Ohio State, my alma mater, University of Wisconsin, just humongous, all paid for by taxpayers.And Ms. Carpenter made a point of some students, and these are many of them are not traditional students, in a much smaller classroom setting.Your average freshmen class at Ohio State or University of Tennessee in freshman English 2 to 500 students sometimes watching a video screen.I have a problem with that, and it is true when you get into a smaller classroom setting, it is gonna cost more money to do that, and I think Ms. Carpenter, you made a tremendous point.Information is key so you can go in and make an informed consumer choice.That's what I did when I went.My choice was I didn't have the bus money out of town, so I knew I was gonna go to school, but it was an informed choice, and I think that's what you did.You made a very informed choice about what your needs were.Obviously, you were not an 18 year old, as I was, 17, When you started college.You had a little more of an idea about what you needed to do; I didn't.And graduation rates, Mr. Miller makes a tremendous point on that, is that if you look at our own state of Tennessee where you get a Hope scholarship to go to college, to junior college, to community college, or to a four-year school, 50% of our students in two years don't qualify after that.They lose their Hope scholarship because they're not succeeding academically.And I think if we're going to do this gainful employment rule, everybody should have to do the gainful employment rule.If you're gonna set standards, there's no question there probably are some bad actors out there that are not living up and doing what they need to do, but everybody ought to have the same standards in this country.Mr. Alford made that, and thank you for your service to our country, by the way.Everybody ought to have to apply with the same rules.If you're gonna do that, then private schools should, public schools should, and for-profit schools should.Dr. Cortes, would you comment on that?Yeah, I do agree with you, Congressman.As you know, not all for-profit institutions are alike.Do you know, for example, that there are only 94 regionally accredited for-profit institutions in this country and Puerto Rico?That's an example of the differences.Berkeley College is a brick and mortar.We own our buildings.We pay taxes: local, federal, and state.We invest back into our community and to our technology.When you look at our sector, we led the sector in technology in distance learning, Not all out students...Most people assume that for-profits are all online colleges.They're not.Colleges like ours are 80 years changing lives in the state of New York and New Jersey, and there are many family-owned businesses that are for-profits that put a significant amount of money in the economic development of the region.In your folders, you have a report that we put together in New York, Berkeley College, and in New Jersey.We have invested in economic development over $223 million in a given year, both about economic support to the economy, jobs, student expenditures, building, construction.Those are the impacts that the private sector institutions are offering.It also offers access and choice for students, as you did when you chose your institution.The students come to us because they see the flexibility, they seen the quality of many of our institutions, and they see the ability to get degrees that they can not have in other places.In the state of New Jersey, for example, there are only two institutions that offer fashion merchandise degrees, and we're one of them.So they can't go to the public institution because they're full, then they come to us and we do a very good job.Thank you.Madam Chairman, I want to thank the panel for sticking around for our votes.I really appreciate you all doing that, indulging us, and thank you.You've been a great panel.I yield back.Thank you, Dr.Roe.Mr. Davis?Thank you very much, Madam Chairman.And I also want to thank the witnesses for being here.It seems to me that we are holding a hearing in search of a problem that is not being addressed.And I say that only because the rules that have been promulgated, that have been issued, seem to be fair, seem to be balanced, provides opportunity for correction.And I was one of those individuals who urged the department as they were having discussions and looking at making new rules, to try and make sure that they took into consideration the needs of all the institutions because I represent a large number of for-profit institutions of higher learning.I also represent a large number of public institutions of higher learning.So I want everybody to be treated fairly.As a matter of fact, the philosopher Camus is supposed to have said one time that \"I love my country, but I also love justice as I love every opportunity that we can find for access to higher education for our citizens.But I also love transparency.I love factual information.I love serious analysis.I love good counseling and information that will help lead individuals to the kind of choices that will not only improve the quality of their lives but will give them the resources to pay back whatever it is that they owe\".Dr. Cortes, let me ask you.As you know, the continuing resolution that the House leadership offered sought to cut Pell grants over a million students by approximately $845 per student.Some Republicans have recently described Pell grants disparagingly, as a welfare handout, and highlighted it as a need of substantial funding cut.How important are Pell grants to your students?And will a loss or reduction in Pell grants harm access to higher education for your students and those who attend your institution?Thank you for the question, Congressman Davis.Absolutely.I think the loss of any funds for the students that we serve is gonna impact their ability to access and to persist in college graduation.I give you an example.Many of our students, sometimes in the middle of the year, come to us for additional funding that we could provide as institutional aid in order to pay their books, in order to get transportation to the school, in order, for them, to pay the rent in their homes.We talking about the students, which I mentioned earlier, an average family income of somewhere around $25,000.So it would be harmful to your- - Very harmful.Extremely harmful.Thank you.Let me move on because my time is about to expire.Mr. Alford, let me ask you, and I've had a great time working with you and the National Black Chamber of Commerce.I have a great deal of affinity for the work that you do and for your organization, and I thank you for it.Thank you, sir.I was struck by your testimony though, at one point, where you suggest that for-profit schools are the ones that truly are serving low-income and minority students.And so I asked what about the HBCUs?What about the HSIs?What about the PBIs?What about these minority serving institutions that are public or not-for-profit and do a great job?Yeah.And I support them, and they are at capacity.University of Wisconsin, when I graduated in 1970, it's enrollment was 3% Black.Today, 2011, it's enrollment is 3% Black.The University of California system, that each semester they have fewer and fewer Blacks matriculating at those schools.So the HBCUs, yes, sir, but there are a small percentage of the potential we have to educate our people.The largest HPCU is Howard University's 11,000.You get from Southern at 10,000, Texas Southern 10,000, and then you're down to four digits in any of those schools.They couldn't house 40 million, a population of 40 million people, whose children needed higher education.I would certainly agree with that and indicate that they still have capacity though that is unmet.But let me thank you for your answer, and thank you for participating, and I yield back, Madam chairman.Thank you, sir, as always.Thank you, Mr. Davis.And now I'd like to recognize Mr. Towns.Thanks very much, Madam Chair.And let me also thank you for holding this hearing.I really, really appreciate you moving forward with it, and I want to thank the witnesses for being here and to say that I know that it's been a long day and been a tough day for many of us in terms of conflicts.But the point is that I'm happy that you're here.And let me just say that as I listened to some of my colleagues, you know, I'm sort of wondering, are they thinking about the economic situation that we face across the board?The top universities in this country have people that are now unemployed and because of the fact there are just no jobs.And I think that sometimes, you know, when we look at things that, you know, we sort of forget about that when you look at the top universities, people coming out, no jobs, and then we look at the situation we discussed in terms of gainful employment, and then we sort of ignore the fact that there's going to be some problems there when it comes to jobs as well.Let me start by saying I support a fair, balanced process.I really do.And of course, I support a fair, balance process and I support a good government, and I support educational choice, but I do not support poor quality institutions, I do not support predatory practices.and I didn't do not support a regulatory process that is not transparent.I believe that the department's rules leave many bad actors still capable of harming students.I also believe that the department's rules may adversely impact many quality programs, and, in turn, hinder educational choice for minorities.First, in the family college attendees and economic disadvantaged students, but I also think there's some other areas that we need to look into.And when you look at some of these athletic programs, and it's known that there was one university, they went for 10 years and did not graduate one basketball player.I mean, nobody wants to talk about those kinds of things.I mean, let's look at the real issues of education if we are serious, you know, across the board, rather than just sort of looking at one thing and picking on it and staying with it.You know, I'm also not certain that the process which department came to the rule was entirely fair and balanced.I'm not convinced of that.I heard some of my colleagues saying it was fair and balanced.I'm not sure of that.There are a number of aspects that are currently undergoing review by the IG Of the department, and until we have the final report, how can we say who won't be able to say it?I don't see until we get that information.So I'm just sort of cautioning my colleagues.Mr. Afrin, let me just sort of raise this with you very quickly.I share your concerns regarding the disproportionate impact that dysregulation will have on minority students, as well as your concern regarding the process by which the regulation was crafted.I agree with many of my colleagues here today that there are numerous good things being done by career colleges, though, I also agree that there are a few bad actors in the mix.Some are citing examples of questionable recruitment practices, and I've heard all of that, and low retention rates, you know, however, we need to look at that also with the economic situation, you know, if you in school and then you have an economic crisis in the family, what are you gonna do?You're going to drop out.I mean, so I think that sometimes we just look at these things and we sorta looking at them with tunnel vision, and I don't think we can do that.I think that we need to look and highlight in terms of a lot of people that as a result of these institutions have been able to go on and live a very decent life and make a major contribution to many people, and I think we should not forget that.So Mr. Alford, what do you suggest that we do?Real quickly.I think we need to go back and review this in a fair and transparent process when it's open.I think when a short seller writes an article, subprime goes to college, and he's talking about the gainful employment rule, how they're gonna make this happen and they're gonna make big money, I think something's wrong with that.And that same individual can go into the inner circle of a federal agency and talk to executives of a federal agency and make suggestions?Talking about Mr. Eiseman.It stinks, and something should be done about that, I think.I think we need to go back and punt and reevaluate this.My time is without merit, Madam Chair.And I would like to just ask a unanimous consent that the statement by Mr. Alcee Hastings, from the state of Florida, that his statement be included in the record.Without objection.Thank you, Mr. Towns.I yield back.Mr. Bishop.Thank you, Madam chair.I appreciate your holding the hearing.And I apologize for arriving so late.Another committee I was on had a markup.But this is an issue that I'm very interested in.Well, let me start.Ms. Carpenter, I read your testimony.I found it very moving and I congratulate you and Herzing University on doing such a good job.There was one particular statement that you made that I just want to highlight.You say, \"My associate's degree from Herzing University has proven to be of high value to me and my employer.My employment history with Quest Software is but one example that proves that fact\".I know you know this, but I think it's important to say for the record that if such a statement could be made, even in much more modest form by your fellow graduates, Herzing University or any other university that graduates students who can say that, has absolutely nothing to fear from this regulation.Nothing.So congratulations, I'm glad your experience went well.And what this regulation is designed to deal with, as Mr. Miller said, are the outliers, not those who are doing the work of providing access to a higher education and to help people get the American dream.And I'm glad you're on your path to the American dream.I want to pick up on where Mr. Miller is questioning was.This regulation, in my view...And I was one who urge the department to withdraw the first pass at this, I felt that it was an unfair regulation, and I frankly applaud the department for going back and having several iterations of this.And I won't engage you, Mr. Alford, on whether or not the process was transparent, but I think reviewing 90,000 comments, I think that's something that is not to be taken lightly, but here's the environment in which we're in: This regulation says that if 35% of an institution's former students in years three and four of their repayment status make at least one payment, that is an institution that is satisfying the gainful employment regulation.I find it impossible to believe that someone can consider that regulation to be an onerous or arbitrary or unfair regulation.And let me put it in the context that we are in.Here's the context that we're in: The budget resolution that passed the House of Representatives, if it were to ever take on the force of law, let us hope it does not, would cut the Pell grant maximum to $3,000 from 5,550 to $3,000.If we don't act, we will have no Perkins Loan Program come 2014.H.R. 1, which thankfully will never take on the force of law, eliminated SEOG. So here's the Republican vision of Title IV Student Financial Aid Programs: no Perkins, no SEOG, a $3,000 Pell grant maximum, and work study at its current level.That's the Republican vision.That's what they've voted for.Now, I ask you in that context, how long do you think the federal government will be willing to guarantee $90 billion a year of student loans if in years three and four, we consider it onerous, impossible to achieve of a 65% default rate in years three and four?I would suggest to you the underpinning of the finances of the for-profit sector and frankly, every other sector, which is the guaranteed student loan program.We're not gonna be able to count on that guaranteed student loan program if we're looking at that level of default.And yet, that is in fact what this regulation contemplates.So I would urge anyone who's taking the position that this is somehow excessive to assess it in that context because I think all of us have the same goal here, which is to see to it that students of modest means get a chance to go to college.I'm a former college administrator, I'm a former financial aid director.I've spent my entire adult life dealing with the issues of access and affordability.They mean a great deal to me.And I'm very fearful that if we're not careful, careful stewards of taxpayer money, then that money is gonna go away, and so I view this regulation, frankly, as a modest means of the Congress and the administration discharging its responsibility to be careful stewards of taxpayer money.So I just really ask you to look at it in that context.Let me then go, I'm sorry, My time is expired, Madam Chair.I appreciate your indulgence.Thank you.I want to thank you, Mr. Bishop.I will point out to you a note that Congressman Roe has just handed to me that points out that in 2006, the amount spent on Pell grants was 12.4 billion, and the amount scheduled to be spent on Pell grants for 2012 is $49 billion.Would the gentelady yield?Let me go on to the...I'm just putting out a fact there for you.I was going to put that fact in context.Okay.Let me, if I could, let me recognize Congresswoman Speier.I'd like to finish this up no later than two o'clock, if at all possible.Madam Chair, thank you very much.And I want to thank all of the witnesses who are here.Again, we all apologize for the frantic pace that we operate under.It doesn't make a lot of sense from time to time.I think this is a very important hearing, but I've got to tell you at the outset, I think what the Department of Education has recommended is embarrassingly small.I would challenge any of my colleagues to go back to their districts and say to their constituents that we are funding many for-profit colleges at 90%.Now mind you, if we're funding you at 90%, you are government schools.The University of California is a public institution, and the funding from the state is less than 20%.But you are for-profit schools, and 90% of your money, in some cases, is coming from the federal government.And I might also point out that in one of the colleges that was highlighted, Bridgepoint Education, 29% of their spending in 2010 was for marketing and 30% was for profit, so only 40% of the money at that institution was spent on students.I would challenge any of us to go back to our districts and say, this is good government.This committee is about dealing with waste, and I would suggest to you, as Mr. Bishop did earlier, that if you can't make this, I mean, this is embarrassingly low as a standard, and if you can't make these standards, then you shouldn't be in business because, frankly, you are government operated institutions.You are funded by the government, and if you can't make these very modest standards, then you shouldn't be in business.Now, here's where my concern is.This reminds me of the financial meltdown.This reminds me of subprime loans.This reminds me of the same institutions that targeted low-income people for subprime loans to get into loans they shouldn't get into, and then they went belly up and the country went belly up.One of the institutions has said that it is looking at student profiles for recruitment; Welfare moms with kids, pregnant women, recently divorced, low self-esteem, vocational rehabilitation, experienced a recent death, physically and mentally abused, drug rehab, fired or laid off.That is the target population that some of these institutions, these for profit institutions, are seeking candidates from.Now, my concern is, since these actual standards don't apply to the military, to veterans, guess what's gonna happen?We're gonna to have some outliers, I'm not suggesting that you are, but some outliers going out and targeting our veterans, and we've already had cases.\"Frontline\" recently did an evaluation and actually said to a Marine sergeant, who was enrolled at the Art Institute, told the recruiter they suffered from PTSD and was ensured that the college had special tutoring programs for veterans, and he later flunked out of his photography degree program for being unable to finish the work and receiving no help from the college.Or former Marine, Wade Cutler, and guardsman, Brad Seliga, also in the frontline report who were hired by Ashford university, specifically to recruit fellow veterans, both of whom quit and discuss with the way veterans were being suckered out of their GI Bill benefits.Now, my question to Mr. Carnevale: Do you think that we are going to see an engagement now by these for-profits to focus on veterans because they're not gonna be subject to these modest standards that are being suggested by the Department of Education?Well, I don't want to make this a character assault on people who run these institutions, but I used to run for profit operations, and I can tell you, I would, that is, I would go after the populations where the money was and the regulation wasn't.In the end, I have no problem with that.My problem would be what's the outcome, and unless we start judging these things by the outcome, it's good that for-profits chase after abused women; if they serve them, that's fine, and that's what I think this regulation does.It demands that we use outcome standards to judge the use of public funds efficiently, and if we don't start looking at efficiency in post-secondary education, there's gonna be no more equity 'cause we can't afford it.I might also...Thank you, Mr. Carnevale.I might also point out that the University of Phoenix received over $84 million in post GI Bill benefits, and it increased its recruiters to the military from 91 in 2003 to over 452.So I'm putting word out to all the for-profits.I'm gonna watch what happens to the profiles of veterans in your programs because we need to protect them.And we are not gonna have them waste their great GI Bill benefits on institutions that don't deliver.I yield back.Thank you, Ms. Speier.You of course can put anything in the record that you would like.Ms. Waters.Thank you very much, Madam Chair.I'm very appreciative for you allowing me to take part in this hearing today.I have a long history dealing with private post-secondary private schools.I come from the California State Legislature, where I created a whole body of law relative to private post-secondaries and private schools based on my experiences in South Los Angeles.I ran job training programs there, and I watched the recruitment methods.I watched the kind of messaging that was done by many of these private post-secondary institutions and private colleges where they raised the hopes and dreams of a lot of poor people, who certainly did not realize any careers or real jobs from the Pell grant money that they allowed to be spent in these institutions, and it was disheartening.And that's why I've spent so many years on this.I do believe that this potential scandal is gonna be bigger than the subprime housing meltdown scandal, where many of our homeowners were tricked into mortgages and loans that resulted in foreclosures.I have over the years involved myself with any number of these institutions, Corinthian, ITT, Kaplan, on and on and on, and the record is replete with what they have done.I take particularly exception to this messaging that talks about how well you're doing for minorities and how, if you are not offering opportunities for minorities, they're not gonna be able to be educated or to have careers or jobs.I think, Mr. Alford, you stated that gainful employment regulations will harm minority students, but students attending these institutions are already being exploited.Students at for-profit institutions represent 12% of all higher education students, 26% of all student loans, and 46% of all student loan dollars in default.How would you propose that we protect these students from being saddled with debt and low prospects for job opportunities?And how is it that these very, very mild conditions of gainful employment that was just described by Ms. Speier, is gonna harm the private school industry?Mr. Alford?I have a lot of relatives that have grown up in your district.And those who received education, many from for-profit schools, are doing well, raising families, and living prosperous lives.Those relatives of mine around 73rd and Hoover and going further into South Central, who did not receive education, are either dead, in jail, or on welfare.Education is the key.So I don't think hurting an opportunity, a vehicle to educate someone is a productive thing to do.I don't know what you just said.I was listening for some facts.I thank you for sharing with me that little vignette about what happened- - It is was real, ma'am.It is real.But you have no facts.So it does not resignate at all.I want to ask a little bit...Well, I have something here.I understand there's been a lot of talk about the rule-making process.I would like to submit the list of program integrity negotiators for the record.The negotiated rulemaking included several different types of stakeholders, all of who stood to be impacted by the rule.The following communities of interests were represented: Students, consumer advocacy organizations, two year public institutions, four year public institutions, private nonprofit institutions, private for-profit institutions, college presidents, admissions offices, business offices, financial aid administrators, regional accreditators, national accreditors, workforce development officers, lending community representatives, test publishers, and state higher education officials.I'd like to submit that to the record.Without objection, Ms. Waters.And I will point out to you that your time is up.Thank you very much.I appreciate the opportunity.Sorry I was not, Madam Chair, able to get into all of this discussion about short-selling because I really do want to reveal something about what is taking place in that whole area.I will back the balance of my time.Feel free to put other pieces in the record.We have all done our best to express our appreciation to the members of the panel for the disjointed hearing that we had today.We appreciate your being with us on a Friday afternoon.Some of you came from long distances, and we understand the hassle of coming here to Washington any time but particularly when you come from long distances, and I don't know if you're gonna try to get away on a Friday afternoon, but we do want to thank you very much for coming and hope you will return some time under little more relaxed situations.And with that, the committee stands adjourned.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/gov.house.ogr.ra.20110708.2.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/gov.house.ogr.ra.20110708.2.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/gov.house.ogr.ra.20110708.2.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/gov.uscourts.ca1.case-16-1046/gov.uscourts.ca1.case-16-1046.2017-02-09.mp3", "text": "The next case is 16-1046, United States versus Janice Troisi.Good morning, Your Honors, may it please the Court.The sole issue on this appeal is whether the evidence at Janice Troisi's bench trial was sufficient to support her conviction for healthcare fraud conspiracy and 10 substantive counts of healthcare fraud.More specifically, did the Government prove beyond a reasonable doubt, that she possessed the requisite mens rea, meaning that she acted willfully with a bad purpose?That is to say, with knowledge that her conduct was unlawful, and with a specific intent to defraud.The parties seem to agree that that's the requisite legal standard, as set forth in this Court's recent decision in Aguila from 2015, although the recorded 28 J letter filed by the Government last week, may cast some doubt on that front.In any event, this case involves, there are several facts in this case, which distinguish it from many other healthcare fraud cases.First, in this case, the patients actually did receive services.Services which may well have benefited them.And second, Miss Troisi was a salaried employee, not an owner.And other than, so, she had no financial stake in the receipt of revenues, or the company's business plan, other than to keep her job.Now, the Government points to really three bodies of evidence in supporting its case on mens rea.First they point to Miss Troisi's hiring, training, and management practices.That is to say she hired nurses right out of nursing school.She trained them, allegedly inadequately.And she was an aggressive, tough boss.And the evidence certainly supported all of those allegations.None of them, I submit, satisfied in any way, shape, or form the Government's burden of proof on mens rea.Hiring nurses out of nursing school, this is not I submit, the most desirable nursing job in the world.These nurses were being paid, they were having to go to people's homes, they were being paid on a per patient basis.If her training wasn't as good as it should've been, that's not a crime.And she was no doubt, a very tough boss.Judge Woodlock described her as a lady Marine drill sergeant.That does not mean she had a criminal state of mind.Second, the Government point, and the Government asserts that she was familiar with this body of applicable regulations, an therefore, that she knew exactly what the requirements were.And she knew that the requirements were not being complied with.And I submit that is simply not supported by the evidence.What about the, what about the striking fact, this is the documentary evidence, the striking fact that we're talking about a very large number of recipients of these home health care services, that the care plan seemed almost to be borrowed.They just seem to be, rather than individualized, as you might expect, if someone was really examining the needs of an individual patients.They just seem to be the same plan over and over and over again.And surely she was responsible for filling out these plans and signing off on them.Isn't that rather a striking fact?Well, it is.And, and if she had a good faith belief that these patients needed services- - The same services over and over?Well, that they needed, - That hundreds of individuals needed the same type of care?That they needed skilled home nursing services.So there's no doubt that she facilitated paperwork to make sure that they continue to be eligible for those services.And that these services would fit within, and would be reimbursable.But that may have been sloppy, it may have been misfeasance.There should've been more individualized attention and those forms should've been filled out on a more individualized basis.But that doesn't prove that she knew that what she was doing wasn't lawful, and that she had a specific intent to defraud.These regulations are not simple.There's a 93 page chapter in the Medicare Benefits Manual, that's in evidence.And the crux of the standard, that is, that it would be, that we're taking a considerable and taxing effort for the patient to leave the home.I mean, this is not crystal clear standard.There is plenty of in play in those journals.Particularly when you're dealing with a population of people who are elderly or have a whole variety of infirmities.There is nothing in her resume that suggests she had any expertise in this area, at all.She had never worked for a home health care agency before.And so their assertion that she understood the stuff backwards and forwards, and knew darn well that what she was doing was unlawful, simply is not supported by the facts.They claimed that she...what about her instruction of the nurses to put aside their own observations and conclusions about the status of the patient.Whether this was home care, whether they were in need of skilled nursing services and, always fill out the form in the same way.And then when a nurse did not comply with those instructions, she went in, using the same color of ink, and made corrections to the forms in order to qualify these patients for Medicare reimbursement.Isn't that a bit of a smoking gun?It certainly was, I think, an important arrow in the Government's quiver at trial.She clearly, as somebody who had been a nurse for decades, essentially trusted her instincts about what these patients needed, over the instincts of these novice nurses.And she was..And she basically with the novice nurses on all of these occasions.No, Your Honor, she - Personally, where she...No, no, Your Honor, she did not.And, and having made a, apparently some blanket determination that this population of patients needed these kinds of services, she made sure the paperwork fit the bill.And she did that.And the evidence is certainly clear and overwhelming that she did that.So one thing that troubled me about the case was what her motive was to do all of that.And the Government says, well, she actually, is not the job that she's promoted to Director of Nursing shortly after she's hired.And I assume she did get some pay raises.She was not a direct beneficiary.But from your point of view, is it that she had no incentive whatsoever to participate in this fraud?She just didn't want to rock the boat?Well Your Honor, I mean, she had it, it was a job.It was a decently paying job.So in that sense, I suppose, that would provide her with an incentive to go along with what she was expected to do.And that was to make sure the paperwork, in fact, supported the continuation of these services.She was promoted to Director of Clinical Services, I think.I'm sorry that it's not just a continuation.There are new patients - You're right, you're right.being added every week - you're right.Yes.The initiation of services, and then the continuation of services, once they were originally presented.I certainly can see that, Your Honor.She was originally hired, I believe in October of 2010 and was promoted to Director of Clinical Services two months later.And there's not a lot of evidence of what she was doing during those two months.The bulk of the evidence was after she had taken that job.I believe that the evidence was the predecessor in that position left around that time.So. - And was there evidence that the predecessor had not similarly instructed the nurses, that this was something new she brought with her?The evidence at trial focused on what happened after Ms. Troisi was there.I don't recall a lot of testimony about what had happened with her predecessor.Although, there certainly was testimony from Dr. Wilking that the same course of conduct had been going on for a number of years.But wasn't there some, if you could call it, guilty stated blind evidence in this case, in the sense that shortly after she and Dr. Wilking became aware of this investigation, she made some statement to you and came to show how she was vulnerable because of the large numbers of forms she had filled out in the same way.There was testimony that she showed on the statement, suggesting that she, she knew she was in trouble.Well, yes, Your Honor, after the FBI basically raided the business, she did express concern that since she had a role in doing all this paperwork, that she could be in trouble.So I don't think that that is sufficient to demonstrate that while she was doing it, that she knew that she was violating the law.But once the FBI came in, of course, she was concerned, who wouldn't have been?I thank the Court.Good morning, Kelly Lawrence for the United States.Just briefly to address the 28 J letter that was raised by defense counsel.The Government simply submitted that to clarify its position.I believe we do agree on the standard of review as set forth in this Court's decision in Aguila.Just wanted to clarify that we weren't advocating a specific intent standard, like the ones set forth in Roxof v Cheak, which the statute itself prohibits.As I read the, the Defendant's brief, and as I hear him today, speak about the evidence to support the conviction.I don't hear any disagreement about the actions that the Defendant took in terms of training the nurses, altering the Oasis patient assessment forms.Filling out and signing the plans of care, the form 485's, or that maintaining a separate file of correspondence with treating physicians who had asked to services to stop.That evidence is in the record and the Government believes fully supports the Defendant's conviction, but there was more.And as to her consciousness of guilt and as to the systemic and sort of thorough scheme to defraud and her role in it, the actions the Defendant took, went beyond just doing her job.The hiring of recent nursing school graduates.It may be because they, that's an easy way to get nurses into this type of business.It also served a different purpose.And as reflected in the nurse's testimony, the Defendant bullied and manipulated them in a way that she couldn't perhaps do with a more experienced nurse who had knowledge of home health care and Medicare regulations.This allowed the Defendant to maintain control over the nurses and their visits in a way that furthered the fraud.She, when they questioned her judgment about correcting the form, she just told them to do it.When they asked to stop seeing a patient who refused to be seen, or who was never home, she said, keep going.And if they didn't keep going, she threatened, and then did, take a patient away, which caused them to lose income.So this wasn't just an happenstance that perhaps recent nursing school grads would enter this business.What was her incentive to do all of this?Her incentive, although it has to be inferred from the evidence.It suggests that she wanted to be Director of Nursing and she did it.And she was a very aggressive person by all accounts through the testimony of the various witnesses at trial.And she may have been an ambitious person who wanted to be a leader and a Director of Clinical Nursing.She did receive slight pay raises, but no evidence of this lining her pocket.The Government agrees with the Defendant that there wasn't evidence of that at trial.The Defendant also did have years - Is the evidence clear she started all of these practices in the two months before she got her promotion?It is not clear, and the court, District Court, restricted testimony about the prior nursing directors activities, Sharon Richardson.In order to keep the jury focused on these two Defendants, and what they had done.So there isn't evidence about what had happened before.It seems from the way it was presented, that it couldn't have been that she continued practices, that she didn't necessarily create them.However, she brought to bear her own personality and her own style.And she did fully embrace the role in terms of controlling these nurses and, and telling them to go out and keep doing the visits.I would also note she, she did admit that she was responsible for, and the nurses confirmed this, filling out the plans of care.Which were identical for all the patients, regardless of their specific medical conditions or needs.And she recertified those patients as well.Moreover, I think that one of the more damning aspects of the testimony that was given at trial is that when nurses, primary care physicians, and even patients ask for those services to stop, she refused.And when the primary care physicians contacted her and said, I didn't authorize this.Why are you seeing my patients?Please stop the services.She just simply ignored them.She argued, sometimes and disputed that they weren't needed, but she also ignored them.And when the face to face requirement went into effect, she would simply send out the fax, asking the doctors to confirm the services were necessary and that the face-to-face encounter had occurred.And if the doctors refused, she signed the form and had Dr. Wilkings sign the form too and submitted the papers to Medicare.In the Government's view this shows, ample knowledge and intent to defraud beyond simply just doing her job.Did I understand you to say earlier in your argument, that when the attending doctor for the elderly patient said, don't provide these services, he doesn't meet, or protested the, then she kept those letters separately in a separate file?That's evidence of consciousness of guilt.And the Government's view, that is evidence of consciousness of guilt.And as an evidentiary.Was it in the record?The evidence is in the record.Yes.That's when the search warrant was executed, they found a file of correspondence, in her office.Correspondence in her office.The District Court, I just to be clear, the District Court noted in rendering the verdict at the bench trial that he viewed that evidence could go either way.He didn't rely on it specifically in favor of the Government, but it was something that is in the record.And the Government argued, demonstrated her knowledge and intent to defraud.And what I hear the Defendant arguing today is simply asking the Court to draw different inferences from the evidence, which is essentially uncontested here.That her actions, with respect to her role, DNA, demonstrated fraud.And this is quite well known as the standard for sufficiency reviewers to draw the inferences in favor of the Government.And when the Court does that, the Government submits, that there's no doubt that she was guilty of these crimes.Ms. Lawrence it's just, I've heard from the case.Your office has prosecuted healthcare fraud for a very long time.Is it still a priority of your office and why do we keep seeing so many of these cases?I would say, I believe it is a priority of the office.I can't give you a ranking of the different priorities, but it is still very much part of, of the prosecution and our investigations.And I'm not sure I understand the kind of case - It's a priority because so much this activity is taking place.Despite years of prosecution.I believe it continues to be a priority for the Federal Government and the Department of Justice, which makes it a priority for our office as well.If you'd like additional information, I can seek it from in the office.Thank you.Thank you.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/gov.uscourts.ca1.case-16-1046.2017-02-09.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/gov.uscourts.ca1.case-16-1046.2017-02-09.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/gov.uscourts.ca1.case-16-1046.2017-02-09.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/gov.uscourts.ca1.case-17-2114/gov.uscourts.ca1.case-17-2114.2018-07-26.mp3", "text": "Number 172114 Francis H Woodward versus the United States.Morning Mr. Segal.Morning, Your Honor.May I reserve one minute for rebuttal, please?Yes, you may.Thank you.May it please the court Bruce Segal representing Frank Woodward.Your Honor, this case began when my client, Mr. Woodward was indicted on July 27th, 1990.Believe it or not, that's 23 years ago, tomorrow to the day.And when one reviews the course on Services Law, and the evolution of line services laundering during the 23 years, I've had the privilege of representing Mr. Woodward.It is evident that there has been a dramatic shrinking of the scope of that law.Most recently in the McDonald decision by the Supreme Court and our position is that the two counts remaining out of the 28 on which was to Woodward was originally charged, are now rendered invalid as a result of fundamental errors in the trial created by the McDonald decision.Those fundamental errors, take two forms.One is the sufficiency of the evidence, And the second is on the instructions given.Both of which are deficient under the newly refined standard imposed by McDonald.So in terms of the sufficiency of the evidence, it is our position that the conduct for which Mr. Woodward was convicted no longer constitutes a theft of laundered services as redefined under McDonald.And the beginning of that analysis is the two-pronged mechanism, which McDonald's sets out for determining what an official act is.And then, two-step process is at first you have to identify a particular matter or cause a controversy that is within the jurisdiction of the public official.And secondly, you have to show a particular actions, or decisions he took or he made with respect to those causes or concerns in evaluating the evidence in the Woodward trial.It falls short on a number of grounds.First of all, I'll deal very quickly with the type of evidence which I think clearly is no longer an issue under McDonald.It was a great deal of emphasis on the greater access that Mr. Sawyer, the lobbyist for John Hancock had to Mr. Woodward, as a result of the gratuities, allegedly all the meetings he had with him and generalities of that sort.That's the evidence.There was evidence to that effect.What was the instruction?The instruction.Instruction didn't reference access at all, did it?The instruction did not reference actions at all, Your Honor.The instruction - - Access - Did not, no.The instructions did not emphasize access.It emphasized an intent in receiving the gratuities to be influenced in the performance of official duties, but not any requirement of actually performing official acts within the parameters of McDonald.But Judge Woodlock pointed out in his opinion denying , pointed out several official acts that he felt the evidence reasonably related to Woodword's conduct.They were bills that were introduced into the legislature and either passed by the committee that Woodward coach in or bottled up by that committee.He did, Your Honor.And respectfully, we believe the district judge abusive discretion in arriving at that conclusion.And I say that for a number of reasons where the evidence that the district judge pointed to in support of that conclusion falls far short of the McDonald's standard is in the second prong of that standard.Showing that Woodward made a decision or took action with respect to those particular bills.I don't think there's any question, but bills themselves constitute a subject matter or concern within the first stage of the process, of the mechanism.And it's the second step where the problem lies, because look at the evidence that we're talking about here.The evidence was that as the co-Chair of the Insurance Committee, Woodward carried bills in the legislature.McDonald doesn't address that issue though, does it?I thought McDonald makes it clear that access, showing access alone is not enough.McDonald does not say that an official act cannot be the act of one does as the chairman of a committee in doing those things that wouldn't nix to bill.That's correct, Your Honor.So, it's not a big problem if your coram nobis?I don't think it does, Your Honor.Because again, I'm focusing on the - - We can only rule for you of the extent of McDonald.I'm sorry.We can only rule for you if we extended McDonald from the case of access to the case of carrying legislation.Right, and what I'm suggesting is that a fair reading of McDonald requires great rigor and precision in evidence that Woodward took action or made decisions with respect to particular identified matters, causes a concern, and where the other, - I thought some courts have accepted this stream of benefits idea post McDonald - The steady stream of benefits idea, concept may have some vitality in the wake of McDonald.But only to this extent, Your Honor.It would still have to be the actions of the legislator would still have to be tethered to the gratuities received and you'd have to show some specificity and precision in terms of what actions were engaged in, in the future with - It was the lunches and the life for him carrying legislation as the head of the committee.There was no evidence, Your Honor, of any action that Mr. Woodward took in carrying legislation.They were generalized descriptions of what happened in the nature of carrying legislation.The problem is when it got to the specifics.It's inferential, basically.It was two problems.Number one is there was an assumption piled on assumption piled on inference that we assume if Woodward was the Chair of the Committee, that he must have done A, B and C with respect to carrying the penalty.That's a sufficiency point.That's not a McDonald point.Well, I think it's a combination of the two, Your Honor, because McDonald requires that kind of specificity and precision in terms of the action of the legislature.And we don't get it where it is.It's very generalized here, I'm sorry.But not only is it inferential point but that fact finder has got to have some room to make some reasonable inferences.But it seems to me that your argument completely overlooks or extinguishes the difference between coram nobis review and direct review.If this were a direct review of Woodward's conviction, some of these arguments might have some persuasive power.Might!But on coram nobis review, we have a much more rigorous standard.Coram verses described, quoting indecisions of Your Honor, or is it an extraordinary remedy?And there's no question that it is designed to be such.I do believe, however, that in meeting the standard of fundamental error, if one can show that in the wake of a US Supreme Court decision that comes after the trial, the evidence on which the defendant was convicted no longer was criminal, that does rise to the level of fundamental error.that Warren said extraordinary remedy.But as Judge Barren pointed out, McDonald doesn't say that the acts described in Judge Woodlock's most recent rescript was not criminal.You can make an argument that an extension of McDonald might lead to that result, but you can't say that McDonald doesn't deal with the passage of legislation or the carrying.What it means to carry a bill through the legislature on how that relates to the Hobbs Act at all.Those would certainly relate to meet the standard of the first crime, Your Honor.Or describing a cause for concern or question within the jurisdiction of Mr. Woodward as a legislator.The evidence, however, is remarkable in how generalized and amorphous it is, rather than demonstrating specific actions or decisions on the part of Mr. Woodward on the instructions.I'd like to emphasize one point we did not make in the brief and that Your Honor.And that is that the description of what an official act is in the context of the mail fraud statute came only in the description of the state gratuity statute.requiring that gratuity be received for because of an official act.This is not a requirement and was not described as a requirement.Time is up.If you did not make it in your brief, I don't know how you're gonna make it now.I suggest you file a 28J letter.Try it that way.Okay, thank you, Your Honor.Thank you.Good morning, Your Honor.May it please the court, Sonia Ballston for the United States.As this court said in George, the writ of coram nobis lies at the far end of the continuum, ranking from direct appeal to initial as successive collateral attacks.It requires an error of the most fundamental character.And that \"must denote something more than an error simpliciter\".As my opposing colleagues seems to concede at this point, that requires a showing of insufficiency, that the act that the defendant committed, no longer constitutes criminal activity.We would agree that if that could be shown, that would satisfy the standard.But the evidence here was more than sufficient as the district court pointed out in its opinion.Instructional error is not enough.And that's, I think, what he's conceded here at oral argument.The instructions in any event were sufficient.I'm just not following.Now you seem to be just applying the same sufficiency standards that you would do on direct.If there is no evidence in the record, demonstrating that the defendant committed an act that remains criminal.So don't have to start with that part remains criminal.Just under McDonald - Yes, yes.Okay.Right, I will.Before you get to sufficiency, what does McDonald mark off as the kind of things - Yes.that are not criminal.And does McDonald tell us very much about whether this type of thing is or is not?That's right, Your Honor.And it doesn't .McDonald has nothing to say about what happened in this case.This case was a bribery case about the enactment of legislation about the defendant's votes.About his actions in the legislature.And the arguments to the contrary, at this point are essentially all the tax on the stream of benefits idea, of which this court has reaffirmed in the wake of McDonald and the Tabaris case.And he keeps talking about specificity.That there's specificity required.Like we had to identify the one particular thing that got bought by this bribe.And that's not how bribery law works.That rule would be simply absurd.It would be easy to avoid and no one would ever be convicted of bribery again.But our government will be sold down the river.That's not what the law requires.It's not what McDonald requires.I think the district court's opinion clearly lays out all of the evidence here and did a wonderful job of explaining why relief is not required.Unless the court has further questions.What are the official acts that we are talking about here now?His actions as chairman of the committee?Yes, so there were several categories of official actions.One would be carrying bills through the legislature, which is not necessarily flowing from his responsibility of chairman.But something that he did with most of the insurance bills that were before the legislature during his time as chair.Testimony can be found on appendix 128 to 129.His votes are clearly official acts.You look at the evidence on J appendix 100 and 200 to show that an all but 31 out of 600 insurance and bills, he voted the way John Hancock wanted him to vote.His role was a gatekeeper as sheriff, the committee that he had the power to keep bills off the floor.You can find evidence of that in joint appendix 116 to 125 and 253.And his role in blocking the non-smokers bill time and time again, which was a particular concern to his benefactor.You can find evidence of that at joint appendix 130 to 132.The record here was replete with official acts, but still qualifying for McDonald.And those were the things the government was arguing in this case.If you look at the closing argument, in pages 934, 935, 937, 943.Those are the things that government is hammering on to get this conviction.And the government didn't argue access.McDonald just puts assets off the road.And it doesn't even say it's irrelevant.It just says it alone is not enough.So you have to have access going towards something else.But the joint appendix here at 771 and 776, there was discussion about whether the government is gonna argue access to the jury.And the district court says, \"I don't think that's the theory\".The government says, \"No, that's not our theory.We're not gonna argue that\".So even before the jury instructions came out, that was off the table.That wasn't the theory of conviction.So this has nothing to do with McDonald.It's very unlike that case.Do you have a view about the collateral consequences part of the district court to ruling?Sure.So the district court, I don't think they are folding one way or the other.It just said, \"I'm not gonna deny relief on this basis\".And I think that's sufficient.You don't have to get to that to deny the relief here for the same reasons the district court didn't.Both because of the fundamental error, and the interest of justice point.This court has never decided, and Georgia specifically reserved the question about whether these state pensions can qualify.And it's not necessarily to decide here.So again, it would be an advisory opinion, but I think the key issues there unresolved in this record.They're are factual questions about whether the contributions were refunded and how much that was.And so what the marginal difference between how much of an annuity that would buy at the time that it was refunded versus what the monthly pension is and those faster just undeveloped.So the defendant bears the burden.He hasn't carried that burden.There's no evidence in the record that would carry that burden.And on the address ability point, he hasn't shown one way or the other.But it necessarily would be automatically reinstated.That opinion that he cites the Skelly opinion is about an appeal of someone who's on the verge of getting kicked out of the program, who hasn't yet been kicked out.There are no cases that I'm aware of and he hasn't cited any about somebody who's been kicked out and trying to get back in.You should have found the district court.Thank you.My sister neglects the fact that the type of descriptions and evidence of carrying bills or that Woodward bills were reported favorably of the committee between 1985 and 1990.Joint appendix 134 to 136, gives a flavor for the amorphous and generalized type of evidence that is untied to any specific action that Woodward took in terms of making a decision or taking an action on a particular question, matter, or concern.All of these actions - When I read the record, there were approximately 600 bills of interest in the life insurance industry of which he only opposed 31.Well, that is a I don't believe perspective, that's a fair reading, Your Honor.because we show 31 specific instances with the bill numbers bill dates, bill information that was not the case.The government showed no specifics and all of their evidence was outside the statute of limitations.No specific actions by Woodward were shown after July 27, 1990.Thank you.Thank you.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/gov.uscourts.ca1.case-17-2114.2018-07-26.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/gov.uscourts.ca1.case-17-2114.2018-07-26.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/gov.uscourts.ca1.case-17-2114.2018-07-26.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/gov.uscourts.ca1.case-19-1382/gov.uscourts.ca1.case-19-1382.2020-03-04.mp3", "text": "Today's cases will be called as previously announced and the times will be as allotted to council.The first case today is...excuse me your honor.Let's try that again.Today's cases will be called as previously announced and the times will be as allotted to council.The first case today is 19 dash one three eight two Chen versus United States...The United States Sports Academy Inc.Mr. Holinski.Yes.Good morning, your honor.Your honor and the Samantha Lea court.My name is Stanley Lenski.I appear on behalf of Mr. Chen, the plaintiff in this action brought initially from the Commonwealth of Massachusetts superior court, transferred here by diversity.My biggest issue, I mean, I think the strongest issue here that clearly Mr. Chen asked your honor to reverse the dismissal of this matter of the US district court.Return it to an active docket.The best argument for that is the nature of the proceeding that we're going to note of here today that, that this district court relied on, who convert this to a summary judgment record, even in the inadequate record, that, that this is the 12 B6 proceeding, we're to rely on the pleadings, as we all know very well.Council, excuse me, it's not a 12 B6 proceeding.It's 12 B2 motion.Yes.And in a 12 B2 motion, the court is entitled to rely on a properly filed affidavit.Yes, I'm also broke, I'm sorry.Okay - Yes, I've done enough of these that 12 B6 seems to come out very often, but 12 B2, yes on an affidavit.But to me that is the most problematic because we have not had a chance to explore the underpinnings of those facts.But also you did have an opportunity to ask the district court for leave, to do jurisdictional discovery before it ruled on the motion to dismiss, and there was no such request made.That's correct, your honor, that is in my view, not a bar to this argument, the argument that's before the court.That being, that being said...Well why, why isn't it a bar?Well, I don't think, take...availing yourself, avail...the party availing itself of, of all, you know, it's not as like a, an administrative proceeding of belling oneself of all administrative remedy issues, that the...the cake law is the case law.The law is the law that we...if we are to look at the facts that are before, the record that is before this court, and it was before the, the district court, the trial court, it does not support the decision to dismiss this matter as it has been done.Why not?I'm sorry?Why not?Oh. - What, what evidence is there in the, in the record of the requisite minimum contacts?So, the evidence I think is overwhelming.You know, we have, as I've, as I've argued, we have, you know, this is a very poignant point in time because we have so much social media and we have so much, you know, internet activity for the first time in many, many, forever.So these present very, not believable legal arguments, but, well, you know, the difference between a passive and an interactive website, the numbers of distinctions between those, like, as I mentioned, a restaurant, or what website or gym website versus an interactive website.Interactive websites going to touch everything, especially where it's, where you're talking about a medically licensed individual, including the, the licensure banks, Massachusetts banks.Is your argument, essentially, that the mere existence of an interactive website that is, that can be accessed in any of the 50 states is enough to confer jurisdiction in any one of those states?No you honor and I...Well what other context do we have here other than, the mere fact that there was an interactive website?Well, we, we don't, we don't have an interactive website such as Westlaw.You know, we don't have a dat...you know, something that's a database where we can go online and just search and that's an interactive website.We have this party reaching out to Massachusetts and the world for that matter...Excuse me, what evidence is there of reaching out, or targeting other than the existence of the website itself.Well, there's an admission in the affidavit that at the time of the pleading, there were, this, this company had active students in Massachusetts.Well, on your theory then, once there is a website, which can be as interactive as this one, in effect, there is personal jurisdiction in every jurisdiction, which the website reaches.Yes, yes.Particularly in this case, because you know, you're talking about fees being...I mean, think about the implications of one, you know, somebody who is medically licensed and offers a medical degree.You've got licensing authorities, you've got regulatory authorities, you've got end-users who are going to go to the website to check out the doctor that they're going to go to.And to evaluate that doctor, use the same website.You've got retail industry, where you have to go and buy a computer.And, you can't avail yourself with these services unless you buy a computer and buy internet service.You've got Massachusetts, you've got servicing, in case something goes down.Somebody has to come to your house and fix it.In order to access this online system.You've got email servers back and forth.You've got...if you're paying them, you've got your bank in Massachusetts, that's dealing with this out of states enterprise.Now I'm not saying any one of these individual factors is enough to confirm minimum contacts that you would to establish jurisdiction.Taken together though, this is more than Westlaw.What if someone accesses your website from California and you have some, as many websites do now, some interactive component.Is their jurisdiction to sue you in California?Well yeah Sure.When we look at...I hate to bring up Twitter, but Twitter or Facebook you know these social media platforms that have jurisdiction throughout the 50 states.How is this different?I think this is even on a higher level.So, essentially you're saying, if you assume that most companies and most individuals who learn to have a presence on the internet that can be accessed from anywhere in the world.You seem to be pretty close to saying that any company for any transaction can be sued in any state in the United States.So, no.Then what would be the distinguishing factor, once they have an interactive website that is accessed from that state by several people, everything you say could be said.That's the analysis of the sliding scale.That is, I agree with that analysis.I think that this is so complex that I agree with your honor.That you...who has jurisdiction, and who doesn't.Who are we going to bring to this state and who aren't we going to bring to the state.And the sliding scale reaches that the sliding scale, you know, this is a totality of the circumstances situation.This is what we need to look in, and I argue to you that this is the very kind, when a company is reaching out to Massachusetts.I don't understand what the company has gone to reach out, what the company has done other than to establish the website.What the company has done is not so much reach.So I wouldn't suggest it's the reaching out portion...Well that's the phrase you just used.So if I misspoke, it's not the reaching out portion.It's the complicity.It's the once you reach out and somebody says somebody in Korea, somebody in, you know, in Massachusetts says, Hey, you know, I see a website here, I see that you offer degrees, that will be recognized in Massachusetts.Can I sit in my home in Massachusetts and earn my degree from Massachusetts?The answer being yes, is when jurisdiction should attach in this situation.It's not the reaching out.It's the acceptance the complicit...Well are you in effect saying that what is significant here is not so much from the establishment of the website.It's not so much what happened before the individual came back and said, you know, I want to get going again on my degree and I now living in Massachusetts.Are you saying that his, his attempt in effect to re-enroll after he had moved to Massachusetts, is what gives pers...Is what entails personal jurisdiction, not what happened before that.Well, you know what...to answer your question first, there are other students there...there are other students that are admitted by the defendant in Massachusetts and also, I don't believe it's the subjective facts that relate simply to my client that matter.To answer your question, it is, as soon as a company such as this, says, I know you're in Massachusetts, you can complete your degree in Massachusetts, Without coming back to the state, you have jurisdiction.You just entered the state, you've entered the Commonwealth.Thank you, counsel.Yes.Thank you, your honor.Hi, good morning you honor, this may appease the court.My name is Bethany and Minnick, I'm here on behalf of the defendant, I believe the United States Sports Academy Inc.Touching on some of the issues that your honors have addressed here today.While technology has certainly altered the landscape in terms of how the courts are required to look at jurisdiction, the courts had also made it clear that jurisdiction cannot be obliterated and the states cannot simply come in and grab any after a business that has a website or an internet presence.The fact that the United States Sports Academy has a interactive website to some degree does not confer general jurisdiction in this matter.We've asked counsel on several occasions, what is that the United States Sports Academy specifically did to draw in students or to reach into Massachusetts.And the facts are that they did nothing.They had a website that is interactive and allows for people in all of the states to access it, to gain information.And while foreseeable that a student or participant might go on there and fill out an application, or even enroll in the program, is not sufficient to allow for this court to put general jurisdiction over the United States Sports Academy here in Massachusetts.What's at issue here is a contract claim.And that contract arose of a relationship that occurred in Alabama in 2008 and in 2010.We have a breach of contract claim.The neuro presence of an internet website and Massachusetts is not what gives rise to the contract claim.The contract claim arises out of the enrollment file in Alabama pursuant to the terms of the agreement the parties entered into at that time.With respect to specific jurisdiction, the test that my brother's speaks to this sliding scale that was identified in zippo, while not specifically adopted by this court, it certainly has an examinative length.And that scale talks about the past events of it, and also the more specific ends where there is further interactivity between the parties in different states.And here we don't have a situation where there is a significant amount of interactivity between the parties.We have a website that the plaintiff utilized while in Alabama for a period of about two years, and then he disappeared.We didn't hear from him for a period of about six years.At which time he made an isolated unilateral contact with Massachusetts.And if you look at the complaint, there are suggestions of, I think, three different conversations that this individual had with the United States Sports Academy from Massachusetts.Nowhere in the complaint, does he identify that he said he was in Massachusetts at the time.That he informed them of his move to Massachusetts from Alabama or from some other state.And the court has to look beyond the website.So taking that passive scale, all of the cases say that it is not just the presence of a website that could be accessed in another state, but you have to look beyond that and look at purposeful availment.And I suggest to you that the facts in this case demonstrate that there was no purposeful availment by the United States Sports Academy, relative to Mr. Chen or anyone else for that matter.My brother has identified that there were two other students, which we've put her in our affidavit, who at the time of the filing were enrolled in a single course in Massachusetts.There's no evidence of these students were...received any advertisements from the United States Sports Academy, that the sports academy solicited their business.Certainly no evidence that the plaintiff's business was solicited or that the United States Sports Academy came to him and asked him to enroll in their institution.The evidence is that he went to Alabama, he enrolled in the school, he was in Alabama for two years, where they're located, where they're incorporated, where their offices are.And then he took the courses, all of the 48 required credit he took in Alabama.And then at some point he left the jurisdiction, didn't inform the United States Sports Academy of it, didn't re-enroll in some of the other cases talk about, for example, in the case of, having to pronounce this incorrectly with TD versus Walden University, there the individual left the state where they had originally enrolled and they then re-enrolled in another state, letting the institution know that they had re-enrolled in that university.The institution maintained contact with them, knowing that they were in another state, they had other students that were also enrolled in that state.They targeted there students.They advertise to them.They had pre enrollment workshops.There's sufficient evidence in that case, not for general jurisdiction, but the court found that there was sufficient evidence for specific jurisdiction.Because beyond having an interactive website, there were other purposeful availment that allowed for the invocation of specific jurisdiction.Also in the case of peril versus grand canyon, which my brother sites, too.They are, again, specific jurisdiction, not because of the presence of an interactive website, but because they actively recruited over a thousand students.They contacted and spoke to a thousand students on a regular basis for the respect to their program studies.They had had conversations directly with the plaintiff in that case about her course of study.So again, very different facts from the facts we have here today.In our jurisdiction, there was a case of chase versus jest.And there, there was no jurisdiction, general or specific.For very similar facts to what we have here today, which is that the while there may have been a website and there was a website, there was no advertising, no solicitation business, no pre enrollment screenings or fairs that they attended.Same facts here.The United States sports academy does not come into Massachusetts.They don't hold school fairs or, you know, come in and try to post ads in schools to solicit business.They don't advertise here.They have no office here in Massachusetts.No telephone number.They don't pay taxes here.There's no evidence whatsoever that they solicited any business here in Massachusetts purposely.With respect to the email communications, again, those are general responses to inquiries made by the plaintiff.They were unilateral.The plaintiffs solicited that information from them regarding the course of study and his program.Which again goes back to 2010, when you leave the complaint, he says that he entered into this arrangement with them to change his course from a comprehensive examination to a portfolio.Again, activity that took place in 2010 in Alabama, not in Massachusetts.So for these reasons and the reasons that my brother waved and the underlying case, his ability to conduct pre discovery or jurisdictional discovery relative to these facts that we've talked about here today.There is no evidence of general or specific jurisdiction that would allow for this court to bring the United States Sports Academy into Massachusetts for this litigation.And for that reason, I ask that you affirm the district court's decision.Thank you.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/gov.uscourts.ca1.case-19-1382.2020-03-04.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/gov.uscourts.ca1.case-19-1382.2020-03-04.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/gov.uscourts.ca1.case-19-1382.2020-03-04.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/gov.uscourts.ca11.19-14227/gov.uscourts.ca11.19-14227.2020-12-16.mp3", "text": "And we have what, the next case on our docket this morning, Georgia Advocacy Office versus Theadore Jackson.And I see Ms. Palmer is here.Ashley Jenelle Moore Palmer is here for Jackson.Yes, your honor.And Devon Orland is here for the attorney general.Thank you, your honor.Actually, I am no longer with the Attorney General's Office.I am with the Georgia Advocacy Office and I'm representing the Georgia Advocacy Office and the name plaintiffs in this action.Alright.Thank you.And why don't we begin, Ms. Palmer, you may begin your argument.Thank you, your honor.And good morning to you all.May it please the court.My name is Ashley Palmer and I represent all of the appellants.In this matter.The Supreme court has rejected remedial orders that unnecessarily reach out to improve prison conditions.Other than those that violate the constitution.And that's Brown v Platter.In July, 2019, a preliminary injunction was entered against the Fulton County sheriff and four of his employees as a result of two alleged constitutional violations that the court found after hearing three days of evidence and testimony regarding the treatment of seriously mentally ill female inmates in the Sheriff's custody.Although the District Court abused its discretion in entering this preliminary injunction, appellant's recognize that this is a highly deferential standard.By contrast, there isn't any question that the District Court's order fails to satisfy the need, narrowness, intrusiveness factors found in the prison Litigation Reform Act.Further, the court did not make its order final and thus it expired by operation of law.90 days after it was entered on July 23rd, 2019.I'll first speak to the issue of the underlying order being expired.Despite the District Court's belief, this order was not idolized upon the entry of the court's September 23rd, 2019 to den the mortar, of the cases that have sought to define what the PLRA means by making a preliminary injunction final, both the ninth circuit and Mayweathers v Nulon.And the third circuit and Victory V Berks County have interpreted a final preliminary order as being a perspective or permanent order and appellants believe this is the correct reading.If the District Court still anticipate having a trial on whether a permanent injunction is necessary and that's what all the parties are anticipating, then the preliminary junction that is in place is by definition, not a final order.We think the record, which was recently supplemented is sufficient for this court to determine whether District Court judge was correct, that the preliminary injunction is a final order for the purpose of avoiding the 90 day restriction, because the language of the statute is clear.Appellant asked for a determination by this court that the injunction has expired, but we also recognize your honor, is that the Mootness doctrine and the plot that there's a question about the Mootness doctrine is applicability in this case.we would argue pursuant to Mayweathers V Nulon, which is a night circuit taste at the 11th circuit sites approvingly in USB Florida, Secretary of Corrections, which states that a district court does not buy a length of terms of the PLRA by entering a second injunction, after the first is expired.Nothing in the statutes limits, how many times the preliminary injunction can be imposed.Thus in this case, the court, the District Court could enter another preliminary injunction, one that may very well state, whether the court intends to finalize the order, but also one with the same level of intrusiveness and overbroad.And this that we have here, appellant's fear that the district court will be guided by the scope of relief in the order, in question here, unless this panel issues the appropriate correction.So this.Let me be clear about the, the Mootness argument you're making.If we were to agree with you that the injunction under the statute expired after 90 days, because it wasn't made a permanent injunction.Then on remand, the District Court would have the opportunity to issue a new preliminary injunction or be required to perform the analysis, to issue a permanent injunction.At that point.Well, your honor, he would be a permitted to enter another preliminary injunction.And this goes to my second argument to your second question, which is the analysis that he would have to go through.And for both the preliminary injunction and prospective relief, he has to go through the need narrowness intrusiveness analysis.And so we will be the same analysis as laid out in the PLRA, applies both in the preliminary injunction context, as well as in the context as perspective relief.He also judge Grant, could immediately issue perspective relief.He could immediately put into place a permanent injunction, which pursuant to the PLRA would be in place for a two year period, at a minimum, depending upon the apellants coming back and making an argument that they believed at that time, it should be extinguished.And so he could do both your honor, to answer your question.So it looks like from a statute that you may really like some things about 3626 1 2, which is the 90 day limit, but you may not like, that it looks it's not requiring specific findings of the sort that are required in 1.Can you talk to me about if you've noticed any differences, it appears that perhaps preliminary injunctive relief, the judge certainly must conclude that those factors are met, but there's not the same, there's not the same requirement for issuing findings, there.Thank you, judge.And I understand your question and what I would say to that is in this instance, although we don't believe that the preliminary injunction was made.I know the District Court judge in our supplement that we made to the record as your honors have probably seen, believes that it was.And so accordingly, based upon that, his belief that it was a final order, he is required to make those findings that are found in 1 in order for it to be made final, not only does he have to affirmatively make it final, he also has to go through that need-narrowness intrusiveness, which this court has stated in it's case law, requires that they make, make those particularized findings.And so that's.Does he need to make those findings?And then the top of the order says permanent injunction rather than preliminary junction.Is that in your view, what needs to happen to transform the preliminary injunction into a final order?I believe your honor, that there has to be some language that puts the appellants on notice that this is in fact not just a preliminary injunction, but a permanent one.There's been other case law that says that the case will that the injunction will be in place until a final order, on the underlying case is issued.We have nothing like that here.There was nothing where the court stated that we had any awareness that our clients at the beyond the 90 day period, that they would still be required to comply with the mandates of the preliminary injunction.As it concerns the preliminary injunction, your honors, and the PLRA as your honors are well aware.Congress has placed strict limits on remedial relief that a court may impose on a jail or prison.It must be as a judge Grant and I've been speaking about narrowly drawn and not intrusive.However, here the court went too far in dictating to the sheriff, how he should remedy the alleged constitutional violations, which he found to be twofold, the deliberate indifference, which we disagree with obviously, and also an ADA claim.This court recently had in Huffer v Secretary Florida Department of Corrections discussed that blame the deliberate in different standard, but even assuming based on the facts that the court had in front of it, that it was accurate and it was correct, in making those findings, the relief that it ordered, the remedial relief is the issue with which that we have here.In Lewis v Casey, the Supreme Court noted that its opinions have alimented courts becoming immeshed in the minutiae of prison operations in the name of the Constitution.And that's because as this court held in pre prison, legal news v sector Terri, Florida department of corrections under Turner v Safely a Supreme court case.We are wide ranging and substantial deference to the decisions of prison administrators because of the complexity of prison management.The fact that responsibility therefore is necessarily invested in prison officials and the fact that courts are ill equipped to deal with such problems.The problem.I think these allegations are frankly, pretty horrific, let's assume for purposes of argument, which I know you don't actually agree with, but let's assume that it's all true.And there is a substantive violation.How, how could the court's order be more narrow, yet less intrusive to the specific operations of the prison?It seems like those are the jail.It seems like those are someones intention.To answer your question, judge Grant, I think Lewis v Casey speaks to this too, and it talks about the deference that should be given to prison officials and our particular case, I understand that the facts as they were presented to this court, then yes, they do come off as being quite horrific.But the act of the matter is the issue before the court with a staple wound, which was, is keeping women in a sale for longer than 22 to 23 hours, deliberate indifference.And is it exacerbating or is it causing their mental health issues, their serious mental health issues that already existed to be further exacerbated?That was, that was the issue.The court went in a broad scope to address many other issues that were not before it, issues that plaintiffs presented at the lower level in terms of, you know, their discomfort with the fact that sometimes the toilet's leaked or they're upset in this with the temperature within.Sometimes the toilet leaks seems like a pretty dramatic understatement wouldn't you agree?Well, I would say your honor, that there was evidence that was shown that yes, the toilets leak because the inmates were putting things down in the toilets.And so yes, there are, there were, there were draft things that were happening.Floodings, things like that that happened.I would submit to you honors , typically in a jail and a prison setting, and the jail was managing it the best that they could in terms of letting people out though, which is the essence of the deliberate indifference, I think to answer your honor's question in terms of the four hours that the court mandated, the court even said itself in its order, it wasn't finding that that was a Constitutional mandate, but what is required per Lewis v Casey is to give deference to the sheriff.And so the question should have been asked the sheriff, I have found that you are in violative of the Constitutional deliberate in different standard.What I'm saying to you is sherif I need you to go back with your jail officials and bring me a plan to allow us to ameliorate what's happening here.And it may not have been four hours because the fact is is that, especially now, as we know in the light of COVID, there are many difficulties and many issues that the jails deal with on a daily basis.And so slowly.So council, what was the, the alternative remedy proposed by the sherif.That sheriff didn't have an opportunity, judge Wilson, to propose an alternative.What the judge did was accepted a four page order from the plaintiffs that they presented at the conclusion of the hearing that he signed in everyone's presence.And then he asked and then he indicated that he would make more particularized findings.The appellants defendants in the underlying case, then filed a motion for reconsideration in response to our motion.The plaintiffs then presented the court with the 54 page addendum order that your honor is have before them.And he signed that without any alterations to it.And so as my understanding, correct that the order also does provide a safety valve for the sheriff to ensure deference to jail administrators when it's necessary for a penological purpose.It is a very limited in scope safety valve judge Wilson and I say that because even though the court said that I recognized, that there are valid basis by which you may have to keep someone in the cell for longer than 24 hours, you still have to not only document your reasons for doing that, but someone at a rank at either Lieutenant or captain or higher has to assess why you make that decision.And then after that, we have to bring in one of your medical professionals to ensure that the decision was rightfully made by your correctional officers.And so, again, that goes to the need-narrowness-intrusiveness that I've been speaking about, judge Wilson.The fact of the matter is, that when the court steps itself so far into stepping into the shoes of the sheriff and the prison officials, that is what the PLR and Congress said cannot stand.And so I see that my time is up.I will come back and reserve some time for rebuttal.Thank you.Right then, We'll hear from this Ms Orland on behalf of the Georgia Advocacy Office.Thank you, your honor.May I please to the court.My name is Devon Orland, and I represent the appellate that this action.After three days of evidence and argument, the District Court ruled from the bench.But despite his belief, that courts should be cautious about entering an injunction, that this was the type of case that required court intervention.As he found defendants treatment of women with psychiatric disabilities to be both repulsive and shameful.The District Court's decision wills was supported by the undisputed record that women with serious psychiatric disabilities were left in their cells for 22 to 24 hours a day, for days, weeks and months on end.The cells were covered in bodily fluids, rust, and mold in these conditions, they deteriorated leaving them incoherent, screaming unintelligibly laying catatonic, banging their heads against walls and repeatedly attempting suicide.Dr. Jeffrey Mets one of the foremost experts in the field of forensics put forth undisputed testimony that the bare minimum was to provide the class with four hours of Adaceae time, five days a week.This still leads to the class plaintiffs in lockdown for 148 of the 168 hours in each week.The court provided appellants with the opportunity to devise their own plan with how to implement this court order.The court entered up brief written order on that same day in that order, the court stated it would enter into a more detailed order to meet the requirements for 18 USC 3626 2.The court did just that and entered into a 54 page order detailing its legal and factual findings, and specifically making the need-narrow, least intrusive determinations, as defined by the statute.And it did so within the 90 days specified by law.The District Court's decision should be affirmed.I'll first address the validity as to the District Courts grants of the preliminary injunction.And then we'll address the impact of 18 USC 3626 2.I further note that while appellants inaccurately assert that the addenda mortar expired by operation of law, they also acknowledged the likelihood that the District Court would enter a new operative order.The District Court did in fact do so and appellants chose, not to appeal this order.And as a result, the operative injunction orders, is not really before this court.As to the validity of the order, as the court has already noted, the conditions were widely described by the plaintiffs in this case, through affidavits, expert testimony, standards of harm, scientific journals, the negative impact to security as a result of, the Sheriff's conducts photographs and log books.All of this evidence was undisputed.The county offered two theories.The first being what they were doing was fine.And second that they were working on a plan to remedy things.There was no disputing any of the expert testimony that locking these women up in these conditions, in fact, impaired their psychiatric condition and made it worse.There was no contesting testimony that very little psychiatric therapeutic interventions occurred, and there was further, no testimony that the conditions that were displayed were anything other than what they were depicted to be by the plaintiff's complaint in that testimony proper by the plaintiffs in the case.The initial grant of the plaintiff's motion for preliminary injunction was entered on July 23rd after the three-day evidence described.And then the court entered into that detailed order on September 23rd, 2019, the order itself detailed evidence, which produced the eyewitness accounts of the conditions of the facility and failure to treat persons experiencing with psychiatric disabilities.It further outlined that people who didn't experience psychiatric disabilities were allowed out of their cells and given programmatic opportunities that people with psychiatric disabilities were not.It outlined further the impact of the conditions, especially since the women were locked in their cells for such a long period of time.And the core analyzed each prong of the preliminary injunction standard outlined the facts that supported the ruling and found in favor of the injunction at every term.The court specifically outlined its compliance with 3626882, and it's need narrowness intrusive requirements to adopt the appellant's view of 3626 in this case would if in effect cause district courts and plaintiffs to have to file a new preliminary injunction every 90 days, the purpose of the preliminary, the Prose and Litigation Reform Act was to alleviate the burdens on courts and to bring meritorious claims to the, to the tribunal.Further to the provisions requiring the need narrowness least intrusive findings were to avoid courts from having injunctions in place for years on end, without specific findings of the court, the District Court, in this case complied specifically with the requirements and said it did so and highlighted it did so in its order.And as a result entered into a compliant order.Do you think that, the court's action effectively converted the preliminary injunction into a permanent.I do not buy judge Grant.And the reason I don't is one, the court didn't say it was entering a permanent injunction, and I don't believe it's required to do so specifically it's required to make the preliminary injunction order final as the court highlighted in United States vs Secretary Florida Department of Corrections where the court in that case did vacate the District Court's order specifically saying that it didn't finalize the preliminary injunction, the term finalizing an order making findings allows for a court to enter an initial order to alleviate what in this case certainly were dire situations quickly while also allowing the court to craft a remedy that is in fact, need narrow least intrusive in compliance with the Prison Litigation Reform Act through a thoughtful review of the record presented.The defendants in this case will still have an opportunity to try the case.This was a preliminary order.No discovery had occurred and discovery is ongoing.They will have an opportunity to file for summary judgment to disprove the facts that occurred were presented at the preliminary injunction hearing and further to dispute any facts that were presented through Apian, as opposed to cross examination and direct testimony.This was not a final order.This was a preliminary injunction, and this was a finalization of the judge's preliminary injunction order.Moreover, if you look to the canons of statutory construction to determine that the, the addendum order was anything other than a preliminary injunction order, it flies in the face of how a statute should be interpreted.So the court says unless the court makes the order, meaning the preliminary injunction order comply with the provisions of Awan, it expires within 90 days.That statute, that reference refers to the preliminary injunction initial order that as often issued in these types of cases, I further note that appellants claim that they had didn't have notice that this order would be in effect in greater than 90 days is belied by the fact that the District Court reference 362682 twice first in its initial order.And then it addendum order.Don't we need to though, because I think everyone agrees that the PRA is not the most artfully drafted statute around, but don't, we have to look at 3626 I think to give us some context for what Congress may have been trying to accomplish with the section that we're mostly focused on and would looking at taking that into account, give some evidence that perhaps keeping the injunction as a preliminary injunction, wouldn't allow the provisions under beads to come into effect the two year termination and so forth.I didn't really understand the court's point, but I think that if you look to be, it defines the terms for which a tr a permanent injunction is terminated.The whole provision deals with permanent injunctions.If in fact that the intent was to eliminate a preliminary injunction within 90 days, then the court, then the Congress would have said after 90 days, the court must enter a permanent injunction.There's no reasons for it to say, to make the order final.Instead it would say it expires after 90 days unless the injunction becomes permanent.That's not what the court did, what the legislature did.Instead, it's supported a provision to terminate longstanding consent decrees, which as the court knows were rampant at the time the PLRA came into being, but also to, to tell courts, look, you've got to look at this every two years.You can't just keep on going.So there are two provisions.One is the 90 day, you've got to make this injunction for 90 days, unless you make these findings.Then there are the federal rules of civil procedure, which require discovery to actually take place over a period of time.Then you tried the case.And if you're going to enter a permanent injunction, you have to comply with these other things.A preliminary injunction has never intended to last for years and years on end.And that's some of the reason that the court issue is, or the legislature passed this rule, but they can't possibly expect discovery, which even in a truncated discovery schedule is going to happen in 120 days.So you have to take it in the context of how the litigation process occurs.And in this case, the litigation process is ongoing.We would have already tried the case by now had we not all been stalled a bit by the pandemic.So I think the statute in the context of the greater judicial system makes perfect sense, which is you have a preliminary injunction.You need to make me nearness least intrusive findings in order for that injunction to stay in effect.Beyond that 90 days court, you need to do your job.You need to actually make these findings and do the work to keep something preliminarily from creating more harm.And then once you try the case, you don't get to keep an injunction and stay in a jail or prison forever and ever amen, without similarly, continuing to re-review.So you had seen.The court that under, under B, under 1 c the court can issue a preliminary injunction almost immediately with, I'm not saying that we would suggest this, but essentially with no findings, they can just say, this is horrible.It's got to stop now.And unless they, unless they go through the steps required under 1, then that initial, initial, preliminary junction expires.But if they go through the steps required on 1, then that becomes a final preliminary injunction that can remain in place as the permanent injunction litigation proceeds.That's right, your honor.And in fact, if you look at every single case relied on by the appellants in this action, it refers to the court not making the need narrowness least intrusive analysis, including this court v the United States versus secretary department of Florida, department of corrections.Every case where order has been vacated as determined to be not expiring in that 90 days, the court specifies that the district court did not make those findings and therefore not finalizing the preliminary injunction order.And if discovery kind of drags out, let's set aside the pandemic, which I think is a pretty unusual situation, but what, under ordinary circumstances, what remedy under your reading of the statute do prison officials have, if, if your preliminary injunction just stretches for years, which seems to be contrary to what the PRA is trying to make happen.I think they can always go back to the District Court and say, we've, we've moved the client.They can say we've made the claim or this injunction is no longer meritorious because I mean, there's no reason that they can't go and move or vacate the preliminary injunction.It just doesn't automatically happen.So I think if you look at the, if you look at the role that statutory construction issues, in this case, you have to take a look at the wording of the statute.And the statute it says itself says unless the preliminary injunction, unless the order meaning the initial order and preliminary injunction is, goes through the 3626 2 language that it vacates.And that unless only can refer to that last piece.in conclusion, I would just point to the court that the evidence and testimony in this case was largely undisputed.The only all the experts, all the, all the practitioners that testified at this hearing said, the minimum you can get out is 20 hours a week, which still leaves an awful lot of time in lockdown.And there wasn't a single solitary person who said it, it was healthy.It was safe.It was treatment.It was appropriate, or it wasn't deliberate indifference for these women to be locked down in the manner that they were locked down.And there were a lot of factors in that, including the cell conditions.And if you look at the District Courts addendum order on pages, 50 and 51, he outlines those conditions and the why.It was further undisputed, but, and documented by hundreds of photographs, the conditions that these women were asked to live in, all of the testifying experts agree that women with psychiatric disabilities are harmed by the segregation that this and this was exacerbated by the physical conditions.And the only remedy offered by any expert was that the minimum was 20 hours out itself.The district court rightly weighed these undisputed facts and the testimony that there was no security benefit to the segregation and make concrete and need narrow, least intrusive findings within the 90 days required by statute asset, the district court's order be affirmed with the question.I'm going to drag you back into set short into rotation with one more question, before you sit down.Absolutely.Thank you.So the, the preliminary injunction section says that it expires 90 days after its entry, unless the court makes the findings required and makes the order final before the expiration.What do you think that, what do you think is required to make the order final besides those findings?What are we to make of that and?I think the Court needs to actually issue the order.So it goes through the factual analysis, not just said, need narrow least intrusive, but do what the court did in this case.And say, I'm compliant with 3626 2.And, and therefore the order, I mean, I don't think the court needs to make a magic word, say the word final.This court has never found that magic words were required, but again, it's referring to they order.So it doesn't just say it needs to make at least, least intrusive need narrows findings.It says an issue in order, you can't just stay at it from the bench.You need to actually do the detailed analysis and put it in on order.Thank you your honor.Thank you.Miss Orlin.Ms. Palmer, you've reserved some time for rebuttle.I did.Thank you, judge Wilson.I wanted to follow up on the last question that judge Grant was asked, which has to do with the and, to answer that question to, the and is there for a reason, and it's not just the Superbowl, it's not just does the court have to make the particular line.It also has to make it finer.And the reason for that is so that all parties specifically the upon whom the, the injuction apply are aware of the fact that this is not pursuant to the PLRA, just the 98 order, but it's one that has been finalized.That is not what occurred here.I think it was around the struggle and answering that question because the fact is is that the judge did not stay here.And he acknowledged in the transcript that is now before your honors in supplement, that he did not state affirmatively or put anyone on notice that this order was going to be in place post the 90 days.That may have been his intent.That may have been what he was thinking in his head, but unfortunately, appellants can not operate pursuant to what the judge may have been thinking without actually being articulated in the order in some form.What's your response to the suggestion that it's unrealistic to think that a permit that the litigation required and the discovery required for a permanent injunction could realistically happen in 90 days or less?I actually don't think that that's an unreasonable thought at all your honor.There are many district courts and outdoor appellate courts that have found that that was the very purpose behind why the PLRA was put into place.And that was to take a very long drawn out process.Then y'all know how civil litigation and track ratings are.The very reason that jails and prisons can not continue to be in limbo as we have been for almost two years.And when July of 2021 rolls around next year, that would have been exactly two years from the time when the George, when the judge put the original order in place.And the fact is that would be the same amount of time for a permanent injunction.And so it flattened the face of the purpose behind the LRA. There are District Court that have said that, in fact, that is the very essence of life puts it at night and day that Mayweather says that, yes, you may have to come back every 90 days to prove up your case again.And though that may seem counterintuitive to the way that litigation is brought.It does go to the fact that that's, the Supreme court has filed their prison and jail officials have to be able to properly oversee and provide the necessary operations that they need for the jails and prisons.And when monies are being reallocated, when you're having to go before the board of commissioner, which we had nine to finding its staff and being upheaved to facilitate all that, the judges asked the sheriff and his personnel to do that presents a problem for jails and prison.What about the facts?What do you say about the fact that the injunction that we have before us has apparently been updated or there's a new injunction?What are we doing?I understand.Well, what I'm saying is, first of all, that it still relates back to the original order.There have been instances in other courts specifically, I think of a court at a District court in Alabama that had the berries in case that came before it.And even though it came back and it made a modification, the question was whether it related back.And I believe that did furthermore, what I would say your honor is that updated is absolutely flagging the base of the intrusiveness, the least intrusive that one is supposed to do.When you're telling a share how long you have to bring a person out for.And when that person, without doing that four hour time, what they are obligated to do, which is it's been three hours giving them therapeutic activities, and one hour ensuring that they get outdoor recreation, that we're supposed to go through the process, things of ensuring that they understand what it means to clean their state and educating them about how to keep themselves going and going through all of the law books.Apparently the judge, because the plaintiffs didn't like the way the sheriff was maintaining his loft.So we had to put in another process to maintain the law groups, to document how people about for free time.That is absolutely not what Lewis v Casey speaks to, which is the deference that is supposed to be given to prison and jail officials.A court is not in the position to be able to say what happens on a day-to-day basis, especially in such a fluid environment, as a jail, which is not a prison.Things are happening every day in that environment.And for the judge to put this very onerous order on us, which I know it was oral, and wasn't able to contest, there is no contestants from the other side, this is not the least intrusive.It would not.If it had been, the sheriff would have been consulted, there have been his, and would have been taken into consideration.If it had been the motion for reconsideration that we brought back before the court would've been.If your time has expired.Thank you, your honor.We could just add you restaurant out briefs and vet.You would find the distractions, not only in that.Thank you.All right.Thank you, Ms. Palmer and Ms. Orland, the court is in recess until nine o'clock tomorrow morning.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/gov.uscourts.ca11.19-14227.2020-12-16.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/gov.uscourts.ca11.19-14227.2020-12-16.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/gov.uscourts.ca11.19-14227.2020-12-16.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/gov.uscourts.ca2.19-1433/gov.uscourts.ca2.19-1433.2020-06-23.mp3", "text": "We'll begin with the Motion Ray cell versus bar.Good afternoon, your honors.And may it please the court.My name is Denitia Bacchus, and alongside my colleague Gregory Devinsky.I am pro bono appointed counsel for petitioner Mohammad Russell.I understand from your deputy that rebuttals are not the default in the motion context.So if I may, I'd like to request one minute for rebuttal.You can have one minute.That means you're only going to get four.for your main argument, but go ahead.Understood your honor.So thank you, your honor, This emergency motion of two simple questions, Whether Mr. Russell raises substantial claims and whether extraordinary circumstances justify his release.If you answer both questions affirmatively, then you should exercise your authority to release him.On the first question, the government doesn't dispute that Mr. Russell raises substantial claims, which we preview in this motion or we'll read them full in our forthcoming petition.The second question, on what are extraordinary circumstances justify his release, comes out in our favor.There can be no doubts that we live in extraordinary times, evidence in part by our discussing this motion by phone.But it is not just the pandemic and its effect on normal life that make these circumstances extraordinary.It is Mr. Russell's severe medical vulnerabilities.Among them, his long-term use of an immunosuppressant medication and his syndrome.There are many of these applications now we're getting them in the, in the the criminal context, the, the facilities do seem, do seem to do better.They're doing better.And, And so just from a couple of months ago there, I mean, you know, the, the, the numbers are down.So is it still, such a great emergency?It is your honor.And to be clear, we applaud all efforts to make the Buffalo facility safer for the average detainee.But the the point is that Mr. Russell is not the average detainee.He is the medicine.Let me, Let me question you about that because I am familiar with these corticosteroids that are used for allergies, have, cause I have, number of family members who use them.GERD you also, the Gastroesophageal reflux, chronic cough, exercise induced asthma all seem to be relatively, you know, common ailments, rather than this is not something like Lupus or a Cancer that has been diagnosed.These are the chronic conditions that are found widely in the general population.The government argues at them.And I guess he's had one cold and an upper respiratory infection, to file an immigration detention.Sorry, Are you confident, that these population, that they would distinguish Mr. Russell just on their own?I mean, there may be other aspects of his circumstances having been held for so long, for example, that make his case extraordinary.But, I, I do wonder about your reliance so heavily on his use of the corticosteroid, and as well as these other, relatively minimal conditions in my experience.And by the way, by the way, you have one minute left of your four minutes.Go ahead.All right.Sorry, I used your time.No, no problem, your honor.So Dr. Keller a medical expert, with over 20 years of expertise in diagnosis and treating people and also in work alongside I has opines that Mr. Russell's particular medical conditions, and that does include both his long-term immunosuppressant use and his weight and all of these and, and his depression, anxiety has long-term detention and the facility, that all together combined these various conditions at to his specific medical vulnerability to coronavirus.That is the point.We are not arguing that anyone separately, would necessarily affect what would be enough, but we do believe that combined, and we have evidence both here and in the CDC guidelines that these, these condition's effective vulnerability on the CDC guidelines, your honor, The CDC does recognize that immunosuppressants' use, excuse me, that corticosteroid use, does lead to immunosuppression.And so, but that is respectfully what we put forward on the relevance of the, you know, suppressant medication.If I may just very briefly, I just like to quickly address the government's extraordinary attempts last night to forward a new medical declaration, in, in reply to our arguments.I think it probably goes without saying, that you cannot surprise the court and your opponent with new evidence on the oral arguments.He, the.I actually haven't, I haven't seen it was something, something was filed last night.It was your honor, at 6:58 PM last night, the government attempted to amend its medical declaration.And what we contend is an, almost a concession of our points on there of our challenges to their medical repetition.All right, we'll find it and take a look at it, but we'll hear from the government.Good afternoon, your honor, said the government and may it please the court.I'd like to start very quickly with the various CDC guidelines that the petitioner has cited in support of her claim that Russell's used the corticosteroids, puts him at risk.Those exact, those exact CDC guidelines actually say, and I quote that the use of oral or intravenous corticosteroids, may affect a patient's immune system.And so, - Could you speak a little more slowly?Please.Yes, I'm sorry.I only have five minutes.I'm so sorry that doesn't help.So I'd just like to very quickly point the court to, the CDC guidelines that the petitioner's cite explicitly, as saying at Mr. Russel's use of these corticosteroids, that he takes, the nasal spray, which is a localized corticosteroid, affects his immune system and puts him at greater risk.The CDC guidelines explicitly describe corticosteroid use as a risk factor in saying, and I quote The use of oral or intravenous corticosteroids or other medications causing immunosuppression, can put a patient at risk of a, at risk of an effective immune system.And so the CDC guidelines that the petitioner sites themselves they're actually not probative, but the claim that they're making that is, that this localized steroids, which acts differently than intravenous or oral corticosteroids, in the bloodstream and its effect on a person's immune system.I, I was troubled by some of the other aspects of the case, including that even though, he does not have a criminal record, he's, he's been in detention for, for, for two years.Does that not make this, an unusual case, an extraordinary case, really?Your honor,it's our position that it doesn't.Mr. Russell has challenged the nature and length of his detention more than once in the district court.And he has actually won one of his habeas petitions in part, and it's entitled by July of this year to receive a more individualized hearing, on his continued detention status.And so the nature of this sort of motion, and again, they're so rare, but we're seeing them in this pandemic context.But they .Shouldn't we in considering, What is a danger from respect to the virus?Also consider, why the person is being retained, detained and how much?I mean, the two things really go together.What is an extraordinary risk, for one kind of person may not be sufficient for an another one?Shouldn't we look at the whole thing together?Your honor.Again, there are so few of these cases that I think you're right, in saying that this is a totality of the circumstances sort of consideration.But I would say that the medical allegations that the petitioner is making, are not supported by the record.And that bumps this case, away from being an extreme circumstance in a way that they're arguing.Let me ask you another question.In two opposing counsel, the presider had, aren't things easing up.I'd like to ask you both, are they easing up generally, or is it in prisons, that currently there is still much to be worried about?That is, yeah, it certainly has, it eased up in my state for instance.But, the guidelines that we had in my state, are the prisons, are now becoming what nursing homes were in an earlier part, is that so?Your honor.I don't think, Thank you.Your honor, that's not supported by the declarations that I've received from the detention centers.There has been no, I've confirmed this today.There has been no new COVID cases in the detention center where Russell is, since April 20th.The facility is below 50% capacity to ensure that detainees can maintain social distance.Despite, petitioner's contentions in their apply brief, detainees are required to wear masks anytime, they are outside of their housing unit.And all employees that interact with the detainees must wear masks at all times.And so not only has the detention center gotten better, since the Jones Litigation, but the detention center is a much safer place for Russell to be, when the epicenter of the pandemic, which remains in the United States to be New York city.Could you just clarify one thing for me?So the status of the mask requirement is what, with regard to prisoners.When I was looking into Jones litigation, it seemed to me that, people were inmates that were requested to wear masks, but it was not required.It's a very new requirement that they are now required to wear the mask, not all the time when they're outside of their housing unit.So anytime they go to court, anytime they go to a medical visit, anytime they leave their housing unit, they are required to wear a mask.I think, I'm sorry.I understood Mr. Russell was housed in a dormitory style kind of open area, where there was space for people, but where he could be, then affected by someone else's mask wearing practices and be the victim of a transmission.Is that, Am I incorrect in that understanding?That's not incorrect, your honor.Not incorrect, Okay.There aren't, there aren't, Yeah, sorry.I just murped to that.There, there are only a few single unit housing styles in this detention center, and those are being used for the Jones Litigation, for detainees that are determined to be at high risk.And Russell has not met those criteria, and so he is in one of the more standard housing units.That housing unit itself, to the extent it can be made more safe, is being made more safe.In that each unit is under 50% capacity.One other quick question, if I could, I, I understood, you to be representing that the incidents is low right now of COVID in this facility.But it was not clear to me what the testing rate was, Does everyone tested every day?Not everyone is tested.Every person that comes into the Texan detention center, every new intake, is tested and quarantined for 14 days.Even if the test comes back negative.Otherwise detainees are screened for symptoms, and tested if they display symptoms.And any detainee symptomatic or not, can request to be tested and they will be tested.What about the staffs?What about the staffs?Are they tested daily?or how often are they tested?Your honor.I don't know the answer to that question, but I would gladly, I can find out and file an amended statement from the director of the facility if you'd like.Well, yeah, sure.Go ahead.And, and you can do that.And then the other side can respond if it wishes, but, but, but I would do it relatively soon.Okay?I'll do it as quickly as I can.Thank you, Your honor.Well, we'll hear the rebuttal.Thank you, your honor.A few quick points.First on the method of the trans, method of the administration and the submissive slide.The government is correct, that currently the CDCs guidelines, do distinguish between different methods of administration of corticosteroids.I know that that is a recent update, as the government's medical declaration itself acknowledges COVID-19 is still a new disease with evolving information.Thankfully, the CDC guidelines are not the only evidence that we have to this point.We cite cases, excuse me, not cases.We cite studies by the National Institutes of Health, namely the National Library of Medicine that does not distinguish between the immunosuppressant effects of corticosteroids that are administered nasally versus in any other fashion.And one of those studies confirms that the specific corticosteroids that Mr Russell uses is absorbed into the system when it is administered nasally.On the points about his criminal history, We want to just reiterate that he has no criminal history.He has never been arrested.The government does not argue that he was a flight risk.Let me interrupt for just a second, please.I guess we have open still, the question regarding the amended statement that has to do with medical information, about the import of Mr. Russell's white blood cell count.And if we, the panel decides to consider that, is that something he'd want an opportunity to respond to.On the substance, as opposed to just the - filing of this at the very last minute.That's correct, your honor.I, I would say here that, you know, based on us having less than 24 hours to review it, we believe that Mr. Russell would still prevail, even as the court were to wait that certified declaration, we, we, we, we would, we would still believe that Mr. Russell prevails, he tries to, the government tries to make two new arguments.One on his white blood cell count and notably on his weights, which they don't actually mention in their affirmative motion.On the white blood cell counts, the government puts forward a new CBC test.From September 2019, long after Mr. Russell had already began his corticosteroids therapy, based on the studies that we cite.The relevant comparison are baseline levels, eye levels before, a patient begins corticosteroid therapy, to a level after the patient is on corticosteroid therapy.Meaning that the fact that over the course of six months, someone's white blood cells haven't changed very much, doesn't tell us anything about the import of that test.On the wait.Yep, That's it.Thank you.Thank you.Well, over.The court we'll reserve decision.We'll move on to the", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/gov.uscourts.ca2.19-1433.2020-06-23.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/gov.uscourts.ca2.19-1433.2020-06-23.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/gov.uscourts.ca2.19-1433.2020-06-23.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/gov.uscourts.ca5.19-11259/gov.uscourts.ca5.19-11259.2020-06-03.mp3", "text": "Argument in North Presidio versus Lowe's Home Centers, LLC. And we should have Mr. Ernest Leonard and for Lowe's, Mr. Mark Gladwell and Anthony J. Luciano.So I only see two lawyers, do we have three?Yes, Your Honor.Lowe's is actually splitting the argument.I'll be taking the first part and then my colleague, Mr. Luciano would take in the second part.Okay.We'll hear first from Mr. Leonard.Mr. Leonard, you may proceed.I don't hear anything coming from you yet.Thank you, Your Honor.Can you hear me now?Yes.May it please the court, this is Ernest Leonard.On behalf the appellant for Presidio LLC. As described in their brief, this case involves a real estate project for Texas that was being developed by North Presidio.Lowe's was intended to be an anchor tenant.As described in the brief, there was a signed contract, which was the agreement to enter into ground lease, which contemplated that three contracts would then be signed at closing.And then, it was around me.The most important issue is how did, Judge McBryde certainly tried to put you in a box and nail it tight.So where did he commit an error?The primary one has to do with that we do have an enforceable contract.Under the facts plan, we have a situation and I fully recognize and appreciate the limitation of liability provisions that Judge McBryde pointed out to section 13B, which was damages would be limited to the earnest money.And section 35 was that closed until closing site development work would be performed at North Presidio's expense.However, under the facts he pled here, we have a situation where the site development agreement with its $4.3 million damage cap, while it was never executed, is enforceable under Texas law.Now I would agree.It certainly would have been better had North Presidio did no site development work before closing.However, that was not practical and even the contract contemplated there'd be some.Basically, I would rely upon two principles of Texas law that I believe that Judge McBryde missed.First of them is that an agreement to make a future agreement, which this was, can be enforceable if it is specific as to all essential terms and the essential terms of the site development agreement were set forth in the agreement to enter into ground lease itself.As authority we cited the Texas appellate court case of APMD holdings, which Lowe's also cited, which basically enunciated this rule that agreement to make a future contract could be enforceable under those conditions.That court said that essential terms are those that the parties would reasonably regard as being vitally important elements of their bargain.And very importantly, that court said that material terms of a contract are determined on a case by case basis.That is it's a fact issue.The court also said that Texas courts favor validating contracts rather than avoiding them.So in our pleading, Your Honor, we note that section 7B of the contract, almost all but writes out the site development agreement, it lists six detailed express requirements of the site development agreement.The section 7B of agreement also contemplated that we'd be doing work.Some site development work before closing.We pled that they had weekly telephone conferences, at which time they will confirm that we were doing the work.My client was doing the work under their own criteria and the Lowe's development criteria.And that during these calls, Lowe's affirmed that the terms of the site development agreement, when the drafts were being exchanged, were acceptable to them.But let me ask, what do you do with section 35?It seems to clearly say until the closing, your client's at risk, if things don't consummate.Yes, Your Honor.I believe that goes towards the timing of the payment, but in this case we have some additional facts, which is the conduct of the parties themselves and going forward under promises that they would execute that.And I believe it's.That goes to your non-contractual claims, right?I mean.Your honor, it does.That would, but it also goes under this principle of law, Your Honor, that an agreement to agree could be enforceable.And I understand Judge McBryde's reliance on section 35, but I would contend that in a timing of payment issue.In this case, we have the conduct of the parties where they were going forward with Lowe's encouragement to do significant site development work.And therefore, I believe these allegations support the conclusion that the essential terms of the site development agreement had been agreed upon.Even though Lowe's thereafter refused to execute the document.Also significant.Can you help?Can you help us?Yes, ma'am.It seems that, okay, Judge Costa asked you about section 35.So what about 13B?It doesn't replace 13B, it's not in disharmony with it.It's not at all clear what term of the SDA. You want it to be enforceable, but what term of it would change our analysis?I agree with the general principle that an agreement to agree can be enforced in Texas law.That's just a general proposition, but where does it get you?Well, under the pleadings, they had everything worked out.In fact, the only reason that Lowe's gave not to execute the agreement was a change of leadership.So construing those pleadings, we had everything worked out in the SDA, which is described in section 7B, describes essentially obligation to pay per site development costs that were specific to Lowe's.Okay.What part of the SDA would make it, the pre-closing site development compensable?That's not clear, to me at least.Yes.It's section 7B. It describes in subsection four, tenant shall pay periodically within 30 days and reimburse landlord for tenant share of the project costs, including, without limitation, the cost of site work.So the agreement was that the site work that was specific in and attributable to Lowe's would be reimbursed.And so that's essentially something we'll take to the jury on that is ask that that amount be determined.But you don't just take the SDA. You have to take the contract too, even assuming you take the SDA and the contract will say that pre-SDA site development is only compensable after closing pursuant to section 35.I understand.You need to take them both.I don't see how you get around 35, even if you're allowed to take the SDA. - I understand, I believe that's a timing issue, but what we would have here is it talks about the payments will be due after the closing.And what we have here is an essential under Texas law.They had an agreement to agree that's enforceable.And we would be entitled to our reimbursements for that.So you're saying pre-SDA site development is compensable as long as the money is gotten for it after closing, even if it's incurred prior to closing, and that that's your interpretation of construing both those provisions in harmony.I think I understood the question, Your Honor, but what I'm saying is, if the parties have agreed, it should be found to have agreed to the SDA, it would be required to be paid.And I understand there is that problematic issue with section 35, which says that no payment will be due until closing.I fully understand that, but I believe what we do have is, based upon the conduct of Lowe's, based upon the conduct of the parties, we have all the facts that supported show that they agreed to this, and they should reimburse us for the significant cost that we incurred developing this to be essentially a Lowe's track.The other point of contract law is if a draft of an agreement is prepared, submitted to the parties, each them expresses their consent, there's a written contract.And we cited a Supreme Court case for that.And that's really just black letter law.And the pleading allegation supported that.The fact that they communicated regularly.They said, we affirmed, we agreed to this and that when it was at the end of the day, the only reason why they wouldn't sign it, was because of a change of leadership.Now Lowe's argues that the fact that drafts were being exchanged meant the assent was not unconditional.However, the fact that will be pled was the only reason they didn't sign it was because of a change of leadership.And I think this is also a fact issue.Now, as far, we did also plead some alternative claims because in the event that the SDA cannot be found unenforceable under Texas law, we believe we would be able to recover under the promissory estoppel and quantum meruit.And promissory estoppel of course recited the elements, promise, reliant, foreseeable reliance, and substantial reliance by us on there for the detriment.Lowe's has two primary arguments.First of all, they say there can't be promissory estoppel because there's an express contract, which was the agreement which covers the claim.Well, not really.What that does is cover issues, for example, 13B covers limitation of liability, saying that the only thing you get is that the agreement to enter into ground lease is breached is return of the earnest money contract.But we have other damages besides site development.The section 35, as I mentioned, is timing.The agreement, the executed agreement, to enter into ground lease does not give rights itself to reimburse that site development, which is what Lowe's argued to Judge McBryde.If that's the case, that agreement did not cover reimbursement to our right to reimburse it.Without the agreement to enter into the ground lease only, we would not be entitled to do anything.That's why this is not a matter of an express contract covering the same subject matter.The other argument they made was that they did not plead it as a promise.Well, we pled in paragraph 15 of the complaint, that based upon their frequently stated intent to consummate the agreement and enter into the ground lease and other contracts that we, North Presidio, spent substantial funds and resources to develop the property in a manner that would accommodate them according to the Lowe's criteria.Now Lowe's argues several cases.They cite a case from this court in 2010, Atkins, which the court found that promises to resolve claims for extra work at a later date were too vague.Well, that's not what we have here.We have here, something very specific, do the work and we'll enter into the SDA. They also cited Wiseman case, which says an agreement to agree cannot support a claim for promissory estoppel.Well that case is a bit different, because that really involved promissory estoppel as an affirmative defense and the court views the example of an oral agreement to sell real estate that would be otherwise barred by the statute of frauds and said you can't backdoor an unenforceable agreement in by using a promissory estoppel argument.And they also cited a case from the Court of Appeals City of Beaumont and Texas Court of Appeals.It said a commitment to complete performance under a contract does not give rise to a promissory estoppel claim.Well, that's very different because here the parties, this is alternatively pled, so it's assuming there is no contract.We agreed to complete a contract because here, since it pled alternatively, that means there is no contract.Quantum meruit, we had the same issue as express contract that I have addressed.And the district court - What benefit did you receive for that claim?You have to have received the benefit, is my understanding.I believe that Lowe's had to receive the benefit, that was the intangible benefit.I'm sorry, right.That's right.What benefit did Lowe's receive?And I want to be very Frank.The law is not real clear out there.There's not a lot.What my argument is, they received an intangible benefit because they had the benefit as part of their development plan of a site that was being developed.I've looked quite extensively for cases that address use of enjoy in terms of intangible benefit.And Your Honor, I was not able to find a case that correctly fit on point.They cited.Not any case whatsoever that might even possibly say that you could have such a claim?I do not.Your honor, I'll be very Frank.I did not.They say cited.They cited a couple.You want to know how I feel about your fraud claim?Yes, ma'am.What claim?Yes, I don't understand how the new CEO changing direction is fraud.And I don't understand really what, every once in a while you pepper into all the various arguments that the new CEO changed direction.I don't understand how that's relevant to any of the clients.So you need to help me with that.Yes, ma'am.At some point in time, they realized they weren't going forward.We don't know what that point in time is.That's why we're relying upon the relaxed standard, where they have the information from them.If they knew they were not going to.Mr. Leonard, your time has expired.You have some time in a moment.We'll hear next from Mr. Liddell.Yes, Your Honor.Mr. Liddell.Mr. Liddell, okay.You are allotted 13 minutes.Thank you, Your Honor.May I please the court, I plan to focus in my part of the argument on why the contract limitation of liability provision takes care of all of the claims North Presidio pleaded here.Then my colleague plans to talk about some additional independent defects in the non-contractual claims.So before diving into the language of this contract, I think it's helpful to just take a quick step back and look at what kind of contract this is, what it's trying to do.This is a real estate contract, and it shares the same structure as virtually all contracts of its type in that there's a first contract to then close at some later date.Some things will happen leading up to the closing, but when the buyer, the purchaser, enters that first contract, it puts up earnest money, and then it can walk away before closing and just be out that earnest money.This is a very common structure.This is how real estate contracts work.And that's exactly what happened here.Lowe's entered into that first contract, put up its earnest money, decided to walk away and then forfeited its earnest money.Now, when you look at the specific language of the contract, all this is confirmed, in effect, amplified.Your honors have talked some about section 13B. That section starts out with a real kind of classic statement of the earnest money framework.If the lease is not consummated on account of Lowe's defaults, hereunder forfeiture shall be an entitled as its sole and exclusive remedy here under to receipt of the earnest money deposit.But then section 13B actually goes beyond that.And it makes clear that the earnest money isn't just the exclusive remedy for a breach of contract claim, but for any claim with really any connection to the agreement.And its language is clear and unequivocal on this point, \"North Presidio hereby waives and releases any right to sue Lowe's as to any claims, injury, or loss arising from, or in connection with this agreement to recover damages over the earnest money deposit\".And Texas courts have made clear that that arising from, or in connection with language is indeed as broad as it sounds, it encompasses any dispute connected to the agreement, even claims that merely relate to it.So the parties later kind of amplified this or confirmed section 13B's limitation of liability provision in section 35, which what Your Honors have also brought up this morning and that's a provision that's in bold, all caps.The parties knew what they were doing, and it says, let's just read it, \"until the closing, any site work, grading, other work, North Presidio undertakes in any other action, lifespan or activity North Presidio undertakes in anticipation of Lowe's leasing the surmised premises is strictly at North Presidio's sole risk and expense\".Now, my friend on the other side has said that's a timing provision.I'm not exactly sure what he means, but just reading it, it says \"until the closing\".As in, unless, and until the transaction closes, all of this is at North Presidio's risk and expense.Of course there was no closing here.So that until the closing term wasn't satisfied.So the section 13B, section 35, reading them together, really just leave the clear impression that unless, and until the transaction closes, that Lowe's can not be liable for more than $50,000.So let's apply those provisions here.And I think it's helpful that I don't think the parties actually disagree on limited key points.For example, North Presidio hasn't challenged whether these provisions are enforceable, either as a whole or as any of their claims.No do they challenge that their contractual and non-contractual claims come within the scope of them.That is for section 13B, that they arrived from, or in connection with the contract or per section 35, that they seek damages for action, money spent or activity undertaken in anticipation of Lowe's closing the lease, which again, section 35 says it's all at North Presidio's sole risk and expense.So putting that all together, at least for purposes of section 13B and for section 35, there's no real dispute.Apart from that slight dispute on section 35, that North Presidio's claims come within the scope of these and that they apply, at least on their face, for these two claims to bar all the contractual and non-contractual claims because North Presidio has now received its earnest money.Again, all it's entitled to.So North Presidio, instead of engaging on these key terms, it turns instead to the spirit of section 7B. So let's look at section 7B. 7B doesn't purport to change anything regarding section 13B or section 35.What 7B does is it talks about one of the contracts that the parties are supposed to negotiate leading up to the closing.The closing, once involved the ground lease, the contract called the EPCR and a contract called the SDA and then the agreement to enter ground lease, this initial contract that's before the court, that talks about all of them and gives very broad outlines, what kinds of terms there to include, what kinds of areas they were to address.And the contract contemplates that the closing is when the parties execute those contracts and exchange them.And then those three contracts will govern the parties' conduct going forward.But of course there was no closing or execution here.And so the SDA, whatever terms that the parties might have eventually negotiated, regarding it, that never came into effect.So not only as Your Honors have recognized, do the general outlines of the SDA reflected in the agreement not purport to alter section 13B or section 35, but even if that were at work or otherwise, it simply wouldn't work here because the SDA never became an enforceable contract.And I just want to be clear on this point, this execution was required.It was a part of the SDA to be binding.And there were a couple of reasons for that.One, if you just read the agreement as a whole, it first differentiates between the agreement to the SDA and the execution of the SDA. And the execution part was supposed to happen at closing.And that makes sense in light of the broader framework of the contract.In section 13B, section 35, they make very clear that up until closing, Lowe's is at most responsible for $50,000 in damages.And then after closing the ground lease, the EPCR, and the FCA, they might provide for additional liability.But again, there wasn't execution.There wasn't a closing.The FCA never came into effect.Mr. Liddell, what do we do with opposing counsel, Mr. Leonard's argument that while they couldn't collect the money ahead of time before closing that the pre-done work could be compensated after closing under the, you know.Yes, Your Honor.The first agreement.Yes, I understand, Your Honor.I guess a few points here, first of all, in section 7B, when the contract lays out the six or so terms, calling them terms is kind of generous, the six or so provisions and very general language of yesterday was to include none of those.None of those say, and I don't think that my friend on the other has contested this, that they mean to apply to work done pre-closing.And if you pair that with both section 13B and section 35, which says I think very clearly, until the closing that yields the only possible interpretation, being that until the closing, the section 13B section 35 govern.After the closing, if the parties reached agreement on the SDA executer debt, then it would go through.I guess part of my opposing counsel's argument here is this notion that the SDA contained all the essential terms.And I just want to be clear on a few points.I mean, one, North Presidio never pleads breach of the SDA. I want to make that clear, I think it's important to see how all this operates.They plead that we breached the agreement to enter ground lease, that first initial contract, by failing to enter into the SDA. They say this time and again, in their pleadings.There is no breach of the SDA claim.It's all about the agreement.So if you look at breach of the agreement, then the limitation of liability provisions, and again, 13B and 35 obviously apply.And there's no indication that the stated terms of the SDA alter them and more important, even beyond all of that, this notion that the SDA contained all the essential terms, just to match up to what North Presidio has pleaded.If you look at the terms that North Presidio pleaded, there's a conclusory pleading that Lowe's quote \"Assented to the terms of the SDA\".And then the only term that actually talks about is this reimbursement for site work provision.But even that term's incomplete, because if you look at what they actually plead, it says, and frankly, what the agreement indicates, it says that Lowe's will reimburse North Presidio for quote \"its share of the project costs,\" but nowhere, either in the pleadings or in the agreement, does North Presidio ever even say what Lowe's share is, which again, just goes to the broader point, that section 7B, we're just laying out a very general framework for some contracts that that was essentially to come into effect if the parties reached an agreement and decided to proceed with closing, but that never happened here.We don't have any terms of the SDA that are either in the agreement or even pleaded that would possibly override the very strong provisions in section 13B and in section 35.Also on this point, I don't think that my opposing counsel is arguing this, but I just want to dot all my I's and cross all my T's, to the extent there's any argument that these later oral discussions about the site work and that we assent to the SDA to the extent he's arguing that that some somehow does change section 13B and section 35, which again, I don't think he is, but just to be clear, section 24 of the agreement, which is on page 330 of the record, it makes it very clear that you can't amend this without a signed writing.\"No amendment to this agreement, express or implied, shall be binding upon the parties unless such amendment shall be in writing and signed\".Again, it's undisputed.There's no signed writing.They hadn't pleaded one.So the SDA couldn't, if it contained some terms that somehow aren't pleaded, but the court would still consider them, again, just couldn't override the clear terms with 13B and 35.And my last point, briefly, Your Honor, even if North Presidio had pleaded a breach of the SDA, and even if they had pleaded full terms, all the essential terms, which we don't know what they are, but even if they had, it still wouldn't change anything.Because even if these were two separate contracts, you would still read the SDA along with the agreement.And the only way to read those two contracts in harmony would be to do, as I said, a few times now, is that the SDA takes over post-closing and that the agreements limitation of liability provisions govern pre-closing.Also, Your Honor, that's why we think that the court doesn't have to go beyond the terms of the limitation of liability provision to resolve all of North Presidio's claims.Unless the court has further questions, I'll yield the remainder of my time.Thank you, sir.Next here coming up, Mr. Luciano, who has seven minutes if he needs it.Good afternoon, Your Honors, as my colleague explained that I'm going to be discussing a few additional reasons why the non-contractual claims were properly dismissed.Two in particular, the first of which applies to all three of those claims and it's that because those claims are functionally duplicative of the breach of contract claim, they're subsumed within it and can't exist apart from it.And then the second, specifically with respect to fraud, is I'll discuss a few of the pleading defects and failure to comply with the particularity requirements under rule 9B. Turning first to the express contract, Texas courts have been careful to police against parties taking what is in substance, a breach of contract claim, and rephrasing it in equitable or tort terms.Applying that to the quasi-contract first, the whole point of quasi-contract is that when parties find themselves governed by no agreement, sometimes equity will step in and fill in the gaps.But of course, that doesn't apply when an express agreement covers the promises in the case of promissory estoppel, or the services, in the case of quantum meruit.And that's precisely the case here.Turning first to the promises, this is from paragraph 12 of the amended complaint, they plead that the frequently stated intention of Lowe's to consummate the agreement and enter into the ground lease, the ECCR, and the SDA. That promise is an agreement to perform under the agreement, or that promise is a promise to perform under the agreement to consummate the SBA, to close on the ground lease.And so by failing to perform that promise, Lowe's bore breach of contract liability.There's no reason to resort to equity to effectively sidestep the contractual provisions.It's the same story with respect to quantum meruit.The services at issue here are site work performed in anticipation of closing.And I think, as should be painfully clear by now, section 35 of the agreement covers that with about as much particularity as you can imagine.It specifically puts that those services at North Presidio's sole risk until closing.So North Presidio cannot take what amounts to a breach of contract claim, services and promises covered by an agreement, and then resort to equity.North Presidio's counsel's argument against that is that no contract covers the services at issue because the agreement doesn't provide for compensation of them.But I think that gets it backwards because the express contract law applies even when a contract forecloses liability, it covers the services all the same.It just doesn't provide for compensation of them.And that's what makes it all the more important to hold the parties to the terms of their bargain and not allow them to resort to equity.The existence of two potential contracts doesn't alter the calculus either.I'll point the court to this court's opinion in Williams v.Colonial Bank, there plaintiff's employee wanted to enforce one contract.This court agreed with the employer that another contract controlled.And because that second contract controlled, it foreclosed the ability of plaintiff to resort to equity, to enforce the terms of what was an unenforceable agreement.Now taking these same principles and applying them to the fraud claim results in what Texas courts referred to as the economic loss rule.And that rule, the gist of it, is that if duties and damages sound in contract, then what you've pled is substantively a breach of contract claim.Even if you call it something else.Here, both of those defining characteristics align decisively on the favor on the side of contract.Again, the promises that issue or the alleged omissions are a failure to perform under the agreement.In other words, that Lowe's failed to disclose that it didn't intend to follow through on the ground lease.That's functionally duplicative of the contractual obligations that they already bore.And so, in that sense, there's no room between that and the breach of contract case.Another way to think about it.I think this is a helpful phrasing is from the Lincoln General Insurance case.Judge Costa, your opinion from 2015, where you explained the economic loss rule bars a tort claim when no factual basis for the tort claim would exist, had the defendant complied with the contract.Here, applying that principle, if Lowe's had followed through and abided by these promises that North Presidio rephrases in fraud terms, of course there would be no fraud by non-disclosure claim.Turning to the second defining characteristic, which is the damages, here we have the classic case of purely economic loss to the subject matter of the contract.In other words, reliance damages anticipation of closing.North Presidio I think candidly conceived this much on page 26 of its opening brief, where it explains that it sought contractual expectancy damages and the economic loss rule would bar its claim so long as a contractual obligation exists.We would submit that a contractual obligation undoubtedly exists.They sued for it and recovered under it.And so the fact that they cannot recover their full measure of damages is all the more reason to apply the economic loss rule.The very purpose of which is to avoid parties disregarding unfavorable provisions by recasting breach of contract claims.But even if all of this wasn't substantively breach of contract claim, turning specifically to the fraud pleadings, I wanna just highlight in my time left, two failings in that respect.I know that North Presidio relies primarily on the relaxed pleading standards for the facts within the defendant's knowledge, but that has no applicability to the first failing of their fraud claim, which related to the duty to disclose.Even assuming there's a duty to disclose here, furnished on partial disclosures, North Presidio gave no elaboration on what those partial disclosures were, when exactly they occurred over the course of these weekly conference calls that could have happened at any more from a year plus long period, or who from Lowe's affirmatively made those partial disclosures.All of those facts were within North Presidio's knowledge and their failure to plead them with specificity derails their fraud claim from the outset, even with respect to facts that, perhaps were within Lowe's exclusive knowledge, the relaxed pleading standards for information and belief are not an exception to the particularity requirements under rule 9B, that's in the Bell Helicopter case, nor are they a license to make allegations on information and belief, but yet omit any factual basis for them, that's from the Willard case.And so here, what you have is a multi-month period in which Lowe's must have decided that it wasn't following through and must have allegedly been able to disclose that, but that allegation could be copied and pasted into any breach of contract case.For that reason because the pleadings are deficient, we respectfully request that the court affirm.Thank you, Your Honors.Thank you, sir.Mr. Leonard, you have five minutes on rebuttal.Yes, Your Honor.I would like to follow up on the fraud claim.The nature of our fraud claim, as I mentioned, is that at some point in time, Lowe's knew they were not gonna go forward with our project.We know, at least at the time, they told us it was terminated.We also know that a few months before there was, as we plead, there was a new CEO, and that there was announced a plan to close stores, as well as re-evaluate the new developments.We don't know when that point in time occurred.We won't know until we take discovery.Those are facts only within the mindset, a little bit in the knowledge of Lowe's.If the decision was made and they allowed us to continue working and doing site development work, then we have the fraud by non-disclosure because, as we plead, we had meeting after meeting week after week after week, when we told them what we're doing, they said, \"We're fine.Keep going\".Every meeting looks good.That's the basis we claim.We do not have the facts, nor would we, until we have discovery to plead into particularity.That is why we are relying upon the relaxed standards.As far as the economic loss goes, counsel is exactly like what we stated.This is an alternative pleading.If there is a contract, if the SDA is enforceable, then we would go under that particular theory, we would not have half a fraud claim.But the right to damages, the right to reimbursement doesn't come under the executed contract.It comes under the site development agreement, which was never executed.And if the court finds that is not enforceable, then we certainly, it would take it outside the economic loss provision because the duties were not set by a contract because the contract didn't exist.Nor would the rights or damages be based upon contract because the contract does not exist.That is why it is an alternative pleading.And then as far as the nature of our duty, they made the argument that we're adopting a new statement section that the Texas Supreme court has not addressed.Well actually, he cited the statute, the fraud by non-disclosure elements from this court's opinion.And then we cited also the reply brief at the Supreme court, although they noted that they had not officially adopted the statement provisions about fraud by nondisclosure, that it did not hold the other cases that was addressing, that did say there's a duty to disclose based upon partial disclosures.It did not hail it was wrongly decided.Rather, it basically said the evidence before it didn't support an application.So that's the nature of our fraud claim.We go back to the situation that you think if the contract itself, if the SDA cannot be enforceable under these circumstances, I believe the facts do relate it to be enforceable, we should be able to recover the very least of the promissory estoppel, because they certainly did tell us, as we pled, that their intention was to consummate agreement, enter into the ground lease ECR, the site development agreement and relying upon that, we spent substantial funds developing that and incurred expenses upon that.So for that, we believe we're entitled to certainly under the promissory estoppel argument.That's all actually, I had to the rebuttal, unless any questions.We've got your argument and the case will be submitted.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/gov.uscourts.ca5.19-11259.2020-06-03.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/gov.uscourts.ca5.19-11259.2020-06-03.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/gov.uscourts.ca5.19-11259.2020-06-03.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/gov.uscourts.ca6.13-5150/gov.uscourts.ca6.13-5150.2014-06-25.mp3", "text": "Cases 13-5150, 5685 and 5907, United States of America versus Demetrius Fields, Clinton Lewis and Martin Lewis.Argument not to exceed 30 minutes to be shared by appellants and 30 minutes to be shared by appellees.Messers Stengel, McAfee and Simmons for opponents.Good morning, Your Honors.Mike Stengel of the Memphis Bar here on behalf of Demetrius Fields.He wants the sentencing challenged.This is the sentencing challenge.Great.And very simply the current law of this circuit is fairly clear that you look to the plea agreement to determine whether the United States reserve sole discretion on whether to it make it 5K1 or not.Okay, so we have that, we have that.Well, I think that that's the issue, is whether we have that or not.Sorry.It is, I would suggest from reading this court's cases that it's not always easy to determine whether you have that.And what's very unique in Mr. Fields' situation, is that there was a stipulation that Mr. Fields provided substantial assistance to the United States, which the district court ultimately at sentencing, described as extraordinary.And the United States, the prosecutor, agreed that was a fair description.It's Mr. Fields' position that once the government stipulated that he had provided substantial assistance, that they had an obligation in good faith to either make the motion or prove by a preponderance, that there was a breach of the plea agreement.Well, you know, this plea agreement bears discretion.It didn't say shall or will like we had in Lewis' case, isn't that right?That's correct.So, you know, it was always understood that the government had discretion as well as to file a 5K, but he got the benefits of the 5K anyway.So I'm kind of, from a district court judge's perspective, I'm wondering, what's the point?I would disagree that he got the benefits of the 5K. - Didn't the judge say that the cost of this extraordinary cooperation, I will depart down to 50 bearing down, instead of giving him life imprisonment?He did vary downward from the- - Okay, so that's what the 5K would've done.The 5K didn't bind the judge to whatever the government recommended by paper.Just give the judge a basis to depart that one.That's correct.Is this a distinction between the word bearing and depart?Is that what this all comes down to?Is this a distinction without a difference?Is that what this comes down to?This court may well conclude that.Mr. Fields would disagree, in part- - Wouldn't you say that it's harmless air to not get a departure to which you're entitled but instead get bearance in the same amount?That would be condescending.In other words, I'll even bring to you to you that it's an error.The terms mean different things.And they come at different times in the calculation, but wouldn't we almost say communist?Not under the facts of this case.In most cases, I would say that they would.But in this case, the plea agreement provided that the government would make a specific sentencing recommendation as to a cap, if it made the 5K1.And this was a situation where the court on two occasions, knowing there was no 5K1 and finding- the court determined that the only reason there was no 5K1, was because of this government's conclusion that there had been continued criminal conduct.This gets to the same place.It's like one person taking the bus from Cincinnati to Columbus to get there at four o'clock, another person taking, you know, a car that gets to Columbus at four o'clock.You took different vehicles but you got to the same place, at the same time.I'm still struggling with what the issue is here cause he got what he wanted anyway.And the government was not required to give him a 5K, it was not.Show me where in the record, where in the agreement, the government was required to give the 5K, mandatory language.There is not mandatory language in the plea bargain.In fact, it says that the government need not.Aren't those the words?Um...Need not file for substantial assistance, on the grounds for substantial assistance.Whatever.It's presumed reasonable, this sentence.Is it not?It is presumed reasonable.Right- - It is- - Good, low-guideline sentence.presumed reasonable.So you're the steep hill that you have declined here today.Obviously the one that Judge Marbley's focused upon, but we have to overcome the presumption.It is a- - It's a sentence that's low-guidance.It is conceitedly both a steep and a high field for Mr. Fields to climb.However- - It's impossible.I need to climb over Mount Everest.In the snow.I don't...I don't make the call.However, I would simply suggest that with respect to traveling to Cincinnati by bus or by plane, the only thing that I can say is, without the 5K1 and without the government's recommendation, which was required in the plea agreement, if the 5K1 was met and the judge's two or three times soliciting by recommendation for sentencing from the government, that without the 5K1, we cannot determine that we both- that Mr. Fields arrived, that the judge arrived at the exact same sentence.We could also say that without the drug dealing from prison, you'd get a different result too.Well the- - Mr. Pierce.the government made that point explicitly clear, but again, Mr. Fields's problem is that there was no real establishment of that, in the courtroom.And indeed, that was something that bothered the government.I want to go back for a moment a point that you made about, you know, maybe he gets a different sentence if the 5K is made.Didn't the government decline to recommend a sentence during the plea ?Yes, on more than one occasion.All right.So, is it even, if the government had moved for a 5K- sometimes they'll make a move for a 5K and not suggest the extent to which varies.So wouldn't we be in essentially the same position, once again, even with the 5K made that the government has yet to position that it was not going to recommend a particular sentence?No, because this, the 5K, potential 5K language in this plea agreement, specifically stated that if the government moved for a 5K, it would recommend a sentence of 20 years or less.And so there would have been a recommendation.And again, that's one of the unique situations about this.Okay, thank you, Mr. Stengel.You ate your full rebuttal.Thank you.If it please the court, my name is Marty McAfee, and I'm with the Memphis bar.I represent Martin Lewis in this case, not Clinton Lewis in this case.We've gotta keep 'em straight.I had asked the jury to do that throughout the 6 1/2 week trial.This was a very unique case.28 days of testimony, 75 witnesses, 315 exhibits.The government portrayed this as a vast conspiracy.Respectfully, it's just- it's more likely that this was, this was more likely meeting concentric conspiracies that the government would have to prove.And when you look at all the testimony regarding Martin Lewis, you find just weeks and weeks and weeks where there's no testimony.Martin Lewis did this, or did that, or was involved, or was there, or was guarding, or saw it, was delivering, dealing, any of that.Essentially the case against Martin Lewis, when it comes to real witnesses and facts regarding one of the several murders involved- - Is this is a buildup to the motion?Is that your point?Or- where are you going with this?It goes towards both the severance.It goes towards the variance from the- - Okay, well, on the severance, you know I- I will say I, thinking about this case, that we did have this point where, there was a stage where I was saying to myself, it really does seem prejudicial to have these cases altogether.Thank you- - But then I- - But then I thought, I can use the word stage.And then I thought to myself, but wait, this is a conspiracy case.And how funny- that seems- I mean if you- if the alley- if there's enough to have an indictment, that there was an agreement to do criminal business with somebody, I don't know.Why shouldn't you be tracked together?I mean, I realize that conspiracies have bigger players and smaller players, and I get that, but it's still a conspiracy.How strange to have separate trials when there's, well, one conspiracy or one set of conspiracies among a bunch of the same people.It's the set of conspiracies that gets, it gets terrible when you prove for 10 days that Mr. Capone did this, and for another 10 days that, that this gangster did that, and another 10 days that this gangster did that.And then you spend hours proving that Martin Lewis was involved in this far-flung- - The reason that's not so bad is, all you have to do to get out from under co-responsibilities is say, \"I never entered the agreement\".He never entered the agreement.If you do that, everything's irrelevant.But if you did enter the agreement, then the bad consequences seem naturally to follow.Well, and honestly, I had allotted, at least in my planning to spend perhaps 14 or 15 seconds on severance.Okay, I'm sorry.I just want to let you know, I had a good thought for you for a little while.Well, you still can and- - You spend five more seconds on whether or not- - Sure.the government is correct that your severance argument receives only plain error review, in such as that- was not really- okay.Well, it was brought up- - I understand.But it wasn't- - countless, countless, countless times, pretrial.It was brought up- - Not renewed.over and over during the trial.And it was not renewed at that.So I do think I'm stuck with that.Okay, so .Here we go.But just on severance and say this, the only way we get to your \"but then I thought about this,\" is if you believe the witnesses they put on.Which is why Brady matters so much here and it's why the perjured testimony matters so much here, because that's really the only way we really have a trial.The bedrock that the whole system rests upon- - Okay, so perjured testimony, I mean...I don't know, I felt like that had a really great caption, but then when you read it, you realized your theory of perjured testimony is the government's putting on witnesses, and I guess it probably does count as perjured testimony if they're both saying opposite things, but what you had was, the only time they were saying opposites was as immaterial points.Points in the story that really didn't go to whether someone murdered somebody else at someone's directions.They went to whether someone was in the car at that point in time.Well, when you- I'm going to respectfully disagree on that.And I think if you, and I'm going to tell you, this is a sea of information.I mean, this is a record to tackle and for y'all to get to the- - Well, give us the one that really counts as perjury and they'll respond.Okay.I'll do my best.With this, most of the really good variances that matter for me, for Martin Lewis's case, the government can't make it without Marcus Brandon.They can't make it without Terry Peete.They can't make it without Carlos Whitelow, because their testimony is essentially that Carlos Whitelow sees Mario McNeal, says, \"He's over here\".And he waits in a certain place until Martin Lewis is directed, driven over and kills Mario McNeal.Driven over by Terry Peete and then confesses about his actions to Marcus Brandon.Now you're going to see the theme of those three names: Brandon, Peete, and Clinton Lewis over and over in the testimony regarding Marcus' term.Now that is a separate murder in the government's best conspiracy theory.But, when you look at, when you break down what those three, really what all those witnesses around that murder had to say, they're not consistent and clearly the government knew about that prior to trial.The investigation- - This, is inconsistency the equivalent of falsity- - When- - to equate to perjury?When you, when one person says, \"He left with Marcus Brandon, Terry Peete and Clinton Lewis and we never saw him again\".And that saved those two people that are in the car, other than Clinton Lewis, Marcus Brandon and Terry Peete say, \"No, he left with other people and I never saw him again\".And the government has that information well ahead of time and they know about it and they've got 'em written down and one's saying north, I'm certain north, and one's swearin' south, I'm certain south, that is not just an inconsistency.An inconsistency is, \"Where did I leave those keys?Was it in my blue suit or was it in the tan suit\"?That's an inconsistency.There was a murder to explain here.Well, which one?I mean turn around, I suppose.You're focused on turn around.I'm looking back.Well, that is, that's right.But when you look at all of the different testimony on this, first you have to look at Marcus Brandon because the government withheld information until after Marcus ran and had testified.They had a DEA 6 where one of their witnesses, TeMarcus Cartwright, said that- - Wasn't this the that was acquittal?Yes, it was.Okay.Well, I didn't represent Clinton Lewis.Clinton Lewis was acquitted of that and yet he was convicted by the jury verdict with the conspiracy behavior surrounding that.So those are inconsistent too.But regardless of that, yes, it had to do with a murder that Martin Lewis was not even accused of.But these are all witnesses that are shared among this murder, and this murder, and this murder.And when you can show to a jury inconsistencies, and you are entitled to do that before we should honor this jury verdict.You can't say, \"Well, there's an acquittal on this\".Or, \"But, Mr. McAfee, Martin Lewis was convicted of that.Didn't the jury take that away from here\"?Weren't you given a chance to put the witness back on the stand?Yes, sir, after- yes, sir, we were.And that mitigates this, but it doesn't give us back our opening statement.The credibility that we need before a jury when we're going into a trial, trying to guide the jury through six and a half weeks of testimony.A lot of which, we should know was coming.They set up the practical matter.If you might have a stronger case, if Clinton Lewis had been found guilty of the murder.Because, really, if you going to give an opening statement for what you know will be a six week trial, are you going to deal with such minutia way as to say, \"Well, Mr. Jones here will be in seven times when he went on cross-examination\".You aren't going to tip your hand like that.You're just going to say, \"Ladies and gentlemen, evaluate the credibility of the witnesses\".You're gonna throw a teaser out there.At least in the traditional opening sentence.I couldn't do that because I was told over and over pretrial, \"You'd been given the- You've got, we were told over and over prior to the trial, we've turned over all Brady.We know what Brady means and we will continue to follow that obligation.And yet for three and a half months, that the change in TeMarcus Cartwright's...its version of the- - Mr. McAfee, have you ever gotten Jencks material?Yes, sir.And you've done opening statements without having been given Jencks material before trial, right?But, but I can't get Jencks material after a witness that I want to cross-examine.No, we're talking about opening statement and you don't know what's in the Jencks material.That's correct.So it's not my, you know, this is kind of to the Brady situation, right?It is.So, and since there was no actual harm or at least no harm that you pointed out thus far, when you were given the Brady material and you were given the opportunity to cure, what's the prejudice?We were prevented from curing it by not being allowed to put on Detective Mackenzie, who could say, \"We had probable cause to indict Marcus Brandon, Terry Peete, and Clinton Lewis.We did indict them in Mississippi and the government said-\" - Because wouldn't that be speculative?He's speculating as to what a grand jury would have done.He could say that they were indicted and the reason that that's important, is that it's yet another obligation that these witnesses owed to the government because the United States government went down to Mississippi and said, \"Let them go, we'll take care them\".And Mississippi thought that what they meant was we will prosecute them.But what they meant was we will take care of them and they did take care of them.And the jury was entitled to know that they took care of them in that way.Because if you can say, \"Mr. McAfee, if you will say ABC and D,\" and of course I can't prove that they said that, and I don't think that they said that.But I will say this, you take away the murder diamond that's between me and all of eternity, I'm your man.And that was our theory during this trial and we were entitled to exploit it in every single way we could.And he's the only witness who could have testified to that, that you were from calling?Except we, well, there was also Billy Ray Miles, we were limited on that, but frankly, we did it anyway and once I looked at the record I admit, the government's right that there's not much prejudice there.I just didn't want to concede it because I don't want you to ignore it because the government did appose what was clearly relevant across.Okay, thank you.Two seconds, I better stop there.We're not going through this .We've got rebuttals.Yes, sir.Mr. Simmons.Thank you, Your Honor.My name is Jim Simmons.I'm from the National Bar.I was involved with this case initially pre-trial and then for medical reasons I had to leave before the trial started.Now representing Clinton Lewis on the appeal.And I was listening to the argument, and why is this case different?And I think there's something that makes this case different from your typical conspiracy case, in that, it's a statement made by Marcus Brandon, it said, \"On cross-examination, why do 10 when you can do a 3\"?That's what his father told him.That's what he admitted to on cross-examination.And that's the mindset of the vast majority of these witnesses because this case was based almost entirely on cooperating witnesses.There was no DNA, there are limited phone taps, - Is this an efficiency point you're making?No, Your Honor, it's a mindset.It's a mindset of all of these witnesses- - There's nothing improper about it.That's how conspiracies are tried, right?At least in my book, how they are.I think in this case it's different because usually the conspiracies are tried with cooperating witnesses plus.In this case, there's very little plus.There's an incentive for the witnesses to testify based upon their expectations of 5Ks. And they admitted it and they were thoroughly cross-examined as to their expectation of receiving some benefit for their testimony.And the fact that they've cross-examined, a lot of them cause then the jury has an opportunity to evaluate whether they trust their testimony, right?That's correct, but, I'm going to go back.This case is, I'm arguing he went to bear because I don't think you can take each individual issue and raise and say that's reversible error.But if you take the issue of the perjured testimony, you say is it inconsistent or is it perjury?I'm a little suspicious of the .What do you mean by that?Do you mean that you could have, something counts as reversible on a scale of 1 to 10 when it's 9 or over.You're saying we just get a bunch of 7s?We had four 7 arguments and that gets you cumulative air, even though none of them rose to 9 or 10?That is my understanding of the law, Your Honor, is that you can have a series of errors and among themselves, individually, do not amount for much of a error.But taking them as a whole in the aggregate, you did not have a fair trial.That's exactly the- - So, do you have to own not to be errors?Yes, if it's not error, then it's not going to be a cumulative error.Yeah.I think that the government points that out and I think that's logical.So a difficult harmlessness argument gets a little easier the more I .Okay.Yep, yep.The Brady violation, I'd like to go back to that because this is, again it's- the sequence of events where Mr. Cartwright was interviewed back in June of '08, according to the government, he said, he gave a gun, traded a gun with Clinton Lewis.He made arrangements for that gun then to be put in the hands of law enforcement.The gun was, in fact, the murder weapon.And then he re-interviewed prior to trial in December, January and again in February, and he says, \"No, I did not trade that gun with Clinton Lewis.I traded that gun with Mr. Brandon\".And that isn't like- - Doesn't he say Clinton Lewis was there?Pardon me?Doesn't he say Clinton Lewis was there?In other words, even when he changes his testimony, it's not completely exculpated.According to Mr. Cartwright, he did not change his testimony.Cartwright said, \"I did not say that to the agent\".The agents say he did, so who do you believe?I'm just saying, the final version, is still one that's not completely exculpated.That is not the way I read the record.Because, what he said is that it was Mr. Brandon who had the gun, that was trading with Mr. Cartwright.It was not Mr. Lewis's gun.It was the murderer weapon.So, yes, I think he is saying that Clinton Lewis was not involved in that gun.And the logical sequence is that gun, whoever traded the gun, was also the one who committed the murder which- - It doesn't say Clinton Lewis was there during the exchange?Yes.Okay.And weren't you- after the- well, you know it was delayed and the government is going to have to answer for that.Weren't you given the opportunity to recross both Brandon and Detective ?And we're getting the opportunity here- - And you opted not to do so?And then opted not to do so.Okay.I think that was the decision of the trial council, which would they could- could take it back and do an effective cross-examination.Weren't you give an opportunity to also- didn't you get a chance to cross-examine Cartwright once you got the new Brady stuff?Cartwright was called as a witness but not Clinton Lewis.Okay.And at the conclusion of the government proof.The government did not call on Mr. Cartwright.He was called by Mr. Lewis.So the prejudice in here is the delay itself?You ultimately got the Brady materials and you were able to cross-examine Cartwright, or examine Cartwright and you were given the opportunity to cross-examine Brandon and Detective Jordan, which is the same thing you would have been able to do had you gotten the Brady material , right?You wouldn't have had the opportunity, but I think to effectively cross-examine them after he has already been cross-examined and a direct examination of the Brady material .Yeah, she did- - So, we had the opportunity but our position is, it would not have had the same effect with the jury.So Mr. Chairman says, keep your red lights on, but I think I wanted to give you guys some flexibility.So you probably have five more minutes.Would that be all right?Sure, sure.Okay, then- okay, go ahead.The point that Judge Cook brought up about, in fact, the Turner murder of Mr. Lewis was acquitted out.The point is he was convicted of kidnapping that resulted in murder and that got into the life sentence.So it was the events at the kidnapping where we have the conflicting testimony.What I think is credible to this is the acquittal, the argument would have certainly been stronger as to the perjure testimony had he been convicted.But, frankly, he wasn't convicted.But it shows that the jury considered this.The jury considered Mr. Brandon's false testimony, inconsistent testimony, but Brandon was the key witness in this case.And through this entire three, eight week trial, Brandon, was the childhood person, childhood buddy.They ran together.They did everything together with Clinton Lewis.He is the critical witness against Clinton Lewis.He had a deal.His, why do 10 when you do a friend?I mean, that's his mindset.That's the mindset of everybody.But what's critical is the conflicting testimony that you had at the time of the abduction.You had Martin Brandon's, you had Clarence Broady, quite a lot of .Also in version of the offense that you sit there and not reconcile with.Somebody- - In every detail.This is what's tricky about this.I mean, you can have lots of perception issues where you don't remember this one feature or that the other person remembers that feature .But if it doesn't go to the heart of it that's wrong, right?It does get to the heart of it.Because these are not misperceptions in details.Give us the biggest one .He was naked.He was bloody.He was put into the back of a van and Mr. Brandon was present, he participated.And Mr. Brandon says, \"I slapped him and I never saw him again\".The testimony was he was in Arkansas and gettin' back to the possession of Mr. Brandon.Mr. Brandon cannot be telling the truth when he says I had nothing else to do with it.Somebody is lying to me.Somebody is, it's not a mistake.It's not a misperception.It is somebody is lying and the government, in this case, offering 5Ks to everybody is in fact for the credibility of each of these witnesses.Okay.Is there anything else you want to say?The seventh issue, again, it was plain error.We're not conceding that buddy and the transcript of this trial and proceedings, I think over and over again you were saying, the adversity between Clinton Lewis' and Martin Lewis' counsel.And the two examples is Mr. Whitelow was recalled after he had been examined by the government, did not raise any issues pertaining to Mr. Lewis.He was cross-examined by Mr. Lewis' counsel, who, Clinton Lewis' counsel, who raised no issue regarding the abduction.Then he was cross-examined by Martin Lewis' counsel, who at that point raised issue of the abduction.And then the court allowed the proof to be reopened and proof put in, which would not have come in in a separate trial as to Clinton Lewis and his culpability in the abduction and the murder.And the other is .Again, after the close of all approved, was called by counsel for Martin Lewis, who again, talked about Clinton Lewis' participation in the abduction and the government asked, only, I think, three questions.Are you sure that it was Clinton Lewis who abducted Mr. Turner?And that was the sole cross-examination.I think the undue prejudice by the failure to bring up and we want that issue to be considered.Okay, thank you.Thank you, Judge.We'll hear from the government.Is it one of you or both of you or...?Both of you both of us, Your Honor, may it please the court, Dave Lieberman for the United States and joined at council table by assisting United State's attorney, David Pritchard.I will be addressing the things related to the two Lewis defendants.Mr. Pritchard will be addressing the sentencing claim by Demetrius Fields.Let me start off first with Judge Marbley's invitation to address the Brady.This relates to the pretrial statement of TeMarcus Cartwright and the defense argues that our disclosure was unduly delayed in of Brady.As we said at the outset of our brief, that as a matter of our own expectations and our own policy, we should have disclosed sooner and we've been completely candid at the court.The question in this case is did our mid-trial disclosure, violate the standards of Brady?And the answer is no.Brady requires disclosure at a time for which the defendants can make effective use of the evidence at trial.And this loop- - Here is one of my concerns about the timing of the disclosure.The defense did not have those disclosures pre-trial which they should have had.These are not Jencks material, these are Bradys.Yeah, we are here- - And so, you know, in pre-trials, I think by all accounts are critical.Period.Because you prepare, you know, most of the persuasion is done, or a great deal of it's done in opening statements.They could have used these materials in the preparation of their opening.Why was this not disclosed?So, you are .I encourage the court to take a look at the transcript of the Brady hearing that's document 1360.Okay.And our trial team lays out in full, its explanation.Number one, they had initially planned to call Cartwright to the stand.Number two, they thought that his pretrial statements were covered by Jencks.Can I stop you on the first point?Yes.Is that right?That that's an explanation?You're going to put someone on the stand?Why, I understand why that helps you.So, you know, what the trial team is looking at where a series of cases that this court has issued: Presser, Banks, and the one discussed below is an unpublished decision called Brazil.Where this court has said that where a statement falls under the Jencks Act and where the government intends to call that witness at trial, the timing of the disclosure is defined by the Jencks Act.Now we didn't call Cartwright to the stand.And nothing in my brief and nothing in my argument today is relying on the Jencks stand.It's only Brady.And the Brady asks, going back to Judge Marbley's initial question, did we disclose in time for the defense to make effective use of this at trial?Now on the point of crafting opening and closing arguments, this court in says, well when we're looking at Brady prejudice and materiality, we're looking at issues of guilt or innocence, not matters of trial strategy.But setting that point aside- - So just, I'm at a really simple place.Okay.I can't get off of it.I just, it seems really obvious to me, if it's blatant material that would otherwise help the other side, why is it at all irrelevant when you're going to call that person as a witness?They need that cross-examination and everything else.I agree- - It just doesn't make any sense to me.I agree, Your Honor.The explanation that our trial team gave was based on statements that this court had made in Presser and Banks and Brazil- - were there was no prejudice because something else happened.I really said, \"Well, if you're calling the witness, it doesn't matter\"?And that just doesn't make any sense to me.So I needed to cross-examine the witness.So the, the statement in Banks was, if it's covered by the Jencks Act, Jencks Act overrides Brady with respect to the timing of the disclosure.Well then I'm throwing it out.Which is why I'm not at all relying on those cases and not adopting the arguments in those cases.I'm- - We said this all are prejudice?I just would've thought this is a prejudice issue.Not a, there was no Brady problem.We should- no?Your Honor, these tests of radius, did we disclose in time for the defendant to make effective use of the trial?That's the question of whether a Brady violation occurred.That's the test of Brady and the requirements of Brady don't ever set under your paradigm.Because Brady is pretrial disclosure and they filed a Brady motion.You were under an obligation, not only to disclose to them but to disclose at .But I guess you could argue that- but with disclosure is not related to government trial tactical strategy.It means when you discovery, if you don't have it, when it's asked for, but you later come into possession of it, that's disclosure.You had it when they asked for it, you made a tactical decision not to disclose it because it gave you a benefit to disclose it later at the Jencks and you withheld it.So what do we do when you do something like that?Your Honor- - To discourage you from doing it again?Because I know that you know it's the legal move.I know that you know that that was wrong.And that's why we can get candid with the court at the outset.That this should have been disclosed earlier.The situation, and I could be misremembering, but the situation that we have here is actually very similar to the facts in Banks.I believe in that case, there was a pretrial statement given by one of the government's witnesses, saying that he did not remember the defendant being involved in the drug deal.And that's where the entire line of arguments that our trial team was relying on, came out of the Banks case.I am not relying on those arguments here.The question under, and I know we're engaging- - Can I just ask you something that- Why can't- tell me what is wrong with this way of thinking about the case.We do not need to address whether it was a varied violation, from finding the prejudice.I completely agree with that.So why, I mean, it sounds like you're asking us to split a lot of hairs and lines that I'm not, aren't intuitive to me.And the other part of it seems incredibly easy.I was trying to address, I think- - No, no, I'm not, I'm not complaining.I'm just, I'm putting a question.I get my question.My question is, why am I bothered with- Why should I bother with this when I have a prejudice inquiry as well?You don't have to bother with it.You can focus entirely on the materiality to resolve the disputes here.Materiality being, the defendants must show a reasonable probability that, had we disclosed this sooner, the results of the proceeding would have been different.Right.And I have not heard any fact, any argument, any piece of evidence or testimony that was not presented to the jury as a result of our mid-trial disclosure.And I have not heard any argument winking any of the counts of conviction that either of these defendants faced to Cartwright's statement.I'll walk through both of the defendants, one by one.Martin Lewis: Cartwright's statement addressed the .45 caliber handgun used to kill Turner.Martin Lewis was not in any way inculpated in that episode.We didn't charge him with that or allege that he participated in that.So the statement is unquestionably irrelevant to the jury's assessment of his culpability.And Clinton Lewis, this was one of the members of the panel brought up earlier.This statement, or directly on count three, the murder of Turner in a direct hearing, and the jury acquitted on that.I think at this stage on appeal, it's up to the other side to- - Come clean.Yes.I agree wholeheartedly with what Judge Sutton just said.Yes.And I agree with your analysis.I have a different concern, however.I don't want to see us eviscerate Brady with death by a thousand cuts.So, yeah...Because the court, the district court was sage enough to kind of remedy the mistake that you created by this late Brady disclosure.And so as a district judge, I- and I think as a court of appeal, we have an interest in Brady not being eviscerated.So how- what can we do to ensure that this doesn't happen again?Your Honor, when you're completely free to repeat the government's concession here, that we should have disclosed this earlier and that, in that our failure to do so, while regrettable, did not violate Brady.In terms of all the analysis, including the materiality analysis.We have been very forthright that this was exculpatory and that we should have disclosed pre-trial.And I'm not sure what more I can offer you.I can also say that this is something that the department and the US attorney in this case treats very seriously and the US attorney has individually addressed this episode with members of the trial team.I'm satisfied with - Thank you.You may move on to another issue.Okay, thank you, Your Honor.If I could move on to the claim that the government presented perjured testimony.Counseled by a friend on the other side for Clinton Lewis, focused on the testimony related to the Turner kidnapping.The government had two main witnesses: Clarence Broady and Demetrius Fields, which walked through each step of how Turner was abducted from the streets of Memphis, driven around for two days in the van, and then dropped off at a stash house and was later killed.Both Broady and Fields implicated Marcus Brandon in the abduction.Wasn't council's right.We did call Marcus Brandon to the stand.Marcus Brandon says, \"I was there at the initial abduction but I wasn't a part of it.I saw them, actually slapped the victim, and then I walked away\".So that is the discrepancy is a degree of participation.Broady and Fields thought that Brandon was centrally involved.Brandon admits he was there.Says he played a minor role in it and did not otherwise participate in that.That is a discrepancy.That is something that defendants are allowed to use and they did use to try to impeach Marcus Brandon's credibility at trial.But it does not establish perjury.It is an inconsistency- courts, including this court, has said that, \"inconsistencies in government testimony do not amount to perjury\".The defendants have an additional burden.They have to show materiality.What did these discrepancies regarding the testimony - Excuse me.What did these discrepancies or how did these discrepancies effect the verdict?And the answer is it's very hard to see in this case.Because, although we had a number of witnesses and some of them had individual discrepancies as to who were these secondary players were, everybody said that Clinton Lewis was involved.Everybody.There's no discrepancy on that point.And then the final point at any perj- of any claim that the government's perjury, they had to show that we knew that we were doing this.And again, courts have been very clear that the fact that, we have witnesses who offer inconsistent statements, will not impute knowledge of perjury, knowledge of false feed to the government.This is what trials are for.Sometimes our witnesses do not- their memories do not align completely.We present our case and we leave it up to the jury to decide.The district court here, Judge Mays, gave very extensive instruction to the jury as to how to evaluate credibility.And there's every reason to believe that- - What are you say about the variance arguments?Well, at first I would say, it's not preserved.There was no claim at trial about variance.And so we're here after playing here.The second point that I would say about variance, is that the standards of the defendants is exceedingly high.They had to show that a variance only occurs when the trial evidence can only be construed as showing multiple conspiracies.Sort of like a sufficiency standard.And they've not met that burden.And that's really hard to do.So, why is it just a sufficiency test?I think people's eyes glaze over when they hear the word \"variance\" but they don't glaze over when they hear the word sufficiency.I think it is very much a citizen's arrest.Uh-huh.In a light most favorable to the government.But there's a third obstacle- - So, just to- so if here there's a global conspiracy alleged, to claim a variance, no, there wasn't.There were lots of conspiracies.You're saying it's a complete \"variance response,\" to show that there was sufficient evidence to show the global, big conspiracy.Yes.That is the discussion.Yes, it's actually really hard to find a successful variance objection in a RICO case.I had a time of it.And that's because this is not an ordinary 841 drug distribution.Is this a single chain or is this a web?When Congress passed RICO, it designed to target conspiracies, to engage in enterprises that were involved in multifaceted racketeering activities.So one person may be involved in drug trafficking.One person may be involved in kidnapping.There's a whole list of them in the statute.And the question is, have we connected it back up the line to the enterprise?And the answer here is clearly in spite, all of this court's guidepost.Everybody here had a common goal, they were working for the organization to traffic drugs throughout the Southeastern United States.The nature of this scheme was incredibly complex and interlocking, had to get the drugs from Mexico, across the border, to Memphis.You needed truck drivers, people to unload the trucks, people to distribute the money to stash houses and get it out to the community, security like Martin Lewis to protect the organization's interests, and then get the money back to Mexico.The government detailed where each defendant, in this case, where they fell into that line.And then the third point is similar to the same that the participants overlapped here, because this is all about moving the product down the line to the consumer.By all those guideposts and under a variance standard, a sufficiency standard, this and under plain error review , this conviction on count one should stand.I think we understand your arguments as to the Lewis's.Is there anything else you feel compelled to say based on what your friends on the other side are saying?I am happy to rest on my brief for all the other claims and turn it over to my fellow.Okay, thank you Mr. Lieberman.Thank you.Thank you, Mr Lieberman.So, Mr. Pritchard.Yes, Your Honor.So, I wonder if you heard some of the questioning from the bench on the Fields' appeal.I did.I don't really have anything to add.I'm happy to questions.That's an excellent argument.Thank you.All right, we'll hear rebuttal.Since the government submitted it, I've got nothing specific to rebutt, as far as argument, I will submit it.Okay, thank you.And McAfee, you want to go next?Thank you, Your Honor.What really happened to Marcus Turner?He was abducted, beaten, hauled to a house in a car, driven around for two days, and then he was tied up, ridiculed, beaten some more, left on the floor and ultimately put into a van again by someone, taken to Mississippi or killed in Tennessee and taken to Mississippi or taken to Mississippi and killed.Somebody abducted him, held him, hurt him and killed him.Here are these small discrepancies.Mr. Brandon says, \"Well, I witnessed the abduction, saw Clinton-\" - don't need to be one person?So your theory is that one person, who did all of those steps?Well, if you listen to the different versions- - You said once, somebody did- - No, no, you're right.and several people- - No, you're right.I suppose.But some- - And maybe a different person did this aspect?We know the slapping occurred, but- - No, no, you're right.You were right.I don't need to- - don't know for sure.I don't mean to minimize anything anyone did in this.In fact, what I want to do is point out that, that's what each of these people are testifying to.Brandon says, \"Well, I witnessed the abduction, saw Clinton beat him.Never saw Turner again\".Law enforcement prior to trial did confront Mr. Brandon with the fact that the other witnesses were saying different things.Now, anyone that's ever practiced law dealing with US attorneys knows that, that usually means you're invited to leave with your client, when they're saying- when they are test- when they are minimizing their conduct.What does Mr. Broady say?He says, \"Clinton Lewis, based upon Marcus Brandon, abducted this man, hauled him to a van.Broady turned Turner over to Clinton Lewis, Marcus Brandon and Terry Peete\".Mr. Weibo, admitted that he participated in the abduction, released Turner to Terry Peete and Marcus Brandon.Mr. Peete says, \"Not involved in the abduction.Turner was released to Clinton Lewis and Marcus Brandon.I was not involved in the killing\".All of those things have to do with Marcus Turner's abduction and they are, every one of them, trying to minimize what they themselves did when it comes to this horrendous crime to Marcus Turner.But these are also witnesses that are essential to the government's case against Martin Lewis.And so, when you ask, why does this matter?When this, these inconsistencies, as the government puts them, one of them's telling the truth about it and one of them is not.Now on several different points- - What about their point that supports perjury?They have to know ahead of time that that's what- there's falseness.And the fact that they come out as inconsistencies, doesn't prove anything ahead of time.But they knew about it before the trial.And they put it on.When you put a witness on, that you know is telling something false, then you're supporting perjury.Did they know it was actually false or did they know it was inconsistent?If the- - Let the jury sort it out.Okay, if the question is, was the bike yellow or was it red?That's inconsistent.If it is, Mr. McAfee, were you there holding the pistol?And one says, yes, and one says, no, that's not an inconsistency anymore.I wasn't there during the abduction.I wasn't there during the torture of, and I wasn't there during the killing.Mr. Peete is lying or these other witnesses are lying.One of those two things is both inconsistent and perjury.And if we're going to believe that the system is going to make sense, we have to rely upon- there's not cameras everywhere.We don't have them.And the only thing you can do is to take what juries find, with sworn testimony, because it's supposed to be meaningful when you put your hand on the Bible and swear to it, and that's only meaningful if we are sifting before we ask the jury to just sift through these things.It's not good enough to say, \"Well, I know they had a lot to look at over that six and a half weeks, but the jury blessed it, so we're done; and it's just inconsistencies\".Yes, that is good enough when it's, well, I can't remember if his, his suit- was it navy, was it dark blue or was it black?That's an inconsistency.But if one of you says, \"Mr. McAfee argued before me today\".The other one says, \"Well, he didn't make much of an argument\".And the other of you says, \"He wasn't there at all\".That's not inconsistent; it's wrong, one is wrong.Well, it often, too, depends on the lateral perception.If I'm color blind, you know, I might think it's green.You're seven might think it's gray and blue.We're just inconsistent but- - And I agree with you- - We all agree it's red.Yeah.Okay, I agree, but that would just be inconsistent.All right.But, Marty isn't here.One of 'em is wrong.Thank you.All right, thank you, Mr. McAfee.Appreciate it.Mr. Simmons, come up.Your Honor, I have nothing further to add to this point.Okay, well, thanks to all five of you for your arguments, some longer than others.We appreciate and thank you for the briefs.And Mr. Stengel, Mr. McAfee, Mr. Simmons, I see you're all three court appointed, which we really are grateful for.I hope your clients are grateful for.It's a real benefit to us and to the system.And we did this when we were in practice and realized how little you get paid for it.So thanks very much for what you guys did.Great work today.So, thank you.Thank you, Your Honor.Okay, the case will be submitted-", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/gov.uscourts.ca6.13-5150.2014-06-25.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/gov.uscourts.ca6.13-5150.2014-06-25.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/gov.uscourts.ca6.13-5150.2014-06-25.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/Passive_Houses_Presentation/Passive_Houses_Presentation.mp3", "text": "What's fascinating about Vermont is that it's got a very Democratic legislature overall, but there's also a very deep Libertarian Democratic bent, which says, \"We cannot force things on people \"because that's not what we do\".And every time they appoint someone and say, \"Look, what we'd really like to do \"is to say you cannot sell a house \"unless you have an energy audit\".And I talked to the people in those groups who are representing the bank and the real estate side of things.And they say, \"You can't do that.\"It'll ruin the sale\".And my response was, \"When I sell a house,\" and I've sold two houses, I've lived in houses and sold them, \"I just made a number up what I was asking for\".It's not like there was a calculation I went through.I've lived in it for seven years, I'm expecting this return, and if I don't get this, I'm an unhappy puppy.I just make up a number.Right.So add $500 to that number, and you've got a professional BPI for $400, whatever it is, a professional Building Performance Institute Professional giving you the lowdown on your house before you sell it.And that gives the buyer something to bargain with, and it gives the seller something to bargain with.The seller can say, \"Look, I know \"that this is wrong with this house, \"and I'll fix these things before I sell it to you \"because I know I can do it well and cheaply,\" or whatever, or I'll take my price down by what the difference is, but I'm making the price up anyway.So if you're making the price up and you say, \"I bought this house for $200,000 \"and I wanna sell it for $260,000,\" and then you get the audit, and you know that it needs $30,000 worth of work to really be energy efficient in a way that someone would be happy with it, then you can just say, \"Okay, I'm asking 290\".Right, it's that we're making these numbers up, it's complete fiction.And the banker was like, \"People still not go for it\".He happens to be a neighbor of mine, very nice guy, David Adams works at the Vermont Federal Housing Agency.And the real estate people don't want it for reasons that I can't possibly fathom, because it only gives them something to sell about the house.So what we're gonna talk about from now on is instead of why the real estate people don't want it, what all the benefits are.So if we talk about how we need to know what our housing stock is like, and we need to make sure our homes are safe and- - Durable.And durable, and we're gonna, and you know, and then we make it a baseline for people to say when they're buying a house, \"Well, I wanna know what's the building performance like\"?People should know what building performance is, and people don't know what building performance is.Yeah, and something that the Vermont Green House Alliance, which is a trade group that's also got members from all different branches is working on is trying to push from the appraisal side to say, \"Look, if you have a house \"that's really energy efficient, \"there's a provision in the appraisal rules that say, \"if it's really super efficient, \"then it's not like any house on the market, \"and you can call it a special case\".If you can label your house a special case, then they have to bring in an expert in that case.For instance, you have a horse farm that you're selling.You can't just get Joe, nice guy over here, appraiser who's never appraised a horse farm before.You have a right as a person who's selling that to go to the bank and say, \"I'm selling a horse farm.\"I need an appraiser who understands \"the valuation of a horse farm\".And they get someone who's had that experience.Well, if you have a house that uses 1/10 of the energy that normal house uses, you have a special case, and you can argue that to the bank and say, \"Look, that was real estate agent.\"I need a special appraiser for this \"because my house is unlike any other house\".And it will come around.There are new rules coming up in the appraisals, and I might touch on that later if we get back to it, but why don't I turn it over to- - All right, I think we might as well get started.We may get some more people.I don't know if we have to introduce Chris because he's got his credentials up there, which is nice 'cause if they can memorize anything.But the Jericho Energy Task Force meets once a month, generally, on the second Thursday of the month.But just to confuse people, this month, we're doing the second Tuesday.We're a task force, which means that people can come or not come, whatever they want.We work on a whole slew of things, but one of the things we'd like to do is bring some public presentations to educate people.We've also done buttoned-up workshops.We've got the Home Energy Makeover trailer to the Underhill Harvest Market.And today, we bring you, Chris West.If anyone has any questions about the task force, feel free to contact me afterwards if I'm not in a run eating stupor.And I'll leave my stupor 'til afterwards.So my name is Chris West.I am a Passive House Consultant.I have a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering that I got living in the Netherlands, and I worked as a mechanical engineer at the bachelor's level in the Netherlands teaching and also doing energy audits on schools.And I'm going to give you, tonight, a basis, a basic understanding of what passive house is, because a lot of people have heard the name, it's really, if you're interested at all, energy efficiency, it is the most energy efficient building standard in the world, and it's all based on building science.In the last 15 years, we've had huge advances in building science and building energy science.And we can, using the application of modern building science, we can build houses that use almost no energy to heat and cool.I like this slide, like starting off with it because people usually don't have a good understanding of what the energy mix is in America.This is from Architecture 2030, which is a group that's pushing for energy efficiency in buildings.And what we see in this graph is US energy consumption by sector.And what's important about this is this orange slice right here.The two slices together give you the amount of energy that we've put into our buildings together, and it's about 49% of the energy that we use goes into our buildings.The smaller slice, this 5.5% is the energy we put into actually building our buildings.And the 43.5% is the energy we used to sustain them after they're built.So when you think about where we're putting our efficiency, things like LEED in the National Green Building Standard are very into sourcing locally and doing all of that.But if you look at the proportion that that actually saves, if you're going to look for savings in energy, that is only 4.5% of all the energy we used while the building operations, heating, cooling, and other things like that is 43.5%.So if we can cut down on the energy that our buildings use, we have a much bigger influence on overall energy use.The Vermont State Comprehensive Energy Plan, which the Vermont state legislature passed a number of years ago says that by 2030, 100% of the new homes that are built somewhere between 1,000 and 3,000, depending on the year should be net zero houses.30% of all new homes built by 2020 need to be net zero to fulfill the requirements of the Comprehensive Energy Plan.And a lot of people have, and I run into this every day in my normal business, have ideas about what net zero is, okay?I'm gonna tell you what net zero is.Net zero means that your house uses a certain amount of energy, and you have a certain amount of renewable energies that covers the amount of energy your house uses.That means that you can have a huge, wasteful, horrible house and have a field of solar panels, and you have a net zero house.That's the truth because it's all about balancing it out.However, the other path is to make a super energy efficient house, put a lot of money into building a house that's really energy efficient and have a couple of panels to get to your net zero.And this is the path that we're working on, PH is just my abbreviation for passive house.This is something I learned when I was in the Netherlands, it's called the energy triangle, and it's based on the recycling triangle, which is reuse, reduce, reuse, recycle.You reduce first, right?Stop using stuff, and then reuse what you can before you recycle.And the last of it, you put it back into the system, and they churn it around, and then make it into something we can use again.But the third part always uses more energy than just not using in the first place or using it without recycling it.So the energy triangle says, the first thing we do is we reduce the load that we have.And the second thing we do is we use renewables to take care of as much of whatever the first one couldn't get rid of.And then if we can't completely fulfill the requirement that that load is with renewables, then we use fossil fuels as sparingly as possible.Passive house, now, a lot of people confuse passive house with passive solar, and a lot of people who have been talking about the introduction of passive house, which came to the United States in about 2005, started in 1995 in Germany say, \"Oh, passive house, I've heard of that.\"That's where you have a lot of windows in the south\".No, actually that's passive solar, and passive solar is something that was developed and designed in the 1960s and '70s, and it was a great thing for what it was at the time, but it's not a passive house.Passive house does use passive solar heat gain.And that's really important, but it's not the main part of it.Now, passive house has become more and more a part of the vernacular of building industry in America, and only the eight years that it's been here, it is now the target for the Department of Energy.The Department of Energy says, \"Okay, we're trying to be like passive house\".And the Journal of Light Construction, when they have someone talking about air sealing in the Journal of Light Construction, when they're talking about insulation, they said, \"Well, we're not gonna go \"as far as passive house\".But that word is still there, passive house is still the gold standard.The Green Building Advisor, which is something, it's an industry website that with lots of blogs about how to build stuff, and I recommend it highly.If you're interested in doing something to your house, go to the Green Building Advisor, look it up, see what the experts are talking about.They poo-pooed passive house in the beginning, and now, they're always referencing it.Even if they're saying it stinks because of this, they're still talking about it.Bad publicity is still publicity.Better Building by Design, I started going to Better Building by Design.Do you all know about that?This is a yearly conference that Efficiency Vermont puts on for building industry members, builders, architects, et cetera, at the Sheraton in Burlington in February.And I went the first year, we just set up the Passive House Alliance, the first year before we set up the Passive House Alliance.So I went there and I was like, \"Well, passive house\".And people were like, \"Yeah, I've heard of passive house, \"a little bit of this\".Two years ago, it was like, okay, we've got a table, we got the Passive House Alliance, which is a group of Passive House Consultants and other people interested in passive house, and every now and then, in one of the sessions, you'd hear someone say passive house.This last year, every session that was talking about building energy, talked about passive house.It is what we're trying to get to.So even people don't like it are talking about passive house, \"Oh, that passive house\".There's even a group who decided to call their thing, an active house, which is beautiful, right on, because you're pushing against passive house, wonderful.So when we're talking about building energy standards in America and in Vermont, we really have to just know what the playing field is before we can understand where passive house fits into it.So as a part of the Americans for Recovery Act, the ARRA money that Vermont got, and we got something like $90 million, we had to, as a state, implement a building code that is based on energy.Vermont does not have a building code.You can write on a napkin what you want your house to look like.You can go to the Jericho Town Hall, you can register that as your house, and you can build it yourself.You need a plumber who's registered, licensed plumbing and your licensed electrician.You don't need an architect.You don't need a builder.You just need a Home Depot card with enough credit to buy the stuff and go, and get it, and build it yourself.Allowed until ARRA, until we took that money, and we said to them, \"Okay, we'll implement a building standard\".And we now, have what's called the RBES, and that's the Residential Building Energy Standard.It's tied to something called the International Energy Commission Code, which is the minimum that you can build to.And that's an R, I'm gonna be using R-values.You all know what an R-value is?R-value is the resistance to heat passing through a wall.A wall, a two-by-four wall filled with fiberglass in between is about an R-11.So that's the standard.A lot of people have just a standard two-by-four wall with some fiberglass in the middle, and that's an R-11.So the RBES says an R-20 wall, R-40 in the roof, two inches of foam under the slab in that, and four air changes per hour.I'll explain that in a minute what that means.So that's what they have to build to, even though, until recently, it was not required that the certificate saying that you built that was in anyway, filed anywhere, but we've been working on that.That was passed in the last legislative session.The next step down is Energy Star.So if you build an RBES house, 2,000-square-foot house, you're probably spending $3,500 a year to heat that house, pretty standard.And if you built it with how we were building before the RBES, you're probably spending 4,000 $4,500 a year to heat that house.Energy Star is a Department of Energy program.It makes a house that's 30% more efficient than code.And that means slightly better walls, slightly better roof.Actually, the air changes five air changes per hour instead of four, which is kind of odd, but it is 30% more efficient.You also have to buy all Energy Star appliances inside, all CFLs, compact fluorescent light lamps.Then we have the Building America, which is a program that the Department of Energy uses to showcase new building energy standards that will then be rolled into the next version of Energy Star.So it's kinda like, \"Okay, we're gonna do \"whatever we think is the next thing, \"and in two years, we'll just make Energy Star 4.0, \"and that'll have some of the stuff \"we did in Building America\".And then we have passive house.So building ventilators, 15% more efficient than that, but passive house is 90% more efficient than the RBES, and than your Vermont Energy Code, and costs approximately 15% more to make.I'm gonna be showing a number of graphs during this presentation.All of these graphs are based on actual data from Efficiency Vermont.That's the beauty of Efficiency Vermont.Efficiency Vermont is an amazing resource.They have a lot of data they've collected from houses and how they work.We have actual real-time data on a hundred houses in Vermont, something like that with monitoring systems.So we can say with certainty that if we're gonna look at a Vermont baseline, which is that house that they were building before they adopted the federally required RBES, that it was using this much heating.See, heating is the red, water heating is the green ventilation is orange, cooling is the blue, which in Vermont is almost nonexistent, and you have lights and appliances on the top.We have a wonderful environment for cooling in Vermont because you have these 85-degree days, you have the 65-degree nights, and you just open up your windows, and it cools your house off, and you close them up in the daytime, that's called night flushing, and it really works here.There are places in the country that that doesn't work, and we're just very thankful for that.But you can see here, I've got RBES, Vermont Energy Code.I've got Vermont Energy Code Plus, which is adding a little more R-value, and then you have Energy Star there, and then you have passive house.And what you notice with all of these is what's being reduced in general is that red bit.We're cutting down on the heating load.There is in the passive house is green, but it gets very small at the end because passive house also likes to put passive solar hot water up, and that cuts down or a heat pump water heater, which uses about 1/5 of the energy of a regular water heater.And that's how we can get that water heating demand down.People are still using the same amount of water, but it's the amount of energy you have to put in to get that water.So how does passive house get from this RBES, right, this, what I considered to be a horrible, wasteful thing, but is the minimum energy standard you have to use in the state?Well, let's talk about the history of houses first, just a second.In the 19th century and before the 19th century, we built houses to keep the weather out.That was pretty much it.You wanted the rain outside, you didn't want the rain inside, so they built houses that kept the weather out for the most part, right?'Cause you had these big gaps that sometimes rain got in, sometimes snow got in, but in general, the weather was outside, and you built a big fireplace in the middle of the house, and you stoke that with lots and lots of wood.And even with that, you still had your outside clothes on inside to stay warm enough and be comfortable.Then came along the 20th century.And what did the 20th century bring us?Well, it brought us a lot of machines, and it brought us cheap oil, which is basically what we've been running on as a country for a hundred plus years.So we have all these new machines, these boilers, these hydronic systems, forced hot air, that are not efficient because they don't have to be 'cause fuel oil was 15 cents a gallon, 20 cents a gallon, and we can waste it, and who cares.There was no concept of putting out too much CO2, or CO, or any of the other pollutants.And I don't focus on global warming in this presentation because although I personally think it's very important to cut down on our emissions of these gases, it's not that important to the story.So in the 20th century, we didn't fix the shell.We didn't add insulation to any great effect until the 1970s and '80s, which is not that long ago, speaking just historically.And we just have these honking machines that they're oversized because the plumber doesn't wanna get called back, that HVAC person doesn't wanna get called back and say, \"Oh, my house is cold\".So they make it 150% more powerful than it has to be.So you're just burning a lot more, but who cares?It's really cheap.Now, we're in the 21st century.In the 21st century, they've really gotten into the science of how buildings work.And I'm about to give you the story of what that is 'cause this is this one person with really thick walls, capturing solar heat gains and using a couple of small, but very efficient mechanical systems.A lot of these standards that you hear about, LEED in the National Green Building Standard, they're really not focused on energy, LEED is about 15% interested in energy, but more importantly, they're pages, and pages, and pages, and pages of these checklists.Very complex, really hard to get through.Passive house is simple.There are four things you have to hit on passive house.You have a maximum heating load.You have a maximum cooling load, like I said in Vermont, is not such a big deal.You have a maximum total energy demand.And that source means that the energy they have to put in at the fuel plant, the coal plant that sends you that fuel, that electricity or in Saudi Arabia, what energy it takes to pump that out, ship it here, and put it in, so the source energy that's used, and airtightness.In the passive house, we start by making the envelope really, really good as far as a thermal transmittance.Okay, there are three ways that a house loses energy.It loses it through conductance.Conductance is the heat that goes through a material and out into the cold heat.Now, I'm gonna ask the question.Does heat rise?No. - No. - Hot air.Hot air rises.Heat goes from hot to cold.If you're in a warm room, and it's colder below you, the heat is going down.Only hot air rises, right?So when we're dealing about with trying to cut down on the conductive losses, we make very thick walls.There are two other losses.One is a ventilation loss, which is the air that you purposely bring into your house to bring fresh air into your house.There's a loss there because you're bringing in cold air.And then you have the real demon, the infiltration loss, and infiltration is the uncontrolled ventilation of your house through gaps in your house, somewhere around the windows, at the soffits, at gaps where this sill plate sits on top of your foundation, they're all over the place.And the older the house, the leakier the house.So the first thing we're attacking is that conductive loss.And in Vermont, because we're in one of the coldest climates in America, we're in climate zone six, cold and humid climate, we need an R-50 to R-60 wall, R-80 to R-100 ceiling, and R-50 to R-60 under the slab.Now, why do I have the other numbers here?Because it really depends on your sighting of the house and how much solar heat gain you get as to what you need.The size of the house, and those things all have an effect.The passive house system is not proscriptive.I cannot say to you build a house with these walls and you'll have a passive house because there are too many factors involved.When you get to a super energy efficient house, a house that uses almost nothing to heat, every loss, every gain has to be taken into account.High performance windows, windows with a U-value of .16 or less with a high solar heat gain coefficient.If you were to go to Home Depot right now and buy windows, Andersen Super Low-E Windows, they have a U-value of .29, which is almost double what you need as a requirement for the passive house, and they have a solar heat gain coefficient.That means the amount of heat that gets through the window into your house is .36 or 39.Those windows are not designed for Vermont.Those windows are designed for Georgia, where you wanna keep the heat, the warmth of that heat from the sun out of your house.We look for, in the passive house, we look for .5 or higher on the solar heat gain coefficient.And there are companies that can give you .6 and .61.I've even seen as high as .64.Eliminate thermal bridging.I work with a contractor who does energy audits, and we walk around the thermal imaging camera.And what you see here is a picture of a thermal image of a house in a cold day.What we're seeing here is the nice warmth inside.The red is warm, so the inside is nice and warm.They're losing a lot through the windows 'cause windows in general are not very good thermally, but these ribs here, those are actually the wood studs.The wood studs are conducting heat from inside the house, outside the house just like the fins on the lawnmower are cooling the lawnmower off by letting that surface area radiate.A lot of houses have thermal bridging, and in passive house, we need to eliminate that thermal bridging in order to get to a super energy efficient house.Airtightness, I'm gonna be throwing out this term, air changes per hour, and what does that mean?I said that the RBES has a four air changes per hour at 50 pascals, that's ACH50.50 pascals is the amount of pressure that a 22 1/2 mile per hour wind blows against your house.So when it's zero degrees outside, and it's 68 or 70 degrees inside your house, and it's blowing 22 1/2 miles per hour against your house, if you have a house that's ACH4, that means every 15 minutes, all of the air that your furnace had worked really hard to heat up has been blown out of your house, and is now outside, and you've got a whole bunch of new, fresh, freezing cold air in your house that your furnace has to heat.And then 15 minutes later, it's happened all over again.So one of the things that we try to do, if you have that situation, four air changes per hour, 5, 10, I've seen more, then you are heating the outside, and you need a really big furnace to keep heating that cold air that's coming into your house.Passive house has a minimum requirement for new buildings.This is a mall.Right now, I'm talking about new buildings of .6 air changes per hour at 50 pascals.That's less than one an hour.That means that every hour and a half or hour and 20 minutes, that fresh air has been blown in, that cold, fresh air has been blown through the gaps in your house.So you need a much smaller heat source to heat that back up.When you get a super energy efficient house, you are heating your house.Internal heat gains, your refrigerator, your washing machine, your television, all of your electronics, your light bulbs, everything, your dog, everything that you have in that house that's giving off heat is a heat source.Every one of us gives off a hundred watts of heat at rest.If you're jumping around, you can give off more, but you're putting off as much as a hundred watt light bulb.Now, we're all old enough to remember what a hundred watt light bulb is.So there are certainly children in school who don't, but every one of us is like a hundred watt light bulb.And we used to use those in the incubation for the chicks to warm them up, right?So when you get a super insulated house, every one of these people is giving off a hundred watts.I have houses that I've helped design that if you invite 15 friends over, you're heating your house.We orient our houses, and we get those high solar heat gain windows so that when the sun is up in the winter, and we wanna capture it, we can hold those solar heat gain.So more windows in the south, not crazy, not greenhouse number, but more windows in the south, fewer on the east and the west, and almost none in the north.Small picture windows so that you're not stuck in a room with no light, but not big windows.If you wanna do that, you can.You can still build a super energy efficient house.It just won't hit the Passive House Standard.It'll be a little worse than the Passive House Standard.I called them near passive house, and I love near passive house houses, because if you're gonna try to hit Passive House Standard and just not make it, you still have a super energy efficient house.We wanna make sure that when your house is really well-heated by the sun in the winter, it's not overheating in the summer.So we use things like overhangs and shading to make sure that your house doesn't overheat.There's a maximum overheating of 12%.That means that something like eight or nine days in the summer, your house can go over 77 degrees according to Passive House Standard.When we make a house really, really tight, I said .6 air changes per hour, so everybody says, \"Well, wait a second.\"I'm getting that fresh air in my house.\"If I stopped that fresh air coming in, \"isn't it gonna be sick?\"Aren't I gonna not have enough oxygen\"?And the answer is if you don't bring the air in on purpose, yes, but what we have is a new technology.It's like 20 years old, it's called a heat recovery ventilation system.And what heat recovery ventilation system does is it has a heat exchanger in it.And in that heat exchanger are, it's kind of a bunch of straws that pass each other.And it sucks the warm, stale air out of the house, and sucks the cold, fresh air, and it passes them along each other so that the heat from the stale air is transferred to the colder coming in, and comes into your house fresh but warmed.Now, it's not heated to the 70 degrees you want in your house, but some of these European systems are 85 to 90% efficient, which means that if I have a house, and it's zero degrees outside, and it's seven degrees inside, my heat recovery ventilation system is bringing in cold, fresh air at 58 to 60 degrees.And then my heat pump, my heating system heats from 60 to 70 instead of from zero to 70, and that is key.And when you put all of these things together, including a very small heat source in our environment here in Vermont, because it's just too cold to do without it, you have a super insulated house.So the passive house concept, heat recovery ventilation that uses almost no energy in and of itself, triple glazed windows with a thermally broken window frame, so that the whole window has an R-value of seven or better.We use materials with low-embodied energy.Now, you can build a passive house with lots of foam, either the blue boards that you see at Lowe's or with polyiso or any of these foam products.The thing about foams is that they take a lot of energy to make.So you're using a lot of energy to make them, and part of the whole passive house concept is to use as little energy as possible to make your house and to run your house.So we prefer natural products if possible, and where we can use them.We like cellulose, which is recycled newspapers.We like rock wool, which is recycled slag from the steel process.It's a leftover from the steel process.We like using foam underground below grade.We like using extruded, sorry, expanded polystyrene, which is what we know as styrofoam.The blue board is something called extruded polystyrene, and it has an enormous global warming potential, which means that the gases that it gives off are bad for the environment, and it takes a lot of energy to make.Foams where you must, and we try to use natural products when we can.Short runs for your domestic hot water, which means when we design a house, we want all the bathrooms and kitchens pretty much near each other, so you don't go from here all the way to here in your house, and lose all that heat, so you have to run your hot water longer.And we try to keep our houses compactly designed.That is a big deal.It doesn't have to be small.You can build an 8,000 square foot while you'd want to, an 8,000 square foot passive house, because it's about how many, once again, just to run back, it's about the load per square foot per year.As long as you hit that, you have a passive house.But the passive house community is also into less is more.So we like to make small houses if we can.And in Europe, you have a family of four living very happily in 1,200 square feet and thinking they have a lot of room.And in America, that same family has a feeling they need 3,200 square feet.So we're trying to get people to design houses.And also, houses that are not crazy designs with a lot of bumps out here and there.Because every time you have a change in geometry, every time you have a dormer sticking out, you have a potential for a thermal bridge.What do we get when we do all this?We have a 90% reduction in heating and cooling compared to the Vermont code.We have a 70 to 80% reduction in our total energy demand, superior indoor air quality, I'll explain that in a minute, occupant comfort, this is a big one.When you are in your normal Vermont vernacular house, I live in a 1970 raised ranch, the feeling of comfort changes from when you're standing in the middle of the room to when you walk towards the window.The closer you get to the outside wall, the colder it gets.That's why we put our radiators under our windows on our outside walls.That means that the wall in the middle of your house is actually radiating heat.That's a more comfortable level than your outside wall, which is actually taking heat from you.In a passive house, we strive to have all six sides of the room you're in.Now, this room has more than six sides, but in general, six-sided rooms that they're all radiating the same temperature to you.And we found through studies that people are comfortable at a lower set temperature if all the surfaces are radiating the same temperature.We can heat our houses to 68 degrees, and that's not cold.We don't need it at 72 because you're not getting this change in temperature as you move away from the center wall.Lower annual energy costs, hello, and smaller carbon footprint.So a lot of people who've heard about passive house say it's really expensive.And what we found in Vermont, 'cause there have been eight built in Vermont, and there are four more that are in the process of getting certified, and there are like seven or eight almost passive houses, that they cost between 10 and 50% to build brand new.Retrofits, they're expensive, they're about 30% of the valued house, and I'll get into that later.But what we found interestingly enough is that it doesn't cost, the out-of-pocket cost for a passive house is not more from day one than building a code house.And when you build a passive house for that .6 air changes per hour, you have to have a builder who builds it so well that you have a much higher quality construction.You're not gonna have water infiltration into the house, where you've thought about if moisture gets in, how it gets back out, where you've thought about that airtightness, and when you get to that point where you need that airtightness, then you get a house that has a much longer life span than a standard house, more durable.And then we have people who say, \"Yeah, but I gotta have my marble kitchen top\".Well, what's the payback on a marble kitchen top?People always saying, \"How quickly is my investment \"in passive house paid back\"?Well, what are you investing in?What are you interested in?This is actual data from a project team in Vermont.This is the code house, and what the mortgage would have been, and the energy costs.And this is a almost passive house.Actually, it's not a passive house.And what the energy costs were, and what the extra mortgage was, and it shows that the out of pocket from day one is exactly the same.And as soon as the energy that you're using goes up in price then because your passive house is using 90% less than that house, your incremental increase in cost is smaller.So you're basically making money from day one.I'm gonna give you a case study, so you understand the history in Vermont.This is the first passive house that's ever built in Vermont.This is a Habitat for Humanity house that is built in Charlotte.It's 1,050 square feet on the inside, it's 1200 square feet on the outside, just 'cause you have 16-inch walls.That's what happens when you're building a passive house to get that R-40, 50, 60 outside wall.Right here next to this couch is the only heating source in the whole house.It's a air-to-air heat pump, which means that it doesn't have any holes in the ground.It's just a suitcase-sized unit outside.And if you've ever been in a hotel, and you've seen those kind of things on the wall, some people call it wallboard, that's the inside unit.So the air's blowing out into that room right there, and I'll bring that back up in a minute.A passive house can look like anything.This is a Vermont vernacular house.You can also make it look like a contemporary house.Here's the south elevation, not a greenhouse.It's not only windows.This is the west elevation, the east elevation, and the north elevation.You'll notice the north elevation has small windows.This is the actual house.You see it's got solar domestic hot water panels on the top.Nice looking house, doesn't look crazy.These are the mechanicals for the house, except for the heat pump.This is the heat recovery ventilation system.This is a ground source system that actually pre-heats the air before it gets in during the winter, so that the core doesn't freeze.This is the solar hot water tank, and this is the backup because Vermont does not have enough sun in the winter, we have very cold winters, to give you all of your hot water through that system, People were worried that because we're only putting heat into this room without any distribution system or ductworks, that this room up here would be cold.But what we found, and this chart shows it, what we found is that that heat recovery ventilation system is so efficient, 85% efficient, that it's actually taking the heat from that room and blowing it up into the first bedroom.In passive house, we use something called whole house ventilation, which is where we blow fresh air into our living spaces, and we extract air from our moist spaces.That's our kitchens, our bathrooms, and our mudrooms.And what that means is that we're actually drawing air through the house the whole time, and it gives a nice fresh air all the way through.And what we have here is the heat pump in kilowatt hours, that outside temperature, and the temperatures in the rooms.Now, this is actual data from this house from December of 2011.And we now have data that has been collected on this house for almost two years, and it is still operating this way.What you're noticing first of all, is that that red line is all over the place.And if you were living in a code house, you'd expect these things, which are the inside temperatures to be following that because it gets cold, and your house loses heat, and your thermostat says, \"Turn my furnace on,\" and it turns the furnace on, and brings the heat back up, and then it all goes away, and it goes back up.So you get this up and down, up and down on the inside temperature.So the first thing you noticed is that the temperatures inside this house are very even.The outside temperature is fluctuating wildly.We're down here, we're going from 40 degrees down to 12 degrees.The inside temperature is barely changing at all.The other thing we'll notice is that this orange dot is the room that has that heat pump blowing that warm air in.The blue diamond at the bottom is the furthest upstairs bedroom.There's no heat in this bedroom.The only heat is what that HRV is going back into the house throughout the house.The temperature differential between the warmest room and the coldest room is four degrees.So it's 72 in that living room, and it's 68 in that bedroom without any distribution ducts except for the HRV. How's the indoor air quality?Very important question.First of all, about this graph, you need to know that the limit for air quality is 1,200 parts per million.This maxes out at 585 parts per million.So if we were to make this graph show it to where the actual limit is for safe air, we'd be up by the ceiling.Outdoor air has 450 parts per million CO2.So this graph is showing, except for some outliers here when there's some cooking done, and you can see when people cook in these, because the indoor air quality meters can see the rise in the volatile organic compounds that the indoor air quality is hovering around 550 parts per million, showing that the indoor air quality in this house is better than any house in Vermont that was built to any other standard.When you go into your bedroom at night in your standard house, you close the door, if you had a CO2 meter, when you woke up, sometimes you're hovering around 2,000, which is dangerous.It's not gonna kill you, but it will make you groggy, and it will make you lethargic, and our kids have to suffer this too.What does it cost for this person who's living in this house?Now, this is a Habitat house.Like I said, it was given to this woman.She has a mortgage on it as well, which is given to her.She has herself and two teenage children living there, and her monthly utility cost in January was $132.Now, I have to explain something about that.That is her total electric bill.She only used electricity.That is her heating, her hot water, her cooking, her televisions, her computers, the Xbox is for both of the children, and lighting.Average through the year, she's spending $67 a year for everything.$67 a month through the year.If you see, when they break this out, that the heating is only 1/3 or 1/4 of this, they're spending about $20 a month to heat this house on average in Vermont for a family of three.That is what passive house can do.This is a second home.This is in Norwich.This is not being lived in for year-round.The people come up in the weekends.This is more data.You recognize this graph now.There's no heating system on in this house.This house is only being heated by the sun at this particular time.Here's the outside ambient air temperature.Here are the inside air temperatures.The HRV is not even on.See, the HRV is not even running it.It didn't get below 50 degrees with no heat on.The only thing heating this house at this particular moment is the sun on the coldest day in January of last year, brand new data.So when we look at the energy that houses are using, this is more of that data that Efficiency Vermont has given us.This is actual data from actual houses in Vermont.The first five are Energy Star houses.The last two are passive houses.Actually, this is a passive house, and this is a near passive house.And you'll notice immediately that the passive house is using a lot less of everything.Certainly, a lot less heating, that red bit.Why, however, is that so high?Why is this one using three times the heating energy of that?It happens that that family is being lived in by, the family that lives there was from the Sudan, and they'd like to keep their house at 90 degrees.So they're keeping their house at 90 degrees.Yes, they're spending four times what this family who was keeping their house at 68 degrees is, but that's still only $60 a month to heat their house at 90 degrees.That's actually this house here.That's where the Sudanese family lives.That's the passive house.So Peter Schneider, who's given me all this data, and who works for Efficiency Vermont built this as an experiment.This is a passive house.This is 10% less worse than a passive house, and that's 15% worse than a passive house.He just wanted to see what he could do.This is a 3,200 square foot passive house in Stowe.And these slides are just to show you the variety of what a passive house can look like.It doesn't have to look like anything.You can decide what it looks like.You can make something with all kinds of dormers, and wings, and everything.A passive house, it'll just take a lot more effort to get there.Not my favorite house.I'm not very fond of the look, but it's on piers.They decided that they didn't wanna build it with a basement, or a slab, or anything.So in conclusion, with passive house, you get a high quality home, a healthy living environment, slightly more expensive to build, payback in three to seven years depending on the fuel you're tracking, and we're expecting a high resale value.I'm saying expecting 'cause nobody has built a spec passive house.A spec is it's when someone builds a house, puts on the market and lets it sell.People are as clients having these houses built, and they're moving in, and they're living there.So we don't have any houses that have been been sold in the open market.And net zero energy is easiest to reach by using the Passive House Standard.So that's the first presentation.I don't wanna lull you all with my sonorous tones into too deep a stupor.Passive, yeah, into a stupor.But I did, I know that a lot of people have houses, and they wanna know what it takes to make a house that you already have into a passive house.Now, my house isn't a passive house.You see all that, 4.75 with retrofits.It's actually more like eight kiloBTUs per square foot per year, and I got mine to something on the order of 12.So it's three times as bad as a passive house, but I did get my house from 110,000 BTU per hour heating system to 24,000 BTUs per hour.So I've reduced my load by 75%.So when I bought this house four years ago, I have these two garages.Those two garages are under my bedrooms.The first winter, we had frozen feet whenever we walked from the conditioned space below over to our bedrooms.Now, we like our bedrooms a little chilly, but we didn't like them that chilly.So I have a northwest orientation with the ridge, which means I have east-west orientation with the main access for my building, exactly the wrong orientation.I have a heated garage, it was wonderful.It went from my furnace.I had a hydronic heating or baseboard heating.It went into my daughter's room, then into this garage, and then in my son's room, and then into my bedroom, and then back into the garage, and then into my bathroom.By the time that circuit got to the bathroom, there was no heat left in it.I was heating the outside, literally.Now, you all know what a raised ranch is, right?You've got about two to three feet of cinder block wall on the bottom.You've got a walkout basement, which is where the garage is.And then it's all frame going up.When I moved in, it was originally single-pane windows, and I just moved here from the Netherlands where they have pretty good windows, and I said to the local contractor, whose name I will not divulge, because I don't think that he deserves to be beat up about this 'cause he just didn't know any better.I said, \"What are the best windows you can find me\"?And he said, \"Oh, Andersen Super Low-E. \"They're the best thing around\".So I said, \"Well, you're the expert.\"I just moved here.\"I've been living in Europe for 10 years.\"Get them for me and put them in \"'cause they're better than single pane\".And he did, and it costed me $15,000, which is what a set of windows would cost you.And as soon as I finished having them installed, I took the passive house course, and I fell over dead.'Cause I was like, \"Oh, for 7,000 more dollars, \"I could have had the best windows in the world.\"Triple glazed with a thermally broken frame, \"the whole thing, but didn't, okay\".So in my renovation plan, I decided I'm not gonna replace these windows I just bought.I'm just gonna live with the fact that I have these windows.There are two bed downsides to these windows.They're double hung, so that they're very leaky.So I can't make that air changes of point.Now, with the retrofits, it's one air change per hour instead of .6, but I can't hit that.The other thing is that they have a horrible solar heat gain coefficient, that .3.They have an U-value of .29, which is like R-value of three.And , okay.It has a couple of good things going on.It has some fiberglass in the walls, the two-by-four walls.Now, as a person studying auditing, I have learned that you cannot install fiberglass so that you get the number rated on the package.The package says R-value of 3.3 per inch.But if you go like that to fiberglass, it's got an R-value of one or two.And who doesn't do that with fiberglass?And if you do that with fiberglass, and then try to pull it apart, you're still not doing it.No one, even the best installers cannot install fiberglass to the rating it's given in the factory, impossible.They even have grades of insulation installation one, two, and three, where one is the best, and three is the worst.And they even say in some of the standards, you cannot get fiberglass to class one installation, it's impossible.So I'm saying that I've got an R-11 wall, but I know that it's really like an R-7 or 8, best case scenario.No insulation on the cinder block wall above or below grade, no insulation on my slab, and 12 inches of blow-in cellulose in the attic, but my top plates are completely unsealed.So as my hot air rises, right, as we're talking about that, as my hot air rises, it hits the ceiling in my roof, goes through the holes and gaps in my ceiling, goes through my insulation, making it absolutely worthless, creating a negative pressure plane, sucking cold air through the holes in the bottom of my house, just creating this convective current, which is just spilling energy out of my house.What do I have?I've got a 30-year-old oil burner that was about 80% efficient.I was using between 500 and 700 gallons of oil and three cords of wood to heat that house.When I first moved there, I said, \"I've been living in a house \"that always had natural gas \"'cause I lived in a city, \"and I didn't really feel like heating with wood\".And then I got the oil bill because I used a tank a month, and I was like, \"Wait a second.\"This stuff costs $3 a gallon.\"And okay, I'm gonna learn \"how to stoke wood in my wood stove\".And I did, and I went through 700 gallons of oil and three cords of wood, and I learned that you spend an hour a day tending a fire when you have a wood stove at home, and that's life.And I got used to it.I even like it now, it's kind of cool.But at the beginning, I was like, .So I have one bathroom fan that you know, not continuous, but I can turn it on to 120 CFM. CFM is cubic feet per minute.In the initial blower door test, which I've actually done at your house, and I've done it at her house, and I actually recommend that anyone who's interested in doing any upgrades to your house, first, have a professional come and do a real audit with a blower door test, was 8.25 air changes per hour.That means with a 22 1/2 mile per hour wind and zero degree air outside, and 68 to 72 degree air inside my house, every seven minutes, my furnace had to turn on to reheat the air that was just blown into my house.Now, that does mean however that if it's a 40 mile per hour wind, that's happening a lot faster.So Vermont is a climate zone six, cold, humid with 7,200 heating degree days.Heating degree days are based on the amount of time and the number of degrees that it is below 68 degrees that you have to heat for.So what do I have to do?So I took the class, the CHPC, that's the Certified Passive House, it's actually PHC, that's a spelling error, is a Certified Passive House Consultant test.And I learned that these things stink.Never buy them, talk to me first.I will get you more expensive but awesome windows.So what was I gonna do?First thing, I was going to remove the garage.I was gonna frame the garage out.I was gonna add a six-inch sweater of polyiso foam to the outside.Now, why polyiso?Polyisocyanurate board is got a very high R-value, and you can buy used very cheaply, which means that I'm saving it from going into a landfill, I'm not causing them to make more for me, and I'm getting a high R-value.I found a guy, who told the guy, who sent it over.I got all of my insulation, external insulation for this job for $4,700.That's not the cost.The cost was all the work that had to be done.I did a modified chainsaw retrofit, which means that I was trying to eliminate thermal bridging.Where your ceiling is, if you have a flat ceiling, a cathedral ceiling is different, your two-by-four's running along like this, and you have a top plate, and then you have the ceiling joist that goes like that, and actually sticks out to make your eave.Well, this bit that sticks out, that's actually a fin allowing heat to go up and out of your house, and I want to eliminate that.So I cut a bit out and made sure that when I put that six inches of insulation in, it made a continuous insulation layer with the cellulose in my attic.I'm also adding 7 1/2 inches of rock wool downstairs on the inside because you have that bump out with the cinder block wall, and I decided I just wanted to fill that up.So after that insulation on the outside, I wanted to air-seal the whole house.I had a bay window on the front, which was a horrible leaky thing that was just hemorrhaging air.And if I'm gonna put six inches onto my house, then suddenly that bay window, it's got this really weird detail.How do I have six inches sticking out but the window starts here?How do I actually make that work in the new, I just decided to rip it out.I ripped my oil burner out.The other day, a guy came and took my oil tank away.I have pictures of it.And I was like dancing, it was one of my happiest days ever.I bought myself a really expensive, but very good HRV. It costs about $5,500, and I'm doing the installation myself, and my budget is 70,000.My, sorry?HRV?Heat recovery ventilation.That was that thing that passes the heat over.Is that the same thing as an air exchanger?An air exchanger unit does not have to have heat recovery in it.There are air exchangers that just bring the cold air in, and take the warm air out, and don't do a heat transfer.So that's why we have heat recovery ventilation, HRV, and entropy recovery ventilation, ERV, which also brings the humidity and keeps the humidity between the two places balanced.I don't like that.We live in a very humid environment.I don't wanna bring that humidity into my house.I prefer an HRV. So I'm not replacing my windows.I already did it.I got 20 years with these stupid windows.Unless some rich relative that I don't know dies, I'm stuck with 'em.So the first thing I did was get rid of the garage.So here are the guys.I hired a local contractor who I'd never hire again.Doesn't that happen?You hire a contractor and you say, \"Boy, we're gonna do this project.\"Isn't it gonna be great\"?And then you just, at the end, you're like, \"Here's the money, I'm not gonna argue about it, \"but I never wanna see you again\".Not a bad guy, he just doesn't know any better.So you saw at the very beginning of the thing, there's my garage, there's my garage gone.He didn't even know we shouldn't be using Tyvek anymore.If you build a house and someone says, \"Let's put Tyvek on the outside \"and make sure that when we put \"the fiberglass in the wall, \"make sure you put a thing of poly, \"of that clear plastic on the inside\".That's death to a wall.What you're doing is you're ensuring that any moisture that gets trapped in that wall never gets out.And if we're sheathing our houses with OSB, oriented strand board, that's pre-digested wood, which means as soon as it gets wet, it turns to mush.You've seen it.If you leave that stuff out in the rain, a week later, you can just squeeze the water out of it.As soon as the epoxy that's holding it together is gone, it's worthless.We are now building houses that have what we call double vapor open walls.We allow the moisture to get in when it has to, not moisture, vapor.What's the difference?Moisture is droplets that you can actually see on the surface of something, vapor, there's vapor in this room, that's just gaseous water.Gaseous water can move into the wall and move out of the wall.As long as it doesn't get to the point where the dew point is met inside the wall, you have no problem.Here's the insulation.So it's $3,900 for the entire project, but it was $500 for delivery.So there's your $4,500, what do you do?Here's the modified chainsaw?So here's my wall coming up, and here's my ceiling joist coming out, and that's my roof joist, my truss, my, it's actually gusset, this is called a gusset.And so, this is a two-by-four coming out that way.And I didn't want the insulation that I was gonna have here.I wanted it to attach to this installation.So I have a complete insulation wrapped around the house.I don't have this and then a break, and then that, 'cause that point will allow moisture to, I mean, heat to get out.So this is my thumb, that's my mouth.This is what I did to my joist.My joist comes out.This is the house, there's the Tyvek.And now, what I'm doing is I'm cutting out this mouth so I can shove the insulation up here, and I'm gonna have other insulation, blow-in cellulose, is gonna meet it right here.So there's no point at which this piece of wood that is then sticking out is going directly to the wood that's in my ceiling causing that thermal bridge and allowing heat to escape that way.And here, you see just the mouths that I cut, and here's the OSB I put on the inside so that I could blow insulation.So you could actually say, \"Well, that's a thermal bridge,\" and you're right, but it's this thick.And the thermal bridging is insignificant.So air sealing in the attic, you can see here, my contractor, Jim Bradley from Caleb Construction, who isn't someone who I sent away after I hired him.He's the best contractor I've ever seen, honest to a fault.Does the best work I've ever seen, his crew is great.This is all the spray foam that he did against that OSB that you just saw giving me an R-value here.Then he's then going to go ahead and fill that with cellulose, and not a little bit of, sorry, this is my nephew.I'm sorry, I lost that.That's my son, yeah, there you go.I blew 24 inches of cellulose into my attic.I wanted 30, but 24 is enough.That gives me an R-88 up there.And because I had him foam all the top plates and all the recess lights, all that heat is staying in my house instead of going up and through my cellulose, making it worthless.What's my son doing here.I had an attached deck.Attached deck is a you have your band joist going around your house, right, that your floor membranes are sitting on top of, and then to make a deck, they just stick a plate to the side that they call ledger board.And that is directly attached to my band joist.That is the floor joist going around the perimeter of the house.That's a great place for water to get into and to rot, but it's also a thermal bridge allowing heat to come out.So I said, instead of doing that, I'm gonna put a bunch of four-by-fours on stilts into the ground.That's one of the holes that we dug, and that's my nephew.And right here, I have a gap of about a foot right now.I'm gonna be able to be building that back.But there is no connection between my deck and my house.Had the front stairs, the same thing.It was a little deck.I pulled it away, I'm gonna put it on stilts.It's not gonna be attached to my house.I like the deck, I use it daily, but I don't want it to cause this problem.So here, I have some friends who are helping me do that, and that's the gap now.Here's my house, here's my deck.You can tell everybody to jump.Yeah, well, no, I've built it out.This is the same thing.The guy who I bought the house from had this concrete pre-cast stairs that he thought were ugly, so he built something on top of it, but it's attached to the house.So I ripped it off, I broke it up, and when I was done, I am rebuilding it back on, but not attached to the house.Something I did myself, because I happened to have had the time to do it is that I bought myself a tag-a-long backhoe for three grand 'cause renting them was $150 a day.And I figure I'm gonna need it for a couple of weeks, and I dug down to the foundation of my house, and I put six inches of EPS around the entire foundation, and then I put this stuff, this is a bituminous coating with a vinyl cover that actually protects the EPS from water.Now, a lot of builders will say, \"Oh, EPS is waterproof.\"Oh, XPS is waterproof\".Absolute malarkey, anyone who's ever been to a beach, and been on a floating deck, and had to haul one of those floating decks that used EPS as a float knows that that stuff gets waterlogged.And the science is now showing that EPS loses its R-value at about a half an inch a year because it exchanges the gases that are in it for the water that's pushing up against it.And water is conductive.So not only are you losing the R-value, but you're bringing water against your house when you do that.You have to have a moisture barrier.Oh, they do.Yeah.Yeah, you gotta be careful.So I put in a fresh perimeter drain around the whole thing, and here's me putting it back in with my friend's Kubota.It's nice having people who like collecting big tools.We ripped all of the siding off.The vinyl siding was beginning to crack anyway and my wife hated the light blue.So this is the first course of that three-inch polyiso I put on the house.There's the two inches, and around the windows, I decided not to move the windows out to the outside plane, I decided to leave them in, personal choice.And there's my bay window, you see?It's gone, I ripped it out.Then I used this high-quality European barrier.This is a vapor barrier and an air barrier, and I used this high-efficiency tape, and I went from 8.25 air changes per hour at 50 pascals to two air changes per hour, so 77% reduction.The strapping is on there because when we do all this work, we actually wanna have a plane for drying.We want to allow any moisture that gets in to have somewhere to dry to.So I put strapping, 3/4 inch strapping in, and then I put the vinyl siding back on top of that.Here's the window bucks that we put in using this nice jig.That's what it looks like on, and then they framed it around with a nice trim.There's my window, I ripped it out, and now, it looks like that.I was amazed, I thought that I had a great view with this window with the five-by-five, and then the two side windows.The second that this window was put on, we were all like, \"Wow, what a beautiful view\".I have Mount Mansfield right out in front of my head, in front of my house.A chimney, we all have chimneys.Some of us are lucky enough to have a chimney inside the house where it heats the houses as it gets warm.Not me, I have a chimney outside the house.Not only outside the house, but on the north side of the house, great.I decided that I didn't wanna break it off.Although I had a deep need to get up there and knock the bricks out, but I decided that was a part of my mix.I needed to keep wood in the mix because sometimes the power goes out for days at a time, maybe a week at a time, and I don't have a passive house that I can be sure will be at that 60 degrees with no heat at minus 10 degrees for a week.I'm pretty sure it would be above freezing, but I don't think we'd be there.So I decided to keep it, but I decided to wrap it.So I wrapped it with ROXUL. ROXUL, like I said, is made from the slag, slag from the steel industry, which means that it is fireproof.In boilers, they wrap boilers in this stuff.What'd you call it?Rock wool is the name of the actual stuff, ROXUL is the company that makes it.And then I wrapped it again, and in the end, it also has a siding around it up to that point.This is that cinder block wall.I decided that I was gonna add two inches of insulation.So I have six inches of that poly, of that styrofoam outside, I put two inches on the inside, and I'm building the whole wall out to meet that.Instead of having that step that you often have downstairs where everybody puts their books, I decided I just wanted the wall.I sacrificed the extra square footage.I don't care, I want a straight wall downstairs.It's just a personal thing.My final wall value is an R-66, which is passive house standard.Here's the build-out.This is just one of the walls.This is the original stud wall.I put another stud on, just a two-by-four stud, so I could get two layers of 3 1/2-inch rock wool in there making seven inches.And this is what it looks like.This is an intelligent membrane.This is a membrane that senses where the vapor drive is coming from.And the vapor drive is coming from inside the room towards the material.It closes down and has a perm rating of four.Perm rating is the amount of moisture that it'll led in.And when it feels the vapor drive from the inside of the wall that opens up and has a perm rating of 34.So moisture that's inside the wall can very easily transpirate into the house.What I did on top of that is I put two-by-three stringers on top of this, so that I have a 2 1/2 inch gap between this and my wall, allowing a drying plane, so the moisture can get out.It also gives me a handy place to run wires and stuff.I decided that I was going to turn my chimney into a sealed combustion.Do you all know the difference between atmospherically vented and sealed combustion?Atmospherically vented means that if you have a wood stove, or oil furnace, or an oil boiler, it takes the combustion air from the room, and it uses that for the combustion process, and then sends it to the chimney.My house is too tight for that.If you have a leaky house, it's creating a negative, when you're burning your wood stove, it's actually creating a negative pressure sucking air from the outside in to give you air to go up the chimney.Sealed combustion means that you have a pipe that brings fresh air to the unit, and then out the chimneys so you'll have a complete circuit that does not include the indoor air.In order to do that, I had to hire a company to do that.This is from the outside going through the rock wool.This is the tube, this is me making it all.That's my daughter helping me out.And this is what it looks like in the end.That's the fresh air supply.That is attached on the inside to my wood stove.So when the wood stove acts for air, the air doesn't come from the room, it comes from outside, yeah?Chris do all wood stoves- - No, you have to be very careful.As a matter of fact, I had an Pendleton Avalon, and I thought that I could buy an outside air unit for it, and I found out afterwards that I couldn't, so I had to get rid of my wood stove, and buy a brand new wood stove.I bought a HearthStone that had that attached to it.Had a larger burn box, so I decided just to upgrade altogether since I had it anyway.And a 12-hour burn time instead of six, which means that instead of an hour, maybe I can spend only 50 minutes doing my wood stove.When I'm doing my air sealing, when I am in a passive house or in a house that I'm trying to make really tight, every hole in your wall is going to increase your air changes per hour.So I need to catalog every hole in the wall, I need to talk to every contractor, every subcontractor and say, \"Look, we worked our butts off \"to make sure this was gonna have \"a very low air changes per hour.\"If you make a hole in the wall, tell me, \"and I will seal it\".And we had a real problem at the beginning, when we had the vinyl sliders come up.They wanted to use that inch and a half nail, and we said, \"No, you're using a 3/4-inch nail \"because we don't want it go in through our air barrier\".Electrical sockets, well water supply hose, outside garden hose, flora drains in the garage, fresh air supply for the wood stove, all had to be air sealed.My cat decided that my very expensive membrane was a scratching post.So I realized that and stopped her from doing it, and then I had to fill it up.There's the pump, that's my old access hatch.I have access to the gable ends now.I don't have any access to the house.This is a drain in what was the garage that had to get covered up.And I had to get the HRV installed, which in a house that is being lived in, is hard.So I went into closets as much as possible.Fortunately, the basement was not all that finished, so I have an opportunity.So here's the end I ended up with.I have a heating plant, 55,000 BTU wood stove, and a 22,500 BTU heat pump, which works at that efficiency, 250% efficient, to five degrees Fahrenheit, and then it loses output down to -18.So this heat pump works down to -18, but it gives off less BTUs. So it's expensive.It costs me $70,000 to do this work, and I wasn't paying myself for my time.So if you add my time, I'm estimating around $85,000 for this project.That is a third of the value of my house.My payback, if I'm looking at oil, which is what it'll replace is somewhere on the order of 10 to 13 years, depending on that's where the 2% increase in oil, 'cause I wanted to be conservative.When I'm doing my calculations I'd like to paint a rosy picture and say, \"I'm expecting a 5% increase or a 7\".Even historically at 7.5% increase, that brings my payback down to about seven years, which is pretty good at that point.So these are the numbers, which I'm more than happy to let you stare at, but it doesn't help the pain, the fact that it costs so much.I happen to be very fortunate that I had a lot of equity in the house.When we bought the house, we had a big down payment, and I could take the equity out.But here's the key, I've reduced my heat load by 75%, three times worse than the passive house retrofit numbers, but I don't care.I have my heat pump on now.We had a 21-degree day the other day, my HRV isn't even working, so it's not redistributing the heat in the house.The heat pump was set at 72.The coldest bedroom was 70 degrees.I'm in heaven.And the heat pump, like I said, is 250% efficient.That becomes because it has a...Part of the heating mechanism is that it boils a refrigerant.That refrigerant boils at -54 degrees Fahrenheit.That means that even at -15 degrees Fahrenheit, there's enough heat in the air to boil that refrigerant, and that's where the efficiency comes in.That's why it can be above 100% because we put one kilowatt of energy, and you get 2.5 kilowatts of heat out of it.This is the actual blower door test, it was 4.25.We actually got it down to 3.95, and we're gonna do another blower door test when we're done, and hopefully, we'd be down in the the 3.5 range, which will bring my air changes per hour down to 1.7 or something, which is awesome.When it was 45 degrees out, I didn't have to heat my house.Just us, the cooking and things like that were heating the house.So it's its own payback.That's what the house looks like now.And JC, who is JC Earl, who's a member of the group, the Energy Committee, is going to be setting up a tour of my house and also of the Shelburne almost passive house that I helped design and built with Tom Moordown in Shelburne, and we're gonna try to get that together in January.He was gonna try to do it in December, but I'm leaving in December, and we wanna make it work.So if you're interested in seeing my renovation, you can make an the appointment just to come and see me, or you can wait for the tour.If you're interested in seeing that almost passive house in Shelburne, you can let me know about that, and we can arrange that, and you can come with a group through the Energy Committee.And if you're interested, please, if you know someone who is planning to build a house, have them talk to me before they do.Don't let them build a house that is gonna cost them $3,500 a year to heat when we can build them a house for almost no more money, 50% more down, but no more out-of-pocket per month money that they'll be able to heat for $400 a month in the winter.Any questions?I know it's a lot to take in.I apologize for being wordy.I hope I was lively enough that you're not all falling asleep.Are there questions?I got one.Yes, David.Chris did an audit on our house, which is probably two or three times the size of your house, and I was feeling really bad afterwards, but now, I don't feel so bad.I felt bad for you.Oh, gosh.You have a big house.Yeah.Yeah.That's the way 'til I get the bulldozer.Well, there are some people who I would suggest if you want to work on your house, sometimes the best way to work on your house is to sell it and build a passive house.Oh, no, did you just say that to us?I did.Oh, okay.Although I felt really bad.Although I must say that if you want a house that is really going to be super energy efficient, the only way to do it is to build it new, or do what I did, which is throw money at it.It's a great house, I love this house.Well, I'm an engineer.Engineers are into function over form in general.So I want the thing to work well, I don't care so much about the aesthetics.It's a raised ranch, is it pretty?Are raised ranches pretty?No, not in my opinion, but I don't care.It's warm, and it's a place where we have our happy family, and our dog, and our two cats, and our mouse, and that's the mouse that we have on purpose, by the way.When you make a house really energy efficient, you don't have mouse problems, you don't have a mouse, yes?Anything on mice?We have lots of mice that come in, especially around this season.Yeah.And so, the walls are four-inch walls.They had, oh, what's the...The XPS. - The fiberglass insulation batts.Okay, yup.Every time I've undone a wall in the garage or somewhere, and looked at that in the basement to look at that stuff, it's black with dirt.Yup.It's full of mouse channels and everything.So the R-value's probably down from 11 to about what?Half or something, one.First of all, if you've seen black, when you open up a wall, if you see black in your fiberglass, you have air-washing.Air-washing is where there's air infiltrating into your wall and blowing cold air through your insulation, and taking that insulated value, and making it zero.It's as if it was empty, because the house have to heat that back up, and then it's getting washed again, and heating it up.It's just like the inside of the house.So the R-value, especially if you know you have rodent activity, because what's happening then is that the feces and urine are becoming blown throughout the house, and you're getting that in your house.It's just unhealthy.In that situation, there are a couple of things that you can do.You can rip all the drywall in your house out and start again.And if you're gonna do that, at least talk to me, and I'll give you some ideas.You can do what I did, which is rip the outside of the house out, and add a whole bunch of insulation.The reason that mice come into your house is 'cause there's access, it's warm, and they can smell food because your house is just blowing, when the wind blows this way, it's blowing it out this way.And all the smells of that food are going out into the world.And every one of these hungry, cold mice are thinking nirvana.They are, and I can't tell you how many times we go into a house that has supposedly insulated walls, and we looked, and you just see these squirly little pathways where the mice, or squirrels, or whatever, voles, shrews, all of these little rodents get in there, and they love it.They just love it, it's a great place to raise a family.And when I pulled down the insulation of my house, I had a mask on, and I was using a HEPA filter vacuum cleaner because the hantavirus, although we don't have it in our area, is caused by dried rodent feces.So it's not just kind of bad for you, it's really bad for you.And I know your house, and I know that at some point, you guys would probably be well off taking the siding off and putting your siding on.And if you get there, then you do this.Then you buy cheap insulation, you hire Jim, and his guys come in do the whole job.They go up in your attic, and they seal it all up, and then you can heat your house with your ground source heat pump, which is what you should be want, it's what you want.You do it anyway, but you're living in that house at 55 degrees, which is okay, you can make that choice, but that's not the choice.Yeah, it is a forced choice, that's not a choice on purpose.Yeah.Right?'Cause that you have that old cast iron radiator in the upstairs rooms, and you're putting your heat pump water through there.I've been to their house.And that radiator is not rated for that.And the water's in the right temperature to bring that room up to anywhere near comfortable levels.But if you did this to it, and got rid of that garage, and made that garage conditioned space, you would have a really nice house, warmth-wise.You have a very nice house, feeling-wise.Yes, Andrew.Do you attach the EPS, the slabs to the outside of the house?To the cement part?No, to the sheathing.Okay, now, that's a good question.Now, that's not the EPS, right?Because the EPS was only attached to the cinder block.You're talking about this stuff.The recycled- - Yeah, what we did is we did it in two courses, and these are washers, and we used screws.And Jim, he had an opportunity because my basement was on drywall, it had no sheet rock.You could go in and say, \"There's a stud here, there's a stud here, \"there's this stud here\".And when we pulled the sheathing off, we saw that the sheathing they put on my house was Homasote.Homasote is sound board.They have that on the exterior?The exterior sheathing is Homasote except in the corners where they thought, \"We needed a little structure, \"so we're gonna put some half-inch plywood\".That's it!If you're not familiar with Homasote, it's a paper product.Yeah, you can crumble it in your fingers.It's got an R-value, but it's got absolutely no air stopping power at all, and it's not structural, and it should've never been used there, but it was really common in 1970s 'cause it was really cheap to put plywood on the corners and Homasote the whole thing, and that's what they did in my house, so.It seemed like a good idea.It seemed like a good idea at the time.Well, for the builder, it was a good idea 'cause they wanted the cheapest house they could build.So they went through, and they found the studs, and they actually had to go and buy a 10-inch screw, even though it's only six inches of insulation because the eight-inch screw was just not getting into the stud enough.So in the places where the screw wandered and didn't get in on the inside, I had basically a two inch end of a screw sticking out that I broke off.So that's how they did it.And it is all sitting on top of the EPS, as you can see here.So it's not just hanging there.That's how they did it.And then they put another layer on top of the bigger screws and just longer screws.There was a lot of work.I mean, this part of the project was $42,000.And then I wanted that bay window replaced with a flat window, and that costed me another $4,000.And the taping took more time than they were expecting with the TYPAR we just got.Nobody takes TYPAR or Tyvek, and it does nothing if you don't tape it.And when we went through, and I had them use this super MENTO 1000, this amazing European, this German air barrier, they had to spend much more time with the taping than they thought they were going to.So that costs me another $3,000 more than expected, and that brought me up to my about $50,000 that I paid Jim to do work.Isn't that adding to the moral of the story that the more detail you put in on the insulating, the better off you are?Airtightness, if you're gonna do anything to your house, make it airtight first.It takes whatever the R-value is of your insulation except of course, it doesn't, mice are not insulative.And increases it, the second you stop that air-washing, you're saving the value of that insulation.Although I must say, when we go and we do an audit, it's almost always the case that we tell the people, \"You've gotta get this insulation out of here\".It's full of mice, rodent droppings, it's not functioning, and it's not sitting properly, and like I said in the beginning, you cannot install fiberglass to the R-3.3 that they say on the box, it's impossible.They do it in a factory laboratory, and there, it's possible.You don't live in a factory laboratory, you live in the house.It's just like the spray foam.They say you can only spray it if it's 80 degrees and there's no dust and there's no moisture.And that's the best time to do it.Yeah, I know lots of construction sites that have no dust and no moisture, and it's 80 degrees, yeah, perfect, so.But yes, I suggest spend your time and effort making it airtight first.And that's what any good BPI, it's building, no, it's been a long day.Building Perform- - Building Performance Institute Certified Auditor will do.He'll say the low-hanging fruit is air sealing, make your house tight, and any installation that's in there is good.And that includes getting up into the attic, and all of the framing.'Cause the way people build houses, I hate to drone on, please stop me if you're getting bored, but when you build a house, what they should do is they should build a house before they build any internal walls, they should put sheet rock up, and then they should build the internal walls.That's your air barrier into the attic, but they don't do that.They frame the walls, and then they put the sheet rock on, and then you have these pathways through these walls into your attic, which is what creates that convective current, which we see in every house we go to.And nobody knew then that they were creating a convective pathway 'cause it's not more expensive or take more time to put the sheet rock up first, it's just something they didn't do, because the sheet rock guy came next week, and that was easier.So if you just had a crew that put the thing, the sheet rock up under your ceiling before they put the internal walls in, you wouldn't have to have someone crawling in, and taking your cellulose away, and spraying the top plates to make sure they're sealed.I gotta say, once we had it, we had it done the stages, and the first thing we had done was the top plates were sealed, the house was instantly more comfortable.I mean, instantly, it was amazing how much that changed because then the air was not escaping through the top, it wasn't creating a negative pressure plane that was sucking in cold air from the bottom, it just changed the way the whole house operates.Air sealing first.And get an audit.Really, it's $400.You're spending the money that you'll save from the work that you'll get done in the audit, maybe 5, $6,000 worth of work will be paid back within the first four years.'Cause you usually get a 30% savings on your fuel use, and most of us are spending what?3, $4,000 a year on fuel oil, easy.Never mind the wood.I mean, put it together.That's it right there, you're saving it.And we're at a point where oil is not gonna get cheaper, and we don't have enough people getting access to natural gas.There's some buying groups for propane now.You can get propane moderately cheaply, but that's gonna change.It's very important in my industry to know what's happening with natural gas prices, because fracking has made natural gas very cheap.Well, what's happened is that nobody's building coal-fired plants anymore.Everybody's building natural gas-fired plants, which means that this glut that we have in natural gas is gonna be used by all these industries that see how cheap natural gas is, and the glut's gonna disappear, and we're gonna have a rise in the price, which is gonna make more fracking.I mean, this one goes wonderful circles that we call this as.So let's get off of that by making our houses, once again, that triangle, reduce first, reduce your load first.Any other questions?Thank you so much for your attention.Thank you.Thank you.Yes.I don't even wanna know really.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Passive_Houses_Presentation.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Passive_Houses_Presentation.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Passive_Houses_Presentation.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/PermanentCha_3/PermanentCha_3.mp3", "text": "Economy apartments and houses are almost always unfurnished.The rooms are usually smaller than stateside.There are no closets, and the landlord does not provide any household appliances or light fixtures.In almost all cases, communities will furnish these items.Finding economy housing that suits you may take time and effort and a lot of patience, especially if you're assigned to a remote site in or near a popular vacation spot.Your sponsor will be able to help you both before and after you arrive.If you're assigned to Vicenza, the Housing Referral Office will help you make arrangements once you found something satisfactory.In other locations, the local command, through your sponsor, will be your primary source of help.As a protection to you, an HRO official in Vicenza is required to review any contract you sign with an Italian landlord along with a pre and post-inspection of the quarters.Rents for economy apartments will vary according to size and location.Frequently, you will get more for your money than in the States.Keep in mind, however, that you will be required to pay a security deposit of up to two or three months' rent plus a utility hookup fee.This can total as much as $1,500.This amount could be lower depending on where you are assigned.Wherever you end up living, the government will provide you with major appliances, such as refrigerators, stove, washer, and dryer.Basic furniture is provided on a temporary basis of up to 90 days, or until your own arrives.As you plan what to bring, remember, the rooms are usually small and not everything you have may fit or be appropriate.For example, electrical power in Italy is generally 220-volt, 50-cycle except in Villaggio della Pace units, where there is 110-volt, 50-cycle power.That means that your 110 appliances will work there but any motor-driven appliances will run slower.This affects what you should bring.Lamps are okay with Italian current they just need 220-volt bulbs and inexpensive adapter plugs for European style outlets.Radios will operate with transformers you can buy at the PX. Tape and record players run slower on 50-cycle current and will have to be modified at the PX. If you do not live in Villaggio della Pace, your US television set can be modified to receive US programs as well as programs from Italian television.Residents in Villaggio della Pace can also receive programming by cable from the Armed Forces Television Service and the Southern European Broadcasting Network, SEB, without any conversions.Just plug in the TV and turn it on.Telephone service in Italy is adequate but new phones are in short supply.Getting one may take you several months, even up to a year.Should an emergency occur at home during that period, your family will have to reach you through the Red Cross.All this sort of thing can be spelled out for you by your local Army Community Service Office.In fact, once you're here, you can turn to ACS to help you get settled into your new quarters.They have lending closets where you can borrow household utensils and other items on a temporary basis.And they can provide you with all kinds of assistance, services, and information about local facilities and community resources.Since finding appropriate housing on the economy may take several months or even longer, you will probably begin your tour in Italy by living in temporary housing, for example, the guest house at Caserma Ederle.Or you may be required to live in a local Italian hotel near your duty station.After housing, a major concern most families have is school for the kids.The Vicenza American School is an excellent, fully accredited US type school covering grades kindergarten through 12.A similar school located in Livorno serves students from Camp Darby.Children of family station at remote sites are taught at American schools in Ariano and Livorno.Since there are some sites that are simply too distant to permit busing of students to US schools, you should advise your sponsor of your children's specific educational needs.If your family requires special education services, you should contact your local ACS and MILPO and inquire about the Army's Exceptional Family Member program.The US schools in Italy have hot lunch programs, club activities, and sports programs similar to those in the States.Plus, they offer field trips and learning experiences in the Italian culture.A daycare center is operated in Vicenza at Caserma Ederle and the Camp Darby on a schedule that may be handy if your spouse wants to go to work to help supplement the family income.Every effort is made to help Army spouses find jobs on US military installations.However, there are usually more applicants than there are jobs available.In addition to child-oriented education and daycare, the Army offers a number of continuing education programs for adults in Italy.They range from pre-high school remedial and refresher studies to college level and advanced graduate degree programs.Something else you ought to think about is how you and your family are going to get around while you're in Italy.Facilities over here are normally dispersed, so you'll have to make frequent trips, especially if you live on the economy.Public transportation is excellent and inexpensive, but many people still want to have their own private vehicle.Keep this in mind.Italy and USA CTEF require US private vehicles to pass rigid safety inspections before they are allowed to be driven.Check with your current Installation Transportation Office to find out about auto safety standards in Italy and Greece so you can make any needed repairs or modifications before you depart or make a decision whether to bring it at all.In Turkey, you are not authorized to have a privately owned vehicle.Driving in Italy and in Greece is different than back home.Many streets in the towns are very narrow, and handling and parking a car, especially a large one can be difficult.On the Autostradas, driving is faster with fewer constraints.You will be required to learn the local laws to qualify for a command issued driver's license.And you will also be required to have liability insurance with collision and comprehensive suggested for your peace of mind.Insurance rates are high and should be considered in your financial planning.You may have gathered by now that a PCS to Southern Europe can involve some substantial one-time cost to get started.Despite the fact that work is being done to reduce these costs, the success of your stay may be determined by how well you're prepared to handle the required financial obligations involved in a move abroad.You will be paid in dollars, which you can use for purchases in US facilities, but you must use Italian lira for purchases on the economy.Your purchasing power off the base depends on the rate of exchange, which changes frequently.When the dollar is strong, you get more lira for each dollar, so you're able to buy more Italian goods.But when the dollar weakens, you can buy less, so you should be prepared to budget carefully.This cannot be overemphasized.An assignment in Southern Europe will be a satisfying and rewarding experience when you plan ahead for your trip and are prepared to meet your financial obligations.Discuss your specific situation with your sponsor or ACS financial counselor, and arrive knowing that you will not be overextended financially, then, you'll be able to do your job as a soldier effectively and efficiently, and you'll be able to take the fullest advantage of the opportunities open to you in this interesting country.You can enjoy visits to picture book locales that will take your breath away.You will be able to join regularly scheduled trips to ski resorts in the nearby Dolomite Mountains arranged by USMCAV, the US Military Community Activity, Vicenza.If you aren't a skier now, you can be by the time you complete your tour here.You'll also have plenty of time to participate in a variety of other outdoor recreational activities.You may especially enjoy the popular sport of volksmarching, walking in groups, along a specified course through local forests or through historic areas of famous cities or towns.You can enjoy the famous food and wine of Italy in a variety of different eating places.You will learn that over here, the main meal is at mid-day followed by a period of relaxation or proposal.As you meet the Italian people of Northern Italy, you will learn that they're generally attractive, intelligent, and well-dressed.Like all other cultures, they have some customs that are different from our own.Your sponsor can help acquaint you with Italian customs to help you make your stay here more enjoyable.The bottom line of a successful experience here in Italy is being able to communicate with the local people, and that begins with attempting to learn the language.The Army's Gateway or Head Start programs are good places to begin.When you can converse in Italian, you'll be able to make friends easier and enjoy your travels in Italy to the fullest.The main thing you want when you get orders is peace of mind.Contact your sponsor and let him or her know about your special needs and arrival date.Your local ACS can also provide you with useful information.Review your ACS orientation package.Turn to your local ACS center.Learn all you can about Italy, or Greece or Turkey, if you're headed for either of those CTEF commands.Begin studying the appropriate language.And plan ahead.When you prepare yourself for your PCS in Southern Europe, you will help assure that your arrival here will be the beginning of one of the most positive experiences of your life.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/PermanentCha_3.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/PermanentCha_3.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/PermanentCha_3.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/Peters_Township_Council_-_January_28_2013/Peters_Township_Council_-_January_28_2013.mp3", "text": "I'd like to have a roll call, Mr. Silvestri.Mr. Ball?Present.Mr. Lewis?Here.Mr. Berquist will not be here, Mr. Arcuri?Here.Mr. Stiegel?Here.Mr. Atkinson?Here.Mrs.Merrell?Present.Will everyone please rise and join us for the Pledge of Allegiance.I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands, one Nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.First item on the agenda is the approval of the minutes of the reorganization meeting of January 7th, 2013.There was one change I think, or one correction.It was in the section 8B. Mr. Ball's proposed resolution regarding Peter's requesting a change in our assigned senatorial district.First paragraph, third line from the bottom.Mr. Ball, I think, the second word township, should be county in the end of the sentence.So, on page 11 of the minutes, I'm sorry, neglected to say that.Do you agree, Mr. Ball?That's fine.Okay, is that a motion?I move that the minutes be approved with that one correction.Is there a second?Reluctantly, yes.Okay, is there any further discussion?You all in favor of the approval of the minutes and the motion that was made, say, aye.Aye.Opposed say nay.Passes six, zero.Mr. Silvestri, special reports, do we have any?No. - Okay, the next item is audience comments.This is the time for any member of the audience, who so desires, can get up here and discuss a non-agenda item for at least, for no more than five minutes.Is there anybody?There you go, come on up.Name and address and you're on your way.Hi, my name is Eric Roullard, and I live on Buffalo Ridge Road.Do you need the address or...No, that's fine.Okay, and I'm here to talk about the redistricting, and why it should be important for Peters Township.If you've noticed, we're...The way it's designed and the way the Senate district is drawn, other people have talked about it.Essentially, we're the odd man out.Most of the county voting in this district is Allegheny County.They get...They don't get most of the attention, I think they get all the attention.How many times have I wanted to do something, or escalate something?And it's very hard to get anything done, and I'm not municipal or anything.I'm just an ordinary guy trying to do some political organizing.I'm sure democrats have the same problem, where they wanna get something done and then they have to sometime appeal to a higher up and they can't get anything done.So, I think, if we were with the rest of Washington County, we could get a county commissioner to help us.We can get another municipality to help us.We could team up and get something more effective.When we have to team up with Allegheny County, they figure if we don't get anything, maybe they get more, that's...It's one of those games that needs to be played and we have to figure out where we want to be, and who we want to be to team up with to get things done.And I believe we would get that done better if we were all included in Washington County, and I believe that's the district, Senate district 46.So, I think, that would be a good move for us.Okay, thank you.Thank you.Is there anyone else from the audience who would like to talk about a non-agenda item?Ma'am.Good evening.This is my first visit, so I'm kind of nervous.So, I'm just gonna read off my paper, if you don't mind.Would you please state your name and where you live.Certainly.My name is Angela Carrier, and I live on East Highland Drive.Okay, thank you.And don't be nervous.I'm very nervous, my knees are shaking.Turn that microphone down so you can speak- - Can you hear me now?That's good.That's good.I've lived in Peters Township since 1999, and my comment is also in regards to Peters Township potentially moving from Senate district 37 to Senate district 46.I believe Peters Township has an affinity for Washington County and not Allegheny.Over the last 14 years, I've watched an amazing amount of development of so many areas in Washington County.I feel that Peters Township no longer goes north for all of its shopping.For example, this Christmas, not once did I go to South Hills Village to buy gifts.This year I shopped in Washington at Kohl's, Tanger outlets, Toys R Us, and several other stores in the North Strabane and the Trinity Point area for everything I needed.My point is that I feel that there has been a clear dividing line between Bethel Park and Peters Township, and the rest of what is considered South Hills area.Especially in regards to shopping and personal family needs.With so much growth in Peters Township and Canonsburg, I think, the two are more blended.Excuse me, blended more now than ever before.I don't feel any affinity at all with either Bethel Park or Mount Lebanon, for that matter.When the people I network with for business ask me where I live, I tell them Peters Township in Washington County.Thank you.Thank you.Any further audience comment?Seeing none, we'll move onto unfinished business.The first section thereof is the Youth Commission.There's five potential openings on the Youth Commission board to count nine.Currently there are four councils interviewed, I believe nine of 10 people, and there's still one left to interview.I didn't know if you want to act on any of them tonight.Oh, I know personally, since there were so many candidates, I think, I would appreciate a little bit more time to think about that and to review some of the documentation that they supplied.I know it's in the docket, but I personally think I need a little bit more time, but I don't know how everybody else feels.Mr. Silvestri, when the gentlemen who applied, but wasn't able to come tonight, do we know when he might be available this week?I think, he could be available before the next meeting, the beginning of the next meeting.Do you think that- - I know he's out of town, I'm not sure if he's out of town all week.I would like to...First of all, I would like to interview the other person, and then I would...I think, most members of Council would find it helpful if we had a summary of the resumes that were presented to us.So we can go back and refresh our minds.This is probably the biggest field that we've had for any group that we appoint.And the fact that we've had so many truly qualified people, makes the choice very hard.There's nobody that wouldn't be good.We just need to find what we think are the best of them.Please, if you do some sort of summary, keep them in the order that we interviewed them.And some of these people go back December 3rd, so it's been a while.Mm. - I'll move that we table any motions until we interview the final candidate.Is there a second?Second.All in favor of the motion, say, aye.Aye.Opposed, say nay, six-zero.The next appointments we need to address are the Zoning Hearing Board.Yes, we're trying to...There's a couple, I mean, Council had questions about attendance and we spoke with Mr. Federline, the chairman, and he sent a history of attendance.They have not had many meetings in the last couple of years, where there was at least three board members.So, they did have to appoint a hearing officer.We did contact Ms. Noble, she's currently an alternate and is willing to be a full member.Mr. Zephro has asked if someone replaces him, he would like to resign cause his work schedule made it difficult through this upcoming year to attend meetings.Mr. Ferran and Mr. Dickson would both like to attend.We do need to change some of the term dates so that it conforms with the ordinance.We never did get it all straightened out, we went from three to five members.Yeah.After I read your dissertation, I was not sure we had it straightened out yet, Michael.No, I think we would- - I don't think so.If we have it the way I propose it as far as terms.Yeah, I read what Mr. Silvestri recommended and I would make an alternate recommendation.I think that Ms. Noble, who has agreed to come on board as a regular member should be appointed for the position that expires in 2017.I would make a motion for that.Do you wanna do them all separately, Mr. Chairman?I don't have a preference.Why not make it the one that expires in 2018?Is there some reason why?Well, I was going to recommend that we advertise for a new appointee, who would start this year and have his five, his or her five year term end in 2018.Uh. Did you make a motion?I'd like to make a motion that we reclassify Stacy Noble to a regular member with the term to expire 2017.I second it.We have a second.We have a motion and two seconds.Is there any further discussion?To the point of order, I think, you probably would accept the resignation of Mr. Zephro first, so that at least then there's already a vacancy on the board.Okay, so we wanna make that motion?I move that we accept Mr. Zephro's resignation as soon as we find an alternate regular member, and ask that he serve until that time.I'll second it.We have a motion in the- - I'm not too sure that's what Mr. Silvestri was asking.I thought you wanted to accept his resignation.And I'll defer to Mr. Johnson, but I mean right now, I guess we...We need to determine what the status of Mr. Farron and Mr. Dickson is before anybody can be appointed.Well, let me then start from the beginning.I move that we appoint Mr. Dickson to a term as an alternate through the year 2014, with the term expiring 2014.Mr. Dickson would be coming off of the committee as the regular member.Why don't I tell you the whole deal?Yeah, do the whole deal.Well, I'm you know, I'm real confused now.Mr. Dickson, I would suggest, become an alternate based on his attendance, and his term would expire 2014.Mr. Farron would stay as a regular member with a term that expired 2014.I would suggest that we asked Mr. Federline if we could revise his term to end 2015.We have Mr. Stasic as 2016 already, and that would stay the same.And then Stacy Nobel would become a regular member with a term that ended 2017, and we would search for another full-time regular member to replace Mr. Zephoro when he can.Once we find a replacement, then he would resign.Are you on board, Mr. Silvestri?I don't...I'm not sure I know whether that works or not.So, Mr...As I assess, Mr. Zephro wants off?Correct.Okay, and how many people do we have on there now?Forget about the alternates, just regular people.Five.Five, so if we take him off, we'll still have enough to conduct business, right?Correct.All right, so why don't we just accept his resignation with regrets?Well, the question was about, the reason this all came up and we didn't reappoint last meeting was about the attendance.Well, I mean, I don't...I understand that, but I mean, if Mr. Zephro wants to resign, then I think, we should let him resign.That would be the first order of business.All right, and then, we'll have a slot to fill and let's fill it with Ms. Noble, and then go from there.Unless that doesn't sound logical.I don't know.Works for me.Well, I'm gonna make a motion that we already have a motion on the floor and a second.We have two motions on the floor, though.Can we ask the...Right, well, let's move to withdraw the previous motions and start over?I withdraw my motions and defer to the chairman to make a motion.Okay, I'm gonna make a motion that we accept Mr. Zephro's resignation with regrets.Second.Okay, is there any further discussion?Okay, all in favor, say aye.Aye.Aye.Aye.All opposed, say nay.Okay, that passes six, zero.Okay, now I'm gonna make the motion that we appoint Ms. Noble to, is...To the Zoning Hearing Board and not, no longer be an alternate.She's an alternate now, correct?Okay, and she would fill out, I guess, Mr. Zephro's term through 2015, January, 2015.Okay, does that sound right?Second.Okay, is there any...So, we have a motion and a second, do we have any further discussion?We just still not really addressing the concern that Mr. Silvestri had with the proper staggering terms that followed.Well, if you do...Okay, okay, I see what you mean, okay.If you do like now, if you appoint Ms. Noble to 2015, it still gives you the option of correcting the rest of them.Yeah, but I know it's just not 2015 in your staggering language.No. That's true.That's true, correct.Do we have a...We have a 14.Well, Jethro's a 15, Jethro's a 15.We have to replace him, should be 2015.Okay, that works.That works, yeah.Okay, so we have a motion and a second.Are there any further discussions?All in favor, say aye.Aye.All opposed, say nay.So, that passes six, zero.Now, if anybody wants to make a motion with respect to the...Dickson, or Farron, or I guess, who else is left there.I'd suggest we just leave those the way they are for the time being.Well, until we figure out, I guess, somebody is up though in January, right?Actually, technically right now, both Mr. Farron and Mr. Dickson's terms are up.So, they would need to...You have two dates now that are available, the 7th.The one that would enter in January, 2017 and then, January, 2018.But do we know whether they wanna stay on, or?Farron does, yeah.Then I would move that we reappoint Mr. Farron to the...Second we have Farron and Dickson.Mm-hmm.Mr. Farron to the term expiring 2018.Mr. Dickson to the term expiring 2017.So, that gives us 14, 15, 16, 17, 18.Well, wait a minute.What about 13?This is 13.This is 13, January 13 .We're on 15, okay expiring.So, we have a motion, is there a second?Would you repeat your motion, Mr. Ball?It's a very .Yeah, well.I move that we appoint Mr. Farron to the term expiring in 2018.Mr. Dickson to the term expiring in 2017.So, we have a motion, do we have a second?Second.Okay, is there any further discussion?All in favor of the motion then say, aye.Aye.And all opposed say nay.Nay.Okay, so that's five, one.So, is that now filled, or...But we're still short one, aren't we?You filled the full members, but there's an opportunity for alternate.Right, okay, but we don't know who may be interested in that.We're advertising .Okay, so we should advertise and then we'll try to fill those, but okay.We should congratulate ourselves on the most complicated appointment yet.I know.Next is the Parks and Recreation Board.We were waiting for the School District to come back with a decision on Mrs.Schwarhaus, and the board did table action.I spoke with Mr. Valdic, his secretary, and they seem to be, I think, somewhat confused as to what their role was and the terms.The one thing they were asking was if there is...But currently, the way it's structured is there's one school board recommendations in one year and two in another.And the reason that happened was when Council expanded the size of the board, they gave the district two additional recommendations.So, they both came in that year.They'd like to see if it's one each year so they could have windup to vote on every year.And then they were...They weren't sure, the interaction with the board.So, I think, there's a lot of confusion going on because there's...There was so much change in personnel.I'm not sure what they're asking.What they would be looking to do.So, right now the school board has not made a recommendation on that position.Yeah.Okay, so we have to wait to hear from them before we can approve their appointment.Correct.And then there's some issue about, they wanna stagger them now instead of one and two, they want one one-on-one.Right.Okay, well, I guess, the ball's in their court then.Correct.Okay.And then Council tabled action on Mrs.Chevelles appointment and asked us to advertise.And we have a couple of candidates.Okay.We wanna interview.Well, when I was the one who made that motion, because I wanted to try to see if we could have some variety as far as diversity and representation right now.Though most of the people on the board have some association with sports associations.And I was hoping aside from Mrs.Schwarhaus, who now is sort of in limbo also, was hoping that we would get some people who would represent some of the other residential users of the recreational facilities.End of the Park and Rec- - The Park and Rec's Board.I just wanted...My name's Melissa Sigman.I'm on the Parks and Rec Board.I live on Fireside Drive and I just wanted to make a correction to that statement.I don't have any children that are in youth sports.I haven't for six years.And my kids played in lots of different sports.I had varying levels of just standing on the sideline, being a parent.So, I think, your representation that Ms. Schwarhaus is the only person who has no affiliation to the youth sports associations is incorrect.In fact, I think, a couple of other members no longer are on boards of the sports associations in which their children participate.And Joe Mays is also not on a youth sports board of any kind.Why I appreciate you correcting that for me, thank you, Melissa.Thank you.So, how many applications for the Park and Rec Board do we have besides Ms. Chevelles?Two.Two.So, why don't we just interview those two people and then go from there?This is that their School Board interview.Wow.In fact, these are School Board appointments, right?No. - I think this is- - One is Council, one is our School Board.So, we have potentially three people that you would consider for our one appointment.And you don't know where the School District's going which is another evil.I shouldn't have said that.What would probably be another topic for a meeting, Mr. Lewis.Yeah, if that is one half.I can't answer to that, I know some of the people did.Okay, so we're tabling, I guess, any action on the School Board.Right, you're gonna have to.And on ours until we can appoint, till we can interview personnel candidates.I just wanted to make it clear that there's a little note in here that Ms. Chevelles is uncertain as to why she was not appointed.It wasn't anything, at least in my mind that it was personal, or something that she did or didn't do.I just think that over the last year or so, we've had discussions directly and indirectly in respect to various issues that have come before us about the park and certain programs that should be there.And certain activities that maybe aren't traditional sporting type situations that we wanted to try to address.And I just think that happenstances is that that issue got raised in regards to this appointment.And I don't know about the other members, but I could speak for myself that I would have no problem whatsoever reappointing her.But I think that given those discussions, and the fact that this issue was raised, that it'd probably be a good idea to at least interview a couple of candidates.And we may end up just back at square one anyway, but and that would be fine, but I don't want her to take it the wrong way.It's nothing personal about her, something she did or did not do.Well, I think, at least in my mind, I think it's nice to have a list of people in our back pocket in case somebody does need to step down.So, we have a list of people that we know we're interested in filling in all those roles.Right, I personally didn't think attempt, attack on Mrs.Chevelles at all.Moreso just seeing what's out there.Okay, all right, moving on.I guess, we're into new business, that's the consent agenda.The purpose of the consent agenda is to improve the efficiency of our meetings and to avoid having people wait for items that apparently require little, or no discussion.These will be acted with one motion.Any item can be taken off this agenda and acted separately if any Council member, or audience member desires.The items on the consent agenda are one, exonerate Paul Lauer and the Georgia tax service 2012 leaned real estate tax.All unpaid taxes have been leaned with the Washington County Tax Claim Bureau as required by state law.Two, approval of resolution 010213, approving the destruction of obsolete records in accordance with the Pennsylvania Records Retention Act.And three, approval of resolution 010413, amending the police pension plan to eliminate the killed in service provision.Confirming action taken in 2010 as the state now provides for this benefit.If anyone...Does anyone here wish to remove an item?If so, we'll handle that item at the end of new business.If not, then I will entertain a motion to approve the consent agenda.I'll make a motion to improve the consent agenda.Second.Okay.My only comment would be as the resolution you announced for number two.Yeah.Mr. Silvestri's- - That should be on three, yeah.Yeah.Well, it should be a 10313.Well, that's not what it says on this piece of paper, but that's okay.We'll deal with that amendment.I will make the motion to make that correction.I take it there's a- - I meant to second.Second, okay.Is there any further discussion?Okay, all in favor of the consent agenda, say aye.Aye.Opposed say nay.Passes six, zero Mr. Silvestri.Next item is Park and Recreation Board update report, and we have a suit coming up to it.Good evening, my name is Joe Mays.I live at 251 Teepee Road, and I'm a member of the Parks and Recreation Board.I'd like to thank Council for the opportunity to present our quarterly report for October, November, and December.What I've found, I've been on a lot of different boards with the School District, and also with WPL. But I've found that this Recreation Board that has been together for quite a few years, almost every one of us have been there for more than one term, has worked very well together.And we have a lot of confidence in our recreation director, Michele Harmel.In fact, we sent a letter to the Council indicating our support and what a great job she does.Not only her, but Becky and the rest of the staff.So, we're very, very supportive of that.We also realize what our role is as board members and just providing input, and realizing that she's in charge of the program.We've been very busy this entire year, 2012.And during the month of October, the tennis heart true court renovation project was completed, and the bubble was installed once again for our township residents interested in tennis to be able to use that during the winter months.We also met with one of the associations, and we're very pleased at the Wrestling Association with a new president has really done an outstanding job of things that Michele needed to continue their program.The Board also discussed and approved a new flag policy, a flagpole policy for the Parks and Recreation department.And we had a booster group of racketeers proposed to buy umbrellas and provide shade for spectators on the hillside at the tennis bubble.In November, we also had another proposal from...To plant trees at the tennis center to serve as a wind barrier.And there were some adjustments that were suggested by our maintenance supervisor, and the project was approved.We're pleased that the fitness trail equipment's arrived and they are working on that during the winter months in the spring.And then it looks like that's gonna be able to be used during the later in the spring for our residents.And one of the issues we did have to deal with that I think, came to you also was the use of spikes on field five.And again, we addressed that issue.We've listened to all the groups that were concerned.We made a recommendation to Council to prohibit the use of those spikes on field five, with that artificial turf.We also had discussions about having another sports associated board dinner, and that has been established as the date of Tuesday, February 19th.In December, again, they continued to work on the fitness trail, and also the Football Association made a proposal to build an additional storage up at Hofbauer Field and the Parks and Recreation Board approved that building as presented.One of the other things we spent a lot of time on last year, which I think is a critical component of the recreational programs is this volunteer coaches and how they can get their criminal history checks and their child abuse clearances.Michele has done an outstanding job throughout the year of getting that into place.And I think, it's made it easier for our volunteers.And more importantly, it has, I believe, is helping to protect the kids involved in our programs.The other thing that happened this past fall was field five, the opening of that complex.And again, if you've been up there, it's quite impressive to see the number of kids and families that are there in the evening.Also, our board, I think, would like to compliment Michele and the athletic director at the School District, as they continue to improve of the sharing of facilities.I think that helps not only the School District's activities, but also, the community activities.Being able to share those facilities.Last year, I kind of took you on a bicycle trip and I'd like to try to mention that again.One of the things that I do in the fall and also in the spring, in the summer is ride Arrowhead Trail.And I think that's the jewel of the township.Gives us an opportunity, if you ever go through that area, you see all age groups doing all types of healthy activities.But now, with the new section of the park being opened up, I ask all of you to maybe as a group, or even individuals ride a bike, take a walk up through there.Cause in the spring time, if you come up the trail, you see the softball kids in the spring the summer.You see them in the fall, and then all of a sudden, you make that turn, you come up to the field five and there are hundreds of kids, all ages with parents and grandparents watching practices and games.Then you make a right and you go past Hofbauer Field.In the fall, you see the football and the cheerleaders.In the spring, you see the lacrosse, then you go past the other field by the...Let me see, the restrooms and then, I think field three, four we call it.And now you see the usage of baseball, softball using that.In the fall, you see again the football players.If you make around a turn right above the rec center, you look down to the baseball fields, and you see those fields being used.And then the field next to the rec center also, you also see that field being used by softball, baseball.But every time I go past there on a bicycle, or if I'm walking, I have a feeling of pride that I have a small part as being a member of the Rec Board.But I also wanna compliment you cause many of you have been here for many, many years, and with your foresight and Mr. Silvestri's leadership, you have provided outstanding facilities and programs for the community members.And I just think it's gonna continue to get...It's gonna get better, but again, without your leadership, these things wouldn't happen for the residents, or our community.Thanks very much for giving me the opportunity to say that.Thank you.Thank you.Thank you.I guess, the next item on the under new business is a request by the Junior Football Association to construct a building at Hofbauer Field.This is this as Mr. May said, this was approved by the Park and Recreation Board.And now before Council to determine if there's any issues with it.If Council's found it acceptable, we would enter into our standard facility improvement agreement.Can you reiterate what the standard facility agreement involves for?Well, basically- - Association in the township.It sets the terms that the facility once constructed is owned by the township.Provides for requirements for insurances, and that the association is authorized to do the work.I don't have it with me right now, but it's something we worked up with Mr. Johnson, we used when we did the original building there.As well as other recreation association for other projects, but the key is that once the building is constructed, it's owned by the township and we would be responsible for it.I might've missed it, Michael, what is it proposed cost to this thing?Anyone saying?The cost is just under $25,000 that's being proposed.We assessed the numbers that we received from the Football Association.There are representatives from the Football Association here at- - What's our standard agreement side that they have to take care of it, or what?No, it becomes the township's property.I mean, they're using it, but it's...We would be responsible for the building once it's constructed and then it's our...It's a Council facility.And we're gonna have somebody look at those plans, and make sure that they're structurally- - The plans were already reviewed by the building inspectors, and are in a position for a permit to be issued if Council approves it.Did our township engineer look at it?No, he wouldn't look at that.Why not?Reviewing those plans, and I mean that's a building inspector issue.And I don't look at any house plans, or anything like that.Okay.What did the original one cost?I don't know the and outs.I don't know if someone from the football can answer that, or- - Actually, yeah, I'm from football and I have no idea what the original cost was.It was built before I looked into that.I have two questions about it.The design shows an existing deck, and is that connecting the two buildings, or are you...Can you walk underneath that?Is that what the proposal is?Yes, there will be space underneath that.Okay, so the safety requirements for- - There's already a walk on- Like the existing building, if I move over here, the existing building is here.The deck is above, there's a garage door here.So, that's already, and it's all like a slab underneath.So, it's already being walked under currently.In the minutes of the Park and Rec Committee, or board meeting, there apparently were some objections.What were the objections to the construction of this?I wasn't at that Parks and Rec meeting.It was apparently by a parent.Yes, I'm aware of an objection, but we voted as an organization 14 to two to pass that.So, there were two people that were opposed.Okay.It says in the minutes from the prior thing we just discussed that there was a parent from the Football Association to express his concern.He felt the money could be better...To better serve the children in other ways.Is that a thing- - Yeah.Yeah, yeah.So, his proposal was to put that money towards turfing the field, which 25,000 is a long way from...So, pretty much a million dollars of turf almost.Okay.That was pretty much it.Where you going to show?I got...I have a question, do the structures that we built, that they built, that we're ultimately responsible for.Did they have to be handicapped accessible, or something like that?Cause I mean that, it looks like there's just steps going in there, and I mean, I don't wanna get in a situation where we do this and then somebody complains that they can't get up there cause they're handicapped.We did address that and because of the square footage, it is not required, no.We did address that with the building inspector when I met with him.Okay.What are the dimensions of this, these buildings?You've got an elevation there, there's no plans here, and I'll get off that cake, but there's just not a lot of information here, that's my point.It's 10 foot by...25.By 20 well, 24, yeah.240 square feet.Yes.Thousand dollars a square foot.Yes.Think about it.Think about it.It's a two story building.Pardon.It's two stories.So, it was proposed for storage- - $1,000 a square foot.Correct, it's for additional storage.We are...Currently we are tapped out of storage.We lost some space whenever the lights went in there because there's some gates that have that area blocked off currently.And we used to store some stuff on a route 88 storage, and we gave that up.It was just impractical from community members, like myself and stuff.To get all the way from there, to carry pads and equipment down there to store when we can just keep them right there.And the president of the Football Association indicated at our meeting, that he is currently storing a good deal of equipment and supplies in his office at home.And he says he's not always going to have that available, so.Look, I'm not opposed to it, and I don't wanna be an obstructionist, but I just think this is a ridiculously high price.And I don't know what you've done in the way of checking for alternate bids, but that's a lot of money for that structure.That's the whole point I was trying to make, a lot of money.Have you got any other bids?And I'm not suggesting, I'm not telling you how to spend your money either, but I just think it's your maybe taking an easy way out here and ought to be looking at something else.It's actually $100 a square foot.It's not 1,000.said 1,000.No, it's 100 he's saying.100.How many square feet?240.Yeah, but it's two floors.Two floors.Whatever that is.All right, okay.All right.That's all right.I feel better.That's your one mistake in here, that puts you- - It's all about being...It's all about feeling good.Any other questions for us?Anybody have any questions?Anybody wanna make a motion?Well, this is being done without the expenditure of township funds, it's like not clear, okay?Correct.I don't know that it would have been that everybody who was listening.No, I'm not opposed to it.What do you need, Mike?A motion to concur with us?I'm glad I did.I move that we concur with the project subject to the execution of the standard facility agreement.Is there a second?Also, can we have a motion and a second, is there any further discussion?All in favor of the motion, say, aye - Aye.Aye.Aye.Opposed say nay.Passes six, zero Mr. Silvestri.Let's see.You're in the hot seat in the next one.The next one is a special permit request by Saint Benedict.They have a church for multiple signs for their multi-week fish fry.I'm not sure that I had made a couple of phone calls into the person requesting it.And I'm not sure if he's around or not, but he...I don't see him here this evening.I don't know if you want to table this until he has an opportunity to be here, I think- - If we were to table it, I think, we need to discourage the concept of all these multiple signs, and suggest that he come back with at least a more reasonable proposition.Where does he want them to be?Cause it's- Did he tell us?Yeah, it's in his letter, Or in the attachment, I guess.There's 10 locations.I remember last year, didn't we have a...There was one up there near center church, and we had to tell them to move.We have this same discussion every year.Well, nah, this is the first time St. Bens has came in and asked for them.Oh, there you go.Excuse me.We always have the same discussion, this time it's just beforehand.Yeah.Well, I would agree with Mr. Lewis' point.I think that there's definitely signage they could use, but the idea of putting a lot of signs on it in public areas is kind of not...Not the point.And if we begin to make too big of a gesture to allowing this, I'm not sure it wouldn't encourage other people to do the same.Will he be able to come back to the next?Yeah, the fish fry doesn't start until the 16th, I believe.I'm sure they're at the entrance signs on 19.That would be a real bad deal.Yeah, some of these aren't really objectionable, at least in my mind.Right, there...I mean, he certainly could ask for the Bridge and the Valley Brook Bridge.All right.Not at times, perhaps.No, I really don't have a problem with what they've done with their resistant church sign.I mean, it's there.If they wanna put a banner in front of it, I mean- - Right.I mean, it's for a good cause.Why don't we just table it, and then maybe they can come in and provide a little bit more?Maybe they can narrow these locations down to something that's a little bit more palatable to the board, the Council.You wanna motion to table, I'll make a motion to table if that's what you're after.Second.We have a motion and a second.All in favor, say aye.Aye.Aye.Aye.Opposed say nay.Okay, passes six, zero.Next one is final plan of Anthony Farms plan of lodge parcel plan for Peter's Townshipland Company.On drawing by Jr. Gale and Associate revised.The date revised on January 3rd, 2013.Yeah, I was gonna say, which one are you?I'm gonna explain this briefly.PT Land Company, developers of the Anthony Farms plan along with the Stanley B Anthony Estate or finalists, Anthony Farms parcel plan.It's simply parceling off and splitting parcel 300 that was created when phase one was recorded.It's splitting this parcel 300 into two pieces.This piece here, parcel 308 will be purchased by PT Land Company from the Anthony Estate, and it will be consumed by phase two lots and public improvements.The plan, in addition to parceling off parcel 300, it establishes all the necessary easements and rights of way to facilitate phase two from being constructed.It's simply a plan that parcels off the property that PT Land Company is purchasing from the Anthony Estate.Planning Commission did review this at the January 10 meeting, and approved, recommended Council approve it subject to five conditions, all of which have been addressed.So, this is basically a financial agreement because they're buying it in pieces.Correct.Okay, so it has to be subdivided so they can buy the next piece.Correct.I move that we approve the request for division of the Anthony Farms parcel 300A, SAA- - That I have a question on that parcel 300 B, that's for anticipated, it's for the next phase.Correct.If that didn't develop, that lot, that would not be landlocked, or anything like that, right?No, it would not.No, it doesn't.I think, it has frontage on two public streets.All right, so we have a motion and a second, is there any further discussion?All in favor of the motion, say aye.Aye.All opposed, say nay.It passes six, zero.I'd like to ask the chair to consider changing the agenda here to deal with the off-premise sign.There's a number of people in the audience that are here to deal with it that I think, we'll accommodate them.I have no problem doing that.I think we should get through this F though, which is the final point if we want to- No, we ought to get to first part, I think, I have no problem jumping around to do that, but- - I'm sorry, I thought we already concluded- - The next item is the final plan of the Anthony Farms plan of lots phase two.Peters Township Land Company on drawings Gale and Associates revised the one in 17, 2013.This is a re approval of this plan.Council did approve this plan back in April, 2012.The plan did not get recorded within the 90 days for reasons maybe PT Land Company can explain.It's simply re-approving the plan that was approved back in April, it's 20 lots.All the lots are half-acre plus.All 18 of the 20 lots use a 50 foot building line.Council did approve two lots with a 40 foot building lots.Lots 219 and 220, I think are the ones with the 40 foot- - Yes.They're off in the corner, I remember them.All the other aspects of the plan, dedication of open space, what will occur in phase two.There's two stormwater management facilities that will be dedicated to Peter's Township.All the runoff from phase two gets directed to those two facilities.There'll be a traffic impact fee paid for each one of these lots, 1,100 per lot at the time of building permit approval.Planning Commission did recommend the plan be approved back in March of 2012, subject to 18 conditions.Some of which had been completed, some of which have not been completed.I move, we re-approve the plan.Is there a second?I'll second it.Is there any further discussion?I'd just like a clarification.There was a question on whether or not the developer was going to attempt to solicit from Penndot, the ability for a left turn in.Oh, yes, Kim Gale's from Jr. Gales and Associates.Yes we did, and we were denied.Okay, so that's completely off the table.It's off the table, it's right in and right out.One other question, and I'm gonna keep asking this about the open space in different developments.The open space, has there been a discussion about what that's going to be, or is that basically the scrub area, with really no useful purpose?I guess, right now, currently the only open space is back in here, long phase one.Mm-hmm, is any of it usable?The open- - It's walkable.Walkable.It's walkable.The open space in this plan provides a buffer between existing neighborhoods and the new neighborhood.It's not just scrub.It provides a necessary buffer.Okay.Is there any other comment or question?She had the one question I did about the...Does this- - Does the plan provide right in, right out?Yes.Okay, then that's what we're approving.Yes.Okay, so we have a motion and second, is there any further discussion?Seeing none, all in favor of the motion say aye.Aye.Aye.All opposed, say nay.Passes six, zero.Thank you very much.Okay.I think, unless my other Council members have any different opinion, I believe that Mr. Lewis, his suggestion that we jumped onto item seven under correspondence to address the attorney Haynes is the Arlecchino, Arlecchino off premise sign.If we could, that might save some time.Mr. Haynes, how are you, sir?I'm fine, Sir, and you?Good.Mr. Chairman, I've addressed a letter to you back in April, the beginning of May.A discussion was had with Council about a sign, which was asked to be placed on property by Arlecchino's.Up until the time that that sign was placed, there had been signs for the school house and Arlecchino had simply put the sign on themselves.Up until that time, there was a rental situation with it.There has been no agreement to any sort of rent.The Council decided at that point to allow them to put a temporary sign up.And that was intended to be for a period of approximately six months.The six months have long passed, they would have passed in November, or December.And we have given notice to Council as well as notice to the attorney for Arlecchino's that we intend to remove the sign at this point.Immediately following the construction of the sign on May 3rd of 2012, I did address a letter to them requesting that they enter into negotiations as to the placement of the sign.They have had an additional seven or eight months in order to speak, or enter into negotiations and nothing has been done.This is simply a situation where they apparently feel that they can take the space and use the space.To go backwards, this property has been owned.This property next to it has been owned for a period of at least 60 years by Mr. Harbison, and his predecessor, Mr. Niedemeyer.They have used this and in fact, Council Peter's Township has addressed them and asked them to maintain that property on occasion, which they have done.They have cleared it, they have constructed on it, and have completely treated it as their own.At this point, we have simply come to Council to advise that we are not going to allow the sign to remain there at this point, without some sort of compensation for the sign, or a direct order from Council telling us that we have to.Does your client own that property, or as you're claiming it's by adverse- - At this point, it appears we're claiming it by adverse possession.I remember when it was here before.It was unclear as to who like...It was like...The last record owner is a person by the name of Robert Roche.Mr. Roche owned a large piece of property there, which was split off.He also owned three or four properties on the other side of the road, the other side of 19th.And it appears that this piece was a leftover piece after several subdivisions.It is a small piece that sits right in the jointure of the road, and does not appear that it has ever been deeded out.I have done extensive search to the point of I have pulled all the tax books clear back into the 1880s for Washington County to see if this piece has ever been actually possessed by anybody other than Robert Roche.And I cannot find anything.His name appears on four different surveys of the property, but it appears just to have been repeated each time, okay by the surveyor, and just added to it.It's not being assessed?Is it being assessed?I don't think that it's being assessed.What I actually thought at some point was that the township may have taken this, but we have checked.And it's not because of the fact that that is a major intersection, and that the township probably at some point used it for the construction, either of 19, or old 19 as it were.But a check with roads for the Council shows no, that they don't have a claim to it of any sort either.So, we have maintained this property at least 60 years, and we intend to act like we are the owner of the property, which Mr. Arcuri and Mr. Johnson, of course, will tell you is necessary for our adverse claim.Mr. Haynes, looking at your letter of January 2nd, it makes reference to the fact of ownership either by actual deed, or by possession.But your position now is it's by adverse possession.Correct, I've not been able to find anything that actually deeds it.As I said, at one point, Mr. Roche owned this property, he owned clear over to here, and then reality after doing the review of the surveys, Mr. Harbison actually owns over into here.So, there's no record owner of that property?There is no record owner of this property.Has not been since at least 1920.And tacking your client's possession and control of the property, along with their predecessors, it's more than 60 years- - It's in excess of 60 years.There has been nobody use a claim, or pay taxes on the property for a period of at least the 60 years.Mr. Haynes?Yes.You say that they Harbison's use and maintain the property, what do they use it for?Well, they have used it on occasion for storage vehicles, but they are the ones that have been required to keep it cut, okay?The Council's- - It seems pretty steep, that's why I was asking.I couldn't see how it would- - No, it is steep in here.In the actual portion of the property that is Harbison's, it's very steep right here.Mm-hmm.But this is Harbison's property.Right, I understand that.Okay, they've come across and again, this is a much flatter area, okay?And they have maintained, they have kept that cut down for 60 years.Mr. Harbison doesn't use that for his own signage, does he?I don't remember ever seeing anything.No. - Hello, Mr. Harbison.Mike Harbison, our signage is right behind our building on 19.Actually, if I may.Right there.You can actually see the shadow over it.Mm-hmm.That's it right there.Furthermore, in terms of the question as to Arlecchino and raising an objection, or putting a sign, there is absolutely no way that they have any claim to this.Under an adverse possession question, the question would be, who else might have a better claim than us?Who else might have done something to maintain the property?They of course, are clear off in this area.And there's absolutely no way that their rights come down to there.They do not have any type of a chain of title right to the property.I understand, my recollection from the discussion was that the classroom, the sign for the classroom, which was the prior restaurant had been there for years.But that was under a lease.I'm not- - They were paying a lease to Mr. Harbison, which actually acknowledges his possession.Does that document- Does that document exist?I am assuming it does.As a lease.My dad does have a signed agreement.Yes.I don't have that with me right now.So, when the property was transferred, that just was omitted from any conversation, is that what happened?That the new owners of the restaurant didn't realize the...I mean- - The arrangement.I don't know.I can't possibly tell you what went on between Arlecchino and the school house- - I think we're about- Yeah, okay.I was just gonna ask you if you heard from Mr. Cayman, but I guess, you've heard from somebody else.Well, I am actually here on Mr. Cayman instead, he unfortunately had a prior obligation this evening, So, was not able to attend.My name is Ryan Woods, so I'm an attorney with the law firm, Goldberg, Cayman and Garvin, and then, to address a lot of the issues that had just been raised by Mr. Harbison's counsel.We believe, and we're in the position that they have zero rights, title, interest at all in the property, in the area, in where our sign is located.And furthermore, we believe that we would have rights to this property for its continued usage over the past, I believe it's almost 30 years or so that this sign has existed there.And I do have a couple of documents that I'd like to pass out, or if Council would prefer that I just utilize...Pass them out.Yeah, all right.It's always better to look at them.That was my thought as well.If you don't mind passing this down, thank you very much.It might be good to have one for Don and- - It might be good to have one for me too.There you go.At this desk we're sitting next to one- I think there was- - There's more- - This is the first I've heard probably in the five months.The first picture that I have included, and I can wait till those get down.Does everyone have a copy?Yeah.This is just a picture of- - This is a picture, exactly right, that was just placed up there for...Depicting exactly what we're looking at here.As shown this is Camp Lane Road, this is Mr. Arbison's property.And his sign's actually located up in this northern...is actually outside of this triangle, located in this area that's across the street, and it's located there.The second picture that I've included, this goes back in their chain of title of Mr. Harbison.And this was a survey that was prepared for the property that was in January 27th, in 1964.If you look at the way this property is, this was also just recently confirmed by Mr. Harbison's counsel, where it comes to the lower portion, that is actually on the other side of route 19 there, which he had just shown on the prior overhead.But if you look at this picture in conjunction with the first actual overhead aerial view, you can see that where the property comes over, the line is actually brushing, a brush line runs well to the north.That would actually be the east looking at the...The north designation here, where the sign, the signage is located at.And if you look here, run actually comes through the property that we're located on, well outside of that too.It's well outside of the survey area of the property that is actually now currently owned by Mr. Harbison.The next document I included in here as well is the actual deed, which it was in April, of 1994, which was, which now gave title to Mr. Harbison, included in here, and explained is the actual property that's included within that survey itself.It does not include any of this land.So, none of this was actually traded, provided to him, which would be required by a deed in order to have adverse possession.You actually have to convey that property under belief that it is yours.That is not included within this deed itself.So, therefore there was...There's no- - Excuse me.I doubt...Let him have his say, Mr. Haynes.And I would also just like to go onto the last document that we have there, 12.This was actually prepared for Harbison audit.This was dated February 25th, 1994.And then, it was revised on May 5th, of 1994.And again, this is the exact same survey that was included in the 19, the 1964 surveys, exactly the same.Again, depicting the same property, and once again, more importantly, excluding the property that he's now claiming he may have by adverse possession.Again, this is his own admission.In 1994, providing that this is not his property.And furthermore, that the property that's located within that survey itself, is what he actually owns.We believe in furthermore, in regards to the discussion of adverse possession, this is not the proper format, forum to determine whether or not they may or may not own this by adverse possession.This would actually have to be something that would be adjudicated and determined by a court of law.He cannot, this cannot be adjudicated by Council itself to determine whether or not he has this by adverse possession, whether he's met all of the key elements for tacking and furthermore, the necessary requirements.So, I don't believe that he actually has standing to raise the issue whether, or not we have the sign here or not.May I interrupt for a second?Yeah.Well, no, just...Just to...Go ahead, Michael.Refresh your memory.When this came to Council last year, a lot of these arguments were being made and there was at least, they seemed like it was the potential of an agreement, or an understanding that would be made.And what Council did by setting six months time period, to allow the sign that there was either for some conclusive, some conclusion by some group, either themselves or the court to determine who owned the property, or for some agreement to occur.Our position is, or our responsibility is, when someone wants to put a directional sign on a corner property, they have to have permission from the owner.As the staff, we could not confirm yes, or no, who owned the property.So, the whole idea was for Council, whether Council had was to allow some time for it to get worked out, or to be determined definitively, and in the interim, the sign will be kept.And that's where we were.I remember, and I also remember, if I'm not mistaken that in the past, the permission from that sign was from Harbison for the- - Harbison, or Niedermeyer, one of the two, yeah.One of the two.Right, that's true.But I mean, I know Mr. Haynes was all jumping up and down, and I understand what you're saying, and I agree with you.You don't need a deed for adverse possession.And quite frankly, I mean, this survey shows what he actually asked, but it doesn't show what he took, what he may or may not have taken by adverse possession.Did you file a statement of claim?No. - Okay, are you going to?Absolutely.Okay, the bottom line is as I see this and I might be wrong, but we don't really have a stake in this.That's right, but Mr. Silvestri, it's what we call the background .We don't intend, Council loaded, we don't have the authority to adjudicate the title of this property.Mr. Arcuri's also right, we're not the...The title of this property is not necessarily limited to the survey.If it was clear in the survey, we wouldn't have this, we wouldn't be in there at all with respect to adverse possession claims.But this, the sign from it was awarded temporarily because we didn't- - Well, I made the motion and I did it was to maintain the status quo until we could get more information.I mean, it doesn't look like we were gonna get any more information.And I think, properly so, because it was as a dispute that we assumed was gonna be resolved between the property owners, which apparently hasn't occurred at this point.I mean, I think, you guys just do what you wanna do.I mean, it seems to me that if you think that you own the property and you're gonna take the sign down, that's gonna force this into court, and you guys can...If you can't come to an amicable resolution of it, then some judge will come with an amicable decision.I mean, I- - Since you've taken up time, I just wanted another question as far as the discussion.Has there been a discussion of paying a lease?Is there a problem with the number?Is there a problem with the concept?I had not been involved in any, any of those prior discussions.It would have been Jonathan Cayman from my office that would have had those discussions.I'm not sure where that is, maybe he can shed- - It seems like something that should be able to be amiably collated.Again, on May the 3rd, I addressed to them a letter saying, \"Let's resolve this matter.We feel that we own it, your previous person paid $300 per month in order to be here, time has passed.It should be 350,\" which of course, that's called negotiation.$350?Per month.Per month too, yeah, signed there.Okay.I know it's called negotiation, but that...That seems like a lot for a little sign.Again, I agree, but the prior sign, which was more extensive, okay- - Well, I understand that, and that was taken down.That was taken down, that was 300, and we were up the assumption to be honest, that if something was worked out, maybe a more permanent sign was going to go up.Oh, okay.Okay, understanding that they probably also did not want to invest a whole bunch of money in a sign when there was a possibility that they were going to lose, or we were going to cut it down.But at this point I have received absolutely no response to negotiations, not so much as a phone call at all from Mr. Cayman.Well, it seems to me that the economics of the issue ought to be...It would have to be resolved in- - Yeah, I mean, that's...You're gonna spend a lot more money.Which you're already doing on attorneys.Well, I dunno.Well, that's a good thing.It's always a good thing for the attorneys, but I mean, there's gotta be some give and take here.And I mean, there's another street that accesses that restaurant right up the block.I mean, they can maybe get a sign off of that property owner.So, you gotta worry, 350 a month as opposed to zero a month, and I- - Well, right now, we're getting zero a month, so.Well, and I understand that.I mean, the equity's just- - I really think, I mean, Council tried to facilitate a resolution some time ago by saying fine, put the sign up for six months.That hasn't worked, apparently.I think, at this point, we're pretty much out of it.I mean, it's between you, between the two parties and to me, do what you need to do, and hopefully it gets resolved.I absolutely agree.I really sent the letter as a courtesy.Okay, since you had been nice enough to mediate at least a little bit the last time.But the discussion, sir, was that we recognize in this instance and in many other instances around the township, the need of a business to advertise their business.And we recognize that that particular business is not exactly right on 19.So, having some directional sign would be advantageous and try to facilitate it, and that's really about all that we can do.I mean, I don't see anything else that Council can do.I mean at this point, I think, we need to hand it back to you and say, please resolve it between yourselves, or some court will resolve it.Absolutely, as I said, and I sent the letter because it was actually a thank you to the Council for having tried before.And I thought it was a courtesy that I should advise that this is where it was proceeding.I think you guys- - Thank you.You guys can work it out, I'm sure.Thank you.All right, we're gonna go back to under new business, item G, award bids for liability and casualty insurance coverage.Okay, we went out and solicited proposals for insurance bids and Marie Murphy, a risk consultants, risk resources was our consultant to handle this project, and she is here.I would point out that Marie has said our current carrier is not renewing our coverage.So, we are in a position that we must have a new carrier at the beginning of the month.Marie, you wanna go through the proposal?Yes, hi, my name's Marie Murphy.I work for risk management resources and usually insurance is one of the more difficult things we do, I think, but maybe tonight that's not so.So, we'll try to make this short and sweet.Is that a comment on the meeting?Pardon me?Is that a comment on the meeting?Yes.Usually I'm like in the beginning of the meeting, but anyway, we'll try to make it simple tonight.What we did, I was hired and retained by Peters Township to manage the insurance renewal proposal for Peters Township.We do this on a routine basis, usually every three years to see what the market will bear, what's happening in the insurance market.And to get competitive proposals.This year was different, because your current carrier declined to renew your insurance coverage.That created a problem, because you've belonged to the same carrier, I think since 2007.They provided us with very good coverage at a very good price as you can see from these renewal premiums we're gonna go over here shortly.And so, it did present a bit of a problem at renewal.So, if we can go first, cause I know that we wanna discuss the dollar thing first to show you what we found when we went out into the market.And I think that this proposal that you see on the insurance renewal premium proposals as proposed January, 2013, Gallagher was your expiring carrier.That's the one that is no longer gonna be providing a quote.We put an ad in the paper, anybody that was interested responded, I did a set of specifications based on last year's policy, because I had been working with those, that policy structure since 2007, and it was a good policy structure.And we got competitive proposals against that.What we found when we did this was first of all, nobody would provide us what we had at the price we had it, period.That was just not gonna happen.As you can see from the proposals, we did get, they're sort of within the realm of each other.Okay, as compared to our expiring premium over here at $138,000.So, that was the first thing we learned immediately, was what we had was gone and we weren't gonna find that again.So anyway, we went through and we requested the premiums for everything.And if we also wanted to look at deductibles too, because in a lot of these proposals, what you retain yourself, went up in a lot of instances.One of the major covered differences that the old program had that we don't have this year is your law enforcement liability was covered under your general liability insurance.Therefore, you didn't have any deductible.Now, you're going gonna have a deductible.Okay, so I studied this every way I could.I studied it from increased deductibles, premiums, deductible options.And then of course, the coverages, because we hadn't had those core coverages and sort of start there.So if you would just go briefly to the risk management resources, actually marketing report, these are all the agents that we had approached, or that actually approached us via a request through the newspaper.And these are all the responses we got.Now, you can see by looking at this, we did get a nice spread of people that were interested and they were all approaching quite a variety of insurance companies, but we did get a lot of declinations.So, once we got that done, we did come up with several proposals that were viable.They all have different premiums.So, at that point, what my concern was to make sure that we had the best price matched, excuse me, with the best coverage.If you go to the premium page again, you'll see that the lowest proposal was from the Campbell Agency with great American Insurance Company and CNA. There's another part to that, that I failed to put on there.And their premium came in at 185,864.Okay, which is a substantial increase over your expiring, but it was the lowest of all the proposals, okay?Yeah, why is that dollar amount different than you took...You said 180.185, that is 185, but the one where- - Oh yeah, that's another revision.Did you give them the new revision revision?Oh, okay, I'm sorry.All right, I didn't know you had the newest revision.I was gonna hand that out in a minute.Okay, so you have the 177?That's correct.Is that what you have up there?Yeah.Okay, yes, okay.So, that's the 185.Okay, so you have 187 in your hand.No, 177.177.177, I'm sorry.Yes, that's the most latest revision that I got practically on my way here.What we've been trying to do is ever since these proposals came in, once we had the bids and we knew who the low proposals were, and who we could work with, we've been trying to work our way through this to make sure we had all the coverages we needed.That was really the key to this, this time.I can't forego the coverage for the price.Let's just, we can't do that.So, as I said, we had a lot of declinations.We did get a lot of people interested.There were several issues.Now, if you go back to the original insurance, the major coverage comparisons, I'm sorry.That's a separate chart.What I did was I honed in on the major coverage points, okay?Once I had the premiums established, the next thing to do is okay to make sure that, okay, this is a cheap price, but does it have what we need?So, you'll see from this sheet- - They don't have that sheet.They don't have this sheet, oh okay.Basically, what we did was I went through and I actually did a comparison of all the coverages, and I came up with major coverage points.After I did that, I ended up with a few concerns, and that's what I wanna just discuss with you momentarily.As far as the premium goes, the great American Program does give you what you need at a reasonable price.There are some things that we don't have anymore, and one of those things we don't have anymore is coverage.Part of the coverage for the engineer.Okay, in the old program, it covered Mark for...I know you hate to even say it outloud, it covered Mark for bodily injury and property damage claims.Okay, as well as public officials claims, which basically is a wrongful act.The same thing that covers everybody here on the board.Okay, that policy you'll still cover Mark.Okay, so we do have partial coverage for him right now.What that means is, and I'm sure Mr. Johnson can back me up on this.Coverage triggers what determines what policy responds to what claim.Okay, so if someone sues Peters Township and Mark, for a wrongful act, okay, that will be covered by the public officials policy, because that's what public officials covers.But if the result of the wrongful act was bodily injury, or property damage, that's picked up under a different policy on the general liability side, and that's where we lost the coverage.Because the prior carrier was so broad with their coverage form, nobody included, it just was like, they threw it in.I was sorta surprised when they did.So, when we got to this renewal, I was...I was surprised that everybody told me it was covered, but they didn't understand the difference between the errors and omissions professional exposure he gives us, versus a regular BIPD, which might be too much detail, but the bottom line is we need to fill that gap.Mike and I have talked about the most...What's the exposure that we worry about most with Mark?From a bodily injury and property damage standpoint, we sort of came to the conclusion it would probably be if there was a storm drain that was designed improperly; and if you wanna add something to this.And it caused somebody's home to be completely flooded, that would be a property damage claim, okay?Assuming he designed it?Right.Yes, and that was part of what you do, correct, the...Well- - Yeah, we don't design a heck of a lot of new storm storage systems.It can occur, and you've noticed that we're doing retrofits of old stuff.So, then and once again, because it's vague.Okay, because he could, maybe he wouldn't, we have to nail that down, because we can't have him exposed.Or if we do have the exposure, we need to know it and absorb it, okay?So, what happened was, like I said, if he sued for wrongful acts specifically, okay, and it doesn't mention bodily injury, or property damage, we have coverage.But if we get that strange claim where they do ask for bodily injury, or property damage, that's where we have this little gap.So, I went in search of coverage for that gap.Practically, like I said, on my way here, I finally got a number, which kind of floored me, to be honest with you.I didn't think it was gonna be that high.It came in at $10,475, okay?And it has a $25,000 deductible, which if you look at that, you have to hit $35,000, period, before it even pays for itself.So, this part of the coverage, we can move ahead with this insurance program, and I'm gonna continue to work with Mike on this open issue because I was thinking, on my way here actually, that do you belong to an association of any kind?Okay, they may be able to provide him with an insurance quote that would be more reasonable.This one came out of Lloyd's of London.Okay, and Lloyd's isn't cheap, but it was the only quote that I was able to get too.So, but I think that it also had to do with people telling me it was covering, it wasn't until I read the coverage forms I realized that gap was there.Okay, so that was sort of why that got delayed a little bit, but it can be solved.I think, we can solve it.Like I said, we do have some coverage for Mark.It's just the BIPD portion that I'm concerned about, and I think, we should pursue this and see if we can get a better premium and a quote.Because the other side of the coin is, is if Council, if you give it some serious thought, and we get Mark's input, what would be the risk compared to the $35,000 a year you're gonna spend on insurance?Is it really worth it?How many of these projects does he do a year?How often does he do it?How much are we really exposing ourselves to this BIPD risk?So, I think, that needs to be discussed further because I think that maybe it's not as big of a risk, or maybe it's a bigger risk than I realize.I don't know that.It sounds like a lot of what...Mark and I discussed what he does, which is why I didn't really think that it was gonna cost that much money.Not that you don't do important things, but he's not doing a lot of design, and that's usually what costs all the money.So, that kind of threw everything for a loop.So, I will say that we can move ahead with the rest of this, but I think we need to continue to pursue that, okay?The second point I just wanted to bring up was the auto exposure.One of the reasons why everybody, everybody declined your quote was because of the auto problem.That was part of the problem.You have a frequency issue and we did get a couple of standalone quotes, but we were able to negotiate apples to apples quotes and the Great American Program now contains everything we need.Okay, on the auto portion too.And that's something Mike's working on right now, he's signing people up for driver training courses.Unfortunately, here in Peters Township, and I can say, cause I hate driving out here at night, especially in the rain.You've had like 17 years strikes since 2007, and that's just, what can you do?Look, it's very rural out here.It's dark, you know?So, it's not really something you can control exactly.The other point I wanted to bring up was deductibles.I think, one of the reasons why our losses look so bad here at Peters is because we submit things in the $500 range, in the $1,000 range, okay?Right now, our auto deductibles are 500 comp, 500 collision.So, every time you hit a deer, you pay the 500 and then, the insurance company pays the rest.Well, I think, we've totaled one, or two vehicles already.So, when you look at that, the insurance companies are eventually gonna catch up with that and say, whoa.So, I'm making the recommendation we definitely get those deductibles up so that at least as we move forward, this frequency thing isn't showing up all the time on your loss runs, okay?And I think we should do the same thing on property.We can carry $1,000 deductible right now.I think, we should bump that up to 5,000.We haven't had very many property claims.The ones we've had have been lightning strikes at the radio tower, and I believe we've had a couple snow and ice things.Okay, so- - One big one was the sprinkler- - Oh, the sprinkler system, that's right.I forgot about that one.So, that part of it, I think that the Peters Township has the ability to absorb that $5,000 per claim.And I think, that based on your loss history, that's not where your problems have really been.It's been on the auto side.So, I think you should give that consideration, cause there's other savings to be had by taking the higher deductible.And since you're looking at this transition year where you're going to an almost what, $46,000 increase?It's probably a good time to take that deductible savings.The dam exposure was another issue.That's always been a stick in the program.We've always been lucky enough to get it covered.This year what happened though, was there's only one program that's offering us the catastrophic coverage on the dam.And what I mean by that is you have the first 1 million, 3 million on your primary insurance.Then there's something called an umbrella that goes over that, that provides another 5 million.In previous years, you had the entire $8 million for the dam exposure.You had it on the primary, and you had it on the umbrella.No one, but Travelers is offering that at this point, and the Travelers Program is quite a bit more expensive.So, when you look at the risk, we've discussed this at length also.You do maintain the dam very, very well.There's an ability to lower the water if we know there's gonna be an issue with flooding.We can open the valves and get that water pressure down.We had hurricane Ivan, and it handled Hurricane Ivan.So, that was what a...Was that 100, or 500 year?I forget.500.500 year flood.So, I'm not really totally overly concerned about this excess exposure on the dam.I think, that the 1 million, 3 million is probably sufficient.I just don't see the dam creating much of a problem that we won't know about before it becomes a catastrophic failure, because of the way that it's maintained.Okay, and because of what happened in Ivan.I think, if it was gonna have a failure, that's probably when it was gonna happen, so.So, based on all that information, I'm making a recommendation that you increase the deductibles to 5,000, take $1,000 deductible on your auto, take all the reductions that they're offering you.Let me continue to pursue this gap in the ENO, and I would recommend the Campbell Agency with Great American and CNA. - In the body of your recommendation, you say something about the auto being with a different carrier.Yes, it is with Great American, and it's with CNA is the auto.It's a different carrier, and Erie also offered a standalone quote.Okay, they were the same standalone quote.So, we went with what Campbell originally gave us.The terrorism coverage, we've not taken that in the past?No, and I have an explanation for terrorism.The one thing I would like to say about it is in my business, the Act goes on forever.Okay, so to make it a short explanation, the thing that you need to know is before you can collect any money, because we had discussed this.Like what if somebody came into the township and even if it was a domestic terrorist act, and did whatever they did, it has to be declared an act of terrorism by the Secretary of State, the Secretary of the Treasury, and the Attorney General before it's considered an act of terrorism.So, I don't...Unless it involved the City of Pittsburgh and Peter's Township, I don't ever see that happening.It would have to be some horribly catastrophic thing before I think those bodies would consider it a terrorist act under the Act.So, the only clients I have that normally purchase that are water and sewer authorities, because they're high risk targets, and they only purchase it on the property normally.So, most of my municipal clients do not purchase it.So, we've not had it in the past.Right.We've declined it in the past.Does anybody have any other questions?This situation that you're talking about using the umbrella coverage.Mm-hmm.Why is it that the issue that we have with Mark, isn't something that falls under that umbrella?Well, Mark is covered under the umbrella, it's a different coverage.In other words, the public officials coverage is the primary part of the coverage that he's covered under.And it's also picked up under the umbrella.So, it's just a different coverage.He is picked up, and he's also picked up for bodily injury and as is anybody that works for the township has bodily, injury and property damage.He just doesn't have it as it relates to his engineering duties.He has it for everything else.Can you think of an occasion that you have had this issue, a seal to a drawing, or a design that you have done?It's typically in conjunction with permits.If I apply the VP for a certain crossing permit, or a stream bank.Yeah, I think- - Sometimes I have to stand for permit, they're on MS4, I had to stand the TMD on plannings.It's very rare that it would be for a project that we designed in house.Now, that doesn't mean that I can still design it and oversee it, but- - To me, that would be an avenue that would preclude the ability to pursue a claim against him as a design professional.Well, it's a...What it's called is an error or omission.Oh, ma'am, I know well though, what you're talking about- - Okay, so- - That's my business.Yeah, okay so what I'm saying is, the ENO portion of the claim under the general liabilities is what I'm worried about.He does have the wrongful act coverage up here, and he has it on the primary and the umbrella.It's the missing piece.It's not worth 10,000 bucks.Well, that's what I'm saying.We need to go further with that because I don't know that there's really much risk there.And then, when you add the premium into the deductible, you're looking at $35,000 before the insurance responds, and really, what is our risk here?He's not worth that.But I think, it's something that- - I said that tongue in cheek.I mean, I think it's something we should pursue a little further just to see, like I said, maybe the association has something, cause you know how association programs have special rates for their members.And we might be able to do something that way.I agree with you, I think that premium's atrocious, and I don't...I don't see the risk that he presents, that it deserves that kind of premium.That was nowhere near what I thought it was gonna cost, because normally, it's the design portion that is the risk.And he does very little if any design, and there's always someone else involved too, right?There's always gonna be a subcontractor and a contractor.And a lot of other parties that will all get sued with us, so we can all be in there together and it'll work itself out eventually.But we wouldn't be the only person standing there.You're trying to make that sound like a pleasant ordeal.Well, I think, the more people involved, the better, let's put it that way.It gives more money, or more money available to spread around, but...Can I ask you a question from the audience?Mm-hmm.I'm Scott Bramrose.Oh, hi, Scott, how are you?Nice to meet you.Nice to meet you too.Sorry, , I just wanted to ask, when you were reading my form and the liability about the professional coverage for engineers and surveyors.Mm-hmm.Does it not cover his...I think it covered his- - Well, I think, let me see on my coverage comparisons, because I think, it said it was covered, but it's your premium that made it costly.Oh, yeah, I know my premium is high- - Yeah, but let me see if we have- - I just wanted to say that that coverage was available under- - Oh, yeah, let me see, I'm sorry, yeah.That's the point you're trying to make.Yes, his program with Britt did include that exposure.It wasn't that it wasn't available.That it was the program costs that made it cost prohibited.Well, he's a good guy, but he's just too expensive.Yeah, so- - And this was who again?This was Sloan Agency through the Britt Insurance Group.Their premium was at 191,742.Michael, does your position and recommendation stand as you put it out in your...To go with so Campbell Agency.Campbell?Yes.One last clarification though.Mm-hmm.Mr. Lewis, I don't mean to interrupt.All right.So, across the columns, the one that has, is not included is beside the skate park.Is that an omission, or is that...I mean, is that, what does that mean, I'm sorry?Oh, it's included.I'm sorry, you mean there should be a word included- - Yes.Yes, it is included.I'm sorry, that was...That should be included.All right, cause that's- - Cause that's a big deal too.I mean, that's a potential- - It is, it is a big deal.Believe me, the skate park- - So, that is included?That's in everybody, and it's- - Sorry to interrupt you.You have dams, skate parks, you have all sorts of things.So, it makes it a difficult risk.Is there any other questions?I have a question.Mm-hmm.The issue came up last year when we were involved in some litigation involving an individual, who had sued the township federal court under an 1983 action.And Council was vehemently opposed to paying a nickel.I know what you're talking about.Towards that claim.I know.And because of the coverage that we had, we really didn't have, I guess, it's a hammer clause, or whatever my...I practice insurance, so I keep the...So, if I say don't settle on a no practice case then the insurance carrier can't do that.Right.And when I inquired about that from Mr. Silvestri, he indicated to me that our policy does not provide for us to say, we're not paying a nickel, and you have to defend it.And if we wanted that, that it would be more expensive.I'm not, I don't know that it's available, okay?Any professional person, a doctor, a lawyer, because it is a professional person, the insurance company extends the obligate, or the courtesy, I would say, of allowing you to refuse to settle.And that would be obvious because if you're a doctor, your reputation could get ruined.And if you really feel it's an opinion thing, and it wasn't a medical fact, then you can go ahead and refuse it.The only thing I've ever seen in an insurance policy that gave you any kind of control over that was a waiver of governmental immunity clause.Where if you had immunity, and you wanted to waive it, okay?Because of some reason, I have a water authority, for example, that had a bad pipe and they knew it.And every time it would flood, it flooded the same house, but the insurance policy would not allow them to pay it.They would go to their governmental immunity clause, and say, \"We're immune from this liability, and we're not paying it\".Well, I found a policy, or we found a policy that did allow that waiver.I've seen it go that way, I've never seen it go the other way, because there's a right and duty to defend.But when you look at the policy conditions, all through the policy conditions, it talks about your obligations as an insured, versus an insurer.And you're obligated to do what they say.The only time I know that that's different, like I said, is in a professional situation.I've never seen a policy that...And Mr. Lewis, I don't know if you have either, but I've never seen a policy that would allow you to pay, or to say don't pay.because believe me, there are a lot of people feel this way because the claims sometimes are ridiculous.You have two I can think of, which I won't speak of right now, that are absolutely ridiculous.And all your costs have been in defending the thing.You haven't paid a penny, but you've been...There's a big reserves sitting there for defensive of an idiotic claim, but there's nothing you can do.And what'll happen is it'll come to a point for the insurance company, where they're gonna say, look, it's cheaper for us to pay this than to keep fighting this.And that's their privilege to do that, so.But I appreciate your opinion.Okay.And don't get the impression I know anything at all about insurance.Oh. - But I do know about professional liability and engineers, so.Okay, good.Well, maybe you can help us with Mark.I would move that we award the Campbell Insurance Company.I don't know whether it's exactly, if it's 177, 159 or if someone else would be less than that.Maybe if we continue, and go through, we can negotiate the terms and conditions.Well, yeah, this'll be the number that we'll be using, and then- - That's 177.Yes, the 170, the one that's not up there, the 177.Okay, so we have a motion and a second, is there any further discussion?Hearing none, all in favor of the motion say aye.Aye.Opposed say nay.That's a six, zero, Mr. Silvestri.Next item on the- - Thank you.Thank you for your time.Thank you.The next item is petition received for Barrhill Road traffic calming study.Yes, there was a petition with sufficient names to meet the minimum criteria to have us investigate, to determine if it would qualify for a study.We would look at it from the standpoint of the amount of the speeds, and the amount of traffic.And then, if it does qualify, then it would go to the Traffic Calming Committee to review.In addition, we do have two outstanding ones.One that we will be doing additional traffic counts in the spring, which is Senate Church, cause that wasn't able to after the stop light was in.And then the last one was, which has been here for awhile has been...Maple Lane.Maple Lane and when we did the original studies, one portion of Maple Lane qualified from a speed standpoint, past, going past George, and the other part before George did not.When we went out there and took additional accounts to see if it still did, it actually flip flopped.The section before George now is over the speed and the section after George is under the speed.And I guess, what I'd like to do at least, is get a proposal from TPD to see what that would cost to do a study there, and then come back to Council.That's what we've done in the past.Yeah.I see no reason to alter that, unless somebody has one.Is that okay?Have a vote.I think you're okay.Do we need a motion?Well, just to authorize us to do the study.All right, so- - The counts.So, you have a motion, Mr. Ball seconded it.Any further discussion?All in favor of the motion say aye.Aye.Aye.Any opposed, say nay.Passes six, zero.Our next item is resolution establishing that drop a trust for drop pensions.Yes.The police pension plan.We really submitted a trust agreement to Bank and it basically included everything that's in this agreement, in this resolution.They took the position that for what was involved, they didn't want to get into, enter into such an agreement.Then we went back to the PNC. To see if PNC was willing to do such, and at this point we still don't have a response.They were looking at it, but we're...We need to get these things established.So, the other option was for us to adopt the resolution establishing the trust.And then we just opened up the standard trust agreement, trust accounts with the bank under the resolution here.As opposed to having an agreement with the bank for a trust.I move that we adopt resolution 10513.Second.So, we have a motion and a second, any further discussion?All in favor of the motion, say aye.Aye.Aye.Opposed say nay.Six, zero, Mr. Silvestri.Payroll bills.I've reviewed the payroll and bills, that large file of them.There's a lot.Yeah, there's a bunch of them this time.Find them in order and move that we pay them.Second.Okay, a motion to second.Any further discussion?Hearing none, all in favor of the motion, say aye.Aye.And opposed say nay.Six, zero, Mr. Silvestri.Could I ask a clarifying question?Sure.Well, Mr. Ball, will you be doing that all the time, or were you just subbing for Mr. Berkowitz?No, Mr. Berkowitz was absent.Thank you.I'm sure if you wanted to do it Mr. Berkowitz would let you.There's a filling.Yeah, it's just part of the duties of the vice chair, that's why I wondered.I came off the bench, out of retirement.Next section, since we did correspondence, would be reports.Given the late hour, is there anything in there, Mr. Silvestri, that you feel strongly that we need to discuss?No. - Okay, is there anybody else on Council that would like to discuss anything that appears under the report section?No, there wasn't anything.Anybody?Okie doke, let's move to item number nine, which is miscellaneous.It's Road Tour date.Yeah, Road Tour date.That's coming up.We're recommending March 2nd, I think, was it the 2nd?That's- - Yeah, March 2nd.That's what I heard.I can't do the 9th, I have a cub scouts field the trip on the 9th, sir.What?I always think you're really- - Bring the cub scouts on a field trip.It'll be snowing.Last year, we did it on the 3rd.All our neighboring communities did their road program before us, and I hate to be- - I hope it snows and we can't see a thing.We did better last year.Well, it's also weather permitting.I mean, if it's snowing, we would cancel.If the roads are covered, we would cancel, I mean.Well, it sounds like a...That's a good day, I guess- - It's fine.I'll shoot for the 2nd, and then- - Let's shoot for the 2nd, if it doesn't work out, we'll just reschedule, okie doke.The other part of it is the...The Valley View Drive cul de sac.And I was gonna have Mark...Mark, there are some drawings in your docket.One of the things we've been talking about is we have a number of streets that are long, dead ends.Mm-hmm.Without any adequate turn arounds, Valley View, Long View, Hammonds.Elm.Elm.What's the one off the- Thompsonfield, we went up there when we were- - Yeah, Algrove.Is that Algrove?Yeah, and we discussed this in house and we thought that the best approach would be to try to do them incrementally, one at a time, and since Valley View is going to be paid this year, we're recommending that we look at putting in a turnaround at 65th.Not that the current standard of 80 feet diameter, but 60 feet diameter, which will be adequate enough for a garbage truck to turn, public works vehicles, and any emergency vehicles.This would necessitate getting additional property outside of the right of way to do this.And we would have to contact the property owners, and it could very well get, if we couldn't work it out, where it may get to the point of eminent domain.Where we'd like to get permission to start the process, so we can be in a position to include that in the paving project.This be for Elm that you're doing that, it'd be easier for the turn.Well, I got one property owner seem amenable, but I'm not sure about the other one yet.We haven't had contact with- - Weren't there three of them then?Nah, actually two.It's actually two.We can lay it out so that we only affect two property owners, so.Okay.now have actually had, what?Just seeing the property owners and task, and probably mention the idea.But we'd like to get Council's authorization on it.I think, you should go- No, I think, you still need to do that.Mark, did I get- Did I get out of this information that you can do the hammer head without impinging on anybody?We could, that would be plan B. - Yeah.Yeah, if the property owners- - Well, that's a fallback, though.It's a fallback- - It's less effective.We could do it, but the only problem it doesn't accommodate garbage trucks.And that's really the big issue of Valley View right now, is the garbage trucks either have to back down, and pull out, or pull in and back up the street.It's just not safe.So, we'd like to...And the 60 foot is not our standard cul de sac, but it's the same diameter.We just did it on , this part of the Anthony Farms deal, and that's working well for the garbage companies.So, we'd like to propose that it's the minimum amount that we can get a garbage truck to- - That's gonna come down in numbers.Yeah, so.You were saying- - I'm surprised a garbage truck can't handle the hammer head, though, it's not big enough, huh?Well, it's got a 40 foot runway, so if we go to plan B and try not affect those property owners, we're still confined to that 40 feet, it's not a 50 foot right away.So, I just don't think they're gonna be able to make that turn.Could you...Do you know how many homes are on that?How many other people are affected by living on that road, and having to potentially be...See the garbage truck going up and down backwards, or...Well, if you- - Say 13, 1,300 feet.Right, so there's probably about 20- - Yeah, 25- 26, lots of- - So, we couldn't ask them to bring their garbage up to the main intersection, so.No. - You should see how steep it is.Yeah, I mean- - I know I'm being facetious.I'm being facetious.Yeah.Yeah, see, that just sounds- - It's about 24, if I understand.Mm-hmm.What is it too small for .And one at the end.So, yeah, actually, I think it's about 28.Yeah.25, 20.All right, anything else under miscellaneous that I know we're in some police cars.Yeah, one other item that- I wanted to bring up, one of the things that we've failed to include in our budget process, and but we think we need to do it, is the post-retirement benefit actuarial study.One of the things we're required to include in our financial reports, as well as just for purposes of budgeting, is the the actuarial value of our post retirement benefits.We've actually been budgeting money annually towards this, which a lot of municipalities haven't.But we do need to get an appraisal, or an actuarial study done about every two years.Is it two years, or three years we do them?It's three years.Three years, and we're recommending that we...We be authorized to enter into an agreement with Mockenhoff Associates, who did the last two.They were the best price the last time we looked at this, to have this done.It's about $5,000, I think, isn't it?Just under it.Just under it.Right.We need a motion.Yes.We are authorized to do the evaluation.Is there a second?I'll second it.Okay, we have a motion and a second.Any further discussion?Hearing none, all in favor of the motion say aye.Aye.Opposed, say nay.Passes six, zero.The last item I would raise is the seeing if there's a possibility of getting a meeting with Panndot next week, either on the 4th, 5th, or 7th.The 4th, or 7th is best for me.Me too.At 16:00 o'clock in the afternoon.Yeah.The 4th.That's not real good for me.Or not good for me either.Are either of the other two better, or is- - The 7th- the time- - The 7th.Thursday.Thursday.That might be better for me, but that, I mean, you know.As long as Mr. Atkinson's here, I'm happy cause I know - - It's more of a meeting to brief you on what's happening with the project, the likelihood of it occurring as well as to update you on this whole situation with the various requests.Okay.That'll be...Well, schedule it, and if I can come, I'll be there.You gotta be careful Frank, there may be decimal points involved, and I would fail.Nah, you'd do okay.Mr. Stiegel never did learn to do decimals, I can tell you, never did.Anyway, I'll be there, Michael, whenever.You tell me when.Well then, we're looking at the 4th, is that what we're...That's fine.That's okay by me.Anybody else- Mr. Ball, how about you, or?4th is okay, 5th is not good.5th is not good either, so.March 4th.Mr. Stiegel, would you be available, or are you not sure?It's pretty hard during the day to do anything.Yeah.You can do it, Barry, come on.Come on.You tell me when it is, and I'll see what I can do.Anything else that we need to talk about under miscellaneous?Just to point out there, we did get the LSA grant.What was that, 250?Yeah.What did we ask for?We asked for 500, a little over 500, but we budgeted for 250.We didn't tell them that, but I think, what happened was we had a project in, Montour Trail had a project in, and they decided okay, 500, we'll give half to you, half to you.Because Montour Trail got them for like, 600 and something.Okay, does anybody have anything for the next agenda.I had.Oh, please.Two things, you had mentioned in one of the prior meetings about the new performance review system.And I didn't know if you'd be prepared to talk about that then.You mean at the next meeting?Mm-hmm.Yeah, sure.And then, I expected to have an executive session, there was a follow up to a request by chief .Yeah, I wasn't sure when we were gonna do that, but yeah, we need to do that, yeah.Mr. Stiegel?Yeah, so the draft fire study, is that, that's available, can we get a copy of that?Yeah, we were hoping to get it more refined, but my understanding is, I have no problem giving it to Council.It was supposed to be an internal review, but we can make you copies of it.Please do.I asked a couple of weeks ago about that.Yeah, I know.I know.They have it a week from now.If it isn't already.Mr. Sifron asked if I .We'll get that electronically, then?I may have...I don't know if I can, or not, I'll have to see, cause the way it was sent, I'm not sure I can do that electronically.I may have to- - How long have they had it, Mike?If we can- How long have they had it, Mike?I'm not sure.We got it about a week ago, a week and a half ago.We've been bombarding the township with our flyers on the workshop that begins tomorrow, on the comprehensive plan.Tomorrow evening, 79 right here in the council chambers is session number one.We hope to see you there, I think, we put some things on your desk.We've been email blasting and the next one's all day at the library.You can stop in there if you can, and then the last one's right in here on Thursday, January 31.When you say all day, tell people that it's like two hours sessions.January 30s in the library, public library, multipurpose room.It's a workshop all day beginning 9:00 AM. There's a 9:00 AM to 11:00 AM, a 12:00 to 14:00, a 15:00 to 17:00, and a 19:00 to 21:00 session.Hope to see- - And those are all the sessions?Attendance at all is not required, they can pick one.Pick one of those times.Correct.Okay.That's where they do the chip game, where they give you some instructions and some background, and then they would...They have two different options they can see how they want to see the township develop, and then they can put down chips as to where they want to see things happen.And that'll be then looked at by the consultant to come up with scenarios, and will be discussed at the following meeting.So, tomorrow night as somewhat of an overview of what has already been completed.That plus we're gonna talk about what other communities are facing, and how they've resolved some issues.We talk about traffic, and we'll talk about the status quo gross scenario findings.And then, talk about what's gonna happen the following two days.So, what's Thursday specifically?Just findings.Wrap up, yeah.Results.Yeah.The January 30 sessions.We got an email today from , and it said that, yeah.Thank you.Okay.Is there anything else?Meeting's adjourned.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Peters_Township_Council_-_January_28_2013.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Peters_Township_Council_-_January_28_2013.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Peters_Township_Council_-_January_28_2013.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/Peters_Township_Council_-_November_12_2012/Peters_Township_Council_-_November_12_2012.mp3", "text": "For Monday, November 12th, 2012.Yes.Mr. Sylvestry, your roll, please.Mr. Berquist?Here.Mr. Arcurie?Here.Mr. Ball?Present.Mr. Steigel?Present.Mr. Axton?Here.Mrs.Merrill?Present.And Mr. Lewis will not be here.Okay, can we ask everybody to stand and join us saying the Pledge of Allegiance?I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands, one Nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.Next item on the agenda will be Special Reports.Next will be Approval of Minutes.I already talked about that we do this every time.Next will be approval of the minutes for the regular council meeting of October 22nd, 2012.I move that the minutes be approved as submitted.Second.It's been moved and seconded and all those in favor, please say aye.Aye.With this, the motion carries.Okay, now we'll get to the special reports.There are none.There are none?Next item will be audience comments.It'll be an opportunity for members of the audience to address council on a non-agenda item, limited to five minutes.Anybody in the audience wish to address council at this time?Okay, seeing we have no unfinished business.particular visitors, say for gasoline and diesel fuel has been a three shape purchasing council.As we discussed at the last meeting, there was an issue with getting a performance bond.Yes, defer that was the low bidder is unwilling to provide performance bond.They, because of their profit margin.And so that would give us the ability to disqualify them and go to the next low bidder, which is our current carrier based on our total gallons anticipated for the year that the total difference in price is $5 and 35 cents.So, yeah, it's negligible.So we're recommending that we.I move that we disqualify Reed Oil and from the prior award, and that we award the bid for gasoline to Glassmere.Second.Okay, and in second and all those in favor, please say aye?Aye.Motion carries.New business.First line will be a presentation by the Mont Rochelle council to deep bridge options, cross valid recruit here?Good evening.First of all, a brief status of where the bridges are.Valley Brook Number one, we've got DEP approval, October 17th.We went out to bid up October 29th.The bids are due November 30th, and we hope to have a notice to proceed for the Valley Brook bridge Number one, sometime shortly after the holidays.The primary reason for the meeting tonight is Valley Brook Bridge Number two is the second one we'll be building.We have a grant for the design.We haven't heard yet from DC on whether we got it.We put a design, a grant in to LSA for construction money, but early on, 10 years ago or so, when we showed plans to council, we showed valley Brook Bridge Number two as being a girder design.We've learned since that time, that a trust bridge, either a prefabricated trust or potentially a reuse of a design that HDR Engineering has offered to the Mont Rochelle council as a design we could possibly use, would be the more cost-effective solution by about two or three hundred thousand dollars.And that's significantly enough, different enough from what we showed you back then, that we wanted to give you some idea of what it might look like, and make sure there are no serious objections to it, and get your approval to proceed along these lines.These are some conceptual renderings that Jon Koloski from HDR, who's here with us tonight, put together to show us what the bridge might look like.If it were essentially the same design as the Clifton Road bridge up in Bethel Park.It would either be something like this or a 160 foot, this is a 200 foot bridge.It would either be this or 160 foot prefabricated design, which would be a little bit smaller than this.Jon came along in case there were questions on the design and why this is superior to the girders that I already showed you before.Can you drive a Sherman tank across it?That's the criteria for me, bout.Is that true H10, Jon?H10, maybe H15.West Valley Brook, right?This is the West Valley Brook, right?Yeah.Yes.That's a long bridge.How long is the one across in Bethel Park?The 200 foot.That's it?That's it.That's the bridge.That's the bridge.That's the design that they've offered to let us reuse if it makes sense.It's cost-effective.Yeah.It's not very attractive.What's your definition of attractive?The one on Clifton Road is in my opinion, not attractive.That's fine, I just saying .I mean, but who cares?I'm not going to be walking across it.If it saves you two or three hundred thousand dollars.Okay.It's a bridge - I don't see anything wrong with it.Jon what's this bridge rated...Objections - No, if there are serious objections in this approval to continue with our design and along these lines would be what I'm looking for, yes.Might be H15, I'd have to check.I believe this is about an H15, your smaller ambulance, for sure.I'm not sure about your bigger truck, we'd have to check.Give me a number on it Jon, what was it?What was the number, and the weight, and age?An H15, it's the highway.15 10?30 ton.30 ton?Yeah.Well, that'll handle anything we put on them.Okay.But the only reason for that is maintenance vehicles.It's just, it's a minimum design load.Infrequent, no big deal.Correct, infrequent.What ages our rebound bridge?I don't know, I'm not sure.Well, it was supposed to be designed for five ton, but it's much more than that because of the changes PendDOT required.You're going to have to close Valley Brook Road to put that up?There'll probably be traffic restrictions at some point, yes.It's a shame it couldn't go on at the same time as the intersection project, because it'll be closed then.When is that happening?It's supposed to happen next year.When was that?Now, wait a minute.If we had the money in our accounts, - I want to hear this answer myself, Mark.I want to hear the answer to myself.It's going to be...It's going to be a two-year project though.It won't be complete until 2015.If cards fall the way we hope they will, we could potentially be doing at the same time, which would be ideal.I can't guarantee that, of course.We'll make them cards fall.People, keep your fingers crossed for LSA and DCR to come through.Well, it sounds like you got your marching orders.Okay, thank you.That would be a great addition, by the way, so.It's needed for safety precautions.Next line will be.You know what?We saw the picture too there that it was taking all the cars parked along the highway.I went by there the other day, there is like 20 cars along there.Someone's going to get hurt Michael.We could request it be a \"No Parking\" area?Okay.Next line will be the final plat approval in Valley Manor, phase four and division two for San Don, and Don Hazel, and Andrew, and to meet the crew.We'll discussed this, I believe back in the summer.So I have open space to put together what's mentioned.I believe the counsel gave stop marching orders, going forward to work out a deal with the three parties.Yes, the amount of open space for the crew property would be 0.058 acres.And for the Hazel property, would be 0.232 acres.And the funds would go into the open space fund to be used for recreation, capital improvements, or land acquisition.For the public, can you just state what the fee was?The fee is it was based on our costs of appraisals for a park property that we purchased and updated.But for the 0.058 acre parcel, it's $1,160, and then for the other parcel, it's $5,658.I move we approve the revised plan.Second - Second it, any other comments at this time?Counsel?Any audience comments?Okay, all those in favor, please say aye.Aye.Opposed?Nay.Nay.So like four to two, in favor.Okay, third item would be re-approval Plato plat.Venetia Point for the Martin Brothers Incorporated.In drawings by Cobalt Professional services dated October 30th, 2012.This plan was approved in 2009.And at the time they were, the reason the revised plan was submitted was they wanted to increase the number of units and make smaller units.So they felt it would be more marketable, since the existing units were not.I remember that.They weren't selling.What did they do, not record it?They did not record it because at the time, there was an issue with tap and availability, and then it just kind of fell between the cracks.And so they came in for a building permit last month or last week and that's when we were informed, but until it's recorded, we can't issue a building permit.So they're asking for re-approval based on all the same conditions.But did the other one expire after certain?After 90 days, if you don't record it, then it expires.Well, I'll move that we approve the Venetia Point revision, subject to the conditions set forth in the August 25th, 2009 letter of, I assume it was a view Mr. Sylvestry?and payment of the fees for plan approval.Second.Okay.It's seconded, are there any other comments from counsel?What, are they here?Yes.What's the issue back there as to why it's taking so long?First concert Cobalt Professional Services.The issue was part of the requirements were approval by Peter's Creek Sanitary Authority.At the time, they were under cap.I couldn't get the planning module approved and it just , that was it.And then the market fell out, and everything, just, everything just stopped.It's my understanding that there was some question about the design that you proposed to Peter's Creek Sanitary.No. - Related to the way that - No. - The laterals were going to be fed in?I'm sorry?Related to the way the laterals were going to be fed in, whether you could share them between two buildings.That's a separate question.Right now, there are nine additional units proposed and there are nine additional laterals being proposed - Hmm hmm.There's a lot of rock on that site.Hmm hmm.And the question you're alluding to is down the road, whether or not we have to make nine cuts across them.I mean, cause the rocks, it's solid rock.I mean, we may have to shoot it.So if we can take two laterals or bring two laterals into one crossing, that was our question.Right now, we're looking at nine laterals, nine additional.We'll break into the main, and that's where we stand right now.When you say you're going to additional walk-on, are you starting to get some interest back there?I don't know if necessarily, I can't say that there's any, but they're looking at things are picking up a little bit.So they're going.Good.Go in, yeah.I'd like to see that get done.Which set of buildings are you planning to do next?I can't answer, but I mean, I don't know what the set or what going to done.Well he got it, he must've applied for something, right?This would be .These six units here.These three units are available.Okay, I see.Hmm hmm.These six.Okay, thank you.Thank you.Thank you.Any other questions?Discussion?Okay it's been moved and seconded, all those in favor, say aye.Aye.Opposed?Okay, carry six, zero.Next item will be a committed to establish a sewage management district for Peter's Creek one or two on a .Peter's Creek is working on an extension of Bower Hill Sewers.This was something that they applied for in 2010 through the local, through the County LSA Program.And it did not occur.They're reapplying for this.One of the conditions that will be that is being made by the DET is that, if within five years of approval, if the sewers are not extended, then the township would have to develop a sewage management district for on lot systems requiring inspections and recordings.We already have this on the books for unconventional on lot systems.And we had to do a similar thing when the value drive sewer project was done.So this is very similar to that.There's a draft letter in your docket.This is where the sewers would go.And the long parallel Bower Hill Road, here's Venetia Road, Bower hill.So this area here right now is not sewer.And so it would pick up these homes on this end.What's it going to get done?It's supposed to, yeah.They've been trying to do this for awhile.You know, kind of also got held up because the issues with it, the corrective action plan.But now that it's part of the comprehensive plan for the 537 district.And it's a priority for the authorities.Like what section of Bower Hill is that?This is Venetia Row right here.Okay, and this is Bower Hill.This is Santa Woods coming up in the back end there.I'm with you, yeah.The only thing I would ask, I think that we should go ahead with this.In the letter, you may want to check the second sentence of the first paragraph.I think you missed a phrase or a noun in there somewhere.Second.Okay.Within five years, I'm thinking, you mean the township will then, or somebody will then implement a sewage management plan.That's basically right along the township border there, Michael.Hmm.Yes.The red line is, you know, there's a touch of land.Well, close to it, yeah.Damn close.Yeah, the creek is the township line.So what do you need from us?Counsel would need to agree to commit to doing a sewage management on lot management plan if the sewers are not constructed within five years.What kind of sewers do they have now?Well, those lots are on lot systems.So septic systems, same amounts, whatever that involves.You know, you would have, we would have to do inspections, the routine inspections.They would have to, they'd be required to do routine pumping of the septic tanks, making repairs, things like that.One moved that the township agreed to establish a sewage management district for the Bower Hill Road area as indicated?It's just been moved and seconded.And do we have any other discussion on this?Are we actually forming a district or is this.No. We would form a district if in five years, if the sewers are not extended.Okay, and that's what the motion is?Right.Okay.Is there anything else?All those in favor, please say aye.Aye.Opposed?Anyone heard three people?Aye.Okay I'm sorry.Motion carries, I have six, zero.Okay.Next line will be an authorization to utilize the services of energy for procurement as a purchase of electricity and natural gas.Mr. Lauer?Your business?Yes.We went out and solicited proposals from a number of firms, for service and energy preference for the township.We have had our experience with on the main energy.And if pleased with their service, they're also one of the largest energy brokers in the state of Pennsylvania.And what that allows us to do as a small energy user is to have our loads aggregated with others, to get us the best possible price.So we're recommending that we once again, enter into an agreement with on-demand energy to work as a broker for the township.Alright, I move that we authorize you to lock in a price through on-demand energy when you believe it's optimal.Was that really what you're asking?Are you asking you to utilize.We're asking you to enter into a contract with them, but what we will in fact do is that at the point in time, when on demand makes a recommendation to us that we'll be able to walk in.So we're kind of putting the cart before the horse here.Well, should we do it all at one time?We can actually, - By the time they say, this is the time to do it, we need to.One, we need the authority to enter into.Right, I knew that, I moved that, you're authorized to continue with on demand energy.Period.Okay.And we will enter into a contract at the optimal time for.Well, no, no, that's what going to be my next motion.As soon as we get through this one.I do have a question.Okay.I do want to second that.Yeah, okay.After the second, I do have a question.On the chart you gave us, it looks like high voltage is a lower rate.So what is your, am I reading that incorrectly or are you?No, you're not.But one of the things that, what this really gets down to, and what I make issue in the report is that there are limited number of markets for electricity and natural gas.So it really doesn't, you know, it gets down to this question of price in part, but it also gets down to this question of service.And one of the things that high voltage does not have is a huge portfolio.And that's what you get with .And so then instead of us entering into our contract, electric contract on our own, what on demand we'll do is aggregate are others, which allow us to get the kind of pricing a large volume customer would get, as opposed to, relying strictly on our amount of electric credential, gas.So what you're basically saying is the big cause of the options on demand has, you anticipate that our rates will in fact be lower, so we will not be losing money.Right.Which is a good explanation that people would like to hear.Thank you.Hmm hmm.It was made and seconded the requests.Are there any concerns?I think we were wondering actually under the natural gas, what is does that unit?DTH. - Stack of therms.Okay, Alright.Well, on that note, all those in favor, please say, aye.Aye.Opposed?Motion carries, six, zero.I'm going to make a motion that you're authorized, that the Township Management authorized to lock in the prices when they feel that it's an optimum price.Second.Okay, this has been made a second and it as well.Any discussion on that item?Okay, all those in favor, please say, aye.Aye.Opposed?That also carries six, zero.Item number six, Payroll and bills, which I reviewed and will recommend that they be approved, I'll make that motion.Second.Any discussion?All those in favor, please say, aye?Aye.Opposed?Those carry six, zero.Correspondence, anything you want to hid on?There's a letter from the Quail Run Homeowner's association Board.And they're asking for the township to make one section of Quail Run Road from Sandpiper here to Scott on the lower side, a \"No Parking\" district.It's exactly the high side of the road.This is the road there.But this area in red, they're asking that that side of the road be \"No Parking\", and that they would only have parking on one side of the road.What's it, it's both sides now?Yes.I guess because of the number of units, they've been having issues with cars, parking on both sides and trying to get through, and that's the main road into the plan.And so they're requesting to that we adopted an ordinance where we were in the process of preparing an update to our motor vehicle ordinance.So this would be added to that if council concurs.Mr. Sylvestry, is this related to too few parking spaces for guests, or is it just the convenient thing that people are doing?I can't answer that.I mean, we, in this plan, this was one of our first big townhouse plans.I think we have some additional parking, but it's not at the, we did not have a requirement that was specific in the ordinance back then.So that could have been a problem back then.Because there is parking in this area.There's some parking over here, but I don't recall that there's very many separate parking lots in that development.And that was, I think we adopted our, we changed our ordinance after this plan to create additional parking for guests.Well, the reason I'm asking is that we just approved finish a point that continue on and to mitigate that in the future, perhaps we need to look at additional spaces for that type of.Well Venetia Point does have a requirement for additional parking.I know, but they really have too many from what I can recall from it.Four.Yeah, that's not very many.We need a motion to approved this or.We just needed indication Council would like us to include that in our update ordinance that we're preparing for the next meeting.I think I'd like to have more information.Okay.As to like, what is the available parking?Because if it's because, you know, they have a lot of guest and there's no place to park, they're just going to park someplace else.You'll cause a problem someplace else in the plan.I think, you know what I'm saying?I mean, shouldn't, we know exactly whether it's what Mrs.Merrill said?Is it visitors or is it people parking there because it's in front of their house and then they're, you know, they don't want to pull it in their driveway or whatnot.I mean, I think before we, that that's a long area of roadway there.I mean, how long is that?Do you know how long that is?It's probably a couple thousand feet.See, that's what I saying.It's also a narrow road, that's the other problem.I mean, I don't have a problem, I've been up there.I mean, it is narrow, but I mean, I don't know if we want to, you know, maybe we'd just be pushing it off of there to some other road that this is going to be even worse.What seen from the.Now see the road is standard size, it's 24 feet.Oh, it's 24 feet?What's seen from the pictures that what's happening is the way people are parking.And it's really creating sort of like a.Like a maze?A maze that people can't get through.And it creates because of the elevation, line of sight issues and go, and when they go around, the curves are up the hems.Well, I mean, if you think it's okay, well God.No, I'm just, I think there's a problem behind the issue.But I think that right now they're looking for some sort of way to make improve safety.So from a safety perspective, I think we should look at what can be done in that particular area.I mean, obviously if there's a safety issue, I don't have any problem with what they want to do, but I mean to just ban the whole side of that street, I don't know.What do you think?I think just looking at the picture and the arc that's there, it did just appear to be a safety issue.And anytime you park on the street, it's always.Yeah.You'd do the same thing in granting more than one side parking there.Well, do you know whether or not the association, like had the homeowners, - I don't know - Input to do that?I mean, you know, we do that, I don't want, you know, 50 Quail Run residents up there screaming, \"Why'd you do it\"?We could, we can ask those questions and get back to you.I would think that, I'd rather do.I think that's proof.Just restricting parking on one side of the street.Right.The letter came from the condominium association.Yes.Tom Frank, President, so.Plan's been there for 30 years, so I think we can probably put it off two more weeks?Well, that's I think.I think I'd want to have more information.Not that I'm not inclined to do it.I know that it is sort of a maze up there sometimes, but I'd rather get it right, than have to redo it.Okay.Thank you.They also have correspondents reports?There are no reports.How about their Chesapeake application?Yeah, that's required by law.Anytime there's, under the new act, anytime there's a well, any adjacent community must notify the adjacent community.This well has actually been under construction last summer.Ed and I were both viewing it when it was being fracked, but I guess they're restarting again with that?New well.What's that?It's a new well.New wells are proposed .Yeah, but it's on the same site.Is that the one it's up behind that hill there?Like across from tracks?No, no, no, this is in Nottingham.You have to go.It's very hard to find.It's in a big ball.It's off of Sugar Run.Oh, okay.Sugar running off of Cooper, is that correct?Off of Cooper.Right.Miscellaneous?Yes.Fuel tax?We have the audit from Auditor General's office on two years of liquid fuels tax.There were no exceptions.There was minor adjustment in the balance, but there's no action required by council.It's just there for information purposes.The other item is there's a zoning hearing board, two zoning hearing board cases coming up, to determine if the council has much to take a position on them.Both are signed variances.One is dealing with an electronic sign and we adopted a new ordinance earlier this year that limits it to one color.The council did act, allow you to have like pictures on it.They requested a variance to be able to have multi-colored pictures.This is a sample - No. - Of the sign that they're proposing.No - That seems like a lot of signage for that building.Is it between the building and the monument?Is that within the square footage, Ed?The building signage is under our square footage that we allow.The freestanding sign is a little over, but they're kind of non-conforming in that.They're just using the same sign that Ethan Allen used to have there by 18 square feet.They're allowed 70, but this sign would be 88 square feet.Can I ask you a question?The applicant, she owned the property prior to the ordinance.That's one of her she did not.Oh, she did not?So her argument is that she was in the process of purchasing in May of 2011 and we adopted our ordinance revision in July of 2011.And so she was in the process.She was in the process.Did she testify at the hearing on that?We haven't had any hearing yet.We passed the ordinance.No. - We would have advertised that ordinance before we adopted it.We had several people, I remember.I guess my issue is that she's trying to say that it's required as for certain vendors.If she would have brought that to my attention, to any of our attention at the hearing, I think I would have been much less inclined to vote for the order.And the question before council is, do you want to take a position recommendation to the zoning hearing?Yes, we have to enforce our ordinance.I don't like those multicolored signs anyway, so, and I've been on record all along.I don't want us to get like, you know, McKnight Road.So if we have an ordinance and it provides for one color, then it's one color, period.What good's having an ordinance, if everybody's going to come in here with, you know, well this happened or that happened, no.That's the ordinance.That's what we approved.That's what they're stuck with.Works for me.That's hard to argue with.I really don't have a problem with it.We spent a lot of time coming up with that and now we're going to change it?Nah.Well, I think the other issue is, is if that signage is actually an excess of what the standard is, she's asking actually for two things, that would be a variance.Well, I think she's grandfathered in on one.One's grandfathered in on the size of the sign, but not digital sign.I would argue that the outside frame of that sign was standing as it was, but that S and P Floors above the digital, she could have moderated the size of the rest of that.Because right now it's empty.There's nothing in there.Yeah, I know, but if we're going to take the position, \"She can't have the color sign\", I'm not going to make her put smaller numbers, smaller letters.I'm saying that, I'm saying it's two things in my viewpoint.And I don't disagree that if we created the ordinance, we need to support the ordinance that we agreed to.But that is an electronic sign that the - The Color Board - The Color Board below is just an example of what will now be changing.Yes.But even Allen didn't have, they didn't have that.But her requirement to.Is blue background, red and, or amber colored zone.And she wants to be able to display colors.Like it shows on.Yeah, what I'm asking is, it says a requirement to be a franchisee for this company requires a display of this particular.That's one of her arguments.But it doesn't have to be electronic.That's true.So she did confirm.So she could put that sign on the other side of the building.Oh, I see.Once that awning of the entrance, right?No, you can't advertise things like carpet plump, like product she markets at the location.She can advertise the name of her business on her building, - Oh. - Not products she sells on the building.So she couldn't put that sign over on that, where's that other picture?She could have it in the window.Huh?According to our ordinance, that colored sign could be in the window.Could be in the window.She is asking for a sign over her entrance.That's another part of her application.Yeah, I saw that somewhere.On entrance.I mean to park up there on the awning side.That's not as good.You guys have the next picture?Is that picture?Oh, I'm sorry.Wake up, Mike, come on, I know.That is her other - At the game when she wants.That she wants now.She couldn't put that side over on the other side of the.No. - Well does that meet our ordinance?Could she ask for a variance over there to put that sign?To put what sign?The one that says carpet, whatever.No - No. - Well she could ask for a variance, but.My point is she saying she needs that colored sign because she's a franchisees for this company.If I understand is correct.That is correct.And she wants to put it on the electronic board and we're saying electronic boards, we own allow colored, but one color.Right.And what I'm saying, so I'm with Frank.I don't want to change ordinance, but she could also ask for variance to just put that sign somewhere else in the building and not be on the electronic board.And we might be willing to pass that is what.Kind of like Mattress discounters, remember has a big service on in the window.Yeah.Yeah.And you just said.Imagine this company had 19 little placards the other weekend.So you get like Mr. Lewis, your cotton placards.Just letting you know that.There's options available for her to display.That's what I'm trying to get to.There are options.It doesn't have to be electronic.It could be another option somewhere to fulfill her obligation to her franchisor.That is correct.She's a franchisee, it would be the franchisor.Or. - Or. - Right.That's all I'm getting to.I mean, because you don't want to restrict any franchisee from fulfilling his franchisor obligations.Right.So do I have any views?I'm getting confuse, Jon.Do I have some directions?Send the position to the zoning hearing board for council.Our position would be, follow the ordnance.Following the ordinance, - And to encourage her to.But we're willing to look at other options for her to fulfill her franchisor obligation.Okay.There's a principle and then there's a second one.What's the second one?Wow.The second one - That hurt me.Is for Sun Chevrolet.Whoops.They're asking for variance to put - Whoops.Whoops.Events.Okay.What does it look like?Signs, signs, everywhere signs.That's why I'm telling you guys.Walking of the scenery.You got zoning here and board member her tonight.He's not allowed to speak on us.Just soak it all in Jon.Okay.They're asking for a variance for, to have two signs because now that, similar to what was approved for thousand where Southfield Lincoln, where there's the main sign on the office side, there's a little smaller sign that basically it?That's it.Two signs on one facade.Which they had previous.Correct.And what's the total square footage, does it still meet our requirements?Less than our requirements?See, I. - I don't have a problem with that.I don't have a problem with it either.I think the other side.Because they're not digital signs.That's not a standard Chevy, that's not standard Chevy building.Is that another franchisee thing?It is a franchisee thing.Okay, anything else on this line?Yes, there's a request by Mr. Albert Cashier, Public Works.American Public Works association is looking to do a fundraiser with a bunch of public works departments.Similar to what you see in that intersection, like Penn State or the Fire Department to raise funds for Hurricane Sandy Relief.With Mr. Albert Cashier proposing is to be able to go out probably this weekend and have a couple of trucks at the corner and be out there with some volunteers to solicit funds from Patsy Motors.But you're saying that he's donating this to Salvation Army, not to Red Cross?No, Salvation Army.Well I'm good with Salvation Army.You need to motion to get further consensus.Consensus?I would agree.I passed out a couple of things.The gas impact fee, you said you did get a final number?Yes.It was 259,000 and some change.It was basically about 2000 less than what the original ones said, it wasn't bad.At the next meeting, we have a public budget hearing or budget workshop next Monday.We've also advertised a special meeting to talk about healthcare.We have to give the answer to NIT by the 20th.We weren't ready for tonight.So we're going to have that.And we just wanna let you know that Rick Enscoe from Enscoe Long will be there, in addition.The meeting with Verizon to look at Valley Brook is on the 20th at 9 a.m., Tuesday.We did advertise a public hearing for the next meeting for a budget amendment.It is basically technical amendments to put us in compliance before the end of the year for the 2012 budget.And I also passed out a list of board appointments, the council boards that are rough.I got a double check ETB. I just received the email from Mrs.Zachary.I think her terms is fine cause she's doesn't want reappointment because she's moving out of the township.I'll double check that one.Who was that Michael?Kim Zachary.Oh. This is the board appointments.We'll get you a current attendance on these for next meeting.Any other agenda items?That's all I have.I have two things.General information.The high school recently participated in an event called \"Lived up\", which I might be saying incorrectly, where they created a video to be posted in a competition with other high schools.The entire school participated.And there's the potential for the school to win $5,000 based on votes.So if anybody out there would like to go online and look at this \"Lived Up\", and vote for the high school, I'm sure that will be very appreciative.It's great, a little program.They had to, they were given a song.They had to lip sync, so to speak to it.Pan through the school and do different things.It's really very nicely done.So I would encourage you to do that.We know how to get.It's on the internet.I don't have the actual login, but I think if you went to Peters Township High School, they have a link to it from the high school.Yes, the Patch Mic.The Patch Mic.Yes.And then, the only other thing I wanted to say is Happy Veteran's Day to everyone and thank you for your service.Any items for next agenda?If there's not, meeting's adjourned.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Peters_Township_Council_-_November_12_2012.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Peters_Township_Council_-_November_12_2012.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Peters_Township_Council_-_November_12_2012.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/Peters_Township_Council_-_Regular_Meeting_-_December_19_2016/Peters_Township_Council_-_Regular_Meeting_-_December_19_2016.mp3", "text": "Now that we're all here, may we have a roll call.Mrs.Merrell.Present.Mr. Stiegel?.Present.Mr. Berquist.Finally here.Mr. Lewis.Here.Mr. Arcuri.Here.Mr. Ball.Present.Mr. Kosir?.Here.Please rise and join us as we pledge our allegiance.I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.Two sets of minutes to review or approve.One is from the regular council meeting of December 12th, 2016, discussion or a motion?I'll move to be approved.Second.Moved for discussion if not, all those in favor, please say aye.Aye.They who'd oppose would be nay.That motion carries seven zero.Next is to revisit a transcript of a public hearing that was held September 19th, 2016.There were a number of proposed suggested comments and or edits.What we did was to go back and pull the video that was shot by Peters Township community television, checked the areas that were of concern to Mr. Ball, where they needed to be corrected, they were corrected and those that were stated as they were were left.This now reflects what happened at that meeting.Any other discussion?Very difficult to really...I'll make a motion that we approve the transcript.Do anything other than accepting.Second.Motion's been made, seconded, all those in favor, please say aye.Aye.I'm going to abstain, I wasn't in the meeting.Our next opportunity here is to congratulate two of our firefighters.Do we have someone that has a speech or am I gonna read mine by myself?We've got Chief McLaughlin, we also have Firefighter John and Firefighter Hopkin with us.Okay.And we're gonna, - I'm going to need to elaborate.And Mr. McLaughlin has some things he'd like to say, but we're going to show you a video of exactly what this competition is.Well thank you for taking the time tonight to recognize us.The fire department is generally a very humble organization.We don't toot our own horn but when people toot it for us, we thank you and appreciating us for that.When people go above and beyond what we normally do, we try to recognize those things.Chief Bill and Brittany have done that throughout the entire year in 2016.They've taken the time to go to these competitions and compete and every they compete, they wear our gear.They represent township, the fire department and all the residents of the township as well.They wear Peters Township proud, they're very appreciative of the opportunity that they got to do this in Peters Township.It all started in April of 2016 when they went to FDIC to compete and both of them ran so well throughout their competitions in the year that they got invited to the world challenge where over as you see in your notes, 450 firefighters from 12 different countries and 20 United States came together to compete in this competition.What is the competition?I can only show you the video, I can't explain it.They've explained it to me a couple of times, I've watched it in person, I've tried to do it myself, it's not easy.They call it the fastest two minutes in sports.Is it a sport?Well, we're competing for things.It really gives you the idea of the basic firefighter's skills between dragging and lifting and hitting that we take advantage of all the time.So Mr. Lowell, if you would please.Firefighter Hoffman is on the right-hand side here.Holy cow!They're lifting a hose, a roll of hose up the roller hose, another 40 pounds and everything is precise here too.If they miss stairs on the way down, there's penalties.If they don't drop the hose in the box, there's penalties.Everything is under timing because it's such a close time, they have to be precise with their movements as well.They have to touch every stair on the way down.This next maneuver is called the Kaiser's Sled is to simulate forcible entry.The weight of that sled is 130 pounds of sled.That piece of steel that she's hitting.A mallet, a rubber mallet.Finally, the dummy drag at 185 pounds, distance of 150 feet.106 feet.Guys, thank you for your support in this.We appreciate your recognition but honestly, you're recognizing these two.Bill and Brittany have done a phenomenal job not only at the fire station and what we do, but also representing the township and the fire department in broad, so thank you guys.Can you tell us what the awards are that you have and what they're for?Yeah, we each ran it's kinda like the Olympics in firefighting.We're there for a week, you're running every day and even though you were invited, you qualify for the challenge.You every day proceeding and to see whether or not you made the finals.And we both made the finals in individual, candidate and relays.We were all pleased with our runs.Brittany ended up with a bronze medal in the female tandem, running with a firefighter in Canada, she's from Alberta.And sometimes when you're with a smaller department like ours as opposed to big departments and they send 10 or 11 people, you're looking to build teams from other departments.And we both ended up with relay with relay medals, Brittany ran that.And when it's a relay race, all those six stations are split up between four and five firefighters.Brittany ran in Natal on the final and they ended up with gold medal, probably one of the most fun races to watch 'cause it was a pretty tight finish, but they won the gold and they just missed a world record by three tenths a second.And it was 90 degrees out every day, it was a tough weekend.I, along with a two buddies, we started with three.We ended up having to run them in the finals without only, we started with four, one guy got injured, so one of us had to run an extra leg, but we ended up just coming in second to New Zealand , in the men's master relay.We ended up with the silver medal, so we're pleased with that.And we just met a lot of great firefighters there.The woman that Brittany ran into in the preliminary in the video you saw is the captain to the Greensboro, North Carolina fire department.She's also a world champion powerlifter.I've seen her lift 450 pounds and Brittany beat her.Next year you'll be in Kentucky, right?The finals world yes will be in Kentucky.The first race of the year will be at the fire department instructors conference in April.We'll start then and pick three or four races throughout the year just to make sure we qualify all of us into getting by all right.You were on duty last night, I could hear your voice up old trails, I guess.That was an interesting evening.Somebody ran through the garage?Is that what I saw?Yeah, a little accident with a neighbor losing control of the vehicle and crossing into the neighbor's property and through their garage.Thankfully no injuries.I was expecting a young person to be in the midst of that but not necessarily.Well, thank you very much and congratulations.Next element of this meeting is audience comments.Do we have anyone in the audience wishing to address a non agenda item?We're losing all the two people in the audience, they're both writing diligently.I presume that means there's no audience comments.I got carried busy scribing some of these reviews.The next part is unfinished business which we can dispense with because there is none.New business.Anthony Farm's planned lots phase three.Now we know where Mr Zilkha is here.This is a simple plan that's not creating new lots, all it is doing is rerecording store basements on lots 304 and 305 and rerecording the sanitary sewer through the year to new easements that are centered over the as-built lines they discovered when they were doing construction easements were off, so this plan simply corrects that.Planning commission did review it at the December 8th meeting and recommended council approval subject to no conditions.And we approved the Antony Farm's plan to launch phase two My calendar says here it's November 4th 2016.Second.All those in favor, please say, aye.Aye.Anyone opposed to be nay.Motion carries, seven zero.Next is a D-dock change order, something we're not familiar with.This because Ryan was in charge of this project.If you haven't had a chance to see the new stage structure, this is it's current condition.There's some paving that still needs to be done when the spring comes.I think everyone will agree it's a dramatic improvement over the prior stage.The construction on the project is done.There were a couple of minor changes that were required during construction.The net effect is that there's a change order deducting $256 off of the construction costs.I'll make a motion that we approve change order number one.Second.I have a question, is this the change order that pertains to the rafters or something like that?There's actually a couple of things.There's a rafters, we had some additional supply lines for the water extended to the outside because we're going to put an outdoor drinking fountain there.And there was an addition of a utility sink and the plumbing to accommodate that.What was the reason that you gone from the metal rafters to the wood?It had to do with the ability to get the materials and given where they are located, the architect didn't feel that it made any substantial difference in the structure in terms of its integrity.What about longevity?I'm not sure that it's going to make a difference given where this is located in the structure.Well, are they treated wood?I would imagine that they be treated.It's pressurized wood.They should hold up better in the outdoors.Any other comments?If you have a question, a second?All those in favor please say aye.Aye.Anyone opposed would be nay.That motion carries seven zero.Next item, a little more of consequence, I guess.It is an ordinance levy on the tax on real property on Peters Township in the year 2017.What is being proposed is to set the millage at 1.522 mils.When the information was sent out to council, Mr. Ball correctly identified that we had a typographical error and we've corrected that and that ordinance is in front of you.The intent of this millage rate is to put the township in a position, not to realize a windfall, but simply to be in a position to collect the same amount of property tax that we would have received had not there been a reassessment.Now, as we have discussed at workshops, in many regards, this is a guess because what we don't know is the aggregate assessment for Peters Township is a moving target and appeals are coming in every day to court.And so what the ultimate aggregate assessed value of Peter's township will be, will be something that will change.But this is our best attempt to create a situation where the township is left whole after the reassessment.It looks like a lot of the appeals, at least the ones that we've seen, initially have been no change.And I'm assuming that at least some of those are being appealed to some place.Yes, again, not so much concern about the residential appeals, but we do not have a clear understanding yet of how many commercial appeals will be taken to the county.And I think that again, individuals have 30 days from the time they receive a decision to make those appeals.And we're still in a period of time where people are filing appeals to court.Mr. Lowell, normally we equate a dollar value to a mil.I think last year it was 314,000 or something like that for one mil.So does this calculation equate to that or is there another number that we were described to?Well, it's relatively easy now because we're at a hundred percent of valuation, so for every thousand dollars that your house is assessed, it's $1.52 that you applied to that.And what people are going to discover is what we predicted was people who live in older homes, who were here in 1981 will find that their local tax burden and school district tax burden will go up.And those people living in newer homes may well find that their taxes are going down.But there's not a direct correlation to a number.I didn't do that calculation.I mean, like I said, it would be easy to do.All you're you're doing is $1.52 cents about 50 times whatever this is.The point I was trying to make is it's variable.In the past, we could make a statement that one mil equals X amount of dollars for the township and that is not the same anymore.It would be a different amount.Yes, you'd look at this in tenths of mils at this point.Right, that's what I was trying to say.People were normally used to hearing a certain number equals one mil but that's not the way we can work it out anymore.Further discussion.I'll make a motion that we approve ordinance 810.The mil one's submitted.Second.Any further discussion?All those in favor, please say, aye.Aye.Anyone opposed please say nay.That motion carries seven zero.It follows is the school district tax rate, the same as it has been this though, do they reset that rate in whatever...They will reset their rate in the late May or early June and what I will tell council's what I've been telling everybody who calls up because we've been getting a number of calls about what's the school district millage going to be.I don't think they're in a position to know that yet, we certainly aren't in a position to speculate on it.When they get closer to the time when they need to set their millage, just like the county provided us the aggregate assessment, they will provide them as well.The one advantage that they will have over us is that by that point in time, some of the appeals will have been settled.And the other thing is even for those ones that have not been settled, do at least have some idea of what the scope of the appeals are.So I think they're going to be in a little bit better position than us.Just a minute, the question that everybody seems to be asking, at least that I keep hearing is so okay, I understand this is our township actioning tax, but what's my total tax bill?And I keep referring them to Mr. Belzec of Renton school district to make that decision.All right, do we move on?The next would be an ordinance adopting the Peters Township 2017 operating budget, which for those that have not seen the documents there's a copy of available here in the township.And then there's a copy here, there's a copy on the website.There's a copy in the library, so it's available readily to the public.One thing I would like to say is that the budget itself is the reflection of work from a lot of different groups and individuals.Certainly this year was a little bit more interesting from the staff side because we have a lot of new people involved in the process.I really want to thank Brian and Tom because they stepped up and helped a whole lot to get this to where it was at.And of course council's role in this whole process and the amount of time that you spent is really remarkable.And one of the things that I'm very thankful for is one of the things I got from council was very clear direction which made the process of putting this together a little bit easier than it might've been otherwise and so I thank you for that.Although it does bear some bad, right?Which is our expenditures exceed our revenue.Our expenditures exceed our revenue in part, that's because we're going to be spending some of the funds that we borrowed this year and we'll hopefully be buying an ariel fire truck.We're also doing some work on the park lands and some of that will be paid for with some of the borrowed funds.But yes, there is a gap between the amount of money we're spending and the amount of money we're taking in.It's going to create a challenge for us in terms of monitoring the budget as the year goes on.One of the discussions I'm gonna be having with department heads on Wednesday is to get them to begin to think in terms of not only their department, but the community as a whole and find a saving so that in fact by the end of the year, that gap is somewhat closed.I do believe as I've told council, particularly since we've taken on additional debt service this year that in 2018, we should anticipate in Peters Township that there will be a property tax increase.I'll return for that, we've picked up about 50 acres of new property that we hope to develop to everybody's benefit.All right, can we have question?Well, there were some discussions we had before about our earned income tax revenues being flat or actually decreasing, they were going to look into that.I mean, did you figure anything out?Yes, I think we have a pretty good idea of what's happening, there isn't a solution to this though.I believe that it's largely tied to the oil and gas industry downturn in that industry.I think that has directly impacted our earned income tax receipts as well as in speaking with Keystone, we're seeing this throughout Washington County.In addition to that, we have some key earned income taxpayers, the top 10 payers and in the revenues from those individuals alone, there's a decrease of about $95,000 in earned income tax receipts.I think until the oil and gas industry turns the corner, I think it's going to be a challenge and that's why earned income tax receipts for next year are budgeted to be flat from this year.But on a positive note, we have a few businesses that have come into the township, potentially we'll gain some revenue from the people they employ and so that's a positive.Can I ask now for a motion?You could have asked the question.I move that we approve ordinance number 811, approving the 2017 Peters Township operating budget.Second.Opportunity for more discussion.All those in favor, please say aye.Aye.Anyone opposed would be nay.That motion carries seven zero.We have one more ordinance to adopt, the 2017-2021 capital improvement program.I didn't bring that binder, you were provided that earlier.Well, actually in the back section of the budget, there's a complete listing.In addition to that in the manager's report, I provided you a summary of the 2017 projects that are being proposed.It's an ambitious program for next year.Again, we're going to be meeting amongst ourselves on Wednesday morning to talk about how it is we're going to get this program implemented for next year.And would the list of capital projects be in the handouts - Discussion?We need another person to move motion.I move that we approval the ordinance 812 adopting the Peters Township capital improvement program.I'll second.No further discussion, all those in favor, please say aye.Aye.All opposed will be nay.The motion carries seven zero.Payroll bills, I've reviewed the invoices and the values that are posted.I was somewhat surprised with the number of them in the short period of only one month, one week.I suggest we have a motion approved.So moved.All those in favor, please say aye.Aye.Anyone opposed will be nay.That motion carries seven zero.Correspondence, there was none.Reports, there are several.Anyone over the discussion items relative to various reports that were included in the document.The one item that I did make note of in the report and it's really not part of the report itself, but we have been notified by a representative of Maher's office that we will be receiving a $250,000 grant to do improvements of the shelter and the playground in Petersburg park.And I will tell you this, on many occasions the DCED simply uses the representative's office as a way to pass that message along.But in this particular case, that grant as much as Ms. Harmel did a wonderful job in putting that application together, the receipt of that grant has a lot to do with representative Maher's intercession on our behalf.He arranged for the secretary for the department to come and visit us.He's lobbied with them directly.He's done a yearman's job in terms of representing the community and as a result of that, you have this grant.Maybe you can extend an invitation to him to come in and present the check to us in person and thank him for all of his help.Okay, we can do that.On to further miscellaneous.I have a few things.Please.In your docket, there is a record of attendance for boards.I'm giving you this now but you're going to see this again on January 2nd but highlighted other people who are up for reappointment and you can make a judgment as to whether or not their service is adequate to be reappointed.One of the things that we did learn is that the zoning hearing board would like to have a second alternate, so we need to fill that position.We still have positions to fill in the environmental quality board.And so my question to you is I have tentatively on schedule to do interviews on the 9th of January.Is that something that council wants to do?It fills the whole month I believe.Well, there's a question with regard to the other item there that that possible workshop.But I mean, do we want to do the interviews on the ninth so we can get the boards all up?I think that's appropriate.Okay.The other thing, we are out still searching for candidates for the Peters Township sanitary authority.I had cause to speak to Mr. Silvestri.He was asking about the township and I was explaining to him the deed with regard to the Peters Township sanitarian authority and he has suggested that if council thought there would be value to his service, he would be willing to serve on that board, so I just put that up for you.Have we had any other applicants for that position?Mr. Coby, who is the chairman of the Peters Creek sanitary authority, who actually lives in the service area for the Peters Township sanitary authority, has offered to serve on both boards.And we have one other individual who I'm not familiar with, who has submitted an application.I would want to have the Sylvestri guy come in so we can interview him.In seriousness, I don't know that you can find a more qualified individual to put on board but right now, it's struggling to hire a new manager of the department, you've got a couple of board members, one who will be leaving relatively soon but anyway, in addition to it, I think we've got to take action and take the motion to appoint Michael.I don't disagree that Mr. Silvestri is in a unique position to contribute, but I think it would be somewhat inappropriate to not talk to the other people, that would be my only concern.And also talk to him a little bit about his thoughts related to the position, we don't normally discuss board appointments.I quite frankly would think it would be an insult to ask him to come in for an interview.We've been working with him for 40 years.Do you make a motion?I would make a motion to appoint Mike Silvestri.And I would second.Further discussion.Apparently there is none.Well, Mr. Lewis and I exchanged an email about this.I just would like to have a conversation with Mr. Sylvestri before I vote in his favor, but since you've made a motion and there's a second on the floor, feel free.Yeah, I just think in this instance, we do have a sense of urgency.I think you actually pointed that was in the initial aspect of it.I think the consequences of not taking action here and the opportunity to get Mike's participation, they might hire a manager.Can we have a roll call please?Sure.Mr. Kosir.Aye.Mr. Ball.Aye.Mr. Arcuri.Aye.Mr. Berquist.Aye.Mr. Stiegler.Aye.Mrs.Merrell.I'll abstain.Mr. Lewis.Aye.Motion carries six zero one.Thank you.Other miscellaneous.I just wanted to point this out to you.We were approached by the Peters Township hockey club.The club is a high school club, but at one point in time, that wasn't true.When I first started here, the hockey club was actually a club of the township.They wanted to come up with a throwback jersey and they needed our permission since our logo shows up on it.And they wanted to share with you what that jersey looks like.This is actually going to, I believe, be a fundraiser for the hockey club but the jerseys must work, they've used them in one game and won that game.So I just wanted you to be aware of that.And thank you, I'll use that as a jumping off point for an event that takes place on Wednesday.It is a charity event for funds for this cotton fashion family.It's the Peters township alumni hockey game against Cannon Mac alumni, it will be at south point.I believed in helping Tom, it was at 7:30, although I'm not certain of the time I gave them.Our time is 6:50 PM. - Okay.What time?6:50, I think it had to do with ice time.So they crap up the game over by what, 9:17, right?Not a minute over.Donations are $5 and kids are free, so I would encourage anyone that would like something to do on a non stormy night, Wednesday, I think would be a great gesture to fill the place.I just have one last thing and one of the things I put in front of you, if you're interested, we have a bar mitzvah hand a report as to the payoff at the Rolling Hills country club, that's to be filed in court shortly after Christmas I understand.It's on the bottom, it's the last thing.I'd be interested.I don't have one.Well, look at mine.And that last item, we opened the bids today on the Bauer Hill school, we've received one bid, it's from Tom Robinson.Tom is the individual who renovated the matching school to this and so his bid is $25,500, which was pretty much cover our costs.One of the things that we've asked him to do is to take a good look at the building and to be able to give council some idea of whether or not he thinks it can be renovated because we took bids two ways.One, renovating the building and maintaining the facade and two, tearing the structure down and I thought it might be important to council to understand what his intention was before we award the bid.He's been given access to the building and he's going to get back to us.I know his initial thought was renovating the buildings when he wanted to do.His concern is the structural stability of the building.I'd like to take a few moments to reflect on what we've gone through this year.I thank this council.I certainly want to thank the other members of the council for their indulgence, we've had a very busy year.The staff has been great in helping us come up with, do I want to call them replacements or new additions to the community's resources and certainly different challenge.I think that hopefully the tagent doesn't ever have to face to this degree again.And Paul, my hats off to you, the whole members out here.Do we need to recite all the people that we've had to replace?Well, we don't need to recite all of them, but I can tell you this.The one thing that I feel so comfortable with is, and this is in part the wisdom of council's decision-making, the people who you have hired to replace really long-term department heads has been outstanding.Mr. Herson, Mr. Grimes, Mr. Lennick, they are just wonderful people.And these were difficult positions to step into given that somebody's occupied them for so long and done so well, but each of them has met that challenge.And I can tell you working with Ryan, he picks it up quick, give him a project it gets done, so we've got a good team in place right now.I just genuinely feel that way myself with a lot of anxiety going into the year.Absolutely, I agree.We can look forward to moving ahead with this.Anybody else have any comments?We did not receive an LSA grant and the grant was for the streetscape project.We added a second application with the state of Pennsylvania and that was not funded either.We're going to go back and look at the streetscape project and try to arrange it in a way that we can do it within the funds that we've had budgeted.And I think we can accomplish that by pairing the project back some.Just driving around the township, it just seems like we've got a lot of areas where I talked to Mr. Zilkha about this today, where we've got water running over the roads creating a lot of icy conditions.I saw one today on Southern Church Road, right past Southern church.There was another one on East McMurry road and I'm trying to remember the other one I've seen.I've never noticed them in these particular areas before.We had two inches of rain followed by a 15 degree night, it was an unusual circumstance all over the South hill.There are going to be reoccurring problems throughout this whole road.Route 19 coming down toward, that's Bowzer, I guess I would say water running down this separate territory public works.I was on the phone this morning early...I'm surprised we don't have more accidents, comes around that turn and it's right there.But you're absolutely correctly there.You saw more of that this morning than you would normally see.And I know the guys, although they spent a lot of hours doing snow and ice removal over the weekend, they were out first thing this morning hitting those icy spots.Okay, thank you.Next agenda items, which would be on the purpose of the press, holiday on January 2nd.We're all coming in that day.And at that meeting, we'll be recognizing two individuals, one is Sergeant Collins will be here to be presented his medal for heroism.And then in addition to that, Mr. Rogers is going to be here, Joseph Rogers, he's 102 years old.He'll be celebrating his 102 birthday and we're going to be presenting him the key to Peters Township.Very good.Anything else, that's it?The meeting's adjourned and with that Thank you very much.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Peters_Township_Council_-_Regular_Meeting_-_December_19_2016.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Peters_Township_Council_-_Regular_Meeting_-_December_19_2016.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Peters_Township_Council_-_Regular_Meeting_-_December_19_2016.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/Peters_Twp._School_Board_-_Buildings_and_Grounds_Committee_-_Feb._4_2013/Peters_Twp._School_Board_-_Buildings_and_Grounds_Committee_-_Feb._4_2013.mp3", "text": "Indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.Okay, we've got a lot of things to cover tonight so we're gonna try to move this long as fast as I can.I'd like you all to try to limit the time on each topic that you wanna talk about.We're gonna bounce around the agenda a little bit because of the inclement weather we wanna get right to safety and then let our friends from HHSDR do their presentation to get on their way.So we're gonna first start with safety and, talk to?Okay, thank you, Mr. Dan LaVey.One of the concerns that we have in the district, and we do an annual audit of safety of each building, and obviously, based on some of the events around the country we've been...It's on, just get closer.Yeah.We've been more concerned about that issue.And I do want you to know that we've been doing expect inspections of each building in the district.We've included fire, police, our principals, our director of building and grounds.We've also included our architect, HHSDR and we did a complete tour of the facility.Mr. Wasik and myself also accompanied that tour.And I think what you're gonna see is there are gonna be some immediate things done in the district to improve security.And we're also gonna be involved in some long range planning to improve security around the school district, building by building.Obviously we're not gonna, at this point, discuss the details of the safety measures we're taking, because there is an element of confidentiality in some of the issues that we're addressing.Mr. French, you may wanna share with the board, the more comprehensive booklet that we did on school security.Thank you.Just real briefly, I know this wasn't a main topic tonight.As Dr. Imperio said, we did do an evaluation of all the buildings.We did a fairly thorough booklet meant for discussion purposes, but I don't think, like you said, you wanna maybe save some of this for later discussion due to the confidentiality of what we've found as far as security in each building.This is, was identified as phase two.So as mentioned before, I think phase one was addressing some immediate needs at each of the schools.And then what you'll find here with further explanation later is the next step you would wanna take a look at.When you look at it yourself, it may be a little confusing.I think that's why it's a good opportunity to sit down again and go through it pretty thoroughly because there's different options for each school.And obviously each option has a different threshold of cost to try to address the needs.So with that, I think I'm gonna pass this booklet out and then you guys can think about it a little bit until we get together again.And while Mr. Francis, distributing the booklets, remember this is phase two.Phase one are more immediate issues.I have shared those with the board by the weekend review, and you'll be seeing some of those items for approval on the February agenda.So this is what we would describe as more, a little more long range.Okay, does any board members have any questions on that?Well, Ron is, did we get to look at it?Yeah, well, basically, yes, this is really just for us to know that this has occurred.Review what- - That's right.You have all come up with and then for further discussion in one of your future meetings or something.Correct, that is correct.Okay, our next topic is gonna be McMurry Elementary.And once again, Mr. France is gonna be giving us a little dissertation of what our issues are.And, Mr. France, I don't wanna steal any of your thunder, but we did talk about phasing this project as well.So you will see it in several stages.Right, thank you.John's passing out a handout that summarizes some of the priorities we identified at McMurry.And just to start off, I don't know how familiar everybody is with John, but John, he was a, he's an engineer in our office.He's our, one of our site civil engineers.And he's been very heavily involved with the fields at Pleasant Valley.So if you have any questions with that, John can answer that.But I think he's also gonna be here for the discussion later about the athletic complex.Yeah, just a little brief history at McMurry.The last time I think I was here, we talked about the pyrite issues at McMurray and some of the expansive soils that have been moving under there.I think last time I was here, it was back in January of last year.And it was just a, basically a briefing of, of the update of the report that you usually get.You have a monitoring come in, you have Elliot Surveying that comes in and establishes points throughout the building.And then they measure the change in difference at those different points.Also at that time, the board had chose to take a path at that time to kind of just wait and see and monitor those findings.As they develop, you had borrowed money along with your work.You had identified at Pleasant Valley at the time and set it aside in case it got to a point where it was needed to further address.So tonight, just real briefly to touch on that.You've had your recent round of, of reports back from the surveyor and they were done in November of last year, 2012.And basically the findings are pretty much the same as what we've expected in general, in the same areas that have been suspect in the previous reports.It's still moving in those areas too.It's approximately about a quarter of inch more.It seems like the areas that are affected, those areas are continuing to move.It's not drastic.It's nothing to be alarmed or concerned about.I think at this point, as you decided in the past, I think it's something you can just continue to monitor, be diligent about, about the situation there and constantly keep your eyes open for different situations to developed, but it's not something that's gonna occur overnight.It would be a real hazard.It's just something that we need to be aware of.As I've pointed out in the past, it's not related to the structure of the building.It's all entirely independent of the structure that the structure is sound there.It's localized to the floor slab and anything that's constructed off of that first floor slab.The upper floors are completely safe, as is the first floor.Is it still mostly on the one, in the one area though, it's not the whole floor, right?It's mostly just that one side still?Correct.The front of the building is okay and the back of the building is okay.And it's that middle seam of the building that is really being shifted.And it's that mechanical room through the stage and over across to the office area and the old kindergarten wing.If you recall our discussions at one time, the way that building was constructed, there was a lot of cut and there was a lot of fill on there.And if you look at the topography of the site, you can actually see the profile of how they carved out the hillside to place the building there.On the backside of the building is where they did the significant amount, most amount of cut to construct the building.And that's where they took out all the pirated material.At the front of the building is where they put a lot of fill.So there's a lot of overburden over top of the pirate that was still buried.So it's safe, it wasn't disturbed.It's that seem right through the middle, where it was closest to the cut, not enough was removed and that's what has become expansive.And that's what's affecting the four slabs.Mr. Perez, I have a question.The information that a John Carly handed out here with all the photos of what looks like some damage, that has nothing to do with the pirate, does it?Is that a second topic- - That's the second topic, yeah.If anybody has any questions about the pirate, as I said, I think it's something you wanna monitor, but if you wanna- - And I'm sure that Mr. Gall has full control of this and knows what to look for.But when you say things that might show up, red flags, and you say it should be monitored, when is the next time that you would come out yourself or whoever you have, or however this works, how often are we thinking in a year, six months, three months, unless Mr. Gall finds something else, what do you mean by monitor?The process up to date since 2010 has been every six months.You have your surveyor come in, shoot the points, and then I kind of review them and share them with the administration on what the next step would be.So I would suggest you continue that, correct.Okay.Thank you.Okay, anybody have any more questions on the pirate?No?Okay, then we'll move on and talk about.Okay.Excuse me, I don't have a question about the pirate, but I'd like to know was this because maintenance wasn't being done, these things then, or...Well, let's start on those there.What John handed out there was a, a list of priorities that we've established and this was initiated by Mr. Meesha.He wanted me to come out one day late last year and take a look at some of the, the water leaking in the library and also some windows that were leaking.That's how he reported them to me.And what we found was some of the windows in the existing building are leaking air and water, the most significant areas are in the library, I've identified that as priority one here.That cost there is to replace those windows.For whatever reason, that's on a weathered side of the building.It's exposed to a lot of rain and wind and the gasketing on the windows, they're wood windows, and they have aluminum cladding on the outside of them.The gasketing on those windows has failed.It's not a maintenance item.I don't know that what could have been done to prevent that.It almost seems like it's a combination of the manufacturing of the window and the combination of the weather and just the harsh conditions on it.For some reason on that side of the building and the openness of the space driving against that side of the building, probably a slew of different things I could name.But given that, that's the condition you have there now.If you look at the first photograph there that kind of describes to you, shows you where we're at on the building, these are the seven windows that are in front of the building facing the parking lot.This is the upper library.These are areas that are failing.There's also two windows on the upper corridor of the second floor that are also, have this condition.If you look on page three, this is an up-close of that library.You can see that bottom sill from the water compromising that gasketing of the glass, the water gets in behind that aluminum threshold.And just basically soaks that wood until it rots.And then the window has failed at that point.The lower picture on page three, you can see all the aluminum trim is pushed away because the wood behind it has swelled.And it's just, push that aluminum off of there.Same thing with page four, you can see on the upper part of that trim on that bottom window, the gas fitting is pushed out of it.So all those pictures there, I just, I just noticed those were at the library and I've identified those as if that's something you wanna address at this time, it can be taken care of for the cost that I've estimated there.I think that's something you could even do internally as far as bidding out on your own and getting quotes on because of the dollar amount associated with it.Just as a side note, aside from those windows, I wanted to take a look at the rest of the windows inside the building as well.Page four at the bottom, shows a window completely separate from those library windows.This is in the courtyard.And although it's not as severe, I just wanted to point out that you can still see that gasketing failing along that trim line of the bottom of that window again.So it leads me to believe that it might be something related to the process of fabricating the windows at some point, but, whatever it is, that's the condition that exists there.Are these are the same kind of windows that are used elsewhere in the building and we're not seeing it, or are they...Primarily, yes.They're all a wood clad window, yes.Do we know if they're all the same manufacturer or we don't know that?They are.They are?Yeah.They're original to the building when it was constructed in '93.You know, we did some investigation on the warranty that was in place probably when it was constructed.The glazing itself, the glass glazing has a 20 year warranty, which would have just recently expired.But I have a feeling this isn't the glazing, this is the actual window construction holding the glazing in place and that was a 10 year warranty.Yeah, it's gonna be our expense.We don't frequently specify these windows and we weren't the architect here just to preface that, but it's very uncommon that that would even happen with this window.I'm not sure why this condition occurred, but it has.They all seem to be in the same area, so.Yeah.And in a similar condition, deteriorating to a point where they'll all be like this.So just going back to the first page, I placed those windows that are in the worst condition as your first priority, you wanna address sooner than later, and then priority three would be the remainder of the windows in the building when you see fit that that would be an item that you would wanna address.How many windows in each are we talking about?Well, there's seven in that first phase.And I think there was...40 or 50 in the remainder of the building.And there ere large expanses of, they get larger as they get closer to the classrooms.But in general, yes, about 50 windows.So that's, what, I'm sorry.That's what's down in priority three, summer 2014 or later.Yes.Okay.So that's the full remainder of the building.Yes.Quick question, in the priority one, it looks like there's seven windows in the library and two in the corridor.Is that a total of nine for $3100.So they're not $3,500 a window at seven.They're a little cheaper than that.Right.And there are different sizes too.You can see on that page too, that the ones in the library larger and the two that are in the corridor are just small, smaller openings.Okay, we can come back to this, I'll move into priority two here.This was another finding that we noticed going back to my initial introduction here with John, when he brought me out there that day, we had found that there was a driving storm.It might've been one of the larger, hurricane Sandy at the time, but there was water leaking along the wall in the library.And we just replaced the roofs up there and all the flashings, all the coping.So it was strange that there was this water coming in and upon further evaluation on a dryer day, looking at the outside walls of the upper part of the buildings, the walls are very wet.And let's just go through some of these photos here.I can describe to you where we are.On page five, this is an upper, upper north wall.This is like facing the bus garage to get your bearings.And then on bottom of page five, as we get closer to the wall, you can see how some of the mortar joints are wet.And this was a actually a dry day.So it's actually holding that water after it does rain and it's causing really premature deterioration of those mortar joints.Getting a little closer, look, turn the page to six.This is another portion of an upper north wall over top of the classroom wing by the Gable end, also facing the bus garage.And then on the bottom of page six, you can see the, the wet joints, there's actually mildew inside the making those joints black on the outside of the building.Water's getting inside of that face of that wall and pushing the salts from the mortar out.You can see some white staining there and the mortar and the brick faces cracking.There's a crack, a hairline crack you see there.Is that still facing the bus garage, or is that in a different direction?This is facing the bus garage, all these walls, yes.I'm looking at page seven.This is a different area, on the bus side, on the bus garage side of the building.What's happened here is the stone coping around the perimeter of the high walls around the roof.The coping joints have failed.If you see the bottom picture there, those are joints that are cocked on top of the wall, holding the two stone pieces together.Once that joint has been, has failed, and the water actually gets down inside that face of that wall and then when it freezes and thaws, it just blows those faces of those bricks off.And that's what you're seeing above on the top picture there.Similar on page eight.This is a freestanding wall at the dumpster area.This is also one of a few conditions that, that happens over by that dumpster area.There's also a fuel tank that has a screen wall around it as well that looks very similar to this.And then also the stack for the, the boiler room on the bottom picture there.And it's difficult picture to, to make out there, but you can see the staining and the, and the salts pushing out.And this is all a product of that water getting into the top surface of that wall, and then just as it goes through those freeze, thaw cycles, it either pushes that water back out through the wall or sucks it in when it's raining and just causes the wall to deteriorate.Again, it's nothing that is a hazard.There's not bricks falling, but it is something that you'll wanna address sooner than later.The longer that this continues, it's only gonna get worse and become more costly once you do finally address it.So the point of tonight was just to point these out to you and let you make a decision on how you budget when you approach the scope of work.Moving on to page eight, these are vertical masonry control joints.These are typically caulked.You can see that the caulking has failed, and then it's letting water into these locations as well.Not good for the wall again.And then on the last page, we did some investigative work to see why this water was actually getting down into the library.So we had an independent consultant come in from Cleveland, he's with the international masonry Institute.And we opened up a portion of the wall and you can see the counter flashing that lets the roof terminate against that wall.And then you can actually see the through wall flashing.It's that copper colored on the bottom picture that would let the water, any water that would get into the wall, it would let it drain out through the bottom of the wall.So you actually designed these walls to, if they do get water into them, there's a way for it to escape.So the first thought, we know, we were wondering why this water was even getting into the library, but when we opened the wall up, you could see that the gauge of the copper that was used at the time of construction was very thin.And any droppings from the mortar when they laid the brick up could have easily nicked it, or what have you.And they're overlapped every eight feet as well.So soon as a large amount of water entered that wall and built up, it had to release somewhere.So it eventually worked its way down in the library.So that's a summary, that's going back to the first page.That's what we identified under priority two.Those are the masonry repairs in the first set of items there.The caulking repairs, the items I did not have photos of was also the metal roof.The roof itself is in good shape.It's the gutters and your transmission systems of your water for, over the time, I don't know if it's acid rain, but the gutters and downspouts have just, have rotted through and they were leaking water, so, probably at this time would be a good time to replace them.Underneath the priority two, where it says masonry repairs, the one that's next to the bottom, remove, re-install new thru-wall counter flashing on north side of building.The bottom picture on page 10, does that mean that we're gonna open up the brick all along that wall, replace all that copper flashing that's in there?Exactly.That's what I think the best course of action at this point and not knowing exactly where the water's coming in at.I think the best course of action is to open that wall up in small areas and replace that flashing.Likewise, if you look under...which one is it?Third item underneath masonry repairs.I mentioned that stone coping that has been compromised in the head joint, so that stone is leaking water down into the wall.There as well, instead of just pushing more caulking into that at this time, I think the best course of action is to put a continuous metal top over top of that stone.It's not gonna change the appearance of the building, but at least it's gonna give a solid surface on the top of that.The water can get down....for that bullet?Yes.Okay.Does that also carry over to page nine?Yeah, it's a similar picture showing that coping top, yes.So are these problems a design problem, a construction problem or a material problem?Well, that's a good question.I've been trying to figure that out myself since when we found these, I think it's a combination of everything.There has been some conditions there that, like those copings we're talking about, it's very unusual for a stone coping to be placed on top of a wall without some type of flashing underneath there.So if the water does get through that stone, it doesn't get down into the wall.That's a typical detail that's commonplace in practice.It's shown that way sometimes on the design documents, that was, this built building was constructed from.Sometimes it is, sometimes it isn't, but when I go out in the field, it doesn't look like it's really installed anywhere.So I'm not sure what the contractor was doing at the time, why it wasn't installed, but that would have helped the situation.The vertical walls, I think that's just a combination of the weather and it being hit by the weather.And for whatever reason, the mortar that was used, maybe was a soft mortar compared to the brick.And it's just letting the mortar get wet and seeping into the wall.But yeah, I mean, it could be, it could be a combination of things.Could the problem with the windows even be due to some of the movement that we've had in that building, due to what we've, about, due to the pyrite or the movement and the building because it has shifted some over these couple years since you've been watching that.Yeah.It's been reasonable, visibly in that one area, where was that in the corner?The, back by, I think the- - Yeah, the back door on that corridor is really moving.Yeah, that was significant.So that could even, not to mention, what are they, 30 years old?I mean...Yeah I don't think the exterior walls are affected by that condition.All those exterior walls that you see from the outside, as well as the windows, they're on deep footings and they go through that pyrite and that they they're on caissons basically, they go into bedrock.Internal to the building, it's just the four slabs that are floating over that, those areas of the pyrite.So I don't, I think they're two separate issues.So, are the, and I'm just curious, I know you have some pricing here and you don't usually do that, and that's really doesn't need to be discussed anyway in detail tonight but, I'm wondering when you think about putting new windows in there, do you think about windows that have any wood in them?I mean would we use vinyl windows now, or what, what would we, what did you, what are you thinking?I don't know if you did this or if someone did this price for you.What I was planning to replace them with is in an all aluminum type window.It's very similar to what we did over at your middle school in '08.All of the windows are similar to these here.They don't have that vinyl covering on them that always ends up flapping in the wind anyway.Yeah, okay.Any other questions on McMurry?Any topic?You left me speechless.I must say.Well, I think the good part of the report is that it is, it has been phased out by Mr. France and HHSDR. So it gives us some options on when things have to be done.We're not saying that everything needs to be done all at one time and that's good.And thank you very much for that.Yeah, if you're thinking about jumping into any of these projects, just looking ahead, this is probably work that you want to plan for summer.It can tail off into early fall.I mean, it's outside work, so it could occur while students are inside of the building.It won't be, shouldn't be that disruptive.So just as far as your decision-making, working back to that, we'd have to prepare documents, a scope of work to get contractor on board during those periods of time, so.And phase one, we can do that pretty much on our own, I think, as you and I talked about.Yes, I could work with Ron and give him an example of a spec that he could, you could put out and Vince, you just put advertise yourselves or get quotes on to get those addressed but then if you replaced the windows later, that would be a larger scope.I don't know if you wanna follow that same protocol.Any other questions?Is this interfering with the temperature inside the library right now, those windows?You said the the airflow is, the windows interrupting the air flow.Is it interrupting the temperature inside the library?No, unless you're right at that window and you were to hold your hand up, then you could, you could feel the temperature difference.It's not affecting the entire space.Okay, thank you, Mr. France.Thanks.Okay, next speaker will be Mr. John Corley.He also was from HHSDR. - Correct, evening folks.Last Thursday, first of all, I'm the civil engineer with HHSDR. I've done tracks and fields for about 15 years.As Matt had alluded to earlier, I was highly involved with the PV field project.That's ongoing still, unfortunately, we're trying to wrap that up.Just to give everybody a little quick scenario on that.There was some paperwork, final paperwork, mainly with the conservation district that required an as-built that I finally had issued to me.I'm reviewing it currently, so we should be able to wrap up the paperwork.The items outstanding on the site are mostly landscaping.Half the trees have died.The bushes are in sad shape and the grass has not taken to my satisfaction.I think there's only about 60% of the grass that has taken good routes.So the contractor will be coming out here in the spring to replant, replace the dead plantings also, and that should hopefully wrap up the project at that point in time.Last Thursday, Mr. Gaunt and Brian Geiger and myself went out to the stadium to actually do an evaluation of the existing conditions of the stadium.I think how I'd like to, we also had a gentlemen, excuse me.We also had a gentleman that I invited, Dennis O'Donnell, who is currently with Nagel Surfaces.He's also formerly been with turf systems last, AT&T which was a formerly Southwest track or turf surfaces who was the first system you had down at the stadium prior to the pro-grass system that was put down 10 years ago.That's just to give you a little bit of the history of that.So he's very well familiar with the existing, the original system, turf system that was down at the stadium.How I'd like to do this is talk about it in three different aspects of my evaluation.First, I'd like to talk about the track surfaces, meaning the track itself and the actual field events.This system here is essentially what you have down here.This black portion at the bottom is a rubber base sheet.And then it has a it's about 13 inches thick.It's about a nine millimeters, I'm sorry, 13 millimeters thick.It's yeah, it's got about nine millimeters of the black matting.And then it has a three to four millimeters of what they call a structural spray coating on top.Your system out there, I believe was put down 10 years ago, along with the turf system.What my evaluation showed is it's showing a somewhat normal wear, particularly in lanes one and two, which are the lanes that are used the most.There is some deterioration, almost complete deterioration of the structural spray.The good news is that your rubber matting underneath is in fine shape.There is no evidence of a delamination, blistering, some of the signs you see of it coming up and needing repairs.There certainly are some, a few areas that do need some full depth repairs, but all in all, the rubber matting is in good shape.It's a 20 year system.Usually I tell folks, and every six to seven years you should have restructural spray on it to help keep its life, its surface life longer, kinda like seal coating on asphalt parking lot.Always helps the life of the asphalt.This is the same with the structural spray on a track system of this kind.You also have to restripe obviously when that occurs, but it can actually make a 20 year system into a 30 year system.My evaluation, there are some repairs that would need to be done, but I think if you just go out and have a restructural spray on top of the existing surface, they may have to come and put some filler in, in some locations, particularly the javelin, the javelin runway, which is underwater.It had some grading issues, whether it's settled or wasn't installed correctly, but there's actually water floating on top of it.But I think most of that can be taken care of with maybe milling off some asphalt, putting additional asphalt and then putting a patch of this system on top.But all in all, my summary is that I feel the black matting is in great shape, it just needs a restructural spray, which they recommend again, that you do every five years.I say, you can do it every six or seven years on your system in your life.Have we had it done in the 10 years we- - No you haven't, no.And is it a matter of doing the entire track or just doing lane one and two?I would recommend that you do the entire track because there's a fade issue.You'll notice just like, if you go out and do emergency patching right now, you'll see the bright, you'll see this red and not the orange-ish red that you have out there now.So you will see a patch and as you will see, lane one and two would be more brighter than the other lanes.Now that, you know, with the striping, you can do it so that you have the actual lane striping right at the difference between the old and the new.But my recommendation would be to do the entire structural spray.Any questions on the track surface?What does it cost?An eight lane track typically would be, I would say around 50 to $55,000 to do the structural recoding or the spraying.And that would include the line striping also.So can we assume if we divide by eight, we could figure out for ourselves how much it would cost to doing one and two, or does it...Fair enough, I think.There'll be, just doing two lanes will be a little more than linear because you've got the administrative costs that you're gonna have.Right, the less you use as far as the quantity, the more the price may go up a little bit more, correct.The turf I think I'd like to talk about next.You have again, a 10 year system there.It was put on by pro-grass.Originally there was a Southwest system on there and when the pro-grass came in and put, it took off the old system and put on this new system, they lived in what we call an any e-layer.And under that e-layer, we suspect and hopefully we're gonna get some courts done to verify that there's probably an asphaltic layer under that too.These two layers are, I don't know how old that stadium is.Probably 25 years old since the last system has been down.But that e-layer is saturated.At this point, it's showing warps, it's got undulations in it.It's causing an irregular surface, it's causing a surface that's inconsistent.It's hard one area, soft the other area.It looks atrocious if you get up close to it also.As far as the actual skin itself, the pro grass, it looks like that was a slit film.Slit film only came out about 10 years ago.So that was probably pro-grass's first rendition of it.And anytime you get the first of it, like from a company of that nature, you find out that they come out with second and third and fourth generations because they improved upon their first one.That ten-year-old turf system to me looks like it's about 17 years old.It's really has matted down to the point that it doesn't look like a viable surface anymore, even to try and groom it up and put an infill in to try and rejuvenate it, I don't think it would be cost-effective.And then with e-layer being underneath and the possibility of having a layer of an asphalt underneath the e-layer that's out there, I would recommend at this point to look at taking that skin off, seeing the condition of the e-layer, more than likely getting rid of the e-layer and the asphaltic layer under there, putting sand in its place, which will soften the system, which is a good thing to get for safety.And then look at putting a new skin on top of it.The good news there, as well as with the track itself, is they both drain great.There is no ponding on the actual track oval.There is no ponding, we were out there in a fairly good rain.It had rained for at least 20 hours.There was no evidence of any kind of drainage issues on the turf.So the drainage system, which is a high ticket item underneath the turf looks to be operating terrifically.So it's just a matter of dealing with the issue of the e-layer and the surface of the turf system.The third item would be the D-zones.Now the D-zones, for those of you don't know are the little, they're called D-zones because they're shaped like a D. They're the areas behind the goal line and the oval.They're where your long jumps are at, your triple jump, your high jump and your pole vault.These areas are probably in the most dire need of some kind of, in my opinion, they need to be taken out and redone completely.You have large cracks that probably, the largest one's about an inch and a half.Water certainly getting into the substrate, which hasn't affected the turf system or the track system.But if left unchecked could certainly cause some drainage issues under the surfaces that are in good shape.They're showing signs of blistering decay.The one area, the one side, I think it's the north side is a complete track surface on top, the other side, other than the pole vault, I believe, it's just a painted asphalt surface.Again, I think these systems, I'm pretty sure that both these D-zones have the original substrates that have been down for again 25 years.And we're certainly introducing water into the subgrade, which could affect the other systems that are still in good shape drainage-wise.My recommendation on these would be to take out what's there and either come back with an asphalt surface or more preferably for safety reasons, come back with an asphalt surface with a track system on top of it.Those are the three areas that I evaluated as far as the concerns.Now I know Brian, one of the first things I noticed out there and Brian concurs with me is that there's only four feet of turf from the back line of each end zone to the hard surface.This is a safety issue too, as far as I'm concerned with football, field hockey and soccer.I'm not sure about the other sports, but I do know that there could be an athlete that could cascade themselves over that turf area.I told Brian, we could certainly extend the turf to about five feet.Might even be able to get six feet additional turf area behind those end zones, which would make it a safer situation for all the athletes and the users of the facility.It would mean that we would have to move the pole vault, which would be no big issue, whether we, it's the sand pit on the other side that would be a little bit more of a cost endeavor to relocate that.There's plenty of room to relocate those field events and to extend the turf system to a more safer distance behind the end zone.Doesn't have to be done, I just personally believe that's a safety issue.You could just look at replacing everything in kind out there as it is now, if that would be the preference of the school district.That was two years ago when Doctor Zeddy did the walkthrough of all the facilities, that was an item that was raised at that point, because you run off the end of the field and the surface is so slick, like concrete, that if you're wearing cleats or something, you run off the end of the turf, you go flying across the hard surface at the end.Can you replace that with some of the track surfacing at that point?Yes.Would that be cheaper than turf?Not that much cheaper, you're gonna replace it with something at this point, in my opinion, the D-zones need to be replaced.So if you were replacing it with asphalt and a track surface, or you're gonna gut it out and put in the, the aggregate and the turf system, I think the cost to do one as opposed to the other, you're not gonna find a whole lot of difference in that cost since you're replacing it with something.One other thing about extending the turf system.There is a curve in there that would have to be taken out and another curve repoured.I think though, the drainage we can minimize, I think we could put in a few bleeder drains and just slope the stone itself in that six foot area that we wouldn't have to incur a lot of costs if we wanted to extend that the turf.Did I understand you to say that you were thinking about moving the poll vaulting on the out of the outside of the track?No, just move them, if we moved the turf out six feet, we just would move those events six feet along with it.And it looks to me that we won't even lose any distance of the runways.The runways could all stay the same length that they are.We would still have a little bit of interference with one of the sand pits.It would be within 10 feet, but we can still think about how we're gonna lay that out.And what would be the cost of these items?Hold your hat.Let's forget about it, let's forget about extending the turf at this point.Let's just say we're gonna replace the turf as it is.We are looking at probably $400,000 to replace, to get rid of the old, get rid of the e-layer, put in two inches of sand in place so that e-layer and then putting down a new synthetic turf with the infill.You're probably talking about $400,000 to do that work.Does that include the cost of that track?Now the track would still be the, the 50, what I say, 55?55.55 for the track work.That'd be $455,000 to do the whole thing.No, the D-zones, we haven't addressed that.And do you have a cost for those?These are all estimates, but I would say to do each d-zone, would be about...was 53, 53, I'm gonna say 55 to do each one, $55,000, - $110,000 to do both?That's correct.And the turf currently is out of warranty now, right?Yes, eight year warranty on the turf.And that's been down for 10 years.Your track surfaces are five-year warranty.Again, that's been down for 10 years.How many years is this, part of it been underwater?One part that you mentioned was underwater.Is that the javelin pit, that's what I've gotten here.It's slowly, I'm not sure what's under it, but the ground, you can visibly see the day we arrived there, it was snowing raining a little bit.It was pretty much underwater.We've been patching it for years, but I think the asphalt needs to be replaced and that area just needs to be stabilized.One of the thing about those D-zones too.They are flat, which they need to be for the high jump.It has a very, a flat tolerance for the event itself.But the cracks are probably what's draining it right now.And I think we probably would have to look at maybe even upping that 55 to maybe 60 to put in some drainage to make sure that whatever new system we put in there, that it drains properly.If you move that outside of the track, and any, I mean, any future potential then would be eliminated, it's that correct?Near the track itself.If I moved what out of the track?Moved the pole vaulting and that, on the other side of that track, that would be an independent system out there which would not then in the future potentially affect the football field.Correct.Would that cost more or less to move that out there?You're just going to, what are you going to, what are you proposing to do to the existing d-zones if you move the events out?I don't know, what's the options?I mean, grass would be the cheapest, but it would be hard to maintenance it over the other surfaces.You could just make it asphalt and keep the bleachers on it, which would be sufficient for that.You could probably fix the cracks.It would be...I think it would be, it would be more money to move everything outside because you have to do something to the D-zones because, just because of the cracks and the drainage infiltration that's occurring right now.So it's in, plus there's a stone base in the existing D areas that we're gonna be able to reuse if not keep in place.And then if we go outside, we have to have, we have to make sure we have a proper sub-grade and we'd have to put in new stone base and new drainage.So yes, it would be cheaper to leave them and fix them inside the d-zones.Well, would that run another possibility of having the same kind of issues in the future?No, not if we drain it, not if we put in proper drainage.I just wanted to make sure I took the appropriate notes.At one point, when you were talking about the turf, you were saying the good news was the drainage is terrific and works well.So that's only under the turf.The D-zones have a problem with their drainage?Yes, they do.Again, there is no drainage per se, inside of them.They're ponding everywhere.But it's not spilling over onto the turf.At this point, no, but it's infiltrating into the subgrade, which could affect the drainage from the other systems.Separate systems.Yes.Brian, did you wanna add anything?Looking at our turf, you probably need- - Brian, you probably need to be at a mic and get you on a camera, yeah.Looking at our turf, if we make the investment to do this this year, you won't be replacing a turf field for 10 years.When they put the pro-grass, that was the first all rubber pro-grass field.Again, as John said, that was the initial version.Estimated use was eight to 10 years.We got the high end of this field right now.Now with new fields, with properly maintaining them, you're going 10 to 12 to 13 years in some schools with the new fields.And I think if we do this, our field, there is soft spots.There are hard spots and it's more related to e-layer broken down.E-layer at this point, it's 20 years old, it's lasted two turfs.And that's where you have your problems.We had to stop games in the middle of games to replace areas of turf that have lifted up.That that's how bad some of this is last year during our soccer season in particular.And I think that looking at the field that we have up top, you can tell the difference between the two fields and, and I've seen a lot of turf fields.I go a lot of games and I haven't seen one in the shape and the condition that we've gotten out of it that we have right now in our stadium.Yeah, Brian, do you have any idea how many students......use the field in one year?What's the question?How many student athletes use the field.If you happen to have those figures with you, huh?I do.Isn't that amazing?Mr. Guy, comes prepared.Between all of our games, practices, and again, we're splitting teams between the PV field and the stadium.I have a number of 46,000 people use that field on average a year.And again, some of those are duplicates.You know, there's 20 kids on the freshman soccer team.They use it 15 times that year.So those are numbers that are added up between everybody who uses that field.And I'm not counting the physical education classes.I'm not counting anybody from the community who just shows up and uses the field on their own.I'm just talking about what I know from our sports internally, from rec sports who also use the field on a permanent basis.And this is our high school field right in front of the high school, not both PD and the high school?That's just the stadium.Our students and any competitors of similar size teams.Correct.Thank you, Mr. Garner.I know this is school district property.It's our responsibility to maintain it, but have you had any interest along the lines from other groups like the township gets, soccer boosters or football boosters to help them when they put in turf or lights or things?Have you had any interest from folks who might be wanting to help us raise some money to do this?I don't think we've put that out there yet.I know I have people willing to help with projects in the district, more so scoreboards than anything, but I don't think we've got to that point yet.I know our booster groups, they raised some money, but they also spend some money.So their, their margin of donation I don't think is that all that great.But obviously that's something that we can at least put out there and see what we can get.We've talked a little bit about corporate sponsorship and all sorts of things.We don't have to talk about all that now, but, I mean, everybody's doing it.It's just, so, collect your data on that.Maybe the next meeting we'll be asking you about it.I have a question for Mr. Carly, what type of window are we talking as far as to remove the existing field and install a new one?Are we talking two months, three months?What kind of duration would that field be out of service?If we did all three phases of the work, meaning the track surfaces, the turf surface and the d-zones, I would consider that to be about a three and a half month project.Three and a half months?If we were to just do the field first and then do the track it at different time.What kind of timeframe are we talking?First of all, I recommend that's a good idea to go from inside out.Number one, to do that turf system, that could be, without extending it?I would say with extending it.With extending it?Because the curb work is what takes some time there.I would say then that that would probably, that could be done in a month.In a month.Because my thought would be, we could rush to football season.And then of course we have time between football season and track, so that was the thought of trying to- - Well, you don't wanna put it down in the winter.Like we had issues at PV. I was wondering if graduation is usually the first week of June and football, if Brian is nice and schedule our first two home games away, you could have half of June, all of July and a little part of August, right?To- - Our first home football game is the first Friday in September, which gives us, I believe a three month window to put turf down.With graduation being the first Friday in June.We wouldn't need that field until the first Friday in September.We have some flexibility, obviously with PV to move other sports up there temporarily.Well, keep in mind, extending that turf back six feet, we have to address the pole vault and one of the long jump runways.'Cause they will be in conflict with how far we feel we should go back with the turf.And when do we use those, the spring?The spring, yes.Well, I mean the runways, you'd have track surface on them.So yeah, I mean, it would make sense economically to do it when you did track work.Well that $350,000 we got in our bond refinancing isn't the last long between windows...Okay.Do you want me to bring this up?All right, that's a question we can ask later.We do wanna touch real briefly on one alternative.This project really does bode well for what they call a Keystone purchasing network, where you can actually go through this networking, save a little bit of money, but mostly you save time.As far as the design is concerned, they would need some drawing layout that can show them quantities, but it comes actually through them, an agency out in Eugene, Oregon, who they buddy up, in this case with Nagle track surfacing and field turf who were two of the most outstanding manufacturers in the field of turf and track.This is a purchasing program that again, kind of cuts out some of the overhead.They don't have actually have a general contractor overseeing them, which then again, I would recommend that we oversee them so they don't police themselves, but it does help in time as far as getting purchases, getting deliveries, the design and this, since this project, really we're not changing anything that isn't gonna evolve any permitting.I don't think Ed Zilkha and the township is going to consider this a land development.I could check with that to make sure, but since it's all resurfacing, it's a maintenance project.So there is no real permitting or submittals that we would need to do so we could get this on a faster track if we at least explored the purchasing network.The downside to that is you're stuck with the two manufacturers.You don't get to, now, they each have different systems within themselves that you could shop, but you know, you can't go out and shop different manufacturers.You're kind of stuck with the two that are offering the cooperative.They also do scoreboards too as part of their co-op Yeah, the alternative would be to go out and competitively bid it, which means that we could get different products, different manufacturers involved and get the prices between Chevy and Ford so to speak.And that could get the price close to where these folks are at.The trouble is with that is the bidding period.This eliminates that three week bidding period and the award period.Actually I have Mr. Dennis O'Donnell working on some numbers just to get them together so they can, we can look at them to see what this would offer us.And we could, he's more than willing to come and talk to the board also.Tell them more expertly about this system.Sounds like you've already made up your mind.Sounds like you're going one step, are we still in a discussion?Well, Dennis is a salesman.So he's willing to do the treading and just to show us what the numbers, the real numbers are.Having any discussion on this?I mean, you've gone like one step far.Are you tying down there?Do you need to change the film?Okay, cool.I thought we were talking about the maintenance of buildings.Yeah, so anyway, to answer your question before the camera went off, this has, this has not been discussed.We're just collecting information.This is the first time I've heard of any of this and Sue's over there holding her heart.So I know- - This is the first time I've heard of it too.So Mr. Guyer, Mr. Carly, I really appreciate all the work and time you've put into it, but I have to say personally, there are so many other capital improvement projects that I would rather see before this happen.So, I also feel that other people in this room have known about this before and I did not.Who, who?I have no idea.So how did people know about it?You know, there just seem to be some strategically placed questions that had magically come up.Oh, for goodness sakes, Sue, Sue!Sue, that's crazy, we never, Sue, Sue, not at this meeting.Sue, Sue, call your meeting to order, you have a gavel there.This is not gonna happen in a public venue.This is enough.No one has discussed this.It's just wrong.That's enough.That's my opinion.Well, sometimes you need to keep your opinions to yourself.'Cause I'll tell you what, this is a public discussion.And this is the first time I've ever heard about this.I've heard about- - The first time I've heard of it, - That there is, on all of it, there's a safety concern, as far as I'm concerned.If in fact there is a safety issue and we may have to address it.We brought this safety issue of two years ago in Nina's walked through when I was Buildings and Grounds Chair, and we went to every facility in the district.And this is basically an informational meeting, this is not a voting meeting.I understand that.So while these gentlemen are here- - Then don't falsely accuse me of things.We wanna, we wanna, we wanna use all the resources, you're taking away valuable time from these gentlemen who've come here with an expertise.So that an embarrassment and that's ridiculous.You have no proof of that.Why would you say that?I'm not embarrassing you.You are an embarrassment.That's terrible, we work as a team.Does anybody have any more questions to these gentlemen?As far as their expertise.What was your timeframe you were thinking by doing it?You weren't thinking it this summer, or when are you thinking of?We have the time to do it this summer if we can get it through.I'm just going back to the last time we did it.There's a lot of planning done to start literally the day after graduation.Right.And even then with all that, with the weather and all the other variables, it was squeezed to get in in order to get football going.Right.Now we're in February.To go through the entire planning process, bidding, much less, how are we gonna pay for this?Right.I don't see how you're ever gonna get this done in a matter of three months.So I guess, I question whether we'd get it done this summer or are we looking for possibly doing it during school, forget the football here we're putting it into next year.Okay.And obviously that decision is your decision.I think that we were just brought here to explain the issue that we have.Whenever we do it, eventually you're gonna have to do it just based off of the age of the system.This year, if we don't have the time to do it.So be it, but at least we're, making an attempt just to get it on your radar.Right.Well, and that goes back to something Ron alluded to.There was safety issues.Now the last time we did this, it was never brought up anything about the D-zone that that needed to be done.So, you know, has something changed that it's not nearly as safe now as it was then or what happened?And John correct me, but I think the, you see a lot of, a lot of cracks appearing maybe 10 years ago when you did it, you didn't have those cracks because the system was again, 10 years newer than it is now.You have a 22-year-old, 21-year-old stadium.It's starting to show wear, especially in those D areas and there's some significant cracking going on in the D areas.It's taken a lot of the track surface with it, not the track where the eight lanes are, but the track inside those D areas.There's some chunking going on in there as well, where it's actually pulling apart.Okay, the first false was '92, when that stadium was actually used for the first time.So we just passed 20 years on it, just to get the timeframe when it was So, okay.Okay, does anybody have any questions for these gentlemen?No, but I don't have any questions, but I do have something I'd like to say to Mr. Carly.Yes.In construction business, and having some several lumberyards myself.I certainly understand when you work with somebody, you just feel they're the best.And I understand your excitement there.So I understand what you were, while you were presenting these people, trying to get it done, you know them, you know their history, been in the business a long time.So I get that and I thank you for that.It's, you know, just, it's one of those things, you know who you know, and you know when you know that they're the best, that's it.So thank you for that, I understand that.You're welcome.Don't know where the board could ever end up on those decisions, but understand what, what your thought is.The company could do this under the network?Field turf and Nagle track surfacing, yes.The manufacturer is Sport Techs.So we couldn't go up there and hear it?Sport Techs will have a comparable system to what's up there, yes.They have a slit film system, which is the system and that's an all rubber system and they have a system very similar to that.Based on what a couple of the board members have said, are you talking about this system as though it's on like a pre-bid list?Like we have other things on state lists?Is that what you're saying?The time of bidding, in other words, has the state already approved these bidders as they do, for example, when we buy technology hardware and software?It's very similar to that.Dennis could probably tell you a little bit more about it.I haven't, I've only dealt with a purchasing network once before on a project.It's pre-approved by the state?Correct, correct.And it is an alternative if speed is the necessity to get something in quickly to conventional bidding.Okay, no further questions right?No but there is some price breaks on that too, right?Well correct- - We have that filing, I don't wanna be repetitive, but you know, in my husband's companies, in his selling supply yards, we have buying groups that can save you a lot of money as well as time.Oh absolutely.So that's something we could look at too.Yes.Thank you.Okay thank you.Okay, moving on.We're gonna go to attachment one.In attachment one....there's actually a revision.So we're gonna pass out the revisions.That was the second page.Thank you.I think so.Okay on attachment one there, you can see many items that were listed.A lot of the items were listed by the maintenance, Ron Gauld actually put input on this.Once again, these are not all projects that are gonna be done, but we're looking at that need to be done at some point.Start off with the, at the high school.And we look, the roof over the main gym and the science wing.There's actually many water leaks in the high school.I was kinda naive to the fact last year when there was some work done on the roof, I thought they were doing the whole roof.Yeah so did I. - And in fact, because of budget regions, it's broken up into different sections.They have areas of the roof that have not been done and that needs to be done.So until we get that completed, you're gonna constantly have leaks and we would like to solve that issue.So that's something that I think we should look at.Mr. Denliving?Yes sir.The vents on the roof, I know whenever I was over there, I forget what, I think it was a volleyball game.The room inside of the gym got very hot.And so the people were forcing the doors open so they get some ventilation.Now I understand that there's a problem with the vents we have on those, on the roof, in the gym.Is that correct, or...I know nothing of that.Mr. Gauld, are you aware of that issue at all?Mr. Gauld is a new employee and actually we're kind of all going through this together.There's many issues that we're discovering.Anytime you come across something like that, if you would email that to me.Yeah, I just didn't know if this was, if this was talked about or anything like that, because I know that I was actually standing with Brian whenever, because I was concerned about the doors being blocked open, and the reason why there was nothing sucking all the air up from all the people.I mean, it was during the end of the summer, whenever the volleyball team and that were playing and, you know, so it was very hot in there.So- - The gym is not air conditioned, correct?It is not.Hasn't that been going on for years Brian?Yeah.From my understanding there there's air handlers in the gym.There's units up there.I don't know the reason they're not functional right now, but that's been a problem.They're not functional or you're just, - I'm not sure.There, it appears there's air handlers up there, I think for years, and this is prior to me getting here, they haven't been working and it may be a situation where, for whatever reason, but, I believe they're there.They look like they're there.They're there and that's why I was wondering.Are we sure they're not heaters opposed to being cooling during the summer?There is no air conditioning in the gyms.Right, I'm not sure if they're heaters.Okay.But that's something obviously we can look at.Yeah, I didn't think this was something new.That's why I just questioned it.Well, thank you for bringing that up then.And what Mr. Gauld put down his list of many things.Moving along, we have the auditorium overhead house lights, fixtures and controller, I guess last year we, at the end of the last year, we bought some LEDs and started putting them in the auditorium in order to make the longevity of the lights last longer.And there's been some issues as far as the dimming capability of the existing system.But that is just, once again, it's something else that doesn't have to be replaced right away but it's something that in the near future, we may wanna look at.The classroom windows are original in that building.So a lot of them leak.They're, I'm sure they're thermal pane for that matter, but that is something that we need to look at.The swimming pool scoreboard, it malfunctioned during the season this year.And as it currently is being used, it does not give score, but they have an interface box that takes a digital signal to an analog signal, and they've been having problems with it.So that is something we may wanna look at.The boosters in the swim club actually have, both have made a commitment to contribute money to it.I think we got $750 from the booster group, which is a very cash tight group, just like all the booster groups are.And I think it was $1500 from the swim club.So that was a noble effort on their part to try to help us resolve that problem.There's some issues with the outdoor light poles.If you drive through the parking lot, you'll see some of them are, most of them have surface rust on them around the bottom of the poles, as well as there's some upgrading that needs to be taking place on some of the pole lights.Once again, it's not something that's to be done right away, but it's something that we need to look at in the future.Also back to the swimming pool, there's a swimming pool hot water system and monitoring devices.The season, we lost the heater for the swimming pool for 12 days.So those athletes in the, dead in the middle of their season could not swim in their own pool and actually had a home meet at Cannon Mac, which they won, but just something that, something we need to take a look at.Should we plan on keeping meets over there?Well actually- - It was because of the heat.It's actually a wonderful facility they have there.So before we move on to like the middle-school and McMurtry's, anybody have any questions about those particular items?Well, we see all of these items on the estimate for the capital expenditure budget, Tom, in your finance meetings.Well, you know, I guess that would bring up where I'm sitting here listening and the people that this is directed at aren't here anymore, but we have gone every budget season.We've said, what capital expenditures do we have?We did walk throughs a couple of years.Most of this stuff should have been on that list.When we took out the loan for PE, we could have taken out more money, addressed a whole heck of a lot of this stuff.Yeah.So to me, it's very disturbing that we didn't get the appropriate information we should have.Some of it, I agree with you.I agree with you, totally.Some of it, for example, talk about the high school field turf.We knew it was coming out of warranty and every year we were given information that let's stretch it out one more year.We think we can do this.They hired a new machine to come up and comb the synthetic grass.So I think some of these things have been coming and because we were frugal, we kept pushing stuff off.But then again, some of the stuff that's being done.Does nobody look up and see mortar coming out of a building?Exactly, exactly.I mean, really, I think that's inexcusable.It wasn't on our walkthroughs before either.It wasn't there, I don't recall- - There's other things on here, but that's a whole 'nother point.Getting back to your question.Yes, I guess again, I'll say that when we get into budget, I think we should have a bit of a plan.Like we've been saying that so much has to be the next couple of years so we can see what do we need to do?Is there things that we need to address sooner than later?Is this something since the market's still acceptable, we'll take out a bond.We haven't completed our last bond issue.Maybe there's, we can modify the, the terms of that, get some more money to address some of these.I think that we have some options to discuss over the next month or two for things that we do have coming up and that maybe we can have a valid list of things in timeframe that we need to do this.The issue with McMurray.That's why we did do the phasing plan and the issue with the safety, we did a phasing plan.These are kind of like things around the district and two things have to happen to get cost estimates, but also to identify a priority with this particular list.And I think, for example, the swimming, the hot water system, that was a recent.I mean, it may have been on its last leg, but it recently became, you know, unfunctional, so- - We aren't going to have those every year.That's right.As we continue to see in our capital reserve fund that we can address some of these up to a certain point, but there's other than these, when we're talking millions of dollars already, we're up over $2 million just between McMurray and the other items that, the same.So, you know, we've got some money there and we haven't even gotten into crossing some of these that are, the phone system's probably gonna pop up as a priority also.So there's things that we need to phase and to do some planning because I'm anticipating the budget's gonna be very tight again this year.It's not like the state's gonna come up with a whole bunch of money they're gonna give to us this year.Just going through this building security analysis, we're talking with some big bucks in here.I'm looking at this for the first time.This is an expensive repair.And, that, some of those items, that's why some of those items there, they're not in.That's considered like a longer distance of phase too.I mean, the things that we have planned was the items that I gave the board a couple of weeks ago.You're right.Okay.I think what disturbs me about it, you know, I didn't mean to attack, oh there it is.About the field, what what disturbs me about the field is just that being a new board member, I didn't realize how needy our turf was at the high school.And I guess knowing how much money you put into the PV field, I'm sorry.I, don't know if you all realize to help me, the high school field was before money was put into the PV field.I wasn't on the board then.So we talked about for at least two years, yes.We talked about- - We knew it needed help.But I don't think any of us expected it to be on this list.I mean, we didn't know, really, where this was all gonna end up this quickly.Would have been nice to get another couple years out of it.I didn't mean to jump on you but I was like, okay, then why don't we do the high school field before we did the BB deal?That's, but I wasn't on the board then, so.Okay, move along to the middle school.There's a storm water drainage issue on the back of it.Mr. France, would you comment on that a little bit?Yeah that was pointed out to a Greer and I, when we were here last week, that that was an issue over, it's between the two wings of the building.If you're familiar with the back of the building next to the gymnasium wing, and next to the center classroom wing, there's an open courtyard area there where the wings stick out and it's facing the back hillside here.In that area, there's, just looking at it with snow on the ground.You can see high and low spots in those areas.It looks like just a process of erosion and settlement since the building was built.It's just created these ponding areas where water's just laying on the ground surface and saturating the ground.I think with some minor topsoil grading, there is a yard drain in that area that we can manipulate that soil to get it to flow and drain out of there.It's really that simple.So it might be an easy fixing.Yes.That's nice.It doesn't cost anything.Okay, and then the McMurray one, when we actually went into detail already on.Pleasant Valley, there's some unit vent wiring to network.Last summer, we put some unit vent ventilators.We replaced some existing unit ventilators and they needed to be replaced.They were worn out and the control wiring was never completed.So the units are in there and they're not on the in-house network system as far as monitoring them and temperature control.So that is something that needs to be addressed.And that was actually phase one, as far as putting the units in.There's a phase two where there's more units that need to be replaced.So basically 80% of the units up there have been changed out, there's 20% more to go.So that that's kind of a substantial little project that has to take place up at Pleasant Valley.Bower Hill has a roof cable leak.When they put the addition on Bower Hill, apparently there's water that comes from the roof cable that actually comes back into the building.And once again, with a water issue, it's something you wanna address as soon as possible.Otherwise it just creates more and more problems down the road.The district administration building, we have a rooftop air conditioning unit that Mr. McMurray probably saw it put on.How many years is this unit been on?That thing was like a jet engine for so long.A couple of years ago, it wasn't replaced a couple of years ago.No, we talked about, or it was talked about a couple of years ago, but it was never replaced.Well there was talk about putting the enclosures on it.And a lot of other options, so, yeah.We were talking about that when I was here in 2008.We've been talking about it every year about the noise that's in the building.Yeah.Yeah.And we already talked about the turf on the field, the bus garage, right now, they're using a portable pressure washer that's caused a somewhat, a cumbersome process where they have to fill it with fuel oil and drag it around.And there was a suggestion made, made to have a stationary one that is gas, natural gas, and it's mounted to the wall instead of being dragged around and beat up.Once again, that's just something that is an item that might be a possibility.It's not something we're gonna move forward on.There's possibly the ability of additional seating on the visitor side of the football stadium.And then district-wide, which should go to the top of the list, is the district phone system, which is, at the current time, maybe Vince will elaborate a little bit on that as far as our priorities with the phone system.I'm actually investigating the district phone system.I think there's a few options out there.We're just learning now as to some of the alternatives to the current system that we have, where the three buildings here, the middle school district office and the buildings across the street are all on the same system where we may have to just expand our current system to include the high school, Pleasant Valley and Boulware Hill.And we can all be on a centralized phone system.And then we've also had some discussions with the utility companies in the area, from service providers as to what our best options are.We have been experiencing some outages due to the underlying underground lines in front of the high school.And we wanna go away from that and do something that is more permanent, looking at files, maybe some use of the internet to change the phone system to a more acceptable use, accessible system.Okay.Will we have options on that for budget meetings coming up?I'm working with it.And I think I had a discussion with Matt.I wanted to bring one of the engineers and see what we have and what is our best way to go.Some of the discussions with the utility companies in the area have been very productive.Matter of fact, I got a return call today and I was just playing phone tag with them.That things do look good for the district in us.Do you know if they laid files, cable on that side of town this year?Cause I know on our side of town, they were laying in everywhere on the Venetia side last summer.From what I understand, I think Iowa Sydney is in the area where the high school is, but it was not accessible yet to large companies or large entities.I don't know if that has changed.That may have been the phone call I got today.If they're smart, it's just changed.I mean I can figure it out.I thought you mentioned the meeting that we had with the vice president of Verizon last week, yeah.I mean, that is who we're talking to.We're talking to Verizon about the files to try and get that service provided to the high school and PV elementary.So we won't have experience those outages.But just one thing to kind of just expand on what was said by Mr. Balsic.We did have meeting with the vice-president of Verizon and technically, the way we bid our phone services, they are not our provider.We are provided through ERC link and where we get Verizon services.Now, why wouldn't we go directly to Verizon?Because we're able to bid it and it's at a much cheaper cost, but Verizon is recognizing that a school, particularly like our, some of our school buildings when we lose phone service, which was lost in many places throughout the district, that this creates huge issues for us.So they're working with us directly to try to resolve that and make bias available some other new tech techniques.And one of the big issues is are we gonna try to expand on the present system?Are we gonna look to put in a whole new system?And that's where we're gonna be bringing some cost estimates to the board.I'm going to comment on this too.I think of all the safety issues we've discussed here tonight, I think the phone system is the biggest safety issue.When the power went out to the high school, my understanding is the administrators couldn't even communicate with one another.They couldn't communicate with the teachers in the building.I was under the understanding that they had like, walkie talkies- - And they do.And they were using them.They were not working properly from what I understand, maybe I'm misunderstand.But the point is I would just like to agree with Mr. Don Levy that of all the things on this attachment one, the district phone system ought to jump to the top.That's a good point.Thank you.I guess, along with that, I'd throw out the generators.Was that a maintenance issue or do we need to upgrade the generating system for the emergencies in the buildings?That was actually a maintenance issue there.What took place, there was a great misunderstanding where people thought that the generator came on and then it ran out of gas.That's what my students came home and told me, my kids.What actually took place was they lost the power.The power came back on in what they call a single-phase condition.So you have three phases feeding your building.Only one came back and by the good wit of our maintenance staff, they went and turned the power off.Otherwise your three-phase equipment would have burned up and would have caused quite a bit of damage, you know, a lot more expense.So what they did find was the generator did not start.The maintenance department director, Ron Gauld, had two companies come out that day for the generator.The first one came out and said that he troubleshot it down to a start board that roughly would be around $2,000.And Ron had another guy come in and he troubleshot it further and said, yeah, it was a start board, but there actually was a rodent that actually lived in it.And actually they have a picture of it.I actually saw it.Is that true?I heard that story.It's absolutely true.I actually went there and saw the control cabinet, stuff filled with nuts and grass, and, so to answer your question right now, from my understanding, Mr. Gauld has gone ahead and instilling, instilling some of his maintenance procedures.So now the staff is gonna abide by the way, he did the generators at Duquesne university where they're gonna be testing them more often.Ron, would you like to give us an explanation of how you plan on testing those?Yeah, this was a, that was a difficult day last Tuesday when we had a major power failure, utility lines down and the generator did not start.What we found as Mr. DeLeon said, we had two generator mechanics come in.I didn't wanna spend $2,000 on a \"maybe\".I called another friend of mine who has proprietary rights to those generators.He came from Mon Valley hospital, dropped everything for me.And he got up there and he tore into it and looked at it from a different perspective than the first technician.He pulled off covers and there was a woven inside of the control board, was a nest.And we don't know what type of rodent it was.I suspect, somebody that like walnuts because the walnuts were all throughout the unit.Chewed, that squirrel or rodent or a chipmunk chewed through the start wire.Of all wires, he got lucky and he picked the right one.So it was the perfect storm.But, as Mr. Dunley just said, I've instituted today, I met with my staff, there are new procedures in place.They will operate the generators.The first of the month, physically will be in place.They will go ahead.I'm gonna train an individual starting Wednesday morning.And he is gonna go to all the units the first week of the month.The other weeks they are on remote starters, exerciser clocks.That's fine, but at least once a month, if not more, they will be physically looked at.It's just like your car.You'll check the oil, you'll check the battery, you'll check the antifreeze, you'll check the belts and you'll start it so that we can have a higher degree of response and assurability that these are gonna work.So, you know, I apologize for that.Not operational, but we're going through some learning pains.I'm learning what my staff has the capabilities of doing and what they don't have.And ironically, I had a generator contractor in my office at 10 o'clock that morning talking about a potential contract maintenance.And this happened.Just the one generator, would that do both Pleasant Valley and the high school?Yes.That's the design of somebody previous before me.Are all the generators in all the buildings sized appropriately?We've had, at high school for a long, it's been several years since the renovation.And there's been changes with what's being powered.I mean, right now we're very contingent on that technology.Are these things all sized practically, or do we need to look at those?Well, a good question.Because when those were sized to high school, 10 years ago, you, I'm sure you didn't have the technology that you had in the building, but again, emergency generator has one function in a building of this nature and institution.It's designed to operate, start and provide life safety, exit signs, lights for people to move and to congregate and possibly leave.It's not designed to operate classes and continue, you know, business as usual.So the answer to your question, I haven't completely, you know, gone through that.I am, there are, not deficiencies.There are issues that were not life safety issues when they were designed years ago that now I wanna bring it up to grade.For instance, some emergency lighting in classrooms, without windows.I'm working on that to ensure that that happens.Mrs.Paddock and me have been in constant conversation about how we're gonna do that at the high school.When you have interior rooms in the basement where there are no windows.So I wanna see a light in every one of those rooms, and we can do that.We can do that and make that happen in the foreseeable future.But we do have to have a generator start.That's where I'm starting at first at.It seems like there's along with, and you've probably already done it, is looking at some of the emergency procedures that need to be looked at and revised if necessary.Absolutely, absolutely.I had a parent call me and ask me if it wouldn't be appropriate at this point in time until something gets done, if you just don't keep a, now granted, he could get up and walk away, but a wall-mounted flashlight charged in every classroom.So at least you got a flashlight.And we're gonna do that.That's one of the things that we're gonna do too.And police and fire were on hand and they have portable generators.So they were getting lights into the buildings and things, you know, under the condition that we were under, things went fairly well, understanding that it was a difficult situation.Staff did well, kids did well.And we actually got through most of the day, which was kind of a goal.You know, this occurred 10:30 in the morning, and we had concerns about dismissing 1500 students from the building that early in the day.So we worked to try our best to try to keep things as operational as we could.And as we solved one problem, another one turned up.So it is also gonna give us an opportunity to revisit a lot of our procedures.Mr. McMurry, the generator fleet is a good fleet.It just needs to be fine tuned and so does the staff that operates it.That's fine, but it had been so long in all of them.It's always good to look at and I'm sure that's on your list of things to make sure.And that just falls in with what our prior discussion, if there's anything that we need to have for capital, if we do need to upgrade some generators, it would be good to at least have that on the list to be looked at.Thank you, Mr. Rob.Thank you.Thank you.Okay, jumping through here quick.For the next step, what may occur and when, basically all of these items we've talked about, and other ones that may come up, will all be brought forward in the budget process.I'd like to go up to the first item where we had an objective.Review the current needs of the school district facilities.This review is not addressing routine maintenance, but rather a large district capital projects.That's open for discussion.If you have anything that you think we wanna go into as far as the capital expenditure, since we are gonna be calling into the budget process, now would be a good time to bring it forward.I mean, regular items, it's not routine maintenance, but year to year, I can think off the top of my head, if we're looking at like having to replace a school bus and all that kind of stuff, that's gonna come up in the general capital improvement budget, right?Yes.Mhm.As a matter of fact, it was on the list.It was on the list, yeah.A truck, we talked about a truck, a box delivery truck, we talked about school buses.Sorry.And the dump truck, no that's okay.The way they were set up there, I, we had them and then we missed reading.Will he be working with as chair, of course.And then bring that information to the board with Mr. Gauld, especially in this next month, because as Mr. McMurray points out and Mr. Balsic, I'm sure you'll be involved in it too.Now's the time for us to know about whatever we need to know about so we can get it into the budget process.Will you be working on that and...Yes we will.And, I think what we'll be working on is putting a priority to this list, which I think the board has pretty clearly indicated and then putting some numbers with that so that we can plan accordingly.Thank you.If there's no other questions I'd like to open up for public comment.Some people patiently waiting through the whole meeting.Name and address?Thank you.My name and address?Name and address please.Okay, I'm Lisa Regal 100 Keystone Court in Venetia.I am here speaking only as a parent and a community member, no other role.I just wanna say, there is kind of a feeling in the community.There's a little bit of a rumor going around that there is a half a million dollar expenditure on athletics going on, and that's partially why the rumor got me here, but I'm also here because I do want you to plan ahead.There's an awful lot of, as you've received tonight, problems, that are gonna affect our kids.And I want you to think ahead and plan, as Mr. McMurray said, I appreciated that, plan for the future.And I know that stating the obvious, but I just, I just thought I'd say it now.So thank you.Thank you.Anyone else?Okay.Well, I picked up, Can I interject one other thing is, I know that the administration has met with the township planning group and going along with that.So I think as we move along with that, there may be issues coming out of that that may impact what we need in our planning.Is that something you have on?I think so, yes.Okay.I've just heard some of the things that have been thrown out and it could seriously severely impact what, what are plan is.Well, when we met with, Vince and I went over and we met with the township and the planners community plan, the long range planning group that they have.And of course, one of the questions that they have for us is continued population growth in terms of not only residents, but also student populations, will we need to expand on facilities, will we need to build a new facility?So those are questions that also as the future years come, the district will have to consider.Well, one thing to always throw out there, and maybe it was brought up is that when a lot of the long range planning and if we did have to do another building, where would that building actually be?There isn't a lot of space where we could actually go in and buy 30 acres somewhere right now.So in the planning with that group, there needs to be consideration is the expansion is all towards Venetia area.Right.There needs to be an area possibly identified where a school could actually be without having to go through- - But would we have to build in Venitia, we have landed Elm Grove.that we talked about two years ago, potentially building on Elm Grove - Well but if the growth is all on the other side of the township.And fortunately we have buses, but you know, is it property we own or property that we have to go buy that now people know we need it, the price is gonna go up.Exactly, and there's other alternatives, but none of them are easy.We also talked about how to get in and out of Elm Grove too, like how that's all situated.We may have to look at- - Well that's gonna be one of the big issues is where do we actually put the thing.Look at our high school now.It's, you know, getting in and out and all that congestion and kind of...Excuse me, Tom, being on that committee, that steering committee, some of the folks in the audience were with us the other day when we sat through the three days in process.And I know my group was in fact, looking at that possibly as a joint share between the township and the school district purchasing a piece of property that because according to the plan, they're gonna need about 110 extra acres in parks if the plan grows out for the 2000 students and the 10,000 additional people in the community.So they're looking at it also from purchasing a large track of land for additional parks in the community.My group, and I brought that up in the Venitia area also, of looking at possibly getting with the township, looking at a piece of property and joining with them to putting it like in one area.And the only area that is, really, for that size of a property would be down there along Bebop.Not the part that's over top of the mine?Well, welcome into Peters township.I was gonna say, where is it?That area, if we're talking about the same one, that's not real, - Well I know, but whenever, that's the only game in town, as far as that size property, that's the problem with it.So, but that is an issue that we've been, and that's one of the issues I had brought up to, to the board about why we have to meet with the council, because there are issues that they're trying to seed on the future that is gonna affect us in so many ways.And like I said, if they're planning 2000 additional students in the next 10 to 15 years.We're in this planning committee meeting, right?That includes everybody, right?In the meeting, you have counsel there and...Right.Well, I mean, it's just not a matter of building another elementary school.What happens when those kids get to the high school that can't support what we have now?Exactly.Well, that's what I said.This is projecting into the future.Or McMurray elementary.Bower Hill or Pleasant Valley.I mean, all of these- - Those two can stay as they are, but if you're gonna build another elementary school, those kids have to go somewhere after third grade.And now you're talking about four buildings.That's when we just start adjusting again, you know, that's the problem.But I mean, like you said, these are issues that are being looked at by some people, not necessarily the overall township, but you know, we threw those figures and facts into it whenever they ask them what is projected, if our growth kept going, you know, when we went to school here and it was 4,000 people in the community.Now there's almost 23,000.So there's a big difference just in those years, but it didn't go up 10,000 in 10 years.It went up, you know, four or 5,000, every 10 years, so...Motion to adjourn?You don't need the committee.That's second.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Peters_Twp._School_Board_-_Buildings_and_Grounds_Committee_-_Feb._4_2013.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Peters_Twp._School_Board_-_Buildings_and_Grounds_Committee_-_Feb._4_2013.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Peters_Twp._School_Board_-_Buildings_and_Grounds_Committee_-_Feb._4_2013.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/Peters_Twp_Planning_Commission_-_July_12_2018/Peters_Twp_Planning_Commission_-_July_12_2018.HD.mp3", "text": "I'd like to call to order the regular meeting of the Peters Township Planning Commission for July 12th, 2018.Ed, roll call.Mr. Mills will not be here.Mr. Magrino will not be here.Mr. Kartofilis?Here.Mr. Wylie?Here.Mr. Smith?Here.Mr. Tselepis?Here.Mr. Verlato?Here.Can I get a motion to approve the minutes of the June 12th, 2018 regular meeting?All in question to approve those minutes.All in favor?Aye.Reports and Correspondences.Site plans/subdivisions filed.We have one subdivision file for review, and it's the Sarchick, I'm not sure if I'm pronouncing that correctly.It's Sarchick plan of lots.It's also a one lot subdivision on Bower Hill Road.So we'll be dealing with that tonight.Any other items to add to the agenda?No. - Any items or comments on items not on the agenda?Good evening, gentlemen.First of all, my name is Monica Marrow.I live at 105 Walnut Drive.I'd like to thank you all for what you do, the service you provide as Planning Commission is invaluable.I am a council person, as you all know.I am here as a council person, but I am speaking solely for myself.I represent no one but myself.I wanted to say a few words about the plans that have been coming up through the Planning Commission and passed on to council for approval.Most specifically, I wanted to share what may be deemed frustration with many of the plans that come to council with requests for variances and special conditions that deviate from our newly approved zoning ordinances.Township spent a considerable amount of money and time to do the comprehensive plan and the zoning ordinances.They've been published, yet almost every residential development or any commercial endeavor comes forward seeking some deviation or variance.Now we all know we live in Pennsylvania, and there are hills and dales and creeks and challenging topography, and we all know that Peters has relied on revenue from development, both residential and commercial, for a long time to support our public infrastructure and our public services.We also know that much of the remaining property in Peters Township that has potential for development also has the probability of difficulty.I think we're pushing the envelope every time a development comes forward, and two recent issues made me feel compelled to come and talk to you.Again, this is my personal opinion and only my view of how things are, and it is not critical to you.It is an observation of what I see happening.The first example, with all due respect to Mr. Hoskins, who has developed some wonderful plans in the township.The most recent phase for Hamlets of Springdale, to me, is pushing the envelope.It's a bit of a following.It sits on a mound and the developer requested a loop road to make that workable.That design was a request to compromise our standards, when in fact there were ways that he potentially could compromise on his own.Fewer lots, maybe a different design, or maybe not going into that part of the property.I wasn't really in favor of the modification.I thought it was a creative solution to a problem that he created by himself.The second is the waters project.Both the parking spaces, which are too small in the garage, and my recent realization that they have a four story frontage on East McMurray Road, were very frustrating to me.I do have to ask, did you all realize that the garage was exposed and that, in fact, there would be four stories at East McMurray?Because I didn't when I looked at the plan.And to me that is a direct violation of the intent of what council stated when we talked about the town center plan.It's water under the bridge, in some respects.The design said it's been approved, but that is something that I think should really not have been allowed, or it should have been brought to our attention.When it came to council, it was about the variance for the subdivision for the right of way so that they could have a turning lane.And, \"Oh, by the way, there were parking space issues\".I don't agree with them being smaller.I don't agree when I realized that the garage was exposed, so that's one of the reasons I voted that we approved this subdivision, but I am hopeful that the zoning commission will not approve that variance.I'm personally ashamed that I missed that, because I do try to be very diligent about what I look at and what I read and take into consideration how it affects the residents and how it matches up with the ordinances.Maybe some people think I'm anal, I don't know.I think I'm doing my job.Anyway, in conclusion, I again want to thank you for what you do.I realize it's a lot to look at and a lot of work.I just want to express my sentiments that I would really hope that the Planning Commission would be a little more critical, look at plans a little more critically when they present requests for deviation and modifications that maybe could be avoided if the developer would make, would not have tried to push the envelope and put as much as they could into a small piece of property.If you would like to say anything in response, that's fine.I just thought that I needed to come and again, thank you for what you do and just ask for better scrutiny of what's coming before us.I'll let Planning Commissioners respond first, but I need to respond as well.I'll let you respond first, if you have any response.First of all, I want to say with respect to Hoskins, Hamlet Six, it was a deviation from our subdivision ordinance.We didn't update that.We were deviating from a rule of 600 feet that's been in our ordinance for 30 years and is outdated.There were no variances granted on the conservation residential zoning.There have been no variances granted on conservation or mixed residential developments that have come in here that have been recently approved, one.Two: the waters.It's not four stories.It's Valley Brook Road, not East...I'm sorry, you're right.I apologize.At Valley Brook Road, you see two stories.The fourth story is set back 50 plus feet.It's that whole ordinance working together that you need to consider.It's not a four story building because it doesn't meet the definition of a four story building, and it's not going to be four stories right on Valley Brook Road.It will be two.The fourth story is set way back, so you didn't miss anything.Well, I think probably what I'm saying to you is that the view of the facade is not what I anticipated it to be.I don't think I was alone in realizing that the garage level was exposed.It had to be.Well...It's only exposed along Valley Brook Road.The 90% of it is not exposed, therefore it does not count as a story under the definition of a story.That is exactly the idea that we can explain away anything.Well, I'm not explain away anything.It's the ordinance.You can't make developers do things that are not in the ordinance.You make them comply with the ordinance, and there they did.There's no deviation relative to the height of the building.They are requesting the variance for the nine by 18 versus 10 by 20 parking in the garage, which in my mind is de minimus.We made a recommendation - In favor.to do a mix and not require all the parking lots to be, what is it, 10 by 20?10 by 20.They could have some of them 10 by 20, but where, I think it was pillars.Structures.Impeding the size of each space, because if you make those nine by 18, about half to balance would be 10 by 20.See, and it's my understanding the developer was not willing to make that.They are requesting the full, I think it's 80 plus spaces in that garage to be nine by 18, because they want a certain ratio of parking for the residents that will be residing there.It's even questionable in our zoning ordinance whether that 10 by 20 applies to private parking in a garage.We don't regulate parking in a multi-family town home.We don't regulate parking in a single family home in a garage.It's even questionable whether that 10 by 20 applies, and we took a conservative approach and made them go through the mayor.You know, Mr. Zuk, I appreciate your explanation, and I understand that you're defending the fact that waters is following what you perceive as the ordinances.My personal comment was just that the side of the building and the way it will appear is not what I read it to be.And I did not realize personally that the garage was exposed.That's all I'm asking.That to me, it looks like it will be four stories at Valley Brook.You're right, I misstated.The perception.You do understand that perception is truth to most people.So I'm just telling you my perception.I don't think there's been a lot of deviation from the rules that you perceive there are.There's been very minor deviations, that 600 feet, like I said, it's been in our ordinances for 30 plus years, and I think it's a little outdated.We just did the zoning.If that was the point...So it's in the subdivision ordinance.We didn't totally update the subdivision ordinance.I'm sorry.I don't want to take your meeting to debate.You need to make sure that you're hitting these things accurately, which I don't think you are.My perception is that there are a lot of times that we have plans where there are variances, there are modifications, one thing and another, all I'm saying is...They're not.There are not a lot of those.There have been a couple here in, you know, recently, but there's not a lot of variances being granted on new developments.Just not happening.I respect your perception.It's an accurate perception.Thank you, gentlemen.I appreciate it again.Thank you for everything you do.No old business on the agenda.Planning Champion Capital Subdivision on Bower Hill Road.Champion Capital LP. They recently purchased the 2.3 plus acres at 269 Bower Hill Road.They're asking Planning Commission and the Township tonight for approval to subdivide that 2.3 acres into two single family residential lots.This is the property where a recent fire occurred, and there was a death.Then Champion Capital bought and then tore the house down that used to exist on lot one.That was done in March of this year.We're talking about a modification here tonight for this subdivision.The proposed plan is to create one new lot, that's lot number two, which will have direct driveway access to Bower Hill Road, just like the existing residents used to have.Bower Hill Road is classified as a collector roadway, at Peters Township, and our subdivision ordinance stipulates that except for previously recorded lots of record, you're not allowed to create new lots with direct access to Bower Hill Road.They're requesting the subdivision to be approved in this modification request.This section of Bower Hill Road has a 25 mile per hour speed limit.The required safe sight distance in our subdivision ordinance, looking left from, the new lot is lot two.Looking left is 250 feet and looking right is 195 feet.This stretch of Bower Hill Road, as you can see on that subdivision, it's a fairly long straightaway.So there's good sight distance from the proposed right of way on lot two.They would exceed the 250 left and the 195 right, to meet and exceed our Township safe sight distance for the driveway on lot two.The driveway on lot one, too, has the required safe sight distance.This property is in our low density, residential zoning district.The minimum lot size in that district is a half acre.Both of these lots exceed one acre.This area of Peters is serviced by the Peters Creek Sanitary Authority.There is public sanitary sewer access available to both of these lots one and two.The plan includes a 20 foot wide sanitary slash utility easement between the 50 foot building line and the property line along Valley Road.There's a 20 foot easement that runs, there's a sanitary sewer right here.And Peters Creek has indicated that they will provide, that utilities will provide access for both lots one and two to that public sewer.There is the requirement that Peter's Creek Sanitary Authority approve this plan, as well as DEP has to approve sewage facility planning modules.Therefore, staff's recommending that the Planning Commission approve, recommend council approve the Champion Capitol final plan, including the modification to our subdivision ordinance Section 385.36: blocks, lots, and parcels, be approved subject to those nine conditions that are listed in my report.Lot two would be subject to a $1,500 traffic impact fee.That's one of the conditions on the plan, and both plots would be required to, at the time of a building permit, come in with their building permit application, a storm water management plan for each lot, as each proposed home is submitted for building permanent location.Other than that, the plan is in pretty good shape, and staff's recommending approval, subject to these nine conditions.Is someone here to talk about the plan?Yes.Can you come up and maybe answer a couple of questions for me?On the plan itself it shows some high-tension wires.I can't see those on the birds eye view.Are they pretty predominate, or are they real high?Yes, they are high, and they are pretty large.I mean, you see it on the plan, and they just cut up right...Can you just tell us your name first?My name's Andrew Ehrenberg on behalf of Champion Capital.Isn't it kind of strange to have .Won't the driveway be like, right under these high-tension wires?Is it going to be tough to put a house there with those high-tension wires there?Any problems with doing that?No, it shouldn't be a problem.The way we subdivided it to optimize both these lots.And like Ed said, with the driveway having to come up the side, cannot face Bower Hill Road.It will slightly be under that power line, but it shouldn't be...I wasn't quite clear.Where would it come?On the side yard, or on the South side?The driveway would be here.It's not uncommon to have a power line right of way running through...I guess I never went around...Great Meadows has them.Windermere has them, Stonehenge has them.Okay.It's not uncommon.It's a pretty tight space you're building on lot two though, right?Because there's a pretty significant drop off on the back on that street.Yes.We have intentions to build a larger home on lot one and a significantly smaller one on two.I shouldn't say significantly, but they won't be two exactly the same Hoskin style homes.Put it that way.Right.If there was not safe sight distance here for lot two, you know, I wouldn't be sitting here recommending that we approve that modification.This is along a fairly straight portion of Bower Hill Road.If there was not the required safe sight distance, then it would be a different story.In this case, there is safe sight distance.They're creating a 1.21 acre lot, minimum is a half acre.So that part of Hoskins plan that comes down that's shown on the overhead, is that already there?That road already built?Yes.I can't, I was down there not that long ago when this fire happened.And I couldn't recall if that connection was already built.So the sewage connections already built.It's already there?Sanitary sewers there.Any other comments?Can we get a motion?I'll make a motion that the Planning Commission approve the recommendation based upon the Planning Commission's memo dated July 6th, 2018 for the Champion Capital final subdivision, as well as the nine recommendations so stated in the memo.All in favor?Aye.Thank you, gentlemen.We'll figure out when this plan is going to council.We planning modules and such.It'll go probably sometime in August.Anything for the planning portion, Ed?Well the only thing is, we let the Planning Commission know we hired, we've hired two new folks.This is their first week of work.I didn't make them come tonight because it's such a short little meeting.At the next meeting, I will introduce our new Assistant Planning Director, which is Seth Koons, and our new zoning person Code Enforcement Officer, which is Kristen, who will be at our next meeting in August.Other than that, I don't have anything.All right, meeting adjourned.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Peters_Twp_Planning_Commission_-_July_12_2018.HD.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Peters_Twp_Planning_Commission_-_July_12_2018.HD.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Peters_Twp_Planning_Commission_-_July_12_2018.HD.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/gov.uscourts.ca9.19-17529/gov.uscourts.ca9.19-17529.2020-10-05.mp3", "text": "Good morning your honor this is Brian Boshi on behalf of the appellant, as I've watched lawyer after lawyer go over their time.I guess I better reserve three minutes for rebuttal.Okay.Thank you.Preliminarily, I would like to point out that in addition to all the other things we're going to talk about this morning and all of the claims and the elements of the claims.My client, Mark Hunt, is the only party of this action who did not commit wrongdoing in this matter.Brock Lesnar cheated, and got caught, and was sort of the other way, because it didn't want to know that Brock Lesnar was cheating, and was not going to be able to headline their UFC 200 card.And was going to cost them tens of millions of dollars.My client complied with contract he signed, expended tens of thousands of dollars of personal expense, training, traveling, doing everything he was required to do, to fight in the manner that UFC guaranteed him.And yet somehow after the lower court's decision, he is left without recourse and candidly, among all the other reasons I'm going to site to in this argument, that can not be the right answer.This matter should be remanded because he does have , and those claims were properly alleged, and he was wrong.Preliminarily- - What was wrong...Sorry go ahead.What was error about the determination that all of the damages he saw were consequential damages that were barred by the contract?Because all of the damages that were alleged were not consequential damages, I was going to deal with that in the contract section, but I'm happy to deal with it now, Judge Rawlinson.At the end of the day, the damages that Mark Hunt suffered in addition to consequential damages that that UFC has pointed out, are barred.Mr. Hunt, expended tens of thousands of dollars training, traveling, for one event where he was ice skating uphill, for lack of a better term.I mean, he was beaten before he walked into the ring against Brock Lesnar and another event, that he was pulled out of primarily for the allegations of the complaint.Because he had shed a light on what UFC had done in the Lesnar fight.And though he relied upon the representations in both his contracts, and specifically, and I don't want to quote it because it's filed under seal.But if you look at this up, O6 through O8 and the guarantees that are in the contract that my client is going to get a clean fight in all of his contractual fights.He didn't get that.And he relied upon that to his detriment and the breach of contract caused him actual damages.He lost appearance fees that were booked before the fight, based upon reliance that he was going to have a fair fight with Mr. Lesnar, and he didn't.I mean, and then the record is, I mean, I don't think there's, We're at the putting stage so when I say the record is clear, Mr. Lesnar got caught.He tested positive twice and was suspended.And paid a nominal monetary fine for it.But at the end of the day, it was my client who suffered.So these are not, and I know that Judge Dorsey was very hard on that in her decision and candidly I disagree with it, that these are all consequential damages.I don't know, and I don't think anybody knows.It is a pure speculation as to whether my client would have defeated Brock Lesnar, had he not cheated.That is absolute speculation.But the damages incurred because he had to fight Brock Lesnar.He had to fight a fighter who had been cheating, are absolutely not consequential, and they are absolutely not speculative.He should've never been in the ring with Brock Lesnar.Brock Lesnar should've never been in that fight.And had that not happened- - Can I ask you- Can I ask a question?If you're still answering Judge Rawlinson's question, I apologize, You can continue.I didn't want to, It seemed to me- - He's answered my question already.Oh, thank you.Okay.It just seemed to me that the breach of contract claim is a tough one, is an uphill battle.You know, your client got, I believe $700,000.He fought he says, you know, had I known there that there was doping and I wouldn't have, you know, that the contract was therefore breached.I suppose it would require that your client remit the $700,000 he received and seek some consequential damages, but, you know, it just struck me that it's almost more of a toward theory and it's either fraud in the inducement or just, you know, a garden variety fraud claim, which you've already plead.And it seems to me that once you get into, \"well, he would have won\", or \"he would have done better\", and \"he might have not lost endorsements cause he might've done better\".That just strikes me as being pretty speculative.What seems fairly clean to me, however, is the argument, you know, that if I knew that this other person was doping, I simply wouldn't have gone forward because it would have been bad for my reputation.Doping is very effective in terms of giving unfair advantage to folks, if that's the evidence.And I simply wouldn't have gone forward with this fight.And one can then, at least there's a fairly clean road in terms of damages in what that might've meant, as opposed to sort of betting on the outcome of a fight with this, you know, these uncertainties.So I just like your reaction to my sort of pared down version of what I think maybe is left in this case.And Judge Pregerson, I agree with most of, I actually agree with most of what you said.I would direct your honor to, and it's again, it's under seal.It supplement, O6, O7, and O8 as the contract.And here's why it is significant that he fought Brock Lesnar, who was a doping fighter.The contract provides that my client was going to get paid $700,000 for the first fight, regardless of who he fought.He was going to get that money, whether he fought Brock Lesnar, whether he fought another fighter, whether he bought someone else.Later in the contract, in paragraph, in sub two, sub three, and then eventually in 6.2, there are incentive clauses where my client had he had the opportunity to fight for a title, had he gone in with a legitimate fighter in his first fight.There are performance bonuses.He is entitled to more money under their contract, if he fights for a title.And then if he becomes a champion he's entitled to more money after that.And then he's entitled potentially to a piece of the pay-per-view.So, when I say that he should not have fought Brock Lesnar at all, certainly he would not have been entitled to the $700,000 and then another $700,000 for another fight.What I'm saying is he would have gotten the $700,000, regardless of who he fought.He could have fought me.That would have been even more inequitable than fighting Brock Lesnar, but had he fought someone else, he would have gotten the same $700,000 and the contract provides, that there would have been other opportunities.That's point one.Point two would be, the guaranteed fight money is one component of the contractual damages, but he was going to get that regardless of who he fought.The guts of what I think was alleged, and I think what stems from UFC's contract.And again, I would point out that this is UFC's contract.I happen to know Mr. Williams drafted it.He did a very fine job drafting it for his client.It is a very good contract for UFC, but it is their contract.And when we're talking about categories of damages that can or cannot be recovered under this contract, it doesn't say reliance damages in there.And it doesn't say that for a reason.And again, I would argue that, to the extent that there's any ambiguity at all, it'd have to be conveyed against the drafters of the contract.But Mr. Lesnar, if he would not have had to fight Brock, or if Mr. Hunt would not have had to fight by Mr. Lesnar, he would not have expended the money, the training, the other things that he did to fight that fight.And he certainly would not have expended the time, money, effort, tens of thousands of dollars in travel to be on the UFC 121 card that he was ultimately pulled off of because he complained about the Brock Lesnar situation.So, I think that while I agree with you, that certainly the fraud claim and in my opinion, the battery claim, which I'm going to get to in a second, are much cleaner.I do think there's a contract and a covenant of good faith and fair dealing here.And I think that their contract sets forth damages that are recoverable by my client for the breach, irrespective of whether he was paid for the fight with Mr. Lesnar or not.I think that there are damages above and beyond that $700,000 in the contract and outside of the 700,000 that are recoverable for their breach.I don't know if that completely answered your question, Judge Pregerson, but if you had any follow up to that I'd be happy to address it.I mean, just thinking, I don't want to take too much time, but just thinking this through a little further, maybe an expert could testify that the doping provides some percentage of an advantage 50%, 40%, and maybe I'm wrong that it would have to be his only remedy is, you know, to not have fought at all that maybe there can be a damages calculation based upon on those issues.I don't know.I don't know.It just seems tough.Well, and I don't disagree that it's a hard analysis and it's a hard, it's a little bit of a burden to overcome, but I will suggest your honor, that I think the contract, and I think expert testimony to your point as to the doping advantage, but certainly there are damages recoverable for the breach of contract and certainly for the battery, I look at the battery and aiding and abetting battery claims and I'm jumping into this right now because I see four and a half minutes left, the district court relied on Avila and rely on the Avila case as the sole reason to dismiss the battery and aiding and abetting battery claims against Lesnar in the UFC, based upon an assumption of risk theory.And I can't think of a better way to say that analysis is just wrong.I coach, when I'm not doing this, I spend a lot of time managing baseball and every one of my kids that goes up and goes to that bat in our games knows that there's a chance that they're going to get hit, that the pitcher is going to either miss, or is going to be mad at them and throw at their head, or is going to throw it some other, that they could get hit with a baseball.It's a fundamental part of the game.Okay?So when my kids are playing baseball or the college kids in Avila are playing baseball, when they go to home plate with that bat and that helmet, they know right then and there, that they could get hit at any moment with a pitch ball.When we're talking about assumption of the risk in a UFC fight, the UFC and Zuffa contractually guarantees, in their agreements, that fighters are not going to have to assume that risk against doping fighters, that they are going to get fights against clean fighters.And just in case it wasn't crystal clear in the contract, Mr. White personally assured Mr. Hunt that he was going to get a clean fight that Mr. Lesnar was going to be tested, used some profanities cause that's what Mr. White does from time to time.But that Mr. Lesnar was going to be tested.And what happened?Not only was he not tested until a week before the fight, he was tested and the results were held until after the fight was over so that, candidly, UFC 200 wasn't going to lose another draw because they had already lost John Jones for a doping violation, and they didn't want to lose Mr. Lesnar on top of it.So this to me is not comparable to Avila decision.This is a clear cut case of battery, aiding and abetting battery, and damages that ensued from the battery.And Mr. Hunt did not assume a reasonable amount of risk stepping into the ring with Mr. Lesnar because he had a contract and specific representations, and that goes more to the fraud claim a little bit.from Mr. White that he was not going to step into the ring with a doping fighter.So assumption of risk analysis that Judge Dorsey took looking at Avila, as compared to this situation, in our opinion, is misplaced.And it is a completely different standard.And Mr. Hunt did not assume reasonable amount of risk just because he's a UFC fighter.To that point, as with the other claims, and I kind of touched on this a little bit.I'm sorry.I just have to interrupt you.I, you know, I watched a lot of baseball too, you coach.I don't think that deliberately trying to bean somebody is within the assumption of the risk of major league baseball.I mean, what happens is the benches get cleared, you throw up a hundred mile an hour fast ball at somebody's head.I don't think that's part of the game, you know?Yeah it happens and people do it, but you tell me that you can line up four batters and the pitcher can deliberately throw at each one of their heads and that's part of the assumption of the risk?No, I don't think so.So I'm kind of surprised you go there.Okay and to that point, I think that Avila doesn't necessarily talk only, and I'm more referring to the dissent, which I tended to agree with more than the decision, in that an intentional pitch ball at someone's head, or a negligent pitch ball at someone's head, candidly, when your batter, when you're going up and, you know, these are college age kids.And so I don't know what, in Avila, what was going through their minds.I don't think most people would, but when you go to the plate, you know that there's a chance that you can get hit, whether it's intentional or negligent or otherwise.I would refer to, and Judge Pregerson sounds like you're a baseball fan.The Astros played the Dodgers earlier this season.And those guys all went up to the batter's box and the Astros players, one by one had a pretty good idea that someone was going to throw at them and eventually it happened.And Joe Kelly missed because he's not very good, but he threw the ball behind one of the batter's heads and that was something, but the Astros players knew that that was a possibility when they stepped into the batter's box that night.And I would submit that under Avila, when you played baseball, generally, whether it's intentional or negligent, you know, that there's a possibility that you could get hit.And I think this is a completely different situation specifically because the UFC contractually guaranteed that this was not a risk that he was going to have to assume.I'm a little over my time, but I'm happy to follow up on that question.All right well let's go over to the other side, opposing counsel.Good morning your honors.My name is Colby Williams.I represent Zuffa LLC, which we'll sometimes refer to as the UFC, and Mr. Dana white, the president of the company.I'm sharing time with my colleague, Mr. Olson, who will be arguing on behalf of Mr. Olson.I plan to argue for nine minutes.So- - Okay.Picking up with the contract issue because both Judge Rawlinson and Judge Pregerson asked about it, let me see if I can quickly knock that out because something that has occurred in the oral argument that has continued to happen in this case, both in the district proceedings below and in the opening brief.And that is Mr. Hunts claims morph.What you've heard Mr. Boshi arguing is that he was deprived of training expenses, and traveling expenses.Traveling expenses was never an issue below, anywhere.And there's a reason for that.The contract between the parties in section 7.1, which is in the record, provides that Zuffa pays the traveling expenses for Mr. Hunt, and that was done here.There was never a claim that that wasn't done.What we see is Mr. Hunt gets blocked on a particular argument and then seeks to expand it.So I just want to clarify that for the record, there are three independent reasons why the contract claim fails.First, and I won't spend a lot of time on it, but it's emblematic of what I was just talking about.The issue of reliance damages was never presented.Mr. Hunt never once argued that he was entitled to quote unquote reliance damages.The argument that was presented to Judge Dorsey.And that's why it's unfair to criticize her for addressing only consequential damages, was that he lost his training expenses for UFC Fight Night 121.That occurred after UFC 200 and thus Judge Dorsey viewed it as something occurring after UFC 200 and thus was a consequential damage barred by the contractual language.That section is section 10.5, it clearly bars consequential damages.The fighter is only entitled to recover his purses.There is no dispute in this record that Mr. Hunt was paid for UFC 200.And I will go further and tell you, as part of our summary judgment briefing, it is also clear we provided every single bout agreement.Mr. Hunt was paid every purse for all six fights.There is no dispute about that whatsoever.The next reason, I think this is probably the most important reason why the contract claim fails, is because reliance damages, your honors, are meant to put the complaining party into position he, she, or it would have been in, had the contract never been performed or had never come into fruition.You typically see this in the context of a contract and negotiate in good faith, where the parties negotiate for a period of time.One may do due diligence, spend money on fees, and the deal doesn't come to fruition.That's a situation where reliance damages may be appropriate.Not here, not where Zuffa has fully performed and paid every cent owed under the contract.So unless there's any further question on reliance damages, I will go ahead and move on to what the next focus of Mr. Boshi's argument was, and that was the battery claim.Mr. Boshi says that the contract and Mr. White both guaranteed that Mr. Hunt would fight a clean fighter.Most respectfully that is not correct.No question that the contract provides that fighters are to honor the provisions requiring them to comply with all Nevada athletic commission regulations, including rules prohibiting the use of certain substances.That is agreed, but Zuffa can't guarantee that a fighter isn't going to take a prohibited substance and- - Can the fighters themselves reasonably assume that that's going to be a clean fight.I'm sorry, Judge- - Can the fighters themselves assume that it's going to be a clean fight in light of under the rules of the association they got to follow the Nevada.Sure, your honor.I think that's certainly the goal.It's certainly Zuffa's goal to eliminate- - Why would it be unreasonable?Why would it be unreasonable?Yeah.I think this case provides an example of it, your honor, Mr. Hunt's entire complaint, the Rico complaint that was such the focus below is premised on the fact that he had previously fought two fighters who came back testing positive for a prohibited substance.But that last fight was against Frank Mir in March of 2016.The very next month is when he signed his current promotional agreement with the company.So he's clearly aware that that takes place.The first fight that he gets scheduled for under the new promotional agreement is with Mr. Lesnar.If you look at the allegations in the complaint and the Sprewell case from this court teaches us sometimes a plaintiff can plead himself out of a claim by providing too much detail.And I would submit that's what Mr. Hunt did here, because he recounts his repeated communications with Mr. White, where he is raising questions about Mr. Lesnar and his compliance with the testing program.And so I think in this case, Mr. Hunt, absolutely consented to this fight, but while it may be an aspiration and one we tried very hard to accomplish, that fighters are not going to test positive.We ultimately can't control what a fighter puts in his or her body either knowingly or not knowing.So how does this argument relate to the fraud claim?How does it relate to the fraud claim?Yes.Well, so the argument on the fraud- - Go ahead, - Judge Dorsey found that there was no proximate cause for the fraud claim, and that was tied because again, the focus below was on the Rico claims.And when she found no proximate cause on the Rico claims, she found no proximate cause on the fraud claims, but we would submit, your honor, that there is an additional basis upon which this court could affirm on the fraud claims.And that is, none of the statements identified in the complaint, constitute an actionable misrepresentation that could have been relied on by Mr. Hunt.We have a slew of things included, but they typically are statements Mr. Hunt made himself, statements that were made during the parties contract negotiations, which now Mr. Hunt says, \"Well, I would have wanted this that or the other thing in the contract\", but you didn't agree to that ultimately, but you did agree to the contract Nevada Supreme court in the road and highway builders case teaches us that you can't have a fraud claim based on allegations that contradict the contract.And then- - Can you have a fraud claim based on nondisclosure?You can if there's a duty, of course you can your honor, you certainly can have, but there's no allegation that there was a non-disclosure here because Mr. White isn't alleged to have known that Mr. Lesnar was testing positive.Mr. White's statements reflect that you saw enough, the independent testing agency was testing Mr. White, or excuse me.But council, wasn't there some inference that the tests were delayed sufficiently so that the results would not come back before the bout.Yes, Judge Rawlinson.That's certainly something that Mr. Hunt has argued and I'm glad you raised it, because I want to get to that point.And it may require me, I want to tread carefully, and then the court can tell me how to proceed.The allegation has been made that the first time Mr. Lesnar was tested was on June 28th.And that's the test that came back positive on July 15th after the fight.The record will reflect below as part of our motion to dismiss briefing, we submitted a request for judicial notice where we submitted all of Mr Lesnar's testing.And what I will represent to the court is that reflects far more testing than has been represented by Mr. Boshi.I don't want to go any further, unless the court has specific questions.Was there an exemption sought from any of the testing requirements?Was there, I didn't hear the question, Judge Rawlinson.Was there an exemption sought from any of the testing requirements?Yes.So typically when a fighter has been in the program and retires or leaves the sport for a period of time, when he or she comes back, they have to be in the program for a period of four months.Mr. Lesnar was as is contemplated under the doping program.Mr. Lesnar was granted an exemption to that four months testing window.Who requested the exemption?Whether it came from Mr. Lesnar or the UFC decided to grant it unilaterally.I don't know the answer to that question.I will- - Ultimately it was the UFC's decision, correct?Correct.And they were questioned about that by the Nevada state athletic commission, they provided a written response.We also included that in our request for judicial notice, that was exhibit five to our request for judicial notice.So let me ask you this.If there had been no exemption granted, wouldn't Mr. Lesnar have been tested prior to the bout?Mr. Lesnar was in fact tested prior to the bout on multiple occasions.That's what I'm telling you.We put into the record.Were the results revealed prior to the bout?The results were revealed for his first five tests.All of which were negative, but not all of them.How long before the fight was his last test?He was tested the night of the fight, July 9th, 2016.Well but the result for that come back before the fight.That's right.And that's- - For all of the other tests that preceded the fight, how far in advance of the fight were those?All throughout the month of June.When was the most recent one?When was the latest one in June, prior to the one the night of the fight?June 28th.And what was the night of the fight?July 9th.Okay.So between June 28th and July 9th there was no testing?That's what the record reflects, your honor.I see I'm over my time and I don't want to take anything- - No, I'll give you time for rebuttal, Judge Pregerson.I wasn't clear.I thought that he had been tested, test came out positive.Those results could have been available prior to the fight.They could have been, whether the word is expedited or whatever, they could have been made available prior to the fight then the positive result, but it was not.Is that correct?In part, your honor, if I may quickly elaborate.Answer his question.Yes.There were five tests.I just want my question answered.The two tests that came back positive first was June 28th.Could it have been expedited?There is a procedure for expediting, the part I can't answer your honor, is whether it would have come back before the fight, that's up to Usada, the independent testing agency.So I don't know how long that would have taken.And there's no evidence one way or the other- - Go ahead Judge Pregerson.There is no evidence on that the record, your honor.Okay.There were two positive tests prior to the fight.Is that what you said?One prior, one the night of.All fighters are tested the night of, because if it turns out, typically the way this works with a fight is if you're going to be doping, you're doing it farther in advance prior to a fight.You know you're going to be tested the night of the fight.So typically those types of positive tests are rare, because fighters are always tested the night of the fight.But in fact this one came back positive and he was fined for it.But it really didn't matter because he still got his purse basically with, you know, a small amount deducted for the positive test.He did receive his purse.He was fined.He was suspended- - He was fined 500,000 Out of 2.5 million.I believe he was fine.I think it was 250,000, your honor.Mr. Williams I just have one last question for you, switching over to the battery claim, do I understand your position to be that he consent, that the plaintiff consented to fight a fighter who had doped up.That is our position, your honor, yes.Very quickly, the judge found below that there was express consent through their promotional agreement.She also found that there was consent based on consenting to the inherent risks in the sport and given the nature of the complaint that we were here on, and given the specific representations that went back and forth between Mr. Lesnar, excuse me, Mr. White and Mr. Hunt.It's clear that he knew that there may be an issue with Mr. Lesnar and there's one additional place where I believe consent is evidenced, and the judge didn't rely on this, but I believe that this court can, because you can rely on anything in the record that supports this issue.And that would be the night of, or for a particular fight, fighters not only sign their promotional agreement, they sign bout agreements for the specific fight at issue.The promotional agreement is longer term.The bout agreement is for the particular fight in question.Mr. Hunt included the bout agreement as part of his complaint.So it's incorporated by reference we submit.We also submitted the bout agreement for UFC 200 in our motion to dismiss briefing as well as in the summary judgment briefing.So that's in the record and it too contains the express consent that Judge Dorsey found.And the last point I'll make, and it touches on something- - But does Nevada law permit those kinds of waivers?Excuse me, your honor?Does Nevada law permit parties to waive liability for intentional towards, as an assumption of the risk.Your honor, there isn't, that I'm aware of, in Nevada Supreme court that addresses that question.Okay, well the, okay.The lower court seemed to indicate no.Right.Well, the lower court relied on, for that portion of the consent finding, relied on Avila the California Supreme court case.That's the baseball case.That's the baseball case.And isn't there something qualitatively different between doping and this history of baseball that we have with batters and pitchers and that rivalry?I mean, when baseball players are found to be doped, they strip them of their titles.They take away their batting championships.There are significant consequences.So are you saying they're the same thing?I'm saying there, that there are significant consequences for doping, your honor, absolutely.In that perspective I would say there are, in addition to what the athletic commission does with the fines and the suspension, Zuffa has a set of consequences under the anti-doping policy as well that it impacts.I can tell you, Mr. Lesnar has not fought for the UFC since this fight.Go ahead I'm done.Go ahead Judge Pregerson you're finishing- - I was just saying that it just seems to me that if a fighter conceals the fact that they're taking a performance enhancing drug, that potentially will not only cause them to win, but perhaps do more damage to an opponent.I have a hard time thinking that that is part of the assumption of the risk when you're dealing with, you know, this context.That's all.Go ahead, Mr. William, do you have a point you want to make?I was going to say- - This is it.Thank you.I understand that.And all I would say is, I think the analogy could apply across a number of sports, whether it's a doping hockey player, a football player, or a MMA fighter in this context, if a particularly hard hit is leveled during one of those types of games, is the recipient of that hit going to be able to go back and seek to use the tort liability to police those types of incidents within the sport, and I would respectfully submit the answer is no, your honor.Okay.Okay.Let's hear from your co-council.Yes.Thank you, your honor.Mr. Lesnar, Mr. Olsen.Originally sent out to have five minutes, So I'll give it to you but I got to hold you to it.Thank you, your honor.David Olson on behalf of Brock Lesnar, since we're talking about battery, I think we have to put this into focus.The question when we're looking at a battery claim is whether the defendant owes a duty to protect the plaintiff from an injury.Consent, of course, negates the duty, the existence of a duty, because the absence of a consent is an element of the claim of battery.Here, Hunt has definitely pled in his own complaint that he consented to whatever injuries he received in the fighting cage.First, he expressly consented to accept the risk of injury and even death, when he got into the MMA fighting cage.If you look at exhibit B, to his own supplemental complaint, it's the promotional and ancillary rights agreement at paragraph 12, he specifically says fighter fully understands and agrees that the professional sport of mixed martial arts is an inherently and abnormally dangerous activity that can result in severe and permanent physical injury, including death.And he does by clearly unambiguously and explicitly, accept all risks.All risks means all risks.So council, is your position that that consent encompassed illegal doping?It's my position that, that consent encompassed any injury he might receive in the ring, whether it's a fighter who has violated the anti-doping policy or not.He accepted the risk of death and serious bodily injury.He's not allowed- - That'd be true if the death came by virtue of combat with someone who had not been doping, but the problem is the doping brings a new wrinkle into it.And there's at least in terms of the pleading, on the pleadings.I am not certain that on the pleadings, one could say that he consented to fight someone who had consumed performance enhancing drugs, because his inquiries were to ensure that that hadn't happened.So that's inconsistent to say he consented to something that he was assiduously seeking to avoid.It's our position that the pleadings are just the opposite of that.That in fact he did consent to potentially fight a fighter who will fail a drug test.He admitted in his own complaint that on multiple occasions, before he fought Brock Lesnar, he had fought fighters who in turn tested positive.He admitted that doping is an unfortunate reality in MMA. And that's a quote from his own complaint.He admitted that he suspected Lesnar of cheating, of juicing, of doping prior to the fight.Yet with all of that knowledge, he chose to get in that fighting cage anyway.And because he did- - But didn't he also say that was the reason he was trying to get some reassurance, that had not occurred in this case.And would thus we're supposed to interpret the pleadings in the light most favorable to the pleader.So how do we make the inference that you're telling us is compelled from that complaint?We make the inference because although he admits that he sought insurance, that there would be no doping or no violation of the anti-doping policy.He never got that assurance, he never got a guarantee.He didn't contract for a guarantee.The fighting contracts say that the fighters will adhere to anti-doping policy.That's all they say.There's no guarantee that there will never be a violation.And he knew there wouldn't be a guarantee like that.I'm sorry.You had a question?Not a guarantee, an assurance.That's different than a guarantee.And we're saying that if we look at the allegations in his own pleading, we take those allegations as true.He knew there was no assurance when he got into the fighting cage, he knew that it had happened before, he knew that it's likely to happen again, he knew that it was a part of the sport.That's his own pleading.That's what he said.You make it sound like it's completely pointless for any fighter to rely on testing or that any other fighter is not going to be doped.Even in the face of making multiple requests, is he clean, has he been tested, or words to that effect.Well, in a sense, your honor, it is pointless because although not in the record, when asked to put this in perspective and understand the nature of the sport and the anti-doping policy, the world anti-doping association publishes the list that has literally hundreds of compounds on it.These compounds are not all performance enhancing drugs.They include standard medications, they include over the counter medications, they include substances that may occur in food that you buy from the grocery store, packaged food, processed food.A fighter can never be sure that he will pass a test no matter how vigilant he is.And no matter how much care he takes with what he puts into his body, there will never be a guarantee, no matter what the rules say, no matter what UFC does, no matter what Usada does, never be a guarantee that a fighter will pass a test.That's just the reality of this sport.Okay so any representations to the contrary are pointless.In essence, yes, the fighters can do their best to try to adhere to the policy.They can never guarantee that they will not fail a test.You keep using the word guarantee, but that's not the standard.It doesn't, doesn't have to be a guarantee.If there is a misrepresentation or an assurance that was knowingly false, that's enough.There doesn't have to be a guarantee.If we look at the pleading, there is no representation made by Brock Lesnar to Mr. Hunt.There is no representation made by Brock Lesnar in any agreement that provides any assurance that he will not fail on the test.That representation was never made.Okay.Thank you, council.Thank you.Okay, I'll give the plaintiffs appellant's lawyer one minute, but you need to turn on your mic.You need to unmute.Okay.I'm going to try to blend three minutes into one.Council's argument about Mr. Lesnar, and there's no guarantee of anti-doping, he took steroids, he took performance enhancing drugs, and got caught taking performance enhancing drugs.This wasn't some supplement, some dietary, \"oh, whoops.I took the wrong over the counter drug\".He was caught cheating to get bigger, stronger, faster so that he could put my client in a life-threatening situation.That's the reality of what happened.And the analogy and I'll go to Judge Pregerson's point with baseball.There was a pitcher for the Dodgers, a number of years ago, who was a nice pitcher.He threw an 88 mile an hour fastball, and he started using steroids and he started throwing a hundred mile an hour fastball, and he hit a guy in the head.And one of the reasons that baseball tests so diligently for performance enhancing drugs is because that situation creates a life-threatening possibility.If you've got someone on performance enhancing drugs that can kill someone.That's what happened here.Mr. Lesnar took performance enhancing drugs against the policies of the UFC and the Nevada athletic commission for the sole purpose of getting bigger, stronger, faster, and hurting, potentially irreparably hurting my client and that's battery.And in the UFC knew he was going to do it.And they turned the other way, and that's aiding and abetting battery.And I've used up my minute, so.Yes, thank you, thank you council we appreciate your arguments.Thank you, judge.The matter is submitted at this time,", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/gov.uscourts.ca9.19-17529.2020-10-05.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/gov.uscourts.ca9.19-17529.2020-10-05.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/gov.uscourts.ca9.19-17529.2020-10-05.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/gov.uscourts.cafc.2016-1599/gov.uscourts.cafc.2016-1599.2017-03-06.mp3", "text": "Nine, Aylus Networks versus Apple.There are some more seats in the back.Marshall, if you want to tell people they can file in, there's more seats back there now that people left.Yes, your honor.All right.Come on, you guys.I apologize for the chaos .Mr. Zacar, go ahead.Thank you.So, we're here on behalf of Aylus, looking for a motion summary judgment.This motion summary judgment with no infringement was granted pre-based finding.The common ground is confidential.Second, the district court looked at the best location to find support for its conclusion of claim construction.Isn't it just claim construction?You've got claim construction and those are the different sources of claim construction, right?Correct.The court looked at, the court intended to do claim construction, but in its claim construction it did so primarily based on principle of claim differentiation.Look back to support that claim differentiation, and then said it was confirmed by a couple of statements that we had made and gone beyond.So I want to address each one in turn because a single primary base for the court's plan was based on the claim differentiation.And we believe the claim differentiation report misunderstood the difference between claim one and claim two.Let me start with the fundamental inventions.The fundamental invention is an iPhone that controls a control point.An IT server that controls the control point, a media service with the content issued.Those are four components of the invention.What claim one said is, \"One is the communication with one, the other one is the communication with the other.The only way the media can get from the media server to the video editor, is if the control point and the control point work together.That's the only way that it could happen if the two of them -- - Okay, how about this?If you don't mind, I'm going to fast forward you.Suppose I agree with you that the plain meaning of the claims, read in the context of the spec does not prohibit CP from being invoked in claims two and 21.Let's just jump forward and say that I agree with you until that point.But your hurdle to overcome it seems to me is disclaimer.Now we can give it a lot of different names, we can call it prosecution history disclaimer, or we can call it judicial estoppel.But I'm not sure what the right name would be if it applies here.But that to me is it seems like the heart of what you need to convince us of.And your honor, when I was preparing this, that was my conclusion as well.The issue is really not one of claim depreciation, it's whether this prosecution disclaimer or not.And so there's really two arguments, the first is the IPR statement is itself non-disclaimer.This court hasn't provided guidance on that, and I think IPR practitioners would appreciate that.But I actually want to focus on the second now, which is was there a disclaimer in the statement?And there are two statements made in the appendix, shall I turn to both of those statements?The first thing is on appendix 9-7-3.And then the second statement is in appendix 1002.What is our standard for review when someone else finds there's a disclaimer, under what standard of review do we review the lower court decision of a disclaimer?Your honor , at the end of the day we will .And I would actually present to the court, to the district court actually didn't find a disclaimer.They said it was akin to a disclaimer.It really focused on the claim differentiation argument, and really looked at the disclaimer as much as the court specifically said a confirmation.But let me talk specifically to the disclaimer issue.The disclaimer was the first sentence.Similarly, certain other challenging patent claims require only that the control point.The control point logically invoked .So that starts with the word similarly.Here at JA-1039?No, I'm sorry, on 1973.It's in the middle of the page.Middle of the page, it starts with the word similarly.There's the first sentence where the court we said that, \" only that the control point Logic be used.It would suggest to the ordinary reader, from the English language, that would exclude the involvement of the control.It would suggest to the user that the only thing that could be used is the CPP. And what I would say is, this case knows exactly what the was.Which is, you have a sentence that would appear to go into, if this was the entirety of the record, I would read that and say, \"That sentence seems to imply that the control point can't be used\".But it's not the entirety of the record.The entirety of the record, actually a combination of three sentences here.You should read the next two sentences that follow.Let me read those two next sentences.It says...The question going is, is only the CPP allowed, or, is any CPP required?And the very next sentence says, \"In other words, the challenge claim require select reinvoking of CP Logic and CPP Logic.And then the very next sentence it says, \"As discussed above, this is a key aspect of the claim invention.Which addresses an important objective, namely the reducing of expensive bandwidth\".In 1994 studying the bandwidth cost about 25 cents a minute or whatever.So your goal, what he was planning here was, to go to the server remotely to the phone.But minimize that usage of the cellular communication as much as possible.So that the free WiFi would do as much.But again, reducing does not equal eliminating.What they are saying, Apple, of their statement was to both.Only the CP is allowed.It did not say our interpretation is only the CP is required.And two, it said, \"The CPP eliminates the use of the..\".Excuse me, the CP use eliminates.And I'm saying the very next sentence says, \"Don't eliminate, reduce the use\".I believe this is identical to the SanDisk scenario, where one statement standing alone, one sentence standing alone.Often seem , if you took that first sentence and there was nothing else in the record.Yes, it would probably imply, that would seem to imply, that the CP can't be used.But if you read the next two statements, it doesn't say only the CPP is allowed.It just basically says the CP is required.It certainly doesn't say the CP can have no involvement, because it says you are reducing wireless bandwidth.Reducing would not imply elimination.You take these sentences together, the entirety of the prosecution's statement.Your honor, we allege to the court that that's not -- - What about the language at JA-1004?Which talks about, again, it has the language only the CPP is invoked.And refers to that as being in claims two and 21.Those are two basically mirror statements.But, I would again argue, if you look at the statement, look at the very next statement that follows.Importantly, these steps are the key purpose of enabling the local wireless network.Whatever such network is available, in order to reduce the wireless consuming spectrum.Again, what we're trying to do is, in this scenario, reduce the amount of work that the server on the internet history.Because you're using wireless communication network.But the idea that a storefront would not be involved in .We can also step back from the claim to understand what the patent is about.The patent is about internet delivery of media content.The first scenario is, one is the international server, the other one is connection with the media and where Logic will imply that the two communicate.But even if things seem structurally possible, where the CP, the phone with the wireless communication .The idea that you wouldn't go to a storefront to pay for something .What about the PTO's response itself to those statements?We're looking at judicial estoppel, or prosection history estoppel.And this case at page JA-842.You've got the P tabs saying specifically that, talks about the CP Logic, or, the CPP Logic, exclusively handling the negotiation of the media content delivery.Suggesting that they were looking at this only language, and interpreting it in a way that's the way Apple is now interpreting it.And therefore making a decision about IPR Institution, based on that understanding of the language that Aylus used.I have two responses to that you honor.The first response, Apple actually at the District Court level argued that what matters is what we said.And this court should not take into account what PTAB said, or did.Well, it's a legal issue.Yes, 1166.Okay.I'm assuming you Apple .Sure.Should not be considered, and I don't necessarily disagree with that.But, let's take a look at what the PTAB said, the PTAB said, \"That identical evidence has been used for claim one and claim two\".It didn't go into detail as to explain what it found as a distinguishing feature between the two.And so, what evidence could be missing?What it did say was it appeared that the CP is exclusively patented.And that was a actually a four-party argument at the District Court level.What does the word handling mean?And handling, your honor, one thing that we argue at the District Court levels, handling doesn't mean an exclusion of involvement, right?Handling mean, which is what we were saying at the District Court level potential was the CP. And saying, \"Jump on the phone, click on this movie, pay for the movie, get it to me\".And you just go to CP, and all you get is an encryption key is the term.And you get that information, and you go get the content.Handling could easily be understood to mean what we presented at the district court.Which is, look, you can get the content, you can do it, select it, get your content.But you're gonna need an activation, handling could easily prevent that.And, so what I would say is.But in the prior art that was asserted against these claims.Both CPP and CP Logic were in both, correct?Correct, they were capable of being invoked.Both of them were capable of being invoked.You got around that prior art, arguably, with regard to claim two and by 21.By a sentence that says, \"Only CPP is invoked to negotiate media content between the MS and MR\".I guess I don't understand, the prior art had both.You say the way you get around the prior art is you only use one.I don't understand how to reconcile that.You want me to look at the context of everything, and the context of everything includes what were you trying to overcome?And the thing you were trying to overcome used both.How do you overcome that thing if I don't give the same reading to this language the District Court did.Your honor, without going into a detailed explanation of prior art.The difference between claim one and claim two is, claim one says, \"Both of these must be present, and both must negotiate to deliver the content\".Claim two is one step beyond.While claim two says, \"Not only must you have the option of having the two of them work, you must also have the option of having pure delivery\".The concept that claim two was delivering was, I'm gonna give you paid content.I can give you, in claim two, the structure of having the YouTube content, where I don't want to be involved.Or a website link, right?The point of claim two is it provides an additional limitation in terms of optionality.What is the additional limitation?The additional limitation is that the CPP it can be eliminated.It doesn't necessarily require to be eliminated.The additional limitation of claim two is, you can have a structure where only if the CPP does all the content.Okay.But that was the argument you made to overcome to prior art reference.Right, but the difference to overcome the prior art reference was that's a possibility, it's not the question that's required.Wait, wait, wait.I feel like we're beginning to get confused between the liberty issues with respect to what's allowed.And in respect to infringement what's required.What is allowed in a prior art, what is allowed to overcome the prior art reference, is if there is a structure.One possibly within the different possibilities that allows to say, \"This is not prior art allows\".Yeah, you agree of course, just as a basic teaching point.That something that anticipates a claim, if earlier, would later infringe the claim, right?Something that anticipates would later infringe the claim, correct.Right, the analysis, somebody shouldn't be able to say one thing to the patent office in order to avoid a prior art rejection.And then later take a different approach when asserting infringement, right?Correct.Right.No, I'm not saying that's what we did.What I'm trying to explain is, that what we said to the patent office, is that claim two requires two functionalities.One is both work, one is one works.Where do you get the idea that it says both work?Well, claim two requires, right?The claim should've ended on claim one.So the logic of claim two would be that you have two separate functionalities.No, claim two would depend on claim one, which means it therefore must be narrower than claim one.Claim one required two, claim two came along and required only one.Well, the narrower doesn't mean an additional in functionality limitations, you have that two functionalities in claim two.Your specification also talks about the advantages of in some circumstances having this CCP Logic work, and sometimes having the CCP Logic and the CP Logic.But it provides a very specific reason why, in the scenario of claim two, you'd want to only have the CP Logic work.Isn't that right?Correct, we're trying to eliminate or reduce the bandwidth that's used on the wireless spectrum.The consequences that you want the CPP to do as much as possible, right?You want to have the CP do as little as possible, because the CP communication is going to cross the wireless spectrum and that consumes money.And what we're trying to do is reduce that consumption of money.And that's exactly what we said, is that we're attempting to reduce that cost.And you do successfully reduce it if you use only one, right?Absolutely, when you have that reduction, one theoretical possibility of reduction is elimination.We don't disagree with that.What you agreed to in the beginning was that one sentence read out of context, you said would look really bad for you.And you started on page nine something, and I'm on page 104.That one sentence appears in multiple places in this record.This one sentence, you said looks bad for you, but you said the sentences that come after save us.But I could interpret the sentence that come after about reduction, to you reduce the bandwidth if you use only one.And that is how you in fact do reduce the bandwidth.Why don't I read those two sentences as consistent with each other.Since reduction, if I read the first sentence and it says only this one.And I read the second sentence, it says, \"Will reduce bandwidth\".Well yes, if you use only this one it will reduce bandwidth.I don't understand how the reduction sentence saves you.Because reduction is not elimination.Well, if we had met to say no involvement, the very next sentence would've said, \"The use the CP is eliminated, therefore is benefiting in the communication.The sentence, actually, in both 7393, and 973.And in 104 is followed immediately by the issue of reduction.And I think an understanding of the technology makes it clear that you're never going to provide paid content without .And so the idea that the CPP would eliminate the use of the CP entirely, would not fall into how the payment content is delivered, and would be delivered in a logical sense.Okay, I think we have your argument.You've used all your time and your rebuttal time, I'll restore some.Let's hear from the other side.I would encourage you to focus your argument on the same things that he did, if you don't mind.Absolutely your honor, if it please the court.What I'd like to do is pick up exactly where we were on appendix 973.I won't belabor the actual disclaiming sentence, this counsel can see that that says what it says.But the law says you can't look at the context, but the context here are the following two sentences.And counsel glossed over the second sentence.The second sentence on 973 starts, \"In other words\".If the court's there, it says, \"In other words\".What we're going to be hearing is restating the same point.In other words, the challenge claims referring to the dependent claims, require selectively invoking the CP Logic.And, or, a CP Logic based on whether the MS, and, or, MR can communicate with the UV through the local network.It's saying that in the context of both being connected, which is the context of claims two and 21.That it is the CP Logic that is selectively invoked, that's just another way of saying only.So we've got two things saying the same thing right back to back.And even if you turn to the third sentence, which is what the counsel -- - What about the and?I'm sorry?Selectively invoking CP logic, and, or, CPP Logic.Right, and you -- - Wait.Wouldn't you normally say or if you meant them to be alternatives.Well, that's because this is covering all three scenarios.It's covering the independent claim scenario, which is both.I see, okay.I understand.So it says, \"Based on whether they communicate\".It says, \"As discussed above, this is a key aspect of the claim invention\".So what do we know about that?That means that this was not a slip of the lip, this is something that they were focused on as being essential to their argument, to the PTAB. And then we have the language that was just quoted, which addresses an important objective, namely reducing the use of expensive bandwidth.We know counsel both in their brief, and today stopped there.They stopped there, the sentence goes on.EG white area cellular networks by implementing.So now we're going to tell you how this reduction occurs by implementing a least cost routing decision about how to negotiate media content delivery.Well, what's the how to negotiate media content delivery?Well, that's what we were just going over in the claims, it's choosing either the CP or the CPP, or both depending on the network context.All three of these sentences are saying the same thing, the least cost routing decision is the how to negotiate.And in this case, when you pick the CPP, as the court is acknowledged, that reduction goes down to zero.You can read all three these things consistently.Can I...Ask you then, is it your view that the as discussed above key aspect, and the reducing, which includes the reducing language sentence.Is a sentence that applies to pretty much all the challenge claims, and the arguments made with regard to say claim one, as well as claim two?Or, is that sentence really only applying to, what is it?Is it two and 20, or two and 21?I can't remember what the numbers are precisely that are at issue.And I apologize, your honor, but can you point me to where you're...Which sentence you're referring to.The reducing sentence.The reducing sentence, thank you.The one that when you just said, \"As discussed above, this is a key aspect of the invention, which addresses an important objective, namely reducing use of expensive bandwidth\".Now, if that sentence was tailored only to a claim to argument, and if you were right about claim two is one or the other, basically only one thing.Then it would actually say eliminating, and instead it says reducing.So is your view that sentence is a broader sentence that applies to all the challenge claims.In some cases it reduces, in other cases it eliminates.Yes exactly, it applies to all.If you go back up into the text, it's talking about the different variations.And so this is capturing all of them.What about how going up further in the text, it actually starts with similarly certain of the challenge dependent claims?So it's not talking about claims one and 20, it's talking about the dependent claims, right?Right, the sentence immediately proceeds that is talking about the independent claims.It says based on the determination of the challenge, independent claims.So the first thing the independent claims, then it turns to the defendant claims.You're saying within one paragraph they're hitting both.And then at the end when they summarize the advantages, those are the advantages of and, both or either one.It's not crystal clear which...Sure.Scenario.That's right.The reduction language that's being pointed to is zero, in the context of the claims two and 21.And the claims, the situation of the independent claims, it would be a reduction.But the point is, all three of these sentences can be read together.But the first sentence, the disclaiming sentence, means when it says, and the counsel doesn't disagree with that.And if I could turn your honors to the other disclaimer, because this helps enlighten the situation as well.We turn to 1-0-0-3 and 1-0-0-4.Again, we have to look at the context.If we look at 1-0-0-3, at the very last paragraph at the bottom of that page, it starts to claims one, two and four.Disclaimers one, two and four, as well as claims 20, 21 and 23 combined.To claim three alternative steps.So here they're telling the patent office, that these are different ways to accomplish something, depending upon what the network environment is.Then we have the disclaimer itself, which is at the top of 1-0-0-4.Which says, \"If, however, the MS and MR are both in communication with the UE via the local wireless network, then only CPP involved to negotiate media content delivery between the MS and the MR\".That refers to claims two and 21.There you have a great clear if then situation.If A then B. Counsel then pointed to the reduced language, but if you go down to the bottom of that page, 1-0-0-4, we have the same point made.This says, \"The fact that the UPNP\".This is the very end of the page.\"The fact that the UPNP does not care how the MS and MR communicate reconfirms that the UPNP design cannot and does not teach or suggest this feature of the claims\".This the key part.\"Which requires a least cost routing decision based on the determination available networks\".And so, as we learned from looking at page 973, the least cost routing decision is the decision of the CP, or CPP Logic is going to be invoked to do the media content delivery.So again, the language of the disclaimer itself is clear, and the context surrounding it confirms that they meant exactly what they said.Mr Fowler, even if we agree with you, that this amounts to a disclaimer.This is part of the polyp way between the petitioner and the patent owner that occurred prior to the institution of the review.Why should we treat that as prosecution history?Sure.There's, I think, two parts of the answer to that, the first is an existing case law that the court can turn to to seek guidance from.First we had the Supreme Court's Cuozzo decision, Cuozzo said in part that ITRs are re-examination.I have the quotes here if you want.But they say it has a judicial aspect to it, and has a reexamination aspect to it.But Cuozzo didn't draw a line between...Exactly.Pre-institution, post-institution.Exactly, that was going to be my next point.In making that determination or making those statements that is perfectly judicial, and perfectly examinationable.They didn't draw a line saying that some of it's not and some of it is.The statements are broadly worded statements.And this court and its prior pre-Cuozzo decisions, has held up proceedings, such as ex-party reexamination, inter-parties reexamination, and re-issue proceedings.Those kinds of statements, the same kind of statements that were made here were made there.Constitute part of the prosecution history, and can be disclaimers.And we know those cases in our brief, the Katz case, which had to do with reexamination, DuPont.You're addressing now the point about whether or not something that doesn't occur...Prosecution we all typically think of as being that ex parte proceeding, that results in the grant of a patent.Re-examine, inter partes reexam, all this IPR stuff, is sort of different.And what you seem to be addressing now is the idea that statements made in those contexts have nonetheless been held by our court to constitute prosecutions through disclaimer.Don't fiddle with the words Judge More, we could have called it reexamined disclaimer, we could have called it IPR disclaimer, but why give it so many different names?But I guess the question I thought that Judge Lynn asked you, which I don't think any of those cases you point to address, and definitely correct me if I'm wrong.Is, but this statement was made before the proceeding was even initiated.To what extent is a statement made in advance of such a proceeding part of the history that ought to be folded in?Very good.There are two parts to that as well.The cases that have addressed this issue of when the proceeding starts, have had to do with, for example, whether you can appeal a denial a motion to stay in a CPM. That's an intellectual properties case, or whether...PR estoppel applies, that's the Shaw case.And in those cases, both cases, the court had to grapple with the issue of, when does a proceeding start?Because the right to do those two things, or the collusion for estoppel turned on when a proceeding began.So the court did a statutory analysis as it should, and determined that because those two things are based on the proceeding.The proceeding will start upon institution, but that doesn't answer the different question of whether what happened before that is part of the prosecution history, right?None of the cases that this court has addressed, including the HPK. So those are the really the three cases, in addition to Cuozzo that addressed this issue.Have said that what happens before is not part of the prosecution history.It doesn't compel that result either.Well, let me ask you a question.I don't mean to interrupt, but let me ask you a question, try to shed some light on this.Let's suppose these same two statements were made...In a colloquy that occurred in a separate lawsuit between Aylus and Apple.That would not amount to a prosecution history estoppel, because it has nothing to do with the normal prosecution activities that take place in the patent office.Where the patent office has a proceeding before it, that will ultimately determine the scope of patent coverage, whether claims are allowed or not allowed.Arguments made in a separate lawsuit between parties don't create estoppels like that, don't create prosecution history.Why should this argument made in the course of a proceeding that occurs prior to the review be treated any different?Well, that's a very good question.First of all, this is in front of the patent office, that's one of the distinguishing factors.But what difference does that make?Well, I'll tell you, because these are the statements made by the patent holders to the patent office for the purposes of coming to the patent office and many of claims is, to avoid prior art, in order avoid a finding of un-patentability.That's something that's very much like the original prosecution.And the same statements that you could see here, could have been made in the original prosecution.And without knowing the context, you wouldn't be able to tell the difference.Because in both cases, the patent holder's trying to avoid accountability.And this courts well on prosecution history disclaimers founded at least on two very important public policy, public interest policies.One of which is to avoid the situation of allowing a patent holder to report to the patent office and say one thing to avoid a finding of un-patentability.Which is exactly what happened here.And then be able to go to the District Court, and say something else against an alleged infringer.That underlies many cases that this court is going all the way back to Southwall for example.Similarly, public notice function.This court has prosecution industry disclaimers, based on the fact that alleged infringers, or people practicing patents, are entitled to look to the patent office.The record in the patent office is a part of the record in the patent office.To see what the patent has said about the meaning and scope of the patent claims.And the last thing I would say, is that even if the disclaimers...If the disclaimers are made and they're effective, then that's it, that's it for the alleged infringer in PTAB. Because the statements have consequences.The failure to institute, or a decision not to institute, is final and not appealable.You have a situation here where Apple made a substantive argument to the patent office, Aylus made a substantive argument to the patent office.The patent office, although it's not part of the quote, \"Marriage proceeding\".Evaluated the merits of the parties claims on the substance.And decided that it wasn't substantially likely that Apple would be able to prove its claim, based upon the disclaimers made by Aylus.And having denied that institution, Apple therefore had no had no right to a remedy.Yes it does.You can go after it in District Court.There's no estoppel, that's what Shaw says.So Apple still has another venue in which to pursue exactly the same claim.That's why it would be so awful if estoppel kicked in earlier, wouldn't it?If estoppel kicked in earlier, then than Apple would be arguably precluded.Well, I'm sorry.It didn't have any remedy with respect to what had happened, because it's not appealable.The fact is what happened is -- - Yeah, but lots of people deal with that every day, the PTO denies.And sometimes they don't even give you a reason why, and you've got no right to appeal.In the same quills, the same context, this is one reason why disclaimers should be plight.This court has had a well developed body of disclaimer law that applies to statements exactly like this.And oftentimes you have a disclaimer of original prosecution.The examiner doesn't require an amendment, allows the claim.But because the patent holder said something in public, very clearly that limits the claims.This court has said that should limit the claims, that people should be bound by what they said.There was no public policy reason, or no legal reason, why that shouldn't apply here.Where someone's talking to the patent office, and limiting their claims to try to avoid a finding of un-patentability.Which is exactly what happened here.You mentioned, I'm sorry to interrupt, I want to make sure I get my question in.You mentioned earlier that...We have held that statements made during reexamination, or probably reissue, have been found to be prosecution's history estoppel statements.My question is are any of those, are you aware of any cases, where, I know the patent owner can request reexamination.The patent owner can request reissue, I think only the patent owner can.And there can be times when those statements that are made in those requests.Have any of those statements been considered to be prosecution history statements that are important for understanding the meaning of claims?Well, in the DuPont case, that was a reissue case.So I think that may answer your question, and that was held to be part of the prosecution.Not just the ratio, but maybe the preliminary statement before the reissue is actually instituted or granted.There are some procedure by which the PTO looks at the declaration that is provided with the reissue.And makes a determination, for example, as to whether that is adequate for the ratio to occur.Is that a situation you're talking about?I am not sure of the answer to that question, to be honest with.Okay.And can I ask you a very policy oriented question?Sure.As I'm sitting here thinking about what you said, which was helpful because it called to me, called to mind to me the purpose of notice.A person, a competitor who wanted to know what the scope of these claims are would likely read the patent.And, if they had any gumption at all would get the entire prosecution history of this patent, if there were a re exam, they'd want it and they get it.That's what I believe people would do, and so those statements in there put the world on notice, at least with regard to what the inventor believes is the scope of his or her invention.And they affect more than just individual parties and individual cases, right?They would block prosecution more generally, because they're all public.Unlike judicial estoppel, where a competitor wouldn't necessarily go after all the documents.And, in fact, those could be sealed, right?Confidential, so many times all this stuff's confidential.What's said before the patent office is something that is routinely turned to by every competitor in a space.They may not have access to know about, or have any even ability to acquire things that may or may not be stated in a judicial document.That's exactly right.And that's entirely consistent with this court's prior holdings on judicial disclaimer, and prosecution history disclaimer, and why it's so important.And I should point out that one of the many reasons why, although the same result could be achieved here through judicial estoppel.The court may not get there, and this is the superior way to reach the same conclusion.Okay.But again, .That's okay.We're going to restore a little bit of a rebuttal time for your colleague.You're all set.Yeah.All set, okay, thank you very much.Okay, let's do two minutes of rebuttal.I'm used to seeing you over here.Two minutes.Thank you your honor.In the time I'd like to sort of respond to three issues.The first one was Ms Fowler talked about least cost value, suggesting that that you go to the lowest price.But in telecommunications, least cost value is a decision, where you look at alternative pathways to these costs.That you would take into account load balancing pathways, the encryption zone.The least cost value terminology in telecommunications and entertainment context, refers to looking at the cost, but deciding within the .In the end briefing, we didn't get to brief the meaning of the word of least cost value is.But that's what least cost value means.Secondly, this court discussed the issue or PIPR, and whether those should be prosecutionary disclaimers.Your honor, the court includes a post-institution on hybrid proceedings.The PIPR are very similar to do an IPC type proceeding.Where you are truly just going back and forth, and explaining to the court, to the PTAB, and saying, \"This is what our patent's about\".So to hold those as prosecution disclaimers your honor, would change the nature of PIPR proceedings.More akin to , where the outcome of the patent, the scope of the claims, can be discussed.But you're not arguing that the remarks made should go away and be ignored.We're not your honor.Because they're going to have some effect, they should have some effect, wouldn't you agree?As a matter of prosecution history, disclaimer or judicial estoppel.One way or the other, the statement was made, it was part of the public record.It's before the patent office, it's in the file history, it's not going to go away.We're not arguing this way your honor.Well, if you're not arguing that it goes away, then you're stuck with it.Right, but the question is whether we should be stuck with it in terms of as a prosecution disclaimer, or, wherever we should be stuck with it as a judicial estoppel.I think the -- - The end result in terms of your case, it doesn't matter what we call it, does it?No, I understand.The first one is clear non-equivocal statement, the second one is clear inconsistency.I think you'll understand that they're very different.Again, I come back to this case and say, your honor please re-look at this case, in those three sentences, in the entirety of the context.And in those context that was intended to be disclaimer, what we were trying to do was to reduce the wireless spectrum that we were using.Okay, I thank both counsel, the argument is taken under advisement.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/gov.uscourts.cafc.2016-1599.2017-03-06.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/gov.uscourts.cafc.2016-1599.2017-03-06.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/gov.uscourts.cafc.2016-1599.2017-03-06.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/gov.uscourts.cafc.2020-1165/gov.uscourts.cafc.2020-1165.2020-09-01.mp3", "text": "Number 20 dash 1165, Big Baboon Inc.Versus SAP America, Inc.Mr. Reich.Thank you, your honor.So this is the parallel case involved in the award of attorney's fees under 35, USC 85 to SAP and HP for litigation from the, the infringement suit, which we discussed earlier and basically for, to award - to justify an award of attorney's fees under often sickness, a district court needs to have, to weigh the totality of the circumstances in that case and find some type of litigation misconduct to justify that.And in this case, the district court had a magistrate prepare a report and recommendation on the attorney's fees and the district court basically just adopted it.So when..I don't understand your statement.That litigation misconduct is, is required before fees can be awarded.That's under oxygen sickness, your honor.So you need to have some, you know, definitely something of either unprofessional and improper conduct or litigation misconduct.And it's again, totalitarian totality of all the circumstances in a case, and including those parties conduct, including the improper conduct of the movement for attorney's fees.So here would be SAP NHV. And as Your Honor is aware from the earlier case, there's quite a history between the two parties here leading to this case.And interestingly, the, the report and recommendation doesn't mention any of this type of history regarding reexamination of SAP or the CDM as a petition of SAP. And doesn't discuss how the mapping of the claims of SAP on to claim shares team started this, and basically then adopts its own narrative of the facts to try to find litigation misconduct, misconduct or improper...What the court found was that, that the pursuit of litigation was objectively unreasonable, right?Yes, yes, your honor.That's correct.And basically awarded fees based on some arbitrary line in the sand where Big Baboon should have known that this - the patent would be invalidated in the manner that the court did so, basically on, based on secret sales, then that were filed under seal, that would, if the patent wouldn't be held invalid, that we would have no, we would have no idea about.And then the.....The ministry judge specifically found that, that you had been told and, in 2018 about records that it had previously been produced in 2020, in 2010, showing the pre critical dates shipments.If that was the case, Your Honor, then it would have been in the reexamination.It could, it would be two things.There's one in the earlier case, the first case where there were records that discuss sales, but again, 3.1 and all that was also in the re-examine.And by the time the second suit happened, we had the Declaration of Greenspun basically saying everything is present in there, but what enablement and sets that out, and that is SAP then doing.Let's assume for the moment that we reject your position about Greenspun and that, that - we conclude that that provides no contrary evidence to the invoices and the characterization of the invoices as offering the web enabled product for sale in October, 1996.Is there anything wrong under those circumstances with the award of attorney's fees?So basically, Your Honor, where is the unreasonable conduct from the plaintiff to proceed to see if these secret sales are in fact secret sales?All of this was produced under seal.All of this was unaware to the 25th.They had never heard prior to...He only awarded fees for the time after which you became aware of this, right?Yeah.So but a significant amount of fees and for a wide range of activities, basically for the case going forward.You didn't do any discovery to dispute all those documents that were provided to you, did you?There was no, there was no discovery to be had, it was not in discovery.The case, the case was still in claims like initial claim construction and claim discovery.So the full discovery had not even opened in this case.So to, to, to, to go forward.So we didn't have you had, they, they produced these records basically alongside of their summary judgment motion.Now they did offer the - will provide declarations, and whatnot right now, people to depose and a very short time period.But in view of the prior actions of SAP , the testimony of Greenspun, the literature that showed that, hey, this is not, there is evidence saying, this is not correct.These are not on sale in October of 1996.The plaintiff did proceed, but what's troubling is in the report and recommendation.All the sudden the magistrate starts giving a unique narrative of the Fox calling Big Baboon serial litigants, which has had one case and won it too.And then that first case to add plaintiffs, to who the judge said no, file a second case, which Big Baboon did.And then, you know, in the meantime, SAP repeatedly, twice, attacked accountants of Big Baboon.So it doesn't, I don't the qualification that somehow Big Baboon was a serial litigant, it does not..It seems, it seems incorrect.And again, so.What's wrong with the District Court's conclusion that it was unreasonable of you to continue to litigate after the invoices were called to your attention.And you were told that the invoices were for a web enabled product.So they filed a summary judgment motion backing that up.And then right after that, when the summary judgment was filed, the plaintiff consented to all extensions and stopped everything, while this was adjudicated.Just within really, if the position is just because one party merely tells another party, hey, I've got evidence of invalidates drop it right now.And that party doesn't show it, and that party hasn't brought it.That would seem very unreasonable to say that that's litigation misconduct.If you push forward on that, that, cause then should I just..Should the plants just take the word of SAP?Sorry, you better not do this.And be able to at least call the hands, I guess they say, okay, you say that and prove it.And so by the time the Big Baboon actually sees all this evidence and these declarations and things like that, you're at the summary judgment stage, at which case Big Baboon agrees to start saying everything and staying in discovery and staying in and not pushing forward to see what the judge is going to do.So that, to me, that is reasonable litigation and it's certainly not wasting the course resources.So again, the mere fact that one party says, I have this, I got a gotcha.And you have one party wants to wait and see if the gotcha is legitimate or not, shouldn't it in of itself it is unreasonable.Right?So as soon as there's any further questions, you may open in time.Okay.Hearing no further questions, let's hear from Mr. Ham.Good morning, Your Honors.And may it please, the court, the federal circuit should affirm the District Court's finding that this is an exceptional case and it's resolving attorney fee award.At its core, this case is exceptional because Big Baboon does not know when to stop.No matter how weak it's position.The district court correctly held Big Baboon's case on the merits was exceptionally weak and under Octane Fitness, the substantive strength of the party's litigation position is all that's needed to award fees and to find a case exceptional.There does not need to be unreasonable conduct, even though there was in this case, this is a unique case in which Big Baboon's own accusation created its patents in validity, Big Baboon accused the product of infringing its patent, but that product was sold before the patent's critical date.This makes the patent invalid under Evans Cooling.And as you've pointed out, at least by August 31st, 2018, Big Baboon, well knew the facts and the law that invalidated its patent.August 31st, 2018 forward is the only time period for which the district court awarded fees.Big Baboon knew the facts.It knew it accused R3, 3.1 because it made that accusation, and Big Baboon knew that SAP sold this product before the critical date, because Big Baboon had uncontested pre-critical date sales records, which Big Baboon first received way back in 2010, and which SAP reminded Big Baboon of on August 31st, 2018.Big Baboon also knew the law.In June 18, It was Big Baboon who introduced Evans Cooling to this action by featuring the case in its failed motion for partial summary judgment.In mid August, 2018, Big Baboon acknowledged to the District Court that absolutely, if it accused the pre critical date product of infringement, it should be out of court.And on August 31st, 2018 SAP reminded Big Baboon of the evidence and the law, showing that the accused product was sold prior to the critical date, but Big Baboon does not know when to stop.Now, Big Baboon argues on appeal.It was justified in filing suit as retaliation for SAP's prior patent office proceedings against the asserted 2 75 pay at patent.Retaliation is not an acceptable reason under any standard for refusing to stop suing on a plainly invalid patent.Big Baboon also argues on appeal that it's position on the merits of patent validity was reasonable, but Big Baboon waived this argument by not making it to the district court.In any event, Big Baboon's argument is based on misrepresenting.the evidence we believe, as you've discussed this morning, Big Baboon insists the Phillips Greenspun declaration states the accused product was not sold until 1997 after the critical date, but the declaration doesn't say that, and it doesn't suggest that.Big Baboon also argued its litigation position was reasonable because it accused a different R3 3.1. than the prior R3 three - prior, R3 3.1, but Big Baboon provides no evidence in support of this dual identity theory.In addition to Big Baboon's exceptionally weak position on the merits, as an alternative ground, the district court found this case exceptional because Big Baboon litigated in an unreasonable manner, which is the second path that Octane Fitness sets out for showing that a case is exceptional.Big Baboon abusively filed suits on the same patent because Big Baboon does not know when to stop.On appeal, Big Baboon insists it is not a serial litigant, that it filed only one patent suit.That's simply not true.It's filed one suit on the 2 75 patent in the Northern - Central district of California.And when that suit was over, it filed a different suit on the 2 75 patent in the Northern district of California.And as SAP noted in its response brief, on top of that, Big Baboon sued the patent office in the Western district of Washington to challenge its re-examination decision against the 2 75 patent while Big Baboon was simultaneously appealing that same decision to this court.That's three patents suits, not one.The district court also found Big Baboon's litigation conduct unreasonable because it filed a meritless motion for partial summary judgment.The motion was meritless because Big Baboon sought summary judgment based on evidence about a different product, R3, 3.0 E, then the product it accused of infringement, which was R3 3.1. Big Baboon also argues on appeal that its litigation conduct was reasonable because three times it agreed to discovery extensions.Big Baboon's extensions were too little, too late.SAP requested a stay on August 31st, 2018 when it sent Big Baboon that letter connecting all of the dots about why the court would grant summary judgment, but Big Baboon didn't agree to the first of the three extensions until January, 2019.That's four months.During those four months, SAP was forced to spend a significant amount on this case.And it's that expenditure, which makes up most of the court's fee award.Finally, Big Baboon argues the fee award is too high.It argues that it is not reasonable that SAP spent 458.1 hours briefing its motions for summary judgment and attorney's fees.Again, Big Baboon's just not being upfront.The district court opinion is crystal clear that it awarded fees for 196.5 hours on these motions, not 458.1 hours.And I also wanted to respond to a couple of things that came up in Mr. Reich's argument.He said that the case wasn't in discovery during the summary judgment phase, but that's not true.It was in discovery.So I think that argument can be dismissed with as well.And it's, as you've pointed out, they didn't try to take any discovery on the 3.1 products.So to the extent they say, they, they, they should have had that opportunity.They just didn't take advantage of it.So in conclusion, the district court did not abuse its discretion in any way and the federal circuit should affirm all challenge aspects of its decision.Is there any questions?I'll try to provide a response and otherwise I'll yield the rest of my time.Thank you.Okay.Hearing no further questions.Thank you, Mr. Reich.So several quick responses to Mr. Ham.So first and foremost, I'm unaware of why SAP brings up the patent office lawsuit challenging the three examinations.That's a completely different matter and, and different procedure for trying to undo a reexamination.So that's not a lawsuit or a patent lawsuit against anybody.So, and in fact, referring him to the, to the, the opinion to magistrate's report, even though they said that arbitrary dates as in 2018, that somehow that we, that Big Baboon should have known, it was still some time before they did see a declaration or any testimony from Rogan Campus saying, what is going on in October of 1996.And again, I don't believe it's reasonable to say that you just have to take someone's word for it before you have to show it to you.Again, he also brought up discovery, plain discovery was open, but not full discovery.You know, basically the fact that, you know, again, Mr. Ham called us a serial or called Big Baboon a serial litigant, it had one lawsuit.It tried to add as the same claim that that lawsuit, the district court said, please just do it somewhere else.It wasn't raised in the first suit.So Big Baboon had to then bring an action against SAP and HP in the middle of the district of California, because TC Heartland was becoming clear that jurisdiction is going to have to be with people of residence, even within the things.And that is the law now, too.So with that, unless there's any further questions you have my time.Okay.Thank you, Mr. Reich.Thank you, Mr. Ham, the case is submitted.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/gov.uscourts.cafc.2020-1165.2020-09-01.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/gov.uscourts.cafc.2020-1165.2020-09-01.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/gov.uscourts.cafc.2020-1165.2020-09-01.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/gov.uscourts.illappct.1-15-1599/gov.uscourts.illappct.1-15-1599.2018-10-10.mp3", "text": "15 1599, The People v.Mark Shelling.Will the parties are going to argue the case please approach the podium?Identify yourselves and who you represent, and indicate to the court how much time you would like to argue your case.My name is Debra Pew and I represent the appellant, Mark Schelling, for the office of appellant defender.I would like to leave some time for rebuttal, about 10 minutes for rebuttal.How much do you want for argument?Let's say, let's say 20 minutes and we'll see how it goes.Very well.Hi, I'm the assistant state's attorney, Veronica Calderon Malavia.I represent the People in the State of Illinois, and I'll be asking for my allotted time.Very well.Now, remember, the microphone is for recording purposes, not for amplification.So if you want to be heard by all your fans in the audience, keep your voice up please.Will do.Ms. Pew?Good afternoon, may it please the court.My name is Debra Pew and I represent the appellant Mark Schelling.My plan is to only discuss arguments one and two.And so if this court has any questions related to the other arguments, of course, I'll be happy to answer those.So there are two different sets of, two different but intertwined sets of improper evidence that deprive Mark Shelling of a fair trial.The evidence that was the other crimes evidence, and evidence that was actually elicited against him by his own attorney.This improper evidence combined could undermine any confidence that could be had in this case because of these two errors.This court should vacate his convictions and remand for a new trial.Now first as for the other crimes evidence, now there are a lot of charges in this case and becomes very confusing and jumbled.So I'm just going to talk briefly about those, so that we all know where we are.So there were 21 different charges in this case, all of them related to contact by phone, whether it was calls or texts, sometimes when Mr. Schelling was under, was subject to an order of protection.And as the State acknowledges these were all of those charges, alleged, just verbal threats.So there was Case 6898, as they call it.That was 14 different counts, mostly in 2002, or 2012, going into 2013.It was harassment of a witness by telephones to aggravated stalking by telephone, texting and that kind of thing.And then with Case 12014, these were seven charges all related to contact on one day, April 11th, 2013.It was also kind of harassment of a witness and contact by telephone, harassment by telephone.Now the other crimes evidence in this case was of a completely different nature.Whereas the State acknowledges that all the charges here were just verbal threats.The other crimes evidence was a was of a completely different sort.This involved breaking into the complainant's apartment or slashing her tires.These were in-person violent offenses.And so the first of the first spot of other crimes evidence was alleging that Mark Shelling broke into the complainant's apartment.She said that he was trying to steal her television, and also that he threw a bottle of wine at her, injuring her.And the other piece of other crimes evidence, was for about a month later, that he allegedly slashed all the tires in, on her car and then left the knife protruding from one of the tires.So these were sort of very violent and in person and scary, and as the State.Was this event before or after either indictment?Oh, this, this was, all of these were before.The other crimes evidence was for that indictment.In fact, the State actually, they did indict him on the two counts of other crimes evidence, but it seems, but then they eventually dropped the case.They were unable to produce any evidence related to either of these.To either of these events or to produce the witness that they alleged existed.And so, so it was, so, so he was first indicted on those, and then he was indicted on the crimes in 6898, but there was a lot of overlap.So count seven happened before the other crimes evidence, the first set of crimes evidence, then there was count eight, then other crimes evidence and then everything else.So it was sort of intertwined in terms of time.Now there's, the other crimes evidence was wrongly admitted both because of its lower probative value and it's highly prejudicial nature.So, I mean, the proximity of the time is there, in terms of looking at probative value, there's no denying that.What, what effect does the fact there was a bench trial have on your argument?Well, it does have an effect of course, because there's, there's a slightly different approach to it if there's a bench trial, but here, as the couple of the cases for this set with alpha service that if the judge relies on the other crimes evidence that's wrongly admitted and in there the ULD, the Illinois Supreme Court was saying, if the, if the defense objects to the admission of certain evidence, and the court so allows, you can assume that the court relied on it.And here the court did rely on it.And one of the things that's important, remember here.What indication is there in the record that the judge may have relied on the other crimes evidence for an improper purpose for propensity?And actually, propensity because it was, because this was a domestic violence case, propensity actually would not be an improper purpose.And so they were actually admitted for that reason.So, so even if he did do that.What's in the record to show that the judge actually relied on an improper -- - What happened in this case is that there was such a jumbo of different charges.And.So you're saying what you have is some comment from the judge -- - Well, there were -- - Especially at a bench trial - There were comments from the judge indicating that he didn't differentiate between the actual charges that issue, and the other crimes evidence.So the state really focused on the other crimes evidence at trial, so much so that they didn't even elicit evidence related to 13 of the 14 charges against him, one of the cases.And then the sort of confusion came, came to a head when the judge was finding by showing guilty.I get back to that, that confusion, but this was a case that one judge ruled on the motion and then the trial judge heard it at trial, right?Well, what happened was, first one judge ruled on it and said, and then the other judge was actually given another opportunity to rule on it as well.So it was actually ruled on twice.And then the second judge went to trial.So when the first judge was ruling on it and he said, this probably meets the threshold of Donahoe.And, but, but he said that any concerns about dissimilarity of prejudice goes to weight, not admissibility, but in fact, he was required to make a meaningful assessment of prejudice.And then the second judge, when looking at whether, whether or not the evidence should be admitted, he said a couple of things that were sort of concerning.One of the things that he said that, he said, that it's generally admissible in this type of case, not in this case, but sort of saying it's generally okay to allow the context, but then he put some restraint that made it, seem that he didn't actually, that he hadn't done the proper analysis of prejudice.He said that this evidence is violent.Other crimes evidence would help the defense as well.And it's very difficult to imagine how, when you're talking about all those telephone charges, how it was violent, in-person, other offenses could help the defense.And so that suggests that he did not engage in a meaningful prejudice analysis that he was required to.And then in filing Rochelle and guilty, there was a sort of canoodling of, of discussions of the other crimes evidence and evidence of the actual charges.Now, when he made his ruling on the admissibility, was that before or after the testimony came in at trial?It was before the testimony came in at trial.And so he had, he had said he had just been assigned to the case.He said, there are a lot of pleadings I've talked to, I've talked to the attorneys, but it was actually unclear from the record that he was aware of what exactly the other crimes evidence was in relation to what the charge offenses were.But the objection could have been re-raised after he heard it, if there was a concern as to his understanding of the prior judge's ruling.And, but frankly, even if he didn't understand that the prior judge ruled and then he heard it.The, the prior judge ruled on it, but, but really didn't properly lay prejudice.And even if, and even if he had, he had awaited, but this is still, this was, this is not a preserved issue.And it's still amounts to plain error because of the negative effect of this and this improper evidence of trial, because of its prejudicial nature.So to whatever degree the judge did engage in analysis, his conclusion was incorrect given the nature of the evidence that was the, of the other crimes evidence.And then the way that the judge in finding, showing guilty, relied on it, exacerbated any harm of the admission of the other crimes evidence.Isn't, oh I'm sorry -- - No, go ahead.Isn't that all kind of speculative as to the judge's decision-making process?Well, to whatever, he spoke on the record, I mean the record sort of rebuts the idea that he didn't, that he didn't rely on it because one of the things that he says in finding Shelling guilty, he reads aloud four text messages.Two of those text messages are tied to dates for which Shelling was actually acquitted.So presumably the judge wasn't relying on those and finding him guilty because they acquitted him with those two charges.Then there was a text message that wasn't tied to any data at all.And then there was a very abusive text message related to the tire issue, which was the other crimes evidence.And so if he's focusing on his text messages, two of which the client was acquitted, and then one of which wasn't tied to any date, presumably he's focusing on the other crimes evidence.It was the same as talking about the wine, Shelling breaking into the apartment allegedly and throwing a bottle of a wine with the complainant.That was one of, the judge making the ruling was very terse and so he really didn't say very much about why he was making these findings, but everything that he said went back to the other crimes evidence.And so we talked about other kinds of evidence and also, to go into, issue two, also evidence elicited by defense council.But it talked about how Shelling broke into the apartment and threw the wine bottle, and he was very disturbed by the violent nature of that offense, which was not one of the crimes that was actually an issue, he was really focusing on that, in order to find Shelling guilty of these 19 other offenses for which he was found guilty.And so, because he, because of the crimes evidence being so dissimilar and so much more prejudicial, given both the nature and the extremity of what they're like, it was plain error to introduce these other crimes.First, the evidence was close to the balance as the state -- - Assume for a moment that we find, that the other crimes have been admitted, the next question is whether or not the evidence was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt.So let's kind of move through the analysis of.Okay, well, I mean, I was, because this evidence wasn't, because the issue wasn't preserved, I was sort of going straight to sort of looking at close the balance and plain unfit for a trial, but in terms of being harmful, it was definitely harmful because of the way the judge relied on it at, in finding Shelling guilty.He didn't talk about the evidence that was specifically related to these phone calls.He didn't talk about the things that the state was actually intending to prove and guilty of.We talked about these text messages and he talked about him throwing the wine bottle.That was really the focus of his finding.And so the focus of his fighting was on this other crimes evidence.So assuming it was wrongly admitted, the harmless, it was, it was not harmless because of the way the, the judge relied on it.And the defense counsel failed to preserve this issue.And so to argue it as plain error under both prongs, first, the evidence was closely balanced.As the state acknowledges in its brief, by citing the evidence that was elicited by defense counsel, the state did not elicit very much evidence against Mark Shelling in this case.But in fact, most of the most damaging evidence was elicited by his own defense counsel.And additionally, to whatever degree, this comes down to an issue of credibility.The complainant had very serious credibility issues.So the relationship between the complainant and Mark Shelling went on from 2010 to 2011, and it involved a lot of money going one way, that Mark Shelling was loaning her money or getting her money, it's sort of unclear what was exactly happening, but after they broke up, he filed a civil lawsuit against her attempting to get the money back.And then, and then it was only after she was served in that civil lawsuit, six days later, that she brought this charge against him when it dates prior to when the civil lawsuit was brought, but she was sort of sitting at any complaints that she might've had.And then once the civil lawsuit happened, then she decided to complain about these, these alleged incidents.And Mark's prior lawyer said that the complainant told him, \"None of this would be happening if Mark hadn't sued me\".And she also claimed to not know anything about a settlement agreement that her attorney had drafted, saying that she would drop the cases against him if he dropped a civil lawsuit.And, and she also came up with a lot of things on the stand that the state had clearly never heard of, for instance, that she claimed that she had a videotape showing Mark breaking the front door of her condo building, but that she personally decided not to show the police or the state's attorney because she decided it wasn't pertinent.And so not only was the evidence closely balanced, it's typically a violation of the defendant's right to a fair trial whenever, whenever other crimes evidence is, improperly admitted.And so because this other crimes evidence sort of loomed so large over the case, in terms of all the questions the state was asking to the complainant, the opening argument, the closing argument, and the judge's finding, this court should, should remand for new trial on all of his charges because they were so infected by the other crimes evidence and all of that is sort of tightly wound with, what Kelvin's counsel did in this case.Now, the state concedes that this, that the prosecutors in this case really didn't provide much specific evidence about the 21 charges that they brought against, against Mark Shelling.And in fact, majority of evidence was brought, was, was elicited by defense counsel.The state asked him, asked the complainant some very vague questions, and there was a flurry of dates and allegations that tie him to specific dates to the indictment.So the state brought these 21 charges but was asking about, some of them involved ranges of dates, but the state was asking about ranges of dates that were not even in the indictment, and actually only asked her about two specific phone calls that were directly tied to the indictment.And that was count 10 of 6898, and then the call that was an issue in the other case.The defense council, - Your claim's getting short.Okay.The defense council, reaching the breach and filled in all the gaps and elicited all of his testimony from the, from the complainant in order to prove him guilty of all these offenses.What about the state's argument?That it, it was a, a trial...Strategy?Strategy, yeah.Well, if it was a trial strategy, the time to stop that strategy would be at the time that you realize, Oh, wow, I just proved my client guilty but count against him.He started out with one, and then I think any competent attorney would then say, I better try a different strategy.I also had a better stop asking questions like, did he call you on August 8th?Yes or no, rather than asking a question like, if he was actually trying to prove that she had very little recollection, he could have asked the question, like, describe anything that happened between you and Mark Shelling in August, 2012.And so she would have had to explain what happened on that date.Instead, he asks her these very leading questions.Did he call you on August 8th?How many times?20 to 50.Boom.That charge, assuming credibility, that charge is approved.And it went on like this for 30 pages.It was after 20 pages of this that he proved his own client guilty of two class two felonies that the state had not even asked or worried about instead of relying on, - You know what counselors were, sorry, Do you know what counselors were that you just said, the two?Oh, the two?Yes, it was count 10 in 6898.And then it was actually all seven counts, was, I'm sorry, was count 10 in the first case, 6898, which was harassment by phone, after an order of protection had been, had been imposed against Mark Shelling and then also all of the counts in 12014, because those were all related to one specific phone call.And so it was about those two phone calls, the one on April 11th and the one on September 25th.So for all of those reasons, I would ask that this court reverse Mark Shelling's convictions in remand for a new trial.Thank you very much.Thank you.Again.Good afternoon.I'm Cook County assistant state attorney, Veronica Calderon Malavia, representing the people, the state of Illinois.Yeah.This defendant has not shown that the introduction of other crimes evidence was error, much less plain error.This case was about a past domestic relationship and a continuous series of crimes the defendant committed against the victim after their breakup.But this case was also about defendant's theory of defense where he claims that the victim made up these crimes in order to force or blackmail defendant to draft a civil lawsuit that he filed against her.So both the defendant's past crimes and the victim's past acts where the heart of this case and were both relative uh, relevant and probative.Specifically, the defendant's other crimes.It was, they were relevant on several grounds.First, they were a part of a continuing narrative that led to the instant charges.In fact, the other crimes were the underlining basis for the order of protection the defendant was charged here with violating.Second, they spoke to defendant's state of mind.He didn't stop with property crimes, but he continued to call, harass the victim.His case, this case, this was not about him getting his money back because he, he could have relied on his civil lawsuit for that.His conduct, other crimes show that his conduct was designed to harass the victim after she would not have any more contact with him.The other -- Doesn't the law require the trial judge to engage in a meaningful analysis here?Yes, it does.And the defendant had the benefit of two trial judges reviewing his objection to the other crimes, and the record clearly indicates that the meaningful lane of -- - What did you understand it to mean when the trial judge said it will help the defendant?Well, like I said, this is well, he definitely, the defense counsel definitely used the timing of the other crimes to support his theory.What did you understand the judge to mean when he said that it would help the defendant?Defendant used the timing, the dates of the other crimes, because they occurred before, they occurred right after she was served with, with a civil lawsuit, and to support his theory, that she just made things up in order to avoid paying him in the, in the lawsuit.So the other crimes evidence also speaks to the victim's state of mind because defendant had previously crossed the line between, you know, verbal aggression to physical aggression, it was reasonable for her to fear for her safety and for her to suffer emotional distress through these telephone calls in which he threatened to hurt her or kill her.It explains why I should repeatedly call the police, why she was constantly in guard, changing her routes, her route to work and, and also explained why she was concerned for her parents.And since the other crimes evidence speaks to both defendant's intent and the state's, the victim's, state of mind, they were relevant.In, as I stated, rebutting defendant's theory of defense, - What about the court saying that it goes to the weight as opposed to the admissibility?I think the court was referring to that with respect to defense counsel's objection to the lack of evidence, corroborating these two incidences, and was not referring to weighing the, the, the prejudice versus the permanent value.The first judge who considered it looked at, it's been stated that the other crimes evidence complies with the threshold requirement in the statute and Donahoe, and both mandate that the court weigh the probative value against the prejudicial value, indicating that the first trial judge did too.And the second judge explicitly stated that this was more probative than prejudicial.And.I don't understand is why would the state's attorney office indict the defendant for these offenses, drop the charges, and then use them in a potentially prejudicial way, in a case where they have two more indictments pending.I mean, - Well, that's not -- - Why would the state insist on injecting a potentially reversible error into a trial where they have all this evidence of 21 incidences of telephone harassment, texts, conclusions.I mean, what's the point?Well, what is in the record is a road misdemeanor counts charge, and they were elevated to a felony.It's not in the record that there were cha- underlining, which were misdemeanors.There were charged as felonies.They were, the record supports the fact that they were charged as misdemeanors and they were later upgraded after defendant kept incessant, you know, consistently harassing and calling the victim, and other crimes evidence, it's not injecting, it's not injecting reversible error because -- - Well, it is when the crimes are so dissimilar that the prejudicial effect far outweighs the probative value.That that's the problem.The statute at issue here, as well as common law, requires a general similarity, especially when modus operandi is not, is not at play, and that is not a play here.And we, it totally meets the general similarity requirement of the statute and common law.There was the same victim, it had, they all occurred after the breakup and they're all forms of aggression.You know, whether it's verbal aggression or visible, physical aggression aimed at intimidating the victim because she would refuse to have any more contact with him.So when we look at the record, it was properly considered and nor was there any, nor was it improperly focused on by the state or, or the trial judge.The state merely put it on first because it occurred first and the text was introduced because, regarding to the tires, because the texts connected the defendant to the slashing of the tires.The victim did not see that the incident.And there's also nothing in the record to show that the trial court improperly considered this, considered this.In fact, this is a bench trial and is presumed that the judge follow the law and consider the other crimes evidence for only its limited purpose.And there's affirmative evidence in the record that he did so.The trial judge acquitted defendant on two of those counts.So therefore he did not blindly and look at other crimes evidence.What that shows is that he looked at the evidence as to each count and determined whether defendant was guilty or not.And so, Your Honor, there was no, absolutely no abuse in this case and we ask that you affirm the trial court's ruling.What's your position on the defense attorney, proving the defendant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, six or eight counts where the state presumed, presented no evidence to support those counts, for their cross-examination, defense lawyer did.On that, on that I will concentrate on the counts one through six, because we've conceded that the other counts are merged and defendant's whole ineffective assistance of counsel claim is based on the allegation that the state did not present any evidence that he committed the offenses one through six, which were covered by, which covered the dates between November 26th, 2012 -- - Which case are you talking about?One through six and?And indictment one, which is, he only raises an effective counsel indictment one, which counsel referred to as 68.6898?Mm-hmm.Right.The ineffective only focuses on that indictment.Okay?So counts one through six cover the dates between November 26th, 2012, and March 10th, 2013.It's not accurate that there was more evidence submitted by the state.Although I missed it in my brief, I admit, on page 35 of the record, the state asked, he trained November 7th, 2012, and November 26 of 2012, how many times did defendant call you?I'll quote.First quote.The victim answered hundreds.And she also stated that the calls were becoming progressively more scary and threatening.What this means is that the state elicited, undirect, the defendant made threatening calls on November 26th, 2012.And that's one of the dates covered in counts one through six.So because there was some evidence that the state elicited such evidence during the direct examination of the victim, it was reasonable for defense counsel to ask about this period of time, since it dealt with the most serious allegations in the indictment.The defense counsel record shows that counsel pushed the victim and asked specific questions in order to challenge the credibility, her truthfulness and her motive, especially where the victim at times was vague and imprecise.This was sound trials strategy, but even if this court finds that it was a mistake in asking these specific questions, it was still not, it was still not constitutionally deficient.Defense counsel did not just elicit damaging evidence and move on for no tactical reason.He challenged that evidence.He tied his questions about November 26th, 2012 and March 10th, 2013, to his theory of defense that the victim fabricated these charges against him to force him to drop his civil suit.Again, it was, the record shows that immediately after asking the victim about these time periods, defense counsel pursued a line of questioning that he attempted to connect these calls, bad calls, which the victim attributed to the defendant, to 3 0 9 numbers that were linked to the victim's, childhood friend, Nick, and his company, and incidentally, defense counsel also presented a witness to attempt to promote this theory about calls.And if you look at the closed defense counsel's cross-examination, he got the victim to admit and share received thousands of dollars from the defendant.The victim was forced to explain why a defendant's checks have the word loan written on them.She was also forced to explain a promissory note that she allegedly signed, a document that she drafted and that she signed and drafted, where defendant would promise not to sue her and pay, or, ask for his money back.And he also, district has explained a draft or a draft of settlement agreement that was prepared for the attorney.And finally, a defense counsel also presented a witness that, witnesses who attempted to establish that defendant could not have called the, the victim on November 26th, 2012.So if we look at the record, there's plenty of evidence that counsel elicited the challenge for victim's credibility, and, and this was a reasonable trial strategy.Is the evidence closely balanced?I would say, no, the evidence is not closely balanced.True that there are two different accounts here, but the piece of, the strongest corroborating piece of evidence in this record is the April, the defendant's, the recording of defendant's call to the victim in April of 2013, where he's heard aggressively demanding to listen to his gutless, her gutless parents.He wanted to talk to her gutless parents, right?That call occurred after the order of protection, it occurred after defendant was repeatedly arrested for illegal contacting the victim.It occurred after misdemeanor charges.It occurred after the falling of the first indictment.That strongly corroborates that her testimony, the defendant calling her was truthful and it strongly rebuts defendant's theory of defense.So that strong piece of evidence takes this case out of the closely balanced prompt.Well, but even if it's, I'm sorry, go ahead.No, go ahead.Even if the evidence is not closely balanced, our analysis also requires us to look at the seriousness of the error.With respect to, in terms of -- - The admission of the other crimes.Evidence is just, here's just mentioned, you had a tons of information that you were able to use at trial, you didn't even need the other crimes evidence.Oh, I disagree.As I stated, it was relevant to establish her state of mind, of how she reacted, it was relevant to, to rebut his theory of defense that it was just about money and about her not having to pay him money back.I think it was very relevant and, and, and there was no abuse of discretion, but going back to defense council's performance, this is, his performance was totally unlike the cases that defendant cites to -- - Well, could you just, and I'm sorry to interrupt you but, counts in case 6898, counts 9, 11, 12, 13, and 14.Was there any, did the state provide any evidence other than?9, 11, 12, 13, and 14?Okay.On count nine, right.I would look to the record on direct, right?20, no, I think 26 through 27.She asked a question between, about calls from June 7th, 2012 to September 25th, 2012.What's the other account?9, 11.Okay.Count 11, direct.There's testimony of calls on page Y 34 and 11, on 12 there, November 26 was discussed on Y 35.And what other count?The only -- - 12, 13, and 14.Okay.12?Block the data, discussion of black calls, on a, direct on 35, and count 13.There was no direct with respect to that.However, November 26.And that date ranges between November 26th, 2012 to March 10th, 2013.And on page 35, undirect, the victim testified that she got her harassing calls during November 26th, 2012.The only count, there was another count that there was no direct evidence was count seven, which defendant was found not guilty of.And, and, and he was found not guilty because that only was a non-direct.The text messages were never tied up to that date.She could not remember, did not recall the text messages.So there was no evidence.I, direct her across to tie to October 20, 21st, 2011.So this case is different than the case of cited by defendant, where attorneys, they're elicited in the misspelled evidence like a police, like contents of a police report or listed on challenge, damaging evidence.Here, defense counsel, Your Honors, aggressively challenged the victim's testimony, her credibility and motive, presented an unidentifiable theory of defense regarding all the accounts.So looking at the totality of counsel's performance, which Strickland mandates, defense counsel, who was, who was partially successful, was not constitutionally deficient.Can I, back, just finally, I'm reading the conclusion of your, your reply version.Mm-hmm.And it says the people of the state of Illinois respectfully request that this honorable court in 13 CR 68 98, reverse defendant's convictions and remand the case for a new trial.That was a mistake on my part, and I would ask this court to look at the content and the substance of my argument.That's kind of what I thought, but yeah.And then, so.We shouldn't consider that an admission?Uh, no.So I would ask this court to consider the arguments I made today and the arguments contained in my, the argument in my opening, in my brief, and affirm defendant's convictions.In, in both cases.Very well, thank you.Thank you.Ms. Pew, briefly?So there's been a lot of talk up here about the ranges of dates in 6898, and the state did ask to complainant about the range of dates of November 7th to November 26.But the range of dates discussed here is November 26 to March 10th.There was never any specific testimony about November 26.There was just endless range of dates, March 7th, to the 26 were their calls.And she said that there were, but there was never anything to tie it specifically to the 26 or certainly nothing to tie it to the 26th of November through March 10th.There was just, no, there was no testimony whatsoever about those, about, about those dates.And so those counts, of, the state did ask about the, about the 7th to the 26th, but that's actually not tied to any specific counts in the indictment.And as for the claim that that, the state started discussing the other crimes evidence first, because it came chronologically, that is not true.Count seven came before any of the other crimes evidence.And then there was the first set of crimes incident, then count eight, then the next count, next to other crimes evidence, and then everything else.So if the state had been trying to focus on everything chronologically in that front-loading was highly damaging violence, text evidence, they would have done it to, they would have done it that way, starting with count seven.It wasn't chronological.Additionally Order of Protection was not granted until December, 2012.So there was no order of protection related to the other crimes evidence that was, that was admitted.And there's also a suggestion that the state needed the other crimes evidence so that the defense so that, so that they could prove why the complainant felt scared.The complainant was not required to corroborate her own fear.This is not something where we don't believe the complainant.If she says, she's getting these terrifying, these texts, these harassing calls or texts that she needs to corroborate in some way with some violence.That's, that's not the kind of justice system we run here and that was not necessary.And there's a big difference between Mark Shelling, sitting at home on his couch at night, watching TV, calling, texting, versus actually going out into the road and doing these violent things.So even if there was a hearing on the other crimes evidence, it was still extremely prejudicial.And as for, as for counsel's questions, he could have relied on the, state still to prove her guilty, to prove Mark Shelling guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.It's not that he was completely incompetent.He did bring other evidence.He did show the history of money, but he also refused to rely on the state's requirement that they prove him guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.And instead just elicited evidence.This case is actually quite a bit like Jackson, which I cite in my brief, which is a case in which defense counsels elicited one element of one offense.It was, I think it was two questions that are listed in that element and led to a reversal.Here, we have 30 pages of that.And so because of the highly damaging testimony that he was able to elicit, as well as the highly prejudicial nature of the other crimes evidence, we would ask that this court reverse on all charges and remand for a new trial.Very well, thank you.Thank you.Thank you both for briefing an argument on this matter.We'll take it under advisory.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/gov.uscourts.illappct.1-15-1599.2018-10-10.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/gov.uscourts.illappct.1-15-1599.2018-10-10.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/gov.uscourts.illappct.1-15-1599.2018-10-10.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/gov.uscourts.illappct.1-15-1693WC/gov.uscourts.illappct.1-15-1693WC.2016-01-27.mp3", "text": "Madam Clerk, please call the last case in the morning.One fifteen, sixteen, Ninety three, fifteenth, seventh worth thirty nine arrears - You also, you may approach and proceed.Thank you.Good morning.May I please the court half full ?My name is Karen Kun.I'm here on behalf of United airlines.This, I assert as a flight attendant who was injured on a flight from her home in Denver to LaGuardia airport.She was not working on that flight.She was scheduled to work the following day out of JFK .As well established the accidents occurring while coming and going to work are not compensable.There's two issues raised here, whether she was somehow a traveling employee at the time of the accident or whether she could fall into a community exception because the travel is due to the demands and exigencies of her employment.We believe the commission in this case.Got it right.And holding that the accident was not compensable.Our arguments here today are slightly different than the rationale they provided.We don't disagree with their analysis, but we think that their decision was bolstered by the subsequent Canyon prior decision.She was not traveling for work at the time she was commuting.And in order to understand and be clear on the circumstances that occasion, that travel, you have to be very clear on the facts in the record and how the travel came about.Well the defects here are really, the basic facts are not disputed, are they?The facts are not disputed, but the circuit court got the facts completely wrong.Well, that's probably true.That's probably true, but we don't care.Let's just talk about what the law is that applies to the facts.We know she's living in Colorado.We know she's flying out of JFK. - She's living in Colorado.She's flying out of JFK. - So, let's start out with the basic principle that if you are effective worker or you're working at McDonald's or anywhere, and you drive there is your commute.If you're that's part of your regular commute, do you get compensated if you have an accident?No. - Okay.And that's what you're saying.Applies here.That's already said.She is not on the clock.She was not working, when she was traveling, flying from Colorado to New York, with anybody say she was working.No, she testified she was not working.She testified there was no business purpose.For a basis, is she a traveling employee?We don't think she was.She's not a traveling employee.She chose to live in Colorado.Exactly.She could have lived two miles from, she's traveling where.Commute.Exactly.When she gets out of the airplane, that's something different about this obviously - When she gets to JFK, when she gets to her employment premises, then she starts her work-related job.Can I ask him why that wasn't a regular commute to New York that anybody else would be committing to their job?Whether it's two miles or a thousand miles, you're still convenient three.Yes - But let me ask you this.And this is, has been impacted by venture Newburg, right?Obviously the Supreme court took the case from this panel.Is there any difference if somebody is a, you know, working at a permanent location or as a temporary employee, is that they're on the analysis?Well, Dr. Newburg was a temporary employee.It was not a permanent point.But the what deserting bird found what the Supreme court found was that he was not directed there by his employer.So the question is whose choice is it?So if it's a temporary job where the employer says, we need you to go down here for awhile and work this other job that's at the employer's direction.And then the accident is compensable.Eventually Newburg the employer, the employee chose to live miles away from the employment site.And in this case, you're saying she did the exact same thing.He chose to live in another state.Exactly.Okay.And she did that for 16 years.So it occurs to me, your argument boils down to the fact that even if you're dealing with a traveling employee, if the injury occurs in non-work-related travel to where you begin your Workday from home.And in that particular case, it does not arise out of the employment.Yes.It does not occur in the course of your employment.Yes.Your employment does not by a definition, but your definition of a traveling employee, it's someone who travels away from the employment premises to perform their job duties.In this case, her employment premises for the purposes of that analysis is JFK. She was based on JFK, on trips, started and ended at JFK. And so while she's working on those trips, if she's on layover in Shanghai, she can go out to eat.She can ride an elephant, she can do whatever she want.As long as it's reasonable and foreseeable she's in the course of her employment.However, her regular commute is not covered.She's not a traveling employee while she's on her regular commute to the office, just as Lang and Pryor on his regular commute to his employer's premises is not covering.Oh, if she had a stop off somewhere first on the way to JFK and do something that was work related, then the argument might be different, correct?That's the traditional traveling employee.But your argument is very simple.She is simply doing her regular commute to JFK to begin her Workday.If somebody driving to a factory would be as an.Accident.Exactly.And so how does the circuit court.Got it wrong?Because they got the first, first they got the first three facts wrong.They started it by saying the facts are not dispute.They then said on September three.W we we don't care what the circuit court did were terrible to commission.And it was unfortunate.I asked that question in all fairness, just to.They didn't base it on.What would the facts that were in the record?They made some assumptions and some stuff.They said.No, I was drinking the question.Justice Hudson.Yes, sir.The record, as long as you look, just look at the record in this case, I don't think there's any questions.She was just on her regular commute.Miss ICER testified, you know, she's not paid for any of these expenses.She's not directed by her employer.She's not even guaranteed a seat while she's commuting.There's no way of guaranteeing.She's going to make a community shift.That's a risk that she takes by commuting.Well we are talking about it What was the commute under the direction of the employer?And you're saying it was not, - it was not - because if it was, we have a different animal that's what your argument would be.That is my argument - Okay uh huh - Well it seems that you well understand my arguments.I'm going to stand on my brief.Talk to my council.Okay.Thank you.Okay thank you council, council may you respond - The petitioner this is groundhogs day.The movie from bill Murray.I tried this case before I tried it in 2003.I tried it with the exact same facts that are in front of the entire panel today.And the commission said back in 2003, which by the way, was never overturned and is still the controlling law here today.The commissioner jacks that the petitioner was merely in transit on her way to work.So as to take her out of the course of employment at the time of her fall, rather than record supports, finding that the petitioner is properly considered a traveling employee under the app.And that worked for respondent clearly created the necessity for travel.I think that was a commission decision.It was a commission decision - How is the controlling law, - when it's not overturned by your arms precedential value to us, where are we going to done?Let's assume you were absolutely correct.Have you heard of adventure?Uber, Uber just doesn't make a decision that she's a traveling employee that actually Uber.It makes a decision that she isn't a traveling employee.Uber then goes to the decision that let's go to.The second analysis.Does her commute create an exception for the general rule?That community is how could it ever, who chose the little total - Who told her to live in Colorado.But venturing, Uber is a case where a petitioner gets transferred to a job.That's 200 miles from where his home is.get a hotel and take that job.And he likes to drive to, and from the hotel, that's the sheet that for his job, but the difference between that is judge.The difference between that is venture.Uber is a short time part-time position.It's not 16 years in duration.The petitioner is not reimbursed for monthly travel.The petitioner is that - she's not reimbursed for the travel from Colorado to New York.She was giving travel expenses that she uses for travel from new york to colorado - let me ask you a honest question.Did she get reimbursed for travel from Colorado or New York.Reimburses as a hot for parking, for parking for her Park lands free for airline travel street, both of those benefits are provided by United.She can use those benefits to fly to Hong Kong.So can anybody, - Mr. McKenzie, Mr. McKenzie, I'm going to make it real simple for you.A guy is a traveling salesman and every day he begins his work and his employer's office, and then travels around with seller's goods all day comes back to his employer's office and then goes home.Or you need to suggest me to traveling from his house to his employer's office in the morning is compensable.That's what it says.is it make sure you're part of a traveling to play when you're committing to work.Melissa says that a traveling employee and employee who trails is considered in the course of their employment, the moment he or she leaves his report.Mr. Leona would you please be quiet while I'm talking to several generally, that's true.When you leave your home and begin your travel.And that means beginning your job, many traveling employees leave from their house to go see their clients, et cetera, and so on.And we would say then that the incident, he leaves his house.He is a traveling employee in this particular case, no one told this woman to live in Colorado.She couldn't live in New York and she didn't have to travel that.Well, let me grab something out of his answer.Why is that person?He decided a traveling employee, because from the moment they leave their house, they're working, they're doing their work performance, okay?She's at an airplane, not in uniform.You tell me what work she was doing when she was flying from cloud rattle to New York, what job related activities, where she performed.And if there were an urgency contingency, she would've had to work at flight, just like a flight attendant.And she got.Out of her uniform.She wasn't working at anything.If there was an emergency contingency, she would have to work.And that again, will confusing a travel and employee analysis with the analysis under venture Uber, which isn't a traveling plan.It's just under an analysis because she wasn't doing anything related to a job until she gets to jail.F K the commission in Larson states that in order to make her international flight, the petitioner is required to fly from power to Chicago.The commission notes, the petitioner chose to live in Colorado.Nevertheless, United approved.This arrangement reimbursed the majority of her monthly parking.As a matter of course, supplied petitioner with bond limited flight passes this - from what case are getting, This is a piece I tried.I mean, I haven't, unfortunately was.There's no precedential value that that doesn't bear in anything.What was the commission in 90, in 2003?You know what happened if you would cite that in your brief - And we ignore it, we have to ignore it.We're legally required to ignore that decision.How, if you were to find her not to be a traveling employee at the time, how does she not qualify under the community exception standard?I'm not saying that she, she isn't traveling to play at the time, but she's not traveling to play.How does it, she job is that you fall under the community and exception that says that generally a commute to and from work isn't considered to be compensable provides for your means to and from work.Your employer provides for your parking.Your employer provides for your plane fare to and from New York city though, they look at the kids.So that's, that's an exception.In the record to suggest that the only way from her residence to tell you there is by fine, - precisely - no.Mean, it's, it's the only practical way that she could get there.The question is, if it's not, there is no evidence that this is the only way that United is not providing her way to get there.She's deciding to avail herself of United.She can drive there if you want, you know.80% Of their new based flight attendants to commute, to and from work from different, some different areas of the country.Why did they do that?There's nothing about this case.We're going to take it out of the general rule that a commute to start, your Workday is not compensable period - I mean, there's a, there's a whole bunch of cases that say, otherwise, judge, we'll call.Her attention.I'd like to hear what that is.Either one, Curtis.So a traveling employee travel, an employee has an analysis, which is on your right, which is three prong.That's not the analysis that they use in Leona, Newburg.They use and analysis that they say, this person isn't a traveling employee.And by the way, they don't, they don't deviate from the community and exception standard.That'd be, you know, that this is a person that had lived there in Newburg for, I think the testimony was three or four months as compared to my client that lived there for 16 years, that United knew about that United act.And we asked to that United provided.Can we turn him into a feminine point unless they're engaged in some kind of employment related duties or activities, she's not until she gets to JFK. He's not being compensated by United.When she's flying to Colorado, are they paying her to fly from Colorado to New York?Are they paying her to do that.Different?Are the travel, are they paying them for 10 o'clock?Well, that's the answer go?How's it different MLR. So the, - these two couples clean homes and they clean a home and then they go home for lunch together and they're having lunch together and they get a call that they're supposed to go get another job.They're not being paid during this time.Oh, by the way, warm up their car.Just like Sarah finds that the case I argued in front of your honor, they're not Sarah wasn't trailing at the time Sarah was going out to one of her car as was the Melissa.She leaves the house.He is engaging in work-related activities because she's going to take the next cleaning job as directly.Okay.Your claimant in this case was merely going to begin the Workday.Okay.think the law is differently judged.So I disagree with you on that.You may find out what I can say.I respectfully disagree with you on that.I mean, I, I, I certainly laid out the law and there's been a number of cases concerning this, which the commission notes that, that there's been a number of.There's been a number of cases on this very issue of traveling employee.I listed them in, in the brief, - Thank you - Thank you council council you may reply", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/gov.uscourts.illappct.1-15-1693WC.2016-01-27.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/gov.uscourts.illappct.1-15-1693WC.2016-01-27.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/gov.uscourts.illappct.1-15-1693WC.2016-01-27.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/gov.uscourts.illappct.1-16-2943/gov.uscourts.illappct.1-16-2943.2019-11-26.mp3", "text": "Mr. Clerk, call the next case please.Next case being People versus Thomas Gatch.We're ready when you are.Didn't want you to wait, sorry.Good morning, your honors.My name is Chris Evers from the Office of the State Appellate Defender, representing the appellate, Mr. Thomas Gatch in today's appeal.Could you give us your last name again?I'm sorry, Evers.E-V, as in Victor, E-R-S. - Thank you.May it please the court.As always, I would welcome direction from the court division, if particular or nuance of Mr. Gatch's appeal that you'd like me to focus on the first, but otherwise my plan is to initially rest on our briefs on our first issue, that the evidence was insufficient to sustain the conviction.And then the alternative, our third issue that the trial court's error of not giving the proper instructions to the jury during voir dire under rule 431B, mandates that he get a new trial, but I want to focus on the second issue we raised.Mr. Gatch's Fourth Amendment rights were violated, which means that the motion to suppress the additional evidence and the acquired knowledge from the police should have been granted and not allowed to trial because the police came to his apartment to arrest him with no probable cause.And there were no circumstances that would have authorized a warrantless entry into his house.If you're going to start with that issue, do you believe you properly preserved it?Yes, it was fully briefed and a suppression hearing was held and that was going on.It was not necessarily mentioned in the motion when we trialed, but under Enoch, it was a constitutional issue.It was discussed.And this is something that is appropriate for this court to hear on appeal, as you are sort of reviewing a full transcript of this and can make that determination.Then again, staying with that issue.Yes.You've got, it's the middle of the night, there is clearly a fire that occurred in the stairwell.- - Absolutely.Everyone agrees to that, set by an unknown person and a neighbor identifies this defendant as being the likely person who started the fire, after watching the video.Yeah, the two building management individuals told the detective after watching the video that that's Mr. Gatch, which is true because he was on that video in the later video clips, of course.And why do you contend that that was not sufficient for the police to enter the apartment of that individual?Okay.And I don't contend that.Again within a few minutes of when all this really occurred.Well, two points, Judge.So, there's the probable cause issue, which keeping in mind the detective made this determination about two hours after that fire was set.So this is not a matter of five or six minutes and then the police are there.But for the probable cause issue, some of the best evidence of that is that, the idea is that a person of reasonable caution would have committed that offense.This was a process of elimination case.Here, this video, the unknown person goes in the direction of 3B and 3A. The detectives know that, but there's kind of a jump to judgment there.The building manager is saying that that's Mr. Gatch.The detective said you can't see the individual's face.The clothing is different for that.So that is kind of a jumping the gun.And the state's own authorities have been quoted or stated in the briefs, that are talking about Bauer and James, talk about much more specifics in both of those cases, a specific defendant fought or argued with the victim of the arsenal, only 20, 30 minutes before the arson was set.The arson was set in a very specific area that that defendant was known to have access to in which case his own townhouse, but not away from him but towards the two other residents or an apartment of the victim that he had a key to, but had gotten into the building without permission.So that was a narrowing that's more.But here, we know that, that the person that they identified lived in the building.Yes.Lived on the third floor, had access to the stairway and was identified on the surveillance video by the caretaker in the building who was familiar with the defendant.So, where do you go from there?Okay, I guess part of it is the identification aspect.Now we keep saying identification, the detective just said that.But what the detective said is that they told him, they saw Mr. Gatch and knew him.And there's no doubt Mr. Gatch is in that stairwell, approximately 20 minutes after the fire.That connection is not as specific as the case decided by the state, that I've been discussing here.But I understand that this is a narrowing here.And the idea is that apartment 3B and 3A, not knowing who all the residents of 3B might be, We're arguing was insufficient for the probable cause finding.But even if this court agrees, that there was probable cause for the detective.The issue was whether the police had the ability and right to go through the door of Mr. Gatch's apartment, 3B with no warrant.And that's one of our most highly protected things in the constitution, your honor.The first time, whether they had the right the first.Well, exactly, your honor, the courts only wrote the second time.The second time's in the circuit court.We won't chase you.It didn't .Back in time, okay.We don't want you to change anything about that of course.But yeah, the first time.And there was clearly no warrant.And so what the prosecution argued at the trial there, there was an exigent circumstance.And this is a very specific, limited exception, which did not exist under the facts of this case.Are you talking about the Community Caretaker Exception?I will and planning to, your honor, because we've fully briefed out in our opening brief that state did not seem to respond.And they were clearly going in to arrest that's police investigation.That's not what the Community Caretaker Provision is about.Of course.Here though, the circuit court in it's finding, seemed to focus exclusively on a single sentence about that he was upset or sad on the day before, which the detective learned from the two building managers, some indetermined time, talking about the loss of a lady friend, in their words, who had taken her own life.But that was some unknown time in the future.This was approximately two hours after the fire was set.And the court elevated that, unknown emotional setting of the individual, of Mr. Gatch, at best, to that they must go in the apartment right now because the detective testified, basically, he's going to start another fire to either harm himself or try to set this whole building on fire.And that is a leap too far, based on the information that he has.And that goes to the factors that are listed first, in the Illinois Supreme Court and Foskey.They went through a variety of factors, not all need to be there, but Mr. Gatch was not armed.There's no evidence of that.One of the things they look at the most, is the grave nature of the crime, the violent nature.But he wasn't armed, but possibly he had the capability to set another fire and that's what's more specific to this case.Well, that's true, your honor.But the video itself shows that the individual, they're kind of putting a small plastic bag down that you can get in any drug store and a fire started.This was not cans of gasoline being thrown around, not an incendiary device.Every one in that apartment building had the same means to start a small fire, assuming that they had a lighter, matches, or any other common household items.So there's no information which Foskey discussed about, knowing a specific record or a homicide or a violent beating taking place which are the nature of the cases discussed when they mean violent to nature.The police, the detective's own words, also kind of cut against that.They went up there.He was scared or feared for the worst when he knocked at four o'clock in the morning and no one answered, which is not an uncommon experience.And he forgot to check for fire when he went inside.That's the detective's testimony.So that being some concern, I have to go in there without a warrant, even though getting a warrant in city of Chicago, there's 24 hour felony route to get that process started.He wasn't worried enough to actually check for the fire, which is his reason and rationale for going in.That doesn't rise to the level of exigent circumstances from the cases discussing Foskey.And it's not enough to overcome the powerful protection of the fourth amendment for someone's own home, to going in without a warrant.Well, did he have to have a continuing concern when he went into the room or the apartment and found the defendant asleep on the couch?He had to have a concern to go through the door without permission from Mr. Gatch.It's really just really crossing that threshold that we're talking about there.Well, that's what I would think the focus would be.But now you seem to say that he needed to have a continuing concern when he got in the apartment.Well, if the only concern that's been expressed in that the court found that a fire was going to be started, seeing Mr. Gatch sleeping there doesn't delay that concern.Him seeing there maybe him sleeping he may first see him so shows where she is, but if they're concerned that the fire had already been started, that is what they testified to.That is what the circuit court expressly said when finding those exigent circumstances.And so choosing not to search for it, I'm just saying, is demonstrating that maybe it wasn't as pressing a concern as possible.And under Foskey in another case to discussed by that, none of those situations rise into exigent circumstance.There's such a leap there.And the idea of just being upset the day before, also doesn't seem to suggest that yes, this person is going to be setting another fire, two hours after the first one.There is a lot of missing leaps of logic to get that as necessary to go in without a warrant, which is what we're asking this court to find today.Assuming that we don't find for you on your first two issues, the third issue, the 431B violation.Yes.The remedy that's available is dependent upon whether this was a closely balanced case or not.Now, the question I have for you is, you suggest that this is a closely balanced case.Why?Variety of reasons, your honor, certainly that, the identification at the end of the day was not, I saw Mr. Thomas Gatch and his face right there.We're already talking about, as Mr. Ceniceros admitted, he doesn't know who the person in the dark clothing is.They have reached to that conclusion.And the jury of themselves are telling us that.They ask about the clothes, the dark clothes that they wanted to know what was going on with that.They asked about the testimony of Mr. Ceniceros, to get a transcript of that was sent back.And given that the admonition that was not provided, the defendant has no obligation to present any evidence at all.And they are now talking about evidence that they wished that they had, that they don't have, that shows that it is potentially closely balanced in the juror's mind.And that's really the issue for closely balanced.It's not...You're suggesting, we can read jury notes to determine whether it's closely balanced?Well, I'm saying that it's certainly something that the jury is communicating.Does a jury note say, we're split?That's not the evidence I'm asking for.But it's demonstration that the evidence itself, wasn't as clear cut.If they didn't need other questions or had a bunch of questions, they wouldn't ask for that.But closely balanced doesn't mean, there has to be two equal competing narratives.The error was not giving this precise instruction.The jury itself was talking about evidence that wasn't presented.And given that there is no straight forward identification, there is no forensic evidence that exists in some of the other reasonable doubt cases that are discussed by both parties, earlier in our briefs.Is it your decision then that on your third issue, and following up to Justice Hoffman's question, the evidence doesn't necessarily have to be closely balanced in the sense that there's evidence on one side and contradictory evidence on the other side, as opposed to just being very weak.Yes.It's closely balanced so the jury could be going is really agonizing for lack of a better term, to kind of what the decision they're going to make for that too.And the nature of criminal prosecutions and our constitution allows, the defendant doesn't have to resolve evidence.Closely balanced can't mean there has to be evidence from both sides.That's not what the constitution allows for or protects against.So yes, it's that it's weak, it's not clear.This error mattered in how the jury reached their decision.And given that those are the only 12 people who truly know how they're going back and forth, the reason I brought up the jury instruction is because it's the only little insight we have.But if it's so overwhelming, there's indication they wouldn't need to ask about something.They could just make their decision.But yes, Justice Hoffman, to answer your question, I do believe it is closely balanced.Can't we ask you in the time remaining to just briefly address the first issue?Of course, your honor.I mean, this case is a little bit like a game of clue and it's all circumstantial.Yes, your honor.And you do have somethings recorded in video.Yes.The transcript is not as helpful as perhaps a reviewing court would like, in terms of how it was presented at the trial, in terms of identifying different frames of the video, et cetera.Yes, your honor.But all that being, putting that aside, the jury sat and listened to all this.And we have a strict rather stringent standard to review this in light most favorable to the prosecution.And why do you contend that when you view it in that light, the jury couldn't put all these pieces of the puzzle together and say it must've been him.Okay, your honor.So in the light is favorable to the prosecution, is all reasonable inferences, but it's not taking all the evidence the way the state wants you to take it.And that's really what we're focusing on here.We call it speculation.The unknown person in the dark clothes went off screen on the clips one and three, basically somewhere between 3B and 3A, that is multiple people there.There are two different apartments there.And so the idea that we don't have a clear identification, we have no forensic evidence.The only other person who testified, who wasn't a police officer or a fire Marshall, has a motive and even contradicts themselves.\"I know it wasn't Phillip, my partner, \"but I didn't wake up until this fire was already set\".The fire we're talking about was already there.We're saying that that rises to the level of speculation.And certainly the cases decided by the state and we even talk about our Brown's Law and Brown there, is that there's a lot more for the circumstantial evidence because you can create a story, because you can create a narrative and want the jury to adopt it, doesn't necessarily mean that that's sufficient circumstantial evidence, that this is something the court should allow to stand.And that's the argument we're making here there.Can the state make a narrative?They did, absolutely, I understand that.But given the authority that deals with circumstantial cases, there wasn't no threat from Mr. Gatch.There was no clear identification.There was no forensic evidence.And there were two apartments accessible by that person in unknown dark clothes that came off there.And given that, that doesn't rise to the reasonable doubt standard that we want to put someone in jail or prison for a period of time.And if there's no additional questions from your honors, I will reserve my time.Thank you.Thank you, counsel.Thank you.State?May it please the court, counsel.My name is Claire Wesley Conway.I'm an assistant state's attorney and I represent the People to the State of Illinois in this case.I'd like to address the first issue that the defendant raised in his speech, which is the sufficiency of the evidence.The evidence in this case established the defendant's guilt for aggravated arson, beyond a reasonable doubt.The videos in this case obviously narrow the focus.And it's more a case of which image we try to eliminate the possibilities of other people who have an access and living in that apartment building, to have committed this offense.And the videos in this case, they clearly show that the arsonist came from the area of apartment 3A and 3B. 3B is occupied and leased by the defendant himself, solely.There's no evidence that anyone else ever came or left that apartment that day.The maintenance worker who testified at trial, testified, he reviewed the videos.There's no one else coming from that area.We have the testimony from Craig Martin.Craig Martin is the occupant of apartment 3A. He shares that apartment with his partner, Phillip Robinson.Craig Martin testified that neither he nor Phillip Robertson left the apartment at any point.Your opponent would say that makes no sense because he testified he was asleep.So how would he know whether Phillip left the apartment or not?Correct.If he was asleep, but when he woke up, his partner was right there.Okay.Yeah, yeah.And there's evidence that his partner is African-American and defendant in this case, and the video would submit that it was not someone who was African-American.How do you assess?So, the jury, I'm sorry.Sorry, Ms. Conway.Sorry.How do you assert that the video demonstrates the race of the suspect?The video is terrible quality and you maybe for a millisecond, you might see a shadow of a face.I mean, in terms of starting the fire, you don't see a face at all, right?Correct, correct.So, the only time you see, even remotely you see a face in the video, is between the two apartment.From my view of it, it's consistent with someone who is Caucasian.And then the jury got to be able to view that.And from its verdict, obviously found consistent with that.The jury was able to view the testimony of Craig Martin.We don't have a description of Craig Martin and how, what his make and size and everything like that was from the record.But the jury had that before that.So the jury could see if the defendant matched the size and the shape and the frame of the arsonist in this case, from the videos.And that's exactly what the maintenance worker did in this case.He said...Is there anything distinctive about what you see in the video, in terms of an anomalous physique or anything like that, it could be any number of average people, couldn't it?Correct.It could, but again, his testimony doesn't discount the defendant.Again, it's a process of elimination where we're narrowing the focus onto the defendant.And the maintenance worker said yes, that he couldn't identify the defendant from that still shot from the video, but the defendant was the same shape, size and height as arsonists, in this case.Again, pointing towards the defendant.I'm not saying.Explain to me.That's the linchpin of like, oh, we win, at the best, one of those, it's all a matter of steps that are taken and all the reasonable inferences that can be made from the evidence in this case.So we have his testimony.We also have the testimony from the maintenance worker that he watched the video from camera 8 and he was able to determine that the person walked towards the defendant's apartment upon returning from setting the fire.And approximately 20 minutes later, we know the defendant was in his apartment, 20 minutes later after setting the fire because he changed his clothes.And then he walks out of the hallway.That time, he's not so disguised.Then he walks down to the same exact stairwell where he just set the fire and the firemen are still there.Consciousness of guilt, changing the clothes, walking past there.Then he goes down to the lobby and he spends a significant amount of time with the two maintenance workers who are trying to remedy this situation and watches them as they're viewing the videos of this case, all of this evidence, 20 minutes after he sets the fire, actually shows his consciousness of guilt.He was there.He was available and it could have been him from this and all of this evidence narrows the focus on to the defendant as the arsonist in this case, because we know that there arsonist didn't come from 3A, 'cause it was either 3B or 3A. We know it's not 3A and the jury accepted that.And any prongs that this court may have, regarding the credibility of Craig Martin in this case, the jury resolved that.And those are issues that the jury have to resolve in this case.'Cause they saw his testimony and they could too determine from his testimony whether or not he could have been the offender.Now at trial, the defendant asserted a defense that it wasn't him.It was somebody from 3A. Now in appeal, he asserts for the first time that it could have been, there was someone perhaps in his apartment at the time that set the fire.There is absolutely no evidence that there was anyone else in the apartment with the defendant.There's no video evidence.The video was looked at by the maintenance worker.He said he did not see anybody else come and go from that area.And the defendant lived in that apartment by himself.So we submit that the evidence established.All right, look, I think he only had five people testify.Correct.You've got Mr. Barker, the owner who wasn't there.Correct.You've got Mr. Martin who was asleep with Phillip.Yes.And then you have the arson investigator who was on the scene after it all happened.Yes.And officer Granadon, who also didn't get to the scene until after everything happened.Correct, Yeah, they were investigating.So the only person left is Mr. Ceniceros.Correct.And let's just talk about him for a minute.Okay.All right.He's the maintenance worker.Right.He's the one who identifies, says \"I looked at the video, I recognized the defendant\".right?Well.Or, something.Are you talking about at trial?Or, are you talking about the motion?At the motion.At the motion, okay.So if we're going from, to the motion, there's testimony from the detective who spoke to him and from the detective testified that the two maintenance workers both told him, that's the defendant.And the defendant, the whole role of the defendant's knowledge at that point is based on Mr. Ceniceros, fingering the defendant off the video, right?Well, the detective, when he appeared on the scene, he was able to view the video, and then he...But he doesn't know the defendant?Correct.Okay.And then he also spoke with the two maintenance workers who he relied upon their statements to him that that's the defendant.That's the extent of we know.But the defendant is, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I misspoke.The detective is looking at the exact same video, right?Correct.And the defendant is looking at the video that you can't identify anybody in that video.So how does he have sufficient knowledge to bust in the door?Because, and if you're concerned about the fact that there's not an ID of the defendant from those videos, then I would submit that you would look at the two cases that I cited to, which is James and Bauer, in neither of those cases, there was an eyewitness identification of a defendant who had been in fact that he committed, the arson for probable cause.They found there was probable cause in that case, in the absence of any eye witness testimony saying, that's the defendant.So, because it's probable cause, it's not proof beyond a reasonable doubt.It gives the officer enough reason.Is it the State's position then that probable cause existed because someone who didn't see the arson being set, went to a detective and said, I think, oh, it was probably that neighbor, Mr. Gatch because he was upset about his girlfriend and that's sufficient, or was there more?When you say probably, I mean, I don't know, he doesn't cite the exact words of what the two maintenance workers told him.The detective testified, those two people identified the defendant from the video.Okay.And they were concerned.'Cause you have to remember, they just saw the defendant coming down 20 minutes later.Okay.So there's suspicions were, let's just say they were, they were suspicious of the defendant at that point.So it's a totality of the circumstances that the officer has.And what we have to look to is an objective standard for that, for Fourth Amendment purposes, what a reasonable officer would do in that circumstance, based upon what someone is telling them.Putting aside what actually occurred, all right?Mm-hmm.Which was the exigent circumstances exception.You think a judge would have signed a search warrant on this?Do I think the judge, absolutely.A judge, would've?Yes.Yes, again, it's probable cause, it's not proof beyond a reasonable doubt.It's a lower standard that a police officer has to have in this case.And as far as the exigent circumstances, there's a multitude of factors that are reviewing court will look at to determine whether or not there is exigent circumstances, in this case.Do you believe the circuit court correctly, ascertained that the community caretaker exception apply?I didn't feel like, let's just say the community care-taking exception, is something that I didn't find that we could meet, meet.'Cause it doesn't apply if you're investigating a crime, which seems to be what they were doing.Yeah.It's meet, it was hard for us to meet I think that burden.Truly, I think what happened in this case is the arson investigator got there after an investigation was done by the, by the fire department.And as far as the amount of time that transpired between the fire and the time that they actually entered the defendant's apartment, they entered it at, the fire occurred at 1:50 a.m., approximately.And the detective entered the defendant apartment 4:05 a.m. If there was any inexcusable unjustifiable delay on the part of the police officers, they had to wait until the fire department conducted their investigation.They weren't even contacted until the fire Marshall got in there and said that it's an arson and there's been an incendiary source.So then, I don't know what time the fire department did their investigation and contacted the police department, based on the record.But we do know that when the officer, the detective arrived at 3:35 a.m., that he spent that time between, I'm sorry, 3:39 a.m., between 3:39 a.m. and 4:05 a.m., that he spent that time viewing the videos and speaking to the two maintenance workers.So there's no unjustifiable delay on the part of the detective in this case where he could have secured a search warrant.Some of the other factors that you look at is whether the offense under investigation was recently committed.We submit that it was recently committed while a grave offense is involved, particularly one of violence, arson, I don't know if it's under the definition of a violent offenses in the statute but I would consider it to be a violent offense with a potential for a huge loss of life, in this case.Whether the suspect was reasonably believed to be armed.I don't think there's any evidence that the defendant was armed in this case.Whether the police officer were acting on the clear showing of probable cause, we submit there was a clear showing of probable cause.Whether there was a likelihood that the suspect would have escaped if not swiftly apprehended.I don't think that we could actually establish that.But there was a strong reason to believe that the suspect was still in the premises because the two maintenance workers informed the detective that he was still there.In the time you have left, let me ask you to do address, go back to Justice Hoffman's question about the closely balanced evidence.Sure.And the allegedly improper jury admonitions.Correct, Yeah.Obviously we have conceded that the the jury admonition in this case were improper.They did not meet the requirements that have been set by this court.So, then we have to look at, obviously the defendant didn't preserve the issue.We look it under the lens of forfeiture and the defendant has the burden of showing that the evidence was closely balanced on the first prong, .Well, so, why is the evidence greeny and very, very difficult videos?And the face cannot be determined from the video.Certainly not the video of the setting of the fire.Correct.So the only thing you've got is, what's his name?Ceniceros?Yeah, the maintenance worker.Saying, that's him.Correct.That's it?No. I mean, no.It's a little lust in that, isn't it?Well no, actually, what I think is there's a lot.Again, this is the process of elimination because we don't have just one video.We have a series of videos in this case.Right.Okay.So the first video shows someone leaving either from apartment 3A or 3B. - Yeah.Defendant clearly lives alone in 3B and there's two other people who live in 3A, both of those people, the evidence established that those people did not commit that crime and the jury obviously accepted that.I'm not sure that the evidence established that.If you're suggesting the evidence established that Phillip didn't commit the crime, because his roommate who said he was sleeping, said he never left the apartment.I don't think the evidence established that Philip is out of the woods, other than your interpretation, that the person in the video is not an African-American.Well, and your honor obviously understands that what we have to do at this juncture is view the evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution.Well, there's no question about it, in the light most favorable to the state seems to me to be, that you've got Ceniceros saying the person in that video, is the defendant.Correct.But the jury saw the same video.Yes.Right, right.And it's one of those things, again, this is a process of elimination, okay.There's no evidence.There's no evidence that either of the people in 3A committed this arson.There's none.But there's no evidence that they didn't.That, Phillip, there's no evidence that Phillip did not commit this arson, other than your interpretation that the person in the video is not an African-American.Correct.It's a reasonable inference from the record.Well, I'm not sure that's a reasonable inference, but the fact of the matter is that makes all the more difficult in dealing with the fact that this trial judge never told these jurors that this defendant wasn't required to present any evidence.Correct.So now we've got a jury sitting there that hasn't been told, this defendant doesn't have to present any evidence.And I suppose as to Phillip, the jurors are inquiring, well, why isn't there any evidence that somebody else did this crime?Well, and let me just say he didn't admonish them during voir dire about the fact that the defendant doesn't have to present any evidence, but there were jury instructions in this case provided to the jury, which would have informed the jury that the defendant didn't have to present any evidence.But first of all, if it is a 431B violation, and the evidence is not closely balanced, there being no prejudice.There's a reversal and a remand for a new trial.That's Sebby, and People versus Thompson.I mean, that's it, if it's not a closely balanced case, this case goes back for a new trial, you know that and I know that.Oh, correct.I understand that's what the law is, but we're submitting that the evidence in this case wasn't closed balance.Was not closely balanced.Right.And the defendant hasn't established his burden of establishing that.He hasn't established that there was a reasonable alternative theory of this.Oh, he doesn't have to establish the alternative theory.And he has to establish for, to establish that there was a closely balanced case.I mean, I'm not saying he has to do the trial.But at this juncture, he has a burden here.You know, we established the defendant's guilt.He has the burden now.So at this point, he has the burden of establishing something.The burden's established if from the record, even viewing the evidence in a light most favorable to the state, a reasonable jury could have come to the conclusion that you failed to meet your burden of proof on the issue of identification.End of story.Correct.But we submit that the evidence was not closely balanced in this case.Oh, I understand what you're saying.Because the defendant's argument, relies I think upon speculation.And that's why in order to find that the evidence was close to balanced, I think you have to engage in some type of speculation, and that's not viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution.I don't think they've engaged in speculation.The only thing you have to say is could a reasonable jury, based upon this evidence, had made a determination that the state failed to meet its burden of proof, even if we accept all the evidence in its light, most favorable to the state.I suppose what I'm having difficulty with is, you can't see anybody's face on the video, it could have come from one of two apartments, so they say.We've got one person who is, I think unaccounted for and that's Phillip.And you've got Ceniceros saying the person in the video is the defendant.Exactly.I mean, I think.That's it, that's the whole case.Right, exactly.But again, I think it's one of those things where you have to narrow the focus and also you would in that scenario, you're not appreciating the fact that the defendant afterwards, went, changed his clothes, went down, walked past the firemen, as they're trying to still put out the fire and goes down.He's the one, Phillip not up, Phillip's not around.It's the defendant who is doing all of those actions that establish his consciousness of guilt in this case.Well, I don't think we know that the defendant from the evidence of the case, the defendant changed his clothes.Yeah.Unless we believe that it was the defendant in the video to begin with.Well, and again.'Cause all we know is the guy, the defendant wearing a light colored jacket and a baseball cap walked downstairs and walked past the firemen.Right, and again, I request this court to look at the evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution and not employ a reasonable hypothesis of innocence, which the defendant is seeking for this court to do.Well.You're not making the argument at any time we look at the evidence in a light most favorable to the prosecution.It necessarily means the case is not closely balanced.You're not making that argument.No, I don't think that.I think that's one of those things where again, when you look at the evidence that the jury has already had before it, that when you're looking at the, whether or not we've proven the defendant's guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, we look at it in the light most favorable to the prosecution.That's not the measure for closely balanced.Well and closely balanced, are you suggesting that we no longer have to view the evidence, in a light most favorable to the prosecution?No, I'm suggesting that you can win your argument, that he was proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.And still we could come to the conclusion, the case was closely balanced case.Correct.Only if you look at the evidence in a light most favorable to the state.Correct, correct.So one doesn't necessarily preclude the other.I understand, I understand.But in conclusion, we ask that this court find that the evidence in this case, established the defendant's guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, that the trial court's decisions in this case, regarding the motion to suppress is proper.And we ask that this court affirm the defendant's conviction in this case.Thank you.Thank you.Briefly, your honors, thank you.Just hoping your last statements got to what I wanted to say here.I wanna say a few things about the evidentiary facts, but there were multiple review standards here for the insufficient, the evidence versus the closely balanced.So the fact that we're talking so much about whether it was sufficient or not, feeds into the idea that it is closely balanced, even if you ultimately reject our first issue.Well, I wanna ask a question - Yes.That Justice Delort asked you before.Can we consider the note from the jury in our determination as to whether we believe this case was a closely balanced?Yes, your honor, it's something that took place.It's something that the parties were present for, that they decided what to stand back or not.Is the evidence produced to the jury of innocence or guilt?No, not at all, but it does give an idea of what they were struggling with.Closely balanced at the end of the day is your determination, whether the jurors could have gone one way or the other, and it's not competing narratives about the specific error involved for that argument, that they were not told.Mr. Gatch has no responsibility to produce any evidence, goes to their mindset on the very error that took place there.Very quickly, I agree.The prosecutor took pains in closing I would argue, the person who set the fire was white, that's not clear.Whether that's enough to find insufficiency of the evidence, it certainly makes it closely balanced when they put a large focus on that.At trial, Mr. Ceniceros, the building manager expressly said, \"I do not know who is in though\", people's exhibit eight and people's exhibit nine, which are stills from the first and third video clips of the unknown person entering there.At the suppression hearing, the detective testified, \"I was told by the building workers \"while we were watching the video clips\"., not the first one, not the second one, just the videos in general, \"That is Mr. Gatch\", which is not disputed that he is in the later videos coming down there.Those are the lobby videos you're talking about?Well, Mr. Gatch is seen leaving from behind the camera 3A, 3B, walking down the corridor and then talking to the building workers in the lobby.Those are the later video clips, nine through 11 I believe, your honor.Whether that's consciousness of guilt, That's our first thing I've heard about that.Also firefighters responded and were making a lot of noise, not far from this apartment, and that's not an uncommon response to what is going on there too.So I don't know if that's evidence of one way or the other, but ultimately come back under all three of the issues we've raised here, there is some weighing of the information to the detective or to the jurors there.And we would ask you to find that the conviction was insufficient to be sustained, but ultimately he does require a new trial for multiple errors that took place.Thank you, your honors.Counselors, thank you.Matter will be taken under advisement and the court is being adjourned.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/gov.uscourts.illappct.1-16-2943.2019-11-26.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/gov.uscourts.illappct.1-16-2943.2019-11-26.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/gov.uscourts.illappct.1-16-2943.2019-11-26.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-14-0175/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-14-0175.2015-03-03.mp3", "text": "The next case called on the docket is 5140175, White vs.Beelman River Terminals Inc.Mr. Barron, welcome.Morning.Morning.May it please the court.My name is Lee Barron.I'm here with Craig Jensen, at the table with me.Morning.This case is unique in that we have a dispute over a little more than a quarter million dollars worth of attorney's fees, $258,000 worth of attorney's fees that were adjudicated by the trial judge, and I use the term adjudicated loosely here because there was no sworn testimony, no cross-examination, no offering of exhibits.The rules of evidence didn't appear at this adjudication.The case settled the Jesse White case settled in November.In order to get Jesse his money, the case had been around since '07, we're in uh, 2013, so in order to get Mr. White his money, Mr. Jensen attempted to work out something, when he couldn't do that, he filed a petition.Purpose of that hearing in December was to release the funds to Jesse White.The court, and the parties all showed up, and it's clear from the record the party showed up, thinking that this was going to be a preliminary proceeding.The purpose was to get the money to Mr. White, and then there would be discovery.And that's in Mr. Schmieder's motions, that's in Mr. Jensen, or MeyerJensen, in their motions.That's how the court offers, you know, asks the parties, \"Well let's do some opening statements\".And there was never anything more than opening statements.Mr. Jensen made some comments and Mr. Schmieder made some comments, and what's remarkable, in the record, as it goes back and forth, and unfortunately, it was heated.And there were some accusations by Mr. Schmieder that uh, Mr. Jensen wasn't being truthful, there was counter suggestions that Mr. Schmieder wasn't being truthful, Well we have a tool for how to deal with issues when people, you know, say we're not being truthful.We have cross-examination, we have sworn testimony, we have the rules of evidence.But what, were there specific objections to proceeding in the way that the court did?I mean, did anybody say, \"Wait a minute, judge, I want to put on evidence\".For example.Yeah, Mr. Jensen made that very specifically, he did, he made reference to wanting to put on evidence, he did.Sin- we have the record.And then, all of a sudden, at page 27 of the transcript, in the record, page 171, the court asks \"The one third attorney fees is $258,000\".Mr. Jensen says \"Of the gross amount, yes, Your Honor\".And then the court turns to Mr. Schmieder and says, \"is that, is that, is that what it is\"?And Mr. Schmieder says, \"yes\".And Mr. Jensen then says, \"May I-\" and the court cuts him off, \"Hold on a moment.We keep doing this.You're saying they deserve 51,600, Mr. Schmieder\".Mr. Schmieder says, \"What I'm saying is I think we, at least- yes, I'm saying that.And I can deal with that\".And then the court goes, \"I'm going to rule right now, from the bench, that the plaintiff gets $51,600\".Which happens to be 20% of the fee.Is that right?That was the amount that they suggested, but it comes out of- it- 20%, 15%, 25%, 50%.I mean, what's the basis- - I'm not saying that's good or bad or anything, I'm just saying mathematically, - Yeah.51,600 is 20% of 258,000.Do you agree with that?I'm not going to dispute- - I'll verify that for you.And I'm not going to argue with you.All right.Mr. Barron, let me ask you this.I'm just curio- I think you're right, the judge did- I saw that, they cut your client off, he cut your client off.And yet there's some hint in the record about your client having a contract for 11% on this case.This hat- and that exactly, a hint, and- that would be the record was developed.You would be able to see that there was a agreement while he was in an of council arrangement, to have a 11%.And that's Craig Jensen of counsel to the Schmieder Lakin law firm.But then in March of 2013, that relationship terminates.And then Mr. White is quite appropriately given his option and the record, it, we do have this here, the letter in here that Craig sent to Mr. White, and he gave me him three options.Right.Following the ARDC guidelines perfectly.They claimed if they pushed Mr. White, there's no evidence of that at all, they said that you can stay with them.And the letter is actually quite professional.The original contract, though, in the briefs that were filed, it's not clear to me whether Mr. White signed the contract with the Lakin firm or whether it was with Mr. Jensen.I think Mr. Jensen seems to say it was with me, but I was with the Lakin firm, and Mr. Lakin's brief says it's the Lakin firm, he was our employee.The first contract- - So did I get that right?Yes, the, the first contract that was actually signed in 2011, 2 17 2011, that's the first time they have a contract, and that is with Jesse White, with the Schmieder Lakin firm, whatever type name they go under at that time, that that was- that's right, and he was their employee.He's not seeking fees for that period of time.Well is he seeking fees for the period of time he was of counsel?No. He's seeking fees, and he's entitled to fees, there's only one party here that had a contract with Mr. White when the case settled.That's the MeyerJensen law firm, it's not even Craig Jensen, it's the MeyerJensen law firm, So that prior contract doesn't apply.Because that's the out counsel agreement between Craig Jensen and the Schmieder Lakin firm, but all that disappears once Mr. White exercises his right as he is entitled to, to pick his attorney.And then he signs a contract with a different entity, the entity MeyerJensen law firm.That's the agreement, and that's the only contingency agreement that's in effect when the case settles.The case settled though, just months after the contract was signed with Mr. Jensen, right?March to November.Right, it was, it, right, it was, yes, it was settled.He, he signed the contract in March and in November 8th is when the settlement contract- and that is exactly the type of issue, and I think if I can anticipate, I have- and if I'm wrong, tell me I'm wrong, if I could anticipate where the question's going, the question is what happened during that period of March and November.Right.That is my question.And that is exactly the appropriate question.Is- thank you.I wish we had been able to develop it.Just kidding.So is Mr. Jensen then seeking his quantum meruit for what work he did for those months?No. He has a contract.He is entitled to the contingency, a group agreement that he has with the client.The party that is entitled under Illinois law to quantum meruit would be the Schmieder Lakin law firm, they're entitled to quantum merit.He's entitled to the contract that he has with Mr. White.I mean, part of your argument here is, as I understand it, that the trial court got this backwards.Yes.That the trial court should have honored the pending contingent fee contract with MeyerJensen and then determined quantum meruit to- for the Lakin firm.Maybe he would have ended up with the same numbers, but it, it should have been done that way is what you're- - And evidence should have been presented, and it's their burden of proof on that issue.There- all the case law says it's their burden of proof.And there's some interesting reference to that Baker case, the fifth district baker case on attorney's fees.And it's just entertaining for me to read that and see who was called as witnesses.I mean, William Beatty is called as a witness in that case, Bruce Cook is called an expert witness in that case.I think I referred to it as a who's who of the Plains bar.And that's how you prove up cases.You don't have 15 minutes of argument, and then the court just sort of pulls the plug and says, here's what I'm going to do.And then for Mr. Schmieder to represent to the court later on the motion to reconsider and represent to this court, that evidence was presented.That's, that's not evidence.We have rules of evidence, witnesses are called, they're sworn, and I can't pull the quote out of it directly, but cross examination is the greatest truth telling, truth finding tool that we have.And if they're disagreeing, and unfortunately there's clearly some rancor, you can't read that transcript without knowing that unfortunately there's some rancor.Both parties are representing themselves, which violates another rule that we're all familiar with.And that doesn't help.And therefore, the way we resolve that is we have a trial.We do discovery, both parties asked for discovery.They asked for discovery, Craig asked for discovery, we'd get ready for trial.And we do cross examination, we find out where the truth lies.We found out, we find out how much time they put in.They meet their burden of proof to show how much time they put into this case, 'cause that's the quantum meruit.None of that's in the record.And they also get the benefit of whatever time Mr. Jensen put into it when he was working there, right?And I, I agree with that, and even during the period of time that he was of council.Mm-hm.They could bill for that.Now their objection to that is, \"we,\" you know, \"He's going to be disingenuous, he's going to minimize his time\".I can anticipate that argument, that argument was made in the record.That's fine.They've got records.And they, you know, they- - Well typically in a contingency fee contract, especially a Jones act or an FELA, it's fine records are not kept.I- I- - 'Cause it puts a plaintiff's firm at a disadvantage, you agree.I- - I mean, being an employment lawyer, you're very used to keeping records, to the tenth of a minute, I'll bet.You're sitting there, reading my mind, you're scaring me.- It would be a good practice for all plaintiffs firms to do that.Of course it would, but- - But they don't- - But the reality is plaintiffs firms who do Jones act and FELA, or whatever, don't really do- or anticipate a lone star argument.Right?And that's absolutely true, and so then they can come in, and they can go through their pleadings, they s- file the motion for summary judgment.\"Here it is\".\"Here, we estimate it took this much time, we sent this discoveries, we estimate it took this much time.We filed an amended complaint, we estimated that this much time-\" That can be done.There has to be- just like the Baker case, they came in and they developed a record, and there- that's their burden.They have to develop that record.Tell us something about their jurisdictional argument.Yes.Okay.Craig filed the notice of appeal.It complies in every aspect with Rule 303.Well it names White as the appellant, though, right?Right, and, and Rule 303 says you have to do that.Rule 303 says that you- that the notice of appeal must list the parties in the same way that they are listed in the trial court.And two things, one, we think Jesse White does have an interest, and is an appropriate party to the appeal.He has s- interest under the Illinois rules to choose his own attorney, and he has an interest to see that the attorney that he selected is paid.Secondly, there- in the case law, they cite that Nussbaum case, the Nussbaum case goes exactly the opposite way.And as long as the notice of appeal complies with Rule 303, jurisdiction is vested in this court.And this type of hyper-technical argument has been rejected on multiple occasions as we cite in our brief.And what's interesting to me is, in no place do they claim any remote prejudice.They have no doubt what the issues were.'Cause there's- what the notes appeal says is, what we're appealing from are the two orders, the December order and the March order.They're on notice what the issues are.They're here.They filed their brief.It's not as if we showed up here with a default.Well, we didn't know because we didn't show up because we didn't know what we were arguing about.They knew right from the get go, they've known throughout this, exactly what the issues are 'cause Craig complied with exactly what 303 requires him to comply with.I think this- I'm sorry.I'm sorry.It seems that the case law though, that is even cited, the Touhy case for example, lists the parties, even though it's an attorney fee fight.The actual name of the ca- I'm sorry, it wasn't the Touhy case, it was DeLapaz versus Select Build Construction, and that was an attorney fee fight, and yet the names of the parties in the lawsuit were the ones named in the litigation.I think in that case, there was a count.I might be wrong on this, but I, my recollection of reading that case is that there was a complaint for tortious interference with contract that was part of that.Okay.And the other case, like, as you said, was, the other case just referred to the parties just as they were at the trial court.Does the lien statute- doesn't the lien statute itself indicate that you have to serve it in the name of the client?The attorney lien statute.I believe it does.I believe that's correct.And one, on the lien issue, and I want to be clear on this.It's simply their burden of proof to, because of the statutory cause of action, the lien a- the lien statute, they have to prove that they've complied.What we have in the record is an affidavit from somebody at the insurance company or appeal that says what- went through the record, and the only lien that I find is March of- or, March of 2013, after Lakin Chapman was filed.Now, I'm not sure, I wasn't in this case until the appeal, what the record will be once it's fully developed.But those are the type of evidentiary issues that must be developed.And if they can meet that burden, power to them, then we'll move on to the other issues.But that's the reason we have a trial, that's the reason we use the rules of evidence to resolve this.And I think if they had- if Schmieder Lakin had gone to the judge, we wouldn't have to be here.If Craig files a motion to reconsider, he says \"Judge, I don't know what happened.You were having a bad day,\" whatever, you know, \"You, you brought the hammer down too soon, we need discovery, they say we need discovery, we need to put on evidence\".And if Schmieder Lakin had come forward and said, \"You know what, judge, I think Craig's right, we have to put on evidence\".Instead they filed a motion that suggests to the judge \"You heard evidence\".They had an opportunity to present all the evidence they wanted to present and they push the judge to continue the error that he made.At that point- we're here now, and they're still telling you that there was evidence.And that's just implausible.At that point, we think the proper result is that they've given up their opportunity.They shouldn't be remanded for retrial, that the full fee, the full contract should be awarded to Craig.Because they've put us on the trip here to Mount Vernon, I love coming to Mount Vernon, but you know, maybe not in this type of weather, but yes, they- - I have to be here, you have to be here.I checked the website last night to see whether or not it should- we weren't all gonna be here, but it- so I don't blame- - How can that be fair that Mr. Jensen received the entirety?I- and that's why, I think that's probably right.I agree, I think there typically should be a quantum meruit on this, they should have to meet their burden of quantum meruit.I agree with that.And that's why- - So if the judge makes an error, they should wave their quantum meruit.If the judge makes an error that they continue- the judge makes a mistake.And instead of as an officer of the court coming to the judge to say \"Judge, you know what I think we really need to do discovery and we need to hear evidence on this\".Instead they go, \"Yeah, atta boy!Let's- we pulled this one off, let's hold on to it, and let's do everything we can to hold on to something that we don't deserve,\" That's at least th- that's at least that- I think that then they gotta live with that.Punish that.A lot of the mistakes judges make are at the behest of some attorney.- You know.If someone was making an argument- - I'm not gonna- you're asking me to go to a place I don't want to go to.Somebody's making an argument, and.Right.Ah. But alternatively, if you're not persuaded by that, then alternatively, it needs to be remanded and there needs to be a full trial.Thank you.All right, thank you Mr. Barron.Mr. Schmieder.May it please the court, I'm Rob Schmieder from SL Chapman.And I'd like to respond to a couple of things that Mr. Barron has said, first of all, there is evidence in the record.There- Mr. Jensen filed seven exhibits and submitted his distribution statement to the court at the hearing.Is there any point at which anybody stipulated that into evidence or it was offered and admitted or, you know.Well, I did not object to any of the exhibits that he submitted to the court.With our exhibits, we submitted six exhibits that were attached to the- and had sworn testimony of Brad Lakin.An affidavit, which authenticated those exhibits, and they were provided to the court.When we approached the court on that date, the court heard arguments.We were not on the record.The court heard arguments, there was some scuttle back and forth.There was arguments between Brad and Craig.And then he said, after a while, we handed him a copy of the- our exhibits, the affidavit, some case law that we were referring to, the Wegner and DeLapaz cases, and the Rhodes opinion.We then at that point in time, he said, \"I've got too long of a line here.You guys go work this out and if you can't work it out, come back\".We went, tried to work it out, came back.So he'd already heard- he'd already been provided with exhibits with the affidavit, he'd asked questions and we'd argue some of the law, we then came back.So this was a regular motion he called, this wasn't a special setting.Correct.This was a regular motion call.It is- as a matter of fact, I believe it may have been the day or two after Christmas.And for some reason, the courthouse was packed.After, after the courthouse clears, and the judge had, the judge had had this, he also had the court file and the docket sheet.We then, he then proceeds and Craig says, \"I want a court reporter\".He says, \"That's fine, get a court reporter\".And then we proceed.And, and you'll see on there's examples throughout the, the argument, where Craig is actually testifying.Pages five through seven of the transcript, Craig is actually talking about the work that he did at MeyerJensen after the fact.But not under oath, he's not been- - He's not under oath, but he's an officer of the court.And I was an objectee, I mean, he's going to say what he's going to say.And we're going to, we presented our arguments.We had, I mean, just as an example, we had, this is a print out exhibit F of our court, our computer records of this file.And the court, this was attached to Mr. Lakin's affidavit and the court was reviewing this, we were talking about a lot of things.And at some point in time, the court, and that's why this is the second time around that the courts have heard a lot of this.And I think that was sort of the, what Mr. Barron is talking about, the court appears to be impatient when he's heard it all already.There's nothing new coming out of anybody's mouth, and as much as I like to talk, he shut me down as well.And, because none of us were raising anything new, no one ever said, \"Judge, I have one more piece of evidence,\" or \"I need to either state this for the record or take the stand or put somebody on the witness stand\".He had all the evidence, and there were certain times, and Mr. Barron characterizes me as accusing Mr. Jensen of things.All I was doing was pointing out that credibility maps.Because Mr. Jensen had walked in the court that morning and said, \"We had no need, period\".\"We get nothing.Nada\".I- and this was off the record the first time around, he made the same argument a little in, when we were on the record.I then handed the court the lien letters, showing that we had submitted valid lien letters during the representation, and they were actually signed by Mr. Jensen back in 2011.And this case didn't start in 2011, that was another, that was another statement that Mr. Jensen kept arguing.The case actually st- our involvement actually started back in 2009, because the case was originally filed by Lance Mallon, who then worked on a relationship with us, Charlie assigned the case to Craig, and we went from there.And the court shows that he had reviewed the court file because at one point in time during the hearing, I said, \"Judge, if you look at the docket sheet-\" and he cut me off, he goes, \"I did look\".And my point was that Craig said he didn't touch this case until 2011.He had already entered his appearance back in 2010.So the court was taking into account everything that Mr. Jensen had said, whether he was under oath or not.I didn't object.He's an officer of the court.The court had- Mr. Lakin's affidavit and all the exhibits attached to it right there on his bench.As a matter of fact, you'll see in the record, there's an actual extra copy in the record of Mr. Lakin's affidavit with all the exhibits.That's because that was the court's courtesy copy.Then he must've handed it to the clerk and he filed it a second time.And so he did hear evidence.He did hear arguments.Now, as far as my request for discovery, I want to be very clear, I didn't know, going into this, I thought the proper thing for the court to do, the court had a couple options here.The court could say, SL Chapman, you're gonna, you're gonna prove quantum meruit.Or the case settled, I'm going to follow the line of cases that file the statement in rows like DeLapaz, and, and the web interface that says if the prior firm does much of the work and the case settled shortly thereafter, you will award the whole fee to the prodecessor attorneys.And then the subsequent attorneys get quantum meruit.And I was arguing that's what should apply here, and it avoids the whole hassle of us having to show a quantum meruit, of us conducting discovery, going down that line.We can disperse the funds because if we couldn't, this case has been dragging on for, we'd been involved for 46 months, approximately.And depending upon how many hours, and there was quite a bit of work done, the court may not have been able to disperse any funds to the plaintiff if he was going to award us based on quantum meruit because we, until we figure out what that lien amount is, we're not captive to the contingency.But if he follows the Wegner, DeLapaz line of cases, we're captive to the contingency.And then out of that comes, whatever MeyerJensen proves on a quantum meruit basis.He elected to go with that approach.Yes, I encouraged him to go to that approach, I think it was appropriate.I don't think it's an abuse of discretion.The case, and the case didn't settle in November, case settled in September.And it settled in September after, after it had been set for mediation in March.While we were representing Mr. White, the mediation was canceled.Mr. Jensen acted as of counsel to us, agreed to continue the trial date until the fall.Then he sent out a selection letter.Now complicating this whole matter, and I hate this because I don't like argues between attorneys, but we had an arbitration with Mr. Jensen, because he breached his of counsel agreement with us.He went, he was paid a set amount of money to finish a bunch of cases, including this one.The arbitrator found he breached his agreement to, with us.That arbitration award came down in October.We didn't find out about this settlement until a little later.And so we had that going on.Was that introduced before judgment?It was, it was it wasn't in- - Argue, but was the- I haven't seen the arbitration award.No, we, we had it with us.We, I don't, I don't know if- we didn't, we certainly didn't put it as exhibit.We did reference in our, in our pleadings that the court had access to the other file because they had appealed the arbitrators award, accusing the arbitrator of not paying attention during the arbitration, not filing the evidence and doing a bunch of other things.That was before Judge Pryor.And I- in the cause number is referenced in- it was cause number 13L1800.And so we specifically pointed out to Judge Matoesian, if you know, you need more information about that, however, I was concerned about- we have an arbitration award, I'm not asking this judge to do anything with that arbitration award.I didn't want him exercising jurisdiction over it.That was probably before Judge Pryor at that time.But the fact is there was a finding that he breached his agreement.And my whole point in bringing it up to Judge Matoesian was I was telling him that the firm's expectation under that agreement with Mr. Jensen was that we would receive 89% of the fee.So after considering that, considering the statements of Mr. Jensen, and what transcripts of course never show is, Judge Matoesian told us all to be quiet, and he sat there and was presumably calculating whatever percentage or I- you know, looking over his notes, and he was doing these calculations.And that's when he awarded, he made his findings at that point in time.He decided to file the Wegner and DeLapaz cases, which I think is perfectly within his discretion to do.I don't think he could- he didn't abuse his discretion.And at that point in time, the only question before him was how much should MeyerJensen receive.And it was their burden, not mine at that moment, the burden shifts to them to prove their case.Now, quite honestly, what happens at that point in time?I'm the aggrieved party.I'm awarded less than what I think I'm entitled to.I did not appeal it, partly because I can go right back into arbitration.I've already got a judgment, it's res judicata against Craig that he breached the agreement, and I can collect the difference from him, if I really wanted to do that.But I did an appeal.So- - Because you can live with that.Well- - - Well, I think- - Quoting the record.Well, yeah, I think I was- - In this case.In this case.Yeah.Well, I think, I think that was then quite, I think I said, \"I guess I can live with that,\" and I was trying to just- he clearly didn't want to hear it.He wanted to rule, and he didn't want to hear any more arguments 'cause he had heard 'em over and over again at that point in time, so.I think that was obvious in the record.- That was obvious, right.And at one point in time where Craig pounded his fist on the thing, on the, on the table and the judge, the judge chastised him.And it was, for some reason, things were very heated at that point in time.But that doesn't take away from the fact, to say that there was no evidence.There's, there's 13, 14 exhibits.There was a sworn testimony of Mr. Lakin, there was the statements on the record by Mr. Jensen, there was an aff- this affidavit of Christopher Parr that he was referring to, that they don't, that the defendant didn't, wasn't aware of a lien?That's nonsense, what that affidavit says is, \"I am Christopher Parr.I am the new attorney that just was hired\".And the only, the only letter I received was this, this one for Mr. Lakin after they were fired, which Paul had said was, \"Hey, remember we have a lien\".Cause it was a new attorney.We didn't want it getting lost in translation that we, we had a proper lien.So we met our burden.We walked into court, we provided the lien letters, those lien letters were provided during the representation.They were actually signed on behalf of the firm, by Mr. Jensen.They stated our interest.We met every single element of asserting a proper lien.And then the court decided to follow the Rhodes statement.It was a couple of short months, the only thing in the court file, and that, this was the other thing was, the only thing that was- after we withdrew, the only other thing that happened, that was in the court file before the case settled in September, was the filing of an evidence deposition.And we pointed that out to the court.Now the court obviously took into consideration some of the things that Mr. Jensen said about his time and efforts in the case and came up with a decision.And so I think, I think, you know, the, the question for this court is did the trial court abuse his discretion?Having heard it twice, once off the record.And then on the record, I don't think the court can reach that conclusion, that no reasonable person would take the view adopted by the trial court in this, in this situation.Which is what the standard is.Now on- as far as the, the motion to dismiss for lack of standing.But obviously the only party, the only party appellant is Jesse White.So Jesse White, his contract was enforced.He paid a third of the fee.He wasn't aggrieved in any way.Those funds were dispersed last year, immediately after it, after the court issued its ruling.He hasn't been aggrieved in any way.And there's nothing, no, no injury to any recognizable les- legal interest.And so he doesn't have standing to a surplus, now the question- - Can you point me to a case that exactly says that?That the- - That says just what you said, that the- there's no standing of the- - Plaintiff?Employee, yeah the plaintiff in this case.I cannot.I cannot, I mean it just- - Because all of the cases seem to be brought when there's a dispute, even Rhodes.When there's a dispute, it seems like the plaintiff or the party's litigation are really just nominal parties and perhaps they do have an interest making sure that their lawyers are paid.Well, I- - Albeit nominal, but perhaps Mr. Barron's on to something here.Yeah no, no I don't think so, because they- I don't think they have the right.I mean, we have, we have the lien statute, which dictates that the trial court will adjudicate that lien.But that lien arises out of your employment.Correct.Or past employment, right.Some employment, you have to have an employment in order to have a lien.Correct.Right.So, it seems to me that the clients, whether they're plaintiff or defendant, are really the nominal parties.And I think the lien statute does say that notice has to be given client as well.If you look at it.It states that it shall be upon the party against whom their clients may have suits, claims, or causes of action.So it's not, it's not notice to the client.The client obviously receives a copy of the written contract, but all it says, it- and then it says on petition filed by any attorney or their clients, any court- - That's the part I'm looking for.Right.Okay.On the petition filed by the attorney or their client.Right.So it seems to be in the alternative.In other words, it's like suing a corporation.The corporation has to be named, but it's a nominal party.I understand what you're saying.I couldn't find a case that exactly says what you say.Well, except- - That the lawyer has to bring in, how would that happen?Would it be brought- I mean once the case is dismissed with prejudice because it's been settled, how would, would you open a new MR case?How would you envision that happening, if not part of the original case?I'm not saying it can't be part of the original case.What I'm saying is, - But you're not a party in the original case.No, but we've had- but once the lien is adjudicated, and if MeyerJensen is upset with the result, MeyerJensen as a party affected by that order, has an appellate right.Their name doesn't matter- their name doesn't appear in the caption, I agree with you.I mean, most of the, what he's talking about is it's not in the caption, but had they filed, you know, MeyerJensen- hereby appeals from this, that they would have been identified as a party.So your biggest complaint is that their name is not in the right line, on the notice of appeal.Their name's not anywhere on the notice of appeal, other than in the signature block.As the attorney.As an attorney for the plaintiff.And then when you get to the court's document statement, it says, \"Identify all of the appellants, identify everyone that supposedly has an interest in this appeal\".And the only person they identify is Jesse White.So what would you have us do, then?Are you saying that we have no jurisdiction?What I'm saying, you have no jurisdiction over MeyerJensen, or any of their claims, or how this impacts them.That's what the Nussbaum case talks about.In Nussbaum, the plaintiff actually omitted, actually said \"defendants,\" but then said \"hyphen appellee,\" and only namely one of the defendants.And they said we don't have jurisdiction over the other defendants.And so while this court may have jurisdiction over Jesse White, the next question as to Jesse White then is, well, does he have standing?Well I- see- I don't understand why he wouldn't have standing.I mean, this was his injury claim to begin with.He's gone through various attorneys here.You know, why couldn't he appeal to this court and say, I don't like the way the judge divided the attorney's fees.I think Jensen should've got more.Why couldn't he do that?Because the question about standing is whether Jesse White would benefit from any relief brand.He would.He would be more satisfied, maybe.If the division was different.And so why- I mean, - I think that's a- that, well- I mean, if that's the standard for standing, this court's gonna be troubled by that, that new definition of standing.Because if it's just about satisfaction, everybody will always have standing.But.Well, this is, this was his money that's getting divided up.He, his claim is paid, but then he has obligations with attorneys for a third or whatever that comes out of his money.Right.You know?And, and why, why couldn't he say, I, I think Jensen didn't get enough here.Or why can't he say that he wasn't satisfied with your representation and you've got too much?Well, first of all, he never raised any of those issues below.But from a standing point of view, why couldn't he ask any?Well, if he had raised specific issues below, that he was advancing to this court, that may be a different issue.But what he, this wasn't- the moment the court enforced the one-third agreement, he paid exactly in attorney's fees what he had agreed to.No more, no less.But his contract for a third was with Mr. Jensen.So the courts enforcement of a third was before you all joint him, right?Correct.That's not what he anticipated when he signed his contract with Mr. Jensen.He anticipated paying Mr. Jensen a third.Not paying you all anything.Now he may have not known the law, obviously, but that was his anticipation.So why can't he feel injured or be injured?Well, I don't, I don't.I mean the court has not interpreted the contract the way he has interpreted.Well, he's had three contracts.With Mr. Mallon, with us and with MeyerJensen.I'm not leaving, I'm just standing.Okay.And so those three contracts, you could say that for each one of them.What he was- he was agreeing to give a third, a third and a third.Well, then he'd be, that's a hundred percent, if you, if you go with that logic.No, we're just talking about standing.Which is what I'm doing.Which is what you're doing.Thank you, Mr. Schmieder.Thank you.And I did not announce this morning, but I had back surgery.And so every once in a while I stand, so I'm not leaving.So please don't, don't even think about it.I'm listening, Mr. Barron.Yes, that's fine.I've got in my office, one of those electronic desks, this go- get- goes up, maybe you could figure out how to install it here.Yeah.Right.Or when maybe a chair that moves you up.Don't take that from his spot.I'm sorry, go ahead.The petition, the initial petition about attorney's fees was filed by Craig Jensen on November, I believe it was November 26th.And Mr. Schmieder does acknowledge that on December 27th at the regular docket call, he hands to the judge, and he hands to Mr. Schmieder, I mean to Mr. Jensen, this entire thing.And this is the evidence that he's talking about.And he's saying that in the, at hearing, that this entire document runs in the record from 41 to 144, that that, somehow Judge Matoesian absorbed all of this and treated it as evidence.But your claim had also submitted exhibits.He did on November 26, he submitted something, but those- when somebody files an affidavit, Brad Lakin files an affidavit, and in some cases, you know, both the parties agreed, because we're not going to fight about this, your affidavit's your affidavit, that's okay.Then I think, Justice, as you suggested, it gets stipulated into the record.And the judge says, are you objecting in any way to their affidavit?They go, \"No, Your Honor, we accept their affidavit\".Then at that point, it's a stipulation.And that's one of the ways that evidence is created.But, simply filing, if we got to a world where whatever somebody attaches to their pleading is evidence?And is admissible evidence?The rules of evidence disappear.So Mr. Jensen had no objection.Or he did object.He wanted, he expected to have a hearing, and he expected to- - But did he object to Mr. Schmieder's exhibits?He was handed these, he didn't even- - Did he object?He asked to hear evidence.No, he did not ever say I object to what's attached.He expected until the moment the judge ruled, Craig anticipated that we were still in opening statements.He expected that he was, that there was going to be a subsequent hearing, there was going to be discovery, and he would have an opportunity.And hopefully, at that point, he would hire the- - How would he expect that if it's a motion here, he's got his exhibits, and he's got his exhibits, and nobody's saying let's continue the case?The purpose of that motion was to get the money to Jesse White.The motion- that purpose of that motion was not to resolve finally- in fact he's- - How do we know that from the record?Because in Craig Jensen's motion, he asked to put the attorney's fees in escrow.That is exactly the relief he was expecting.Okay, but Mr. Schmieder's motion, I think went beyond that.Craig saw that motion as it was handed to him at the bar, he didn't have opportunity to read this or go through this or challenge any of this.To your question \"did he object to it\"?He didn't even see it, he got sandbagged at the hearing, when he gets handed this thing and says, here's our- here's all of our- how can he even make an objection at the hearing?And how could the judge base his ruling on this that was handed to him on the morning of the hearing?But then there was a break, right?No. There was break while other- while the judge was dealing with other things on his docket.Other motions.There was- but- - And I assume everybody- not everybody, but the two parties spoke.They had a brief, they tried to resolve the dispute.And they were unable to do that.But the judge is up there dealing with other matters.You heard Mr. Schmieder say to you that the judge paused and said, wait, let me read this.You won't find that in the record.In fact, much of what Mr. Schmieder's told you is just not in the record.He was testifying, representing to you certain facts.That's why we have the rules of evidence.And they're just, this thing completely deviated from the rules of evidence.And at the very least has to be remanded for the issue to take evidence the way evidence is supposed to be taken.So we're, you want us to tell Judge Matoesian that he had evidence before everybody didn't really do it right.I, well, there's a couple of things.I don't know that he had evidence before him.I think evidence is when affidavits and exhibits are stipulated.But when, put simply, just having pleadings in front of him, and then he ruled.And we don't know, there's no findings of facts.There's no conclusions of law.I was sitting here when you were talking with Ms. Buckley about the- you know, that makes your job easier, when the trial judge does findings of facts and conclusions of law, even if they dictate them.Or something.But there's nothing in this record that tells you what Judge Matoesian was thinking.Except that reading- inferring, he got frustrated with everybody and he said, \"This is over, and this is what we're doing\".Okay.And this is over.Thank you Mr. Barron.Thank you.Have a good trip back.All right.We're going to take a brief recess.This matter 5140175 will be taken under advisement, and an order issued will repo-", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-14-0175.2015-03-03.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-14-0175.2015-03-03.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-14-0175.2015-03-03.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-14-0378/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-14-0378.2018-06-06.mp3", "text": "The next case call for argument is People vs Barnes.Good afternoon.Good afternoon.May I please court the counsel?My name is Alexandra Munches.I'm with the office of the state of health defender, and I represent Dunfield Barnes.At the age of 17 Dunfield Barnes robbed his neighborhood gas station in Murphysboro, Illinois.He carried an unloaded revolver.When the clerk opened the register, he placed this revolver on the counter before the clerk, and emptied the cash train to a backpack.He then picked up the revolver and left.This robbery lasted between one and two minutes.And the police arrested him, a few minutes after that.Dunfield ultimately received a 22 year sentence, which is the sum of a seven year classic sentence, and a 15 year automatic firearm add on.He appealed.And during the pendency of his appeal, section 545105 became effective.The statute grants trial court's discretion to declined, to impose otherwise applicable firearm add ons to juveniles.This appeal concerns the constitutional effect of this law on Dunfield trial sentence.More specifically, Dunfield argues that following the napping of the statute, the automatic imposition of a firearm add on violated the proportion of penalties clause as applied to him.Now, violation of the proportion of penalties clause occurs.The punishment is so wholly disproportionate to the offenses to shock the moral sense of the community.This is essentially a value judgment or moral question that requires a support to review the gravity of the offense, in connection with the severity of the statutorily mandated sentence and all within RPDs evolving standard of decency.So then misses court looks at are the facts of the case statutory text in this court's judgment is that a court's own judgment, that is.The key really to this test is the evolving standard of decency.Courts have never defined that.The only Supreme court says, As our society evolves, so the two direct concepts of elemental decency.In fairness, which shaped the moral sense of the community.Now this appeal presents a swimmingly novel argument about the evolving standard of decency in Illinois.Specific read on shall argue said, if you've announced sentencing statute incorporating Illinois' own understanding of Miller Graham Roper and others should also inform this court's understanding of our evolving standard of decency.That is even if it becomes effective during the pendency of a direct appeal and untrue sites, Kentucky.Good.If, if he can talk to you about opposition, it's a case in which the US Supreme court will go to federal courts and state courts that violates basic norms of constitutional adjudication to deny equal treatment across cases.To see why this court should look to the text of section 545105.Now this particular subsection B, abolish the automatic application of firearm enhancements to juveniles.And in doing so, it rejected any former theological justification for automatically punishing children like adults.Now, one other thing that this section has done - Do you think this is similar to the sentencing statutes that are, are being amended today, where you can't mandatorily sentence, a juvenile to live a life.You think that this is hard with that evolving public housing?I think so, your honor, I think this court will see, and people be hunter and people would be home in the illness of importance.The most recent decision sincerely drew off that the general assembly is actively trying to incorporate this area of the law into juvenile sentencing.And that's how I mistake as illness import is finally saying only leads the nation in juvenile justice issues.And what's, I think particularly remarkable that the statute is that, actually leaves room open for this court's discretion.So if you look at that sub section B, people be hunter noted that it's intentionally silent regarding retro activity.So the only Supreme court had to look to the statute on statutes to decide well, should subsection A apply retroactively or not.And what they said was, well, it sort of depends.So there's no retroactive application.If you're analyzing under the mitigation portion of the statute statutes, however, retroactive of applications, okay.If you cannot elect score it, I haven't tried it.So it's like if the juvenile elects score for it at a retrial.It says actually the statute is actually serving bill one.And I think that this court should take that as a signal, that the legislature is looking to work with the court.That it's a joint enterprise between the courts and the legislature in the state that, we are fond of saying leads the nation on juvenile justice issues.Are you basically asking for a vacation with the sentence and remand for re sentencing?Oh, you mean for re sentencings?What we're asking for is exceedingly to have mainly a new sentencing hearing at which the child court may exercise its discretion, simply exercise discretion.I think under the re-sentencing statue, there would be a cap of 22 years unless Dunfield has done something bad in prison since then.But yeah, it's just a recap.The cap between six and 22, which the trial court may either impose 22 just under the class X portion or declined to impose the 15 add on and say, it's just the second, but somewhere between six and 22 at a re sentencing hearing.If we were to give you a hypothetical, if we were to vacate and remap and on remand with the circuit court in its discretion, decided that the hands, but for the use of a firearm was appropriate and sentenced accordingly, would that be an abuse of discretion?It would not.The issue in this particular appeal is the interplay between our evolving center and decency in the sort of stripping of the child court's discretion when that's the first time I've seen her hearing.Correct?Correct.And so, we're simply asking for a new sentencing hearing in which the child court may exercise its discretion.In Illinois, we've long held that age is not just a chronological fact.It's a multifaceted set of attributes, security, constitutional significance.The facts of this case and argue call out from recent scene under this new statute.Although the offense Dunflied committed, was a serious one.The circumstances of the case, undercut the general severity of the conduct.He used an unloaded gun.He had no prior criminal history.He has a supportive family network At 17 he expressed remote, remorse.In allocation, he apologized, He empathized with the gas station clerk.He explained that he learned from his mistakes.Dunfield also asked to be placed in drug and alcohol treatment.So. - I mean, those are not the factors that we're considering this appeal, right?Correct.What we're saying simply is that at re sentencing, there's a real possibility that the court will exercise its discretion a way that will positively affect Dunfield's life.Dunfield does not argue that as a matter of constitutional law, the child court may not impose the firearm firearm enhancement to re sentencing.That is not his argument.Now Dunfield argues that given the circumstances of the offense, his personal characteristics, there's a real possibility, the trial court will re-sentence him less virtually if not bound by this former sentencing statute.Respectfully, Nigel asked this query mandatory sentencing.The trial court may exercise that discretion may otherwise find him post a firearm incident.What's the six to 22 years.That was discretionary.Wasn't it?The seven years was discretionary and the 15 was automatic.And I think that under the rate pre-sentencing statute by the cap would be at 22.Right.But, so I, I'm not clear why we would vacate the entire sentence as opposed to just the automatic imposed sentence.On what basis would we vacate the entire sentence?Well, I think that the, the record does not demonstrate definitively how the sentence was calculated.In the sense that, where the trial court had only imposed close to seven years and not impose the 15, or did he want, did he think the 15 was otherwise.If he had his discretion, that he could impose, we think that there's an open questionnaire.And.So I see the open question on 15 years, because that was mandatory.And you're following kind of that philosophy of, well, he should have had, the trial court should have had some discretion.But the six to 22 years fam, the trial court clearly did have discretion.I think, I think, I think that's correct.I think that we misspoke.I think that you know, there would be a good argument that the lower bound on these seven, as opposed to six, but that even with this bound, you don't know whether or not the trial court would have exercised discretion to decline imposes firearm enhancement, or would it have sort of you know shifted somewhere between the range of seven and 30?Otherwise.If there are no further questions, I thank you.No - I don't think there are.Thank you.Counsel - You've been around a lot lately.Hi. Yes, I have your honor.Your honor, Counsel may appeal to court Kelly, Stacey, appearing for the safe, in the defendant's reclined brief, he acknowledges that even if this case would be remanded for re sentencing, the trial court can still impose the 15 year firearm enhancement.The defendant points out that he apologized to the store clerk.I agree that that did happen, at the sentencing hearing, that he has helped people at church.And then he had no prior adjudications or convictions.I also agree that he obtained his GED and has a supportive family life.But don't you think that's probably why you got the seven years as opposed to the higher end of the sentencing.I would have to agree with that assessment.That, that is probably why he got the 7 years.I go back to my last question, which is the only thing that was mandatory here, was that 15 years extension because of the firearm.And what do you think about the argument that because of his age, his tender age, which now we're recognizing, you know, there are issues to be concerned with.What about that?But the court should, should be able to take that into consideration all those factors behind his back.I think the hunter case, that we've both addressed on the seven minute briefing has concluded that the statute does not apply retroactively.So the only way I think that this gets reached by this court, is if there is a finding that the sentence violates the proportion of penalties cards, and that would need to, would necessitate finding by this court that, that the sentence is so cruel, degrading or disproportion to the offense, that the sentence shocks the moral sense of the community.I, agree with me to the statements that opposing counsel made on the evolving sense.And I think it does apply to, as justice case mentioned the Miller case, how we're viewing younger offenders and when does the brain stop wiring and when do they have those adults, the adult ability to be able to determine the consequences of their action.But in this case, in looking at the seriousness of the offense, what we have is the defendant pointed a weapon at a store clerk.He demanded money and told her he would shoot her.He told her if she did not turn over the money, she would be hurt.He did have the wherewithal to conceal his identity during the armed robbery.He wore a mask.And although he argues, that the gun was not loaded, but there would be no way for a person, on the other end of that gun, to know whether or not it was loaded.In her testimony was, she believed this was a fully operational gun and wouldn't have had any reason to think it was not loaded.She suffered severe anxiety and had panic attacks.I understand the defendant's argument that he did this to obtain peer approval, but there's also some information in the record that he had posed for photographs with the gun and maybe to try to post them on social media.I don't fully understand that whole social media component.It's something I've just got me to in the last year, but I don't pose with the, weapons.But along those same lines, this defendant acted alone in carrying out that, that robbery.It shows that there was planning on his part and not an impulsive act.We agree that if this court does find that, this particular sentence shocks the moral sense of the community, that the case would go back to the trial court for re sentencing.I think justice skates raises an interesting question as to, where would the sentencing have to fall.I know it would not be, will be increased, but I don't have a definite answer beyond that.In any event.If I have no further questions from the panel, the state would ask you to find the sentence imposed was not unconstitutional as applied to this defendant, defendant and affirm.Thank you, your honor.Thank you, council Council, any rebuttal?So I think what's clear from this record and from the state's acknowledgements in this court's questions are Dunfield's not an incorrigible youth.No, he is a typical young person who made a very bad decision, but under the law of Illinois for the youth, the turns is not further because he was less likely to consider potential punishments and the goal incapacitation rehabilitation are negated cause he's not incorrigible.All of these factors that you're talking to us about, regard to this young man, are we to consider those when we talk about the constitutional proportionality clause?So I think what - I mean it is a question of law that's before us - Certainly, I consider this first state and sort of the brush clearing, basically Dunfield is definitely not an incorrigible youth.I like that.What does that mean?Just, just the idea that, you know, to put it in really stark turns terms.If under Miller up Graham Roper, children of all people should receive new sentencing hearings.The facts of this crime are far less severe and do not demonstrate on the face of the record in court durability, by any means.But what about Hunter that says that the statue is not retroactive.So I thin, Hunter says, it's, it's a new one's talking.So hunter says that section B is intentionally.So I don't, that's a quote, intentionally silent on retroactivity.And so that almost been court look to the statute on statutes and under the section of statutes, what we found is that it was ambivalent on retro activity.Mainly if you analyze it under the mitigation line of cases, no retroactive application.However, the section of statutes, approves of the application of the statute, following a retrial and re sentencing.So I think what that tells us is that the general assembly is intentionally silent in subsection B, they're signaling to this court.This is a joint enterprise.We have, we've seen Miller Graham Roper.We know that our statutes have not got it done.And we know that almost Supreme court keeps finding as applied in facial challenges to the statutes.And we are now opening this up to the court.And under Leon Miller, we know that this court is supposed to exercise its own judgment about the evolving standard of decency.So I don't think that Hunter forecloses this claim at all.I think on the contrary, it opens up room for this court's discretion.So I think I just want to conclude by saying Dunfield is asking for exceedingly narrow relief in two ways.He wants a re-sentencing hearing at which the trial court may exercise its discretion.And, he's asking for a type of relief that is not going to open up the flood gates of litigation.The types of cases that meet this requirement are where the defendant was less than 18, where a firearm add on was at issue and where the direct appeal was pending on January 1st, 2016.These is a very narrow set of cases.And Dunfield asks that he simply get that re-sentencing hearing in which the trial court can exercise its discretion.All in accord with Illinois evolving standard of decency.If there are no further questions, - I don't think there are.Thank you Council.Thank you.We appreciate the briefs and arguments with council.We'll take the case under advisement and issue a ruling in due course.Thank you.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-14-0378.2018-06-06.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-14-0378.2018-06-06.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-14-0378.2018-06-06.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-15-0166/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-15-0166.2018-05-03.mp3", "text": "Good morning, your honors, may it please the court.My name is Richard Whitney representing the defendant appellant Monte Engelhart In this matter, in this appeal, I am asking this court to reverse Mr. Engelharts conviction and remand this clause for new proceedings based on one issue.The trial courts one sentence denied Mr.Engelharts clear and unequivocal invocation of his sixth amendment right to represent himself without complying with rule 4 0 1 , without conducting any other inquiry and without any explanation, the entire exchange occurring prior to the commencement of trial consisted of Mr. Engelhart stating, \"your honor, I would like to represent myself\", and the court responding \"that will be denied\".Under our sixth amendment jurisprudence.The court's duty was to make a sufficient inquiry to determine whether Mr Engelart's request to represent himself was freely, knowingly and intelligently made, and if it was, to grant that request.Since it oddly failed to do so.And since there was no other basis in the record for finding that Mr Engelharts request was not freely, knowingly and intelligently made the judgment conviction must be reversed.Counsel, At what stage did the defendant make his request?At the pre-trial hearing on the day of trial, but significantly and notably before the commencement of the four ID. And the reason your honor why that is important is because one of the two arguments that the state has made in this appeal for arguing that's one of the narrow limitations to the sixth amendment, right of self- representation applies, was because it came too late because it came on the, on the Eve of trial.However, the very case cited and relied upon the state people be burdened by our Illinois Supreme court.simply made the observation, A number of courts have held Vinnie defense request and time where it's made just before the commencement of trial.However, in the numerous cases that the Burton court cited, most of them were done by federal courts of appeal.Every single one of those cases held the dividing line between what just before means is if it occurs after the board years begun or after the jury is in panel Mr. Engelharts' requests came before the warrant even began.And accordingly under the very, the very cases cited by our Supreme court and burden, We find that the first, third, fourth, fifth, seventh, ninth, and 11th federal courts of appeal all held that the dividing line is either the commencement of our idea or the impaneling of scoring and of the jury.In this case, Mr Engelharts request came before any of that occurred and accordingly following the very authority that, authorities that were indirectly cited in burden.We have to find that this request was in fact timely.Now, there is also another exception where the court cited one, the third court cited Illinois Veld court case where the court held the dictor or stated in dicta that the defendant cannot wait until the Eve of trial and holding for a continuance announced it is decided to rely upon his skills rather than counsels.but notably in this case, there was no request for continuance.There was no indication, implication, insinuation or anything of the kind indicating that Mr. Engelhart was doing this for purposes of trying to delay the trial.And even if there was a suspicion that that might be the case, all the court had to do was enquire or say, well, Mr Engelehart, we'll talk about this, but I'm telling you right now, we're not going to do it.This is for a continuance.The court didn't do any of that.There was no inquiry made, There was no hint that this was for purposes of delay, therefore blew off in the cases that you know, that the whole, that if it's an improper delay, that might be a reason to, to deny the request.Clearly doesn't apply here.The court made no inquiry whatsoever, just said, that will be denied.So accordingly we cannot, the state cannot take refuge and regrets or other cases.And it's a matter of fact, in, in our reply brief, I believe I cited the first district case, 2016 cases of people, B hunt, where the, the sister Pell court held that a request to proceed pro se, which is not accompanied by a request for additional time to prepare, should generally be viewed as fondly, as long as it may be for a trial.And again, this did occur before trial before the commencement of the ordeal.The only other grounds that we stayed relies upon and trying to argue the one of the very narrow restrictions on the sixth amendment, right to self-representation might apply is the state of dance was an argument that Mr Engelhart had been disruptive throughout the pretrial proceedings and therefore it comes with an exception for obstructionist conduct.However, as the roots, in case out of the fourth district cited by both parties, what was clear about, this is a very narrow exception, and it only applies to a defendant who engages enquote \"serious and obstructionist misconduct\", unquote.And as I went through the reply brief and looked at each of these incidents cited by the state, we're not even remotely close to that here.What we had in this case basically, was a client who was annoyed and perplexed by his attorney.And he did express that on, on several occasions, notably in, in three of the occasions, cited by the state, the exchange between Mr Engelhart and court began with \"may I address the court please\" or on one case, it was, I would like to respectfully address the court.How was that obstructionist conduct?That does not even remotely come close to obstructionist misconduct.The only thing that even remotely is in the same ballpark was one time at apre-trial hearing, he made a sarcastic comment that there was a kangaroo court going on.That's it, he didn't obstruct anything.As a matter of fact, if you look at the record of the trial itself, he behaved himself admirably, He did not interrupt the proceedings, he didn't cause a fuss.He didn't obstruct anything.What we have here is a defendant irritated with his attorney.He expressed it on a few occasions.He did have a lot of questions to the court, but he politely asked the court to try and explain things to him.None of that rises to the level of serious and obstructionist misconduct, which I studied a case in the, out of the ninth federal circuit in the reply brief that what that's really referring to is uncontrollable and disruptive behavior in the courtroom.Again, we don't, we don't see that here.And it's a matter of fact, a lot of the exchanges between Mr.Engelhart and his attorney, were in the context of the attorney, trying to withdraw from representing him.Clearly, these two people did not get along, and, and it, it culminated in the requests made by Mr. Engelhart on one of the occasions cited by the state It was the attorney that interrupted Mr Engelhart.In another occasion, he actually corrected his attorney because she misstated the fact about his prior record.These are the kinds of things that happened here.It does not watch the level of serious and obstructionist misconduct.On the Supreme court and people, the Baez, which I think is one of the, the Keystone cases here was very clear that once a clear and unequivocal request is made to represent himself, and you can't get much more clear and unequivocal, than \"your honor, I would like to represent myself\".And if the decision is freely, knowingly and intelligently made which the court here, did not even ask, but if it was then there was no reason to suppose otherwise here, It must be accepted the three categories of a very narrow restrictions on that wide and none of them apply here, the record shows that as we are reading the briefs accordingly on behalf of Mr Engelhart,I respectfully request that the judgment of conviction be reversed in this case remanded so that Mr Engelhart's sixth amendment right to represent himself will be respected.Thank you, your honor.Thank you Council - Can it please the court, good morning, your honors,council.My name is Erin Wilson Legler, and I appear on behalf of the state.The score should affirm defendant's conviction because his request to proceed pro se was untimely as it was made minutes before the start of our Deere, because the request was untimely.It was within the trial court's discretion to grant or deny the request.As per the pry brief defendant accuses the state of misrepresenting the Supreme court's decision in people versus burden in burden, The Supreme court held and I quote from page 24 of the opinion,\"the timing of the request is also significant.A number of courts have held that a defendant's request is untimely, whereas where it is made just before the commencement of trial, after trial begins or after meaningful proceedings have begun.Once such proceedings have begun.The trial judge has discretion to deny defendant's request to represent himself\".The Supreme court went on to conclude that the defendant's request to proceed pro se there was not clear or unequivocal, but it also noticed noted that the request was made untimely because it was made just prior to the defendants sentencing in that case.Prior to?Sentencing in that case.Council, the opposing council said that all the cases, lineup say the dividing lines for dear If you make the request prior to that, then it was time.Your honor, those cases are federal circuit court cases.Whereas we're bound by the direct language that our Supreme court stated and our Supreme court in burdens stated just before the commencement of trial, that would obviously include the beginning of the proceeding in which for Deere is to be conducted.And that is exactly when Mr. Englehart made his request in this case.The parties had appeared in court to start for a year and before they brought the potential jurors in, this exchange occurred.And because, excuse me.it's the state's position that, that particular timing falls directly within our Supreme court's language just before the commencement of trial, consequently, the decision to grant or deny defendant's requests was a matter within the court's discretion.And to that end, prior two defendant's request to proceed pro se the state had informed the trial court that the defendant had a pattern of dispensing with attorney after attorney to delay court proceedings.How many attorneys did he go through?In this particular case, he only had one, but he also had another case proceeding in the trial court.And it was in that case that the state was referring to the defendant's pattern of delaying proceedings by going between different attorneys.Defendant had also been unruly and uncooperative at various points throughout these proceedings.But to be clear, the state is not suggesting that the request to deny is validated by the obstructionist conduct exception that was noted in Woodriff and Woodson as the defendant has indicated.Instead to see is merely pointing out defendant's conduct to contextualize the trial courts the decision when it was exercising its discretion, as it was faced with an untimely request to proceed pro se.And so, excuse me.Trial towards exercise discretion that did not employ.Your honor, if the request to receive is untimely and the decision is therefore within the trial court's discretion, the trial court is not under an obligation to conduct those inquiries.I realized that.when we review an exercise of discretion, we have to read, we necessity reviewed those factors in the background, the underlying factors in the courts, determining that it can exercise its discretion and then exercise.So basically to rephrase what I've asked, did the trial courts on inquiry as to the reasons or the ability or anything back in any way, the actual size of discretion, as far as the underlying basis on which we need to review?No, your honor, it did not.And that is because the request was untimely, had their requests been timely.The trial court would have been under an obligation to conduct those inquiries and determine whether the request was clear or unequivocal, but because the request was untimely, the trial court was not under an obligation to conduct those inquiries as illustrated by the facts in burten.Instead it was within the trial court's decision to look at the circumstances and understand the context and determine whether or not the request should be granted or denied.And given the circumstances before the court, at that time wherein he was aware that the defendant had this pattern in his other case, and the defendant had been very uncooperative with his counsel and had interrupted the proceeding.Sometimes civilly, sometimes not civilly with those circumstances before the trial court, the trial court properly exercises this discretion and required counsel to continue representation.Therefore, the request to deny was not an abusive discretion.And if your honor's do not have further questions, the state would respectfully ask that this court affirm defendant's conviction.Just briefly arrives three points.One, I fail to see any relevance to any prior pattern.In another case of Mr Engelhart request allegedly requesting different attorneys.That's not what he was requesting here.Yes.It would have been a concern if, if he had said, \"yeah, I want to discharge my attorney so that I can get another one\" thereby fomenting another delay.But that was not the case here He said, I don't want to represent myself and with no insinuation that he wanted any delay, they were there ready for trial.Apparently he was ready for trial, at least in the absence of any inquiry, We can't assume otherwise.secondly again, the, the Illinois Supreme court holding in Burten was based on its conclusion that the defendant did not clearly and unequivocally invoke his right to represent himself, completely different issue from what we have here.There's no question that Mr. Engelhart did that here.So it was a bask in dicta where the Supreme court maybe statement and again, the focal is a number of courts have held that \"a defendant's request is untimely where discourse made just before the commencement of trial\" unquote.And it was in that context that it cited all of these cases saying that just before means after warder.So again, the very source relied upon by the state does not support the conclusion of wants this court to draw.It supports the conclusion that I'm asking this court to draw.Yes, it wouldn't have been better if it had been made a few weeks before force, but it was still timely under the very array of case law cited favorably by the Illinois Supreme court in burten.For these additional reasons.we respectfully ask that Mr. Engelharts conviction be reversed - thank you for the timing of this request before here, Daniel jury panel, the legitimate apart court's consideration in the exercise discretion - Well, I would say your honor, given the, importance and the magnitude of the sixth amendment, right, which as the court, in the Lego case, all also by the Illinois Supreme court said, if the decision is freely knowing and told you it made, it must be accepted out of the respect for the individual, which is the lifeblood of the law, I would say that that it's at least implied by burten that if it comes before Gardere, it still has to be respected, absent.Some other consideration that might, you know, give the court a reason to deny the request.But since none of those other factors are present.And since there was no request for a continuance or even a hint of that, then if for these reasons, I believe that it would have to come as an abuse of discretion to simply summarily deny, particularly with no input.And that's the other part of our argument here on this appeal is there is a duty under rule 4 0 1 8 and make this inquiry, which the court failed to do.Granted almost all the case law comes in cases in which the defendant was granted the right to represent himself.And you know, that had buyer's remorse, so to speak and, and so on.it is a little unusual for us to involve it here.But clearly if the court has a duty to inquire before accepting the request implicitly must have a corelative duty to make the, or before denying the request, unless there is some other reason why a serious instruction that's misconduct to denial.Again, that's not, that's not present here.I would ask on the basis of the numerous federal authorities cited in burden that, that this court find that the court abused its discretion in denying the request.Thank you, your honor.We appreciate briefs and arguments counseling.Take the case on her advisement.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-15-0166.2018-05-03.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-15-0166.2018-05-03.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-15-0166.2018-05-03.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-15-0490/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-15-0490.2016-06-22.mp3", "text": "All right.Let's pick up our first case.On the 10 o'clock Carl Snider vs Rrooksby.Argument for the panel.Please proceed.Thank you, your honor.May it please the court.I'm Frosty Drake and I represent the appellant Robert Rooksby.The appellee Gregory Snider sues Brooksby for among other things, a breach fiduciary, seeking money damages, Snider also filed for an injunction seeking an order that Brooksby to be enjoined from using half the proceeds that he obtained from the alleged breach of fiduciary duty.And then he deposit half of the proceeds from the alleged breach of fiduciary duty with the court.The court granted that injunction.This is an appeal of the granting of that injunction.And as I will explain in the grant of that injunction was erroneous.That brings me to the facts, the background of the case, given the issues on appeal, it's not necessary to state the facts in great detail.Brooksby and Snider were business partners in an LLC called Carbon Recovery.Carbon Recovery's business model was to obtain a band and coal from coal storage companies process it and blend the coals.So in that specific sales criteria and then sell it, their buyer was a company called the Southern Illinois Power Cooperative.A dispute arose between Rooksby and Snider as the operation of Carbon Recovery and Snider wrote Rrooksby an email on May 21st, 2015, telling him Carbon Recovery would not be making any payments to anyone except to Snider, meaning that there would be no further payments to suppliers or compensation for Rooksby.So Rooksby thus began dealing with coal on his own account.Specifically, contracting with Peabody Coal, a company Carbon recovery had not dealt with.Snider, became aware of these dealings and sued him for breach of fiduciary duty, essentially alleging that Rooksby wasn't surfing corporate opportunities of Carbon Recovery.As part of the lawsuit, Snider also sought an injunction ordering that Rooksby be enjoined from using 50% of the net sales proceeds of his sale of coal from May 21st, 2015 forward, which was the date that Snider wrote the email.And that he deposited 50% of the same into the court.The court granted the injunction, which brings me to the point that the injunction was wrong, Which brings me to the points on appeal.The first point is that the injunction is erroneous because Snider has an adequate remedy at law.And thus there is no irreparable harm.Of course it's warned of law that an injunction can not issue If the move on has an adequate remedy at law.Here, Snider has an adequate remedy at law, his money damages claim for breach of fiduciary duty.Indeed in his briefing below Snider even stated that he should quote \"not have to wait for a monetary award\", but that's just the point because a monetary award is available.There is an adequate remedy at law.There is no irreparable harm.The mere passage of time from the point of the suit to any monetary award is not irreparable harm.And that makes this injunction essentially an equitable attachment.And Illinois law forbids that equitable attachments.An equitable attachment is the enjoining of the defendant's control or property in his possession to satisfy a claim not yet reduced to judgment.Is there any kind of allegation that this breach of fiduciary duty would somehow permanently damage the relationship with their buyer Southern Illinois Power Cooperative ?I don't believe so.I don't believe there was such an allegation, if that allegation was made, that certainly wasn't a focal point of the injunction hearing or in the briefing.And in other words, any kind of allegation over and above you owe me money.Well, there were things like, I'd like an accounting.I'd like an accounting, things like that.But as to an allegation about a specific permanent harm to a customer, I don't think there was.Even more, even if that were the allegation, the injunction forcing him to pay money into court would have no, no barring to that allegation.And that might support an injunction saying you can't go out and sell more coal.You can't go contact these people, but such an allegation would not create the need or irreparable harm for injunction to pay money into court.What did the injunction bar him from doing?The injunction barring the points of the appeal were anyway, but paragraphs B and C of the injunction preventing them from using the net sales, the net proceeds of his sale from May 21st, 2015 forward, and to deposit into the court, those net sales proceeds.And the court eventually said, you said to deposit the need for the deposit in your attorney's prosecutor account.He was also enjoined from making any further sales to Southern Illinois Power Cooperative except through Carbon Recovery.And we do not, we did not appeal that, that point.I understand, but the point I'm trying to make here is, it seems to me like the claim was more than just, he owes me money.It's, he's damaging our joint businesses relationship or substituting himself for our joint business relationship with Southern Illinois Cooperative.Okay.I'm sorry if I misstated, that was the only claim at issue.I apologize.My point was this, this goes to your, your argument that he has an adequate remedy at law, money damages.And I'm saying, but what about the potential damage to this relationship with the Southern Illinois Power Cooperative?We don't appeal that, we're not asking that he not be enjoined from having contact with Southern Illinois Power Cooperation.We're only appealing the, the injunction paragraphs B and C. To the extent that they.Deposit money.Yeah deposit money.and you can't use the net sales proceeds.Yes.Okay.And also there was no allegation that your client was in solvent, or if this money got away, this is going to be gone.There's no evidence of insolvency.There's no binding a bankruptcy.The closest that it comes to that there's an allegation that we're dissipating a corporate asset, which is just a fancy way of saying you're causing me money damage, which is, you know, one of the main points of my appeal.And refresh my record.How much are we talking about here?The amount that was deposited is $10,000.so returning to the case law here.It does function as a equitable attachment.It may not be a right amount of money, but they're, they're instructing Rooksby, you can't use that money.The court is describing you can't use that money.You can't use that money, you got to deposit it with the court, and that's an equitable attachment.And as the court stated in Kurt kurty, Franz, and the other cases in my brief, the theory of taking away the control of property by means of an injunction for the purpose of anticipating a judgment, which may or may not thereafter be obtained by a litigant is a point of horan to the principles of equitable justice.And that's exactly what happened in this case.Rooksby had property in his control and it was taken away prior to judgment.Of course, there are many cases that denying injunctions when the plaintiff has a claim for money damages and thus are essentially equitable attachments.One particular one that I think deserves discussion here is the Franz case due to a similarity to this case, the Franz case involved the fact pattern very similar to this one.In Franz, a limited partner brought an action against a general partner and the chief operating officer of a partnership alleging breach of contract and breach of fiduciary duty after the partnership sold vacant loss at the low fair market value to an entity affiliated with the chief operating officer.So the partnership is depleting partnership assets by selling vacant lots to an entity that's affiliated one of the partners for less than fair market value in less than the price stated in the partnership agreement.So the lending partner sues and says, that's a breach of your fiduciary duty to me and that's a breach of contract.And I want an injunction stopping the partnership from selling those lots.The trial court granted the plaintiff an injunction stopping the defendants from selling money for loss in order to protect the plaintiff's financial interests in the lots.The second district for the trial court, holding up the limited partners, breach of contract and breach of fiduciary duty sued for money damages constituted, an adequate remedy at law.And thus there was no replicable harm.In addition, the second district rejected the plaintiff's argument that the injunction did not concern a financial interest because it concerned the partnership assets, which were real estate, as the court stated the plaintiff's entitlement based on the partnership agreement is to the profits and the partnership, not an interest in the real estate.The complainant alleges financial injury to the plaintiff by defendants conveyance of loss at a price, less than set forth in the partnership agreement, because the only leave requested by the plaintiff is monetary and jumped at relief is inappropriate and resembles a prejudgment attachment.Here the defendants are trying to basically do the same thing that the sorry, the plaintiffs are trying to do the same thing that they, the point of it in Franz, they're trying to recast their complaints.One for dimunition in a corporate asset or interest, but just as the Franz plaintiffs were trying to recast, their complaint is one for dimunition and the partnership assets.But in both cases, what the plaintiffs are really seeking is monetary damages.They're seeking redress for financial harm and as Franz and many other cases in other contexts point out that is no basis for injunction.And there's essentially no in a legal, equitable attachment.And that brings me to my next point on the appeal.The injunction is basically an end around Illinois attachment statutes.Illinois has a statute that covers what Snider seats.One enforces the defendant to set aside money or other property prior to judgment.And that's 735 ILCS 5/4-101, the prejudgment attachment statute.But of course that statute requires Snider to post a bond, to provide defendant a remedy.In case the attachment is wrongful.It forces Snider before depriving the defendant, of property that was in his control to put a little skin in the game himself, he's got to post a bond.He hasn't done that in this case, and yet the injunction issue.So the injunction has just done an end around the attachment statute and constitutes, and then legal equitable attachment.The final point on appeals, the injunction is erroneous because it fails to preserve the status quo.The status quo is defined as the least peaceable uncontested status between the parties.That point was the 5/21 email from Snider to Rooksby stating that Carbon Recovery wasn't going to be making any more payments to anyone.At that point, Carbon recovery certainly didn't have a receivable from Peabody Coal or SIPC or anyone else for transactions after 5/21, but the injunction changes that it forces, it forces Rooksby to deposit money into the court.And so the injunction does not preserve the status quo.So in summary, the injunction was erroneous because there was an avid remedy of law.It was around the attachments statutes and it failed to preserve the status quo.And against these pretty straightforward, in my mind, clear arguments that the injunction was improper Snider makes just a few arguments, which in my opinion are fairly easily dispatched.First, he attempts to distinguish the Franz case because this case involves a derivative it's not received individually, and derivatively on behalf of the corporation.But that's just a distinction without a difference because the derivative claim is also for money damages and therefore is an adequate remedy at law to whatever dimunition and the corporate interest is being alleged.He also attempts to compare this case to the Bowman case, but the Bowman case involves a Uniform Fraudulent Transfer Act.It was a case under a different statute and not the attachment law and any comparison to this case with attachment statutory cases.It fails because Snider did not post a bond.Finally Snider argues that there is an exception to the rule against that will attachments based on the specific funds doctrine when the injunction involves a specific fund that issue in the lawsuit.However, this is clearly not a specific fund case.First and foremost, even a trial court stated that the basis for its injunction was not the specific fund doctrine.It was not enjoining the use of order in the deposit of specific funds.If the trial court didn't believe that, that this order was going out in the attachment to specific funds, how can Rooksby claim that.Secondly, there was no evidence that Rooksby still had any of the specific funds from the transactions in his possession.And of course it's their burden on their injunction to prove that, and they did not.Thirdly the order doesn't refer to a specific fund instead it generally describes net sales proceeds from all full transactions Rooksby engaged in after may of 2015.A net sales proceeds is not a specific fund.It's not a specific check with a check number or money sitting in a trust account.It's a calculation of net profit after overhead.There isn't one case in the jurisprudence of Illinois that holds that someone's net profit after a calculation of overhead based on transactions is a specific fund that can be attached.And the cases Snider sites for this argument are in a positive and having criticized.Snider who relies heavily on all seasons excavating.However, all seasons stands for the proposition that if the defendant isn't solid and he only has one or two assets left in her real estate, the coordinator joined the sale of the real estate based on the finding of insolvency.I would also point out that the, injunction and off-seasons excavating was directed to specific real estate and preserve the status quo.Neither of which this injunction does.Snider also cites a case called Amarin insurance, but in Amarin insurance, there was a reinsurance contract that was at issue and both parties, both payments under the re-insurance contract.And the question in the case was going to be whether the re-insurance contract was valid or not, and whether it should be rescinded.And the court ordered that both parties make the payments that they were supposed to make pay each other under the contract, to pay those into the court.As the court was says, that the question of whether the contract is valid was getting litigated.So in that case, both parties made deposits.And since the Franz were specifically earmarked, as they are payments under the contract, they were clearly specific funds for that contract.They weren't net sale proceeds for six months worth of transactions.Finally the Kishan case, the Kishan involves a case where money was already in trust.The parties had agreed prior to the lawsuit to put money in trust.Then this dispute broke out about that trust account and the court enjoined the use of the proceeds in the trust account.So it's a pure application of a specific fund doctrine.In short, none of basis support the specific fund theory that snider has alleged, the injunction is erroneous for the reasons that I've stated.And I would reserve further argument until my reply time, unless there are further questions.All right.Thank you Counsel - Thank you - Argument for the appellate.More injustice, golden Justice Sherman and Justice Stewart.My name is Sandra Tivoli.May I please the court.I represent plaintiff appellate, Gregory Snider.This court has to decide today weather the trial court abused discretion with the standard of review today.Did the court abuse the discretion when it enjoined Mr. Rooksby from further, dissipating 50% of the whole proceeds and whether the abuse of discretion when it ordered that that same 50% be deposited into Mr. Rooksby's attorney's trust account.After considering the evidence that was introduced at the hearings, the motions, the arguments, the case law and the trial courts analysis and application, of that, it's very clear that the trial court did not abuse it's discretion for the reasons that the court found that the documented evidence that was introduced intended to show that the proceeds from the sale of the coal were a Carbon Recovery asset.That's what the court was preserving.It was a Carbon Recovery asset.It was not taking away money from Mr. Rooksby.It was preserving an asset that Mr. Snider and Carbon Recovery had an interest in.Second, the preliminary junction was not about two or three judgment attachment, because again, this was a carbon recovery asset, not Mr. Rookbys asset.And third, there was no heir because the injunction involves specific funds that are the subject of the litigation.And I just wanted to highlight a few facts that I think we're kind of left out or glossed over.At the hearing, at the first hearing on our motion, which was the October 22nd hearing.It was our original motion for preliminary injunction.At that hearing, we introduced six different documents.One was the purchase order from Southern Power Coop, and it was given to general waste services.In case you're not clear who general waste services is.That was an agent of Carbon Recovery because general waste services help the insurance and that's not disputed.So it was a general waste services was, used by Carbon Recovery in order to gain the access to Southern Illinois Power.Well, so that is one document.And again, like I said, it was that there was a vendor agreements where general waste services to supply coal to Southern power.And it was a long-term agreement.It wasn't just for a period of time.Second, we introduced Greg's truck services invoices, and those invoices all identified that the coal that was delivered from Kinder Morgan's facilities to Southern Illinois power co-op, and then identified general waste services on that as well.We introduced four different access agreements.There's a series of access agreements.Some that have terminated some, that extended the time between general waste services and Kinder Morgan and those access agreements is what allowed generally services to even access Kinder Morgan's properties to remove the coal.At that time.Mr. Rooksby I believe introduced the Peabody Coal contract.At the rehearing.So Mr Rooksbys attorneys filed the motion for a rehearing and at the rehearing, we further introduced truck scale receipts.So when the coal was delivered to Southern Illinois Power, co-op a truck scale receipt was issued, to the driver of the truck.And that also identified general waste services.This is for the same period of time.Let me just ask a question and the things you're talking about now to go liability and more or less at whether an injunction should have been entered at all.But what I heard your opposing counsel say is he's not even appealing that he, I guess, agrees and he can correct me if I'm wrong here, when he gets back up, he agrees that there, I guess, there was sufficient evidence to enjoin his client from further sales and so forth.He's only complaining about having to put the money up.Right, right.And our point there is that, again he's claiming that the money held is Mr. Rooksby's.And I'm not trying to stop you from making your argument I guess my point is, and I read in the briefs and there, there was a lot on both sides about whether or not there really was, whether or not the plaintiff showed a likelihood of success on the merits, more or less, whether it was reasonably likely that he'd be successful and so forth.Right.It sounds to me like it doesn't matter if they're really not even appealing that issue.And they're not asking that the injunction be wiped out completely.No they're not.its about putting up the money and the money that they put up that they think that they shouldn't have to, because that was Mr. Rooksby's money.The court took away as an equitable attachment would, It takes away a person's property in hopes that you're going to get a judgment, but that's not what the trap we're here found.And that's what It wasn't the evidence because the trial court went through a very lengthy analysis about this and said that the, the evidence overwhelmingly show that those sale proceeds were a Carbon Recovery asset.How else can we, what other remedy do we have besides an injunction to enjoin Mr. Rooksby from further dissipating, a Carbon Recovery asset, because he had it, didn't tell us he diverted.Our allegations are that he diverted the funds, but that it's, that it's a carbon recovery asset.That's what we've always contended - Did you ask for that other remedy and the alternative to not dissipate.Yes.The corporate assets.Yes.And that's exactly what the court says that he is to stop from further dissipating the corporate asset, or sorry stop further dissipating, 50% of the net sale proceeds, because the court found that it was a corporate asset.And the gross proceeds of the sales were something like $400,000 - Right.and more down to 10,000.Within 4 months, Mr. So that the court invited, we didn't know at first how much he had actually received because we couldn't get that out of him, that information out of him.So the court also asked for an accounting.And when at the second hearing in November, the November 16th hearing, which we also have a report of those proceedings.Then he ended at the end of that hearing and accounting that showed that he made about 300 and I have the number here $312,000.And within four months or less than four months, he had spent or gone through almost $300,000.And I was only $20,000 left.So it was that $20,000 figure that they have acknowledged through that accounting, that they still had, that the court decided was a corporate asset.That only 50% of that was held there and asked to be the deposited, just from further dissipation.And it was, it was held in their current attorneys trust accounts, the court didn't feel a bond was necessary because it has essentially acts as, as the protection that a bond would have.So if we're wrong in the end, after trial on the merits, it can be returned to Mr. Rooksby and there's no harm.Okay.So this, let me get back up again, make sure I understand.So when you're talking about this was all done through waste services that's because of the contract was set on my power property required that it go through waste services and he didn't present any new contract that provided anything else.And so that's evidence that he was more or less playing off of the Carbon Recovery name to make the sale.Exactly your honor .Okay.That's your point there?Yes.Yes Let me try to get back on track.Yeah.So I've highlighted the fact that, that I wanted to highlight.And again, the court felt that by depositing the money into Mr. Rooksby's own attorney account, which especially, you know, in the surety capacity that the parties would be protected and the need for bond would be unnecessary.As your honor pointed out, Mr. Brooksby did not produce a separate purchase order.He did not produce access agreements with Kinder Morgan, the Peabody contract so it happens only was from July 9th and terminated on July 31st.There's nothing that extended that Peabody contract and the Greg's truck service invoice actually reflects sale or pulled deliveries from through the month of August.I'm sorry, what?Through the month of August, 2015, as well as the trucks sale receipts.So our first argument that's the plaintiff is entitled to an injunction to preserve a company asset.In order to obtain an injunction, Mr. Snider, did need a established four criteria, clearly ascertainable ascertainable, right that needs protection.The appellant doesn't dispute that I don't think he raised that in his, his, appeal.But even in the event that he did Carbon Recovery clearly had an ascertainable right.And snider as a member of Carbon Property clearly had an ascertainable right that needed to be protected that being the assets of the company.An irreparable injury that would resolve in the protection of an injunction is the second criteria.And the proceeds from the sale of pole for Carbon Recovery that was the only source of income at the time.It still is.Without an injunction in place Mr Rooksby would be allowed to further dissipate the little bit that's remaining.And we would still have the super money judgment, but the court is allowed to allow, the court can, has the authority to allow us to protect our own assets.For instance, you have a winning lottery ticket, you've lost it.Someone picks it up and turns it in.And do you have to wait until they spend the money or to get a money judgment against important?Or can you go in and ask the court, stop them from spending all that money, preserve it so that it's still there.It's their asset.It's the next akin to the specific fund stock.And I disagreed with judge Harrison when he did make the comment during his lengthy analysis, that this was not a specific funds.I disagree with that.I believe that this is specific funds because it relates to specifically we're, we're only looking at the sale, proceeds the SIPCHem to pay for the full delivery for the time asserted.And those specific funds are in the are part of the controversy here that we were saying that he's dissipating them, that they're carbon recovery assets.And they're, they're specifically related to the case.And in those circumstances, then the court is allowed to attach or to enjoin the use of those specific funds.And those were comments made by the trial court judge regarding the specific funds.Yes because I - It's not an order for preliminary junction.Right?That's correct.It was comments during his analysis as to why he reached the conclusion that he did.And your honor, I'd also like to point out that the court took in consideration.He very narrowly limited this injunction.He took into consideration, Mr. Rooksbys interest as a 50% member of Carbon Recovery.And that's why he only ordered 50% of the proceeds to be deposited into the account.So he took the strictest and narrowest approach that he could, that would, that would favor an equitable result.I didn't agree I wanted more deposited it, but the court also acknowledged that that's all it's left at a $20,000.Well, then you are stuck with getting a judgment for the balance.Your honor, the, I was looking into the criteria and both of the criteria for an injunction.And there has to be an absence also in an adequate remedy of law.And as I stated before, there's no other remedy at law that can be utilized to continue to preserve an asset.That's still there.We know that there was $20,000 left.What other remedy can we have to preserve that asset?That Carbon Recovery clearly has an interest in.The fourth criteria and the likelihood of success in the merits was evident from the trial.Court's finding that the documented evidence tended to show that the proceeds from the sale of the whole wasn't asset of Carbon Recovery.Here's my second point, your honor, at the preliminary judge was not an equitable attachment.And I touched on this earlier, an equitable attachment consists of an injunction, prohibiting a party from transferring or using his or her own property.That's not what the court did here.The court bound that the evidence show that it was not Mr Rooksby property, that it was a Carbon Recovery property.So the court was preserving and protecting carbon recoveries property, not taking away Mr Rooksbys property.And I agree with, with Mr. Petri, that an equitable attachment, you know, is, is an attempt by a party to get around the statutory requirements.We're pre-judging attachment if this word equitable attachment is true.But as I stated before, it's not equitable attachment because we're not taking us from that he owned.Further the prejudgment attachment statute under those factors, there's 11 and numerated that allows you to get a prejudgment attachment.There's no error for the court attaching these certain proceeds, because we would have been entitled to a prejudgment attachment.Had it gone that way because Mr. Rooksby is, there's no dispute that Mr. Rooksby.is an out-of-state resident.That's one of the enumerated cases were prejudgment attachment.But you would have had to post the bond.And your honor abide has been subsequently, and it's not for the record.Cause it happened.You can't check that - Yeah you can't check that.But you, yeah, you're, you're, you're correct.And that bond is in case, you know, that they're they're wrong, but the bond is also attached or used before there's your lab for hearing and time is your hearing.So it's, it's when the court goes or the person goes in and seeks attachment without what would that, without giving notice to the defendant and the court does require a bond.Here.The defendant had noticed we had a hearing on it and the court decided a bond was not required at first because of the minimal amount that was deposited.And second, because it was deposited into Mr.Rooksbys own attorney's trust account.You're on the case of Franz v Calico development corporation that is cited by the appellant.It is distinguishable from this case.In that case, the court specifically found that the plaintiff who only sought monetary relief against the defendant for breach of contract, didn't have an interest in the property that the plaintiff stopped to enjoy.And the court found in that phase where they played it didn't have an interest in that property.The court found that it was tantamount to an equitable attachment in this case, the it's different from this case just been removed from this case, because here again, the court found that the assets that belong to Carbon Recovery.At least the evidence that was presented at the time tended to show that it was a Carbon Recovery asset and that Carbon Recovery had an interest in the asset.My third final argument was that the specific funds doctrine applies.And I touched on this as well.So even if the court were to find that it was tantamount to an equitable attachment, we have always maintained that the specific doctrine fund applies, the funds that issue in the case have specific connection to the underlying dispute.And all of the trial judge did comment in his analysis that he didn't agree with, that we respectfully objected to that and disagreed with the judge.And then explain why we thought it was a specific funds doctrine.Case law in Illinois is where the funds, which are the subject of the injunction, or also the subject matter of the litigation as there are.In this case, the issuance of an injunction is valid and has been held the existence of a remedy at law does not deprive equity of its power to grant conjunctive relief.So the fact that plaintiff, alternatively, maybe a money judgment does not deprive a court of equity, the power to grant a preliminary junction.And we do cite all seasons excavating vs what heart, which did not specifically find that they were entitled to it because of the insolvency.It was again just specific funds doctrine.V Schultz where the preliminary injunction restraining payment of the escrow agent to the trust was proper to maintain the property in controversy.And in remarriage of Davenport where the ex-wife the court found ex-wife was entitled to a preliminary injunction, preventing the ex-husband from dissipating expected, proceeds from the sale of family property, that she had no interest.In all examples where the party seeking the injunction has other remedies of law, but injunctions were upheld because it preserved the funds and controversy.During the hearings on the original motion for preliminary injunction, the motion for hearing again, the, the documents were introduced and we contended that the board agreed that attended to show that this was a common recovery asset.So the specific funds are at issue in the litigation.And the specific funds are part of the injunction.For all the Hawthorne reasons.Your honor, the plaintiff Gregory Snider, individually and derivatively on behalf of Carbon Recovery present the court affirm paragraphs B and Z of October 26th, 2015, order for a preliminary injunction and nothing further.Okay, thank you counsel - Thank you - First of all your honor, there was evidence that the coal that was traced subsequent to May 21st, 2015, was the Peabody coal.And that it was a different type of coal than a SITC had allowed them to go in and process.And so the, the kind of allegations they're casting upon me here, aren't taking into account the full evidence that was placed in the record of the hearing.More importantly, the, the question here that they're saying, well, it's a Carbon Recovery asset its a Carbon Recovery asset, but that's the question for the suit.That is the question for the actual trial at the end of the day, whether it's a carbon recovery asset or whether it was our asset, whether it was Rooksbys asset, that's the final question on the trial.But most importantly, it is still just financial harm.It's still just a suit for money damages.What they're alleging as being their, their asset is still just a financial asset.And so they have a suit for that.There was, and that's why the finding that there's no finding of bankruptcy or insolvency, the alleged, there is no irreparable harm because it's still a financial asset.And there has been no finding that he can't otherwise pay even worth the corporate assets and the important thing to look at there is the Franz case in the Franz case, the real estate that was an issue was undisputedly, a partnership asset undisputedly, a partnership asset, yes, the court would not enter the appellate court reversed the trial court's injunction using the reasoning, the trail court would used the reasoning.Well, the lots are sold.There's going to be a depletion of the partnership assets.The appellate court says, the second district said, look, even though they're partnership assets, it doesn't matter because it's still just the financial interest that they're trying to vindicate.And there's an adequate remedy at law for that.And so this is kind of a Sheldon, they say, oh, it's a corporate asset.Therefore you put the junction on it when you say no, it's our asset.Of course, that's the final question at trial.That's the final question of trial, but more importantly, whether it is a corporate asset, whether it is Rooksbys assets, it's a financial harm and they have an adequate remedy of law.And that's why the attachment law doesn't require that it be your property.It requires that you be in possession of the property as we were, we were in control of the, of the monies we had made the sales, we were in controlling that was deprived by this injunction.And so the question of whose it is, is not really the question for the injunction.The question is, is there an adequate remedy at law to vindicate the alleged wrong and here is - Counseling and make sure I'm correct on this.You're, you're appealing both the paragraphs that B and C. B is a don't dissipate, Otherwise being 50% of the net sale proceeds paid to your client and C is deposit one half of the net proceeds, didn't use 50% that said one half, we're talking about the same money.I was like, well, don't dissipate, but I'm going to go further than that.The court's saying, I want you to deposit the $10,000 in the Bank.I believe.I think he was, There's net sale proceeds.And I believe 50% he's ordered not to dissipate and 50% he's told to put in trust.Well, and later the judge said $10,000.$10,000 is in trust.But still a dispute about whether or not that is actually half of what's left.I guess isn't there.I mean, I assume the plaintiff's claiming, you know, there ought to be more than that left or.I suppose they're not bound by.The counsel said that in the argument.My question is, is the 50% of the net sale proceeds referenced in paragraph B the same amount as referenced in paragraph C, which is to be deposited in the trust.I believe so.I believe so.I'd have to, I'd have to, I'd have to double check the record on that one.All right, please proceed.Okay.And there was a lot of thought about the standard or you being discretion.Well, in the Franz case, again, the case that reads right, in this case, the standard review was abusive discretion for enjoining the sale of those slots and the court held, yes, it's an abuse of discretion.When the person pays your sentence, it is a abuse of discretion.When a person has an adequate remedy at law to enjoy the sale.Thank you, counsel.Thank both of you for your brief, your arguments.We'll take this case under.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-15-0490.2016-06-22.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-15-0490.2016-06-22.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-15-0490.2016-06-22.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-17-0179/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-17-0179.2018-08-23.mp3", "text": "The next case is people versus hall 5-17-0179.Good morning, your honors.To the court council, I'm Hannah Strong.And I represent William Russell Hall in this case.This is a recovery petition and an appeal from the denial of his recovery petition, alleging that he is no longer a sexually dangerous person.I raise two points in this case.And their basically pretty straight forward.Just as a little background on the STP Program itself, a person is committed to the Department of Corrections as a sexually dangerous person.Usually upon a second charge, second or third or fourth charge on some sex related offense, the state will choose rather than to proceed on a criminal charge, that they will file a sexual dangerous persons petition instead.Court, I think the reason is because then they can be committed for a much longer time, because quite often there are fairly minor sex offenses that lead to this, but, in any event the new defendant is- - Is there any minor sex offense?You're right, that was bad phrase.lessor significance than, there are far far worst things.Quit often the charges are- - Relative realm.Yes so maybe a class 3 as opposed to a class X. And then they would proceed on an STP petition instead.The defendant is evaluated to see if he meets the criteria.And then generally a trial was held to determine if he is in fact a sexually dangerous person.In this case, Mr. Hall admitted the petition.He did not take this to trial.He acknowledged he had a problem.He stipulated to findings of the evaluators and off he went in about 2002.2016 he files a petition alleging that he is no longer a sexually dangerous person.We had a trial in 2017.The burden of the state at that trial is to prove by clear and convincing evidence that Mr. Hall is still sexually dangerous.So what is a sexually dangerous?A sexually dangerous person is someone who has a mental disorder, either congenital or acquired that affects his ability to control themself.That or in other words, that mental disorder causes him to have criminal propensity.Then he had actually in fact acted on those in the past.And then he is substantially probable to commit further acts of sexual misconduct.Those are the four elements.So in this case, we.The filed petition per say to be released?Yes, in 2016 and that's typically not how it happens.And then an evaluation is done.And if that- - The state retained two experts the client should know.Heller Young is a treatment provider, she is not an expert.Dr. Klaus is the one you hear his name a lot in these cases, he works for Wexford.He does these evaluations as a subcontractor.And he's an amazingly brilliant man.I mean, he's remarkable to watch testify.He absolutely has like, he can remember anything that ever happened that he ever read about about it about then an inmate, it's remarkable, but doesn't mean his opinions are always right.And this case, he found that Mr. Hall still suffered from pedophilic disorder, which was what his original diagnosis was.The history of Mr. Hall was even as young as 13 or 14, he was fondling younger girls.Those acts do not qualify under as a, an act to support a pedophilia diagnosis because you have to be more than 16 to be diagnosed as having pedophilic disorder.Unfortunately Mr. Hall's just kept it up.He fondled people.He did ultimately sexually penetrate a child.He did do that.He did have a conviction for child pornography was his original conviction in 1999.He was put on probation for 30 months, and then in 2000, no, maybe it was '97, '99 petitionary revoke his file and they put him on some more probation for 30 months.Then he committed an act.And that's what led to the initial petition here.So he's been committed from 2002 or thereabouts until 2016 when he filed this petition.He's working the program, which is a four phase program.The first phase is orientation.Phase two is like the beginning of sex offender treatment.Phase three is where you're understanding and applying the principles and phase four is it's time for discharge.At the time of trail Mr. Hall was in phase two.So it is the state's job to prove that he has pedophilia, that he had this at the time.Dr. Klaus testifies that once you've got it, you've always got it.One thing you can do is learn to control it.That's what sex offender treatment is all about.The problem is at trial, they presented absolutely no evidence that Mr. Hall has any sexual urges, fantasies, or troubling thoughts regarding children.That's one way that you can be diagnosed with pedophilia.He hasn't committed any acts against children and to be fair, there aren't any children at Big Money.There are however publications happens all the time that these inmates are caught with child pornography or a Sears catalog that they now say it's pornography because it happens to be at the STB program.They still make a Sears catalog?No ma'am.I find them to get in trouble with religious documents that have pictures of children.That's pornography, if you're at Big Money Mr. Hall's never had any of that.Never, not a single time in 14 years has he had any sort of violations.He's not gotten a ticket for inappropriate possessions.He's not watching inappropriate TV shows.And he has told Dr. Klaus that he no longer has those fantasies about children.So where's the basis to find that he still has pedophilia, other than once you've got it, you've always got it?And this case, everybody got distracted by the fact that Mr. Hall has moved his love interests onto the treatment providers.Not a good choice, not something that they recommend, and they're against it.Totally understandable.But the most important thing about a treatment provider is they're adults.So that suggests he shifted his interest from pedophilia to adult women.Then the next most important thing about that is he's never done a single thing about it.He fantasizes in his head.He admits it because it's part of his homework and he's required to acknowledge everything that he is thinking sexually.And he does.He's acknowledged it.And it's been dealt with.He seems to have developed a crush on one treatment provider who was leaving that sent him into some sort of suicidal spiral, and it was a terrible situation.But the important thing to take away from that, she's an adult.So you're asking us to reverse the jury?Yeah, yeah.I'm asking you to reverse the jury verdict because the initial diagnosis that Dr. Klaus testified to is not supported by any evidence in the record.Not a single thing, other than that 16 years ago, he had pedophilia.And was the jury instructed on that?They would just instruct generally as to reasonable doubt what the elements were.But I mean, were they instructed as to pedophilia and what the elements of that are?Yes.I believe that I'm sure they were instructed about it.So they have the right to reject diagnosis as you're asking us to reject it?Yes.Technically they would've have that right.And I don't have to remind all of you how he did his cases are and how difficult it is.It's not a carpet, it's not a shoplifting.It's difficult for jurors.It's difficult to get jurors.And especially if he's now admitting that he likes older women as opposed to younger women.Yes, he likes the lady, he likes the adult ladies and interesting thing that Dr. Klaus did say about when asked directly, what is the appropriate place for his attraction in the setting in which he resides?Well, there isn't one.This treatment program is designed to get exactly the results that we've gotten with Mr. Hall.And that's my second point.Even though Dr. Klaus testified, he wants to see him acknowledge why he does what he does, acknowledge his cycle, his deviant thoughts, manage his arousal, develop interventions because nobody's ever going to stop the thoughts that go on in their heads.They just have to learn to manage them.And that is a successful treatment.Dr. Klaus says describes what he wanted to see.And so did Heather Young, described what she wanted to see.And Mr. Hall has done those things.The fact that he has biggest problem he's got now is that he has a crush on his treatment provider is a sign that this program is working.It's working.He's redirected his interest to the most appropriate outlet that he has.And most importantly, he's not acted on it.And that's what this is all about.So not only is there no underlying diagnosis to support this conviction, no evidence to support the diagnosis, even though Dr. Klaus believes that he has not made enough progress, so that he has no longer substantially problems to commit these offenses in the future, Mr. Hall has actually shown all of those things that Dr. Klaus wants to see in treatment.Even Heather Young admitted, he had made amazing progress.He understood.First she would say, he doesn't understand the concepts, but when presented with the homework that show he did, she acknowledged well, yes, he did seem to understand them.It just doesn't apply them.It was very much move the ball, you know, whenever he would accomplish one thing.Now, all of a sudden he's short somewhere else, rather than just taking it as gospel their word without looking at why they're reaching those conclusions.It serves no purpose to even take this to a jury if that's what we're going to do.We're asking for a rubber stamp.If we don't look more deeply, it's hard for jurors to do that.It's not as hard for your honor's to separate the emotion from what the law says.And that's what we're asking you to do here.Look at the law, look at what the actual evidence was, and we'd ask that you would find that they did not prove by clear and convincing evidence that he is substantially probable to commit certain acts in the future.Thank you.Do you have a rebuttal?Counselor?Morning your honors, also, it pleases the court assistant attorney general Garson Fisher for the people.You honor, these people do have to show by clear and convincing evidence that a sexually dangerous person remains a sexually dangerous person when they file a discharge petition pursuant to section nine, but this part can only overturn the jury's determination of that.The state meeting their burden, if that determination against the manifest weight of the evidence, here, the uncontested testimony at the hearing is that defendant suffers from pedophilic disorder.And the uncontested testimony at the hearing was that the understanding of that disorder at this time is that, when someone has it, it doesn't go away.The deviant arousal and thoughts that are associated with pedophilia cannot be cured, they don't go away with time.That does not mean that the sexually dangerous person is condemned to a lifetime of treatment in a secure treatment facility, because they can with a sex offender specific program, learn to control those urges and this respondent has made some progress.But the uncontested testimony at the hearing was also that this respondent has not made sufficient progress to avoid a substantial risk of re-offending, should he have to operate outside of the secure detention facility, Big Money.He has begun to understand what his deviant thoughts are.And he has shown according to the testimony of both the state section nine expert and his care provider at Big Money, a very preliminary understanding of what his deviant and cycle is.Let me just interrupt you for a moment, because I don't want you to think that you've been disrespected, but we have had a judge leave.And I don't know if you've been here before, but everything is being recorded and is available to this, the public even, but Justice Moore will be listening after this is all over.I understand, your honor.Okay, I just didn't want you to think about it.It's not my first argument.And then my first argument in the court justice, - Okay.We have to step off the bench.All right, sorry to interrupt - No, not at all your honor.What these respondent has not done is been able to identify sufficient interventions to prevent a substantial probability of re-offending outside of the secure detention facility.Does he have to show that he won't re-offend as to children or does he have to show he won't re-offend generally?Actually, whose burden is that, yours, the state's?The state's burden to prove a substantial probability that he will re-offend.If he will re-offend right?A substantial probability, yes your honor.But is that as to children or is that as to sexual offenses generally?Well, based on the language of the statute, it would be sexual assault or sexual molestation of children.Because we know that he shifted his sights on to older, older people, women, older women.I hate to use the term older women, because of course I am an older woman.I know, well we noticed that he has had very fit testimony of his care provider and the section nine expert inappropriate sexual attractions towards the adult women in Big Money.That doesn't mean that he has shifted his inappropriate attraction and stopped declining reaching his conclusion that he suffers from pedophilia.In addition to reviewing records also conducted a two hour interview with defendant, those of who responded reaching his conclusion.He did display additionally inappropriate attraction towards adults females at Big Money, his care providers.Well I am wondering the relevance of that.There is some relevance, in that as Dr. Young or to the, his care provider, Henrietta Young testified.It demonstrates that he inappropriate believes that any time any female is nice to him, that it indicates sexual attraction to him.And she also testified that in group therapy, he was able to recognize or identify those inappropriate thoughts.But when challenged on their appropriateness, wasn't willing to accept any of the pushback or feedback from group on his inappropriateness.I will say, I don't think that it is a major weight on the state side of the scale, and there's, as I said, the section nine expert, as well as his care providers undisputed testimony regarding each of the elements that the state has to prove, which is supported by actuarial risk assessments, which showed that respondent was three times more likely than the average sex offender to re-offend in an unsecure setting.This is just one more small weight on the safe side of the scale, and when confronted with all of these pieces of evidence, I don't think the state could say that the jury's conclusion that the state had met his burden of showing by clearing evidence respond with a sexually dangerous person was against the manifest weight of all of these pieces of evidence.Unless your honor has any further questions, people ask that this court affirm that judgment in the circuit court.Thank you your honors.Counsel?Just very very quick.Counsel pointed out that Dr. Klaus met with Mr. Hall for some time to interview him and doing his evaluation, that's part and parcel of doing these evaluations.Yet nothing in that evaluation or that conversation made its way into evidence about Mr. Hall's interest in children, other than a single statement that he denies he has any.The report was not admitted into evidence.It should have been.Yes, yes, yes it was.It was admitted, so how could you say nothing was admitted?Oh I mean nothing about his interview with him directed towards Mr. Hall's interest in children.So Dr. Klaus should have talked to him and determined that he had all of this based on something Mr. Hall said, none of that, that sort of thing didn't happen.And his testimony was just that he denied that he had any of that interest.And I do think you kind of hit the nail on the head.The goal of this program is not to turn out perfectly well, adjusted socially skilled individuals.That'd be great.I know a lot of people that need that.The goal of this program is to address what got him in there.And that is, he could not control himself when it came to young girls.We have no reason to believe that he has that problem now.And his interest is now in adult women.And he's controlling that.And the only time it is an issue is as part of his treatment that he has willfully participated in for all these years, and he is required to.I'm sorry.The ability to control with adult women.Although it's a minor piece in group therapy, he did push back on that.I mean, he wouldn't accept responsibility for that, so.He can really can't act out on it in Big Money.Well, you'd be surprised.It would be with women.One of his problems before was he stalked girls, and he almost seems as if he was like someone like developmentally arrested at a very young age.This is how he comes across to me.We don't have that here.He wrote in his homework that he was struggling with a provider leaving and he couldn't go on without her.Well, he's not sending her notes to that effect.He's not hanging around outside of her office, which is an option.He wasn't doing any of those things that anybody presented any evidence on.So he's controlling it to the extent.And then- - He didn't have an option to hang around her office while he's in a secured facility.She works in a secure facility and maintains an officer there, yeah.So she's still there?Oh yeah.Just not with him.Correct, and she teaches, this is an interesting point.She teaches the relapse prevention group, which is a high-level group.That's like the end of level three sort of thing.Why not put her on then?I didn't.Why didn't he put her on to talk about his?Because she didn't like that either, her opinion was it was inappropriate and we didn't need any more of that talk, that's why.But she could have helped him theoretically.Well, her opinion is the same that he should not love her either, that it's inappropriate for him to love her.But that isn't as to pedophilia, and that's what I was asking.What do you think is the answer to that question?Did they have to prove by clear and convincing that he's no longer attracted to children or that he no longer is going to act out on sexual fantasies generally?I believe that it should be, it is intended to address his problem.And his problem is children because you can be a sexually dangerous person and there not be a child involved.You can be there.If he got there on pedophilia.So that's my question is, let's suppose he's sexually inappropriate with adult women now.Does that still make him a sexually dangerous person?I say not, because it is purely by the nature of her relationship and being in this facility as his treatment provider that makes her inappropriate.That's the only thing that makes her inappropriate, even according to their witnesses, if she was a person on the street that he had a crush on, as long as he maintained his crush to himself and didn't stalk her and didn't touch her, no harm, no foul.That's what he's supposed to be learning.And he is, he's doing that in the facility that he is in.So, if we would affirm this.What is the next stage that would happen with your client?They are allowed to file a petition every two years.It generally, this one moved really quickly.It generally takes a couple of years to get to trial.But in other words, he would continue treatment, and is there a third stage?Yes, there is a third stage, which of course he is only entitled to get into when these treatment providers say he can get in and that's a problem.And that's where I was going with the relapse prevention group.It's a high level group.He was in it only like six to eight or nine people can be in that group.There's one treatment provider.And guess who it is, the woman he can't be around because he has a crush on her.So he's kicked out of that group and he can't ever move forward, unless she stopped working there.So here he is.And that's an unfortunate side effect of funding and what's going on in the prisons.And it's just a reality of the patients, but it's a concern.Thank you your honor.Thank you.Nicole will take this under advisement and under a decision in due course.We will take a 10 minute break and be back out.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-17-0179.2018-08-23.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-17-0179.2018-08-23.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-17-0179.2018-08-23.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-18-0533/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-18-0533.2019-06-13.mp3", "text": "This morning, it's 5-18-0533.Patsias versus American family insurance.If parties are ready.Good morning Your Honor's.William S. Daniel, Collinsville for the petitioner plaintiff appellant district Jeffery Patsias.As Justice Barberas may recall, from our Edwardsville days.I like to cut to the chase and get to the bottom line, and save the court time with our oral arguments.There are in our brief an appeal 16 grounds to reverse.I would like to focus on the main three.One, waiver by payment.Two, estoppel by payment.Three, waiver by American family insurance, not over filing it's declaratory judgment action.Basic definition that you all are familiar with.Very briefly waiver involve the intentional relinquishment or abandonment of a known right.AmFam as we colloquially referred to, American family insurance, Wisconsin.AmFam always knew of its right to file a DJ action, but it sat back on its right for over two years, actually 30 months.A DJ action involves action, not AmFam's inaction.To me, the key is that payment, a recognized form of waiver.Waiving any objection or dispute or defense, or where the item actually being voluntarily, and unconditionally paid.AmFam finally paid the May 18th, 2018 appraisal award on, July 9, 2018.The bench trial, I mean vexatious, and unreasonable 155 remaining issues.Was held on July 31, 2018, which was after July 9, 2018.When AmFam had waived its purported defenses and disputes over coverage by its voluntary unconditional payment.$51,564.71 was the net appraisal award that was paid.At certainly a substantial sum, It's not deminimous in any way.AmFam, I submit cannot any longer argue some or any bonafide defense after it waived it, by paying the net appraisal award on July 9.With AmFam waving its reported bonafide dispute and coverage issue by its payment.Then and thereafter, there was no need, to later file the policy as a trial exhibit, on July 31, 2018, because coverage had already been admitted by the July 9th payment of the appraisal award.If $51,564.71 truly was not covered, then AmFam would not have paid it, but it did pay it.AmFam waived its right to file the DJ action, by not filing it soon enough or in this case, not ever filing it.AmFam's asserted defense, merely an claim adjusters, unilateral, and self-serving the letter of correspondence, never became an actually bonafide defense, because it was never presented to a court, for judicial term determination.It's assertive defense never acquired the stature, or status of a bonafide defense.No insurance company is compelled or mandated to file a declaratory judgment action on each and every little coverage dispute, but it is obligated to file one where coverage is contested, and as in this case, especially where the contested amount of loss is put into appraisal by litigation.We had to compel AmFam to name its appraiser, but we went to court to get the appraisal umpire appointed, by judge McGlynn.On the facts I submit the long time chronology, of this particular case.Some were really at several junctures along the way.It became the duty and obligation of American family to file it's DJ action on it's issue of non-coverage.Patsias has claim coverage for a while before, July 9th payment, AmFam had unilaterally denied coverage, but it never submitted it's issue to a neutral arbiter, for a judicial determination of whether its dispute was, bonafide or if there was coverage or not.Is this particular case I think clearly and aptly demonstrates on the record, no insurance company, especially Amfam, Wisconsin, should ever be allowed to be as vexatious and unreasonable with it's delays, as we briefed exhaustively, as Americ, AmFam was in this Patsias case.Therefore the trial court associate judge, which missed the waiver by payment issue in her ruling, it should be reversed on this appeal.After July 9th, when AmFam finally paid the May 18, appraisal award $50,000, it was then barred or at least it stopped, to raise waived policy provisions, and it's defense of the vexatious and, unreasonable delay claims against it.I think that there's been detailed briefing by both sides.I could submit more.I don't need all my time in my view, but of course, delighted to answer any questions, any of the justices may, have and then I'll be back on rebuttal.Okay.Thank you.You'll time on rebuttal as you said - Good - Thank you - Thank you Your Honor, I appreciate it very much.Raymond - Thank you Your Honors.May I please support my name is Marcus Raymond, jury for American family.I guess the drawback in benefit of going second is I get to know what's their respond to, I too wil keep it brief.If the waiver is the main argument that Patsias wants to put forward, I will address that first.The key to all of this and Patsias attorney, mentioned it briefly is whether or not, American family had a bonafide defense.The case law is, is consistent and cited in the briefing, that as long as there's a bonafide defense, regarding coverage, there can be no vexatious damages.I don't think there's a dispute on that.I don't think there could be.And in this case there was a bonafide defense.It had been raised myriads of times before litigation, during litigation.The transcript, and we'll show that it was raised, the, the pleadings at the trial court level, also show that it was raised.And so, so Patsias would have known that this was an issue.The court, the trial court judge Juba Katz also, came to the conclusion that there was, a bonafide defense in this case.And so if I'm just saying there's a bonafide defense, that may be one thing, but in this case, we have a, a neutral learned well-reasoned opinion, from a member of the bench, saying that there wasn't fact that bonafide defense.It, it strikes me as, logically difficult to come to a conclusion that there was no bonafide defense.If a judge was convinced that there was, it's not as she, she had no stake in it, it was just her opinion, after reviewing the facts in the law.That being said, as long as there's a bonafide defense American family cannot be, can not be on the hook for any vexatious damages.If in fact, the argument is that waiver eliminated the bonafide defense.Then the waiver occurred at the time of payment.And as long as in the facts that are pled, Patsias believe led to a vexatious refusal in this case, all happened before the payment.It'd be difficult to argue that, things after payment were vexatious, because they got what they wanted.So it, it strikes me as logical difficult position for Patsias to take while you have these defenses, then you waived them, and but all the things that happened, that we think you did wrong before he waived them, now you don't have the bonafide defense because in fact, the bonafide defense wasn't back in existence.Almost I think Patsias is admitting, that there was a bonafide defense, if there's a waiver.Because there had to have been something, that had to have been waived.Aside from that, this, this case involves an abuse of discretion, standard of review, Judge Julie Katz, I don't think it could be said, she shot from the hip on this.The order that she wrote is six pages long, 24 paragraphs cited case law side of the record.The, the argument in the motion for a new trial you know, was conducted.It took several, it was a ranking hearing.She apines on the record, why she ruled that she did.This was a case that involved testimonial evidence.She was in a position to see both Mister Patsias, and Ron Cleveland, who was the adjuster for American family.Who's mentioned in the record.She's got to see both of their demeanor's in their testimony.And she's afforded deference under the charter case that was cited by both sides and the briefs.Charter says the ultimate decision regarding sanctions under section 155 penalties is reviewed for an abuse of discretion and also stays the legislative intent was to invest this decision with the trial court.She gave them enough reasons and well-reasoned legal opinion regarding why she ruled that she did.Though, this, this court can obviously take a look at that.I think she has afforded discretion and it's difficult for this court to overrule, what she came up with.The Patsias is, is, is never satisfactorily answered a question that was asked at the trial court level, which was why didn't you, or why didn't Patsias is file a breach of contract claim at the beginning.Instead, this, this fire happened in 2016, there was never a breach of contract claim.Or declaratory judgment action filed by Patsias.There isn't a reason why has could not have done so.Patsias is savvy enough to have made it to this court.Presumed Patsias could have filed a breach of contract claim, which is how this normally would have been resolved, and it would have been resolved probably without an appearance here today.Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't Patsias alleged, suggest that is was the, AmFam's responsibility to file a DJ action, and that's because they didn't find that there was any ambiguity or any issue with the coverage.That it their assertion Your Honor, yes.That not.When was that brought to AmFam's attention?The first time I remember it Your Honor, was during the arguments on this particular issue so, then after the, after the payment had already been made, and the argument is, is, is based on Korte or Korte, K O R T E is where that comes from, and that case is not, applicable here, this is a property damage case between, insured and insurer.The Korte case is a liability case in which the insured, was trying to get coverage for a wrongful death action.And in the Korte court said, well when that happens the insurer has three options.They can file a DJ action, defend or defend under, reservation of rights.That case is totally not applicable here.There is no legal jeopardy that Patsias was faced in, in this dispute.There is no ticking gun of the answer, or ticking time bomb of the answer being due.It was a distinction that was picked up by Judge Katz as well, it's, it was, I think cited in a way that, wil not let Your Honor's see what that case was about, by Patsias.The case law is, that is before this court, does not support any notion Your Honor that, That American family has a duty to every time there is a contractual dispute, between a insurer and insured, to file a declaratory judgment action.I imagine most people would not want to be called into court every time there was a dispute, most of these things are worked out.And if Patsias felt strongly about this, he could've filed a breach of contract claim.I'm sure Your Honor's see more than a few of those up here, between insured and a insurance company.So that notion, is just not supported under the law, and whatsoever that American family had some super duty to file a declaratory judgment action in this case.I said I'd be brief, I don't want to make myself a liar, So I will sit down and let Your Honor's have a, brief period of questions for me.Thank you very much - Thank you, Your Honor's - Daniel - Thank you Justices.Every bottle, American family suggests that the key is, that is had a bonafide defense, Which was never presented in court of course.One can not reach a bonafide defense without, a DJ action with a neutral arbiter a court, on a even playing field, finding that there was a, bonafide defense not just an asserted defense, but a bonafide defense, it rises to that level, we've quoted Mariam and Black in the brief.In the oral arguments you just heard for the appellee.I heard an acknowledgement that any vexatious, and unreasonable acts and delays were before, the payment on July 9.I don't think that's tenable.I don't think you can do everything they did, in this case and then excuse yourself with a fig leaf, of a alleged bonafide defense, that was never brought to court.And, there were delays, vexatious and unreasonable delays, between July 9 and July 31, 2018.Not filing a declaratory judgment action continued, to be vexatious and unreasonable.There was no motion that they gave the appraisal award, out of fear I take is the most important part.American family as is in the record, did not pay the appraisal umpire and Patsias appraiser, until Monday, July 30, 2018.Now 5-397.05 mandates that payment where the award, by the umpire matches the figure, of the insured's appraiser.Or the, that's, in the statue American family in it's pleadings, denied that it had any such responsibility, contrary to Illinois statue.I submit that there's no difference, in legal principles, between the third party insurance case, and a first party insurance case.Mister Patsias has been hung out to dry in this case, had to fix a burned house out of his own pocket, You know from the briefs, they paid $3808.20, but it cost over $55000.00 by the appraisal work to make those repairs.Paying 7.35% and leaving 92.5% to your insured, is vexatious and unreasonable.We get the vexatious and unreasonable, if the waived by their payment.The question remains in my final remarks here.My submission of what's the optimum method, for this court reversing this associate judge trial court, although a published opinion is always salutary.A rule 23 order seems to fit the bill better, in this particular case and I'll suggest why.The waiver by payment issue in this case, as I see it is too simple, too straight forward, too easy for these facts to be a testing hypothetical on the Illinois bar exam.Waiver by payment, it's a popped fly.This case was also in my view, too easy for a law school curriculum class, on insurance policy contracts, it's too clear, waiver by payment.This case might be instructive in a college, university basic pre-law class, waiver by payment, as an introductory principle.When you pay without a release, without a DJ action, without a reservation of right, you waive the entire defense if you haven't really had, a bonafide defense in the first place.AmFam waived it's defense by two things.One, paying the claim, and two, not filing it's DJ action, or after we went to court, to get the umpire appointed to get AmFam compelled, to name it's appraiser.AmFam did not counterclaim in litigation, my client had to bring.So, the DJ action absence and the payment especially, waives there defense.I think that waiver by payment by American family, on July 9, 2018 there would not be a significant presidential value, to this case to be a published opinion, that's entirely up to you.I think a rule 23 order may be the best method, but either way we respectfully submit to the court.Thank you - I do have a couple of questions.Yes Your Honor.First, under your theory, the sole burden is on the defendant to file a DJ action, correct?In this particular case, with this procedural posture, With us having gone to court first for the umpire and, the appraiser, for them too assert a coverage offense, it's too late.They did not.They sat back on their rights, so if not waivers, stop-holders really clear.Okay, the other question I have is, once you have the payment on the claim, after going through arbiter and all those things, that issue gets resolved, but then you go to a trail, and the trail judge hears this claim of the vexatious and, unreasonable, aren't those essentially two different issues, and you had a trail on the second issue, and the trail judge found in the defenses favor, correct?Well, the problem with that is, that the trail court disclaimed any coverage dispute issue, being decided that day.The only issue was the 155 penalty attorney fee, and prejudgment interest, but for the court to say there was a bonafide defense, she had to actually decide, the declaratory judgment coverage question.There's no separation there, and that's where, Her Honor ran a foul of established law of waiver.Okay, thank you.Certainly - All right, thank you very much.Thank you Justices.Thank you both for your arguments, court will take the matter under consideration, and issue a ruling in due course.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-18-0533.2019-06-13.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-18-0533.2019-06-13.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-18-0533.2019-06-13.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-19-0104/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-19-0104.2019-10-29.mp3", "text": "On the first case, 5-19-0104, Peoples National Bank versus Darnell.Good morning.Morning.Please the court and council, my name is Eric Terlizzi, I practice in Salem.I represent the defendant appellant, Bobby Darnell Jr. here.The plaintiff received a nearly quarter million dollar judgment against my client based on a count, on a guarantee of a note to a Mr. Thorson.The bank loaned this money to Mr. Thorson to buy an appliance store.And unfortunately, we're here because that loan went south in a few years.Obviously if it had been paid, nobody would be here, but it did not.So the bank proceeded on count one to foreclose the mortgage it had taken on the business property, and then count two, on the guarantee that Mr. Darnell signed.The evidence is absolutely undisputed that on May 18th 2012, when the principal loan was made to Mr. Thorson, what the bank had in its file with respect to this guarantee was exhibit D to the complaint, plaintiff's trial exhibit one, this.One page, page five of five of this purported guarantee, that has two paragraphs in it.The evidence is also very open as to whether Mr. Darnell even in fact had anything besides this page five of five.Mr. Baer, the president of the bank, there's some testimony, \"Oh, we would have sent him the whole guarantee,\" but that's the extent of the testimony.There's no cover letter.There's no anything else showing that Mr. Darnell, when he signed and faxed back, actually the day before this loan was made, this page 5 of 5 of this purported guarantee, had anything else besides that.Mr. Terlizzi, your client doesn't dispute signing this document?He doesn't dispute that that's his signature.You're correct, Your Honor.And is there any testimony that indicates he didn't know what was in the guarantee, as the bank said they sent it to him?I think there's substantial testimony.Mr. Darnell testified that he understood through discussions, and the only actual personal discussions had occurred in February, months before this loan, and before any of the terms were really known or understood at all, or whether this loan was even gonna be made.But Mr. Darnell testified, for example, he thought he was guaranteeing the building, what the building appraised for, 160 to $170,000.They guarantee ended up being for 310,000, which would have included the inventory, operating capital, and so on.If that's- - But wasn't there testimony that the bank sent Mr. Darnell the full packet that included the guarantee, and that the wife faxed back the page with his signature?The actual testimony, Your Honor, Mr Baer, Mr. Darnell's testimony is, \"I don't remember.I'm not denying that's my signature, but I don't really remember what we got, what I signed, but that's my signature\".It's not a forgery case.So he doesn't dispute that he might have gotten the full packet?He might have, and, right, and Mr. Baer's testimony is, \"Well, it would've been our practice to send it to him\".But again, there was no cover letter saying, which obviously should have been in the bank's file, \"Mr. Darnell, here's the loan package.This is what you're guaranteeing.Please sign page five of the guarantee and return all five pages\".In fact, as we found out at trial, but not before trial, a month later the bank insisted on getting a full five page fully, originally signed guarantee.And that came into evidence as, I think it was dated June 20th.Now the bank didn't sue on that.In fact, we didn't even know about that until trial, because obviously a guarantee executed after the loan was made requires additional consideration.The horse is already out of the barn, the money's already been lent.So they knew they couldn't sue on that.They also- - That was more of a formality, that wasn't a requirement that the bank- - That's what Mr. Baer said, yeah.\"We just wanted to cross our T's and dot our I's.And so- - Right, but Mr. Darnell didn't dispute that, did he?The formality issue?He didn't say that sign it.Yeah, there is- - The part after the guarantee, after the faxed page that you have.The June one?The June one, let's call it the June guarantee or packet.The June guarantee, right.That was more of a formality, as you say, dot your I's, cross your T's.There was no requirement that the bank do that.Well, I don't know.I mean, if this is all I had in my loan file, Your Honor, and that's undisputed in this record, that's more than crossing T's or dotting I's or formalities.I mean, I've represented a bank for 40 years.And if this was what I had to say that I've got a loan guarantee, and that part is undisputed.We've cited the testimony of Mr. Baer at page 25, 26 of the transcript, where he says, \"Yeah, that's what we had when we made the loan\".And why that's particularly significant, too, is we have to remember that a guarantee is just, is a contract like any other contract.And what's the first day of contracts 101 teach you?A contract is a meeting of the minds, which means you have to have agreed on the essential terms of what this contract is.This gives a number of terms, even if in fact he had the other four pages, which we don't really know from this record, but if he did have, all it says is the principal amount, $310,000.Now when you go into a bank or a finance company or a car dealer to get a loan, what is the first question you ask?\"What rate will you give me\"?If that's not an essential term of a loan, what is?We don't know, assuming that he had this entire guarantee on May 17th when he signed it and faxed it back, we don't know what the interest rate was, we don't know whether it was fixed or variable, we don't know if it had a balloon payment, absolutely nothing about it.Now, if that's not an essential term, and why that's so important is because that's the contract.That's as important as the loan contract.And maybe to illustrate that, suppose we switched things around, and a bank gave a loan, a written loan commitment for $310,000, and that's all it said.And then the bank reneged on that and the customer sued for specific performance, saying, \"I want my loan\".You know, I think the judge would laugh the customer out of court, saying, \"I'm not here to make a contract for you.I'm here to enforce contracts you've already made.What am I supposed to do, pick an interest rate, amortization, all these other terms on the loan, just out of thin air\"?And really, the guarantee is no different.There is, this record is silent that on May 18th when this loan was made, that Mr. Darnell knew any of those essential terms of this purported loan.And that's why there is case law that says, I mean, there's the clear case law that says if you execute a guarantee after the loan, there has to be additional consideration.And that's just common sense.There's also the case law that we've cited that says if you execute a guarantee before the loan was made, the essential terms of the proposed loan have to be clear and disclosed, and you have to agree to it.Otherwise, there's not a meeting of the minds.There's not a contract.And the bank did not sue on a estoppel cause and say, \"Oh, we detrimentally relied on this page five of five when we made the loan that you were gonna come through and cross T's and dot I's and send that guarantee\".They sued on a contract count, and this is the contract they sued on.So it was the bank's burden of proof.So is that exhibit D?Is that what you're saying is one page was exhibit D?No, exhibit D to the complaint is the full five pages.Right.But it's crystal clear in the testimony from Mr. Baer himself that page five is all the bank had when they made this loan.So my question to you is, how did the parties get beyond the four corners of exhibit D?How did they get all this oral evidence in about the making of the terms, the meeting of the minds?I mean, exhibit D, which is a US small business loan, right, document, would have been complete in and of itself.Well, I mean, that presupposes that exhibit D, which doesn't contain all the essential terms of the loan they supposedly guarantee, is a contract, does represent a meeting of the minds.As I said, it doesn't disclose anything- - So you filed some kind of affirmative defense on behalf of your client?We did, and one of the affirmative defenses was fraud in the execution, based on the allegation that he had been told, one, that he was only gonna be guaranteeing $170,000, the value of the building, and two, that he explicitly made it known that he had to be, he's a tobacco farmer down in Tennessee, and he's got an operating loan that came up in three years.And it's undisputed that that was discussed.Of course, Mr. Baer says, \"Oh, you know, if things are okay in three years, we'll let you off\".And in fact, the loan was not in default in that three years, but the bank didn't let him off because he didn't have enough money in his account, apparently, his business account for that- - Are you saying your client took action with the bank to try to get off the note after three years?There were, yeah.The record's clear that there were phone conversations where he requested that.Now the- - But I'm still perplexed on how you got to all of that.I mean, clearly your client, even in his affirmative defenses, acknowledged that he intended to make some loan.He acknowledged that he understood, that he had agreed in theory to guarantee a loan.Actually, Your Honor, if you read the record, that affirmative defense was dismissed.The trial judge took that evidence in the form of an offer of proof.Which evidence, the one about $170,000?And about getting off in two or three years, yes.And I haven't looked at the notice of appeal in a while.Was that also part of your appeal then, is the inappropriate dismissal of the affirmative defense?I don't know that that's referenced in the notice of appeal, Your Honor.I wouldn't want to tell you it is and then be wrong.Okay.Okay.I just didn't see it in the facts of the case, but I was perplexed as to how all of this oral evidence came in, when the bank- - Well, I could tell you I'm - sued over the contract.just a really good lawyer, but that's not the truth.It came in as an offer of proof.Okay, thank you.You're welcome.But...I guess I don't need to beat a dead horse.That is our position in this appeal, in that whether- - I guess, what is is a bank to do when you get into a situation like this, and your clients as well?It could have, I don't remember, what is the standard of review for us?Is it against the manifest weight of the evidence, or is it de novo?Well, I think it's really more a question of the law, Your Honor, on the issue of whether this guarantee, even if he had all five pages when he signed and faxed it back, if that is an enforceable contract or not.Well, if he had all five pages, what would be deficient about it?What's deficient is, it doesn't reflect a meeting of the minds as to what he's guaranteeing, because it does not contain the essential terms of this proposed loan that didn't even exist on the date he signed this.That's undisputed.But it was anticipated.Okay, so if you could break that up, let's assume hypothetically that he had the five pages that the bank sued on.Correct.Which terms were absolutely missing from the five pages?The interest rate, whether it was fixed, variable, balloon, amortization, none of those terms were in this guarantee, in the full five pages of the guarantee.The only thing he knew was that the proposed loan was going to go to his buddy, Joel Thorson, and Thorson Appliance, LLC, and that the principal, assuming he had these five pages, was gonna be 310,000.That's it.That's why I say, if that was a loan commitment from the bank, that would not be an enforceable contract against the bank because the court would have to supply the interest rate, the amortization, all those terms that are absolutely necessary.You cannot say those are not, probably the most necessary, the most crucial elements of a loan contract.So again, I mean, if you had a note that just said $310,000 and didn't contain an interest rate, an amortization rate, now you know, maybe you could enforce it as a quantum meruit matter, that you lent 310,000 and the guy didn't pay it back, but the court could not supply, and say, \"All right, I'll finish your contract for you.I'll pick a fair interest rate, a nice amortization, maybe we should make it balloon after five years or make it a variable rate fixed to prime\".The court could not do that.The court's not in the business of making contracts, the court's of the business of enforcing contracts.But let me ask you a question.Sure.The form that is used for the guarantee, I'm assuming it's called SBA form 148.So that comes straight from the government.Apparently.There's nothing in that document where it specifically lists what the interest rate is or things such as that, it references the promissory note, which would have all of that information included in it.So are they not referring back to that?Well, and that works, if you've got everybody at the table, sitting down when the loan is executed and you pass the documents around and it's executed contemporaneously, the guarantor can leave with a copy of the note.I mean, there's no, or if they had sent, and they had provided at trial, you know, a cover letter to Mr. Darnell saying, \"Enclosed is the proposed guarantee, attached to it is exhibit A, the proposed note containing all the terms,\" then you've got a contract.You've got a meeting of the minds.You know, even if it's sent back before the loan is actually given, because he knows all the essential terms.This record, and again, the plaintiff's burden of proof, not ours to defend.We didn't have to put on one word of evidence.So I don't think, I really think we should have been entitled to a directed verdict based on the fact that they failed to prove, even if they sent all five pages, that he had, well he obviously didn't have any idea of those other essential terms of this loan.So, and this, you know, we're not talking about a $1,000 loan to buy a washing machine.We're talking about a $310,000 loan that now, some seven years later, even after sale of the security for $90,000, we're talking about a quarter million dollar judgment, a judgment that could put this man out of business.This is not small claims stuff.And for the bank at trial not even to be able to produce anything, anything, a cover letter, anything to show that he was specifically informed of and knew the essential terms of this loan and agreed to guarantee it before this loan was made.And that was their burden of proof, and they failed.We know why they didn't sue on the June 2012 guarantee that is properly executed, that is all five pages, that was after the loan was made, so those terms were known, 'cause they couldn't sue on that 'cause there was no additional consideration.And that's hornbook law, that a guarantee made after the loan requires additional consideration.Could be forbearance, could be whatever, but, and this loan was only a month old.There's no allegation that it was in default, or there was any forbearance or anything in June.So it's a case that looks simple on first glance.Oh, he signed, he owes.But that's a shallow reading of this evidence and the law in this case.And it's the bank's, you know, the bank, this didn't have to happen.The bank could have said, you know, \"We insist on a guarantor on this loan, Mr. Thorson.You have your guarantor there at closing, get all the documents signed, and again, we wouldn't be here because he wouldn't have a defense then.So unless there are other questions, that's our argument, Your Honor.Thank you.Thank you.You'll have a few minutes, Mr. Terlizzi.Am I pronouncing that right?You are, yeah.Okay, thank you.All right, Mr. Hoffman?Good morning.Good morning.I'm going to steal a glass of water real quick.Take your time, sir.Good morning, Your Honors, may it please the court, I'm trying to lose my voice this morning, I apologize.Mr. Terlizzi, Your Honors, I am to start out going to take what Mr. Terlizzi referred to as the shallow view of the case and indicate that really what case boils down to is that Mr. Darnell signed this SBA unconditional guarantee, not once, but twice, in this case.May 17th, he faxed back his signature page, after which, Bo Baer testified to at trial, he had sent him, in the normal course of these dealings, sent him the entire unconditional guarantee, all five pages, down to him at his address in Tennessee.He said that's the normal way he would have done it.They had spoken on the phone previously.They had met previously.They had multiple phone conversations.I think page 20 of the record proceedings notes that.They also had an in-person meeting, I believe back in February, before the May closing.Mr. Hoffman, let me ask you a question that kind of was raised by Justice Boie.This guarantee, where was promissory note?Was it attached?Was there an exhibit, where it was offered?There is not evidence in the record that it was attached to the guarantee.No, Your Honor.There's no evidence?There's not evidence of that that I can recall from the record.Typically, if a document refers to the note, which this one did, this SBA form, wouldn't you expect to see the note attached, and wouldn't we be out of all this trouble if the note were there?I don't believe that was required, Your Honor.Why not, it was part of the contract.Well, the guarantee itself, the SBA form, which Mo Baer testified that is the government mandated for this type of a loan, this type of loan guarantee form.And the bank, I believe he stated, cannot deviate from that form.It lays out who the parties are.It lays out the amount of indebtedness that is being guaranteed.I think here it was 306,000 if I'm not mistaken, and lays out the additional terms of the guarantee.So I don't believe there's any indication that it was required to attach the note, as it is our position the guarantee laid out the necessary terms for Mr. Darnell to review that document, which he had two opportunities to do after it was sent down to him and he faxed back his signature page.I would note, he admitted that it was his signature, that faxed signature.He admitted that it was generated from his home phone number in Tennessee.Mr. Baer testified as well that prior to this, whenever Mr. Darnell filled out the SBA guarantee application, he also faxed up that application with his signature on it from that same phone number.And Mr. Darnell, I believe, just for full statement of what was the testimony, I believe he indicated he didn't recall faxing it up, or he is not the one that faxed up the May 17th signature page, but his wife may very well have done so.However, as a matter of housekeeping, and I think as Justice Cates referred to as dotting the I's crossing the T's earlier, Bo Baer testified that after he, that it was not required, in the bank's eyes, to close the loan to have an original signature on hand for this guarantee, but it would be preferable for housekeeping purposes to, quote unquote, clean up the file I think were Mr. Baer's words, to have an original signature.So after he didn't receive one, which was his understanding, and I may be mistaken, but I think in the record Mr. Baer testified that it was on his understanding in talking to Mr. Darnell ahead of sending him the guarantee, in one of these phone conversations perhaps, that he was under the impression he was gonna be getting it in the mail subsequently.And it did not arrive.There was reference to possibly it was lost in the mail.That's Bo Baer's testimony.So in order to dot the I's and cross the T's, he sends it back down to Tennessee, testified at trial that it was the identical document short of the May 17 signature, it had a blank signature spot and date spot.And he did receive that back.So Mr. Darnell had two opportunities to review this document showing the amount of indebtedness, showing what he was guaranteeing, and executed it both times.So you believe the record is clear that Mr. Darnell indicated that the guarantee he received in June was the same one that he received in May?I don't believe he testified to that, Your Honor.Right, I didn't think so.I think Bo Baer testified to that, that he sent the identical guarantee down.Right, but Mr. Darnell - Correct.has no recollection of that?I believe that's accurate.Yes, Your Honor.Okay.But Mr. Baer, again, when we look at the SBA form, it doesn't have an interest rate, obviously.It does state the name of the borrower, the guarantor, the lender, the date of the transaction, loan number, principal amount, all of that, - Yes, Your Honor.and does not require the promissory note to be attached.That's correct, Your Honor.And I would add, in terms of opposing counsel's argument that the interest rate was an essential term to be included in the guarantee, there is no authority under Illinois law cited in their brief.I have not found authority stating you got to have the interest rate in the guarantee for it to be legally valid.The only reference made in the briefs is to the US, I believe it's US versus Fitzgerald case out of the seventh circuit, which I would note, as I noted in our brief, is the seventh circuit applying Indiana law specifically.And they do indicate that interest rate is an essential term along with the amount of indebtedness, but we don't have an Illinois authority on that.I don't think it's required.And again, as has been noted a few times here, this was an official small business administration form.Does not provide a space for inserting the interest rate.And Bo Baer testified at trial that he could not deviate from the requirements of that form.So we believe that the May 17 signed guarantee, that signature page was valid and enforceable, as the trial court found, as it was executed before closing.And it's our position that the June 20th signature was part of the same transaction.Again, was a housekeeping matter.We dispute, we completely disagree with the notion that additional consideration was required for that June 20th guarantee, or that we somehow couldn't sue under that June 20th guarantee, because it was subsequent to the May 18th closing.This is arising out of the same transaction.This, you have a clear layout in the testimony of Mr. Baer of the sequence of events that led to that June 20th signature and the entire document, I believe, coming up in the mail, and not just the signature page this time.It's out of the same transaction.Granted, it's a little more than a month later, but it was to tie up any loose ends.Bo Baer testified, he was comfortable moving forward on May 18th with the closing.If he would have needed an original signature on that guarantee ahead of the May 18th or at the May 18th closing, when all he had in his hand was the faxed signature, he wouldn't have closed the loan.And we're talking about a government backed loan here for a substantial amount of money.It's not something anybody's gonna play around with or cut corners on, and that wasn't done here.We do cite, in reference to the June 20 signature being contemporaneous to the May 18 closing, we cite the LDS case out of the appellate court, which found similarly a guarantee executed several days later, I think six days later in that instance, because of the facts and circumstances in that case, didn't require additional consideration.It arose out of that same underlying transaction.Granted, we had a larger number of days here, but I think the testimony was clear at trial as to why that was.They gave it some time to see if they got the original signatures in, and sent it back out.I'm still bothered a bit by the note, and I'll tell you why.I understand this was an SBA form that could not be altered, but the court, in striking the affirmative defenses, made a docket entry on June 15th, 2017 that indicates that the terms of the guarantee are the same as the note.It refers, the court is referring to a note.And the bank, I think, filed a motion to strike these affirmative defenses.And I'm looking for the note.Did you attach the note to the affirmative defenses?I mean, to your motion to strike?I don't recall.Where did the court come up with this note?Well, Your Honor, this was a two count complaint filed.Count one was a foreclosure action, where the note certainly would have been attached as an exhibit.I don't recall off the top of my head without consulting page by page in the record of whether the note was attached as an exhibit to count two, which was enforcement of the guarantee, but it was part of the complaint under consideration by the court, certainly.Through the foreclosure?So the note was, I'm sorry, Your Honor?Through the foreclosure, you're right.It was that.That's correct, Your Honor.Yes, but I do apologize.I don't recall off the top of my head whether it was an exhibit or attached in those earlier pleadings regarding striking the affirmative defenses, whether the note was attached or not.But certainly- - But it seems the court looked at the note in making its decision to strike the affirmative defenses, because it specifically references the note.And yet both counsel indicate the note was not the subject of the trial.That's correct, Your Honor.But I would, again, reiterate that the guarantee itself included the amount of indebtedness, included whose obligation it was that Mr. Darnell was providing a guarantee for, and the bank to whom it was being made, and the additional terms that applied.And I would note in terms of the issue of the alleged fraud, which the court struck that affirmative defense, I did, Your Honor asked a question of opposing counsel about the notice of appeal.I do not see reference to the affirmative defense as being stricken in the notice of appeal, just to answer your question on that, if I may.Thank you.But on the fraud issue, I believe Your Honor, Justice Cates had talked about going outside the four corners of that agreement.And I would note that within the four corners of that agreement, we certainly take the position that you do not under the law go outside the four corners.This is a contract.I agree with Mr. Terlizzi on that.This is a binding contract, and contract law applies.We don't go beyond the four corners.And within those four corners is the statement, in all caps, \"Oral statements not binding\".And then it continues in regular font, \"Guarantor may not use an oral statement to contradict or alter the written terms of the note or this guarantee, or to raise a defense to this guarantee\".That was noted, I believe, by the trial court when it struck the affirmative defense, and we believe it's a vital term of the guarantee Mr. Darnell had at his disposal to review.I would also note, we've cited a couple of cases in our brief on this issue, Northern Trust case and the Rose case.Rose came out of this district, I would add, are instructive on the issue.The courts in those cases held that an alleged oral promise is not binding to establish fraud where the guarantor had an opportunity to review the written agreement and did in fact sign it.The Northern Trust court had a good quote, and that cited the Rose case, when it stated, \"A party cannot close his eyes to the contents of a document, and then claim that the other party committed fraud merely because it followed this contract\".I think that's exactly what we have here.We have this loan that, to use Mr. Terlizzi's words, went south, and which nobody, and the bank included, wants to see happen when you enter into these transactions.But now the individual who backed up that loan with a guarantee, an unconditional SBA guarantee, now wants to try to get out of that obligation and is, you know, making these arguments to do so.There was, and I would agree with the discussion earlier, why did we even get into the fraud testimony at trial whenever that was stricken as an affirmative defense?And for whatever reason, and I think council's correct, it came through an offer of proof, but there was ample testimony there for the court to take into consideration and judge the credibility of the witnesses.I think testimony on that issue came from Mr. Baer, from Mr. Thorson, the borrower in this loan, and from Mr. Darnell and his wife about a meeting with Bo Baer back in February ahead of the May closing, and statements that were made.And Mr. Baer did state that he often in these types of transactions gets that question, can I be released, you know, so many years after the closing of the loan?And he indicated that he gives his standard canned answer, that we can certainly consider that, you can apply for it, make that request.If the loan is in good standing, all obligations are met, and if the business, this is a business loan, is showing a positive cashflow and in good standing, then that can be considered.And I believe Bo Baer testified, and I think it's noted in our brief, that he does not recall Mr. Darnell ever making that request subsequently.And we have...What was the, this loan was an old loan, in other words, it had been going on a period of time.About five years, Your Honor, yes.And what interested me is the fact that Mr. Darnell testified that after three years he was supposed to be released.It seems counterintuitive that if you want to be released from a guarantee, you don't know the terms.I mean, if you're seeking to be released and now you claim you didn't have a contract, I'm not sure how that squares up.But.I would certainly concur with that, Your Honor, And I would further state that I don't believe there's testimony that, and I do not believe, going from memory, that Mr. Darnell testified that he did ask to be released subsequently.There was also testimony presented, I would note, that within the first two years of the loan, the alleged promise here that they are alleging is to be released after two years because, and the reason given is because his farm operating loan was coming due in three years, I believe, if I'm not mistaken.And so here, we had testimony at trial from the bank that, and I believe from Mr. Thorson as well, that within the first two years of this loan, you know, after the 2012 loan was made, within the first two years, he hadn't met all his obligations because he hadn't paid the property taxes on the mortgaged property.So already, just kind of extrapolating out or going in the hypothetical, if it would have been requested that Mr. Darnell be released, he probably wouldn't have been because the loan wasn't in good standing.But that's essentially neither here nor there.Another point I would make on the fraud issue, as we note in our brief, is the Illinois Credits Agreement Act, which lays out that a credit agreement has to be in writing, all of its terms must be in writing, and that the parties cannot seek to enforce oral, verbal terms to modify a written credit agreement.And we cite the Bank One Springfield versus Rossetti case, I believe out of the fourth district, that applied that act specifically to a guarantee like we have here.It indicated that- - Do you really think we need to do that in this case?I don't think you need to even get to that point.I think you don't have to, you certainly don't have to - Why would we?go beyond, I'm sorry, Your Honor?Why would we get to that point?Well, just simply as an alternative theory, if we're not gonna go beyond the four corners of the agreement and get into the alleged promises made orally by the bank, and if we don't adhere to the term that I quoted earlier, oral statements are not binding, then simply as an alternative theory, then I think it's barred by statute even to go down that road.But I certainly submit that we don't have to get that far.So what do you think our standard of review is?Do you think that we would interpret this contract de novo, or do we look at the court's orders against the manifest weight of the evidence?Well, certainly I think we look at the court's order, its verdict after hearing the evidence, and it would be a manifest weight of evidence standard.I think we note that in our brief.I do do agree that issues of law are to be reviewed de novo, but I don't think you get beyond that here on those issues.I think the court heard the testimony about how the guarantee came about.The court heard testimony about, the court has the black and white terms of that guarantee.The court on the other issue that hasn't been touched upon about the sale itself and the judgment amount, the court certainly had ample testimony, and we believe that that standard would apply to it, as the court was the trier of fact in this case.Simply touching on the sale issue, certainly we believe there was ample evidence shown at trial that it was a fair and reasonable sale, a fair and reasonable price.The bank, it was a properly noticed sale.None of the grounds by which a confirmation of a foreclosure sale would be denied under the mortgage foreclosure law are present here.We don't have fraud in the sale.Terms were not unconscionable.Simply Mr. Darnell asserts in this appeal that the price was too low, so therefore the deficiency judgment that he owes is too high.But the bank didn't simply throw a dart at the dart board, pick a number out of the air.It had an appraisal commissioned about two months before the sale by Kleeman, and Mr. Kleeman provided testimony via evidence deposition at trial and went into great detail, not only about this appraisal from 2017, I think November 2017 before the January 2018 sale, about the comparable sales he used, which is the preferred approach, and about even a 2012 appraisal that was commissioned back when this loan was first formed.And wasn't Mr. Darnell present at the sale?He was, and in fact, Your Honor, he was a bidder on the sale.This wasn't your typical, and I do bank work, just like Mr. Terlizzi noted, and this wasn't your typical foreclosure sale at the courthouse lobby, where the only one showing up is the bank or the bank's attorney making a bid, and that's it.We had another bidder, and it was Darnell himself.And the bank opened its bidding at 85% of the appraised price.I think Jason Russell from the bank testified to that, as he was the bidder on behalf of Peoples Bank.And so I think that was 76,500.And at the appraisal price was- - Go ahead and finish.Thank you, Your Honor.The appraised price was 90,000.After Mr. Darnell upped the bidding after the initial bid, then the bank bid 90,000 and bought the property for 90,000.We believe the evidence at trial supports that.We ask the court affirm.Thank you so much.Thank you.Mr. Terlizzi?Counsel said that the bank could have sued on the June 2012 full guarantee.But woulda, coulda, shoulda doesn't work in court.They did not sue on it.They, in fact, we didn't even know about it until trial.So they sued on the May- - You didn't know about the June document - The June guarantee.when your client signed it?Well, yeah, I mean- - I mean, you may not have known.I didn't know.He should have known about it.He didn't remember a whole lot, if you read your transcript about this.I mean, he was helping out a buddy.He signed apparently once where he was told to sign, and I mean, that's pretty good help.He's apparently a good friend.I mean, to commit yourself to that.But they didn't, they sued, and they didn't sue on a quantum meruit theory.They didn't sue on estoppel theory that he had to be estopped because it was detrimental reliance.They sued on a contract.And so the question this court has to answer is, is that May guarantee a contract?Was there a meeting of the minds of the essential terms of this contract?And I don't think it's a good defense for the bank to say the SBA made me do it.I mean, the SBA form is an SBA form that I think probably anticipated it's gonna be signed contemporaneous with the loan, and this issue never arises.But if it's signed beforehand, I mean, there's no law that I know of, federal law.You're not gonna go to federal prison if you add a thing on there, \"See note attached as exhibit A, that is intended to be signed\".Because when you sign the guarantee before the note, the note doesn't exist.I mean, maybe Darnell change his mind, not even show up, and go somewhere else, get a better interest rate or something.So, you know, there had to, you don't have a contract without a meeting of the mind of the essential terms.And yes, Fitzgerald is decided under Indiana law.And yes, neither one of us has found a precise Illinois case that deals with does a pre-signed guarantee have to disclose the interest rate.But boy, we could cite you 20 or 30 or 100 Illinois cases that say a contract, you have to have a meeting of the minds on the essential terms, whether it's real estate contract, a loan contract, whatever.In order to affirm this decision.I think this court has to be prepared to say in its opinion, and this is simply a matter of law, not manifest weight or any interpretation of the facts, has to say that an interest rate is not an essential term of a loan.A court can supply that.Whether it's between the original debtor and creditor or whether it's a guarantor, it's not important, it's not essential, and you don't have to agree on that to have an enforceable contract.I think that would be astounding.Do you think that such a bright-line rule is advisable in a contract case, to say that every contract or every guarantee must have an interest rate set forth, or there can't possibly be a meeting of the minds?Well, how can you have a loan, without an agreement on the interest rate, a meeting of the minds, isn't that an essential term of every loan contract?But a meeting of the minds is somewhat subjective, isn't it?And you want us to impose an objective test.Well you, but I don't think it's subjective in this case, I mean, any more than like on a real estate contract, you have to have a meeting of the minds on the description and on the price, when it's payable, I mean those essential terms.That's not coming up with any new, surprising case law, but every contract you have to, the question, I guess the question of law is what are the essential terms in each particular contract.And I don't think how you could conceivably say with a straight face that an interest rate and an amortization is not an essential term of a loan contract.I mean, again, isn't that the first question any potential borrower asks?\"What are you gonna charge me?I want to shop the rate.I'm gonna see if I can get a better rate over here.If you're going to charge me five, maybe I can get four from\".But this note in paragraph nine, I'm sorry, this guarantee, I want to be very careful.In paragraph 9H, evidently says, \"Oral statements not binding.Guarantor may not use an oral statement to contradict or alter the written terms of the note or this guarantee,\" and then it goes on, \"or to raise a defense\".It seems to me that when you sign something like that, there's at least a presumption or whatever that you read the note.But Your Honor, that presupposes that what you signed is a valid and binding contract.And let's suppose the name of was blank.I'm sorry, the name of what?Let's suppose the principal amount was blank, the debtor was blank, and he'd still sign it.I mean, he would sign it, that clause would still be in there, but would that be a contract?Well, I guess we'll find out on another day.But thank you, Mr. Terlizzi.And you have to go beyond the four corners to look at the note, to know, you have to.I mean, that guarantee doesn't speak for itself.Thank you.So you're asking the court reverse?Yes, Your Honor, thank you.Thank you, Mr. Terlizzi.Okay, this matter 5-19-0104 will be taken under advisement.Thank you, counsel, for your arguments.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-19-0104.2019-10-29.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-19-0104.2019-10-29.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/gov.uscourts.illappct.5-19-0104.2019-10-29.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/snafuinfinitylight-board_061818-CL19/light-board_061818-CL19.mp3", "text": "Good evening and welcome to the June 18th, 2018, Belmont Municipal Light Board meeting.I'm Chair Adam Dash.With me is Vice Chair Mark Paolillo.Good evening eat from high above.Good evening Mark.And with us also is a Board Member Tom Caputo.Good evening.Good evening Tom.And of course Chris, Roy, Maria, Aidan from Light Department and we are here coming to you live from the town hall auditorium up on the stage.And we're going to be having a couple of mess, community announcements before we start.One is Belmont Light will be at the Farmer's Market on Thursday, this Thursday, June 21st from 2:00 to 6:30 p.m. Stop by and chat.And also Belmont Drive's Electric is having its next Drive Event to look at the electric cars and test drive them on June 24th from 1:00 to 4:00 at the Chenery Middle School.So, first item on the agenda, presentation of quarter one 2018 financials.Everyone should have an updated version of that.And Chris, Maria, take it away.Please Maria?Okay.Yeah, so.This is updated though, right Maria?We got it at quarter one?Yeah, It's just, we tweaked a little bit of wording - Okay, sure.Based on our meeting - I just wanted to understand that.With all that.Thank you, okay?So we run the first quarter financials and the results were presented to you in the memorandum and the attached balance sheet and PNL. And I want to just guide you a little bit through it, but basically were pretty stable.There are no surprises in our financials for the first quarter.Our first quarter revenues increased by 70,000 comparing to the last year, first quarter results.The sales skill of our sales revenues was 88,000, or 1% higher.And that's caused by the increase in kilowatt hour sales.Other revenues decreased by 10,000 due to decline in income associated with the wire recycling in '18 because we don't do, we do it as soon as we like replace the wire.We recycle the old wire and it generates the other income.Purchase power expenses increased by almost 700,000 at 22%.And that was the last there was a decrease in transmission cost, due to the savings related to the kind of would from Eversource and the elimination of Eversource charges.Purchase power expenses increased by almost 84,000 or 37%.And the significant increases related to increase in Forward Capacity Market charges, which like makes most of this amount.Can you explain what that is?Ahhh - Yeah, I mean, I guess, I know you said there wasn't any surprises, but this is a pretty significant increase.It is.We have a $700,000 increase.So am I adding this up correctly Maria?We have 7,000 plus, - No no no, no.700,000 plus 8 3 9 is a total of 8 3 9.No. The power production expenses includes two line.This is energy and transmission.Oh, I see.So the total.So the transmission goes down, but energy for what Forward Capacity Market charges, as a part of an energy charge, it goes up significantly.So total increase in power.Total increase is 700.Purchase power.What's the 839?839, it's a component.If you look into the beach.Yeah, it's kind of tiny, kind of hard to read, - Four, the last page.Is it 700 plus and 839 increase, or is that?Just 700.It's just 700 in total.Yeah, so nevertheless, we rephrased it.It looks like there is still a confusion on how it is formulated, but do you want to.No, I'll just add.So 839 is.oh, 839 is minus the 140.Yes sir.Yes.but through transmission cost savings, but our power production expenses based on this for-, like Adam asked.I have no idea what FCM stands for.That's what I'm asking, yeah.What is that?yeah.Okay, now I didn't understand the bulk numbers, so thank you.Just got right back to the same place.So that's fine, so.So that's a pretty significant increase.Yes.So. Forward Capacity Market , in a nutshell is basically the payments that we need to make that ISO sets the rate.So the, each utility has a set load amount that they monitor, and then they set the rates that they set aside a certain pool of money to make sure there's enough capacity on the system to support the regional network needs of ISO. And so in order to collect that money, they have these Forward Capacity auctions, and then the generators essentially bid in, into this Market .This was kind of what was created through Deregulation 1997.And so they bid in the different Market rates.And so if you take a look at the graph.Yeah.That's included in the packet.There was a graph attached.This graph, it should be in the a package.I'm not sure if it's attached to this, - No it's not attached to this package here.Probably, as a separate.Yeah I did see that.So what I did, I just compared for, with Forward Capacity Market charges and transmission charges, rates for the period, starting 2013, up to 2021.And looking into the, I can give you mine.I have it, I have it.Okay.Somewhere, around here, somewhere.So if you look into the graph, the blue line is exactly related to the Forward Capacity Market.Is the FCA, is not the same thing as FCM?FCA is a charge, FCM. - Is the Markets.So for capacity, FCA is the auction within the Market.Okay.And so, Forward Capacity auction number eight is somewhat of a controversial auction that generated this large price spike for every utility in the region.And, so there was some litigation involved with that, where there was some Market manipulation and threats by certain generators that said, if you know, this is all alleged, this is not, you know, a ruling of any kind, but basically what the sense was that there was some withholding of generation assets based on results of favorable Market rules.And so there's been some litigation to try and fix that, but I think, I don't know if there were settlements and this, some of this ties together with the ENE Strategies agenda item later to be involved in some of this.I mean, is it you're showing on this chart that it's going to drop down?It's going to drop.And that's, I think due in large part to there's some generation coming online.There's folks that recognize FCA was kind of an outlier and unacceptable in many ways.And so we're looking at it to drop.And so tying in with the PPTA memo, that's also included in the packet, it's somewhat of a retroactive approach that we're looking to take, but in many cases, what we're hoping, moving forward is, if we monitor these Markets more actively, we can set a PPTA price in advance.And so, cause everyone's in the same boat, it's not an office.Is it just Municipalities that are impacted by this Chris?Every utility that's in ISO New England.And so we can implement a PPTA knowing this is coming down the pike and kind of ramp into it.So there isn't a rate shock.But so instead in this particular case, just because that wasn't an established initially, we're looking at a PPTA recommendation for discussion here, - Yeah.Of two mils, basically 0.2 tenths of a penny.And so what we're hoping to do is leverage, you mentioned the downward curve.We're hoping to leverage the downward curve to keep a PPTA in place, even though prices go down, we can kind of retroactively collect.Is this going to be something that we're going to experience the same number every quarter?Or is this like the worst quarter and then it goes down immediately, or it's not going down until the next year.It's an annual, so it'd be going down next year.So you're going to have this 37% increase every quarter for this year?In this item?I think that 30.Yeah, so, but if the forecast was each quarter, yes, there would be 30% higher each quarter.How is that not going to impact the rates by the end of the year?Well, so that's a good question.Wait, so part of this, so with the PPTA, with the two tenths of a penny, so if you, Maria included a calculation in that memo that shows for annual forecast, I hope they don't mind I'm jumping in.Yeah, yeah.That's all right.And so this annual forecast shows that 37% increase results in just under $700,000 in additional costs that we would have to recover.What are you looking at?There is a second memo with a, it's calLED, \"Purchase Problem Transmission Adjustment Rate Review\".Part of the package you gave us?It should be probably, it.It looks like this.Oh, that's it, that's in the same.Alright.I was looking for a different packet, but it was in this one.So, if you follow, so just to give you the noteworthy line items, the most noteworthy, the top line item that starts in green.Green is actuals.And then once it turns white, these are forecast and numbers or actual sales.And so basically based on those figures, you know, we've forecast the expenses.And so then the line Forecast Purchase Power Cost, that's where you'd see this increased Forward Capacity Market charge.That's now incorporated into the model.And then that gives you the resulting last line there prior period, over under recovery, following that through to the end.That's $691,000.For the year.For the year.And so that's what we're looking to collect over a certain amount of time.And that, that period of time and the collection amount is subject to the PPA, PPTA discussion.So that 37-ish percent or maybe a little lower is gonna be the number then.Correct.Is what you're saying.Correct.For the year - For the year.Not for the quarter, - Correct.It wouldn't, it's not a compounding.I was getting a little scared there.Yeah - Good to hear that.I'm glad to hear that.So again, this is affecting every utility, - Correct.experiencing the same things there.Does that mean that most utilities will be changing their rates this year as a result?Or is this absorbed into budgets more easily?Or are we disproportionately impacted?So the one I had involvement, been involved with this and my prior experience, we, it's the same discussion except in advance.So we ramped up rates in advance.And so folks wouldn't notice it over 18 months in anticipation of this year, this would more be a retroactive implementation.And we have a rates tab fund?Yes, and we're planning to use it as well.And the general speaking, we are trying to change an approach to PPTA in general and just use it like use a small, collect, a small amount of money every month, instead of just charging the actual based on the calculations and either collect it and use rates, stabilization fund to offset what is under collected throughout the year, or transfer whatever we over collected through PPT to raise stabilization fund and just to keep the rate more less flat instead of changing PPT rate, you know, every few months as we used to do.So I see you've got the, so that you've got on the panel, you've got $3 million in the rate stabilization reserve.Yes.Where in the budget, is it showing that coming out?I didn't see it.Like how much of it are you planning on using.It's in the memo.So what the memo says, we are.This is just quarter one.Yeah.Yeah, it's just quarter one.And it's, you know, like I'm truing up expenses and it changes, we don't know how July would be and what would be the August, like weather wise, and how much we will collect, and what would be the purchase power, cause.So it's, it's like ask tonight.What's the projection, projected amount you'd be taken out of the stabilization fund?Right now, we're looking into 300 and then I need to discuss it with my auditors whether we will roll forward, down the collection for this year, to the next year, and continue collecting certain amount of money through PPTA, or we will, again, offset from the rate stabilization fund.And the amount would be, I would say like another 500, maybe less.To make up for the 690, to, for recovery - Right.The full 691, - Yes, right.Yeah.Over and just expenses for the year.Correct.So our net, it's not expenses, it's the net loss, in net loss .Absolutely, yeah.And that's, I'm sorry.Is that something that can be predicted, this sort of rate, I mean, this cost of Purchase Power, is that something?Sure, the auction prices, I'd have to double check.I'd get ahead of that.I believe the auction price, the auction, the Forward Capacity auctions are held two years out.So you would know, three years, thank you.Three years in advance.So we should know.Say another price by cap happens today, We should be able to ramp up a rate stabilization fund now.So you wouldn't see it three years from now.Yeah but to ramp up the rate stabilization fund, that means you increase rates.Correct.How does one take money out of the stabilization fund?Is it the same as with The town side, where there's has to be a vote?I think we've, haven't we voted in that?I haven't had to deal with taking money out of this rate stabilization fund.I thought we drew that down to reserve that we, or you, or I think the Board you presented to the Board and we approved it?You approved the transfer to rate stabilization fund.Is that something that on the 164, you do?Or. - That's my question.I just want to know, does it come back to us?I don't know Adam.I'm asking, you know, - I thought we had done it before, but yeah.Not since I've been on the Board for sure.Sure my thought was somewhat, I guess it's indirect.So we were bringing a recommendation of increasing to males.So by association, you would have to take the remaining under collection from.So I guess by, by approving a two mil increase, subsequent to that, it would be an approval.I think when the money comes, when you're looking to take the money out of the stabilization fund, you probably should come to us for the vote.Sure.I believe so, yeah.I guess we get an approval from you to transfer to rates tab.So logically, yeah.I was just trying to find the procedure.And we, anyway, we'll report on the, like closer to the year end, we will report on the results, and the most recent drop, and where we stand, and what is like on the collection amount is, and what we plan to do.And if we decide to take like 300 or 600 from rates tab, we'll come to you and we will tell you what our strategy would be.Alright, well, this is what the rate stabilization fund is for, so I don't have a particular issue with using this as an unforeseen oddity.When you look at the chart, it's just a spike and there's, what are you going to do?But the, it's not unique to us.I guess the thing is going to be important to keep an eye on the quarterlies, I guess, for us.When do you, so we want to make sure we get to see the quarterlies in a timely fashion, because, keep track of this number in particular.When do you think we'd have the Q2?Q2.How many do we at the end to that?I would say August.That would be about the same as the timing from Q1 to now.Alright.But this should already be baked in for the rest of the year from an expense perspective.The only uncertainty is how do the rest of the lines in the budget, or is there some unpredictability?It's no, it's like there is a projection and there is an actual expense.And sometimes it's the rates.And I have to, based on the reality, it depends on the weather.It depends on manufacturers.And sometimes I have to adjust it.That's the problem with this kind of, like with Purchase Power Expense, it's in most cases, not that predictable as you would wish to.So what, all right, so what's been negotiated for clarity is the rate.You don't quite know - We quite know how much.What sales will be, or your demand will be.Absolutely.Hot Summer, could be a cold summer.Okay, so there will be some very broad.Alright, well.Is there anything else we need to do to protect ourselves against this affecting future auctions?Is there anything that can be done or is this just anyone who is in New England is dealing with the same exact thing with no ability to insulate yourself from.Sure, in certain terms of rates, as we take a really close look at how our rates are structured, that's the piece that we have the least control over, being the power supply component.We can go out and secure capacity contracts to hedge against that, you know, an energy contracts, but in terms of how ISO forces us to incur oxen charges, it's we just have to maintain that stabilization account to ride out the spikes that we have no control over.Buy over oil futures.Hedge.Hedge.Okay.So is there anything else under the budget?I mean, that's probably the elephant in the room on that court Q1, right?Yeah.Well, there's some fluctuation between different type of expenses.I don't know.I can go through them if you wish, but it's, it's all here.There's nothing unexpected.It's just movement from one bucket to another.I mean, the Light Department's budget's not terribly difficult to figure out because you buy power and you sell power, kind of what it is, except for whatever spike like this, it's something odd.Other than that it's relative.But you're looking to increase the rate here at some point, effective July 1st?We are looking to Purchase Power and Transmission adjustment, which was waived for the first half of the year.So you want to implement it as of July 1st.As of July 1st and yes.At two cents.No, not two cents.Two tenths.Two mil.Two tenths of a penny.So that would generate about $127,000 in additional revenue, - For six months.For the six months remaining in the year.So that's the effect on the average bill, the penny was about 10 or 10 to $15.So you're, you're looking at year per month?Per month.Yeah, but this is much less.So you're talking, right.So proportionally two bucks.A couple of months.Yeah, so the idea was to take the burden off the customers, so it's not that noticeable how we would collect.You'll recover some of it, - Yes, and would still re- - Like you don't pull down from the rate stabilization fund for, at the end of the year, perhaps.And you said roll, Maria you said to roll it forward to some of the underage to next year.Yeah, but we will be, like reviewing it closer to the end of the year.Is this the, is this the budget?I'm sorry, the agenda item you want to take this up under?I...Because you need to vote on the mils, I would assume.Yes.So I think - Because you're looking for a motion to set up a charge of $0.0108, effective July 1st, 2018.No no no.No, 0.002, I think.It's not.Yeah, it's the different memo.So it's like the second to last.I'm reading the first memo, alright.Hold on.All right, I see.It's the motion would be to recommend setting the purchase power and transmission adjustment, PPTA to a rate of $0.002, effective July 1st, 2018.And keep the rate flat in the foreseeable future.Correct?Yeah.Second.All in favor?Aye.You're not asking for a vote on the rate stabilization fund.We'll deal with that maybe in August or see where that - sure.Where it leads us.And we look at the fund balance quarterly, so we can take it up at any quarter presentation.Okay.Just keeping an eye on the time, But we'll.It took longer than I expected, but that was a big, big thing.Discussion on current, no charge LED bulb distribution.I was at the el Back meeting last week with Chris and this was discussed.So you want to explain what this is?Sure.So basically our, one of our current programs is to give away a free bulb every time you pay your bill - In person.And so, while it might necessarily seem trivial on the surface, it actually is quite expensive and has a significant administrative burden on the folks, the customer service folks.And so one of the handouts you see in front of you, just to, for a point of reference, that's the program details since its inception.In one noteworthy point in 2016, the partway through the year was changed to LEDs. So that's why you'd see the jump from '16 to '17.And so last year in '17, we're looking at almost $16,000 in a program.And then through May of '18 we're on track for more closer to $17,000, maybe $18,000.And so what we were looking to do is, you know, in terms of keeping the big picture in mind, in terms of the cap goals and offering programs that encourage energy efficiency, and you know, on that theme.It's really difficult, If not impossible to track, if you give out a bulb to someone who pays the bill in person, we really don't have any idea if that has a positive impact to energy and there's no limit.So if you have, if your house is already fully LED, You could end up with a significant amount of surplus bulbs.We've had a number of difficult customer exchanges around this program.So I should mention that it does not include eliminating bulbs from events, community events, or audits.And so the other thought behind that is we offer these audits.And so we'd almost, We'd prefer folks to get these bulbs through audits because then it also opens the door, the other energy efficiency measures.And do you know you're replacing - No. - an incandescent bulb with an LED instead of someone who's all LED and it just comes every month to get a bulb to put it on eBay or something.Exactly.And so.I just save them up, right?Yeah.I mean, that's the basics of this is, because we went through this a lot at el Back, is that, it's just the people that go to the window and pick it up, who get the free bulb to pay their bill in person of which most people don't, most people don't pay their bill in person.And actually would encourage people to pay their bill remotely, so they don't drive down to Belmont Light to get the free bulb.And then incur the cost of, actually office cost - of handling payment, Right?Yes.That is not the behavior we want to drive from a cost...Ordering bulbs, storing bulbs, yeah.And el Back's feeling was that stopping this particular program was worthwhile.And then Chris's idea was to take the savings and put it towards a program that would better meet the climate action plan goals that would be a little more rebates for heat pumps or rebates for something else that, you know, solar panels or whatever, you know, that was more directly related to the climate action plan and giving someone a free light bulb which at this, and then this was, to be fair, when the program was started, LED bulbs were relatively new and we're trying to get people to actively switch over.But I think at this point, it's almost harder to find an incandescent light bulb.I think people are switching over or have switched over.So the need to get people on Board with the new technology isn't really there.And that was a consumer education campaign at the time, right?It's less around consumer education.Let's find the next thing we want to .Yes.Up at town day and at the Farmer's Market, they'll still continue to give out the bulbs.Yeah, actually what the public thing.But it's not the same people that come every month and get bulb, bulb, bulb, bulb, bulb every month.So, I mean, those are the, I guess Chris was asking whether we were okay with getting rid of that, \"No\", \"The Free LED Bulb, hen you pay your bill in person\" program, and have Chris redirect the money to where he feels is important to achieve climate action plan goals.So I guess that's the motion.Yes, sir.That sounds great.Did you get that?It was kinda meandering.3000 bulbs, right?Yes.It's not 3000 people.It's the same people coming back month after month.And members of their family, according to this.And there's some people, unfortunately, have abused the program, but that's not a thing, but some people have.I'm fine.Want to make a motion.Yeah, so I move to eliminate the, what's it called?Well it's whatever .The Bulb Payment, The Bulb and a LED Bulb Distribution Program is currently, - For Paying Your Bills in Person.Paying Your Bills in Person.And to have Chris find another climate action.And you could use the savings for other sort of climate action plan initiatives.Second.All in favor?Aye.Aye.I never came down to get a bulb.I didn't even know the program existed.I don't pay it in person.But discussion on possible membership and ENE Strategies.This was also discussed at el Back.And this is about subscribing to the lobbying arm of Energy New England regarding the programs, and having a seat at the table, and having a say, and the way to get tech support.And that it's about $600 a month.And it seemed like Chris's - It seemed like a really good idea.And Chris has suggested it as something that would be, we could do and try it for a year.And if it doesn't work, we don't have, there's no obstacle to it.right?So, yeah.There's a list of the other towns that do, And it's like a lot of the ones we, as a Municipal Light Department, hold ourselves as our peers.If you look at the list here, there's 23 of them on here and they're the ones we all call our peers and they all are members.So it might be good to have us.What do they provide?So page two, - Yeah, I saw that.Is the proposal.And so basically they get to know us and they can provide, you know, materials for public education.They can come to, I believe there's two meetings in this proposal.They can come to board meetings and talk about current events, but most importantly, they have a significant presence.And so that gives us a point of contact into future events, you know, future programs on the state level to also, you know, inject our point of view on how these programs should be structured.And, you know, and basically in the name of moving the Belmont Mission forward.Do you think this is a good, you're recommending this to us?I recommend, definitely.Questions?No, two quick comments.I guess one would be, it sounds like the type of thing where if you ask for help, you probably get it and you get to use the services.And if you don't, they're just happy to collect your 600 bucks, - Yes.And not do anything.So it sounds like it's one where just make sure that we're actively taking advantage of the benefit.Sure.And I guess the second comment would be, can we just make sure that we look in after a year and make sure it is valuable?Yep.These are the types of line items that just make it year after year into a budget without anybody thinking about it.Is it just from this, ENE, or are these are all isolated?So just Muni's and they actually did secure their first private client.That's First Energy on the list, I believe it was - - I'm sorry, MBTA is on here if you look on the list as well.So they had not for profit ENE?Yes.Thank you.I have a motion to join ENE Strategies?So moved.Second.All in favor?Aye.Aye.Preliminary discussion on moving from the Cost of Service Study to rate design.And this is, do you know, the Cost of Service Study has been ongoing to try to get it where, how our rates are, where they're coming from, and to then by knowing where the rates come from, getting some sort of level of control or shifting around on them.And the Cost of Service Study is not in yet, or at least we haven't seen it yet, but the idea is to, what the next is to talk about the next step, going from the Cost of Service Study, when we get it, to then going to rate design, which means, Chris, you want to take it from there?Dot dot dot.So, yes, I mean, given that there's been a lot of discussion around the Cost of Service Study, I wanted to just basically give a quick update on where we're at.We did a week ago or time's flying, maybe week and a half ago, we had heard a presentation from Utility Financial Services.Basically they went through the results they have now and then asked for more information.And so, but one of the important things that I learned, having been my first interaction with this group in a Belmont context is, so their scope of work, they've looked at basically the bucket of expenses that Belmont Light incurs, and then evaluated how those expenses are incurred by each rate Class.And so the proposal they have before us takes the forecasted climate of the industry and compares it against our current expenditures as they are today.And so there's two follow-up components that I think is for further discussion in the future, being the rate design that comes from...looking at how each rate Class encouraged the expenses.So do we want to increase costs for commercial over residential or industrial, that type of discussion also.It also highlights our ongoing internal effort to put together a financial book, a budget book, if you will, that then looks at each FERC account to understand more about what goes into the bigger picture expenses that were injected into the Cost of Service Study.And so we look at it by each account number.So we'll look at overhead expenses, overhead infrastructure, and expenses, not necessarily overhead, you know, general plant, but that to underground expenses, you know, crew, where our crews spend their, you know, construction time, and that theme.And so that analysis, you know, will supplement the cost of service.Also with the Cost of Service Study, they provide a model that we can then manipulate based on our internal budgeting review.And so those, I think that was what I just was hoping to clarify in terms of the deliverables from the Cost of Service Study, being a model and how each rate Class incurs the existing expenses, and that further then highlights the need for us to look at internally how we're accounting for different activities.So you'll get the Cost of Service Study in, and then you'll make recommendations to us about the next step, I would assume?Correct.Questions?Is just sort of framing of where we're going to go?When's the last time we, have we ever done this?I mean, I don't remember.We did.When was that?We had one Cost of Service Study, but it wasn't very detailed on, in '12, '13.And then I reviewed in '15 when there were like high power costs.They went up significantly and we had to review all our rates in order not to collect through PPT, but collect through the rates because the initial projections were not done properly.But - This is a more detailed role by - That's comprehensive.And is it also something, right.Agreed.And so is it something that you do on a periodic basis?I mean, is it couple of years you do this kind of initiative or is that too difficult?That's how it is supposed to do.You're supposed to do every two to five years, depending on how the, you know, the rates work and what is the industry, what are the industry standards?Because the industry is changing a lot lately, like last few years, it changes a lot with all those like EV initiative - Right.And everything.So we need to look into probably more frequently than we used to.Yeah, I thinks so, that makes sense, right.I think that's the big point.You know, what, in many cases outside of here, out of this individual instance, you know, what was the rule of thumb in a utility 20 years ago?It was rapidly changing to something new and dynamic as we implement storage.And there's higher solar penetration and DG and sales decline.And we look at how fixed costs, you know, what percentage of fixed costs are incurred through meter charges and things like that.And so, you know, the evolution of the industry has prompted more frequent and closer look at how rates are designed.Just keep us informed when the Cost of Service Study comes in.You expect to have that for us when?So our follow up is next week.Next week, Yeah.We need to provide what we did.I think it was July?Yeah.It's hard to say.I would say for, if you're asking me for a conservative date, I'll give you a, I think August.I think a more realistic dates so we can plan what we're doing.Right.Yeah, I think August would probably be the best.Okay.We'll look forward to seeing it.Discussion on future planning meetings with el Back.When I spoke with Steve Kioski the Chair, and this was discussed at the el Back meeting about them wanting to come in and talk to us about what we feel their role is, and sort of how to work together with them and sort of keeping the way we're meeting with the various department committee Chairs in the selectman side.It might be good to bring el Back in and maybe at some point bring in the energy committee and Roger Colton as well to sort of discuss what we, and provide some leadership as to what we want them to do, because we've sort of went with Chris coming in.It's things are sort of going in a different direction with Belmont Light a bit.And so everyone wants to make sure that A, nothing falls through the cracks and B, that we don't, and this was more Steve's issue with no one duplicates work.So if we all make it clear, I mean, I've always had, in my mind, what I felt that el Back's role was to sort of be technical advisors to us who are elected, but have no electrical knowledge whatsoever, but to be technical advisors because they do.I don't even know what they're working on today.I mean, not to say that not working on something, but it'd be helpful to meet with them and to talk those kinds of things.Yeah, I've been going to the meetings.And Chris goes...I know we have a liaison with you, and, but, you know, maybe you meet with them on a quarterly basis in the energy committee, just to sort of level set in terms of some of the initiatives that they may be working on.And the energy committee is beyond Belmont Light, whereas el Back is targeted just to this.Right.Circling back around with them, you know, at least quarterly, no less than quarterly.I think it makes a lot of sense.We want to get them in.I think we talked about July or August, and this leads into the next item, which is discussion of Light Board meeting schedule, because I told them we didn't know when July or August would be, however I wanted, first of all, I wanted to make sure we got the Selectmen schedule for the rest of you're done, - Hmm hmm.which we've now done.So you know what the finite dates would be if you want to piggyback it onto a selectman's meeting.So the question then would be for the next rest of the year, if we could maybe get, while we're here, dates for when we were...el Back's.We have no more Light Board meetings scheduled for the rest of the year.We'd schedule it back in the summer.I scheduled through the end of June.Right.This is the last one.Yep.So now we have to schedule through the of the year.Are these potential dates?I'm a tentative now Adam, on the 16th, but I'm here for the rest of the meetings.Alright, So. - We have to be out of town on the 16th.There's the chart here.So these are the meetings where the Selectmen are meeting.So. - I looked at all of these and that we already had these in our calendars, right?Yup, you should.So other than the 16th, every, all the other meetings were fine for me.The 30th is the night of the Collins Center presentation, which is a joint meeting with the school committee and the warrant committee and the capital budget committee at the Selectmen Seven, not to say we can't do this.Right.I mean, at 5:30, as long as it still works for you.Yeah, I guess the question was, do we typically find we need the full 90 minutes or is it 5:45 start, or.Well it's 6:13.So tonight probably not, but sometimes.It's 11 a.m. - When did we meet 11:00 a.m. on the 21st?What is that?So the 11:00 a.m. on the 21st won't work for me.What is that?Anyway.We, it was 8:00 a.m., actually not 11:00 a.m. - What was that for?We couldn't come up with a second time.Oh, that's right.So we're doing it.It's the 21st at 8:00 in the morning.Well, no, yeah.So the Board Selectmen is at 8:00 in the morning and then this is going to be the follow on it.Oh, I see, gotcha.That's why that was there.But that one will be tough for me.So I won't be able to make that.You can't make the 21st.That's, no...I can make the 21st BOS meeting, but I can't stay until noon.Right, so I'm okay with everything other than the 16th.So July 16th is no.So would July 30th be a Light Board meeting?Sure.Okay.The only thing I just wanted to add in there and just see what you'd like to do.July 30th, one of those rare things, I could have a daughter on July 30th, so I'm available, until...You're not.To that, - That's not a good excuse at all.Oh, the other thing is it's totally unpredictable and you and you want to make the meeting, so.I mean, I prefer to be here, Adam, but you know, if you wanted to go ahead with the 16th is kind of tight as well.I just.No, this isn't planned - Make plans today for me on travel.Maybe be having to be in California, looking at flights, and me have to fly out on the 16th.I think we do the 30th and if you, if something comes up, you let us know, we'll move it, you know?Sure.We have to move, it we'll have to move it.That's certainly a legitimate excuse, Chris.I remember like my wife, my second baby, I had court in the morning and I'm like, I can't call the court at like 11 o'clock at night, so you can't just not show up either.It's tough.So August 20th or 27th, which would be your preference for the Light Board meeting?Either is fine with me.The 27th, since it's 30 days later.Yeah, that's fine.And that would be, that would be the 27th.What's your preference for el Back to bring him in on July 30th or August 27th?Well, we should just, if Chris is going to be out perhaps out.Maybe August 27th, alright.So tell el Back, they were, we told them it would be either the July or August and we gave them this chart.So they knew it was one of four dates.Hmm hmm.So unless Steve says that they can't, they don't have enough people because it's the last week in August or whatever.But, - Hmm hmm.You know, other than that, - Yep.We should be good.And then.I've seen since I can't be here on.September 17th, that would be the September Light Board meeting.Yep.October 1 or 15?I don't carry the one.Let's say 15, because otherwise it's going to be too soon on the September meeting.Okay.You got it?November.You want to just continue on November 19th?Yes.December 17?Yup.And then we'll deal with next year, next year.Perfect.So you get all that Aidan?So I guess the one final question I would have is if we think we need a full 90 minutes, I can work to try to get out if...You want to post them for six o'clock and see where we go?We can do six o'clock and if we need to move them up, because we have a particular large agenda, we could in advance, - Or if it bleeds into the Selectmen's meeting, it has happened before.Yeah.I appreciate we close for 6:00 to 8:00.Many times.Many times.So it's okay if we post them for 6:00 and then the one on, Oh we're not, nevermind.So there only the night ones.Well, you can always adjust them.I mean, if you think that it's going to be 90 minutes, - Well what if...You could always post the Selectmen's meeting at 7:30.Right, well when we get the Cost of Service Study, for instance, that's probably going to be a longer meeting.Yep.el Back, I don't think there's going to be a longer meeting, but it's going to take a little time.And if the Q2's come in August, there's a big mess.Then we need to keep an eye on it.So are you going to be okay?You think August 27th, Maria, for having the Q2's, that's another reason for going late in August.Make sure we get the Q2's - Yep.Okay.Okay, sounds good.Who's on the board meeting?You're going to send out invites Aidan?Alright.We'll meet on the 16th, you know, I may not be here, but you guys can talk - Well, we've got the schedule, we're good.We want you.Okay, okay.Alright, Cool.We have minutes for May 22nd, 2018 and June 4th, 2018, both regular sessions.I didn't see anything in them.I thought they were pretty good.So if anyone has any comments or anything, we'll entertain a motion to approve?So moved.Second.All in favor?Aye.Aye.Aye.Anybody else have anything else?6:18 or, so you're right.45 Minutes to spare.That would have been helpful to start at 6:00.I'm sorry.Chris, Chris.Anything else?I just reading the agenda again.Incinerator site?Oh, update on Solar Plans Feasibility proposed BHS incinerator site.Go ahead.Alright, yeah, I skipped that one.But we're gonna be having a larger discussion at eight o'clock tonight on the incinerator.Do you want to talk about the incinerator and the solar?I could just add my thought here.for this line was just add how that could potentially tie in with the renewable energy credits.Basically in terms of, I should state, in terms of infrastructure standpoint, Belmont Light could support really whatever you'd like to put there, incinerator solar, really anything.It's, you know, line extensions, system engineering.That's just blankets, you know, ability to accept any technology that's there.Yeah, I think at the Selectmen meeting, we talked with you about that about the, just making sure to see if any of the ideas for like the incinerator site were just absolute financial or technical, no go's, - Exactly.So we don't waste any time.And if you're telling me that all of them are doable at some level, then that's kind of all we need to know.Yes.Just preliminaries.Exactly.Any questions?Nope.Well, how do we, I guess the point is, and I'm reading here, their alternative three photovoltaic panels.You're looking at that.That's old though.That's 2000.I know it's old.That's my point.I mean, how do we look at this again, as a possibility?So basically what I talked to Bruce about, he, I guess, and certainly new information, correct me if I'm wrong, but they're conducting a more updated survey, which will basically be used to create a grading plan in a new cap.And so he said basically, any design we're looking at for the cap on area B could accept a ground mounted array in terms of the solar application.But to make that assessment, we would need to know the grading plan because the grading.Okay, that's helpful.But I mean, is there a financial aspects of this in which it's non-viable?Is there a line that needs to be sort of looked at from a threshold perspective to say, this is viable financially, this is not viable financially.Is that something we can get as well or update on?How do we have, we don't have a plan to look at right now.Right, and I've always thought that, you know, solar array center, that would be a nice thing to have.sure.Not withstanding some of the other thoughts that we had, we've been taught.Well it could be in conjunction with some of the other ones.Oh that's right.Yeah.Good point.So it was one mega award enough.I mean, I had heard of, you have to do five.I mean anything the key, I guess here, and this is part of a past fractal survey for this site, with the changing tax credit climate and the renewable energy climate.We're looking at solar plus storage as the new way to make things financially viable.Hmm hmm.Historically speaking, a PPA arrangement by itself, was it enough because the developer could leverage those tax incentives?But moving forward, solar plus storage is, you know, looking to take the place of those disappearing tax credits.So I think the short answer to your question is yes there is still financially viable.It just might not be at solar alone.We'd be looking at solar plus storage to make the numbers work.Can you explain again, the rationale for adding storage?Why is that?So the storage component now opens the door to peak shaving, which is a cost saving measure on what we were talking about.Right before you couldn't store it.I mean, this six story technology was nascent, right?And it really didn't.Correct.And Belmont's peak in large part is at night - Yep.As the solar production is tailing off.It allows for participation and frequency Markets, which provide incentive payments for being available to stabilize the grid in times of need.So that's another revenue stream.And so those sources can then offset the declining tax incentives that used to be there.This would be, we would, this would be a developer that would do this, and we'd just have a purchase power agreement with that developer?Correct.Correct.And it would always sell, would it be just, would it be exclusive to Belmont that they could sell this storage stored in?Yep.It would d-.We would have to make financially viable to them to develop the solar array.Exactly.We'd have to have PPA in place.We'd have to look at all of that, right?Exactly.There's just things, things have changed so much that the two, I was reading the 2012 report and I'm like, is this kind of.So I know that.I agree on that.So that's the reason I asked, but we have to be in a situation where, you know, our purchasing of this power and the fact that we can now store it, And like you say, shade capacity would be a financially acceptable proposal for the community, but it also enhances our climate action planning initiative as well.Exactly.And I've always thought that we should do something there with this.Sure.And that's somewhat ties in, I won't go too far down this path.But the rec treatment, so each of these renewable energy facilities currently are associated with renewable energy credits.And so that kind of complicates the discussion aside from just facility, but there's also the environmental credits associated with it.And so there are different Classes and I just highlight them for discussion sake.But Class I RECs tend to be solar and wind, Class II RECs are hydro and alternative RECs, call it Class III for ease of conversation.Those are your bio mass, landfill gas.Anaerobic digester.The digester.And so those, you know, each of those have different environmental attributes associated with that.And so when considering the cap goals, you know, what are the environmental attributes associated with the REC Class.Because Class III is Class III because there are missions associated with those.So different than solar where, you know, just sits there and there's no emissions.The Class III RECs, alternative RECs, or such as biomass, landfill gas, or renewable because they, you can regenerate the fuel, but like landfill gas, there's methane in there and you have to burn the methane to generate electricity.So there are emissions, so it gets a Class III. It's kind of de-emphasized, but it has different properties where solar is variable and, you know, a landfill gas plant can be closer to base load where it's more predictable.So. - Okay.So that's summary there.We're going to have a lot of discussion about this shortly.So, anything else Light Board space?no, thank you.Travis?Bill, whoever?Yes, I want to just bring.Identify yourself for the record, please.Yeah, Phil Thayer.I wanted to just bring to Light Board's attention that some resident experts in solar financing attended el Back on Thursday night and did some preliminary analysis that would be, have direct bearing on the financial viability of a number of solar sites around town.And I'd like the opportunity to ask one Belmont resident, Jacob Knowles, to speak on that topic, because I think it's relevant in given that the Light Board is not meeting again until the end of July, and the timing is kind of tight.Alright, Jacob, you have to identify yourself.Jacob Knowles, precinct four.I think Mr. Paolillo made a good point about that we need to look at the financial aspect of these topics and, you know, we've looked at it to a degree, but what we're really asking for is that there's an important timeline here and an important investment, and that investment may become less or somehow detrimentally affected if we don't act quickly.It's something that we've been bringing up for a while now, but I think that there's an opportunity now for the Light Board to potentially put together a short term, a small working group between el Back, Belmont Light, and the energy committee to just look at this financial question of solar in Belmont for town sites.And that seems like a wise move, just to go through that process, to see where it ultimately leads and get that expert input.I know el Back's working on it, and Chris.That's a really good idea, actually.Belmont Light's working on it.I don't know if.I think if you bring together some individuals or just charge Chris to sort of bring in these individuals.I mean, I think we really need to explore this in a very expeditious way, you know?I mean, especially if we're starting to make decisions on these.Yeah, we need to, yeah, I know we need to move on and make decisions on these things, I just don't know whether it's, you want to set up some formal structure or whether, you know, Chris can reach out to the community.Yeah, perhaps we just have already had that sort of network of.You can call meetings with you and el Back and Jacob, - And like members of...But you don't need us for that.Sure.Yeah that fine.That's my recommendation.I mean, we get recommendations from you, we get recommendations from el Back, and I hope you're reaching out to other people as well, so it's not just this echo chamber.I'm fine with that.That's a great point, but I just, the reason why we're coming here tonight is we did go to the el Back meeting.And the feedback that we received was the Light Board really needs to say, this is something we're interested in.We give you the leeway to go ahead and proceed with this process.We just said that.Yeah, I mean, I think they were saying, I'm asking, I think, chime in if you, like, I personally am saying, I think Chris, as a Municipal Light Board General Manager, and it should bring in the expertise of el Back, and concerned citizens, and making recommendations to us as el Back should do when they make recommendations.And they did because you were there and the more, there's no monopoly and good ideas, they're good ideas everywhere.So I don't know if we need to set up, if considering the time, well I'm more concerned the timeframe, because if you set up a formal committee and they have to post meetings and have minutes and have a whole big structure behind it, it's going to slow everything down.Well el back meetings, they have to post meetings, right?Well, not if just the Chair of el Back met with persons.I think we can direct Chris to sort of pursue this initiative, expeditiously, you know, as you know, Jacob is indicated here, and as you say, Adam, he already has, he's really plug and play with el Back and with the energy committee.And you go to the meetings as well.So, - Yeah.We can certainly pursue, I think that makes abundant sense.And we had, again, when we were doing this.I was going to General Manager.That's an important topic for this Board.Right.And we were doing it for the Purchase Power Policy.There were joint meetings with the General Manager, the energy committee, el Back, I went, and we had those meetings to come up with the Purchase Power Policy.So it's not like we haven't done these before within the existing structure.I'm just more concerned the timing cause you're right about the timing.And if we set some, it's going to take, and then they, you know, we have to appoint people formerly and elect a Chair.It's going to be two months before they can do anything and I'm just trying to find an ex-, I'm not against setting up a committee.I'm just trying to meet your timeline.Yeah, I agree.I was just thinking of it.You need to work through the General Manager.That was recommendation for a working group, as opposed to appointing a committee.But - I rolled with the idea of working groups in general.So long as Chris...So we just asked, we just asked Chris to sort of organize.To organize, to set that up.I guess and then if you've, if things haven't happened by our next meeting, I should assume you will come and let us know.And then if we have to do something more formal, we will.But I don't think Chris has to be told twice to do it.I think he's, I think he would probably do it anyway, to be honest with you.I agree with that.And another comment I would make, Chris, is if at some point you deem a working group or committee more expeditious or useful to your execution, please come to the Light Board and let us know.Yeah.And we would probably take your recommendation.If you want something more formal, If this thing isn't working out for anybody, you know, I'm open.Yeah.Call us from the maternity ward and the 30th, Let us know how you're making out.Sounds good.Well, that 30th meeting may end up moving around, but we'll see.Give us a call as wife goes into labor.Will do.Sounds more than fair.Alright, it is 6:31.So one hour, not bad.Any other comments from the public?Seeing none, I'll entertain a motion - Move to adjourn.to adjourn.So moved.Second - All in favor?Aye.Nice job.Just as a programming note, the Board of Selectmen will be meeting here at 7:00 p.m. in the town hall auditorium.And then at 8:00 p.m., that meeting will turn into the public forum on post closure use of the incinerator site.So please tune in or come on down, Thank you.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/light-board_061818-CL19.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/light-board_061818-CL19.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/light-board_061818-CL19.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/snafuinfinitytalking-news_012219/talking-news_012219.mp3", "text": "Watch and listen to the Talking News every day at 12 noon and 6:00 pm on channel 96, Comcast Xfinity and channel 30 Verizon Fios.It can also be heard Mondays and Tuesdays at 4:30 pm and Wednesdays at 12:30 pm on channel 9 Xfinity and channel 29 Fios.Listen anytime on the BMC Podcast Network on SoundCloud and iTunes, just search for the Belmont Media Podcast Network.And now, on to the Talking News.Big plans in store at Watertown's Arsenal Yards, by Angela Thoma.With the coming of the new year, residents can look forward to the opening of some new shops and eateries nearby at Arsenal Yards in Watertown.Arsenal Yards is a mixed-use development located at the former Arsenal Mall site.The development consists of more than a million square feet and will be comprised of shops, eateries, office space, 425 residences, fitness services, a Hilton Hotel, a green space, and a bike path.There will be 40 tenants in total.The Wilder Companies and Boylston Properties are the developers.Finding the right tenants for Arsenal Yards is a challenge, according to Boylston Properties Principle, Bill McQuillan.The developers are looking for tenants who fit two needs.\"First, they have to keep the banks happy.What this means,\" McQuillan said, \"is prospective retailers must meet a certain credit worthiness and have a record of reliability and longevity.The trick is to attract tenants who are also new, fresh, and interesting, and provide consumers with a reason to look up from their screens, and to go out shopping.The retail business is very challenging.In this world of e-commerce, we have to work very hard to find the right people and the right stores\".McQuillan said.\"Our job is to create a mix of people who satisfy the banks, who have lent us a lot of money, as well as satisfy the customer who is going to make the property and the project a success\".So far, there are 13 confirmed tenants, including, City Works Eatery and Pour House, Condesa Restaurante Mexicano, European Wax Center, Gap Outlet, Hampton by Hilton, Marshalls, Old Navy, Pokeworks, Roche Brothers, Shake Shack, T-Mobile, The Majestic at Arsenal Malls, at Arsenal Yards, excuse me, and Utra.McQuillan said, \"Representatives in charge of leasing, for both Boylston and Wilder, are out all the time, talking to potential candidates, and trying to figure out who the right folks are for the development\".According to McQuillan, Arsenal Yards is hoping to bring as many local tenants as possible.\"While we have great respect for national and regional retailers, we hope to curate local retailers and restaurants into the property\".he said.So far, McQuillan believes their request for local retailers has been successful.He mentioned both Roche Brothers and Condesa Restaurante Mexicano as examples.Roche Brothers is a local chain of supermarkets, headquartered in Wellesley.Locals Ed and Rick Roche co-own the company.Currently, they operate 20 stores throughout Greater Boston, MetroWest and Southern Massachusetts.And over to my colleague Claire.Thank you, Bob.North Indian cuisine comes to Belmont.Spice Delight will be located at 63 Concord Ave, by Rachel Kelly.Spice Delight, featuring North Indian cuisine, is now officially open under the leadership of owner, Rusty Gill and his business partners Rahul Bagga, Raghubir Singh, and Tony Padam.The restaurant is located at 63 Concord Ave., occupying the space where Chinese restaurant, Golden Garden closed, in late 2017.Spice Delight's menu, created by Executive Chef Singh, features items inspired by the cuisine of Punjab, where the men grew up.Bagga said that North Indian dishes, such as chicken tikka and kebabs, are often based on meats and breads, instead of rice and lentils.Gill said that the restaurant projects a simple elegance with its clean, modern style and traditional Indian instrumental music playing in the background.\"The food is going to be nice, of course, but there is a lot more to this experience than just the food\".he said.He said that he hopes that the close relationship he has with his partners extends to the guests of the restaurant.\"I don't really run this like it's a business, but more like a family.That's what my approach to life in general is based on\".he said.Gill first entered the food industry selling wholesale pizzas to New England schools, after leaving his job, pricing mutual funds, at State Street in the early 1990s.He owned another restaurant, Zaika Taste of India, in Medford until just last year, when a Wegmans supermarket moved in, taking over the space.Padam, who was Gill's college roommate, said that he hopes to target Spice Delight's marketing strategies and social media posts, to the interests of the people in and around Belmont, to make guests feel personally connected to the restaurant.\"We want people in here to be looking less at their phones and, instead, to be having conversations with their families and also with the staff\".he said.Padam said that the restaurant's management will be posting on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter to engage with customers.Gill said that he wants the staff at Spice Delight to be authentically happy to promote a welcoming energy in the restaurant.\"There are a lot of places with decent food, but it's the atmosphere which makes you want to keep coming back\".he said.Spice Delight is open Monday through Saturday from 11:00 am to 9:30 pm and Sundays from 11:00 am to 9:00 pm.Now, over to Max.Thanks, Claire.Potential Race for Selectman Seat.Two Prospective Candidates, Town Meeting Member, Jessie Bennett and Warrant Committee Chairman, Roy Epstein Pulled Papers for the Seat, By Joanna K. Tzouvelis.Once the news of Mark Paolillo not running for re-election to a fourth term on the Board of Selectmen broke, within a few days, two prospective candidates pulled papers for the seat.Town Meeting member, Jessie Bennett pulled papers on January ninth, and Warrant Committee Chairman, Roy Epstein pulled papers January 11th.To be nominated, each candidate must collect signatures from at least 50 registered voters of the town to be certified by the Town Clerk.At press time, neither candidate turned in their nomination papers.About Jessie Bennett.Jessie Bennett, Town Meeting member, Precinct One, pulled papers on January ninth for the Selectman seat.Bennett is the first woman to consider running since Alexandra Ruban ran against Selectmen Vice Chairman, Mark Paolillo, in 2016.Paolillo recently announced he will not seek re-election to a fourth term.Bennett has lived in Belmont with her wife, Stephanie Burt, for 11 years and their two children, ages 13 and eight, who attend the public schools in Belmont.In addition to her experience with Town Meeting, she is a member of the High School Traffic Working Group, Burbank PTA, Chenery PTO, part of the town-wide Safe Routes to School group, a board member of the Foundation for Belmont Education and the Belmont After School Enrichment Collaborative, BASEC. Bennett was also recently appointed to the Transportation Advisory Committee.Bennett was also part of the steering committee for the Yes for Belmont, Seven to 12 Campaign and the 2015 Override Campaign.\"This is something I feel drawn to\".said Bennett.\"When we were trying to hammer out thorny issues like trash issues and traffic problems, we need to be approaching it with intellectual curiosity and rigor and a readiness to engage.I hope that those are some of the qualities I'll bring to it if I'm chosen for the job\".She said her work on the marketing side of the Override and Debt Exclusion Campaigns helped her get to know the issues inside out and upside down.\"I had to be ready to engage with people, in person and online, about their concerns and questions.I realized, that to gain an in-depth understanding of town issues, you need to be willing to have your butt in a chair during a meeting, to dig for the right reports, and to reach out and ask questions\".Town issues, she said, that she is most concerned about currently are traffic and communication.She believes the current board has made a lot of progress and hopes to keep the momentum going.\"We are at a moment ripe with possibility.We need to be really thoughtful about what our next steps are\".Bennett said she wants to be part of leading policy changes needed to help with the traffic situation and infrastructure.She also wants to be part of addressing other infrastructure issues in town, that are so important, and is very focused on the quality of life issues.Bennett said she grew up in a working-class family and understands how tight money can get.\"I want to make sure Belmont remains a community that's affordable for a wide swath of people and a place where people feel welcome and valued\".she said.Her professional experience is in non-profits.She was in the marketing department of Beacon Press for six years, and prior to that helped run a literary magazine and book festival in Minnesota.She currently freelances as a Web Designer and Social Media Consultant.\"I try to approach everything with an open mind and rigor and dig in.I try to get under what gloss people are putting on an issue and try to see what's really going on\".said Bennett.She considers herself a pragmatic progressive who knows how to talk to people, listen to people, and think for herself.\"I hope that serves me well.The reality is, I respect we all have different views.We all have to work together on the things that really matter\".said Bennett.Over to you, Bob.Thank you, Max.Another candidate for the position, Roy Epstein.In addition to serving on the Warrant Committee since 2007, and as its Chairman for the past three years, Epstein has been a Town Meeting member, Precinct Six, for more than 10 years.He also serves on the Public Works Police Department Building Committee, Community Path Project Committee, and Belmont Light Board Advisory Committee.His history of service to the town he has lived in for 24 years, also includes being a member of the Major Capital Projects Working Group, Municipal Light Temporary Net Metering Working Group as the Chairman, Town Administrator Search Committee and Town Accounted Search Committee and Belmont Light Substation Site Committee.Epstein said that he has been thinking about running for the past few years.\"It's a big step\".he said.\"The hours are long and the pay is low and it's a big responsibility\".Epstein would have supported Paolillo if he had run again.\"Had Mark continued, I would have been delighted\".he said.He said he also supported Selectman Tom Caputo, who ran uncontested last year.\"There's a long list of big questions that are on the horizon.Just to start with, the high school, DPW, police station, community path, are building projects that need to be completed, and they need to be completed well, because they involve a huge amount of money and they will have a huge affect\".said Epstein.In addition to these projects, he said there's a very long list ranging from school to capital projects, to town budget and much more.\"I feel I, more than maybe almost anybody, right now, has been involved in so many of these areas that I thought it would be irresponsible not to at least try\".said Epstein.He feels gratified by the support that he has received so far from people he has told about his decision to run.\"I think the town is better off with a contested race.There's been a problem attracting candidates, even for Town Meeting, and I think it's unfortunate.The candidates are better in a contested race\".he said.Epstein works as a Economic Consultant in complex commercial litigation and is an Adjunct Professor of Finance at Boston College.He became a Town Meeting member in 2003 and joined the Warrant Committee a few years later because he was impressed at how Town Meeting looked to the Warrant Committee for guidance when a significant question came up.Epstein and his wife, Joanna, raised their two sons, Martin and Jacob, in Belmont who both attended the public schools.He received his Bachelor of Arts degree in Economics from Wesleyan University and his PhD in Economics from Yale University.And now, over to my colleague, Claire.Thanks, Bob.Justice Remains Unserved.Special Report.Criminals Run Free While Authorities Drown in Open Arrest Warrants, by Mike Wagner, Doug Caruso, Daphne Chen, John Futty, and Eli Sherman.Editor's note, this is first of a two-part series.Millions of Americans are wanted on criminal arrest warrants, including hundreds of thousands accused of murder, rape, robbery, or assault, while victims wait for justice.In Massachusetts, there are more than 390,000 open warrants.Many cases stay open for years, even decades, often forgotten as law enforcers and judges struggle to keep up with new warrants filed in courthouses across the nation each day.An investigation by Wicked Local, GateHouse Media, and The Columbus Dispatch, found more than 5.7 million cases in 27 states with open arrest warrants, enough to lock up 83.1% of all Massachusetts' residents.Reporters sought records from all 50 states, but 23 did not provide usable data.Among those warrants, reporters identified nearly 240,000 cases involving violence, a weapon, or sexual misconduct.Enough to fill every state prison cell in Texas, Michigan, and Virginia.\"Most jurisdictions around the nation are doing nothing with warrants like this.Nothing\".said David Kennedy, Professor of Criminal Justice at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York City and Director of the college's National Network for Safe Communities.The warrants pile up.As of August 20th, 2018, open warrants in Massachusetts accumulated to 390,383 dating back to 1970, according to data compiled by The Mass Executive Office of the Trial Court.The data was provided in response to a public records request by Wicked Local.As warrants are issued, the majority are closed, but a number remain open for various reasons such as individuals are in jail, have not been apprehended, have been deported, have moved out of state, or are currently incarcerated out of state.Road Court Administrator, Jonathan S. Williams, in a response to the records request, citing undue burden or expense, Massachusetts would not break down the warrants by original offense or provide any biographic information about the accused.Without the charges, it's impossible to separate which Massachusetts warrants are related to violent charges.Interviews with judges, attorneys, and law enforcement officials from across Massachusetts, show a large portion of the unserved warrants stem from minor offenses, such as, not paying a parking ticket.Warrants cross socioeconomic levels, but disproportionately affect poorer communities and racial and ethnic minorities.\"Open warrants have been a problem in the Massachusetts court system for decades\".explained retired Judge, Raymond Doogan, who served as an Associate Justice at Boston Municipal Court from 1991 to 2014.Paths to a warrant.\"Authorities issued a warrant when they have evidence someone committed a crime, but haven't yet located or arrested the suspect.Many people face warrants because they were charged with a crime or even given a traffic ticket, but didn't appear for a court date.Others were convicted, but violated their probation.Most people, especially those wanted for minor offenses, remain free.As long as they don't cross paths with law enforcement.People are stunned when they're stopped for a traffic ticket and then taken into custody\".said, Peter, Elikann, a Massachusetts Defense Attorney.If you're arrested on a Friday evening and court doesn't open till Monday, you could be sitting in lockup for three days.Overall, records collected by Gatehouse Media, showed one case with an open arrest warrant for every 32 people in the state, providing data.In Massachusetts, the number totaled about one warrant for every 17 people.Now, here's Max.Thank you, Claire.Follow-up continuing with the same story, Waiting for Justice.Police, since August, 2017 have been looking for Cornell Bell, suspected of killing Michelle Clark of Weymouth.The 33-year-old mother, who had dated Bell in the past, shared a son with Andly Cribb, who was hopeful an arrest would be made.\"I'm not giving up\".he said.\"I'm hopeful something will come up and justice will be served.But I honestly don't think that will happen.It just doesn't seem like much is happening\".Bell was wanted on outstanding warrants for other violent crimes at the time he is suspected to have killed Clark.The search continues, but Cribb says it feels to him like the effort to find Bell has deteriorated.Those responsible for serving warrants in Massachusetts law enforcement agencies, often are drowning in other duties, taking time away from tracking down offenders, and new cases with fresher leads come into police departments every day.Law enforcement agencies say they try to prioritize cases, but it's easy for some to fall through the cracks if warrants aren't served in the first few days or weeks.When judges issue bench warrants for probation violators, or for those who fail to appear in court, police often don't know about it.Judges are buried under their own case loads and rarely have time to pick up the phone to call detectives on individual cases.\"Judges may have a hundred cases called in the course of a day\".Durken said.It's very unlikely that judges sitting in sessions day after day, are going to remember all the stuff that comes up.And while many open warrants are related to non-violent offenses, serving warrants can be dangerous.In 2017, Braintree Police Officer, Donald Delaney, was wounded trying to serve a restraining order to a Boston man who had an active warrant for domestic assault and battery, kidnapping, and threatening to commit a crime.Delaney lived.A year later, Yarmouth Police Officer, Sean Gannon, a 32-year-old K9 Officer, was killed trying to serve a warrant in Barnstable.Stanford Graham was shot and killed in Worcester in 2002, after an argument with two other men.According to a report by the Worcester Telegram and Gazette, a Wicked Local sister publication, suspected killer and New York city native, Omar Nunez, fled along with his father, Calvin Nunez, after the fatal confrontation.The father was caught in 2006 and convicted of voluntary manslaughter and sentenced to 15 to 20 years in prison.According to the TNG, Omar Nunez was never found, and an open murder warrant is still waiting for him in Worcester Superior Court.Law enforcement officers across the nation say, \"The best window to catch a fugitive is within the first few days of the arrest warrant being filed\".Judges, police, lawyers, and reformers, use words like, \"flood\" and \"fire hose\" to describe the torrent of warrants.\"The courts are overwhelmed, the police are overwhelmed.That's the way it is\".said Sergeant Joseph M. Guigno, of the Waltham Police Department.It's tough to find the time for some of these warrants or cold cases because police work is non-stop.Over to you, Bob.Thank you, Max.Belmont's Town Administrator Reflects on Past Year, by Joanna K. Tzouvalis.One year ago, on January the 16th, Patrice Garvin became Belmont's first female Town Administrator.Within her first week on the job, she saw opportunities for grants and she was able to enter Belmont into a Community Compact Agreement with the state.A total of $30,000 from the program is being used for comprehensive financial planning and long-term financial planning.Accomplishments in Garvin's first year include, finding a new home for the Belmont Food Pantry inside Town Hall, applying for a grant of up to $400,000 annually, from the State to fix sidewalks and streets with the Complete Streets Policy, applying for Community Preservation Funds to design a community path, hiring Assistant Town Administrator, John Marshall, who will focus 90% of his time on the Recreation Department, reclassifying Budget Analyst, Glen Castro's position to Budget Director, helping start a Belmont School Study Group and reviewing non-union employees.Garvin was Shirley's Town Administrator for about four years before coming to Belmont.Her top priority in her new position was to listen before making any changes.\"I needed to get an understanding of how the town is run before making any significant, impactful changes\".she said.Another goal she had, was to change the staff culture.She did this by implementing an open-door policy with all department heads and planning events, such as the Halloween Trick or Treat at Town Hall and an Ugly Sweater Day for Town employees.\"I want people to enjoy coming to work because they'll want to work.I'm trying to be more lighthearted and fun\".said Garvin.Her goals for this new year include creating a Capital Improvement Plan and working with the Town's new Financial Task Force on a plan to address structural deficits.She said, \"There is never a typical day.There are good days and bad.I like coming in knowing I'm going to make a difference to improve people's lives.That's what I've always wanted to do.I love serving the people of the Town\".said Garvin.Selectman Chairman, Adam Dash, said that he is impressed with Garvin's ability to obtain grants and state funding and her ability to work with people and come up with solutions such as the new location for the Belmont Food Pantry.Her creativity and management style has allowed Belmont to move forward, in 2018, at a staggering pace.\"Now that she has more familiarity with the Town, we look forward to even better things in 2019 and beyond\".wrote Dash, in an email to the Citizen Herold.Selectman Vice Chairman, Mark Paolillo, said Garvin has had a positive impact on Town affairs.\"She is smart, hardworking, and a talented Town Administrator.She approaches every issue in a thoughtful way and dedicates her efforts to finding a solution that is in the best interests of our town.She is a very skilled problem solver\".wrote Paolillo, in an email to the Citizen Herold.Selectman, Tom Caputo, said, \"Garvin has been a wonderful addition to the team at Town Hall.She's very effective at moving the Town's priorities forward and has shown a real skill at identifying creative solutions to complex problems.Belmont is lucky to have her\".wrote Caputo, in an email to The Citizen Herold.Town Clerk, Ellen O'Bryan Cushman, said, \"Garvin has been a wonderful addition to the Town, it's residence and its employees\".In email to the Citizen Herold, she wrote, \"What Garvin has particularly brought to Belmont, she has created a general spirit of optimism and pride in working for the Town of Belmont.She is very customer, resident-focused, to provide a high level of customer service.She's skilled and interested in bringing separate pods or interests together to collaborate.She's very interested in moving projects and decisions forward, not letting them stagnate\".wrote Cushman.Public Works Director, Jay Marcotte, said, \"Garvin has been supportive to his department, particularly with the new Trash and Recycling Contract, the new Smart Water Meter Program and Snow, Ice, Trees operations, and has made several recommendations that they have implemented to better serve the community.And now, over to Claire.Thank you, Bob.Newcomer Files Papers for School Committee, Peter Pantazopoulos Filed Nomination Papers for the Three-Year School Committee Seat, on January 14, by Joanna K. Tzouvelis.Peter Pantazopoulos filed nomination papers for the three-year School Committee Seat on January 14.Pantazopoulos has lived in Belmont for 18 years with his wife, Olga.They have a five-year-old son, Elias, at Wellington Elementary School and a one-year-old son, Evan.There will be two three-year and one one-year School Committee positions on the Town Election Ballot, April 2nd.Incumbents, Andrea Prestwich and Jill Norton have pulled papers.Prestwich said she plans to run for one of the three-year seats.Norton, who was appointed to the School Committee to fill the seat vacated by Tom Caputo, who won the Selectman seat last year, said she is unsure what seat she will run for.Pantazopoulos currently works as a Global Portfolio Manager for Apps Associates.He said he has been thinking about running for two years and believes his finance background would benefit the School Committee.\"A lot of people have asked me, since I have a finance background, to run for School Committee\".he said.He frequently attends School Committee Meetings as a spectator.He said his work experience would allow him to feel comfortable challenging budget line items, that he has the expertise needed to evaluate actual spending and budget forecasts.\"You need someone who is confident and has that knowledge and is fiscally responsible.I think that's what I can bring\".he said.Pantazopoulos said he is concerned about access to afterschool care in Belmont.He wants all Belmont parents to have access and not have to rely on winning a lottery.He also said he believes there is the potential to create a revenue stream for Belmont by managing its own aftercare program.Pantazopoulos said he voted in favor of the grade seven to 12 school because he knows it will help solve the space issues.As long as the older students are kept separate from the younger students.However, he is concerned about the open-campus policy, safety and security for students in the new building, as well as safety of students walking and biking to the new school.Now, here we go to Bob.Along with my colleagues, Claire and Max, we thank you for listening to the Talking News and hope you've enjoyed the show.We will return next week for another edition of local news happenings around Belmont.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/talking-news_012219.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/talking-news_012219.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/talking-news_012219.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/snafuinfinitytalking-news_013018/talking-news_013018.mp3", "text": "Watch and listen to the Talking News every day at 12 noon and 6:00 PM on channel 96, Comcast Xfinity and channel 30, Verizon Fios.It can also be heard Mondays and Tuesdays at 4:30 PM and Wednesdays at 12:30 PM on channel 9, Xfinity and channel 29, Fios.Listen any time on the BMC Podcast Network on SoundCloud and iTunes.Just search for the Belmont Media Podcast Network.Now on to the Talking News.\"25% Of households eligible for affordable housing\" by Joanna K. Tzouvelis.The Belmont Housing Trust recently completed a draft Housing Production Plan which determined nearly 25% of Belmont's current households are eligible for affordable housing.Since 2009 Belmont's housing prices have increased by more than 40% making the town increasingly inaccessible to households with low and moderate incomes.According to Gloria Leipzig, co-chairman of the Belmont Housing Trust, Belmont currently has 365 affordable units of housing which are considered affordable, but 2,400 whole households that are eligible for affordable housing.In particular, there's a need for senior housing and housing for young and newly formed families in Belmont.The Housing Production Plan identifies locations throughout Belmont where development opportunities exist that would help increase affordable housing options.On January 10, the Community Preservation Committee approved the Belmont Housing Trust's CPA application for $250,000 to be set aside to help accomplish the goals of the Housing Production Plan.\"This is a stepping stone we need to lay the foundation to build on going forward,\" said Gloria Leipzig.Leipzig then said there was three key elements of the plan; an assessment of the town's housing needs, a demographic analysis, goals they are trying to meet, and strategies towards achieving those goals.\"People think of Belmont as the town of homes and don't realize the 35 to 40% of residents are renters and about 25% of households are eligible for affordable housing.I think that's a pretty significant statistic,\" said Leipzig.\"Only 6.7% of homes in Belmont are affordable, including apartments,\" she said.In 2013 Belmont revised its exclusionary zoning by-law.Currently a development of 6 to 12 units must make 10% of it's units affordable.A 13 to 40 unit development must be 12% affordable.A development with more than 40 units must be 15% affordable.However, a mixed use development is only required to have 10% of its units affordable.\"The Belmont Housing Trust would like to work with the planning board to revise the exclusionary zoning by-law to increase the affordability requirement to be comparable to similar by-laws in neighboring communities,\" said Leipzig.Two new developments; Royal Belmont, which is partly completed, and the Bradford, which is under construction, will add 72 more affordable units to Belmont's inventory.60 units of affordable housing will be created at Royal Belmont, and 12 at the Bradford.Someone who is making up to 80% of the area median income will be eligible for subsidized units.However, 337 units are still needed to meet Belmont's affordable housing quota under the state's Chapter 40B law, which sets as a goal that at least 10% of a town's housing units be set aside for affordable housing.Leipzig said creating affordable house ownership and affordable rental units in Belmont is difficult.The CPA grant will give the Belmont Housing Trust the ability to work with developers who might be amenable to adding affordable units if the housing trust offers them additional funds.He might be able to buy down a number of units the developer might normally think of as market rate units.\"If we offer funding upfront, the developer might make additional units affordable,\" said Leipzig.\"The funds could also be used for pre-development site work to identify areas in the community where an affordable housing development could be built near public transportation.\"Most important,\" Leipzig said, \"approval of the CPA grant tells other statewide agencies who may be lenders on affordable housing projects, the town of Belmont is committed to affordable housing\".And now over to, Claire.Thank you, Bob.\"Arlington native starts in-home chef service for seniors.He'll come to your kitchen and cook for you once a week\", by Abby Matheson.When Arlington native, John O'Neill, lost his job cooking in the Tewksbury Hospital kitchen, he took the opportunity to start his own business.\"We were thinking about a food truck, actually.I bought the \"Food Truck For Dummies\" book.That's a really young guys game now.It's the same as having a restaurant,\" said O'Neill.Having left the restaurant business for a business cafes, O'Neill wasn't looking to get back into the long hours required for that kind of cooking.While listening to the National Public Radio one day he found his inspiration.\"I came across this story on NPR about Chefs For Seniors and I thought, wow, this would be just the perfect fit.I could do as much work as I want per day.You can do three to four clients a day so I'm not working until 12 at night,\" he said.\"And then also just being able to help them, that's the biggest thing.It's fun to cook for people.People that really liked it and appreciate what I'm doing\".With the help of his brother, Christopher McCormick, O'Neill purchased a franchise of Chefs For Seniors.A meal service bringing professional chefs into the homes of the 65 and over community.\"There's nobody else doing this.There's meal services, you can call Uber and have them deliver meals, there's senior meal service centers aside from Meals on Wheels, there's more upscale ones.But they're just dropping off,\" said O'Neill.\"We're in there.We're hanging out telling jokes\".Other Chefs For Seniors locations include; Florida, Georgia, and Wisconsin.O'Neill's franchise is the first to hit the Northeast, covering Arlington, Lexington, Winchester, and Belmont.For now, O'Neill would be the only chef working for the franchise.Over the next few months, he and McCormick will look to bring on more chefs to help expand their team.\"Finding people is going to be key, that are personable and good cooks,\" said O'Neill.\"To be able to hang out with somebody and engage and build relationships, that's going to be key\".How it works.Seniors or caregivers interested in hiring O'Neill can set up an initial consultation session.They will sit down and discuss the senior's likes and dislikes and dietary needs.O'Neill will then go through the kitchen and take an inventory of what is already there.That way when he purchases groceries for the meals, seniors don't wind up with two of something.\"They control the cost of the food,\" said O'Neil.\"So if they want filet mignons or lobster tails, I'll buy whatever they want and cook whatever they want\".Seniors select from a list of 12 menu items to rotate through over a five-week period.While menu items don't feature calorie counts, they do note which meal options are best for diabetics, contain low sodium, and are hot healthy.Some menu options include lemon chicken orzo soup, Swedish meatballs, apple sage, pork tenderloin, and classic Shepherd's pie.\"They choose four of those entries, and I'll come in and I'll prepare three to four servings of each entree so there will be 10 to 12 servings.By the time I'm done, are four entrees,\" O'Neill said.The meals are then packaged and put in the client's fridge or freezer.After he finishes cooking, O'Neill was sit down with the seniors and discuss the menus for next week.Now here's, Max.Thanks, Claire.\"Farmers' Market plans delayed.Selectmen asked Belmont Farmers' Market to address concerns of Belmont Center Businesses\" by Joanna Kate Tzouvelis The Belmont Farmers' Market entering its 13th season is facing a delay in the approval of plans for its 2018 season.Suzanne Johannet, President of the Belmont Food Collaborative, which runs the Belmont Farmers' Market said she was disappointed not to have the group's plans for the 2018 season approved at the January 22nd, Board of Selectmen meeting.Chairman, Jim Williams, said the Belmont Food Collaborative needs to meet with the Belmont Center Business Association to address the concerns of Belmont businesses about parking and the day the market is held.The selectmen committed to vote on the 2018 Belmont Farmers' Market at the next meeting on February 5th.Selectman Vice Chairman, Mark Paolillo, said the market made a commitment in 2017 to have a dialogue with business owners in the fall and it wasn't done.Johannet had said she sent a letter to the selectmen on November 15th, which was never responded to.The letter includes a bar graph of the average number of parking spaces available at the Claflin Street parking lot at 3:00 PM and 5:00 PM on each day the 2017 Farmers' Market was open.They did not count available spaces in the Locatelli lot, only the municipal lot.\"There was an average of 27 open spaces at 3:00 PM and 58 open spaces at 5:00 PM. We believe that even with the businesses that have not yet opened, there is adequate parking on market days,\" the letter states.Referring to the minutes from the April 3rd, 2017 Board of Selectmen meeting, Johannet said they were never asked to meet with Locatelli Properties or the Belmont Center Business Association before the 2018 season, just to meet with the board in the fall.Which is why the November 15th letter was sent asking to open the discussion about the 2018 market season.Locatelli manager, parking regulations hurt.Kevin Foley, Manager of Locatelli Properties, which owns 49 through 89 Leonard Street said Filene's and Macy's, former tenants, got really hurt by the parking regulations the town implemented over the last 20 years.\"This is a critical moment for the center.I want to make sure the new businesses do well.There are steps we could work on together so it helps both of us.The issue we have is the parking the last five years may be very different than parking this spring or next spring or the year after,\" said Foley.Alexa Hadjiliadis addressed Foley at the meeting asking if his tenant Foodie's Market supports him speaking against the Farmers' Market.\"You are here and it makes it seem that Foodie's is against the Farmers' Market, but I know for a fact that they are not,\" she said.Foley said he is not speaking on behalf of all of his tenants.Business group suggests new market day.Gerry Dickhaut, President of the Belmont Center Business Association, BCBA, said his group supports the Farmers' Market and thinks it's good for the town.\"But we are also concerned about the new businesses in the center having enough parking for their customers,\" he said, referring to CambridgeWear, Didriks and Local Route, which opened in the fall and The Wellington restaurant which is opening in the spring.Dickhaut said BCBA would like the Belmont Food Collaborative to consider changing the day of the market to Monday or Tuesday because it's a slower retail day.Over to you, Bob.Thank you, Max.\"All alcohol license approved for Wellington\" by Joanna K. Tzouvelis.The De Magistris brothers plans for a new restaurant are moving forward.The Board of Selectmen approved their application for an all-alcohol liquor license on January 8.Filippo, Dante, and Damien deMagistris, co-owners of il Casale in Belmont and il Casale in Lexington and Dante in Cambridge are opening a new restaurant in Belmont called The Wellington to be located in the newly renovated 75 Leonard Street building formerly part of Belmont Center's Macy's.Damien said he hopes the restaurant will open in the spring.\"Construction is underway.The restaurant will serve modern American fare, offer seasonal menu with locally sourced ingredients and include vegan and gluten-free options.It will have 133 seats with 21 at the bar, similar in size to il Casale in Belmont.There will be 3,500 square feet on the first floor where the restaurant will be and a little more than 2,000 square feet in the basement for office, storage space, and restrooms.The selectmen approve the all-alcohol license contingent upon the new restaurant's certificate of occupancy and final inspections and approvals by all necessary departments and issuance of common victualler license.\"I am very happy, very relieved that the selectmen were deliberately ready to move it along and get us on our way to build this restaurant and open up,\" said Damien.They chose the name because of its significance to the town's history.The Wellington Tavern used to be located next to Wellington Station.And now over to Claire.Thank you, Bob.\"Grade 7 to 12 option is favored.The design option narrowed down to major addition with renovated pool and field house\" by Joanna K. Tzouvelis.After months of public meetings, the Belmont High School Building Committee voted unanimously in favor of a Grade 7 through 12 option, Tuesday night.During the January 23rd meeting, the BHS Building Committee, Board of Selectmen, and School Committee also voted in favor of the design option known as the, quote, \"bowtie or 2.4\" which is a major addition with a minor renovation of the existing pool and field house.Capacity issues cost derive the decision.Superintendent John Phelan recommended the Grade 7 to 12 configuration to The School Committee and gave a presentation outlining how he reached his recommendation.He said 100 new students have been enrolling in the Belmont public schools every year, since 2011.And he expects 1,000 additional students through 2024.A Grade 9 through 12 high school would not solve the capacity issues in the town's lower grades and would require renovations at the middle and elementary schools costing between 54 million to 64 to $66 million.These costs would not be covered by the grant from the Massachusetts School Building Authority.A Grade 8 through 12 school would solve the capacity issues at the middle school but would still require 39 to 48 million in renovations to the elementary schools to solve the capacity issues.A Grade 7 through 12 school would solve the capacity issues for all the Belmont schools.However, an additional option to right-size the middle and elementary schools would cost 18 million to $25 million.Phelan also explored the possibility of changing the grade configurations for the middle and elementary school buildings to kindergarten through Grade 6, if a Grade 7 through 12 high school is built.He said the Butler and Burbank elementary schools would only be able to have two classes per grade.And the Chenery Middle School would have six classes per grade.Which he said is not educationally sound.The cost would be 25 million to 34 million to renovate the five buildings for kindergarten through Grade 6 Phelan said, a Grade 7 through 12 configuration at the high school, supports the educational vision for teaching and learning for the entire district.It would create an asset for the town and provide breathing room in all the schools.Financially, he said, there is no vehicle for funding for renovations to create more space at the existing middle and elementary schools.Committee members tote the benefits.School committee member, Andrea Prestwich, said there a huge positives to a Grade 7 through 12 configuration.It was standard in the UK where she grew up.\"Older students can take on supervisory and mentoring roles,\" she said.School committee member, Tom Kaputo, said Belmont could make any configuration work.\"I'm confident we can create a great learning environment that matches our vision,\" he said.Phelan said the most important characteristic that makes Belmont a successful district is the culture it builds for each grade configuration.The bowtie design option was selected.There were four options being considered for the new high school building.All of which could accommodate a Grade 7 through 12 configuration.On January 23rd, The School Committee, Board of Selectmen, and BHS Building Committee voted in favor of what has been referred to as the bowtie option.This option involves, a major addition with a minor renovation to the existing pool and field house.It would be a linear construction along the pond further away from the railroad tracks.It will have four floors and two separate entrances at each end of the building.The smaller entrance will be for the middle school, Grades 7 and 8 or for Grades 7 through 9.The larger entrance will be for the high school Grades 9 and 10 or Grades 10 through 12.Core space on the first floor of the building will be shared, which will include a pre-function area for the auditorium, theater, and gymnasiums.Now over to, Max.Thanks, Claire.Residential Snow Removal Bylaw Information.The purpose of the bylaw is to encourage owners of residential property to remove snow, slush and ice for abutting sidewalks so that the town's local services and amenities are reasonably accessible by pedestrians via sidewalks.A sidewalk is defined as any walkway paved with brick, stone, cement, concrete, asphalt, or any other impervious material.Sidewalks that do not meet this definition are not required to be cleared under the bylaw.Snow, slush, and ice must be removed from the sidewalk or treated no later than 8:00 PM on the day following the end of the storm event.The sidewalk must be cleared to a width of no less than 36 inches.A continuous clear path connecting to abutting property, is required.Piling snow on the sidewalk at the property line is not allowed.Property owners subject to exemptions established by the board of assessors automatically are exempt from the snow removal bylaw.Property owners are not required; to clear a path to the street, clear accessible ramps, or clear MBTA or school bus stops.Corner properties are required to clear both sidewalks along their corner property.Enforcement.The Office of Community Development enforces the snow removal bylaw.The Department of Public Works determines when the storm ends and notifies Community Development.Property owners should wait until the storm ends before clearing sidewalks.This will avoid the need to clear a sidewalk twice due to snowplowing of the roadways.Community Development has two staff members for enforcement of the bylaw.These staff members are also building inspectors and are required to continue their responsibilities as inspectors even during snow events.This means they must be available to meet homeowners, architects, and contractors and perform building inspections.Snow removal enforcement typically occurs in the afternoon.Enforcement is focused on school walking routes and at locations where specific complaints have been filed.Enforcement areas are broadened as more time passes after a storm event.There are areas such as the along the route to access road where the town does not do the plowing and therefore enforcement is difficult.Property owners are cited only once per event.If a property isn't cleared, they receive written notice for this first offense.If the property remains unclear after the same event, the owner does not receive an additional citation.If the property is not cleared after the next event, a $50 fine is sent.The bylaw does not give the town the ability to compel a property owner to clear their sidewalk.Property owners are subject to fines up to $350 per winter season if they do not clear the sidewalk, but they can choose not to clear the sidewalk.Over to you, Bob.Thank you, Max.\"Fire damages three storefronts\", by Joanna K. Tzouvelis.A one-alarm fire which broke out inside Pilgrim Shoe Repair, 448 Common Street in Belmont, and damaged neighboring stores, The Spirited Gourmet and Fred Astaire Dance Studio, was quickly extinguished by the Belmont Fire Department on the evening of January the 14th.The cause of the fire is under investigation.According to Belmont Fire Chief David Frizzell, \"At about 8:23 PM, on January 14, a Belmont police officer noticed the fire alarm sounding in the business block of 448 Common Street.Joint Public Safety Dispatch received a call shortly after from the Central Station Monitoring Company reporting an alarm activization\".He said, \"Upon arrival smoke was visible from inside the common area where the fire alarm panel was located.And after further investigation, a fire was seen inside Pilgrim Shoe Repair.Companies forced the front door to gain access and fire was visible in the back of the store.Upon entering the automatic fire sprinkler system activated,\" he said.\"The fire damage was contained to the Pilgrim Shoe Repair and there was smoke damage in the common hallway and water damage to the shoe store and Fred Astaire Dance Studio in the basement directly below the shoe store.The Spirited Gourmet suffered minor water damage.The fire is under investigation but appears to be accidental in nature,\" said Fire Chief Frizzell.His department cleared the scene in three hours.\"This fire was a great example of how important early detection and activization of a single fire sprinkler had resulted in saving a significant amount of property.Had these elements not been in the building, the fire would have been much worse,\" said Frizzell.Chris Benoit, owner of The Spirited Gourmet, said he feels very lucky his store was able to open on January the 15th.\"We suffered some water damage, but you'd never know it today.The ServiceMaster guys came in last night to clean it up.Literally took about a half an hour,\" he said.And now over to, Claire.Thank you, Bob.It's time to license your dogs and cats.It's time to do the annual renewal of your pet license, both dogs and cats, to comply with the Massachusetts General Laws Chapter 140 and the Belmont General Bylaws.Make sure you license by the March 15 deadline to avoid the automatic increase in fees and the possibility of a $50 enforcement violation.If your pet has an up-to-date rabies vaccination currently on file with the town clerk, renewal of the pet license can be accomplished in fewer than two minutes by renewing and paying online.The convenience fee for a $12 pet license is just a dollar 22 more.First time licenses for new pets must be by paper application with the veterinarian certificate of rabies vaccination.Pet licensing applications, both online renewals and fillable PDF, are available on the Town Clerk's webpage at www.belmont-ma.gov/town-clerk.A paper pet license application will also be included with every census mailing to Belmont households during the months of January.Beginning March 16th, the fees increase significantly.Fees applicable are, January 1st through March 15th.Spayed or neutered cats and dogs are $12 or $9 if the owner is 60 years or older.Unaltered cats and dogs, $37 or $34 if the owner is 60 years or older.Now, here is Max.Thanks, Claire.\"Teacher to debut first novel.Book incorporates the magical realism of childhood\" by Abby Mathison.Thompson fourth grade teacher, Sarah Marie Jette wrote the first draft of her novel in three months.But it would be another six years before she was offered a book deal.\"I always wanted to get there, but I wasn't sure if I would,\" said Jette.The Belmont residents started her novel, \"What the Wind Can Tell You\" in 2011.Two kids later, she dedicated herself to refining the draft taking advantage of nap time and the evenings after her kids were asleep.In the summer of 2017, Jette's signed her deal with Islandport Press, a Maine based publishing company.Her novel will be available in May.The thin line between magic and reality.Jette tells the story of two siblings, Isabelle and Julian, who both love the wind.Julian has a severe form of epilepsy.And the novel opens with him having a serious seizure.When Julian comes home from the hospital, Isabelle sits with him in his room.Around them, the room transforms into the magical world of Las Brisas.In this world, Julian has no physical limitations.\"I teach fourth graders.The line between real and magic is very thin for them,\" said Jette.\"For them it's very real\".The rest of the novel explores the contrast between Las Brisas and the real world.The love between siblings and between parents and their children.The novel is is inspired by a family Jette nannied for whose son had epilepsy.After she nannied for the family for several years, they had a second child.On her drive home from visiting the little boys new sibling, she was struck with the idea and pulled over on the side of the road to write it down on a napkin.\"As a parent, you want to protect your kids,\" said Jette.Isabelle's parents want to love Julian and then protect him and keep him safe.But his sister loves him in a different way.Inspiring students.A teacher for 10 years, Jette was used to giving her students edits on their work.\"Getting edits it's really affected me as a teacher,\" she said, \"I've seen the other end\".Jette showed her students how her draft changed over time, how the deleted chapters and characters made it better in the end.\"It's great for kids to see grownups doing lots of things,\" said Jette.As a Mexican American, Jette looked to fill her classroom library with books featuring diverse characters.Growing up she struggled to find herself represented in literature.Originally from Maine, Jette said she would get excited when a character had brown eyes like her but there were never any with brown skin.And, over to you, Bob.Along with my colleagues, Claire and Max, we thank you for listening to the Talking News and hope you've enjoyed the show.We will return next week for another edition of local news happenings around Belmont.Go Patriots.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/talking-news_013018.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/talking-news_013018.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/talking-news_013018.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/snafuinfinitytalking-news_013117/talking-news_013117.mp3", "text": "Welcome to Talking News.We are delighted to have you with us listening to our presentation by members of the Beech Street Center, Patty, Marianne and Jonathan.We will be reading local news and happenings from the community newspaper, Patty?Patty - Two prospective candidates for selectmen.'Tis the season for pulling papers if you want to run for town office in the upcoming town election on April 4th, and it looks like there may be a race for the seat on the board of selectmen, currently occupied by Sammy Baghdadi.Adam Dash and Guy Carboni have both pulled papers to run for the seat.Dash is still in the process of collecting signatures and Carboni is has turned in his sign nomination papers with 96 signatures, the morning of January 17th.The town clerk's office needs to certify 50 of the signatures before his candidacy is official.As a press time, Baghdad could not be reached to comment on whether he plans to run for reelection.The deadline to turn in nomination papers is February 14th, the deadline for current town meeting members to notify the town clerk if they are running for reelection, is January 24th.Sign nomination papers are due by 4:00 PM on February 14th for newcomers and town office positions.Both prospective selectmen candidates are attorneys for their own private practices.Carboni is local government experience includes serving on the Water town school committee for 12 years and as Water town selectman for six years.He served as Belmont's representative to the MWRA for 10 years, 1993 to 2003, and also served on the noise bylaw committee for Belmont.Dash is currently vice chair of the warrant committee, which he has been a member of since 2009.His first experience with Belmont politics was when he was appointed to serve on the community preservation act study committee, which was 2007 to 2009.Since then he has been a town meeting member for precinct one since 2008, served on the zoning board of appeals was vice chairman of this Underwood pool building committee and a member of the Yes override committee in 2015.Johnathan.Johnathan - Limited resources hinder fight.The Belmont board of health convened a public forum, January 10th at town hall and the status of Belmont's opioid needs assessment.The purpose of the meeting was to provide an overview of the opioid epidemic review the findings of the towns, ongoing opioid needs assessment funded by Mount Auburn hospital community health department describe local efforts and the resources to combat the epidemic, strengthen local and state collaborations and discuss what is required from the town and its residents to battle the crisis.Jill Block, a public health consultants with experience conducting studies for Mount Auburn and Emerson hospitals, and the town of Concord was hired to conduct the opioid assessment, which began last fall.Gathering data from numerous Belmont and statewide data sources blocks at 11, Belmont residences have died from overdoses since 2013.The most recent confirmed death was January, 2016.She added that in 2012, 134 Belmont high school students reported taking prescription drugs, not prescribed to them to get high.Several findings emerged from the 20 interviews Block conducted with Belmont school staff treatment and medical professionals, family members of substance users and community leaders.She said both school-based and community-wide prevention education were perceived as limited.The stigma surrounding substance abuse and mental health is a barrier to action and private and pride are also prevalent characteristics of life in Belmont, which inhibits discussion about such issues.Other interview findings included mental health resources were perceived as limited and frequently cost prohibitive.Greater involvement from McLean hospital was expected.Concerned that that no collaborative group exists to take on a community response.And there is strong support for greater availability of Narcan among all first responders and in schools.Captain David De Marco, the fire departments EMS coordinator explained that Belmont firefighters are currently the only first responders that carry Narcan.Narcan is a medication squirted into the nose during an overdose that blocks the effects of opioid and allows the person to begin breathing again.Block also said 40% of the interviewees were unaware of the confidential drug drop box at the Belmont police station for the safe disposal of medications.Police chief Richard McGlaughlin said he does not have adequate space to hold all the drugs that are brought to the drop box at the police station.We're getting hundreds and hundreds of pounds of prescription drugs, which are very difficult to store and then destroy, he said.Block said the key findings of the assessment to date are the need for better promotion of existing resources in Belmont and at the state level and a community education on opioids must be improved to awareness and understanding, including the development of curriculum for substance abuse prevention in Belmont schools.Crucially important is a point person task force, or unifying coalition to spearhead opioid prevention activities in Belmont.Block said no one is viewed as taking leadership on the issue.Marianne.Marianne - Belmont, Tony and community service club seeking children's donations.Relax leading edge and Belmont center, will partner with Belmont high schools, Belmont Toni and community service club, for a charitable endeavor.Monetary and pajama donations for boys and girls will be accepted at the Relax leading edge office, Monday through Friday from 9:00 AM to 5:00 PM, February 1st to the 28th at 84 Leonard street.For the entire month of February, the real estate company will serve as a drop-off point for new winter pajamas for the children's served by cradles to crayons.The office will also accept monetary donations for the cause.This campaign is time to coincide with the 10th annual Boston Bruins, PJ drive to benefit cradles to crayons clients, low income and homeless children ages newborn to 12 years in Massachusetts.New with tags pairs of warm pajamas in sizes, newborn to children to 18 are needed.Cradles to crayons cannot use used or nearly new pajamas.The tags must still be on each donation.Karen Sexton, residential sales manager at Relax leading edge said \"we are proud to be working with Belmont high school to collect new pajamas that will go directly to local children who need them most\".The Belmont Tony community service club at Belmont high school, has affiliated with the PJ drive since 2011 and raised over $4,400 and collected 108 pairs of new pajamas last year.This year, three schools, Burbank, Wellington and Chenery will join BHS to hold PJ days where students and staff may wear pajamas in exchange for a donation.At the high school, participants will be eligible for door prizes to be donated by local merchants.Belmont Tony and members will collect monetary donations from the community at Star market, Antropola road, from 10:00 AM to 2:00 PM, February 4th, and fundraisers will be held at two fresh pond restaurants, Chipotle, March 7th and Bertucci's TBA in the early spring.The group will dry cars at Belmont carwash as its final event in this campaign.This year marks the first time that the club will have a pajama drop-off point for the community.Alice Melnikov, the BHS community service coordinator expressed her appreciation, \"We are so grateful to Relax leading edge for supporting us in this project.It really does take a village and they have stepped up to support two of our causes this year.First, the fight against breast cancer, and now the needs of local children who live in poverty and or are homeless\".Patty.Patty - Belmont's Chinese new year celebration will be bigger than ever by Joanne Tziotis.Hundreds of Chinese Belmont residents will be celebrating Chinese new year with a gala at the Chenery middle school on January 28th.The gala which quickly sold out within the first week of publicizing is organized by the Belmont Chinese American association founded in 2016.Chinese new year also called Spring festival is celebrated for 15 days, beginning January 28th.According to Kathy Gal, one of the organizers of the gala, it is the most important and widely celebrated festival in of all in Belmont and in China.This is the time for family reunions, visiting relatives and friends and exchanging greetings for the coming new year.It is also a time to bring out the old and bring in the new, she said.Families would come together for dinner in the Cherney middle school cafeteria on January 28th, followed by a lineup of 16 performances by Chinese Belmont residents of all ages, including traditional dancing, folk songs, Kung Fu, comedy and rituals.The different groups of performance have been rehearsing for several weeks at the Plymouth congregational church and the Cambridge center for Chinese culture in Waltham.Belmont's Chinese new year celebration will be bigger than ever.This is the second Chinese new year gala celebration in Belmont.The first was held at the beach street center last year with more than 300 people.This year 550 people are expected.After last year's gala, Gauss and many Belmont Chinese American families had an even stronger sense of community and wanted to raise their voice to the larger Belmont community.\"There was a strong feeling that we needed an organization to better promote Chinese culture in the town of Belmont,\" she said.13 Volunteers established a preparatory committee to set up a Belmont Chinese American association.\"The goal of this association is to organize a variety of cultural activities and encourage, more Chinese American residents to be involved in community service and set the model for the younger generations,\" said Gal Jonathan.Jonathan - Belmont town, administrator David Kale accepts new position by Joanna Suveles.Belmont's losses, Cambridge gain Cambridge city manager, Louis De Pasquale announced on January 20th that David Kale has been appointed Cambridge's new assistant city manager for finance, effective March 13th.His last day in Belmont will be March 3rd.\"It's a bittersweet decision,\" said Kale.\"Belmont is my second home.I am very appreciative of the great experiences I've had in Belmont and all the great people I've been able to interact with\".He said he will always be grateful for the team of talented, dedicated, and hardworking department heads, employees, elected officials, and various committees, he had the opportunity to work with, to achieve many accomplishments while working within a framework of limited resources.He is in the process of planning the budget for Fiscal 2018 and expects to submit it to the selectmen by February 13th.Selectmen chairman Mark Pullo said \"it's a real loss for a Belmont's community, but it's a wonderful job for Kale.He is a great numbers guy, a man of integrity, works extremely hard.We will miss him terribly and are sorry to see him go\" said Pullo.He said the selectmen will lay out a transition and timeline for the search by their next meeting on February 6th.\"The assistant town administrator, Phyllis Marshall, will be considered for appointment as the interim town administrator while they searched for a placement for Kale, and she will also have the opportunity to apply for the position, if she desires,\" said, Pullo.Kale said the new town administrators should be patient and diplomatic and able to perform the four C's, collaborate, cooperate, communicate, and coordinate His greatest challenges over the past four years has been trying to move things forward in a strategic and sustainable way with limited resources.\"The greatest future challenge Belmont is facing is the growing enrollment in the schools\", said Kale.\"We need to be able to provide services for the growing in enrollment\".The high school project will have to move forward.\"The board is trying to work on other major capital projects to see if we can come up with a phasing plan and share what the vision is going forward, knowing the high school project is front and center.We have a lot of things in the fire, but we also have to run the store.This is a challenge,\" said Kale.He is proud of the team of staff he's worked with and help build over the last four and a half years.\"We've been able to strengthen the towns bench and attract and hire more and very good department heads and support staff.The town is in a good place in terms of having stability.There's something I'm proud of.We had a strong team when I came and I think it's even stronger four and a half years later, and it will serve the town well, moving forward,\" said Kale.Kale himself was no stranger to Cambridge.He is a lifelong resident and prior to the four years stint in Belmont, he was the city's director and deputy finance budget director from 2003 through to 2012.In that role, his prime responsibility was to develop the city's annual performance based operating and capital budgets.Mr. Kale has a strong understanding of the unique characteristics of Cambridge and has existing working original relationships with most of our current department heads and familiarity with the many community organizations and neighborhood groups in the city, Depasquale wrote.As assistant city manager, he will work to strengthen connections and expand opportunities to enable residents, to engage in and understand the city's budgetary processes and other public processes, while ensuring that Cambridge retains its distinct distinction as an innovative community with a strong tax base that allows a high level of public services and amenities.Marianne Marianne - Parents and children react to crossing guard accident by Joanne Suveles.Burbank elementary school parents and children lined schools street the morning of January 12th to show their love for crossing guard, Jim Mark Antonio, also a Belmont resident who was injured while on duty the morning of January 11th.They also held signs to pleading with motorists, to stay alert and slow down.Many of them even made noise as drivers went by ringing cowbells and clappers.According to the Belmont police report, at approximately 08:18 on January 11th, a 2006 Honda driven by a Belmont woman was heading west on school street, when it struck the crossing guard in the crosswalk at school street in Sharp road in front of the Burbank school.The driver said she slowed down because she saw a child on the left side of the road waiting to cross.She saw the crossing guard on the sidewalk and thought he was going to wait for her to pass before entering the street.Her speed was roughly five miles per hour.She was not able to avoid the collision.Officers spoke to the victim at Mount Auburn hospital.He complained of soreness to the hip, extremities and head.He said he was going to assist the child on the other side of the street, when he was hit on his left side by the vehicle and only remembers being on the ground in pain.He said he never saw the vehicle coming down the road.The driver was issued a citation for failure to yield to a pedestrian in the crosswalk.According to Burbank principal, Tricia Clifford, Mark Antonio's wife, Jerry said he is doing well, has no broken bones, is bruised, but his home and should make a good recovery.Through the years, many improvements have been made to the walking infrastructure around Burbank, including on Gail road and most recently Sharp road.Clifford stated in an email to parents on January 11th, \"there is still more that hopefully will be done and can be done as both pedestrians and vehicles increase in number around the Burbank school\".\"As always, safety is the main concern and focus.We have been working on these concerns over many years and many parents have helped advocate along with the staff at Burbank for improvements.This will continue, and I appreciate your support in this work\".Patty.Patty - Belmont supports women's safety with V-Day performance.A memory, a monologue, a rant, and a prayer presented by V-Day Belmont will be held at 7:30 PM, February 17th and 18th at First church of Belmont Unitarian Universalist 4 0 4 Concord ave at Belmont.M M R P is a collection of essays solicited by Eve Ensler and Molly Doyle that tell the stories of women who have experienced violence and abuse.These stories will be performed by local residents, including a Belmont selectman, Belmont police officer, a professional dancer, a vice principal, members of First church of Belmont Unitarian Universalist and semiprofessional performers.Tickets are available on Evette bright or at the door and cost $15.V-Day is a global movement that's mission is to stop violence against women and girls.V season is February 1st through March 8th, when V-Day events are held around the world to advocate for change and bring about awareness to the continuing issue of violence and abuse against women and girls.The designated beneficiary for the proceeds will be new beginnings reentry services incorporated, a program for women leaving prison based in the Boston area.It's the first of its kind in Massachusetts and will offer a fully comprehensive residential program with services.The V-Day Belmont event is co-sponsored by the First church of Belmont social action committee, Belmont human rights community, Belmont religious council, Belmont against racism and league of women voters Belmont Jonathan.Jonathan - Area, firefighters help battle fatal blazed by Joanna Suveles.Ablaze it's 6 0 6 Trapellar road at the intersection with Agassi avenue, has claimed the life of one man.Belmont fire incident commander, captain John Mooney, believes the victim was in his thirties.The man's body was found on the floor of the front room of the third floor, after firefighters conducted a secondary search of the home as the blaze was extinguished.Mooney believes he may have suffered from smoke inhalation and was also burned.Initial reports were that everybody was out of the house said Forzelle.A primary search for victims was conducted on the first and second floors, but due to the fire conditions and a big hole in the floor between the second and third floors, firefighters had to evacuate the building because the fire took over the third floor said Mooney.\"The firefighters went into defensive mode and used ladder pipes for about 35 minutes to knock the bulk of the heavy fire down,\" he said.Many of the buildings residents were alerted to the blaze by others banging on their doors.It's not yet known how many people are homeless due to the blaze.Mooney said, they're now staying at a hotel, but he did not know which one.According to the Belmont board of assessors property database, the home is a two family, house owned by Serenity family of Newton.The fast moving fire went through the entire building out through the roof.The blaze was largely out as of 7:00 AM. The fire began around 3:45 AM. The original 911 call , went to the Waltham fire department reporting a fire at 610 Trapellar road in Waltham according to Mooney.The Belmont fire department received the second 911 call.The early morning three alarm fire and Belmont drew supporting crews from surrounding communities, including Arlington, Cambridge, Water town, Waltham and Lexington.The Boston Sparks association, a club that provides food and rehab support to firefighters that blazes around the around the Boston area also responded.In a series of tweets posted on the early hours of Monday morning, that Cambridge fire department announced that engines one and nine, ladder one and the paramedics of squad four, were assisting the Belmont crews battling the blaze.The crew of Cambridge's engine five stood by to respond to any additional flagger conflagrations in Belmont, while the town's crews were occupied.Around 6:00 AM, the Belmont police department announced via Twitter, that Trapellar road was closed as crews dealt with the blaze as of 7:30 AM. The road had reopened, but congestion remained.The department warned of major delays in Waverley square and Belmont center on Pleasant street, Mill street and Trapellar road.The cause of the fire is under investigation by five agencies, including the Belmont police and fire investigators, the state fire Marshall, state police Sea Pack team, and the state fire marshal code in forest officer, according to Mooney.Marianne.Marianne - Impact of Belmont high school's growing enrollment by Chris Warren belmont@wickedlocal.com.Based on the most recent enrollment data presented at the January 24th school committee meeting, the renovation of Belmont high school can't come soon enough.BHS principal, Dan Richards said \"enrollment has increased from 1,106 to 1,264 students over the past six years, an uptick of 14%.School committee member, Elise Schuster asked what is the impact?Have we hired more teachers?Richard said one additional guidance counselor has been added to staff, to accommodate the addition of 158 students, and additional teachers have been funded through annual tax overrides.He said 32 high school teachers shared space in 2010, whereas 36 share space now.As previously reported, the Massachusetts school building authority board, M S B A of directors tapped Belmont last January, thus beginning a process that will eventually lead to a completely revamped BHS, including the construction of additional space to the existing 257,120 square foot building.Previously, the MSBA passed over Belmont's building proposal for 10 years straight.The high school building renovation is estimated to cost a hundred million dollars, which could be eligible for millions in reimbursement from the MSBA. The MSBA building process is comprised of eight modules.The Belmont school building committee formed last April and is currently working on module two.In the meantime, Richard's pointed out the recent purchase of hallway benches so that students do not have to sit on the floor when the library and cafeteria are at seating capacity.Earlier in the meeting Arto Asodorian, previewed proposed changes to grades three to five, beginning instrumental music program for strings and band instruments next school year.We have over 600 students enrolled in instrumental music in grades three through five.These changes will allow us to allocate three additional sections of music at the high school, he said.The changes are based on two factors according to Asodorian, resources for the third grade beginning string instruction classes currently in place result in class sizes of 30 or more students per music teacher, resulting in a less than effective learning setting.Additionally, the fifth grade band and string class schedule results in students who are not enrolled in instrumental music, do have study hall periods rather than other instruction, which led to a parent meeting to discuss educational inequity last year.Thank you for joining us for this episode of Talking news.Please join us again next week.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/talking-news_013117.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/talking-news_013117.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/talking-news_013117.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/snafuinfinitytalking-news_011618/talking-news_011618.mp3", "text": "Watch and listen to the Talking News every day at 12 noon and 6:00 PM on channel 96 Comcast Xfinity and channel 30 Verizon Fios.It can also be heard Mondays and Tuesdays at 4:30 PM and Wednesday at 12:30 PM on channel nine Xfinity and channel 29 Fios.Listen any time on the BMC Podcast Network on SoundCloud and iTunes, just search for the Belmont Media Podcast Network.Now onto the Talking News.Five things to know about marijuana in Massachusetts by Jerry Tufte.One year after Massachusetts voters passed a ballot question legalizing marijuana, legal pot sales remained several months away.State legislators are working to lay the groundwork for new retail pot industry and lawmakers in July passed a new law that tweaks the measure of voters approved last year.Here are five things to know about the legal status of marijuana, one year after the 2016 vote.Possession of limited quantities of marijuana has been legal in Massachusetts since last December, but it remains against the law for anyone without a retail license to sell pot for recreational use.Since the Cannabis Control Commission is still setting regulations, retail sales are unexpected to begin until July of 2018.It's legal under state law to give up an ounce of marijuana as a gift.As long as no compensation is received.When retail sales begin, pot will be subject to up to 20% in combined state and local taxes.In cities and towns, where the majority of voters oppose the 2016 ballot question to legalize marijuana, the municipal council or Board of Selectmen can ban retail sales.In communities where the majority of voters favored legislation in 2016, a popular referendum is required to ban or limit retail pot sales.Adults, 21 and older, can legally possess up to one ounce of marijuana on their person, but no more than five grams of a marijuana concentrate.You can have up to 10 ounces of pot in your primary home, but it has to be locked in a secure location.Five quarters collectively weigh approximately one ounce and a nickel weighs five grams.The public consumption of pot is illegal, period.State law prohibits people from using the drug in places that have banned tobacco use.The employers are allowed to ban marijuana use at the workplace.You can legally smoke pot on your own property, but it can get complicated if you rent.Landlords are allowed through lease agreements to explicitly prohibit smoking and growing marijuana on their property.The state law, however, does not allow landlords to bar tenants from consuming smoke-free marijuana products, such as edibles on the property unless failing to ban such consumption would cause the landlord to violate federal law.State law allows adults to grow their own marijuana at home.There's a limit of six plants per adult over 21 or 12 per household.The plants must be grown in an area that is equipped with a lock or secure device.They can not be visible from a public place with an unaided eye or without the use of an aircraft.People processing their homegrown plot at home to make an extract cannot legally use a liquid or gas other than alcohol that has a flashpoint below 100 degrees.Smoking pot while driving or operating a vehicle while under the influence of marijuana products including edibles remains illegal.It is also against the law to have an open container or unsealed package of marijuana or marijuana products in a car unless it is in the trunk.And now over to Claire.Thank you, Bob.Community preservation funds sought for six projects by Joanna K. Tzouvelis and Kristi Armstrong.There are six applications seeking funding from the Belmont Community Preservation Committee for fiscal year 2018, ranging from $5,000 for a designs for a Payson Park Musical Festival bandstand, to $780,000 to construct an intergenerational walking path at Grove Street Park, Grove Street intergenerational walking path.Donna Ruvolo is spearheading a proposal for revitalizing the Grove Street Park to improve the overall look and feel for everyone in the community to enjoy.\"We'd like to create improvements while preserving as much open space as possible,\" said Ruvolo.Included in the renovations would be reworking the parks main entrance to make it ADA compliant and accessible to people with mobility issues, implementing a new landscaping plan to provide more shade and creating more integrated ways for people to socialize, including a six-foot wide walking path benches and the seating area.Belmont's Recreation Commission and Belmont Youth Baseball have also been involved in plans for a batting cage and warmup box.The $35,000 construction site plan was approved last year by the CPC and the Grove Street Renovation Committee has been working with the Belmont Department of Public Works to bring the project to fruition.Town Field's playground restoration.The playground at Town Field last had an update in 1997 and with so many people using Town Field, especially during the spring and fall soccer seasons, a group led by Belmont resident, Courtney Eldridge is requesting $180,000 to replace the old playground with new ADA compliant equipment.Eldridge said that the scope of the project will be kept small with the renovations happening only within the footprint of the existing playground area and the fence being replaced on three sides, as the fourth side has existing tennis court fencing.The Recreation Department and the Community Preservation Committee are supportive of the proposal.McLean barn.Belmont's Office of Community Development, Historic District Commission and Land Management Committee for Lone Tree Hill jointly filed the application seeking $200,000 of CPA funds to implement emergency work to stabilize the building envelope, ensuring it is protected and arrest for the deterioration.The McLean Barn located on 4.6 acres on Mill Street, directly south of Rock Meadow is a historic structure, built circa 1915 and formerly part of the McLean Farm.It is listed on the National Register of Historic Places as part of the McLean Farm National Register District, according to Lauren Meier, co-chairman of the Historic District Commission.In 2005 McLean Hospital transferred the property to the town of Belmont.Now here's part two with Max.Thanks, Claire.Yes.Veteran's Memorial restoration and enhancement.The Belmont Veterans Memorial Committee is seeking $103,000 to help restore and enhance the Memorial dedicated in 1940, located at Clay Pit Pond in the park that designed by Loring Underwood.It is one of several veterans memorials in Belmont, but it is the only one located in an area suited for quiet contemplation.The historic Memorial shows the wear and tear of its 77 years.The wall is falling, stones are discolored and mortar is chipping out.Brush is also growing over the structure and could compromise the integrity of the wall.The flagpole is also aging and the bronze plaque is pitted.The fundings will restore the existing monument to its original condition.The wall will be taken down, stones preserved and cleaned where possible, and the walls will be rebuilt to the same specifications.The flagpole will be replaced with a historically accurate pole and then an identical bronze plaque will replace the one that cannot be restored.Housing Trust.According to Judith Feins of the Belmont Housing Trust, a draft housing production plan was recently completed, which shows that nearly 25% of Belmont's current households are eligible for affordable housing.More than 40% of renters and nearly 30% of current homeowners are cost-burdened, meaning they pay more than 30% of their income for housing.Belmont's housing prices have increased by more than 40% since 2009.Feins said the housing production plan also identifies locations throughout Belmont, where development opportunities exist to meet these housing needs fit within the towns neighborhoods, support economic development and preserve open space.Payson Park Music Festival bandstand.Tomi Olson, founder of the Payson Park Music Festival is requesting funds for a design study to construct a bandstand for the Payson Park Music Festival to provide performers with coverage and electricity and to protect their instruments and equipment from sudden changes in weather.A concrete slab for the performers was put in about 13 years ago, but the issue remains that last minute cancellations due to weather are problematic and costly according to Olson.This Belmont concert series has been going on for 27 years with a large number of concerts per season.11 evening concerts and 4 Friday morning concerts, bringing in 300 to 400 residents for each evening event.The bandstand structure would go over the existing concrete slab and would have a woodland look to keep the area as park-like as possible.It would include an acoustical ceiling and have handicap access.Olson is requesting $5,000 for an architectural design study and will seek community input to create a design that abutters can support.Once the design study is complete, the project will be costed out and Olson will come back to the CPA next year for project funding.Over to you, Bob.Thank you, Max.A look at the highlights of 2017, Interim Town Administrator reflects on the major accomplishments in 2017 by Joanna K. Tzouvelis.The Belmont Citizen-Herald asked Interim Town Administrator, Phyllis Marshall, to reflect on what she believes Belmont's major accomplishments were in 2017 and what future major initiatives and issues the town will address in 2018.Marshall provided the following list of highlights for 2017.The Belmont High School Building Committee formed the Project Team as required to complete module two of the Massachusetts School Building Authority, MSBA building process.The owner's project manager is Daedalus Projects, Inc, And the designer is Perkins and Will.\"These firms are experienced in working with the MSBA process and have been working with Belmont officials and the community as we move forward through the feasibility study process with the MSBA module three for the Belmont High School,\" said Marshall.Belmont Municipal Light continues to plan the work to complete transmission line work and retirement of the three substations located at 450 Concord Avenue, Hittinger Street and next to the Chenery Middle School over the next five years.The Blair Pond Substation project was completed at the end of 2016.The community path implementation committee worked with Pare, P-A-R-E, Consulting to present a recommendation on the feasibility of optional routes for the community path, from the Cambridge line through Belmont to the Waltham line and possible funding options that may be available.The result of their work was presented to the Board of Selectmen for approval.Funding will be required for the next steps.The Belmont Water Department for the third year in a row has received an award from the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection for its outstanding performance as a public water system.The town adopted and implemented the 25 mile per hour speed limit.The construction of a new press box at Harris Field was completed.Special home rule legislation prohibited alcohol license transfer was approved.Going forward all alcohol licenses will return to the Board of Selectmen.Building Committees were appointed for a schematic design for short-term solutions at the public works and police station facilities and a new library building.Renewal of the cable television license with Verizon New England Incorporated for a five-year term was executed.The town received the bronze award for design of the Belmont Street and Trapelo Road Transportation Improvement project.The Belmont Center Parking Management plan was implemented.Solar parking meters are now being used along Leonard Street.Signage was installed in the Claflin Street parking lot with instruction and fee information.The former incinerator site located on Concord avenue was conveyed to the town by the state, was convened to the town by the state.Future uses will be determined.The town needs to pay for the capping of the site.Board of Selectmen Chairman Jim Williams also weighed in on the major happenings for Belmont in 2017.And at the top of his list is the more than 50% reduction of the OPEB liability by 96.7 million, thanks to the hard work and efforts of the Accounting Department and OPEB Study Committee led by retired Selectman, Ralph Jones and Segal Consulting.And now over to Claire.Thank you, Bob.Town in school's facility director retires by Joanna K. Tzouvelis.Director of Facilities, Gerald Boyle 62, officially retired on December 29th from his position created after the consolidation of the town and school facility departments.He was hired four years ago with 30 years of previous experience in the field, most recently for the town of Winthrop.His biggest responsibility has been maintaining the buildings and managing capital improvements for the town and Belmont public schools.Boyle describes himself as a stickler for the details, a fast learner and good at juggling multiple projects.He uses the analogy of spinning plates on sticks from the Ed Sullivan show to describe his position.He compares it to how the guy would spend one plate, then put the second one on and spin it, and the third one on and spin it.The first one would start to wobble and slow down and he used to go back and wiggle the stick to make it spin again.\"When you have too many projects to manage, you really can't give each one the appropriate amount of effort that it should have, and you sort of end up running from spinning a plate and spinning a plate and just getting it before it falls apart.That's been the biggest burden we've had here is that, we just haven't had the people to give the full effort of management.And it's been a real struggle to have to run from plate to plate,\" said Boyle.Cindy Papa has been working as Boyle's Administrative Coordinator for the Facilities Department since 2014 quote, \"I'm going to miss his sense of humor, his consistency and the ease about him.Even under stress, he is very respectful to people and tries to juggle all the projects at once and give everybody the same attention, which is difficult,\" said Papa.She said, \"Boyle is definitely one of the best managers she has had\".Accomplishments, Boyle feels gratified about what he was able to accomplish in four years, understanding that there is still a lot more to do.He said one of the greatest highlights during this time has been helping Belmont become part of the state green community program, which has helped the town become eligible for up to $250,000 in grants annually.This year, grant money helped fund the boiler replacement at the Burbank in Windbrook and ceiling insulation at the library.His office has also helped apply for a grant for electrical vehicles from the state, which are currently being used by his departments, the Health and Water Departments for in-town trips.There are many other projects he helped with including the Harris Field press box and currently the restoration at the fire station.Challenges.Boyle faced many challenges in his career with Belmont, such as updating the fire alarm system at the Belmont High School, adding six modular classrooms at the Chenery Middle School, and most recently working on the contract for four additional modular classrooms at the Burbank Elementary School.When chloramine levels at the Belmont High School Higginbottom pool, we're testing high, the summer of 2013, the entire pool needed to be drained, cleaned, and repaired.An ultra violet filter was added to the water line for the pool, which has helped reduce the chloramine levels.He said, \"The pool should be drained and cleaned every five years\".Another challenge Boyle dealt with most recently was lead testing of all the fixtures in the Belmont public school buildings.His department did a representative sample of all the water in the Belmont public school buildings to test for lead, when the issue was first in the news.And now here's Max.Thanks, Claire.Veterans Memorial receives $100,000 matching grant by Ellen Schreiber.Once again, the Belmont Savings Bank Foundation has left an indelible mark on the town.Last month, a $100,000 check was given to the Belmont Veterans Memorial Committee, when the committee successfully raised another $100,000 to match the foundation's challenge grant.The grant will fund a significant portion of the $350,000 project to restore and enhance the Veterans Memorial at Clay Pit Pond.And with the matching donations, it puts the committee well past the halfway point.Qoute, \"The Belmont Savings Bank Foundation understood the importance of the Memorial for Belmont's veterans, their families, and the entire Belmont community,\" unquote said Angelo Firenze, chairman of the Belmont Veterans Memorial Committee and a former Belmont Selectman.Bob Morrissey, Chairman of the Foundation board pointed to the vision of the Veterans Memorial Committee, as the inspiration behind the $100,000 matching grant.\"The Memorial is for the entire Belmont community,\" said Morrissey.The project is bringing people together to pay tribute to Belmont's veterans and create an important public space for Belmont residents.We are a community bank with a long history in the Belmont community, and this is exactly the kind of support we want to support, sorry, kind of project we want to support, excuse me.At 77 years old, the existing Veterans Memorial at Clay Pit Pond is showing its aged.The stonewall is largely concrete patches.The structure is compromised and the brass plaque is beyond repair.In its current shape, the Memorial does not properly honor the memories of our service men and women.The Memorial project will restore the historical monument to its original condition.And new Memorial stones will honor the contributions of Belmont veterans in each individual military conflict since the town's founding in 1859.The enhanced Memorial will also be a focal point alone the soon to be built intergenerational walking path around Clay Pit Pond with benches, for quiet rest and contemplation.Over to you, Bob.Thank you, Max.Clean water advocate: Flow of info, a public health risk by Dan Atkinson and Jordan Graham.\"The state keeps mostly paper records that are not readily accessible on when and where millions of gallons of raw sewage pours into Bay State rivers, a public health failure that needs to be fixed,\" Clean water advocates said.About 2.8 billion gallons of untreated wastewater runs into the state's rivers every year, despite decades of efforts to fix antiquated drainage systems.The state Department of Environmental Protection collects annual reports on how much tainted water has passed through more than 180 combined sewer overflows pipes that allow wastewater to dump right into rivers.But that data is organized in one central- not organized in one central place.Most of those reports are submitted in paper form and that information is not currently aggrandized, said DEP spokesman Edmund Coletta, Mass department is- the MassDEP is reviewing ways that the information can be aggrandized.Legislation filed by state Senator Patricia D. Jehlen, a Democrat from Somerville would require DEP to alert residents whenever an overflow occurs and publicly post overflow data on daily basis and maintain that information for at least 10 years.\"Providing that critical information needs to happen as soon as possible,\" said Gabby Queenan, of the Massachusetts Rivers Alliance.\"This is a public health risk.Having this information in a more transparent way on DEP's website needs to be prioritized,\" Queenan said.Unfortunately, DEP has staffing and resource limitations, which we're sympathetic too, but this can't sit on the back burner any longer.Last autumn, a storm slammed 8 million gallons of wastewater into the Merrimack River, when Laurens sewage treatment plant lost power and 32 million gallons of untreated sewage spilled into the river after the heavy rains overwhelmed a low filtration system.And now over to Claire.Thank you, Bob.Social worker nun starts home for sex traffic survivors by Maren Dale, news contributor.Although the topic is most often discussed in relation to poor countries, modern day slavery also known as human trafficking exists in the United States too.Because of its secretive nature, it is difficult to know exactly how many victims human trafficking imparts each year, although estimates are in the tens of thousands.One new program designed to help women survivors of sex trafficking is a residential healing home that will soon open near Sioux City, Iowa.The project is being led by Sister Shirley Fineran, licensed social worker and Assistant Professor of Social Work at Briar Cliff University in Sioux City, Iowa.She has taught social work for more than 25 years and has been an active volunteer in peace, justice and women's issues for more than 50 years as a Catholic nun.Recognizing a need, understanding the complexities.After attending a human trafficking conference, Fineran realized this was an area of great need she had not been tuned into before.She said she felt compelled to do more so helped form the Siouxland Coalition Against Human Trafficking.Shortly after she met a woman who was sex trafficked at age 15, and is now a social worker in her 50's who helps other victims.\"She had been left for dead when she was found by the police,\" Fineran explains.\"Despite this, she told me she knows where her trafficker lives, and if he asked her to come with him today, she might do so.I was in shock and disbelief, but it helped me begin to understand the deep control and trauma that victims and survivors experienced\".After praying about what path to take, Fineran felt called to form a safe home for survivors, laying the groundwork, mapping out a plan.As a social work leader, Fineran had the background necessary to move the project forward, but knew it would take time and hard work.She set a goal of 2 1/2 years.In July, 2015, she invited community members to discuss the idea and how best to move forward.The group consisted of domestic abuse shelter social workers, trauma therapists, law enforcement, community activists, residential care social work managers, child advocacy center staff and others who wanted to help.Four immediate tasks were, to develop a board of directors, locate a potential site, raise money and file paperwork as a nonprofit organization, and to cooperate as the same.They realized they were in a challenging spot when they submitted applications for grants.Without an existing house, they couldn't get support, but without support, they couldn't afford a house.Lila Mae's house.In late October, 2016, a home owner interested in donating a house and 35 acre property contracted Fineran.An agreement was made and the organization gained ownership of on January 30th of this year, naming the home Lila Mae's House, after the donor.\"The house and property sit on a hill at the outskirts of our small city.It is a place of healing,\" Fineran said.Currently they are working to raise $300,000 to finish the basement, adding five bedrooms and two bathrooms.Although funding has been challenging, resources are coming in from a variety of sources, including foundations, generous individuals and fundraisers.Fineran said the goal is to start construction soon and accept up to seven survivors.Now on to Max.Thanks, Claire.Launch assault on bugs with plastic shotgun by Johanna Alvarez.Killing flies, and cockroaches is no longer a disagreeable task after the invention of the Bug-A-Salt, a plastic shotgun that fires salt at the bugs, knocking them out and leaving them ready for the garbage.An advertising video for the gun has become popular recently in social networks because of its humor.The short commercial pokes fun at absurd television infomercials and action movies.The video shows inventor, Lorenzo Maggiore firing the plastic shotgun from various positions, including from behind the tree.But the product's real job is to kill flies without damaging anything around them.All the shots end with a slow motion sequence of the insects being knocked out.Skell Incorporated, which sells the product, hit the market in 2012 after Maggiore launched a fundraising campaign on indiegogo.com.His video attracted clients and media reports around the world.By the end of that year, the California-based company had received orders for more than 20,000 units and raised $577,000.Those are the last sales numbers made public.Bug-A-Salt, spelled the way it sounds, which fires regular salt, table salt sells for at least $40 on Amazon and its own webpage.Its latest model includes a laser scope to improve the shooter's aim.Back to you Bob.Along with my colleagues, Claire and Max, we thank you for listening to the Talking News and hope you've enjoyed the show.We will returned next week for another edition of local news happenings around Belmont.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/talking-news_011618.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/talking-news_011618.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/talking-news_011618.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/snafuinfinitytalking-news_050118/talking-news_050118.mp3", "text": "Watch and listen to the Talking News every day at 12 noon and 6:00 PM on channel 96 Comcast Xfinity and Channel 30 Verizon Fios.It can also be heard Mondays and Tuesdays at 4:30 PM and Wednesday at 12:30 PM on channel 9 XFinity and channel 29 Fios.Listen any time on the BMC podcast network on SoundCloud and iTunes, just search for the Belmont Media Podcast Network.Now on to the Talking News.Major decisions to be made by town meeting by Joanna Kate Tzouvelis.This will be town moderator, Michael Widmer's 11th annual town meeting in his role and he expects there will be a lot of debate on the articles related to plastic bags, marijuana, and the number of selectmen.Here is a preview of the warrant articles expected to be voted on for the town meeting and special town meeting.Plastic bag general bylaw.The purpose of this article is to reduce the number of single use plastic checkout bags, distributed by businesses, and to promote the use of reusable bags or recyclable paper bags, thin film, plastic bags without handles used for laundry, dry cleaning, newspapers, produce, meat, bulk foods, wet items, and similar merchandise would not be prohibited under this article.Public works and its recycling coordinator will have the authority to administer and enforce this article.Violators will receive a written warning for the first offense, a penalty of $50 for the next violation, a penalty of $200 for the third violation and each additional violation.The article will take effect six months after posting and publicizing or on November 1st, 2018.Whichever is later.For retail establishments with a net floor area equal to or exceeding 30,000 square feet such as star market in Belmont.For retail establishments, less than 30,000 square feet of net floor area.The article will take effect nine months after publicizing and posting or on November, or on February the first 2019, whichever is later.This article will require a majority vote for passage.The Fattiest Frost House.This article was established 290, 291 Brighton street, a historic district, if approved the building shall not be altered in any way that affects the exterior architectural features.Thena McGinnis owner of the home, Newt Ernest Frost, the grandson of Thaddeus Frost personally, and does not want to see the home have the same fate as the Thomas Clark house, which was moved from its original location on Common street to a temporary location on Concord Avenue and ultimately torn down on August 21st, 2014.The Fattiest Frost House was built in 1827 and is one of the few remaining examples of federal period architecture in Belmont that survives virtually unchanged.The living area is 2,712 square feet.And the lot is 12,486 square feet.A majority vote will be required for passage of this article.General residents were zoning bylaw amendment, approval of this article will eliminate the sunset clause for the zoning bylaw for non-conforming single and two family residential structures, making it a permanent amendment.The amendment required homeowners in the general residence district to go before the planning board for design and site plan review for additions or new construction, this will require two thirds vote for passage.There was also an article that revises special permit requirements for alteration of non-conforming structures in the general residents zoning district, allocating projects less than 300 square feet to the zoning board of appeals.This will require a two thirds vote for passage.In May 2nd FY19 community preservation projects.There are six community preservation projects seeking approval by town meeting for FY 19 on May the second.The highest ticket item is 780,000 and $780,000 and $87 to construct a walking path around Grove Street Park.And for other park improvements, Pace and Park music festival is requesting the lowest ticket item, $5,000 for structural drawings for a performance stage to be added at Pace and Park.The Veterans Memorial Committee is asking for $103,000 to restore the existing monument at Clay Pit Pond to its original condition.Other funds would be, would integrate the memorial into the intergenerational walking path at Clay Pit Pond.A committee to restore Town Field Playground is requesting $25,000 for design documents for new equipment and improvements.The land management committee is requesting $175,000 for repairs to the formal McClain barn at Rock Meadow to prevent further deterioration of this historic structure.In the future when the town determines an appropriate use for the pond, the project sponsor would develop a funding mechanism to support the rehabilitation estimated to cost $2 million.The Belmont housing trust is requesting $250,000 to pursue affordable housing opportunities.Monies will be expended per a housing trust agreement to be developed with the selectmen possible uses of funding include purchasing land or affordable units, working with developers to promote the affordable housing or leveraging state and private funds to increase the number of affordable units.A majority vote is required for passage of this article.And now over to Claire.Thank you Bob.Schematic design plans for the new Belmont High School taking shape by Jovana Ks of Dallas.If residents haven't been paying attention to the work of the Belmont High School building committee, they may want to start.The committee has been meeting frequently with project design, at Perkinson will, as they prepare for the preferred schematic design to be submitted to the Massachusetts school building authority in July for the new grade 7 through 12 high school building to accommodate 2,215 students.For the past two months, the committee has been refining the design in an effort to get the total project cost down.At the most recent meeting, April 11th, the total project cost was reviewed.The total square footage of the building has been reduced by 6,475 feet from 451,575 to 445,100 square feet.The cost per square foot has also been reduced from five hundred and forty-nine dollars and fifty-three cents to five hundred and thirty-three dollars and eighty cents.Bringing the total project estimated cost to 295 million, 824 thousand, 624 dollars.From 309 million, 45 thousand, 915 dollars.Belmont estimated contribution is now $218,910,222 a reduction of around 9.8 million from 228 million $693,977.Bow Tie design.On January 23rd this two school committee voted unanimously in favor of a grade seven through 12 option, which will change the lower school configurations to kindergarten through third grade for the Butler, Burbank, Wellington and Windbrook schools and grades four through six for the Chenery middle school, the school committee board of selectmen and BHS building committee also voted on January 23rd on the major addition, minor renovation design option known as the Bow Tie with two separate entrances for upper and lower school students.Course base on the first floor of the building will be shared, which will include a pre-function area for the auditorium, theater and gymnasiums.Design tweaks and discussions, instead of individual practice rooms for music students, the new school is being designed to have space for small group practices, instead of small practice rooms wrote Lovallo.Gender neutral bathrooms were discussed at the April 11 meeting.Perkinson Will presented options to consider such as a gender neutral bathroom with a common sink area in the center.\" We're not going to build individual bathrooms for every person that needs a bathroom.We're looking at ways to be efficient and respectful of those that need their privacy\" said Lovallo.Upcoming meetings are April 26th, design update and workshop 7:00 PM in the Wellington Elementary cafeteria.May 8th design update and virtual reality presentation, 7:00 PM Chenery middle school community room and May 16 traffic solutions discussion 7:00 PM, Wellington Elementary cafeteria.Now to Max.Thanks Claire.Town meeting to decide future of marijuana in Belmont by Joanna Kate Tzouvelis.Pam Eager is the Belmont town meeting member for precinct eight behind a citizens petition that would let voters decide if they want to stop non-medical marijuana businesses from opening in Belmont.Action on this article requires a special town meeting, which is taking place May 2nd.This bylaw, if approved at special town meeting would not apply to a registered marijuana debt dispensary.The purpose of the article, according to Eager is to let Belmont voters decide whether or not to permit marijuana establishments in Belmont.If town meeting members vote no, then there will be no town wide election and non-medical marijuana establishments will be allowed in Belmont.If town meeting votes yes, then the Belmont board of selectmen will decide if there is going to be a town wide election for Belmont voters to decide.According to town council, George Hall, the selectmen will have the final say on whether or not there will be a special election for voters to decide.This article will require a majority vote for passage.Town supported question four.In the November 2016 state election, Massachusetts voters approved ballot question four approving a law, permitting the possession, use, distribution and cultivation of marijuana in limited amounts by persons aged 21 and older removing criminal penalties for such activities and providing for the regulation and commerce in marijuana, marijuana accessories, and marijuana products, and for the taxation of proceeds from sales of these items.In Belmont question four passed by a 7,017 vote margin, 52.48% voted in favor and 47.52% voted against it.Belmont's turnout in the election was high 82.41% of registered voters went to the polls.Wording in the question also stated cities and towns would be authorized to adopt a reasonable restrictions on the time, place and manner of operating marijuana businesses and to limit the number of marijuana establishments in their communities.A city or town could hold a local vote to determine whether to permit the selling of marijuana and marijuana products for consumption on the premises at commercial establishments.Emma Thurston town meeting member for precinct one, filed six amendments to the citizens petitioned to be discussed by the bylaw review committee, April 25th.\"My amendments simply give town meeting non-binary options for prohibiting the recreational marijuana establishment\".Thurston explained in an email to the citizen Herald on April 24th.The citizens position is an all or nothing opt out for an issue that is exponentially more nuanced than that.These amendments give multiple options for allowing or disallowing various types of marijuana establishments in our town.The sunset clause is address the fact that this is an entirely new industry for the state and should be voted upon bylaws, not addressed the needs or wants of the town in three years, perhaps this would be a more efficient way to revisit those bylaws instead of the messy way in which we had to walk back our alcohol ban.Depending on the outcome of the bylaw review committee, meeting April 25th, special town meeting may have amendments to the citizens petition to vote on.Article eight, temporary moratorium.This town meeting article is for a moratorium on marijuana establishments to last through December 31st, 2018, and requires a two thirds vote for passage.During the moratorium, the town would consider adopting a new zone, the adoption of new zoning bylaws, relevant to marijuana establishments.This article will require a two thirds vote for passage and town meeting is expected to vote on it May 2nd.Article nine, 3% sales tax.This town meeting article would allow a 3% local sales tax on retail sales by our marijuana retailer located in Belmont.Regulations permit no more than one marijuana retailer to open in Belmont at this time.The 3% tax would go into the town coffers.According to selectman chairman Adam Dash.A majority vote will be required for passage and town meeting is expected to vote on it May 2nd.Over to you, Bob.Thank you Max.Items to bring to the Belmont recycling event, a Mary Beth column.It's the, it's that time of year when residents have the chance to recycle textiles, electronics and paper shredding from 9:00 AM to 1:00 PM, May the 12th at the town yard, 37 C street.Note that the listed recyclables are the only items we can accept.Also no early birds.We need trucks to come in and can't have cars in the way, residents should follow the recycling instructions for each type of item.Textiles must be dry and clean, includes clothing, linens, footwear, purses, belts, and stuffed animals.Items can be ripped and stained.It is estimated the average US citizen throws away 70 pounds of clothing each year.Out of the 95% of textiles that can be donated or recycled only 15% achieve this result.The other 85% end up in the trash, when textiles are donated 45% are reused and repurposed mostly as exports, 30% are converted into rags, 20% are used as fiber and home insulation and carpet padding only 5% ends up as waste.Keep towels and sheets separate to donate to the animal rescue league.No bulky rigid plastics will be taken this year.Electronic recycling, anything with a plug, excluding lodge appliances, air conditioners, refrigerators of any size, gas yard and power equipment.Paper shredding limited to five boxes sponsored by the Watertown savings.Now is the time to clean out your home office and safely get rid of all your sensitive documents that have been accumulating and taking up space, boxes of your unwanted documents are shredded on-site in seconds, voluntary cash donations are accepted to benefit the Belmont sport for this service.Usable eyeglasses.The Belmont Lions Club will be collecting usable eyeglasses for their recycled for site program.Books, hard and soft cover books, audio books, movies, music, game, CDs, and DVDs will be recycled by Recycle That.Propane tanks, propane tanks over 20 pounds or other types of gas tanks will not be accepted.Save the town money.If you just have a propane tank to dispose and no hazardous waste bring to the DPW recycled days instead of HHW days.Note that helium tanks will not be accepted.Think twice about buying balloons and helium tanks, both are not environmentally friendly.Balloons even biodegradable ones cause litter when they are released outside, eventually falling back down into waterways fields and forests.Once on the ground, they can harm wildlife and Marine animals before they slowly break down.Tanks that store helium can't be put in the trash or collected by the town, need to find a scrap metal recycler for that.Scrap metal items must be all metal, no wood or concrete attached, examples are bed rails, metal filing cabinets, pipes, tire rims, not the tire, metal furniture, chairs, rod iron, cast iron, non coated pots and pans, etcetera.And now over to Claire.Thank you Bob.A local author's new book details her son's addiction and death by Carrie Feltner.Kate Genovese traces it back to sports between his hockey and football careers, her son Chris known as Gino had six surgeries, four for his knees and two for his shoulders.Those surgeries brought pain medication into his life and amount of drugs that never left his life and only got worse after his sporting pursuits ended.Gino died at age 30 in 2016 from an overdose.Watertown native Genovese chronicles her son's life and opioid addiction in a book called \"Hat Tricks From Heaven\" The story of an athlete in his own prison of addiction, the book took her over a year to write and was officially released in November of 2017.Today, Genovese is on the Massachusetts organization of addiction recovery committee and the central Massachusetts opioid committee.Genovese will host a book signing at the Watertown free public library at 6:30 PM on Wednesday, June 13th, 2018.Proceeds from the book will be put towards opening a sober house called \"Gino's House\" somewhere in new England.So far the book has raised $5,000 toward this effort.Kate Genovese sat down to discuss the book and her son's story.Why did you write this book?\"The opioid problem is so huge right now.He seems like the most unlikely kid that would overdose.He was an athlete, really smart and had tons of friends.We traveled all over the place with his hockey.He went to private school with a scholarship.So he got through school and he got a really good job and had a girlfriend, but he kept slipping.How did his multiple surgeries exacerbate the problem?It was mainly his shoulder.It was really bad.He just kept getting surgery.I want to point out that this disease can come from all walks of life.The doctors thought nothing of giving him prescriptions.One time I spoke to the doctor about it and I said, I think he's had enough.I don't think he needs more.The doctor said to me, 'You don't know how serious his shoulder is'.And quote 'stop being a helicopter mother'.I was kind of intimidated over 20 years ago, I was younger and not as bold.We didn't really see him every day to know what he was doing.When did you know he had a problem?His roommate from college called us one day and told us he was really addicted and needed help.He got into legal trouble and the legal system was equally as horrible.He had break probation and have to go to court.And instead of him doing something, the court would say, quote, 'give us $300'.That's all they did.He ended up in jail and that was horrible.At that point, he said, 'I need help.I know I do'.What surprised you about Gino's situation?I just didn't think he would die, for some reason I didn't think he would.My husband and I felt like we did a lot of things wrong.We did a lot of things, correct too, but parents shouldn't feel guilty like it's their fault.I think that's one of the messages of the book because you do what you can.It's just crazy.I could see in his eyes, there was something wrong.He had no control over it.How did you find the writing experience?It was very therapeutic and I wrote it with my editor.She had lost her son too.What advice do you have to other families that are dealing with this issue?I would just say, start talking to children at an early age about it.Fifth grade, no later, really.Because then they hit middle school and there's so much going on.You should just really be very open with them about it, how dangerous it could be.Especially if it runs in your family.If you're bummed out about and depressed, it takes away everything, all feeling.He was captain of his teams.He was well-liked.He had a lot of friends.He had a girlfriend.He was very social and he helped others.He just was very charismatic and he loved us.He loved his dog Frankie.It's just so sad.Other comments, I'm really mad at the system.They had a lot to do with it.They weren't paying attention.There's just not enough help.And they get burnt out.It's a tough disease to deal with.It only gets worse.There's a variety of things that lead to it\".Now over to Max.Thank you Claire.Talking trash, automated trash and recycling pickup will begin July 1st by Christy Armstrong.When the director of public works talks trash, people listen.And with big changes coming to help Belmont's waste is handled.There is a lot of trash talking going on.Jay Marcott, Belmont's public works director recently hosted a community conversation about the new trash and recycling program at town hall on April 10th, to inform the public of what the changes are and how they will be implemented.\"We are trying to advertise the new trash system that will be in place starting this July\".Marcott said at the presentation.We tried to look at every single option and alternative, the option that was approved unanimously by the board of selectmen in February is for Belmont to switch over to an automated trash and recycling service.Every household will receive a black 64 gallon wheeled trash barrel, and a blue 96 gallon wheeled recycling barrel.In multi-family dwellings each unit will receive its own set of barrels.So two family houses will receive two sets of barrels.Residents will be limited to throwing away one bulky item like a mattress or furniture per week.Everything else must fit into the trash or recycling barrels.Pick up of the bulky item will need to be scheduled in advance by calling public works by noon the day before trash pickup.Excess trash will need to be put in an official town overflow trash bag, which will be sold for $3 each at select locations in town.Yard waste pickup will remain the same as it is currently, but Christmas trees will only be collected during the first two weeks of January.Recycling will now be single stream.So residents will no longer have to sort plastics, paper and cardboard separately.Several attendees of the April 10th at the presentation expressed their support for this shift to single stream recycling and the simplifying of the process.\"We did this to control our costs\" explained Barkat.The way we collect our trash right now is the most expensive way to collect trash.Our collection costs for this year, fiscal year 2018 are $1,148,930.With this new five-year contract soup to nuts our automated collection, including the cost of the barrels will be $1,015,060 per year.Marcott said automation is preferred because since everything is standardized costs can be controlled.Over to you Bob.Thank you Max.Cities towns prepare for future cemetery needs by Melissa Russel.As certainly as death comes for all the end of cemetery spaces on the horizon for many communities, fortunately for Belmont Highland Meadow Cemetery opened in 2007 after Belmont cemetery ran out of plots for purchase in 1988.And is not expected to reach capacity for at least another 20 years.Without the expansion there would not have been adequate space to meet the needs of Belmont residents just as the aging baby boom generation is expected to cause a spike in burial needs.Massachusetts state law requires cities and towns take responsibilities for the burial of their dead, with an anticipated spike in demand for cemetery space in the coming 10 to 15 years, municipalities around the region, looking at their cemeteries and making plans for the longterm.Thomas Daley, a national cemetery consultant with cemetery helpful solutions said even in areas where burial space is not an issue in the foreseeable future town planners are addressing cemetery space in their master plans.And now over to Claire.Now we'll hear from Bob to wrap it up.Along with my colleagues, Claire and Max.We thank you for listening to the Talking News and hope that you've enjoyed the show.We will return next week for another edition of local news happenings around Belmont.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/talking-news_050118.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/talking-news_050118.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/talking-news_050118.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/snafuinfinitytalking-news_050818_title2/talking-news_050818_title2.mp3", "text": "Watch and listen to \"The Talking News\" every day at 12:00 noon and 6:00 PM on channel 96 Comcast Xfinity and Channel 30 Verizon Fios.It can also be heard Mondays and Tuesdays at 4:30 PM, and Wednesday at 12:30 PM on Channel 9 Xfinity and Channel 29 Fios.Listen anytime on the BMC Podcast Network on SoundCloud and iTunes.Just search for the Belmont Media Podcast Network.And now, onto the \"The Talking News\".\"Plastic bag ban approved,\" by Joanna K. Tzouvelis.The first night of the annual Belmont town meeting ended at 9:30 PM with six articles approved by wide margins, with the most discussion on the plastic bag ban.Town meeting continued on Wednesday, May 3rd, and is expected to vote on the citizen's petition for a special election to opt out of the nonmedical retail establishment in Belmont, and seven amendments to that petition, which would allow one or more types of marijuana establishments to be voted on if a special election is approved.Belmont is now one of more than 65 Massachusetts towns which is banning retailers from using thin film single-use plastic checkout bags with handles.The Selectman's article to ban thin film plastic checkout bags passed at the town meeting by more than two-thirds vote on April 30th.Beginning this November or possibly sooner, Star Market in Belmont will no longer provide single-use thin film plastic checkout bags to customers.They will have recyclable paper bags, and also sell reusable shopping bags, or customers can bring their own reusable shopping bags.Smaller retail stores, defined as those covering less than 30,000 square feet, will no longer be allowed to use the thin film single-use plastic checkout bags beginning in February 2019, or sooner, if their current plastic bag stock runs out.A special election could determine whether or not Belmont will allow certain types, any type, or no nonmedical retail marijuana establishments to open in Belmont, once the citizens petition to opt out of the state's legalization of such establishments and the seven amendments voted on by the town meeting.In the meantime, town meeting took advantage of some extra time on April 30 to vote on two articles related to retail marijuana establishments, the 3% local sales tax at a temporary moratorium.The article for a temporary moratorium passed 190 to 52.This will give the planning board until December 31st, 2018 to draft zoning regulations for nonmedical retail marijuana establishments in Belmont.A 3% marijuana sales tax was approved 231 to 7.This will allow the town to judge nonmedical retail marijuana establishments a 3% local sales tax.The revenue from this sales tax will go into the town coffers to be used for anything the town decides to use it for.Former Board of Health member, Dr. David Alper, also a town meeting member for precinct six, said stores in Colorado generate up to $40,000 annually from local sales tax.There is no longer a sunset clause on the general residents zoning bylaw, put in place in 2014 to prevent oversized and out-of-character additions, and new construction.The amendment requiring special permits to such projects to be reviewed and approved by the planning board is now permanent.Town meeting voted 238 to 16 in favor of the article.Special permits for smaller projects defined as 300 square feet or less, such as decks or dormers, will now be reviewed and approved by the Zoning Board of Appeals.Town meeting approved this article 242 to 9.Belmont will now have an additional historic district.It's first single-family property pending approval by Attorney General Maura Healey's office.Town meeting approved an article to make 291 Brighton Street a local historic district.This means current or future owners will have to get approval by the Belmont Historical District Commission for any changes to the exterior of the home, visible from a public way.The home is the last surviving property of what was once a 17-acre farm owned by the Frost family, which grew celery.It was built in the 1800s and is one of a few remaining examples of federal style architecture in Belmont.And now, on to Claire.Thank you, Bob.\"Residents give suggestions to design team for Belmont High School project,\" by Christie Armstrong.The Belmont High School building committee continued its design quest with a community forum on April 26th at the Wellington Elementary school.Belmont residents were encouraged to give their feedback on the current design model and help brainstorm uses for what is being called the South Plaza, an outdoor space between the south side of the new building and Clay Pit Pond.The meeting began with a discussion of the revised design for the lower school, which will house the seventh and eighth graders in a separate wing from the ninth through 12th graders.The aim is to give the lower grades a discreet sense of place, according to consultant Brooke Trivas from Perkinson Will, the project's design team.The lower school wing will be angled away from the closest section of the main building to provide more natural light and open space in that area.Discussion of design.Dick Madden, a Pleasant Street resident expressed concerns about the overall look of the building, and whether all of the open space was necessary.\"I see an awful lot of heat in the winter time pouring through that glass,\" Madden said.The BHS Building Committee Chairman Bill Lovallo, said, \"The building's energy use is being carefully considered.And, the open spaces allow for natural light\".Lovallo also noted classrooms in new school buildings are now required by code to be located on an outside wall.John Kolterman, a precinct one resident, and the former chairman of Sustainable Belmont, also asked about energy efficiency and the goals for a net zero building.In net zero buildings, the total amount of energy used by the structure on an annual basis is to be roughly equal to the amount of renewable energy created on the site.Lovallo said the building will still achieve a very high level of energy efficiency, even if it doesn't hit net zero.Kolterman also raised concerns about traffic in the area, and encouraged the committee to give more thought in terms of urban mobility, particularly with covered parking areas for bicycles.Concern about expense of project.Resident Charles Smart and school committee member Tara Donner also expressed concern about the expense of the project.According to Lovallo, the total project cost is currently estimated at $295 million, with up to 40% subsidized by the Massachusetts School Building Authority.\"This project will likely add $1,800 to the average annual tax bill for homeowners over a 30 year period,\" said Bob McLaughlin, BHS Permanent Building Committee and Warrant Committee member.Now, here's Max.Thanks, Claire.\"Meet Belmont's new facilities director,\" by Joanna K. Tzouvelis.Town Administator Patrice Garvin introduced Belmont's new facilities director at the April 12th Board of Selectmen meeting.Steve Dorrance officially starts his new position on April 30th.He replaced Gerald Boyle, who officially retired on December 29th.Dorrance has been working for the state for the past four years as Bureau Director of Facilities for the four Department of Public Health hospitals, 2 million square feet, 45 buildings, 1000 acres of parking.Dorrance has an undergraduate degree from Suffolk University in clinical psychology and a degree in criminal justice from another institution.His graduate work was done at Harvard University, where he specialized in organizational development.Dorrance took the time to answer some questions from the Citizen Herald so the community could get to know him a little better.\"What are you looking forward to most about this new role for you in Belmont\"?\"Keeping in mind that I've not yet started, but from the interviewing process, it seems as though there are a number of challenges facing the new director.Among them are developing comprehensive preventative maintenance programs for all the mechanical systems in the buildings throughout the town.Fully implementing the work order system, and associated modules, will be extremely helpful to us as a way of measuring productivity, helping us get in front of smaller issues before they become larger and more expensive, and give us a routine way of communicating with those who are requesting maintenance and repair services.The system, as I hope it will work, will be instrumental in providing metrics on a number of things, including the frequency and cost of repairs on mission-critical systems.I am looking forward to addressing some of the short-term operational issues and longer-term strategic matters, including the myriad of choices related to the new high school construction.For many years, I was a member of the National Trust for Historic Preservation, and personally did a number of authentic period restorations of antique homes.I live in an 1876 farmhouse.I am excited about the stewardship responsibility for Belmont's period municipal structures\".\"What do you see as the greatest challenges of this role\"?\"Since I have not officially started yet, it's a bit of a challenge to enumerate what the biggest challenges could be.On the face of it, it seems as though there's a backlog of work that needs to be prioritized and completed.Next summer break is just a few weeks away, and ensuring that all the work that has to be done over break is appropriately specified, bid, and ready to be started.Lastly, I see the facilities department as a customer service function.We exist to serve the needs of everyone who uses or works in municipal buildings, including staff, students, residents, and others\".\"What do you think are your greatest strengths, which will benefit you in this role\"?\"As a vocation and avocation, I have built structures of many types in multiple states.I understand, at a detailed level, construction practices, methods, and techniques.This knowledge will hopefully be important, as we consider preserving our existing structures and building new ones.I hope the hands-on practical knowledge, coupled with the experience of day-to-day operational building management, will be the right combination for Belmont\".\"What have been your greatest challenges in your current position\"?\"Virtually all of my experience, save four years, is in the private sector.In that world, performance goals and incentives are, for the most part, very clear.Change and innovation in the private sector are, among other things, key to personal success and organizational survival and prosperity.It was a challenge for me to adjust to a system that does not reward any of the things to which I have become accustomed over my three-plus-decade-long career.Lastly, although there is a tremendous need for standardization and implementation of best practices, it was very difficult to get there, given the organizational resistance to change\".\"What accomplishments did you make in your current position that you were most proud of\"?\"I started at one hospital, and over a period of about 18 months, assumed overall responsibility for some aspects of four hospitals, including 800 beds, a thousand acres, 40-plus buildings, acres of parking, and miles of roadways\".Over to you, Bob.Thank you, Max.\"Funeral director advises people to plan ahead,\" by Joanna K. Tzevoulis Nicholas Faggas, founder of Faggas Funeral Home in Watertown, always used to say, \"There are two things in life you're never going to avoid.Death and taxes\".He started his business in 1963 and retired in 2015.His daughter, Adrianne, always looked up to her father and joined the business in 1987.Her daughter, Nicole, is now a third-generation funeral director and embalmer.Adrianne says, \"Today's generation doesn't think about the death care industry, and importance of planning ahead\".She often has clients who are shocked at how much it costs to give a loved one a proper burial.The average cost of a burial is about $7,500, and this does not include the cost of the plot.\"If you're not prepared, you have to know that a funeral could be a very big expense if you don't own grave space, because you have to purchase a grave,\" says Adrianne.The total cost of a burial with the plot for a municipal cemetery is $10,000 to $12,000.If it's a private cemetery, total cost of a burial with the plot starts at $18,000.Prices for cemetery plots vary from cemetery to cemetery.She said local municipal cemeteries, like Ridgelawn in Watertown, no longer allow residents to pre-purchase because there is not enough space.If you are a Watertown resident without a plot, you get the next one in line.A single grave for two burials at a municipal cemetery is $1,300 and $800 to open it.\"Buying a cemetery plot is like buying a home,\" says Adrianne.\"It's important for families to see where it is, and make sure they like the location\".Plots at private cemeteries, like Newton Cemetery or the Gardens, start at $6,000, and an additional $3,000 to open.The cost of a plot at the historic Mount Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge and Watertown starts at $60,000, and about $2,100 to open the grave, $1,000 for the grave liner.And, to be buried on a Saturday, it's an extra $1,200.\"It's about $3,800 to be buried on a Saturday at Mount Auburn, if you already own a grave,\" said Adrianne.She said it's prime real estate there.Many people are opting for cremation because of the lower cost and the lack of cemetery space.The total cost for cremation is $2,300, according to Adrianne.She said, \"Cremation is now 70% of the business for many funeral homes.Nowadays, I have families come in and say, \"Just give us the cheapest casket or cremate them\".They just don't want to be bothered.A funeral is part of life.It is not only a religious ceremony, it helps people come to the realization that their loved one is no longer with them.So, death is really for the living,\" she said.She recommends doing a pre-need revocation trust to prepay the guarantee, the services, and merchandise costs at today's prices.And now, onto Claire.Thank you, Bob.\"Reliving the prom,\" by Joanna K. Tzouvelis.Seniors entering the Beech Street Center on April 27th received Hollywood treatment with a red carpet and runway, a photographer taking their photos, a colorful balloon archway and centerpieces, a popcorn station, live entertainment, dinner and dancing at Belmont's first intergenerational prom.The Belmont Council on Aging Assistant Director Lillian Hartman organized this event, with the assistance of Belmont High School volunteer students from the Belmontian Club.\"Other towns hold intergenerational proms, which many Belmont seniors enjoy attending,\" said David Ching.He loved Burlington's intergenerational prom so much he presented the idea to have one in Belmont to Hartman, who took it on wholeheartedly.\"Belmont should have this type of event so their teens and seniors can showcase their ability to organize, share good spirit, and bring vitality to a common place across generations.It was reminiscent, but celebrated who we are today, and left lasting good impressions for all.Teens in the kitchen laughed that they recognize most of the 1950s and 1960s rock and roll performed by Stanley and the Undercovers.And, it was great to see teen servers get out on the dance floor after dinner,\" said Hartman.Volunteer teams from Coldwell Banker, Leader Bank, Friends of Belmont COA, and Belmont High School took on projects to help make the event a success.Black and white photos of resident's proms from 1955 to 1960 added to the Hollywood-themed decor.The BHS Madrigal Singers and dancers from Fred Astaire Dance Studio in Belmont, including Belmont resident and dance student Sherry Jones, entertained guests.Ladies also received roses after dinner.Now, here's Max.Thank you, Claire.\"Community shows support for Becca Pizzi 5K Road Race,\" by Joanna K. Tzouvelis.Nearly 500 people, ages two to 70, registered for the Third Annual Becca Pizzi 5K Road Race on April 29th, despite the wet weather.The event started off with a one-mile run for children with 100 participants.Belmont Savings Bank was the major sponsor and Belmont Boosters were the organizers.The event became an annual tradition three years ago after Pizzi became the first ever American woman to complete in, excuse me, compete in and win the World Marathon Challenge, running seven marathons on seven continents in seven days.She made history again this year, participating and winning the World Marathon Challenge a second time.In her opening remarks before a large crowd at the Belmont High School track, where Pizzi once shown as a star athlete, and runs religiously every day, she announced she was getting into the \"Guinness Book of World Records\" for the fastest time to complete a marathon in each of the seven continents by a female in six days, 18 hours and 38 minutes, January 23rd to 30th, 2016.\"I am so excited we keep growing bigger and bigger, even with the hurdle of pouring rain.Belmont and surrounding towns still came out to run.I'm inspired by how loyal and loving our community is,\" said Pizzi.Scott Dedeo finished first in the male category, finishing at 18 minutes and 54 seconds.Kristin Barishian, Pizzi's sister, was the first female to finish at 21 minutes, 23 seconds.Awards were presented for male and female winners in eight age categories.The youngest winner of the 5K was Molly Sheehan, finishing in 24 minutes.The oldest winner was Missy Shay, finishing in 31 minutes, four seconds.\"I really can't believe that I have my own race named after me.This is a dream come true to see signs around my town with my name on it, in the town I grew up in.I love Belmont so much,\" Pizzi said.Pizzi manages Moozy's Ice Cream in Belmont, and owns a daycare in Belmont.Proceeds from the race will benefit the Becca Pizzi Foundation Scholarship, which will be presented to graduating BHS students in June.Over to you, Bob.Thank you, Max.\"Belmont man pleads guilty to 2016 sexual assault\".Middlesex District Attorney Marian Ryan and Belmont Police Chief Richard McLaughlin have announced that Zachary St. Paul, 35, of Belmont, pleaded guilty today in Middlesex Superior Court to sexual assault charges in connection with the 2016 rape of a woman who was known to him.St. Paul pleaded guilty to two counts of rape, one count of indecent assault and battery of a person over the age of 14, one count of photographing an unsuspecting nude person, and willful dissemination of a photograph of a nude person.According to a press release from Ryan's office, Judge Kathe Tuttman sentenced the defendant to 9-12 years in state prison and five years probation.As part of the terms of probation, Tuttman ordered the defendant to wear a GPS monitoring bracelet, to stay away from, and have no contact with the victim, to undergo a sexual offender evaluation, and comply with any recommended followup care.The release states on June 12th, 2016, Belmont police were notified by the victim that she had been sexually assaulted the night before in the defendant's Belmont home.The victim told police she had been out with the defendant on the night of June 11th, 2016, and when she awoke next to the defendant the next morning, the defendant informed the victim that they had engaged in sexual intercourse.The victim had no recollection of this event and had no memory of returning to the defendant's home.The victim borrowed the defendant's phone, on which she located photos of herself without clothes on.A search warrant was executed on the defendant's phone by Belmont police, who found multiple still photos of the victim in a state of undress, as well as videos of the defendant sexually assaulting her while she was unconscious.And now, over to Claire.Thank you, Bob.\"Should Belmont increase number of Selectmen?Town meeting expected to have decided by May 7th,\" by Joanna K. Tzevoulis.Some of the arguments to keep the number of Selectmen the same are, allow board deliberations to remain transparent and open to the public, every Selectman is vested in the job, elections would remain competitive, three members are more apt to reach a consensus, meetings are efficient and reasonable length, current level of authority and accountability would be maintained, salary and benefit costs would not increase, town administrator communications with individual Selectmen would not increase, too much is at stake for a change of this magnitude now.Some of the arguments for increasing the number of Selectmen are, greatest stability for town government in policy-planning and hiring, increased representation, diversity and viewpoints, less likelihood of one board member being isolated or dominating others, potential for wider range of skills and experience on the board, permits members to use one other member as a sounding board, and communicate outside a meeting, increased access to board members for town residents, increased ability to communicate with town committees, and increased ability to attend external meetings.And, the source is Committee to Study the Number of Selectmen.Now, here's Max.Thank you, Claire.\"Kinesthetic connection.Couple finds community at Belmont dance studio,\" by Abby Patkin.With her nephew's wedding coming up, Nancy Lowenstein was just looking to get in some dance lessons with her husband, Joe Rancatore, who owns rancatore's ice cream & yogurt in Belmont and Lexington.Dancing was par for the course, but the couple didn't expect to find a community at Belmont's Fred Astaire Dance Studio.\"We started off just wanting to learn how to dance, and then we kind of found a nice community and a nice kind of family there,\" said Lowenstein of one of those studio's many Lexington-based students.This community and shared passion for dance are what convinced Lowenstein and her husband to stay.Two years later, the couple continues to take regular lessons at Fred Astaire's.\"We've made new friends that we see outside of the studio now, so that's also been something that we really didn't plan on.And, I think that's been a nice part of this, too.Just the community you get connected to there,\" Lowenstein said.\"It really has been a lot more than learning how to dance, contributing to community\".The sense of community is exactly what made the studio's new owner, Belmont resident Elizabeth Woo, want to invest.Having taken classes at Fred Astaire's for more than 10 years, she has seen it all firsthand.When she heard the studio would be on the market, Woo jumped at the chance to take over for the previous owners, Earl and Jennifer Batol.\"When they approached me with this opportunity, I felt like this was serendipity working to put me in this place, because it was something that I wanted to do, in terms of running my own business, but it was also something I was passionate about,\" Woo explained.Taking over the studio is Woo's way of giving back to her community and fulfilling her dream of running her own business, she said.\"When my husband asked me why I wanted to do this, I joked semi-seriously that this is my midlife crisis project.An affair is way too much work, and I've already owned a sports car,\" she wrote in an announcement to the students.\"Knowledge that I will not cure cancer or solve world peace, this is my opportunity to make a greater contribution to my community, and hopefully enrich the lives of the staff and students they teach\".Woo, a biotech executive, is also enjoying the chance to try something new.\"It's also an opportunity to show my kids that it's never too late to do something that's completely out of your comfort zone,\" she said.Back to you, Bob.Along with my colleagues, Claire and Max, we thank you for listening to \"The Talking News\", and hope you have enjoyed the show.We will return next week for another edition of local news happenings around Belmont.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/talking-news_050818_title2.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/talking-news_050818_title2.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/talking-news_050818_title2.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/snafuinfinitytalking-news_040219/talking-news_040219.mp3", "text": "Watch and listen to The Talking News every day at 12 noon and 6:00 PM on channel 96, Comcast Xfinity and channel 30, Verizon Fios.It can also be heard Mondays and Tuesdays at 4:30 PM and Wednesdays at 12:30 PM on channel 9, Xfinity and channel 29, Fios.Listen any time on the BMC podcast network on SoundCloud and iTunes.Just search for the Belmont Media Podcast Network.And now onto The Talking News.Belmont enters AARP network of age friendly communities by Joanna Tzouvelis AARP's state director, Michael Festa presented Belmont Council on Aging Director, Nava Niv-Vogel with a plaque certifying Belmont's acceptance as a member of the AARP network of age friendly communities on March the 14th in the Selectmen Meeting Room of Town Hall.AARP is a non-profit, non-partisan organization dedicated to helping people ages 50 and older to improve their quality of life as they age.\"As a member of the Age Friendly Network, we will have access to support and resources from other communities, and we'll be privy to the best practices and get great ideas\", said Niv-Vogel.Festa said, \"it comes down to approaching all of the work of town government with a lens that sees people living in that community as they grow older, 20 years from now.The Age Friendly movement is an acknowledgement that it's not necessarily about spending money, it's about looking at the truth that you can have a budget, and if even take those same dollars and direct them in ways that are appreciative of these needs, then you effectively are creating this Age Friendly movement\", said Festa.He said, \"It will be important to understand the needs of the Belmont community.Many residents aren't aware of the services available to them and don't feel connected to it\", he said.He recommended Belmont get priorities straight and develop a tangible action plan.Selectman Chairman Adam Dash said, \"The board will continue its initiatives to help Belmont seniors, such as increasing the amount of the senior tax work off, wright off, lowering the interest rate on the senior tax deferral program and passing zoning to allow assisted living on south pleasant street.We do care about our seniors.If we're also lucky, it is the one group in town that will be able to join\", he said.The Belmont Council on Aging received an $8,000 grant from the Tufts Foundation to develop a plan for an age friendly community through a study from the University of Massachusetts Boston Gyrotonic Institute.The report was completed in March of 2018, and now on to Claire.Thank you, Bob.Tick Tock Chocolates are coming to town, by Joanna Tzouvelis.There's a new chocolate shop coming to town.It is hoping to open its doors in April at its new Belmont location.111 Trapelo Road in Cushing Square, directly across from The Bradford development.Tick Tock Chocolates is owned by a husband and wife team, Dee and Jim Chaplin of Waltham.Dee began making chocolate goodies for friends and family about 14 years ago.In 2007, Dee went back to school to become a pastry chef, studying at Cambridge Culinary.Dee's experience includes working at Blacker's Bakeshop in Newton, Debra's Natural Gourmet in West Concord.Her dream was to open her own chocolate shop, but was not able to fulfill it on the limited income from food services work.She returned to her former employment as an engineer to increase her income with the end goal of starting her own business.In 2017, the Chaplins took the plunge to work towards starting their own business making and selling chocolates.They became incorporated as an LLC in January, 2018.Since then they have been making their chocolate creations in a shared commercial kitchen in Somerville and sell their finished products at a local farmer's market, pop-up shows, shops, and events, such as Handmade for the Holidays at Gore Place in Waltham.Tick Tock Chocolate's specialty, specializes in handmade chocolate truffles, chocolate bars, chocolate covered pretzels and p\u00e2te de fruit.Dee makes the ganache filling for all the truffles, cutting and hand dipping each one.Jim helps decorate the truffles and is responsible for prep and cleaning.Jim said they only use raw chocolates of the highest quality, or fair-trade, and prefer to use local and/or organic and fair-trade ingredients whenever possible.Their truffles \"are a bit bigger than their competitors and less price\", said Jim.\"The location we chose in Cushing Square is ideal because it was not too big and has many other popular stores around it\", said Jim.The previous tenant was the Green Light, which quietly closed its doors last year.Now, over to Max.Thank you Claire Belmont League of Women Voters holds forum by Susan Schulman Pollet in consultation with Bev Friedman and Nava Niv-Vogel.On March 7th, the Belmont League of Women Voters held a forum.Is it crucial to expand support and services for seniors?There were over 50 people in attendance.Bev Friedman of the LWV, greeted the audience and opened with a statement that included concerns that older people have been leaving the town.Those who remain then bear the consequences of a more shrinking social network and isolation.Joel Samuel's, moderator of the event, and an attorney and former General Counsel of the State Executive Office of Elder Affairs, spoke about the Friends of Belmont COA and their role in the community.He cited some key statistics which illustrated that at least 13% of Belmont residents are over 70.Over one third of the total population of the town is age 55 and over.Nava Niv-Vogel, Director of the COA and first speaker on the panel, enumerated on the ways the Beech Street Center and COA are available to the community.She mentioned how the results of this study, called Age Friendly Belmont, support the COA findings about how many seniors are struggling in the town.Niv-Vogel referenced the Safe and Healthy Planning Group an Interdepartmental Group that meets regularly to discuss and problem solve around complex cases of seniors at risk.Niv-Vogel mentioned that the group has advocated for an additional social worker to better treat and follow up on these cases and provide outreach to students who are- residents who are \"under the wire\".Assistant Police Chief, James MacIsaac, the second panelist reviewed what his department does to support seniors.Police are called into homes where there are health emergencies, suspected cases of abuse and neglect, and seniors with dementia who wander, or in other ways, can harm themselves.They typically refer the elders to services of the COA to Springwell, and McLean hospital.However, they too are not in a position to provide the appropriate follow-up.Just to indicate the level of department involved involvement in these types of situations, and as an example, MacIsaac is cited that one senior called 22 times just in the last few months.Fire Captain, Ken Gardiner informed the audience of fire prevention efforts such as ongoing forums on topics such as the File for Life program and tips to avoid fire risks.They have funds to install fire and carbon monoxide detectors, and frequently go into homes for safety checks, or to assist in health emergencies.Firefighters also feel that there are few resources to follow up on the vulnerable elders that they encounter.Belmont Housing Authority Director, Jackie Martin spoke about the lack of apartments for people with mobility problems.There are many social services needs, interpersonal conflicts and issues that they cannot address.Unlike Housing Authorities in many other communities, they don't have a Community Coordinator to handle such situations.Susan Schulman Pollet, social worker with a specialty in working with older people and their families, was on the panel to ask follow-up questions of the speakers and provide a wrap-up of key points made at the end.The result of her questioning was that all of the agencies represented at the forum were united in their view that more social service is needed and that having an additional social worker would be a boon for the town.The audience expressed a wide range of concerns, such as unwieldy trash bins, taxes, which are out of reach for seniors, unsafe sidewalks, limited transportation options, and a shortage of affordable housing.Members of the audience came up to speak in favor of having an additional social worker and that there is such a need.Former State Rep.Anne Paulsen, stated that funding such a position is warranted, especially since \"handling so much of these cases is an inappropriate use of fire and police departments\", Over to you, Bob.Thank you Max.Belmont Savings to become People's United by Joanna Tzouvelis.The sign is for Belmont Savings Bank's six locations in Belmont, Leonard Street and Trapelo Road, Cambridge, Watertown, Waltham, and Newton, will be replaced with People's United Bank signs over the weekend of March 30 and 31st in preparation for the day the sale officially closes, on April the 1st.Connecticut based People's United Bank announced on November 27th, it is buying Belmont Savings Bank for $327 million, according to the Boston Business Journal.The deal will give People's United our NASDAQ symbol, PBCT, a network of branches just west of Boston, filling a gap and it's a local footprint.The bank currently has just under 50 branches in Massachusetts, including a significant number on the north shore and in the western part of the state.According to the Business Journal, the deal is expected to close the second quarter of 2019, making it the eighth largest bank in the state by deposits.Belmont Savings, NASDAQ symbol BLMT, has $3 billion in assets to People's United total of $44 billion.The Belmont Center Business Association honored Mahoney at his final meeting with him as the bank president on March 19th.Deran Muckjian, owner of The Toy Shop in Belmont, ran through a long list of all the contributions McMahoney and he helped make possible in his role as the bank president and through the Belmont Savings Bank Foundation.The list included many of the annual events the bank sponsors, which help bring business to Belmont center, such as 'Town Day' and 'Turn On the Town', 'The Becca Pizza Run', 'Pace and Park Music Festival', 'Cushing Square Fall Festival', 'Belmont Porch-Fest' and much more.\"It's such an important part of the town\", said Muckjian.\"We have a bank that has such input into the overall town's success, is a tribute to you\".Mahoney said that the mission statement written when his journey started with the Belmont Savings Bank in 2010, was to be the most admired bank in the region.\"If you do it by being a great place to work and by being a great place to bank, and being a great neighbor, they all go together\", he said.Belmont Savings Bank Foundation will remain independent after April the 1st.The foundation has donated between $300 and $400,000 annually to local causes in Belmont and surrounding communities served by Belmont Savings Bank.Since the announcement of the acquisition, the bank stock has tripled, according to Mahoney.Patrick Sullivan, Peoples United President, of Massachusetts and Executive Vice President of Commercial Banking, said that they will be involved in the community as much as Belmont Savings has been and will continue to sponsor 'Town Day'.Sullivan has been with Peoples United for six years and has 40 years of banking experience.Belmont Savings Bank will bring the number of People's United Branches in Massachusetts to 58.It has 400 branches in New England and 140 located in stop-in-shops.Mahoney will stay on board to assist with the transition until December the 31st.And now onto my colleague, Claire.Thank you, Bob.Incinerator site will be used for solar.Selectmen also on a retired animal control officer, and talk about search for new Police Chief, by Joanna Tzouvelis.After nine months of public discussions, which began with a list of 17 potential post-closure uses for the former incinerator site on Concord Ave., the selectmen on March 18th, voted unanimously in favor of a solar farm in battery storage.The final three options being considered were open space, a bike and skate park, or solar.The anaerobic digester and hockey rink were eliminated as options at the February 25th selectmen meeting because a letter from the Division of Capital Asset Management and Maintenance, DCAMM, said if the town were to pursue any commercial development of the property, it would first be necessary to obtain amended or new legislation that would allow this to occur.Selectmen Chairman Adam Dash said, they don't have time to change the legislation because the designing of the cap needs to start in May.Also, Dash said, the appraised value of the land would change if it was developed by a third party to generate revenue.Dash said, although Belmont is land poor, he did not think using the site as open space would be a good option because it will still be used by public works for storage and wouldn't be the most bucolic place to spend an afternoon.Dash said, the bike and skate park is a great idea, but the town can barely take care of the parks it has and could not afford to maintain it.Dash said, he thinks solar and battery storage is the best option because it would have the lowest impact on the neighborhood and help the town meet its climate action goals.He said it would be owned and managed by Belmont Light.Selectmen Vice Chairman, Mark Paolillo, agreed with Dash.\"It's a passive use that will create an enormous benefit to the community\", he said.Belmont Light General Manager, Chris Roy said, \"solar, especially when paired with battery storage that is located within Belmont's borders is a great way to boost Belmont's renewable energy portfolio while also combating against the rising costs associated with importing energy from the regional transmission grid\".\"This helps the entire community make progress toward our climate action plan goals and minimize the risk for potential rate increases\", said Roy.Now, here's Max.Thanks, Claire.Book series takes flight, thanks to local parakeet by Joanna Tzouvelis.On School Street, near the Burbank School lives a famous parakeet, Filomena.She is the main character in a series of children's books written by Belmont President and Harvard Graduate School of Education Professor, Fernando Reimers, 'The Adventures of Filomena'.Originally from Venezuela, Reimers has lived in Belmont since 1997 with his wife Eleonora.They raised their two sons, Tomas and Pablo in Belmont.Filomena, the family pet, was purchased from Belmont pet shop 12 years ago.Reimers, who specializes in education policy, became inspired to write the first book in his series one day when he was sitting at home in his kitchen, grading papers, and Filomena was staring at him from her cage.\"I remember wondering what she saw and what sense she made of it, and I wrote a few paragraphs describing how the bird might see her cage and my kitchen\", said Reimers.He asked some of his former students who have young children, if they would be interested in reading the story about a parakeet to their children.\"I drew a great joy from reading their feedback and imagining my former students reading to their children the way I had read to my sons when they were that age.Armed with this feedback and inspiration, I finished the story\", said Reimers.The Burbank Elementary School, where Reimer's sons went, is depicted on the cover of the first book in the series, 'The Story of Filomena', illustrated by Russian artist, Tania Yastrebova.According to Reimers, each of the books is focused on values or dispositions which foster inclusion.The first book focuses on empathy, on the importance of developing the discipline to see the world through another's eyes as a foundation for understanding.The second book focuses on friendship and on the golden rule.The third book examines compassion.The fourth book focuses on inclusion.\"The values are illustrated through the stories of \"Filomena's adventures\", said Reimers.One of his graduates runs a literacy program for hospitalized children in Mexico.She included the book in the program and invited him to read to the children.When he was leaving the hospital, one of the girls asked him to write more stories because she had enjoyed the book.He said, \"he had never imagined that this simple book could bring joy to children spending extended periods in hospitals\".\"Then some of my students and associates who are heads of schools around the world, adopted the book for a project in which high school students read the book to younger children and then exchange essays on what they learned from the conversation with the little ones\", Reimer said.I am really enjoying knowing that high schoolers in the US, in India, in Dubai, in Colombia, and Mexico, are communicating reflections about discussing values with little ones.Over to you, Bob.Thanks Max.Local stars aim to preserve Homer House through dance, by Joanna Tzouvelis and Wendy Murphy.10 local celebrities are participating in Dancing With the Belmont Stars to benefit the Belmont Women's Club, the organization responsible for maintaining and restoring the 1853 William Flag Homer House, known as Belmont's crown jewel, the historic home, which sits on a hill at 661 Pleasant Street.Becca Peaser is one of the stars, who has been taking lessons donated by Fred Astaire Dance Studios to prepare for the event, which takes place Friday, April the 5th at 6:00 PM at the Beech Street Center at 266 Beech Street.Other celebrities participating include State Senator William Brownsberger, Middlesex District Attorney Marian Ryan, two-time World Champion Challenge- two-time World Marathon Challenge Champion, Becca Pizzi, Town Clerk, Ellen O'Brien Cushman and Selectman Vice Chairman Mark A. Paolillo and Council on Aging Director, Nava Niv-Vogel.Similar to the television show, 'Dancing With the Stars', participating dancers will be competing to win.Judges include Jimmy Tingle, founder of Humor for Humanity, Sylvia Whitney, acclaimed USO performer, and Frankie Selly, the former owner of Frankie's Fish in Belmont center, former radio personality and singer Candy O'Terry will be the master of ceremonies.And now on to Claire.Thank you, Bob.Belmont youth commission to hope Peeps Diorama Contest.The Belmont Youth Commission will hold it's 6th Annual Peeps Diorama Contest.Participants can create their own peeps dioramas out of marshmallows.Dioramas should be no bigger than a shoe, or a boot box.Participants can bring their finished diorama's to the Peeps Diorama Party from 2:45 to 3:45 PM, April 11 in the small multi-purpose room of the Beech Streets Center at 266 Beech Street, Belmont.Voting will start at 3:00 PM, and the competition is open to all ages and prizes will be awarded to first and second place winners in the child, teen, and adults categories.Refreshments will also be served.This event is sponsored by the Belmont Youth Commission, Belmont Youth and Family Services Program, and the Belmont Council on Aging.For information contact Marisa Melanson, Youth Coordinator at 993-2720.Now over to Max.Thanks, Claire.Belmont World Film to present The Heiresses.Belmont World Film will present The Heiresses, directed by Marcelo Martinessi at 7:30 PM on April 1st at the studio cinema 376 Trapelo Road, Belmont.The film was Paraguay's 2019 submission for the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar Jimena Cascante Matamoros, a queer rights activist and spoken word poetry performer, originally from Costa Rica, will lead the discussion following the film.\"The film compellingly explores a number of subjects that are given little exposure in mainstream cinema, including the complexity of sexuality and social status\", said Belmont World Film Executive Director, Ellen Gitelman.Although it takes place in Paraguay, the basic issues are universal.Belmont World Film's 18th annual international film series, 'Making Peace' will run for five Monday nights through April 29th at the Studio Cinema in Belmont, with film's beginning at 7:30 PM. Back to you, Bob.Along with my colleagues, Claire and Max, we thank you for listening to The Talking News and hope you've enjoyed the show.We will return next week for another edition of local news happenings around Belmont.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/talking-news_040219.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/talking-news_040219.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/talking-news_040219.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/snafuinfinitytalking-news_040318/talking-news_040318.mp3", "text": "Watch and listen to the Talking News every day at 12 noon and 6:00 a.m. on Channel 96, Comcast Xfinity and Channel 30 Verizon FIOS. It can also be heard Mondays and Tuesdays at 4:30 p.m. and Wednesdays at 12:30 p.m. on Channel nine Xfinity and Channel 29 FIOS. Listen any time on the BMC Podcast Network on SoundCloud and iTunes.Just search for the Belmont Media Podcast Network.Now on to the Talking News.Opioid use on the North shore by J Petticos.The state has never seen an epidemic quite like the opioid deaths and epidemic that hits everyone.The rich, poor, middle-class, jobless, and well employed, but there's hope.Recent statistics across the state show a 10% drop in opiod deaths.The second consecutive drop, though the deathly opioid fentanyl use continues to rise according to DPH fentanyl is a synthetic opiod that affects similar to heroin that works quick and results that leave you just as quickly and are often prescribed for severe pain.Fentanyl is known to be 50 to 100 times more potent than morphine, according to a recent DEA National Drug Assessment.Massachusetts saw the second highest number of seizures and arrests, 3,911 in 2016 for drugs, second, only to Ohio, almost double Massachusetts at 7,971.And just ahead of Pennsylvania's 2,355.Massachusetts also has the fourth highest overdose death rate by any state in the nation behind Ohio, Connecticut and West Virginia.State deaths, both estimated and confirmed totaled 1,470 through September, down from 1,637 through the same period in 2016.According to Massachusetts department of public health, the confirmed opiod death numbers across the state though, slightly waning were still staggering with 710 males, 222 females falling victim, 67 in the 15 to 24 year old category, 281 in the 25 to 34 year old category, 26 in the 35 to 44 range and 213 in the 45 to 54 range.But even in older citizens with 117 dying between the ages of 55 to 64 and 28 dying that were over the age of 65.In the race category, 753 were white, 104 Hispanic, 49 black and eight Asian.In the north shore's biggest cities, the towns opioid deaths still are mostly trending up with no town data yet available for 2017.In Beverley, there were seven deaths in 2012, spiking up to 13 in 2015 and 18 in 2016.In the fishing town of Gloucester, two deaths in 2012 gave way to six each through 2013 and 14, peaking at 11 in 2015 before dropping to nine in 2016.In Historic Salem, the number continued to escalate from five and 2012 to seven in 2013 and 13 each in 2014, 2015, before rising to 19 in 2016.In nearby Peabody, the numbers are dropping slightly from a low of three in 2012 to 12 in 2013 and 14 in 2014 before having 11 deaths in both 2015 and 2016.Finally in Amesbury, a single death in 2012 has led to six in 2015 and eight in 2016.Small towns and big cities the numbers vary greatly.Sara Grinnell, Executive Director of the Healthy Peabody Collaborative part of the Peabody Police Department said that it, when it comes to the city of Peabody, a number of partnerships have formed to combat the opiod epidemic while also working to create a city everyone can be proud of.The Healthy Peabody Collaborative formed in March of 2008, under a mayor, Michael J Bonfanti and a collaboration between the mayor's office, health department and police department, as a focus of addressing substance abuse issues in the city of Peabody, working to reduce underage substance abuse while creating a healthier community.And over the Claire.Thank you, Bob.Part two, Grinnell noted that a three city grant with Lynn in Salem has gone a long way in providing resources for all three cities to work toward curbing the opioid crisis through education and prevention of use.\"We've been to do a lot through the grant \"with all first responders \"now we equipped with Narcan,\" said Grinnell.And firefighters who are able to go out with outreach workers, to people who have overdosed to help provide treatment resources to them and their families.Follow-up is key to many officials who will often worry about the people that are lost in between the cracks, which may have overdosed, and then revived only to relive a vicious cycle of drugs if people with resources don't step in to intervene.Grinnell said, it's an all in atmosphere for all city departments as they work to change the trend of increasing opioid deaths.Although Peabody saw a slight decrease in opioid deaths over the past few years, after a high of 14, in 2014, work on the crisis continues for all departments.Grinnell said Narcan, thanks to the grant was also provided to a number of social service agencies as well.Strategic planning sessions are working on education in providing the resources needed for prevention said, Grinnell.It's been an extremely difficult to get ahead of this, but we are doing as much as we can.When asked about the decrease of opioid deaths in the town and overall the state, Grinnell pointed to the increase in Narcan availability and work to educate people to the dangers of opioid pose even after just one use.Our goal is to see less people using drugs in the first place while providing others with access to treatment and recovery options, said Grinnell.Our goal is for nobody to use drugs, and that would be ideal, but we're here to provide support for people suffering as well as their families.While the focus can sometimes be solely on the person taking the drugs, Grinnell said, there's a number of organizations that help provide support and education to the family members left behind to cope with a loved one they can't control or even reason with at times.One such organization is Learn to Cope, with a chapter in Salem, a nonprofit support network that offers education resources, peer support, and hope for parents and family members coping with a loved one, addicted to opiates or other drugs, founded by Joann Peterson in 2004, a woman whose siblings and son suffered from addiction, according to its website, is an organization that has grown to include over 10,000 members and has become a nationally recognized model for peer support and prevention designed to offer families and the support education, resources, and hope that the founder's family would have benefited from.And now here's Max.Thank you, Claire.Retirement spending by Joanna Katurah.As you reach different phases of retirement, you'll have important decisions to make, reevaluate your withdrawals.Before retirement, you made a budget to decide which retirement savings options were best for you.Now that you've retired and have transitioned to spending, you should reevaluate a safe withdrawal rate from your retirement accounts.A safe withdrawal rate is the percentage of money you can withdraw each year to ensure your money will last for the rest of your life.Financial planners commonly recommend 4% as a safe withdrawal rate if you need your nest egg to last more than 30 years.Downsizing your house, moving somewhere with a lower cost of living can help you save on property taxes, maintenance costs, and mortgage payments.Profits from selling your home can be invested and become a late game savings option.Retirees who want greater flexibility may choose to start renting, reasons not to downsize.Staying in your home can make sense if you paid off your mortgage and expect to pay little on taxes or repairs, plan to use a reverse mortgage to fund your retirement or want to pass the home onto your children.Move to a retirement community.With great activities and amenities, retirement community might be a perfect environment for you to stay active and meet new friends.Retirees who want to age in place at home may find that safety modifications and in-home care can be cost prohibitive.It's easier to move while you're still in good health and less of a burden to your children.Get your estate in order.A will should always be part of your retirement plan, but there are additional documents to consider.Power of attorney designates a person you trust to make financial and health decisions on your behalf if you are incapacitated.Living will, spells out exact wishes for medical treatment in the event of certain scenarios.Trust, gives you greater control to specify who will inherit your assets and ensures a quicker transition.There are many types of trusts.A dynasty trust would allow you to transfer wealth to children and grandchildren while minimizing transfer taxes.Change your Medicare.As your healthcare needs increased, you'll want to consider switching from your original Medicare plan to a Medicare Advantage Plan.Medicare Advantage Plans have a cap on your out-of-pocket expenses of 6,700 or lower.Once you reach that limit, you'll pay nothing for the rest of the year.Original Medicare plans have no limit.So costs can easily rise to tens of thousands of dollars.Arrange long-term care.As you reach your '80's and '90's, you might need the level of care provided in an assisted living or long-term care facility.Ensure that your needs are best met by researching and visiting facilities before you need care.If you move to an independent living community while still in good health, you may be able to transition to an associated assisted living facility.Over to you Bob.Thank you, Max.After ID theft, member praises experience service.a AAA Northeast member in Rhode Island recently received some unwelcome news.Someone was using her name to file online loan applications with several banks in the Midwest.After asking herself how such a thing could happen she faced the question identity theft, victims know all too well.What do I do now?Experian was there with the answer.As a AAA member, she had the advantage of Free Identity Theft Protection Plan from experience simply by signing up.Experian landed her, alluded her to the phony applications by email and within an hour, a fraud resolution specialist was on the phone, talking her through the next steps, like contacting the police and credit bureaus.\"I was a nervous wreck,\" she said, \"but Experian put me at ease\".All AAA members need to know about this service.It's called ProtectMyID Essential.Members who sign up, get identity protection services from Experian, including daily or credit report monitoring, suspicious activity alerts, resolution support and more.Programs like ProtectMyID and preventive measures like shredding old bills, are good practices to keep personal information secure.As one financial crimes investigator stated, I recommend having all the protection you can, said Detective Paul Beckett of the Cranston, Rhode Island Police Department.He didn't handle this member's case, but he's dealt with many like it, and they're becoming more frequent.The number of identity fraud victims reaching all time high in 2017.According to the 2018 Identity Fraud Study by Javelin Strategy in Research, thieves stole 16.8 billion from 16.7 million victims.Beckett said that paying bills online has dramatically increased opportunities for hackers to swipe debit or credit card numbers.Also a large scale data breaches have compromised millions of social security numbers, and other personal information.Credit card skimmers at ATM's and stolen purses and wallets remain real threats and over to Claire.Thank you, Bob.School committee candidates by There are three candidates running for the two, three-year Belmont School Committee seats.Newcomers, Tara Donner, and Jill Norton and incumbent Susan Burgess Cox.Susan Burgess Cox is 30 years in Belmont, occupation attorney hearing officer for the MassHealth Board of Hearings.Her education, bachelor's from Hobart and William Smith colleges, Jewish justice from the Catholic University of America certificate in law and public policy from the Catholic University of America.Town service, school committee member since April, 2015, secretary of Belmont School Committee, member of Belmont Capital Budget Committee, member of Belmont Special Education Advisory Council, secretary of Senior Center, building committee member, Belmont Disability Access Commission.Her family, husband, Michael, children, Maggie and Matthew, seven.Other, troop leader, brownie troop, secretary for Winberg PTA, room parent for Windbrook, member of Butler PTA, member of Wellington PTA. Here is Tara Donner.She is 17 years in Belmont, occupation, English teacher, Winchester Public Schools.Her education is a bachelor's of Wesley College, Master's of education, Lesley University.Town service, Town Meeting members since 2007.Family; wife, Abby, two daughters at Wellington Elementary ages six and nine.Other, volunteer for Curriculum Development in Steering Committee for English Curriculum, the Acceptance and Inclusion Committee chairperson for several years and the Emergency Incident Management Team at McCall Middle School in Winchester, sort of town meeting number in Milton, where she grew up.Elected student representative to the school committee and Melton for two terms when she was in high school, playing softball, gardening, backyard chicken and beekeeping.Children's religious education teacher at First Church Belmont.Here's Jill Norton, 16 years in Belmont.Her occupation, director of Education Policy for ABT Associates.Her education, Bachelor's in Elementary Education from Michigan State, Montessori Early Childhood Certificate from the Montessori Institute, New England, masses of education, policy management from Harvard Graduate School of Education.Her town service Wellington Elementary room parent, PTO third grade enrichment coordinated.Her family, husband Reed, two children, Noah, eight and Ben, three.Other, vestry at the Board of, vestry in the Board of Directors member, at Trinity Church in Copley Square, Boston.Volunteer and youth leader, El Hogar Ministries, Tegucigalpa, Honduras.Avid Walden pond, swimmer, and cargo biker.And now over to Max.Thanks, Claire.Senior Living Options Evolve by Susan Kreimer.Senior living facilities have come a long way from the nursing homes of yesteryear from meatless meals to relaxing rocking chairs, bountiful barbecues, and bonfires.There are many amenities and unique offerings to take into consideration in choosing a place to live for yourself or a loved one.But first it's important to ponder what are my care needs and who can meet those needs, said Rachel Reeves spokeswoman for the National Center for Assisted Living, an advocacy organization based in Washington DC. And if an illness develops or progresses, can you still help care for me?What does that look like as I need more assistance?Taking a tour of a facility is the best way to get a feel for its surroundings, Reeves said.Ask to visit during meal times and test the food.Talk with residents, participate in some activities and evaluate if the employees are attentive and friendly.If you do this before a crisis strikes, you won't be compelled to make a decision quickly and under pressure.Even better, go and stay there for a few days, said John Pinos, Professor of Gerontology Policy and Planning and Director of the National Resource Center on supportive housing and home modification at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles, try it out.It's probably a good investment.Some senior living communities rent guest rooms.If that's not an option, look into nearby hotels.Think about the amount of interaction you want with other residents.I would try to understand what my preferences are overall, whether you want to live in a totally senior complex or environment where you, what you value most, privacy versus sociability, Pinos said, and contemplate whether an urban or suburban or rural setting and sceneries suit you most.Prices vary, but average about $3,100 monthly per person in an independent living situation, $4,800 in assisted living and $6,400 in memory care, according to Stephen Goland, a gerontologist and professor in the geography department at the university of Florida in Gainesville.Well, Medicare and Medicaid typically don't cover these expenses.Long-term care insurance may help subsidize the costs.Although meals are often included, senior living facilities have evolved to give residents more control over their food choices and activities.Residents don't just eat in the dining room anymore.Some housing communities have set up kiosks or mini grocery stores where you can buy food and snacks to bring into your room, Goland says.Whether you're allowed to drink alcoholic beverages in the facilities public areas, and in your private quarters or not at all, maybe a factor to weigh before signing on the dotted line, he said.Also whenever possible, selecting a facility near a family member would be ideal.Not only is management likely to be more responsive to your needs, it helps to call for emotional support and to request something you may need delivered.It's always useful to have a gatekeeper, a proponent and advocate on your side, Goland said.Back to you, Bob.Thank you, Max.Pre-planning a funeral to spend down and Medicaid by correspondent to Jeffrey D. Wagner.Before a person runs out of money, the unit individual comes in, or the family comes in and we set up a pre-paid irrevocable trust in that person's name.It is allowed by Medicaid and that way the funeral money is set aside and protected for the family.There is a few things Medicaid does not allow in the funeral bill, including flowers and after meal, after funeral meal expenses, but pretty much everything else is covered, he said.That everything else includes vaults, burial plots, cremation, and cremation urns, embalming, transportation of the body and other services offered by the funeral director and staff.Medicaid allows the family to set up another funeral account at a local bank for up to $1,500.As an addition to the trust.That money helps out with inflation in cemetery money or engraving the stones.Other directors also note that pre-planning allows the future deceased family member to have their wishes carried out.It also relieves some of the last minute stress and possible disagreements over what that individual would have wanted.And now over my colleague, Claire.Thank you, Bob.Greek Easter Traditions come to life at Agora by Juliana K. Savarese.Hundreds of candles decorated with different themes for children celebrating Greek Easter, April 8th, are being made by the hands of Marlboro resident Dave Metallidis.Metallidis owns Whispers of Spring and Agora, 7 Cushing Ave Belmont.Agora is the Greek word for market, which is what the business originally was when it started by Metallidis wife, Deli, as a Greek grocery store in Brighton.Since opening eight years ago, the business has grown so much.Metallidis, who is practicing lawyer, has been working full-time to create the products they sell for Greek Orthodox events.Greek Easter is one of their busiest times of year.Artificial flowers, stuffed animals, princess figurines, superhero toys, ribbons, and soccer balls, or some of the ornaments Metallidis uses to decorate the candles.The candles are traditionally given by godparents to their godchildren, to bring to church for the midnight service on April 7th called Anastasi, which means risen.When Greek Orthodox churches re-enact the resurrection of Christ, many children also bring them to church for the Agape service, meaning love, on Easter Sunday.The candles are lit and children, supervised by their parents, raise the candles up and down as they sing the traditional Anastasi Hymn, Christos Anesti which means Christ is risen.Every godparent wants to have something special for their godchild.So we have to do a lot of custom work and we have to have a big selection, he said.The candles range in price for $20 to $30, he said.Avengers superheroes are very popular for the boys this year as our Patriots theme decorations.He uses flowers to decorate candles for older girls or simpler nautical and cross decorations for older boys.When it's not the Easter season, Agora sells everything else customers need for Greek christenings and weddings, such as christening gowns and suits, favors, witness pins, wedding crowns, wedding trays, icons, and lodger candles.Now here's Max.Thank you, Claire.International Film Festival to be held in Belmont.Nine films from the world's top International Film Festivals will premiere at Belmont World Films, 17th Annual International Film Series, which runs March 19th through May 14th at the studio cinema, 376 Trapelo Road, Belmont.Most films will screen at 7:30 p.m. Mondays with an exception of opening night on March 18th.All films will be followed by discussions led by experts, speakers, and occasionally cultural performances.The opening and closing night films are proceeded by dinner receptions featuring culturally relevant cuisine at the theater.This year series bound by beliefs features films that show how difficult it is to implement change in the face of long held societal or community beliefs.All but one film is either a North American East Coast or New England premiere, and several others are also their countries submission to the Academy Awards, best foreign language film category.As in the last several years, a third of the films are directed by women.We don't have to look much farther than the Hollywood sexual harassment scandal to understand how long it takes or how hard it is to change the status quo, said Belmont World Film Executive Director, Ellen Gitelman.The characters in each of the nine films are not always successful in standing up to their society's belief.And even when they are, it is often an uphill battle.Here's Bob, again.Along with my colleagues, Claire and Max, we thank you for listening to the Talking News and we hope you've enjoyed the show.We will return next week for another edition of Local News Happenings around Belmont.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/talking-news_040318.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/talking-news_040318.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/talking-news_040318.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/snafuinfinitytalking-news_040919/talking-news_040919.mp3", "text": "Watch and listen to the Talking News every day at 12 noon and 6:00 PM on Channel 96, Comcast Xfinity and Channel 30, Verizon Fios.It can also be heard Mondays and Tuesdays at 4:30 PM, and Wednesdays at 12:30 PM on Channel 9, Xfinity and Channel 29, Fios.Listen anytime on the BMC Podcast Network, on SoundCloud and iTunes.Just search for the Belmont Media Podcast Network.And now onto the Talking News.Paolillo Honored for His Service, by Joanna K. Tzouvelis.Mark Paolillo attended his final meeting as Selectman on April 1st and was honored with three proclamations from State Senator William Brownsberger, State Representative David Roger, and the town of Belmont recognizing his history of service and dedication.Paolillo served three terms as a selectman.\"You've done so much for this town and collaborated \"with so many people, and that's how things get done, \"is by people collaborating\".\"You're a leader that does collaborate,\" says Brownsberger.Rogers said he is sad to see Paolillo go.\"Mark's a really, really smart guy, \"and he's a really, really nice guy, \"and both of them really matter in public service, \"that you bring out your intellect, \"but you also provide fundamental decency as a human being,\" said Rogers.Chairman Adam Dash and Selectman Thomas Caputo presented Paolillo with a wooden rocking chair engraved with the Belmont town seal, his name, and years of service.\"Because you like being the Chair,\" said Dash.The proclamation from the town cited Paolillo's nine years as selectman, as well as his 22 years of service in many other capacities on the Travel Advisory committee, the Council on Aging, Warrant Committee, Committee Preservation Act Study Committee, Town Meeting Recreation Commission, Minuteman Study Committee, Municipal Light Board, Financial Task Force, Capital Budget Committee, Community Path Advisory Committee, Board of Library Trustees, Economic Development Advisory Committee, and School Committee, along with Major Capital Projects Working Group, High School Traffic Working Group, among others.He served as Chairman of the Selectmen in 2012, 2013 and 2016.The proclamation states Paolillo was an integral in the creation of the first Financial Task Force, Belmont's first look at a municipal, and a multi-year strategy regarding town finances and capital improvements, and bringing the town and schools into one budget, creating the One Belmont, One Budget approach.The proclamation also states he was instrumental in changing how municipal employees communicated with residents, pushing for a stronger web and social media presence.\"Mark had set a high standard of commitment and dedication, \"which the youth of our town may follow \"and serve as an inspiration for the citizens \"of the town of Belmont,\" states the proclamation from the town of Belmont.In response to the many accolades and applause from the audience, which included Paolillo's wife, Christine, and his mother, Mary, Mark said, \"It has been a privilege and honor to serve the residents \"of the community.\"I've enjoyed every single day and every single year.\"I'm really going to miss the work\".\"People thought I was retiring \"because of the work and long hours.\"That had nothing to do with it,\" he said.He said he will miss the town employees.\"We had a terrific team of department heads \"and town employees \"that do their best every single day.\"We're not perfect, we try to serve the community \"and the way they want services provided,\" he said.He also thanked the other boards he served with.\"Some were great, some were okay\".He especially thanked his mentor, Ralph Jones.\"The smartest guy I ever served with,\" said Paolillo.He also thanked his late father, Anthony, who instilled in him the need to give back to the community by serving it.Paolillo is a Certified Public Accountant and works as Principal of Abandoned and Unclaimed Property Practice Leader for Ryan of Boston.And now over to my colleague, Claire.Thanks Bob.The Election Results Are In. Epstein Wins Selectman Seat, Page Wins Housing Authority, Prestwich and Checkoway Win School Committee Seats, by Joanna K. Tzouvelis.For many, this year's town election was a nail biter, with a contentious three-way race for the selectman seat, as well as races for School Committee and Housing Authority.Many predicted it would be a close race between selectmen candidates Roy Epstein and Jessie Bennett, and the results proved just that, with Epstein winning over Bennett by 128 votes.Timothy Flood came in third with 136 votes.The most recent close race for selectman was in 2012, between Andy Rojas and the late Dan Sharfman.Sharfman lost by just 35 votes.This is the first three-way race for selectman since 2010, when Mark Paolillo first ran against Daniel Leclerc and Anne Mahon.Paolillo won.Housing Authority.Newcomer Cassandra Page won the five-year Housing Authority seat with 384 more votes than incumbent Tommasina Olson.Page was overwhelmed with joy as she learned the results of Town Hall, read by Assistant Town Clerk, Meg Piccione.She said she did not expect to win.\"I didn't think anybody cared.\"My opponent's been around forever, \"and she's done so many amazing things for this town, \"and I just didn't think I had a chance,\" said Page.\"This is the first time in 28 years \"a tenant has been elected as a member of the Housing Authority Board,\" according to Housing Authority board member, Charles Laverty, III. \"I know she's passionate about a lot of issues, \"so we look forward to working with her on those issues \"and all the changes at the Housing Authority,\" he said.Laverty will become the acting chairman to fill the vacancy left by Olson, who was the chairman.The first meeting is April 22nd, at which time they will elect a new chairman.He said he looked forward to working with Page and welcomes her with open arms.School Committee.In the race for the two three-year school committee seats, the winners are newcomer Amy Checkoway, coming in first with 3,105 votes, and incumbent Andrea Prestwich with 2,975.Newcomer Peter Pantazopoulos received 1,417 votes.Checkoway said she cares about the transition to the grade seven through twelve school and getting into the community, listening to different perspectives and bringing them to the table.She is focused on trying to make sure our students are getting a comprehensive, high quality education, and that teachers and leadership are supported to make positive change in the schools.Her first School Committee meeting will be April 9th.Board of Selectmen.Epstein said he never ran a campaign before and thinks he knocked on 2000 doors.\"The most important experience of that \"was meeting all the people who are incredibly diverse, \"generally very welcoming, very informative.\"I learned a lot from all different points of view, \"rich, poor, young, old, with different concerns,\" he said.He said he believes the experience made him a better candidate, and it will make him a better selectman.Epstein said the biggest issues facing Belmont in the next few years are financial, between completing capital projects successfully and managing a request for an override.\"Managing that in a way that people can live with it \"is the most important challenge facing Belmont, \"and I believe I'm the best prepared to help do that,\" he said.Epstein said Belmont's chronic problem is expenses that exceed revenue.\"Getting prepared for the next override \"is something we have to start thinking about now.\"I've given some thought to taking this as a moment \"where we could maybe simultaneously address \"the tax program for seniors, \"and revisit the business model for town departments \"to see if money can be saved \"by restructuring services and rethinking some of the ways \"the town raises revenue\".Before the results came in Bennett told the Citizen Herald, \"Whether I win or not, I plan to stay involved in the town.\"I will do all of the volunteering I possibly can.\"It's what makes this town great, \"people getting in and getting the work done.\"I'm not going away anytime soon, \"no matter what,\" said Bennett.Former Selectman Mark Paolillo was at Town Hall when the results came in.\"I hope now that the race is over the town comes together,\" he said.He thinks it took a lot of courage for Bennett to step into the ring without a lot of time spent in town politics.\"She came incredibly close to winning.\"I hope she will continue to serve as a town meeting member.\"She has done wonderful work on the High School Traffic Working Group, \"and perhaps in the future, \"she'll throw her hat in the ring again,\" said Paolillo.He thinks it's important for the selectmen to unite the town.\"There's so much more to do, \"and the three members of the board \"need to move forward together, unite the town, \"and let's focus on the issues we need to address \"and enhance the quality of the life \"of the residents in our community,\" said Paolillo.Now, over to Max.Thank you, Claire.AAA Rating to Save Town Money, by Joanna K. Tzouvelis.Town Treasurer, Floyd Carman, announced March 7th that the town of Belmont has been assigned a AAA rating by both Moody's and S&P. This was the first time the town has been rated by two rating agencies, according to Carman.The size of the financing triggered the dual rating analysis in that report.On March 12th, Carman went out to market for a $100 million bond to fund the Belmont High School grade seven through twelve building project.7.4 million to renovate the police and public works buildings, $700,000 for the town's ongoing water main replacement project.There were seven bidders.The winning bidder was JP Morgan Securities, LLC. The true interest cost of the 30-year bond is 3.310%.The town will receive 108,100,000 in cash, and finance $102,030,000.According to Carman, a savings of around 6 million.Effective January 1st, 2020, residents will see the effects of this initial borrowing for the debt exclusion for the BHS project on their property tax bills.The average single family Belmont home, valued at 1,090,000, will see their real estate taxes increased by $760, annually.Focusing just on the Belmont High School debt exclusion project, the Belmont taxpayer will save 5,572,000 on this bond, which he estimates is about $40 on the average homeowner's property tax bill.\"Every dollar counts,\" he said.Belmont is one of nine communities out of 351 that have both Moody's and S&P AAA ratings.The other communities are Acton, Boston, Brookline, Cambridge, Hingham, Wellesley, Weston, and Winchester.In February and March of 2020, Carman said he will go to market for another a hundred million dollar bond for the BHS project.The vote passing the debt exclusion for the new grade seven through twelve high school building in November, 2018, authorized Carman to borrow 212.7 million.The total project will cost 295 million.The town expects to get 80 million reimbursed through the grant from the Massachusetts School Building Authority.Before this debt exclusion, the town was in debt about 75 million, according to Carman, with the $100 million bond, the debt will be 175 million.The following year, it will be 275 million.Although the AAA rating could give the town a premium, which could save taxpayers up to 600,000.\"The AAA rating \"reflects the town's healthy financial operations \"and reserves, \"a moderately sized tax base in close proximity \"to New England's largest employment center, \"strong resident wealth and income profile, \"and rising but manageable debt burden,\" Moody's said in its report.The rating also incorporates the town's aggressive funding of its moderate pension liability.According to the Moody's credit analysis received by Carman on February 28th, factors that could lead to a downgrade of Belmont's rating are a failure to maintain financially balanced operations as debt service increases, deviations from planned funding of pension liability, and the unwillingness of voters to approve future debt exclusions and overrides.Credit challenges are the rapid growth of school enrollment driving rising education and capital costs, and future debt plans over the near term will substantially increase debt burden.The S&P rating report received by Carman on March 6th, describes Belmont's economy as very strong.\"The town's economic profile benefits from its location, \"which has given way to extremely strong \"and stable wealth \"and income levels.\"It is served by the Massachusetts Bay Transit Authority's \"commuter rail, buses, and trackless trolley lines, \"in addition to several roads and exits along Route 2, \"which connect it directly \"to the area's deep and robust economy,\" he said.The report also states Belmont's debt and contingent liability profile as weak, but that the costs are manageable, given the town's very strong demographic profile.\"In our opinion, a credit weakness \"is Belmont's exposure to rising costs \"related to pension and OPEB obligations.\"However, we believe overall costs \"are affordable and the town has been active \"in managing the overall liability,\" S&P said in its report.S&P said the outlook for Belmont is stable, as long as Belmont remains proactive in its management of its debt and liability profile, as evidenced by its careful planning and prudent budget decisions.\"While unlikely \"if financial performance were to deteriorate significantly, \"leading to a draw on reserves, \"or if long-term liabilities increased at a faster pace, \"leading to budgetary pressures, \"we could lower the rating,\" S&P said in its report.\"In addition, \"if the town's tax rate flexibility were to diminish \"as evidenced by its electorate no longer willing \"to support operating overrides and debt exclusions, \"the rating would also be pressured, \"particularly given the expected rise in debt \"and other costs\".Over to you, Bob.Thank you, Max.Students Make a Statement, by Sri Kaushik, Abby Yu, and Chantelle Dunne.On March 14th, hundreds of Belmont High School students streamed into the cafeteria after school to participate in the 17th annual student-led event, Make a Statement Day.Amidst upbeat music and tasty homemade treats, students packed themselves around the circular tables littered with sharpies to decorate free white t-shirts, purchased using donations for the Belmont PTO, the Youth Activities, and DARE Inc.Program of the Belmont Police Department, and Belmont Against Racism.Each year, students and staff are invited to decorate these t-shirts with slogans, images, quotes, or symbols expressing whatever it is that they are passionate about.This year, Officer Horan made a surprise visit to the event, much to the delight of many who had him as a teacher and guide in their fifth grade DARE classes.The goal of the event is to promote diversity, creativity, acceptance, and education among Belmont High School students.Each participant then wears their decorated shirt to school the next day, where they are encouraged to share their statement with their peers and teachers.This year, sophomore Andrew Cubstead and Thomas Boyle collaborated on their t-shirt and made abstract t-shirts that on their own seemed nonsensical, but when put together resembled a unified t-shirt.When asked about it, Boyle responded that it was to show that he and Cubstead were just two halves of a whole.Senior Jess Giorgio made a cute shirt in which her name was the basis of an Asterix poem, a snapshot of her personality.Others made t-shirts focusing on empowering both women and members of the LGBTQ plus community, current gun and immigration laws and climate change.Make a Statement Day is entirely free to those participating.In order to purchase the t-shirts, markers and other supplies necessary for the event to take place, committee members, Sri Kaushik, Abby Yu, and Chantelle Dunne prepared grant proposals and spent the preceding months planning their annual event.And now over to Claire.Thanks Bob.Celebrate Spring at BGA's New Exhibit, by Rebecca Richards.The Belmont Gallery of Art invites visitors to celebrate the joy and beauty of spring with its new exhibit, Birds, Blossoms and Botanicals at the Homer building, 3rd floor, 19 Moore Street.Opening April 12, the exhibit will delight visitors with the many images in vivid colors of the earth's awakening after the quietness of the winter months.One can almost hear the birds singing and smell the flowers, in an exhibit that delights the senses.The response to the BGA Spring Awakenings call for art has been unprecedented, with over 100 artists sending in close to 300 submissions for consideration.The end result is an exhibit filled with work by over 75 artists, featuring not only painting, printmaking, and photography, but other types of art making as well, including textiles, jewelry design, and assemblage, with the common theme of debating the beauty and joy of spring.Visitors to Birds, Blossoms and Botanicals will feel truly enveloped in the earth beauty and renewal at this special time of year.The BGA will host an opening reception for Birds, Blossoms and Botanicals from 6:00 to 8:30 PM on April 12th, with many of the artists present.Wine and light refreshments will be served.A gallery talk, coffee, and conversation with exhibit guest juror, Lauren Meier, will be held from 10:00 AM to noon, April 13.Meier, a landscape designer and editor of the papers of Frederick Law Olmsted, will give a talk on the legacy of Frederick Law Olmsted.These BGA events are free and open to the public.BGA's art fun shops will be held April 27th and 28th.An opportunity to play, let your imagination run loose, and create something unique and personal for you or for someone you love.Working with both found materials and supplies, and guidance provided by the BGA, participants in each three hour long workshop will leave with an original piece of art.RSVP's and nominal fee are required to cover supplies.And now here's Max.Thanks, Claire.METCO Students Showcase Art at Grove Hall Library, by Joanna K. Tzouvelis.METCO students in kindergarten through eighth grade are participating in the fifth annual METCO art show through April 11th at the Grove Hall Library in Dorchester.According to Chenery visual arts teacher, Kathleen Burns, the show originated in response to making sure all students that come to Belmont feel that they are part of the community, and to celebrate their art, not just in Belmont, but in the communities where they come from.Chenery art teacher, Katie Kelly, said the art in the show highlights the work done in the curriculum, such as two-point perspective, one-point perspective, clay masks, slab buildings, screen prints, portraits incorporating the \"Where I'm From\" poem they work on in seventh grade English class.Chenery 7th grade METCO student Crystal Bella Rutter of Mattapan is exhibiting her art in the show.It depicts depression and how it affects the lives of people ages 15 to 24.It was created using a carving tool and linoleum with rolled ink.\"It lets students show what they do in school.\"Not only in school, but outside of school.\"It lets them express themselves and show what they've been going through at home,\" said Rutter.Chenery 8th grade METCO student Cartier Davis of Dorchester is exhibiting his two-point perspective of Legos, with dragons in the background in coordinating colors, made with pencil.He is also exhibiting a ceramic sculpt fish sculpture depicting a betta fish he used to have as a pet.He likes that the exhibit is close to home.Chenery 8th grade METCO student, Meima Diacate of Mattapan, is exhibiting a screen print she created with a group in bright orange and red, and a two-point perspective about social issues, including gay rights.\"I made a box that's like a rainbow \"and a person choosing a path they want to go down \"and being conflicted,\" she said.She's excited to be part of the art show for the fourth year in a row.\"I like that I can do anything I want in the art class.\"I get to choose what I draw and what I make,\" she said.She hopes to continue studying different art forms of art in high school.Chenery 7th grade METCO student, A.J. Sweet of East Boston, will exhibit a picture he created of his dog, Lucky, and a portrait of himself, which incorporates the \"Where I'm From\" poem he wrote.\"I think it's cool people get to see my artwork I work hard on,\" he said.Chenery art student teacher, Sarah Libertini, said the METCO art show is special for everyone who attends, and is an opportunity to connect with the METCO students on a different level.Over to you, Bob.Thanks, Max.Local Non-Profits Receive Community Grants.Harvard Pilgrim Healthcare Foundation recently announced that two Belmont non-profit organizations were awarded a total of $1,000 from the foundation's Community Spirit 9/11 Mini-Grant Program.The Belmont Chinese American Association received a $500 grant, and Belmont High School received a $500 grant.To commemorate those Harvard Pilgrim members who lost their lives on September 11th, 2001, Harvard Pilgrim and the foundation created the Community Spirit 9/11 Mini-Grant Program.This program allows each Harvard Pilgrim employee to award a $500 grant completely funded by the foundation to the local charity of his or her choice for each calendar year.Since this community grants program began in 2002, Harvard Pilgrim employees have directed more than 6.3 million to thousands of organizations throughout Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, and New Hampshire.\"We are so fortunate to have generous \"and dedicated employees to enrich our company \"and the communities in which we all live and work,\" said Karen Voci, the president of the Harvard Pilgrim Foundation.\"The mini-grant program is a wonderful way \"to support our employees.\"They help others to make an impact \"in their own cities and towns\".In 2018, 96% of Harvard Pilgrim employees participated in at least one form of service, or giving through volunteering, the mini-grant program or the Harvard Pilgrim's annual employee fundraising campaign.And now over to my colleague, Claire.Thank you.Belmont World Film to Present Jirga.Belmont World Film will present the New England premiere of Jirga, sponsored by the Australian Consulate of New York at 7:30 PM, April 8th, at the Studio Cinema, 376 Trapelo Road, Belmont.The film was Australia's 2019 submission for the best foreign language film Oscar.Director Benjamin Gilmore will speak after the film via Skype from Australia in a discussion moderated by Zahra Lotfi, a Middle Eastern studies scholar originally from Afghanistan.\"Besides epitomizing this year's theme of making peace, \"Jirga portrays the people of Afghanistan \"in a different light from American cinema,\" said Belmont World Film Executive Director, Ellen Gitleman.Many of the people in the film are non-actors who have participated in these thoughtful Jirgas themselves.Belmont World Film's 18th annual international film series, Making Peace, will run through April 29 at the Studio Cinema in Belmont with films beginning at 7:30.Tickets to film screenings are $11 general admission, and $9 for students and seniors in advance at http://belmontworldfilm.org, and $12 and $10 respectively on day of the show, beginning at 7:00 PM with cash.EBT and WIC cardholders can purchase tickets at half price on the day of the show.A passport includes eight admissions for $75, and can be shared with one other person.Now, over to Max.Thanks, Claire.Pan-Mass Challenge Seeking Kids Rides Coordinator.The Pan-Mass Challenge charitable bike-a-thon held every August is seeking a coordinator for the Belmont Kids Ride event.The organization hosts more than 30 PMC kids rides throughout Massachusetts and new England.In 2018, one of those rides took place in Belmont in which more than 300 local children participated to raise funds for patient care and cancer research at Dana Farber.In 2018, 33 PMC Kids Rides attracted over 4,300 cyclists and 1500 volunteers.Kids ages two to 15 pedaled routes between one and 10 miles in mini bike-a-thons, providing them the opportunity to raise money for cancer care and research, just like the adults who participate in the PMC. Together, they raised more than $950,000 as part of the PMC's monumental $56 million gift to Dana Farber, and in 2019, PMC Kids Rides hopes to raise $1 million as part of the organization's fundraising goal of 58 million.The Pan-Mass Challenge has raised more than $654 million for cancer research and patient care at Dana Farber Cancer Institute since its inception in 1980.For information, visit kids.pmc.org.If interested in becoming a coordinator, contact just Justine Darmanian at 781-343-4012, or justine@pmc.org.Back to you, Bob.Along with my colleagues, Claire and Max, we thank you for listening to the Talking News and hope you have enjoyed the show.We will return next week for another edition of local news happenings around Belmont.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/talking-news_040919.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/talking-news_040919.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/talking-news_040919.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/snafuinfinitytalking-news_041718/talking-news_041718.mp3", "text": "Watch and listen to The Talking News every day at 12 noon and 6:00 PM on Channel 96 Comcast Xfinity and Channel 30 Verizon Fios.It can also be heard Mondays and Tuesdays at 4:30 PM and Wednesday at 12:30 PM on Channel 9 Xfinity and Channel 29 Fios.Listen any time, on the BMC podcast network on SoundCloud and iTunes.Just search for the Belmont Media Podcast Network.Now on to The Talking News.New GM for Belmont Light appointed, By Joanna K Zavalas.The Belmont Light Board unanimously voted in favor of appointing Christopher Roy, conquered Municipal Light Plants, current Assistant Director as Belmont Lights, new General Manager, subject to successful negotiation of a contract, following his public interview on April 9th.Current acting General Manager, Craig Spinale, was also a final candidate and publicly interviewed on April 9th.At the end of July, the Belmont Light Board voted not to renew the contract of Jim Palmer, who served as General Manager since 2010, Spinale, was appointed as the acting General Manager by the Belmont Light Board.Grew White, the same search committee used to help hire town Administrative Patrice Garvin, was used to help with the Belmont Light General Manager search.Ten applications for the position were received, and five candidates were interviewed by the screening committee on April 20 on March 24th.The committee then narrowed it down to three candidates, to be interviewed by the Light Board, but one dropped out.Light Board Chairman Adam Dash, said both were great candidates, but only one could get the job.He said, Roy did a great job in the presentation section of the interview, with the problem the Light Board asked the candidates to analyze and solve, which was how to keep rates from going up, while increasing the green energy portion of Belmont's power supply.He clearly has a passion for public power and the experience in working on; substations, solar institutions.Installations, excuse me, and, and green energy policies.It was a close call, but the vote was unanimous.Mr. Spinale has done a great job as acting GM and really want to, we really want him to stay.Having both of them would give Belmont Light a dream team, said Dash in an email to The Citizen Herald on April 10th.Roy has been the Assistant Director of the Concord Municipal light Plant, since 2013.Prior to that, he was the Interim Communications Coordinator for Concord Municipal Light Plant, from 2011 to 2013.Engineering and Operations Manager, from 2010 to 2013 and Electrical Engineer from 20, from 2009 to 2010, before joining Concord Municipal Light Plant.Roy worked for Enstar Electric and Gas, as a Substation Operations Supervisor from 2005 to 2009.Roy has a Bachelor of Science degree, in Electrical Engineering from Tufts University and a Masters in Power Systems Management, from porster, from Worcester Polytech Institute.In Roy's cover letter to Grew White, he stated on a regular basis, \"I balance pressures from the community, other town departments and system events to provide guidance to our staff, so they can focus on the right tasks with minimal obstacles\".He outlines examples of his experience to show how the key functions of the position closely match his experience, such as his work, developing all aspects of strategic and financial planning, for Concorde Municipal Light Plant and a power procurement strategy outline to help Concord achieve its goals for The Global Warming Solutions Act, it adopted in 2008.\"Belmont would be a great fit for me because Concord and Belmont are essentially sister communities.Sustainability initiatives, our infrastructure, and our light plant organizations are all very similar.I have had a lot of success, aligning the Concorde Light Plants activities with the community's goals and welcome the opportunity to do the same in Belmont\".said Roy in an email to the Citizen Herald.And now on to Claire.Thank you, Bob.Pharma Selectman Bill Skelley, has passed away.By Joanna K Zavalas.On election day, many Belmont residents were sad to learn the news of a dear friend and dedicated town volunteer, who touched many lives, passing away.William Skelley, who served as a Selectman for two terms from 1994 to 2000, and was very active on the Veterans Memorial Committee, and in Belmont's Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.Passed away on April 3rd.Skelley lived in Belmont for more than 50 years.He also served on the Warrant Committee, was a Town Precinct 5 town meeting member, and key player in fundraising for the Beach Street Center Project.He also coached youth sports in Belmont for 20 years.Skelley leaves behind his sons, William and Christopher, Dodd and Mary Elizabeth Fiango, seven grandchildren and his sisters, Barbara Skelley of Belmont and Kathleen Melons of Waltham.The Selectmen held a moment of silence in his honor at their meeting.The morning of April 4 with newly elected member, Tom Caputo, and honored him with a proclamation at their April 9, meeting.Lives he touched.Skelley's younger sister, Mary Elizabeth, was born with severe disabilities and passed away at age 7, when he was 13.In an interview with The Citizen Herald, two years ago, Skelley credited his sister for inspiring him to help others.\"She taught me the true meaning of life, true happiness in our life comes from helping those in need.Bullies, do not understand this, but we must help them understand this true meaning of happiness in our lives\".Skelley said.Timmy Polson is a 9 year old boy from Belmont, who Skelley spent a few hours each week visiting.He was born with a micro deletion of his fourth chromosome, which causes him to be severely disabled.Timmy's mom, mother, Catherine, said there seems to be an immediate bond from the moment Skelley and Timmy first met, four years ago at church, when Skelley introduced himself, Skelley was honored at a memorial service at the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in Belmont on April 9.Catherine spoke about his relationship with her son at the Memorial.She said it takes a lot of time and energy to get Timothy to come to, to truly recognize somebody.Bill invested this time and energy.As their friendship blossomed, Timothy would light up when he heard his best friend Bill come into the room.His head would turn and his expression changed as he often would reach for Bill's face.\"Sometimes Tim would smile and chuckle.Sometimes he'd click his tongue in excitement\".she said.Skelley began an initiative called The Community Friends Project, designed to encourage teenagers to donate some of their time with people living with severe disabilities.Both the Board of Selectmen and the School Committee supported the concept.A let's get it done guy.Annmarie Mahoney, Capital Budget Committee, Chapman, succeeded Skelley on the Board of Selectmen.He and I had worked together when he was on the BOS and I was on the school committee, he convinced Peter Holland, the Superintendent to undertake a collaborative form of bargaining with the Teacher's Union.And he participated with us, she wrote in an email.Bill was a true Belmontian, he grew up in town and was a high school sports star, went to Harvard and became a successful businessman.He married his high school sweetheart and raised his own children here.He always remained actively involved in the town, the school, sports and local politics.Bill was a positive, upbeat, let's get it done, kind of guy.He was a joy to work with and a calming influence in many stressful moments in town government.One of his key interests as a Selectman was to have a Senior Center in town.His parents were active seniors and he believed they deserved a dedicated space.His early work led to the eventual, eventual construction of the present Senior Center, continued Mahoney.Now over to Max.Thank you Claire.Paradise flowers moves to Cushing Square.By Joanna K Zavalas.Paradise flowers located at 415 Concord Avenue, Belmont Center, since 1987, has moved to 454 Common Street in Cushing Square.Owner, Christine Havarti, who has lived in Belmont her whole life, said moving was a difficult decision, but she wanted to make a fresh start in a new space, which is actually closer to her home.She also believes parking in her new location will be better for customers.Sharing parking with the post office was tricky, especially around the holidays, she said.Havarti took over Paradise Flowers in 1999.I had worked there for four years before I realized that I had a head for the business end of the industry too.I knew I wanted the freedom to create the designs I loved.To be able to meet the customers and build relationships with them and be able to support myself, doing it, she said.Soon after taking over the shop, the franchise Kabloom, opened nearby in Belmont Center, which was come competition for Havarti.It was a little scary at first being up against such a large successful company.But I also knew they would have challenges.I know from experience the hours that you have to put in to make a successful flower shop, it's certainly not a nine to five for me, she said.The secret to her success has been choosing the freshest flowers, finding employees who are willing to work long hours at the holidays and are as passionate about flowers and people as she is.My hope is that I'll be at this location for another 30 years.I want to be coming in, seeing my customers and helping them spread happiness through flowers until I'm very old.And that's a long time off, said Havarti.The Belmont Citizen Herald recently had the opportunity to meet with Havarti and talk about our business.How did you get into the floral business?\"It took me a little while to find my passion.I knew I had an artistic eye for proportion and design, but I didn't know exactly how I would use it.I had tried my hand at cake decorating, which I really liked.And I worked in an office setting for a while, but found it didn't suit my creative side.My grandmother Tillie was a painter, and she painted these gorgeous, award-winning paintings of flowers when I was growing up.Whenever I saw them I was moved, the color and vibrancy of flowers, the way it brightens someone's day, and lifts them up even if, just for a moment.That's what really drew me to working at Paradise Flowers originally\".What appeals to you about the new Cushing Square location?\"The new location gives me the chance to be a part of this new Cushing Square.That's really just bursting with possibility.There is so many improvements happening and new development coming in.It's really exciting to be a part of that.I look forward to fostering relationships with the local businesses in the area, and I'm hoping to continue my relationships, with my current customers while meeting lots of new ones.It's such a great area with a lot of character and now it's buzzing with new life\".How will your new store be different from prior location?\"The new store is bigger, brighter, and more up to date technologically.My focus is on giving it the same welcoming feeling I had over at Concord Ave, and I really think it's coming together beautifully.We also now have online ordering.So if that's how you like to order, you can still do that and still know that it's coming from a designer you know and can trust to get the message just right\".What do you love about what you do?\"The best part of the job is definitely working with the clients to help them create custom designs.Each person has their own aesthetic, and I work with them to design arrangements that fit their style and personality.This is especially true about weddings and special events that I provide the flowers for.I love doing weddings and events.Making sure the bride or honoree has the freshest best selection of flowers in the most creative designs.But I also truly believe that receiving flowers is still a special and exciting occasion, if you use a designer who cares about what they're making.That's always my goal.I want the receiver to feel the message that the giver is trying to get across\".Over to you.Bob.Thank you, Max.Three things to know about the Selectmen meeting.By Angela Toma.The Belmont Board of Selectmen met on April 9th.It was the first full meeting for the newest member, Tom Caputo.Here are three takeaways from this meeting.Number one, Regional Dockless Bicycle Share Program.At the end of last year, the metropolitan area planning council, AMPC, announced a project aimed at bringing a new bike sharing network to the Metro Boston area.The multi-tone bike sharing project would connect 16 Boston area communities, including towns, such as Lexington, Newton, Waltham, and Watertown.The system will use dockless technology.As the name suggests, Dockless Bikes, do not require a docking station and can be parked within a defined area, along the sidewalk or at a bike rack.Members of the board of Selectmen, said they believe it is a great way to reduce the cars on the street as well as a great way to make biking easier and more accessible to the community.There is no cost to the municipality for participating in this program.The Selectman passed a motion to sign the memorandum of understanding to facilitate collaboration with the management of the Regional Metropolis bike sharing system.Issue Number two: Fiscal year 2019 supplemental requests.The Selectman did not vote on any fiscal year 2019 supplemental requests.State aid is not finalized and the Selectman cannot hold a vote before then.They are, they are prioritizing funding for existing veterans' services.Officer hours, tree trimming, a council on aging, social worker, a school resource officer for the Chenery Middle School and rodent control.Discussions are ongoing Issue number three: Housing Trust Agreement.The Warrant Committee, discussed and voted, on proposed Community Preservation Act.The CPA Project, at the April 4th meeting.One of the projects is a housing trust agreement, that would establish a housing trust fund to support affordable housing options in Belmont.The committee voted unanimously in favor of housing, of the housing trust fund.However, some warrant committee members have accountability concerns with how the trust will use and allocate their funds.Before the project is taken to town meeting for a vote, the committee men have suggested drafting a contract that lays out how, how the trust will be using their funding.And now over the Claire.Thank you, Bob.A Topping Off Ceremony held for a new, Quote barn.Belmont Day School held ceremony to celebrate construction of the new building.By Joanna K Zavalas.There was a lot of exhilaration in the year as students at Belmont Day School gathered together, the morning of April 9 for a topping off ceremony, to celebrate the construction of the new building, which is being referred to as a barn.This moment is a long, long time in the making.There are some people who have been thinking about this barn and believing in it for as many as six or seven years, said headmaster, Brendan Luggay.According to Belmont Day Director of Communications, Corinne McQuilton.The new building is referred to as the barn, as a nod to the school's history.Belmont Day was founded in 1927, when Belmont was still a town of farms.Belmont Day School initially began operating at, All Saints Parish House on Clark Street until 1932, when it outgrew the church facilities.A parent came upon a little stone house in the big field, that offered expansion possibilities, in a country atmosphere.In 1933, the school's executive committee purchased the stone cottage, which is currently part of the Belmont Day School library, said McQuilton.The barn estimated to cost 11.5 million to build, is expected to be complete in late November.The building will add arts, athletics and academic spaces to the campus and includes a wood shop, an innovation lab, two art studios, general purpose space, offices, locker rooms, and reception areas.And the field house is sized for two, side-by-side dual use basketball and volleyball courts.The barn will enhance the experience of our current community of 274 students, Our plan for middle-school enrollment growth, calls for a gradual increase over four years, adding 30 to 40 in total, new students to the community, said, McQuilton.Now over to Max.Thank you Claire.Dance show elicits many emotions.By Mayumi Muira Motoyama.I saw Avalon Dance and Fitness Studios Spring Showcase Anything Goes on the Dance Floor, at a dancer friends invitation on March 16th.I knew little to nothing about ballroom dancing, but my first dance show experience was far beyond my expectations.Each piece of the program, featuring both professional and amateur dancers in various combinations were beautifully crafted.And I was immediately captivated by the charm of ballroom dancing and the passion of the performers.To learn that such high level performances were being given at a local town studio was a pleasant surprise.The studio is located at 345 Tropellow Road, Belmont.The building may have a modest exterior, but take one step inside and you were greeted by a large staircase and pass the black door at the top, you will find a spacious ballroom.The show began with a brilliant group dance to the Cole Porter classic, Anything Goes.Watching such explosive joy emitted by the 10 dancers with bright smiles and dazzling costumes made my heart skip a beat.Next on the program was a graceful waltz.The moment the pair who had been swinging slowly began sliding across the floor along with these surging music was breathtaking.The program of 26 numbers was comprised of a variety of styles from Cha-cha's, Tangos and Quick Steps with comedic choreography, to Waltzes which displayed the simple beauty of the style using the entire floor.The contrast between each piece kept the audience's attention.The characteristics of the styles could be understood very distinctly even by those, without any dance experience such as myself.Every number's choreography was finely crafted to fit the specific dancers skills and personalities, the audience applauded and called out not only at the end of a dance, but whenever an impressive technique was pulled off, which encouraged the dancers even more.I am sure that the more one knows about dance vocabulary, the more one can participate in the show.The music had a lot of variety from standard numbers to some ethnic tunes.As the program went on, it became clear to me that dance is the art of how one perceives music and how one can express this with a given style.The master of ceremonies that night, was professional, Brad Morrison.He warmly introduced the dancers with their recent achievements and cleverly connected the numbers with his cheerful speech, while talking to the guests.As MC, he was also an essential part of the program.Ballroom dance is generally done in pairs, Pros, Pro-am or Amateurs.Of course, the pair of professional dancers, Jess and Kumar, were particularly exquisite.It was amazing that even on the up-tempo pieces, viewer could, viewers could still see each pose clearly, and they were constantly sensing each other's presence without the need to look.Over to you, Bob.Thank you, Max.Caputo, sworn in as newest Selectman.By Joanna K Zavalas.With his wife, Sarah and twin daughters, Jane and Alison by his side, Tom Caputo was sworn in as Belmont's newest Selectman, on the morning of April 4th and immediately attended his first official meeting of the board.Caputo ran uncontested for the three years seat.However, Thomas Siena Olson decided to give residents another alternative at the last minute, by running as a write-in candidate, just days before the election.Caputo won the election with 2,106 votes.He said running uncontested gave him, gave him two opportunity, gave him an opportunity to have more of a listening campaign, and hear residents' concerns about the town budget and capital projects.He said he would like to make revenue a priority.At the April 4th meeting, the Selectman voted to reorganize the board, with Adam Dash becoming the chairman, and Mark Payolilio, becoming the vice chairman.There will be a new policy, outlining the rotation for Selectmen, to de-politicize the Chairman and Vice Chairmanship.After a brief discussion, the Selectman decided was best for a member not to be Chairman, for their third year due to the time it takes to run for re-election.Payolilio said he didn't completely agree with the new policy, but second the nomination for Dash to become the Chairman.Dash said there would be three simple rules, no drama, be respectful and don't waste anyone's time.And over to Claire.Thank you, Bob.A sugar induced stampede.By Steve Anir.Katie Samuels has fond memories of eating Neko wafers.The chocky multicolored candies made by the New England Confectionary Company, As a kid, Samuel's and her siblings would play, Church, at their grandmother's house, placing the circular treats into their mouths as if they were taking communion, she said.So when the 23 year old Florida resident, learned recently that the Revere based sweets manufacturer was at risk of closing down, laying off hundreds of its employees, due to financial insecurities.She reached out to candy wholesaler, Candystore.com, to try and scoop up as many packages of the iconic sweets as possible.Desperate times, as they say lead to desperate measures.I offered to trade my 2003 Honda Accord for all of their stock, she said by telephone Tuesday.I knew it was kind of a silly thing to say, but I'm serious.I don't have much right now.So I was like, I've got this car and I want all that candy.So maybe they would consider it.In March, Neko Chief Executive, Michael McGee, notified the state and Revere Mayor, Brian M Arigo, that 395 workers could be laid off if the candy maker can't find a buyer.Neko, which has been producing wafers since 1847, is Revere's largest employer.News that the company, they're also known for such old timey classic as those tooth hugging squirrel, nut zippers and crunchy sweethearts could close by May, allegedly send people from across the country into Twinkie hoarding mode.The wall street journal reported this week that candy connoisseurs have been maniacally calling up distributors, asking to buy candy in bulk.Candystore.com is calling it, The Great Neko Wafer panic.The business claims, sales of wafers have jumped since The Globe first wrote about Neko's financial troubles last month.Neko sales spiked more than 50%, Neko wafers are up 63%, the company wrote in a blog post.A clear signal of panic buying.They said a nice older woman called and wanted to buy 100 pounds of wafers.Emails by the hundreds about Neko branded candies came rolling in.And then of course, a young woman named Katie contacted us offering to trade her used Honda Accord, for all our Neko wafers.Now here's Max.Thank you Claire.Vote delayed on Yawkey Way name change.By Milton J Valencia.The city's Public Improvement Commission, Thursday, postponed its vote on a request by the Boston Red Sox to remove the name of former Red Sox owner, Tom Yawkey, from the street alongside, Fenway Park, because of Yawkey's reputation, reputed pattern of bigotry.The decision by the commission came at the request of the Red Sox Organization, which has formally asked that Yawkey's name be stricken from street signs and that the name, the street returned to its original name of Jersey Street.The team asked for the delay on Wednesday, in a letter written by Red Sox Senior Vice President, David Friedman.He wrote that the Red Sox under current owner, John Henry remain committed to restoring the city street to its original name.Henry and his wife Linda Henry, also own The Boston Globe.We remain committed to our petition and do not seek to alter it in any way, Friedman wrote.But he wrote the Red Sox, wanted the panel to postpone Thursday's hearing for two weeks to give the commission, Quote, Ample time to review and fully consider the substantial testimony in any new material that has been received from the community.Unquote.The Commission reset the vote for April 26th.The request by the Red Sox comes after an emotional public hearing last month, in which longtime power brokers, such as philanthropists, Jack Connors and former Red Sox CEO, John Harrington, argued that Yawkey's substantial charitable works, should be given due consideration during the ongoing debate.But some members of the city black community, including state representative, Byron Rushing and Tanisha Sullivan, President of the city's NAACP, pointed out Yawkey's reputed bigotry.Yawkey, for whom the street was named in 1977 owned the team from 1933 until his death in 1976.Back to you Bob.Along with my colleagues, Claire and Max, thank you for listening to The Talking News and hope you've enjoyed the show.We will return next week for another edition of local news happenings around Belmont.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/talking-news_041718.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/talking-news_041718.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/talking-news_041718.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/snafuinfinitytalking-news_061416/talking-news_061416.mp3", "text": "Welcome to Talking News.We are delighted to have you with us, listening to our presentation by members of the Beech Street Center, Cindy, Jonathan and Irene.We will be reading local news and happenings from the community newspaper.Program Benefits Dogs, by Bram Berkowitz.Is your dog barking at the window whenever people or other dogs walk by?Does it try to attack the mailman?Excuse me, when he or she comes around?If so, there is a good chance that the dog has lots of pent up energy and is yearning for some more exercise and playtime with other dogs.In 2011, Belmont established the Off-the-Leash Program to meet this need, allowing residents and non-residents to purchase permits, so their dogs could run without a leash at select parks in town.Dogs can run off the leash at fields, at the Belmont High School minus the turf field or running track.Winn Brook, Grove street, Pequossette and Town Field.The program is currently at its most successful, having issued 112 permits this year, the most to date, according to June Howell, Program Supervisor at Belmont Recreation Department.An informational meeting will be held to further discuss the program and allow people to provide feedback on June 20th.The thing I really want to stress to people is that the program doesn't just benefit dogs and dog owners.It benefits everyone, said Belmont Animal Control Officer, John Maguranis.The dogs that are well socialized with people and other dogs and get the opportunity to run and play and burn energy, those are the dogs that go home and sleep and relax.Residents can pick up permits, which must be renewed annually from town hall.A maximum of four dogs is allowed per owner/walker, including professional dog walkers.And the program will issue up to 200 permits.The town uses the money earned from the program to hire a dog trainer, to provide lessons to dog owners about everything from park etiquette, to understanding a dog's behavior.Owners must clean up after their pets, accept responsibility for their dog's behavior, and must not allow their dog within 150 feet of Tot Lots, areas designated for young children.I think it's a great program and I support it 100%, said Maguranis.Who said a good group of dog owners is typically at Poquessette Park between 8:00 and 9:30 AM on most days.The dogs get to know each other and the people get to know each other, they have a blast.Prior to 2011, Belmont had a similar program in place called Goose Busters.But Maguranis said the program did not have a lot of oversight and permits were pretty much issued to anyone.Now he said, dogs must be licensed and have all of the proper vaccinations before they are eligible for a permit.They must also adhere to a pet behavior assessment and review of the regulations with Maguranis.This, said Maguranis, involves a trial off the leash session to see how a dog behaves with other dogs.It also involves going over the rules, like how to report incidents where one dog may have bitten another, he said.Maguranis said he has had to turn away some dogs, but it is very infrequent.He also said if dogs are not 100% ready to be off the leash, owners typically have the opportunity to work with the trainer hired by the town to get them ready.Jonathan.Westcott Mercantile Expands For Second Time in Belmont, by Joanna Tzouvelis.Belmont residents, Mary Westcott Thomajan and Lynne Czamanske have found a way to combine their creative talents into a refreshingly new retail concept.Many years ago, Thomajan and her sisters envisioned opening an upscale, old style general store, offering a unique selection of gifts, home decor, artisan goods, and one of a kind vintage finds in a nostalgic atmosphere.Czamanske signed on to be Chief Mercantile Officer and that dream became a reality when she and Thomajan opened the doors to Westcott Mercantile's flagship location at 438 Common Street in Belmont in April, 2014.Despite many construction woes in Cushing Square, the lack of movement on the Cushing Village project and the ongoing work being done on the Trapelo Road Corridor project, Westcott Mercantile has managed to maintain a steady, loyal consumer base and even expand amid these constraints.\"Lynne and I have worked diligently to promote all of the unique local businesses in Cushing Square\", said Thomajan, founding the Cushing Square Merchants Association in 2015.Within six months of the opening store's day, they expanded their flagship location at 438 Common Street, to add additional space next door at 436 Common Street, and while doing so incorporated an adjoining door into Revolve, a woman's boutique consignment store, forming Belmont's first indoor market.They have now opened a second location in Belmont Center at 63 Leonard Street, former the home of Marmalade, it's still the hub for Curly Girl Designs owned by Leigh Stanley.\"People are really excited about it,\" remarked Thomajan.According to Thomajan, Stanley approached her to discuss a merger between Westcott and Marmalade, that would allow Thomajan to fully transition into owning the store over a three-month period.\"Leigh felt she found in Westcott Mercantile, an owner and store that would continue to be the home for her Curly Girls Designs products while maintaining a similar flavor and vibe that would carry on in the Marmalade vision for its loyal fans and customers\", said Thomajan.Thomajan said, each of her Belmont stores will be unique and only a small portion of products will be cross merchandise.Both will offer gift baskets for any occasion.The Cushing Square store will continue to have more of an old style general store flavor.\"We have been told that our customers feel like they're on vacation when they step inside the Cushing Square location,\" said Thomajan.\"The Belmont Center location will have a more modern feminine appeal,\" said Czamanske with unique gifts, fashion and home decor.Thomajan said they also plan to fully stock their British Cadbury candy products in Belmont center, along with their fan favorite taffy and artisan old fashioned hard candies.The two level Belmont center store will offer whimsical garden and home decor on the lower level.Marmalade customers who didn't realize Westcott was moving in, were pleasantly surprised when they saw Mary and Lynne's familiar faces behind the register.\"Our customers are happy to know that this was a mutual merger done amicably between two local business owners.This is why we did not close and reopen as something new.It's a nice community based story,\" said Thomajan.Wescott Mercantile was recently voted number one choice for gift shop in Belmont and received silver recognition, second place, for gift shop in the region, including Belmont, Arlington, Watertown, Waltham, Allston, Cambridge, Brookline in the 2016 Reader's Choice.Cindy.A Taste of Thai Food at Patou by Joanna Tzouvelis.There's no need to travel 24 hours to Thailand in order to taste the Southeast Asian country's food.Simply drive to Patou at 69 Leonard Street in Belmont Center.Co-owner, Dan Tanabat of Dedham is originally from Thailand and has been managing the restaurant since it opened in 2003.Patou is owned by the Little Lotus Corporation, which also owns Siam Lotus in Norwood.\"The word Patou is derived from the Sanskrit language used in Buddhist prayer and means darling, sweetheart or beloved,\" said Tanabat.Tanabat believes the secret to his restaurant's 13 year success has been good food, great service and consistency.\"People who came here ten years ago can get the same curry, things never change here,\" said Tanabat.He takes pride in the low turnover of his staff of eight, many of whom have been with him for more than seven years.The atmosphere's casual and comfortable with upscale decor imported from Thailand, such as the lighting with silk pendants in the shape of hot air balloons and artifacts such as statues and a carven table.Tanabat describes the flavor of Thai food as a balance between salty, sweet, sour and spicy.Many of the ingredients used are imported from Thailand, such as the curry spice, and in the summer all the produce is purchased at Belmont Farmer's Market.Tanabat's favorite item on the menu is the whole red snapper, head and bone included in the chili sauce.\"Many people come here for that and not many Thai restaurants carry this item,\" he said.Tanabat said he has been told by many customers that Patou's pad thai is the best they ever had.Currently, his popular seasonal menu item is soft shell crab, lightly battered and topped with mango, Pico de Gallo, available from April to September.Beef short ribs with curry are a popular year round menu item.Another seasonal favorite dessert item on the menu is sweet and sticky rice with fresh mango and cream of coconut.Patou also offers items on the menu for people allergic to nuts, seafood, gluten and protein.\"They'll custom make dishes for people with allergies,\" Tanabat says.The restaurant has a section here for private events, such as surprise birthday parties, showers or book clubs.Outdoor seating is also available in warmer months.Irene.Moose Still on the Loose, by Bram Berkowitz, Laurie Manjikian of Pearl Street said she first thought she was following a human.Others reportedly thought they saw a large deer or a horse, but no it was a moose and a slippery one at that.Belmont's newest visitor evaded, local and state authorities all last week.And as of press time on Tuesday, June 7th, was still on the loose.The state's environmental police who had been hot on the moose's trail at the end of last week in hopes of tranquilizing the moose and getting it out of the populated area for safety reasons have called off their search.\"Letting it be and move into more forested areas and go on its way is the best thing that can happen,\" said David Stainbrook, a deer and moose biologist with the state's Division of Fisheries and Wildlife.The best thing is to try and let it move on its way.It might very well move north.The female moose, which Stainbrook said is likely a yearling, was first seen on the sidewalks of Main and Prescott streets in Watertown just after 5:00 AM, Wednesday, June 1st.From there, it was seen galloping through the streets of Belmont, making appearances throughout the day on Waverley Avenue, Trapelo Road, Concord Avenue, Juniper Road by Mass Audubon Habitat Education Center and Wildlife Sanctuary, Prospect street, Crestview Road and Woodfall road.On June 2nd, the moose was again sighted early in the morning on Summit Avenue and Mill Street.And then later in the morning, again on Juniper Road, near Mass Audubon Habitat Education Center and Wildlife Sanctuary.The moose again made appearances late in the morning of June 3rd, near Robinwood road, and was last seen as of press time on Concord Avenue at 4:45 AM, Saturday, June 4th.\"To me, it was humongous because I thought it had to be a deer\".said Manjikian.The moose was estimated in the seven to nine foot range and Manjikian's husband Raffi, said the moose could poke its head over the family's six foot fence.Soon after its first sighting on June 1st, the moose had gained a large following with regional and national media outlets following the story.A satirical Twitter account called @TheBelmontMoose was created and had massed 370 followers as of press time.According to Marian Larson, Chief Information and Education Officer at the state's Division of Fisheries and Wildlife, moose are more common in Central and Western Massachusetts, which is part of the reason the moose in Belmont drew such a big reaction.\"It's not very common for them to show up this close to Boston,\" she stated.\"We don't have records per se on this, but it's been a few years that I can remember a moose in this close to Boston\".Belmont Animal Control Officer, John Maguranis, said he thinks a moose in Belmont is a result of all the recent development and demolishing of trees in the area, which is destroying the habitats of wild animals.\"To me, that's the real story,\" he said.\"I'm not surprised at all we have a moose and wouldn't be surprised if we soon have a bear\".Stainbrook said, it's not unprecedented to see a moose within the I495 corridor, but that this moose went a little further in than normal.\"Some of these interstates tend to limit their movement,\" he said, \"if they're traveling is taking place at 3:00 AM, without a lot of traffic, they might feel comfortable crossing the interstates\".Stainbrook said the moose is most likely in this area because of natural dispersal.\"Although it is not exactly clear what triggers a moose to disperse or where this moose may have come from, younger moose tend to leave their families and travel to new areas to prevent inbreeding with family members,\" he said.Jonathan.Changes Approved for Zoning Bylaws and Single Residence, by Jack Kelly.Town Meeting Moderator, Mike Widmer, brought the second night of the annual town meeting to order at 7:00 PM Monday evening at the Chenery Middle School.The business at hand for the approximately 300 town meeting members attending, was segment B, financial and budget articles.Most notable was the approval of article 6, concerning the construction of oversized dwellings in Belmont's Single Residence C Zoning Districts.After nearly four hours of presentations, comments and debate.The meeting concluded at approximately 11:00 PM. Widmer opened the deliberation of article 6 by saying, it is the single most complex issue of his nine year tender as town moderator.Article 6, contains proposed amendments to the existing bylaw on Single Residence C Zoning, among other stipulations the amendments would require applicants seeking to construct quote, \"a very large addition or a new house on a non-conforming lot, i.e. less than 9,000 square feet that increases gross floor area by more than 30% to obtain a special permit from the planning board.It would also restrict the building height of a house to 30 feet to the mid point and 34 feet to the highest point, limit the placement and require screening of heating, ventilation, air conditioning, equipment and propane tanks, and limit the house to the average of the setbacks of the adjacent houses.The article explicitly requires consideration of the impact on the neighborhood of the proposed construction.Article 6, is a direct result of the citizens' petition, approved by the town at the April, 2015 town meeting for a moratorium scheduled to expire on June 30th, 2016, on the construction of houses over 32 feet high.This petition spearheaded by Steven Pinkerton and Peg Callanan, town meeting members Precinct 7, was a result of the alarm caused by the growing number of demolitions and construction of oversized houses in Single Residence C Zoning Districts.Planning Board Chairman, Elizabeth Allison said, \"We, the Planning Board have worked hard to develop a revised Single Residence C zoning plan to address redevelopment in a fair and equitable fashion.We worked closely with the citizen petitioners and the Belmont residents, who provided their inputs and ideas in the nine public hearings on this article.Before voting on the article 6, members deliberated on four recently proposed and contentious amendments to subsections of the article.These included elimination of design as a consideration in the special permit review process, amendment seven, allowing the addition of a second story by right, amendment 8, installation placement of the air conditioning equipment and propane tank replacement, five feet back.In other words, ten feet from the front of the house, adjacent to the house and minimizing the visibility, amendment 2, and installation five feet back, ten feet from the front of the house, amendment 6.The Selectmen Warrant Committee and Planning Board announced they had voted unfavorable action on all four amendments.Cindy.Belmont High School Alumni Gives Back by Harry Lane.Can Emily Cook ski, soar, flip and land on her feet?She sure can.Cook is a freestyle skier and aerialist, who is a three time Olympian, 2006, 2010, 2014.Six time US Champion and nine time World Cup medalist, including three gold.Born in Belmont, she began skiing when she was four years old, started to compete in the sport of freestyle at 14 and made the US Freestyle Team at 17.She attended Belmont High School, Carrabassett Valley Academy in Maine and the University of Utah.She currently lives in Park City, Utah.One of her mantras is chin high, work hard, smile.This attitude developed in her days as a young athlete.\"As young gymnasts, my teammates and I would stand in line, chins held high, tummies tucked in and big smiles on each of our faces.Whether we had just had our best performance, were injured or had trouble at home, we would do everything in our power while at practice and competition to hold this pose.This armor protected us.It kept us strong and resilient and was vital when obstacles got in our way\".Positive things that come out of sport, perseverance, dedication and unwillingness to give up.But oftentimes it's grit, which has been so ingrained, can prove challenging, especially after retiring from sport.As an athlete at the Olympic level, it's easy to define yourself by your sport.When you retire, who are you?The challenges of major transition in life can be tough for all of us, not just athletes.What has Cook been doing since she retired from skiing competitively?Perhaps, her updated mantra should be chin high, work hard, smile and give back.Cook currently works for the audio brand, Skullcandy, as their Manager of Sport and Human Potential.The majority of her work takes place in Skullcandy's, high performance lab, working with local and elite level athletes.Her role also led her to work closely with scientists who study Alzheimer's disease and memory loss.One of the things we've noticed is that people with Alzheimer's have far more vitality, happiness and just have a better day when they're listening to music.Although these research projects do help to contribute to the new product development process, Cook says the main goal is to drive an important part of Skullcandy's overall mission as a company, which is to encourage people to live life at full volume.Cook also manages programming for the nonprofit Classroom Champions, which matches athletes with underserved classrooms around the country and coaches young athletes at the Utah Olympic Park.She's an ambassador for Right To Play and Kids Play International and has traveled to Rwanda, Jordan and Tanzania to help bring the life lessons of sport to the world's most disadvantaged children.Cook has also spent time on the board of the Speedy Foundation, the philanthropic organization dedicated to understanding mental illness through education, research and advocacy, founded in honor of her friend and Olympic medalist, aerialist Jeret \"Speedy\" Peterson.And currently serves on the board of a US ski and snowboard association, spending extra time coaching US development athletes, or looking to breakthrough on the World Cup circuit.Irene - Summer Concerts Begin June 22nd.Payson Park Music Festival announced its 26th summer concert season at the corner of Elm Street and Payson Road.The first concert this season, Battle of the Bands is set for 6:45 PM. June 22nd.This event is sponsored by Belmont Savings Bank.A concert will be offered every Wednesday evening at approximately 6:45 PM. Although start time in August is earlier due to less sunlight.For young lemonade stand entrepreneurs, the event offers the opportunity to manage the PPMF Popsicle Stand, with 11 current openings for popsicle vendors.The children will receive a stipend.Beginning July 8, PPMF will produce four children's concerts at 10:30 AM, Fridays.In case of rain, the kiddy concerts will move inside the library.In total, the series produces between 15 and 16 concerts each summer.All of this is sponsored without any financial burden to the town, through the contributions of Belmont neighbors and friends, local businesses, members of several town departments and the support of the Belmont Selectmen.Jonathan.Seeking Fathers and Sons for Interviews.This June and July, the Belmont Story Project will allow fathers and children to celebrate their relationship by recording an interview with each other.The Belmont Story Project, is a local oral history project modeled after National Public Radio's StoryCorps.Belmont Story Project encourages Belmont residents to record and share their stories, preserving them for future generations.To schedule a recording session at the Belmont public library, contact Nancy McColm at 6179932870.To schedule a session at the Belmont Media Center, contact Patty Mihelich at 6174842443.For information go to belmontpubliclibrary.net.Listen to the recordings already contributed to the Belmont Story Project, go to soundcloud.com/belmont-story-project Cindy.Fundraising Underway for New Veteran's Memorial, by Joanna Tzouvelis.Belmont does not have one location in town commemorating all Belmont's veterans from all the wars, since the civil war, including the war with Spain, World War I, World War II, the Korean War, Vietnam War, the Persian Gulf War, the Iraq War and the Afghanistan War.But in 2017, the committee behind the efforts to create a Belmont veteran's memorial at Clay Pit Pond, hopes to make the sight a reality.The current veteran's Memorial at clay Pit Pond is a small plaque mounted on a stone dedicated May 10th, 1940 with a flagpole and is located near the corner of Concord Avenue and Unsworth Street.Working with the same designer as the Conservation Committee for the Clay Pit Pond Walking Path, the Veterans Memorial Committee developed plans to repair the rock walls surrounding the flag and stone, improve the path leading to and around the site and add individual granite stones, noting each of the nine wars around the site with memorial benches, inscribed with pavers with messages honoring veterans, serving their country's wars and conflicts.The project is estimated to cost $250,000.According to committee member, Angelo Firenze, former Selectmen, \"I had a lot of friends that went to Vietnam and suffered.This is a way of giving back to those who deserve to be recognized, need to be recognized and should have recognition\".\"It's time for Belmont to have a Vet's Memorial, recognizing all the wars collectively in one location,\" said Firenze, who served in the US army reserves.His son Peter, is a lieutenant commander in the US Navy.His daughter-in-law Paula is also a commander.They're both currently stationed in Washington, D.C. Brigadier General, Kevin Ryan, chairman of the Veterans Memorial Committee said, he hopes it will be a place where residents of all ages visit to play, run, jog, walk, or reflect.He wants it to be as inclusive as possible, and doesn't want people to feel left out.\"The reason I'm passionate about this project is I want a place for future generations in Belmont to go where they can reflect on the veterans and people who volunteer their service for their country.Those who served, those who died, an educational place,\" said Ryan.The committee has raised about $4,000 so far, toward the design work.They hope to raise the remainder of the funds through corporate sponsorship and brick sales.A single brick is $100, double is an $175.Memorial benches are $25,000.If you are interested in purchasing a brick or sponsoring the project, contact Firenze at angelorfirenze@gmail.com Irene - Thank you for joining us for this episode of Talking News.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/talking-news_061416.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/talking-news_061416.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/talking-news_061416.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/snafuinfinitytalking-news_100218/talking-news_100218.mp3", "text": "Watch and listen to the Talking News every day at 12 noon, and 6:00 PM on channel 96 Comcast Xfinity, and channel 30 Verizon Fios.It can also be heard Mondays and Tuesdays at 4:30 PM, and Wednesdays at 12:30 PM on channel nine Xfinity, and channel 29 Fios.Listen anytime on the BMC Podcast Network on SoundCloud and iTunes; just search for the Belmont Media Podcast Network.And now, onto the Talking News.'Mission to protect, preserve Belmont's historic home', by Joanna K. Tzouvelis.The issue, preserving and protecting our community's historic resources, requires substantial investment from governments and private donors.The impact is that historic properties, and archives of documents and objects, are key to our community's identities.Has anyone ever wondered what the stately, ornate mansions, sitting on the hill across from town hall at the corner of Concord Avenue and Pleasant Street is?Thousands of people drive by this historic structure daily.Some may note a sign hanging in front of it that says, \"Belmont Woman's Club\", but still have no idea what the significance of the building is.American artist, Winslow Homer, was the nephew of William Flag Homer, who built the house at 661 Pleasant Street, in Belmont in 1853 as a summer residence.Winslow spent many of his summers at his uncle's house and much of his work depicts scenes of Belmont people and places, including his uncle's home, according to Belmont Woman's Club co-president, Wendy Murphy.If it wasn't for a group of women in 1927, who pooled their funds together to purchase the 1853 William Flag Homer house, the property would have been demolished by a developer who planned to tear it down and build seven lots on the land, according to Murphy.Murphy has done a lot of research on the property, and found a letter dated March the seventh, 1927, from the Belmont Woman's Club president Belle Chaffey, which states, \"The purchase price was $25,000, and of that, businessmen of the town think we have made a good investment\".But more important still, is the fact that the Woman's Club has done something for Belmont in preserving an old landmark and retaining the dignity of its civic center.To ensure a long-term protection of the home from demolition, the Belmont Woman's Club listed the home on the National Register of Historic Places as part of the Pleasant Street Historic District.Belmont Historic District Commission co-chairman, Lauren Meyer, said, \"The Homer house is one of Belmont's most significant historic buildings for its Italianate architectural style and character, and its historic association\".\"The Belmont Woman's Club fundraisers, the Belmont Woman's Club has fundraisers throughout the year and relies heavily on its membership dues to keep up with the cost of just running the house, which is 25 to $30,000 annually\", said Murphy.Social and educational events are planned for members throughout the year.The home is also available for the public to rent for private functions.The Community Preservation Act funds, paid by Belmont taxpayers annually, are helping maintain historic properties like the 1853 William Flag Homer house.In 2015, the town meeting approved $100,000 of community preservation funding to be used for rehabilitating and restoring the Homer house.Particularly restoration of the cupola, and a replacement and restoration of its failed or missing elements.The cupola project is almost completed, and according to Murphy, there may be about 14,000 additional CPA funds that can be used to replace the chimney, repair or replace the exterior molding, which recently suffered water damage, scrape and repaint peeling exterior trim, and replace the bulkhead which is made a plywood and has deteriorated significantly over the years.The next project that needs attention are the windows.Approximately one dozen of which need to be repaired or re-glazed.Murphy said it would cost $2,000 per window and plans to submit another application to the community preservation committee to fund this project.Murphy said they need at least $400,000 to get the house restored.This would pay for repairs to the land from runoff damage, and for the removal of trees, and parking could be added to the right side of the driveway.They would also like to purchase a handicap ramp to make the house accessible.And now to my colleague, Clare.Thank you, Bob.'Fire damages buildings; two alarm fire breaks out in Belmont center Monday,' by Joanna K. Tzouvelis.A two alarm fire, Monday, damaged several businesses on the corner of Leonard Street and Alexander Avenue in Belmont center, including: BodyTrio, Leon and Company, Vanti Nails and Spa, Lavender Wellness and Massage, and the law offices of Karen Goldenberg.Belmont fire chief, David Frizzell, said the fire department got a call at approximately 1:45 PM from someone at 84 Leonard street reporting there was an odor of smoke.Upon arrival, Frizzell said they discovered a fire inside the wall of Vanti nail salon, 86 Leonard street.\"That fire had extended up into the walls and the roof area next to the Vanti nail salon, and above the nail salon,\" he said.BodyTrio is located on the second floor at 21 Alexander Ave.Leon de Magistris, owner of Leon and Company, owns the building and lives on the top two floors.Frizzell said the majority of the damage is in the nail salon, BodyTrio, and the de Magistris residence.De Magistris said he was shopping at Wholefoods in Cambridge when he received a call from his son, Lieutenant Darren de Magistris, about the fire.His German shepherd, Lula, was home when the fire broke out and was beginning to inhale the smoke, but Darren got her out in time.De Magistris will not be able to return to his home for at least two months due to the damage.\"It was a little bit of stubborn fire.It probably took about 45 minutes to an hour to make sure it was all out, because we had to open up multiple walls, roof structures, and outside sheathing,\" he said.Frizzell thinks the amount of time the businesses will need to be closed will range from a few days to as much as a month, or more, depending on the damage.Leonard street and Pleasant street were temporarily closed between Concord Ave and Leonard Street to allow the crews to work.Mutual aid was provided by the Waltham, Cambridge, and Arlington fire departments.Concern over damage; the owners of the Vanti Nails and Spa and Lavender Wellness Massage were not at the scene.There were no known injuries.\"I'm really grateful no one was there.It's Monday, and all of us, usually, have not a lot going on, Mondays,\" said Donna Ognibene, owner of BodyTrio.\"I think it's unusual that most of us were not in the building having to evacuate clients and get them to safety\".BodyTrio has been in its Belmont central location for 10 years.Dr. Vatche Seraderian, of the Seraderian Dental Group, located on the second floor, 84 Leonard Street, said someone in his office called the fire department when they noticed smoke coming out of the electrical outlets in their office.As he and his staff left, he said they saw smoke coming out of the HVAC vents that served the nail salon next door.Now, here's Max.Thank you, Clare.'The Impact of a Debt Exclusion', by Joanna K. Tzouvelis.Town treasurer, Floyd Carmen, has had many inquiries about the debt exclusion for the Belmont High School Building Committee's proposed grade seven to 12 high school building project from taxpayers who want to know how it will affect their pocket books.Last week, he prepared a financing plan to help give people an idea of the financing and the, excuse me, cumulative real estate tax impact, and shared it with the Citizen Herald.On November 6th, Belmont voters will be asked to approve a debt exclusion of $295 million to help fund the grade seven through 12 high school project.The Massachusetts School Building Authority, MSBA, will reimburse the town for 80 million of the eligible costs.The net to the taxpayer is 215 million.Town treasurer, Floyd Carmen, gives estimates of the annual cost of the new high school to taxpayers at $181 per $100,000 of a home's assessed value.The borrowing will be done in phases over five years, and the real estate tax impact would occur in the year of the financing.Carmen says if the debt exclusion passes, he would borrow 85 million at an interest rate of 4% for 30 years in March 2019.This would add $674 to the annual real estate tax bill for the average single family home in Belmont assessed at $1,003,750.In 2020, Carmen said he would borrow another 85 million at 4.5% for 30 years.This would add $1,390 to the homeowner's annual real estate tax bill for a home assessed at $1,003,750.In March 2024, he would borrow, plus or minus, 45 million at 5% for 28 years.The amount depends on the reimbursement the town receives from the MSBA for eligible costs.This would bring the total to $1,810 added to the homeowner's real estate tax bill for a single family home assessed at $1,003,750.The homeowner would be paying this additional amount annually until 2048.All of these figures are estimates and assumes the high school budget, the project is on budget, and will get reimbursed for all the eligible MSBA costs.Carmen also believes there will be a need for a town operating override in 2021, and possibly another one in 2025, which includes the operating cost of the new school, growing school population, and other town capital project needs.\"On top of the debt exclusion, we'll have to have another infusion, because this is a brand new facility.The growth isn't going to stop, because if you build it, they will come.If you increase your capacity, there will be more students coming into the system.That's just the nature of the beast,\" he said.Carmen said he doesn't know what the additional costs will be to operate the new grade seven to 12 building, if the debt exclusion is approved, and the building is constructed.He estimates it will cost an additional one to $2 million per year for the additional staff.\"You're looking at a debt exclusion in November.Taxpayers will start feeling that in their 2020 real estate tax bills.We will be able to stave off an operating override for a year or so, but there will be one in 2021 for four to five million,\" he said.Carmen believes the rising real estate taxes won't end with the operating override in 2021, if it passes.He said, \"There most likely will be a need for a second operating override in 2025\".Carmen said all future financial decisions need approval by the board of selectmen.Carmen says if the town increases its parking spaces for commuters, it would help stretch out some of the need for operating overrides.He said, \"commuters would pay $150 a month for a parking space, if there was a garage built in Belmont; perhaps at the current site of the Municipal Light Building on Concord Ave, when it is no longer needed by Belmont Light\".\"The new parking meters in Belmont Center have generated additional revenue for the town, but monthly passes for commuters would generate more revenue,\" said Carmen.Currently there are only 10 monthly commuter passes available in Belmont Center for people who take the MBTA commuter rail.Carmen said, \"there aren't more available because the Claflin Street lot parking is reserved for shoppers in Belmont center\".Over to you, Bob.Thanks, Max.Belmont Light to celebrate Public Power Week.Belmont Light will join more than 2,000 other public power utilities to celebrate the benefits of hometown, community-owned and operated, electric utilities during during Public Power Week, on October 7th through the 14th.This year marks the 32nd annual Public Power Week, sponsored by the American Public Power Association.To celebrate the benefits of public power, Belmont Light representatives will be at the Belmont Farmer's Market on October 11th and will sponsor an ice-cream social at 1:15 PM, on October 12th at the Belmont Senior Center, at 266 Beach Street.There are more than 2,000 community-owned electric utilities in the U.S., and in five U.S. territories, serving over 49 million people and more than 2.8 million business customers.Some of America's largest cities, including Los Angeles, that would be Los Angeles, San Antonio, Seattle, and Orlando operate publicly-owned electric utilities.\"Public Power Week provides utilities, like Belmont Light, the opportunity to remind taxpayers that local residents make an important decision about their public power services,\" said general manager, Chris Roy.\"That's because public power utilities are consumer-owned and operated and provide reliable, responsive, not-for-profit electric service.We're accountable to the people we serve and are committed to serving rate payers, keeping rates low, and contributing to the economic developments, and sustainability of the community\".\"Belmont Light employees are committed to providing reliable, safe power, and service to all of our rate payers, and have been doing that since 1898,\" Roy said.\"We're proud that Belmont Light has been part of the community for 120 years, and we plan to provide the same level of quality, reliable electric service to our community for many years to come\".In addition to Public Power Week, customers of Public Power utilities have access to programs and services not usually available to customers of private electric utilities; including conservation services, appliance rebates, and other energy saving incentives.And now, over to Clare.Thank you, Bob.'Meet the new part-time Belmont High School assistant principal', by Joanna K. Tzouvelis.Belmont High School special education teacher, Michael Bruno, has a new role this year as the part-time assistant principal at Belmont High School.The Belmont Citizen Herald recently asked Bruno some questions to help readers get to know them, and him, a little better.Here are the responses he sent via email.What are you looking forward to most about your new part-time role as assistant principal at BHS?As I work with students, families, and staff this year, I most look forward to learning from the experiences the members of these groups bring to the BHS community.I strive to be a thoughtful listener and remain open to various perspectives in order to use new knowledge to make well-informed decisions that will have a positive impact on the already incredible culture at Belmont High.What do you think your greatest challenges will be?I'm quickly learning that there are many components of this new position that pull focus away from the student.At the end of the day, we're all here for the students, and I hope to be able to stay focused on them, as the first priority.I'll be moving from a caseload of 25 students, as a special educator, to being responsible for over 400 9th and 12th graders.Developing systems to ensure I remain responsive to these students and their families will be challenging work.Thankfully, our highly qualified administrative team and exceptional staff will provide support while I work through this learning curve.The building project will continue moving forward this year.Part of the attraction of this position, was the opportunity to be involved in the many important decisions that will need to be made about the physical space of BHS, and the vision dash instructional models moving forward.This work will not be easy, but thoughtful decisions made at this point in the process, will have a positive impact on the school experience we want for our students for many years.What do you think is important for parents and students to know about you?I've been with the Belmont Public Schools for 14 years in a variety of roles, including; wrestling coach, tutor, middle-school teacher, BEA membership chairperson, high school teacher, lead special education teacher, and, now, assistant principal.Through these jobs, I've experienced the Belmont community from several different perspectives, and know this will help me as an assistant principal.Now, here's Max.Thanks, Clare.'Committee answers building questions: grade seven to 12 building proposal explained' by Joanna K. Tzouvelis.As the vote for the debt exclusion to fund the proposed grade seven to 12 high school building is less than six weeks away, the Belmont Citizen Herald thought it would be helpful for readers to get answers to some questions which may not be available on the building committee's website.Here are the answers to six questions provided by the Belmont High School Building Committee, which were sent via email to the Citizen Herald.How much is a building of this size going to cost and operate, and will the town be able to afford the operating costs of such a building?The school department budget has increased over the last few years to support increases in enrollment.We will continue to increase budgets as we grow.Higher staffing levels are needed, with or without a new building.Facilities and utilities costs are still estimates at this time.This building will cost much less to heat and cool and power per square foot than any other Belmont building.How will students be safe in a building of this size and scope?The Belmont public schools have established a climate of safety.There are rules in place and professional staff who work to ensure students' safety each day.What is another example of a grade seven to 12 that would be comparable to what is being proposed in Belmont?It could be anywhere in the country.Does a school this size exist anywhere else?Billerica, Duxbury, Scituate, and many other regional schools.Please see the photo of spreadsheet at the current MSBA projects.How will students in the lower grades in the new building be kept separate from the students in the higher grades?Will the middle school configuration be seventh and eighth and high schools still be ninth through 12th?How is the building being designed to keep the upper and lower grade separate?With lower grades on the Belmont seven to 12 school campus, careful work will be done to ensure adequate separation between the younger and older students.Some strategies may be employed to achieve this that include; physical separation of classroom wings, adjusting school schedules, such that older and younger students arrive and depart at different times, and carefully controlling the flow of students through communal areas.Additionally, there are many exciting educational opportunities that exist when seventh and eighth grades are included on a high school campus.The opportunities for thoughtful, educational connections between grades could include mentoring programs, and other cross-grade learning opportunities, as well as access to shared robotics labs, makerspaces, and other educational areas.After the fourth grade is moved to Chenery, what will be done with the extra space at the four elementary schools?At this time, it is anticipated the classrooms will be used for their primary purpose.Due to overcrowding, alternative spaces are currently being used as classrooms.Ensuring that students are situated in spaces meant to be classrooms is a priority.With the fourth grade moved out of the elementary schools, available classroom space will be utilized to provide differentiated educational space for programming, computer art, et cetera.Available space will also be used to support special education, ELL programming, and after-school programs.Over to you, Bob.Thank you, Max.'Belmont votes to limit the number of marijuana retailers' by Joanna K. Tzouvelis.The overall results of the Special Town Election on September 25th, were: 63.34% for limiting the number of adult-use recreational marijuana retailers to two, which is 20% of the number of licenses issued for retail sale of alcoholic beverages not to be drunk on the premises where sold, and 36.66% against limiting the number of adult-use recreational marijuana establishments.Voter turnout was 18.22%, with 3,169 out of 17,392 registered voters braving the rain to have their voices heard.Opponents of limiting the number of marijuana retailers, only one in precinct four by just one vote, 122 to 123.The other seven precincts voted two to one, in favor of eliminating the number of marijuana retailers.And now, on to Clare.Thank you, Bob.'Campaign against debt exclusion formed', by Joanna K. Tzouvelis.Safe Schools Neighborhood, a campaign to ensure safe routes to the new Belmont High School building, filed its form for campaign financing with the town clerk's office on September 20th, at 3:59 PM. Two Goden Street residents are listed as the chairmen; Debra Talanian and Amy Tananbaum.Tananbaum however, resigned from her position as treasurer of the campaign on September 24.The specific issues listed by the committee are: current site design for new high school does not adequately address issues of safety for students walking, biking, being dropped off, or for vehicular traffic.In an email to the Citizen Herald, Tananbaum wrote, she included her name on the paperwork, due to the high frustration with the current situation.\"While the leaders of the School Building Committee, and other town committees, have spent an extraordinary amount of time hearing suggestions from many stakeholders in the neighborhoods, they have not committed to any actions that will ensure that the four schools' neighborhood, the area between Belmont High, Wellington, Burbank, and Chenery, is safe for walkers and bikers,\" wrote Tananbaum.She stated that concerned neighbors have written letters to committee members and the newspaper.\"I attended scores of meetings and provided ideas proven in other towns.They have listened respectfully, but taken no action whatsoever.I have since spoken with town leaders, who indicate that they are committed to implementing some of these ideas and, thus, have requested that my name be removed at this time.I would like to become an unconditional supporter of the new school building project, and could do so as soon as town leaders share a set of commitments in writing,\" she said.Now here's, Max.Thank you, Clare.'If BHS project moves forward, alternate pool needed' by Joanna K. Tzouvelis.If the debt exclusion to fund the new grade seven to 12 high school building in Belmont passes on November 6th, and the construction project moves forward, the Higginbottom pool will be out of commission for about two years, from the spring of 2019, to the spring of 2021, while the roof is removed and a new level is added onto the building.When parents of swimmers at the Belmont High School swim teams, who participate in the Belmont Dolphins Recreation Program and the Belmont Aquatics team, that's heard this news, they immediately became concerned.Where would the students practice and have meets while the Higginbottom pool is out of commission?According to June Howell, Recreation Department Office Manager, approximately 450 swimmers who use the pool through the recreation and BATS program will be affected.She said, \"The recreation department uses the pool every week night throughout most of the school year, either for dolphin pre-practice, public swimming, or both.On Saturdays, it is used for swimming lessons, including a sport special programs organized for recreation time, clinics and public swimming, and, on Sundays, for public swim\".Howell said she has been actively seeking an alternate pool to be used for Belmont's recreation programs.\"I have called dozens of schools, clubs, and communities, to see if there are hours available, but I've had no success to date.I will continue to reach out to any place I can see that has a suitable size pool,\" she said, in an email to the Citizen Herald.\"If Howell is unable to find an alternate pool space,\" she said, \"the Recreation Department's aquatics program will have to be suspended until the new high school is built\".At the September 17th Selectmen meeting, town administrator, Patrice Garvin, said she is committed to helping the Recreation Department find an alternate pool.Athletic director, Jim Davis, has assured them that he will find another pool for students to practice.This could potentially mean early morning practice times, possibly at 5:00 AM, at an offsite location.As of press time, Davis has not found an alternative pool, temporary pool option.Bill Lovallo, chairman of the Belmont High School Building Committee, said the design and construction team explored a temporary pool option.However, the cost would be two to $3 million.And back to you, Bob.Thanks, Max.Belmont High School Building Project video released.Belmont High School Building Committee recently announced the release of a Belmont Media Center Production, 'Belmont High School, Today'.The video includes firsthand accounts from Belmont High School teachers and administrators about the impact of deteriorating building conditions, overcrowding, and faculty-related limitations on students and teachers.\"The Belmont Media Center and Video Producer, Lucas Tragos, did a fantastic job of depicting the building conditions at Belmont High School, and detailing the Belmont High School building project process,\" said Bill Lovallo, chairman of the Building Committee.\"We are incredibly grateful for the time and resources Belmont Media Center, under the leadership of Jeff Hansel, has put into this video, and we are pleased that the Belmont community will have the opportunity to view the project story through such an effective medium\".Along with my colleagues, Clare and Max, we thank you for listening to the Talking News and hope you've enjoyed the show.We will return next week for another edition of local news happenings around Belmont.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/talking-news_100218.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/talking-news_100218.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/talking-news_100218.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/BOS012317/BOS_012317.mp3", "text": "Board of Selectmen, I'd like to call this Board of Selectmen meeting to order on Monday evening, January the 23rd, 2017 at, what time is it back there?7:05 PM. - 7:05 PM, thank you, Lisa.I'm joined by Vice Chair Sami Baghdady, Selectman Jim Williams, Town Administrator David Kale, Assistant Town Administrator Phyllis Marshall, and a recorder Valerio.Is that a better name for you recorded, like that?I've been struggling in terms of what I should use there.Records recorder or recorder of the minutes.Most important person in the room.Exactly.Okay.As well as Franklin Tucker from Belmontonian and we have other representers here as well So we have a fairly light agenda this evening.We have an update from the OPEB, Other Post-Employment Benefits Committee, looking forward to that, and they're all here this evening.We're going to vote to open and close the annual town meeting warrant.We have some one day liquor licenses to approve.Is Becca Pizzi coming in or just the members of the boosters to authorize the.I believe, we will have a representative.Put her up, thank you.I believe they've been notified, they plan on sending a representative.Okay, cool.We have some committee appointment discussions.We'll probably have some discussion on the town administrator's report on the home rule petition license transfer that they were all anxious to hear about that David, and some liaison reports both on the Community Path Implementation Committee which do a lot of work.Do you have the meetings David that they posted?I forgot to bring those.We can get them.Can we get those fellows so I can announce those under that section there.Capital budget, major building projects, what we're working on there.Jim and I both attended, I don't know if you were able to attend CME, the mastering association events on Friday.Jim was there Friday and Saturday.We can do it on the community announcements.So we will just comment briefly about that and that's it.So I'll do community announcements first and then we'll see if there's any questions from town residents.I don't see many in the audience here.Other than the topics discussed, so community announcements, I'll begin with the winter weather information, it looks kinda nasty out there tonight.So for, this is on our website David?Yes it is.The winter weather resources, visit www.belmont-mass.gov/snow.Okay, that makes sense?To follow official social media accounts on social dash media, and there's a snow emergency hotline, 6179932698.We've only had one storm.Hopefully that's the first and only, right David?As I remind everybody, this is good, if click on behind the link, there's information, how to contact the town and how to get notifications.Okay, great.If we have to do a snow emergency parking ban and it's useful information.And we have a very good, good reverse 911, right, that in terms of when this ever happen there's a parking lot.And the copy of this residential and commercial snow removal by-laws attached also.Okay.Nomination papers are available for annual town election, which is scheduled for April 4th, 2017.They've been available since December 9th, 2016, and they are due, back to the town clerk for certification by February 14th, 2017 at 5:00 PM. For those of you that are interested in writing for annual election.Renew your pet license, okay?Make sure your pet license is renewed and to contact the town clerk's office with any questions for pet license renewal, annual renewal.So those of you that need to do that, please contact the town administrator's office.I think I announced this the last time David, this is a terrific event being sponsored by the Belmont Vision 21 Implementation Committee, talk of the town, sharing the passion of notable Belmont residents to be scheduled, it's scheduled for March 21st, 2017, from 7:00 to 9:00 PM, in the Chenery Middle School auditorium.Clayton M Christensen will be there, Lisa, Ellie, Alfie Kohn and Rupal Patel, and this could be found on our website as well, and the host is Jane Clayson, Jane Clayson Johnson.It's a great event and hopefully we'll be able to attend.I already announced our local election polls open from 7:00 to 8:00 PM, and tomorrow evening, January 21st, 24th, excuse me, I'm sorry, at the Beech Street Center, located 266 Beech Street from 6:30 to 8:30 PM. Toll brothers, will be, are they presenting their remedial action?Yeah.I hope its called, a remedial action plan.There's actually two, there's two things, there's a public information plan and then there's a remedial action plan.Measure plan, that's what R A M stands for, I think, although they've said, it's remedial action plan, but it's one and the same, correct?What's being presented tomorrow night.Basically there, as the notice says their schedule, their plan of attack with regard to dealing with the required DEP notifications, the 20 day public commenting period, discussing what their remediation plan will be, which will then allow folks to make comments to their licensed site professional in the 20 day commenting period.Right.Okay.So that would be.We discussed this on the town administrators report in terms of some thinking that we start to had on, whether we need to consider a peer review, this is just announcements, we could do it under that, of their RAM plan, and may provide comments during that 20 day comment period.So we can discuss that.So, those of you that are interested and I'm sure it will be packed, from 6:30 to 8:00 PM, tomorrow night, I plan to attend myself and then finally with mixed emotions and I think the word's already out David, hit the newspaper, I didn't read the articles yet.Our Town Administrator David Kale has submitted a resignation from the position of town administrator, which is effective March 13th, 2017, and David, can you describe the position, sounds like a wonderful opportunity for you that you'll be taking in Cambridge.Yeah.This is an unanticipated but unique opportunity and I've been asked to join the City Manager's Leadership team as the Assistant City Manager for Fiscal Affairs.Wonderful, going back home.So I wanna thank David, I mean, we'll have plenty more to say about this, but David's been with us since August 2, 2012.Ralph was part of the board when we went to a extensive search and decided on David Kale and David you've been an outstanding town administrator and you've really brought professionalism, integrity, and you've updated our team as well to the town administrator position and the budget process and all of that good stuff as well.I think we'll have a lot more to say but, I'm gonna miss you desperately and wanna congratulate you on this new position 'cause it sounds wonderful for you.So, I think colleagues, what I'd like to suggest as part of this announcement is David and I have been, already started our discussions about a transition plan and having gone through this once before with my colleague, Ralph Jones and Angelo Firenze was on the board as well.We had established the search committee.We made some decisions around interim appointments.So, if it's okay with both of you, I'd like to suggest that perhaps I lay out a plan for that, by the next meeting, to talk about whether that is consistent with what you're thinking about the matter.But David, congratulations again, - Thank you.You've worked tirelessly for the four and a half years with us and wish you could stay longer, but completely understand you're accepting this new role.I guess I'll say a few things, if I may, just because as March 13th gets close, you really wouldn't wanna, you won't wanna have to listen to me.In your office by the way.That may be true.I would just say this is a bittersweet decision and that I would like to thank the Board of Selectmen both past and present members for the wonderful opportunity to be Belmont's Town Administrator and for the support that you've all provided to me and to our team and it's greatly appreciated and I will always be grateful for the positive professional, personal experiences that I've enjoyed during my tenure.I would also like to say that part of that enjoyment is been able to work with a talented and dedicated and hardworking group of department heads, employees, elected officials, and the various committees in town, and we've achieved a lot collaboratively, and we've done that within a limited framework of financial resources.I think the town has a lot to be proud of.I would be remiss if I did not thank the town administrator's staff for their hard work and their support and their teamwork.They, with our department heads and our employees are an extraordinary group of people and I will miss interacting with them on a daily basis, and as I've said, many times, our department heads and our employees are the town's biggest assets and we should never forget that, because they really are a bunch of dedicated and hardworking individuals that we should appreciate.So, again, thank you for the opportunity.I'm not quite going yet, but thank you for the opportunity to wish everybody.Thank you and as I said, it's a bittersweet decision, but I really enjoy the town of Belmont and working for it and I'm gonna miss it so, thank you.Gonna miss you.Thank you.Just to work along David in the financial task force, I mean, it was incredible.So, we never would've made it through without you, and I know I would've made it through as chair on the task force.The amount of time and effort you put into that and how you structured it and the report that was written was just outstanding work.So. - Thank you.I will have many more opportunities to thank David for his service at the town, but we will continue to do business and we'll have to decide an approach that works for this community in terms of identifying a replacement, yeah.Okay, so the first order of business, are there any questions from town residents in the meantime?Oh, I'm sorry, Jim, we wanted to do in the community announcements its just a little bit on the MMA meeting, right?I attended the MMA, I only attended on Saturdays.The selectman association breakout, Jim was there as well.A lot of buzz and discussion around school funding.Oh, what was your table?School funding.It was school funding?Yeah.So was mine.But surprising, not surprising, but the colleagues at the table from, other selectmen from other communities were Western part of the state and their budgets were a lot smaller than ours and they're dealing with issues that are a lot different than ours.So, it's interesting to see this sort of dichotomy and sort of this issues that they wrestle with.So we talked about that and then I was able to talk to go to the annual meeting in which Senator Elizabeth Warren, Senator Ed Markey and Governor Charlie Baker spoke and they were all, three of them were phenomenal in terms of their speeches and outline and particular Governor Baker outlined his commitment as evidenced by some of the work he's currently done with the Missile Monetization Bill and sort of their approach in terms of appointment or their administration of local officials, how they're committed, which was great to hear about continuing to work with the local communities.They've announced and it actually hit The Globe and increase, David, I think it was three level funding or at least it increase, whatever the increase in tax receipts were gonna be.The increase in unrestricted government aid was going to mirror that, and there was also a announcement by the governor that he was going to, his administration was going to increase Chapter 78.Although there have been some comments about, wasn't enough, giving an increase by $20 per student and more to come on that.So Jim, why don't you, if you have anything to share from the meetings.Well, I did go Friday as well.I attended the Department of Revenue, the budgetary discussion.I also attended housing on Saturday.I also went to the Selectman's Association and attended the general assembly.I thought governor Baker's remarks about the number of people having experiences selectmen in the government is interesting.I thought that was very interesting as well.Yeah, because it really does make a difference that it's not at all what you expect until you actually do it, and I believe the increase of local aid, he mentioned 3.9%.He did, I think, yeah, I think he did say that, unrestricted government and fiscal aid.But the Chapter 70 maybe a little bit more than that, children of certain.Right, right, yeah.So that was a great conference and I was happy to be able to go.Yeah, it's a great event.I think we should continue to be active in it and you do get a lot of information and idea here and there.Nothing but a proponent for local governments, so, we certainly support their association.Okay.Any questions from town residents?None.So we have the OPEB, Other Post-Employment Benefits committee, that's what that's this evening to present their either interim report or final report, or at least they have comments on what work they're doing, and Ralph, you're the chair, you wanna join us and perhaps other members as well?And we can join us, you're all welcome to join.Introduce yourselves, put the mics on and we appreciate you coming.We've been waiting for.7 o'clock, we're just going to, before you're not sure.So the, let me just mention again, we established this group in February of last year.Well, you got an interim report to us February of last year, right?February 26th, to think about the purpose and duties under the direction of Board of Selectmen, this temporary, it's temporary working group, will evaluate and make recommendations on the town of Belmont's OPEB strategy.What we employed to date, what more we can do, members will be asked to evaluate the current policy and to consider whether it is prudent to adopt alternative operating funding alternatives for the town's unfunded OPEB liability.He came and met with us almost a year ago and you're back in front of us again.So Ralph, I'll turn it to you to introduce yourself and all members can do that as well - Thank you, I'm Ralph Jones, I'm chair of the committee.I think you've met everyone here at the last meeting.We did.Except for, Timothy Larman, who has joined us.And to the team.Thank you.One of my announcements is that Liz Allison, who had held that position resigned because of the workload of the planning board, and she was kind enough to recommend a replacement who was very qualified as you've seen in his resume and we're glad to have him.Quite impressive Tim.Thank you.I also understand in terms of announcements that the selectmen have been briefed by the HR director on December 2nd, about egg whip, the acronym for Employee Group Waiver Plan.We have been, yes.And I think that's an important development because of the estimate that it may very well eliminate $13 billion of our assumed obligation for OPEB. In terms of our report, I think we've had a real breakthrough and let me just explain what happened.At our last meeting, we reported that we were working with the town administrator and the HR director to get more detailed information on the actual cost of healthcare for retirees in Belmont.That was basically part of our analysis.Yep.The costs, get the real cost and then work from there.Geoff Lubien.Geoff?Took the burden, I think, this summer of really working on that task and he got some good data, although it was not going far back and it could not be released down to the individual level.It had to be given to us in terms of subgroups of various types.Last week, Geoff and I met with representatives from the Wayland OPEB committee and whose work we shared with you last year.Chris Doyle had made contact and we just hadn't ever gone out and sat down and talk with them directly, and we were rather astounded to learn that the Wayland committee had actually contracted out the data collection task that Geoff had been working on to their actuary.We thought they had done it all by themselves, but in fact, they had asked their actuary to do, and as Geoff said, he almost cried when he heard that because he'd been working alone by himself, and in fact, it looks as if our actuary could very well get the information we need to model real cost.Most important in terms of using the actuary was that the Wayland committee could get the results of employee specific information because the actuary was HIPAA certified.None of us are HIPAA certified and therefore the town administrator and the HR director in the town could only give us aggregated data.But using a HIPPA certified actuary, we can get much more granular data and therefore have a much more robust picture of what our costs are.I have shared the RFQ that the town of Wayland used with both the town admin, with the town administrator, and I wanna give copies of it to you because what I am proposing tonight.Was it included it in our time?No, maybe not.No, I'm just bringing it to you tonight.You don't need to read it all right now.But I think, what you'll find is that, I think this is the sort of RFQ we should use when we hire our actuary for the FY 16 biennial report on OPEB obligations.This basically ask the actuary to do two things.The first is do the standard GASB 45 report using all of the assumptions that are imposed by GASB, and if you heard in our previous reports, they don't really, very well reflect what's actually going on in the town.The second part of the RFQ says do that same report but this time use our data on our health costs, our assumptions about experience with healthcare, our assumptions about future trends, and so they got a second and much more town specific and much more realistic picture of what their OPEB obligations are and as we heard last year, there were about 30% lower than what the GASB 45.There's an actual data versus estimate.Yeah, exactly.So what we'd like to do and what we, we met last week, we'd like to ask that the town follow the basic format of the RFQ used by Wayland and also, if possible, perhaps add a few additional tasks, not unlike the sort of tasks you give to Seagull on the plan.For example, there are some possible modifications to our health, our health plan.One that we heard from Wayland was that, as you know, Belmont just has a family plan and an individual plan, those are the two options.A lot of our corporations that we work for, have family plans, individual plans and plans for couples and since a lot of people are simply couples and have no children, you can get a reduced cost and they don't have to have a family plan, so it's a cost saving option, and Wayland even took it one step further and started giving couples two individual plans, which apparently even had a lower cost.So, something like that, we might wanna try out and see if it has any, any benefits for our health costs.Obviously the RFQ has to be developed by the official party here in the town who has the authority to do a procurement.We understand that, all that we're requesting is the opportunity to work with that person and help shape that RFQ, help shape the scope of work and evaluation criteria.This breakthrough, I think, is very important.This means that, Geoff, can stop working on those data trying to interpolate and make assumptions about how all of these groups fit together, and instead we can get a very robust actuarial report that we can then use as a model and then going forward, use as a basis for estimating what our OPEB policies ought to be.Any comments from other members?Maybe the only RFQ. - Chris, if you could just get closer to the mic and say who you are.Oh, sure.Chris Doyle, member of the committee, maybe the only other thing, maybe you were gonna get there, was I think you were gonna ask if someone from the committee or you or someone could be on the, participate in the review of the, I don't know if that's appropriate town policy, but the review.Of the RFQ. - Of the response.No, I think that's fine.I mean, certainly that would be okay with me plus, it's okay Ralph.One final thing, I think, what our committee did at the end of our meeting and a long discussion was realized that this is going to be a long-term process of evaluation.Every two years we're gonna get our new report, hopefully with new town specific information and we're gonna have to look again at what our options are and what our funding procedures should be.So, this is probably going to be an ongoing process for a couple of decades until the pension plan is fully funded.So Ralph, if I may.Any other comments from committee members?Okay, right, Geoff.Hi, Geoff Lubien, member of the committee.The only other thing just to highlight is that Wayland really partnered with the actuary that they hired, to do a more consultative relationship after these two reports are generated, to look at policy options, to look at changes and things like that.That's hilarious.And so I think that's helpful, given the fact that this is something's evolve and live for years to come.I like that, I like that a lot.I think we've done a lot to address this issue by getting a professional point of view in terms of other matters that we can do and other strategy.I think what you're suggesting here is that, the RFQ can be broader than just providing us a report on our unfunded liability and what the assumptions that would be based on actual data.But also, in addition to that, looking at our funding strategy, looking at other things that we can do to sort of impact this estimated liability in the future, that's what the Wayland RFQ did and that's what their actuary for them.They actually got more than they initially asked for in their RFQ. Once they had hired the person and found out that, that particular party was quite willing to give them a back and forth information on ideas, advice, suggestions, and so they found it very helpful.This is 45, the reports sent from Odyssey that's in our binders dated December 14.Is that in?That was the firm selected, yeah.That was the firm selective, but that's the one in which it has a breakdown on actual costs.Yeah.And some other discussions.Okay.You'll see two reports, both looking very similar, but one uses the GASB and the other uses - Okay, all right.I really liked the idea a lot.So when are we scheduled to out for our queue?We were actually.I looked at the list, so, one is of course SMS, which we use, right?KMS. - KMS, excuse me.Seagulls involved, there are notes, something that Jim had suggested before me.The retirement board actually.Okay.So we would go for request for proposal.We've got one drafted.We were anticipating some suggestions from the OPEB working group that we can incorporate into the RFP. We also, don't forget, the GASB regulations are changing with regard to the fiscal 18 audit.So those have to be incorporated because that will be a reporting requirement that needs to be reflected.Frankly, probably in our 17 and 18, because most people have said you should just do it once and not have a split GASB 45 and the new GASB which, for the moment I've forgotten the number.75.75.So basically, do both at the same time so that you have it reflect in 17, 18, I think, has been generally the advice that we receive.Is report as of January 1st of this year from say, fiscal 16 as of, - The fiscal year, I think so, it's 7.1.16.7.1.16.So, but we haven't yet proceeded, KMS is not doing that for us.We were waiting to issue the RFP and we've started to collect the directory data to provide to them.And when would they have, once we've decided on the firm, when would they have the report for us.Its actually pretty perfunctory basis with these components that may add some time, but generally we've already drafted an RFP. We started working on directory data to provide to the actual firm.But we can expanded it to include some of the points that you made, Geoff and Ralph as well, that consultant with nature of, other than just sort of calculating a number for us and maybe a more refined by some consultant - We appreciate the willingness of the town administrator and the HR director to have us help him about this idea.If I may.Yeah, of course.I think it's a great idea.I think it's a great approach.I think this is something that can carry us forward to the future.I'd also like to give selectman Jim Williams credit because I think this is what he's been asking for all along, is, this type of analysis and data from a professional consultant, as a matter of fact, do you have any comments, Jim?Well.Thank you Sami, for that.It's just one of the things I've been concerned about.Ralph graciously invited me to Thursday night's meeting when all of this was discussed.So I strongly support this idea and it's great.I don't know what enabling motion we need to take, but I'd like to see us do that with the chairman tonight.Absolutely Jim, I support that completely.I think that's a wonderful idea, and I think we should have members of the OPEB study group review the proposal, work in conjunction with the town administrator's office and constructing it.I will have a chance to read this as well, I'm assuming Ralph, but, and these consulting.I think, we always say we've done as much as we can.I think we have, but we don't know, right.I mean, there's more that we can think about from a funding point of view.Maybe other strategies that we can employ as we approach our collective bargaining season as well.In terms of impacting future costs, I mean, one of the things that you and I did, as member of the boards, when we had the opportunity to adjust plan design, had a dramatic impact on the future estimate liability, and I know, some of this is collectively bargained.The other point, Jim, I think it was raised at the meeting, now that I'm remembering MMA meeting.I think, some of them.Some raised OPEB, and then one of the members of the board.I raised OPEB at the MMA - I was actually very surprised.I was very surprised.We were talking about school funding and Jim raised OPEB. Do that as it may.Somehow I raised OPEB in this one.But I thought it was a great question because I think what came out of that, is, I forget who the representative was on the panel, and we talked about in, perhaps this can be, what would be helpful from us is, legislatively, we need some support on this and I know that Senator Brownsberger and representative Rogers are aware of that, and I've read that OPEB state, OPEB study taskforce report, and a lot of things that we can do.It would be helpful maybe with the consultant or your input as well, collectively.What more can we do to, or legislators can do, and I'm sure Will's very much familiar with this stuff, particularly.To encourage them, to look at these issues and help provide legislative relief no different than they did.I forget which year it was.Was it 2012 or, I can't remember Ralph.We had the plan designed that was lobbied heavily by MMA that resulted in whatever multi-millions of savings.Generally the people we've talked to, don't think there'll be any immediate action by the legislature.The only thing that might trigger all of this is when the FY 18 numbers start coming out because I think they're gonna be very interesting.They're gonna be very large.18 extra burrow numbers, you mean?Yeah.Good.And there's also gonna be reduced discount rate.Yeah.Which I think they'll need to do anyway.There could be some sharp .Our discount rate is four and a half.So it's not gonna be.Are there discount rates we use for OPEB. - Yeah.That was because of Floyd.But, Wayland still uses seven.There're gonna be some towns that are gonna be.You can use a higher discount rate but you have to have cash in the fund, which we only have minimum.Fully fund the ark in order to use the higher discount rate.Right, which frankly is just, use a high discount rate and really underestimate your future, like you're not gonna get that kinda return on assets typically.Well, it depends, that depends.If you know, write it down.I love this idea and thank you.I'm glad that you supported as well so, I fully support.I think we've heard for all three of us.Moving forward with this type of an RFP, incorporating some of the things you just discussed.I mean, I know, you consulted the aspects about getting the actual data moving forward as quickly as possible.Do I get to make the motion?Yeah Jim and I wonder, the other point I wanna make is, I'm fine with the study committee plus Jim, my colleague Jim Williams, helping to identify along with David and the town administrator's office, who we send the RFP to.Would Geoff work on it then?Yes.He's had his hands around the data more than anyone else.Well, Geoff, thanks for the time you've spent.No problem.I'm sorry that you had to spend that time.I'm sure that will help inform.Yeah, I don't think its wasted at all.No, no, I think it'll help the actuary.No, I think it will, - All right, so Mr Williams.I make a motion that we accept the recommendation of the OPEB committee that we employ or issue an RFQ to investigate or, help me out David.RFP, I think.To basically go out to.Issue an RFP. - Issue an RFP. - This is called an RFQ, but.We use our.Either one of 'em.Basically they issue an RFP, so we can do our next biennial OPEB actuarial study dated 7.1.2016.Incorporating the.The recommendations of the OPEP working committee.Okay, very helpful.Did you get that Lisa?Just, what was the date?I didn't get the date.7 July, 16.7 July, 2016.Okay.Okay.How much did you say, what was .We get the vote?Do you have a second in this.Second.All in favor?Aye.How much you say, that once Wayland did this analysis that their estimated, future estimated liability with town are.20 percent.20 percent right off the bat.But I think its been adjusted.They've also implemented cost reductions that have been pretty significant.Yeah.They did.Yes.They were not at the 50, 50% split for employees, they went to that.They were not as aggressive as we were.As we do this, will they look at, because I think that we've employed a lot of the, sort of, the tactics that have been suggested to manage our liability.Will they look at that as well to ensure that we haven't missed anything?I think we can include that.That would be cool.Yes.I think we've covered everything but you just don't know, right?We've reach out to a lot of towns but a good consulting actuary who's been doing 30 or 40 of these may have something we haven't thought about.Well, I wanna thank my colleagues Selectman Williams for pushing this issue forward as he has for the past several months and I think we're ended up in a good spot.We agree, and I think that we would never have fully investigated this issue, I don't think without this committee, we wouldn't have really looked into this issue and begun to understand as well as we now do without that motion so good work.Yeah, plus the Warrant Committee.I was a town meeting member when I made the motion.I remember that, and I remember the Warrant Committee supported that as well, so thank you.Well, thank you committee for your time and efforts and I guess we'll move forward expeditiously on this, David.Great.Great.Great.okay, have a good evening.thank you Ralph.Thank you all.Appreciate you all.See you all.Thanks for the time.That's great.Wonderful.What are you looking at me like that for?I'm appreciative of it.When you play golf, you don't celebrate your good shots and you don't get down over your bad shots, you just - Steady as you go.Yeah, exactly.So I think this is.Okay.I mean, if you're.Yeah we don't.As Baker said, if you're an elected public official, we're all in this together.We can appreciate that comment, of course, absolutely.But thank you for.Yeah, no, you're right.Thank you for thanking you.David, did we agree to move forward?Like, we did, right?What we're doing is, because some of the calculations were a little bit dated.We've asked Harvard Pilgrim to recalculate the anticipated costs and savings.So once that analysis is complete, we'll provide you a recommendation to allow us to implement.Did anyone approve to move forward with this.You've allowed, you've endorsed us to move forward, which we are doing, update our information, we'll give you an implementation date, which I think fills, we decided should be 7th June, I think, July 1 of 18.So we will be doing that shortly so that we can, as we noted, it's the implementation and the communication and the ability to answer questions with retirees with regard to their prescription drugs, that's gonna require HR to spend a lot of time, so we wanna do it right.So, and we also wanna make sure we implement it, so we maximize our savings to both the retirees and to the town.So I think July one is when we decided to push it out to.What can you say about GASB 75?Are we gonna tell Craig to do something about that in connection with the 2017 financials?Yes?Yes.And does that put the entire 171 million on the balance sheet, do you know?I believe it puts what your accrued liability is on the balance sheet.Just the accrued liability.So, 'cause we have 93 and a half million on the balance sheet now, and we're accruing 11 million a year.So is it, would it be different than that though?I will tell you the calculation and the methodology will change with GASB 75 in terms of how they report it, so, it will be different.So we're not gonna see that in the 2016?Probably will have seen in the June 30th, 2016 - And there is something in the 2016 management analysis, oh no, in the footnotes that describes the GASB changes.So, that's disclosed, and then also, I was wondering, do you feel that you have a good understanding of the healthcare plan itself as it is?Or can we ask Jessica to give us a quick overview of what's available.I think that helps.And who pays what?Would that be something that we could hear?Maybe at the next meeting?'Cause, if you're a new employee, you come and they say, okay, here's your deal.I just liked to, I mean, wouldn't it make sense to remind us, ourselves of that?Yeah, that's fine.Yeah.Yeah.Yeah, that makes sense.Okay David, next meeting.Perhaps part of that, I mean, would Jessica be in a position to give us an update on any sort of collective bargaining matters.She can.Okay.If we're gonna talk about that, David, I did talk to you about one item last week.Which we should not disclose, once we're in executive session.Okay, so, but you've spoken to.Yes, we have.Yep, okay, all right.All right.Okay, anything further on this?Okay, great.Let's celebrate your bad, good shots or get down in your bad shots.I do both actually.Yeah, that was the golf coach.Cause that's a good recommendation, and then we'll celebrate my good shots and get down to my bad shots constantly.You'd be mindful like Becca is, when she runs.She's a pro so, anyway, we're thrilled that she's joining us this evening.So I would ask Becca Pizzi and Curtis Cole joined us on.Becca, I know how busy schedule is, appreciate it, it's an honor to have you here tonight.Thanks for having me.Hi, Curtis, hi Becca.Hi, how are you, good to see you.So we're here to hear more about the second annual, correct?Becca Pizzi Family Fund Run to be held on April 30th, 2017, to allow you.Introduce yourself for the viewing audience.We know, in fact, a lot of people know you, Curtis as well.You start and talk about this event.Yeah, so I was.I'm Becca Pizzi from Belmont and we had this first event last year and had so much fun and the proceeds went to the foundation.Wonderful.Belmont High School and it was just so great giving those out and felt like it was a great day for the community and everybody came together and it was a really fun day and very well organized.I think we were pretty happy with how smoothly.How much was raised?We raised, we made a lot.Introduce yourself.Curtis Cole with Belmont Boosters.Yeah.Last year, the net was $7,000.Wonderful, that's terrific.Of which $1,000 went into scholarships for two student athletes.At the high school, they were awarded senior day, with the balance of the scholarships, and then the other proceeds went into the booster fund which funds grants.The plan is this year is, kinda the same formula for any of the net proceeds.So it's great, essentially, as Becca really wants and we're kinda just following her lead is that all the funds that basically go back into the athletic program at the high school.Okay, that's wonderful, that's terrific.So this event is being held on April 30th.I think he had good weather.I don't remember it, wasn't able to attend, but.I ran it, last year.Thank you for coming.I have done the Brendan grant.So it's the same route, right?Same route.Are there routes for like the over 60 crowd?Kim and I did the over 60.We have to take a Uber back.We did the over 60 for the Glen Shockley Memorial one.Yeah, exactly.You let me win.Yeah, Jim won by a nose.I came in second times.There's only two entrance, in which, Jim came first and I came in second.He won the year before, but there's only one entry.And the year before that.I know the secret, its Uber.I have done this, this route.It's not an easy road for those of us that don't run as often as you do Becca, of course.Yeah, yeah, its not.No but there's water along the way.I did run a number of times with my son.Kids raced too, which is a mile around the track.Oh that's wonderful.That's a lot of fun and they all get metals.So, what are you doing these days?If we don't mind you asking.No. - So still.Are you still marathoning?Yeah, running marathons.Have you done any since last time we saw you?April was the last bit, in February I'm going to new Orleans and Texas, to run those two marathons.Wonderful.And I'm running 10 marathons in 2000 this year.10?10.Just checking them out and doing the 50 states.God bless you.I've teamed up with a John Hancock, who will be one of our biggest sponsors most likely.Oh great.And doing a lot of motivational speaking.That's great.It's just been so much fun.So I still own my daycare and I still manage Moozy's.So, everything's kinda like a puzzle.Oh you're still doing it?Yeah.On your downtime, right?Down time, yeah.So I'm assuming that you spend time within our schools as well.I do.I was just coming from PTO and Wellington.Is there more than we can do, besides approving this fund run, to support some of your efforts in town.Yeah.I mean, you need to let us know that, it's more than we can do as a board to support efforts and inspirational, 10 marathons, it's just a phenomenal, almost one a month is incredible.It's so fun, traveling the world, doing what I love and then bringing back and showing my daughter.My daughter and I are going to Disney this weekend.Well, good.That's good for her, so she's kinda content.Well, congratulations and thanks so much for continuing to inspire all of us.Thanks for your support.And the things that you do.So we appreciate that.So I look forward to seeing you on the 30th of April, right?Right, Jim?Yeah, I see the Chenery runners.Did you start that?The cross country Chenery .We do a kids run every Friday at 7:30 in the morning.So, yeah, so that's fun.I'm not attending that one.But you would not believe the kids that come out.So, that's what I started, and then I started the Belmont track team that meets on Tuesday mornings.Oh, great.So that's a wide variety group of people from Belmont.I used to run track at my school.I love it.Yeah, I love it.How long do they run it?7:30 at the middle school.So they do two times around the reservoir.Oh great.Yeah and then they'll all come to the race.Cause of the known benefits.Yeah.When you do 10 marathons, I mean, I'm assuming, I mean, you still have to train like you do because you just trained.I'm constantly training.So it's easier for me to just be training all the time.Last year, I thought it would be really special just to do the World Marathon Challenge in Boston and nothing else but, now I feel like I'm ready to race, again.Okay.The last time we approved a run, the last question we asked was how many people they expected, and they said 15,000.That was at marathon.We went - At the train crossing.Oh yeah.Cause they couldn't turn left so they had to turn right.Jim it wasn't 15,000.Yes, it was.It was 5600 people.Oh okay, did I say 15,000?You did, 5,600 was still a lot.How many people will be running?We pulled it together in how long?So last year, it was just this last minute.Oh yeah, sure.It was a great idea.You may have three, 400 people, right?Yeah like five weeks to pull it off.140 adult runners in 45.Well, okay.You may get a sense.Yeah.I'd like to double it.Yeah, sure.Well, you'll have two more members of the board that will be there.You can walk, you don't have to run it.But you can walk it?Yeah, you can walk quickly.I'm gonna suggest that you create an over 60 category for these two people.Yeah, yeah, you guys are right.Give us like an hour headstart.The race begins on Sunday but you guy's start on Saturday.We won't tell anyone.That's perfect.Oh boy, that hurts.Oh Lord, I know, I've got to shape, but yes, sir.Would say is, last year, the town in your office was unbelievable in helping us pull this together because we had a short period of time.We had people doing it for the first time and it came together.Yeah, our town departments, they're always terrific in helping.Well, this is a wonderful.fire, it was great.Well, thank you for saying that.We appreciate that.That's a wonderful event and its a great cause and supports Becca Pizzi's ongoing inspirations - And Belmont Athletics, yeah.Belmont Athletics.So with that, gentlemen, do I have a motion to approve the request from Belmont boosters to hold a second annual Becca Pizzi Family Fund Run on Sunday, April 30th, 2017 at 9:00 AM. - Sami, since you ran, you should make the motion.Okay, so moved.Second.All in favor.Aye.Thank you.Great to see you again.Thank you for your support.Thank you so much.Thanks, good to see you.Nice to see you.Thank you.Thank you.Good to see you.Thanks.Take care.See you on the 30th.All the best Becca.Thanks.Becca, nice to meet you.Thank you so much.Absolutely.Start on Saturday, finish on Sunday, okay.Take care.All right Jim, you better start training.Okay.We have to go back up the agenda to vote open and close the annual town meeting warrant.Open the warrant on Monday, February 6th, 2017 at 9:00 AM to close the warrant on Monday, March 6th, 2017 at 3:00 PM. This is only the annual town meeting David, correct?Is this.Mm-hm, yeah.Just include the meetings in May for those?Yes.Does not include the financial meeting or that's part of the.The warrant.I'm sorry.Go ahead.The warrant articles will be submitted during this timeframe.Okay.And then the schedule after the warrant closes on the 6th of March, just to sort of highlight.You've included the schedule in our account, in our book here.I have, yes.While the warrant is open, the draft article language from departments should be submitted to the By-law Review Committee, the Planning Board, the Capital Budget Committee and the Warrant Committee around the 17th of February.The warrant closes for later, and your notice explains that warrant articles proposed by citizen petition must be received by the town clerk no later than March 6th, that those are required.So we'll allow that information be posted on our website.Yes.So folks are aware that they have the citizens petition that they submit it by March 6th.Right.This is for all non-financial articles.This does not include the financial articles, correct?It will include a draft of financial articles as subject to revision as we finalize them.So the financials, as you know, are usually taken up in the June town meeting, but the warrant will include general information.So, no amendments or anything else can be done after the 6th of March?No, the amendments are scheduled, are in the schedule and the amendments are after the warranty is voted.Well, this is placeholder for articles.This is not.Right.Per se the final articles.Exactly.That means reviewed by town meeting.Right, so the draft articles will be submitted to town council for them to review if they need to, not citizen petition one, and then they will be your schedule to vote the articles that will be on the final warrant, will be April 3rd.Our work to include the final articles in the warrant will be April 3rd.So you'll receive a draft of the articles in late March.I thought, we changed that date, isn't that a Monday.April 3rd.April 3rd.April 4th is the election.Right, okay, that's right.So you will receive a draft of the articles shortly after March 20th.This is just to vote to include not to vote on them.Right.Okay.You will take positions after you both final.Okay, that's fine - Warrant article.Alright.So when do the citizen petition close down?The same date as the warrant.The period for the warrant articles to be submitted is February 6th to March 6th.So, after March 6th, there can be no?That's the deadline, yes.Okay.There can be no articles after that.But the schedule outlines when amendments can be submitted.That's amendments to the articles.Right, right, and League of Women Voters is scheduled for March 23rd.Okay.Any other questions, gentlemen?For the motion to open and close the annual town meeting warrant on Monday, February 6th, 2017 at 9:00 AM to close the warrant on Monday, March 6th, 2017 at 3:00 PM. - So moved.Second.All in favor.Aye.Okay, we have two.The League of Women Voters is the 24th of April, I'm sorry.We have two one day liquor licenses.The first is from.Wait.What?Do you need to vote this or you need to sign it.So we can do that at the end of the meeting.Do it at the end of the meeting.Okay.We have a one day liquor license application from the patrons of the Belmont performing arts company to serve wine and malt at the trivia night fundraising event held on February 10th, 2017 at the Beech Street Center from 6:30 PM to 9:30 PM. They're reviewed by all town departments.There were no concerns, so I have a motion to approve.So moved.Second.All in favor.Aye.The second liquor license is a one day liquor license application from Paulette Black of the Beth El Temple Center requesting to serve all alcohol at their gala event on April 1st, 2017, from 6:00 PM to 11:00 PM at the Beth El Temple Center.They're reviewed by all town and relevant departments and they have no concerns, so I have a motion to approve.So moved.Second.All in favor.Aye.Okay, committee appointments, MBTA Advisory Board, David.So Mr. Chair is the chair.You're appointed to be the primary contact for the MBTA advisory board meetings, but we have typically appointed an alternate in case your schedule doesn't allow you to attend.We did appoint Glen Castro to do that, but we feel that now that we have Matthew Haskell joining the team in our office, that this would be a good opportunity of him to be the alternative instead of Glen, especially during budget time and during this time of transition.I think Matthew was looking forward to this and we'll be able to receive and communicate all information received.Does it have to be the chair?I believe, statutorily, I can't say they know that for a fact.I don't know Jim, whether you wanna serve in this capacity because I haven't been able to attend any of these meetings and I know Matt will attend, but perhaps, more active involvement from the Board of Selectmen might be helpful, it's up to you.I mean, I don't care.I'd like to do it.Yeah, would you mind?No. - I've been, I didn't think about this until just very this very moment.So I think two motions, one is to, do I just designate, do I appoint to?I think you either can designate or you can also.All right, so I designated Selectmen Jim Williams participate on the MBTA advisory board in lieu of my participation as chair, and do I have a motion to appoint Matthew Haskell, Administrative Assistant, Town Administrator's Office to serve as the alternate representative for Belmont in the MBTA advisory board.I'm assuming that they both can attend these meetings and that would just support Jim's efforts.Okay, great.Yeah, I'll take him with me.Great, sure.So do I have a motion for that?So moved.Second.Thank you.All in favor.Aye.Okay.Excuse me with regard to this, can we talk about that other matter that I discussed with you?Is that an executive session matter?What are the matters like secret code?Is this like secret code associations or something?No, no.Remember the other day, when I spoke with you on that other matter, that other day, at that time, out of the time?Selectmen Williams was.Like a double secret code.Selectman Williams was inquiring if the MBTA was in the process of possibly considering when they leave the Belmont Center train station to be able to reduce their speed from what they are able to travel at.I know that the police chief has been in contact with the transit police representatives, and I know that's something that's been communicated to them that we're in the process of receiving verification that, Keolis will be implementing a slower speed from the Belmont Center.David what talk did you have?We've had initial conversations.The police chief is following up.So I don't want to say it's been fully implemented, but I know the conversations that have been had about making sure or asking that if the speeds of the train leaving Belmont Center station and crossing on Brighton Street can be at a slower speed than what is allowed.So we will provide you information once we receive confirmation and conclusion from the MBTA. - Yeah, what I can say is that, my information was that the speed limit for the train at the Brighton Street crossing was 75 miles an hour, and this is the limit that doesn't say.That can travel up to that.Yeah, that doesn't say that they're going 75 miles an hour, but I thought it probably made sense since the distance between Belmont and Alewife is only a mile.You don't really gain a lot of advantage by roaring through the intersection at 75, and there's probably a more reasonable speed limit that could be assigned.I agree with that.So we're in discussions with Keolis on the matter?Yes.Now David asked me, where I got the information on the 75 mile speed limit and I told him I got it from the media.So whether it's true or not, I have no idea.No, I think.It couldn't be an alternative fact.Alternative fact, yeah.Which is different from the real facts, by the way.But whatever it is, I think, we'll get feedback on.Okay, well, I think, you're working with.Yeah, no, no.On a little bit more active participation from this board, I think might be helpful.Okay, thank you.This other matter about the discussion with the Selectmen is into a Warrant Committee.Traditionally, it's been the chair in the Warrant Committee, and the vice chair serves in the Capital Budget Committee.I know Sami, you've expressed some, not concern, but you requested to.Yeah, what we had done is switched the roles.Yeah, we had.And I, as vice chair had been serving on the Warrant Committee and you've been serving on Capital Budget, but my time commitments over the next few months, are going to prevent me from taking on that role.It's gonna be hard on me.Okay.So, I've asked not to be the Warrant Committee liaison.It's your, just like you designated Jim to take your spot on the MBTA Advisory Committee, I think.I mean, if its only both you and Jim.I'd like to serve in the Warrant at least the way through next few months, if you want to serve on Capitol, we can just flip the roles.I think, Jim's got a lot on his plate.Yeah, I can.Unless, do you wanna serve on Capitol Budget?I mean, you've been pushing for Capital Budget planning process, which I think is.Wanting to talk about that.Much needed.Well, no, but, if it's okay with both of you, I want to remain on that.It's not part of Capital Budget Committee.It's just a group of individuals that are doing that.Oh okay.It's not all capital, it's a capital.I thought it was a Capital Budget Committee project, well.Well, it's sort of chaired by Anne Marie and Pat Brusch is involved and now Roy Epstein is gonna be participating as David Kale, myself and Floyd, I mean, not Floyd, Carmen.So, I'd like to stay on that working group since we've made some headway, and then after this spring, we can decide what to do.Is that separate than that, separate from the capital's budget.It is absolutely separate.It's been nothing.It's been a group of, a subgroup of the Capital Budget, a quorum sub group, 'cause it's been Anne Marie, myself Pat Brusch, which is not a quorum and David Kale, that's been discussing these matters and now.I mean, is this a formal committee or just a working group?It's an informal working.Its an informal work.And Roy Epstein in the Warrant Committee has expressed interest in, we actually met with Roy with some budgetary matters and asked whether he wanted to just sort of, join forces because it seem to us or at least to me, that the Warrant Committee, I think the Warrant Committee was just, I think Roy was just expressing an interest in it, no different than we are interested in it and I said, why don't we just ensure that we're teaming on this, and if you wanna designate someone from your Warrant Committee to work with us in this working group, he said, I'd like to do it.So he's gonna be part of that as well.So it's same with whomever wants to serve on Capital, I like to remain on that for now.Sure.Yep.Okay, all right.So you wanna serve on Capital and I'll serve on the Warrant?Or if Jim wants to serve on the Capital, that's fine.Why don't we do that?'Cause there's only a few months left unless you're too busy to do it.In which case I'll gladly do it.We can reshuffle the deck.In giving you the option.We can reshuffle the deck after the town election, so yeah.I'll just serve in Capital.So you wanna go, we'll go the traditional route.Yeah, alternate traditional route, and I'm not trying to keep anything from you on the working in that major .No, no, that's fine.But you're working group is coming up with a financing plan.That's part of it, we're doing tours, and I'm gonna report out on that in a moment here.Okay, thank you.David.You need to take a vote?I don't think so.Its just no different than the designation.That's fine.It's the Warrant Committee.I think that's what the by-law says.Okay.okay - David, what's going on with the home rule petition?whatever else you wanna report out on the town ministry, town administrator's report, I'm sorry, David.Sure.So I have had conversations with Representative Rogers and Senator Brownsberger on the draft home rule petitions with regard to the transferability of pouring and retail licenses and specifically the ones that will require all licenses to come to the board for transfer to either new owners, even at the same location in the like.So both have been, both representative Rogers and Senator Brownsberger have submitted those languages in each of those potential home rule petitions to the respective councils, both the House Council and the Senate Council.We will receive feedback from both houses already weighed in.Senate is about to, within the next week or so.So, we will then, make sure that what we've presented doesn't have any fundamental flaws before we submit it as a warrant article to town meeting.I would just also note that in the course of the conversations, the legislature is in the organizational phase of appointing committee chairs in the like, currently.So they're not joint chairs or House or Senate chairs at this point, that they will be coming.In addition to that, and just doing some conversations, I guess it's unclear whether having the home rule petition presented to the House and Senate sooner than the anticipated May annual town meeting necessarily results in faster action.I think we were advised that there are several variables that take place when home rule petitions are passed by towns and it doesn't necessarily, it's not a one for one thing where if you did it in March, that it gets treated any faster or any slower than if you did it in May.It's really up to the chairs.When does legislative session end?There's informal session after they closed, which is where we happened last year.Basically the home rule petition was passed that spring town meeting, and I believe, we went to testify in the fall, to the joint committee responsible for reviewing home rule petitions with regard to liquor licenses.The only thing I would just say is based upon our conversations, there's not a guarantee that if you do something sooner, that that's going to necessarily translate into faster action by the joint committees.What committees will look, know with that.I think it's joint committee, municipalities and regionals regional items.So, like I said, I think the committees are not, I just looked on the webpage today.None of the joint committee chairs or memberships have been appointed yet.So, I guess in terms of schedule, we will receive feedback from Senate Council and final feedback for House Council on the language that was provided.The board then can basically finalize that, so that we can include it on a warrant, and based upon what I just told you in terms of schedule.Yeah, the only thing that's on scheduled is that, I've heard informally that folks may want to call a special town meeting to move this forward more quickly.Well, I would say that if we wait till the spring town meeting, you can have a special town meeting as part of the annual.They're not going to understand that.But I mean earlier than that, like an off cycle meeting.Based on what you just said, I wonder whether that's productive to sort of call a meeting in March or April, and our first meeting is May 1st, we could do a write-up right then, right?You could and as I said, there's no guarantee it gets acted upon any more quickly if we do it sooner.Yeah, that's what we're hearing all these feedback that even though we might have, as a town, voted on a revised language for a home rule petition, what you're suggesting David, may not be taken up by the respective committees and looked at by the legislature any sooner.They have their own pace and their own schedule.Yeah, I don't need to think about that.Well, I think, I think we need the information that David's referring to.I think we have plenty to do between now and whenever, and I also think that if the issue comes up and it comes before the liquor authority, we have our purview there as well.So we can prevent transfer, I mean, if we want to.We can continue on that basis.So, I don't know if anything's on the schedule or not, but I think it's a prudent given, everything that's going on to work within the schedule of the budget.So David, by the next meeting, perhaps we'll know, have feedback, then we can decide then.Okay.What you'd said, is that we're going for the.More restrictive language.That's the only thing that we've been sharing with.The shorter, more restrictive language.But we haven't at this point here or heard any negative feedback on that.Not yet.Okay.We did message them and get an email concerning the bring your own.BYOB. - Alcohol.Yeah, bring your own beers, bring your own booze.I guess it'd be beer or booze.What's the thinking on that?So right now, we don't have a by-law that restricts folks from bringing their own beer and wine to local establishments that don't have licenses.And my understanding is, because we don't, they can't.That is true.Yeah.Say that one more time, please.Because we don't have a by-law.People can do that.They can do that.Yes.Yeah, I mean.You used to do it.Full disclosure, Kitchen on Common, which I'm sad to seeing their doors close and buy a bottle of wine from Spirited Gourmet and my wife and I would have a nice dinner there.So I think it's a quality of life issue for our community.As long as there's not abuse there.I don't think we should look at, at least my point of view is a by-laws restricted.Is that why that was circulated, was it for us to think about?I think it had come up and someone grabbed the liberation.But also the ABC has issued new regulations to expand that to, I believe.Yeah, the corking.Different kinds of establishment other than and I'm trying to think, pubs and to breakfast places and stuff like that, yeah.So they've expanded that to other kinds of eating establishments, which is what we sent you last week.bring a bottle of wine or something for breakfast, is that what you're saying?I'm saying that under the ABC ruling, you could go to different establishments and have the ability.Can a restaurant restrict that, as a matter of policy?I think they can, I'm not certain.So, David, what are you saying then?That, I mean, the traditional use has been kitchen on the common.Are you saying now it's expanded to pizza places and is that or was it always available?I think also, and again, I'm doing this from last week, is I think it was taverns or breakfast places, or those kinds of places.Or even that serve pizza that doesn't have a beer or wine license.You can just bring in a beer or wine.Oh, well, or other establishments you're saying.It's been expanded to then the typical, as you say, Kitchen on Common.Will you tell us the establishments as well.Nope, nope, nope.Just different kinds of restaurants.Oh, interesting.So maybe we should take a look at that, but we wanna be pro-business obviously.We do.Yeah.If you didn't have a license, can you?If you have a license to serve your folks bringing in their own beer and wine.I don't believe so.And it's not all alcohol either.It's beer and wine.So the legislature has expanded.Yes.ABCC has it.Well, they've issued regulations to allow the expansion.If they can being their own beer and wine.Different kinds of kinds of stack.Different kinds of a stack, can we read that?And just so that everyone knows, although I think we've mentioned it before, there is another, and I'm not sure if it's all alcohol license or not, but the distillery over on Brighton Street sells their product.And as a state license.As a state license that doesn't come under the local license.That is correct.But they don't sell beer and wine, do they David?They just sell their own product, right.Is that what that license restricts them to their own product?So it's not like a package store, and that's a separate alcohol license that we don't have authority over.So is that something David, because it's been expansion, you think we need to take a look at or just leave as it is.That is literally hot off the press.We've been doing a review of our rules and regulations.So this will probably cause us to take another look at that before we submit some draft recommendations.We can have a by-law that prevents that, can we?I think it was the licensing board can have rules and regs.Even if a state license is permitted or are we talking about the distillery now?No, we're talking about the expansion of.Of the BYOB. - We could have rules and regulations that say, you can't.Maybe limit hours.You can't bring your own beer.Maybe we need to think about that, ceratin hours of the day.Yeah.Just as a rule.Like at dinner.The rule and regulations, does have statutory effect, meaning that if we have that, then you have, from 6:00 PM to 10:00 PM. - Well, then they wouldn't get a common victualler license, right.If they didn't comply with the rules and regulations.So, as a way to enforce it.Right, maybe we need to think about that a little bit more.Okay.And then the next thing to report Mr. Chair, as you noted earlier in the meeting, Toll Brothers is having a public meeting to discuss their remediation plan for the site and to talk about schedule and other topics with the public tomorrow evening.Under the statutes, they are required, once they submit their remediation plan, have a 20 day commenting period, which they have submitted, and we'll discuss tomorrow.We've been asked to think about providing a town sponsored licensed site professional to review the plan and to make potential recommendations as part of the 20 day commenting period.While the process yields that the licensed site professional does have a public commenting period and absorbs and collects comments from the public to potentially incorporate those into the plan.It may be prudent to engage a consultant that we have identified to take a look at the RAM and to make suggestions to the licensed site professional for toll.So to insure that we have all the bases covered.The licensed site professional can or cannot include them in their RAM plan.But I think that we've had conversations with toll and they are, again, looking to be collaborative and trying to be cooperative.So I think that depending upon what the potential recommendations are that they would be considered seriously.So I believe that is some of the things that we've heard.So. - I actually suggested that we think about having a, I don't know if it's a peer review per se, but you know, I know our health department received the reports from the LSP as well as we do as well.It's a privatized sort of, processes in place.Although there is, rules and regulations and statutory oversight of LSP, DEP. My understanding is that DEP per se, doesn't really sign off on any sort of RAM. - Yeah, there's a comment period by statute and for us to hire a peer review consultant to provide comments on behalf of the town.I think that makes sense.I think that its a prudent idea.I agree.So we will engage that individual that we received a recommended.As long as providing comments.So whatever we provide, it's a peer review.We provide our comments, but whatever the RAM is, they couldn't decide to incorporate it or not, right.Right.So basically the licensed site professional is required to provide a plan that adheres to DEP regulations, and that gets submitted to DEP and basically gets filed.So we will engage that.We will receive will this, or?Unless, I hear something different.I'd like to know, who asked us to do this.I actually asked David to take a look at it.Mark Paolillo.Mark Paolillo is the chair, and the reason for that change.I mean, he said, we'd been asked, I just.No, no.I don't think David, I think you've heard from others.I think David has heard from other folks as well.And I think it's something.Local resident concern.But I think David, along with the health department has also chatted about this.So when I approached David, he said.Certainly not opposed to.We'd been talking about this.I mean, I didn't source it completely.The table was aware of that and also was talking to Angela Brown and the health department.There've been several emails from members of the public that have talked about the RAM and talked about what the town's ability.I mean, it's not to say that I'm not sure that it sets precedence, this is a significant build, there's a concern in that neighborhood about the environmental issues.Not to suggest that Toll Brothers has hired Sage Consulting Inc.and they'll be at the meeting tomorrow night.Not to suggest that they're not gonna do their job 'cause they're licensed.But I think it's good government for us to provide our independent point of view, hiring someone to do a peer review for a fairly small amount of money, whatever the cost might be David.Well, we've been asked to review and comment and we're making that review meaningful.Well, I mean, I thin.By bringing on.Some of these issues, look, I'm a CPA in Brittany's areas.I think some of the stuff that will be presented might require someone who has that background.Jim you in favor of that?Yeah, sure, absolutely.All right, so do I have a motion to, what is this?To engage someone specifically or to pursue sort of, investigated on.I think we've identified individuals so we will engage them.Right.So do I have a motion to approve the town administrator engaging in a licensed site professional to provide.A peer review.Peer review of the RAM plan that will be issued by Sage Consulting Inc.on the cushions village site.Toll Brothers.To provide comments during the 20 day comment period.So moved.Second.On favor.Aye.Thank you, David, for pursuing that.I'm going to attend this meeting tomorrow night and I'm obviously going to sit in the back in the audience just to listen, but we'll just see what comes out of that meeting.But thank you, David.Well.That's not being sponsored by the board or anything.No, no.That was inspired by Toll Brothers.No, I understand.Is it their requirement to do that or?I think they started with the public information plan, but they will be released.I haven't fully read that plan that was sent to all of us.So it might be helpful to look at that.Its starting at 6:45, right.Yeah.It's an odd hour.6:30.6:30.6:30, excuse me then.Any further Mr. Town Administrator.No, when we get to the meeting, that's we have a couple of small chance.So I think everybody, but just on liaison reports and then maybe others, just two that I wanna report out on.Major building projects, I already talked about that.So it has been that hard working group that grew out of, sort of, this whole identification and the need to look at capital major building projects.If you recall, starting from, I don't know if you're on the board at the time Jim, but Board of Selectmen tasked the Capital Budget Committee to put together a priority matrix in the scheme, they did that, they provided it back to us.They sort of provide it back to us that, and then we asked Capital Budget Committee to start to think about a plan forward, and what grew out of that is ad hoc working group, if you will, not appointed by the Capital Budget Committee, but members of the Capital Budget Committee, which included myself, Pat Brusch and Anne Marie Mahoney, David of course, joined us, and then it's been expanded now to include Roy Epstein, the chair of the Warrant Committee.For Carmen is not a member per se, but we'll be providing information on financial projections, debts, and all of that.We have scheduled a number of tours beginning this Friday.I think we're touring.One these station?Well, he said, I believe, public works.I think Phyllips made a copy of the schedule.So the working group.This is the committee.The committee, yeah.So we're gonna tour all the major building committees of buildings, so please stay tuned.We're gonna look at the incinerator site.We're gonna look at a DPW facility, the high school and, the high school.Library.For the libraries, God help me.We got a question, is this a public - Count if you want, that's fine.We don't wanna post the meetings, but I'm happy to listen, there's nothing there that we just discussed.I think part of the challenge of course, is we have four major building projects.We have the high school that we're in the middle of a feasibility study for, that we're looking at, in conjunction with the mass building, MSBA, Masco building authority.The library trustees of course, have a feasibility study group as well, that's looking at the library, and so we have major building projects that if you collectively put them together, cost this town several hundred million dollars.So how do we approach this?What's the plan in terms of moving forward over the next 10, 15, 20 years, and I think this is what this group is hoping to provide, recommendations to this board, to Capital Budget Committee, Warrants Committee and then hopefully a presentation of town, in terms of thinking about a way forward.Clearly, the high school was right in front of us.We're facing with a significant debt exclusion sometime in the near future.But beyond that, those other three buildings are in desperate need of upkeep and repair, and of course we have the skating rink, that's part of the outlook that we're looking at that per se, because the skating rink.We should revisit that at some point David.Skating rink was, if you recall, there was a public private partnership thought about that one.And that's been strategically paused, waiting for the high school.Yeah, feasibility stuff.To see what the footprint may or may not be.That's right, and you're part of the building.Yes.And I might add Mr. Chair, the other one is the community path in some ways has an impact on some of the projects such as the high school and public works.So that's sort of intermingled.Speaking of that, Committee Path Implementation Advisory Committee has been hard at work with our consultants pair, and I went to a meeting last.Thursday, Thursday.I think it was it?Was it Thursday?It's all blending in either Wednesday or Thursday.Last week.Last week.Last week, Lord help us, and they are now scheduling.I think this date has changed David.Three public meetings, and they're primarily focused on right now is continuing to introduce, I think what they've gone, Pare has done in conjunction with CPIAC is introduce a very objective process where they have criteria for matrix.Now some of that's subjective for us, but looking at all of the root segments and options broken down between the west, the central and the east, and also putting criteria, having criteria for those in grading those, and so from that, what you're likely to see is top three sort of root segments for each of those particular areas of town.I think there's a lot of objectivity associated with this process, I support it.It's difficult and challenging not to try to jump to a conclusion.But Pare has allowed CPIAC to really take a very deliberative process in terms of how they look at this.So to that end, they are scheduling three public meetings.I think the Wednesday, January 25th, has that changed?I thought it did.That's the final schedule.So Wednesday, January 25th at 6:30 PM, no 7:00 PM. These are all going to be held in the Town Hall Auditorium.They will discuss the evaluation criteria for their Western end, Waverley Square to the DPW property.Then on February 8th, at the same time, 7:00 PM in town, the Town Hall Auditorium, they will present the criteria for the matrix criteria for the central area, which is the Eastern end of the DPW property to Belmont Center.You think about how they broken this down.It really is logical, and then finally on Wednesday, February 15th, they will have a public meeting to present the evaluation criteria for the eastern end which is Belmont Center to the Railroad Bridge, Brighton Street that connects it to of course, the Cambridge community path, and then finally on March 8, it's a summary of in hot topics meeting at the same time at 7:00 PM. The purpose of the meetings will be to present the consultants conceptual design while the alternatives carried forward from CPI, CPAC, as well as potential alternatives for each segment discussed at the meeting.So I know this has been posted on the website, I believe, right?So there's a lot of work, evaluation criteria, the matrix is very complicated.On the bottlenecks.Bottlenecks and it's really a lot of criteria.A lot of, I really want to thank members of the CPIAC in the amount of time and effort they put into this.I plan to try to attend some of these meetings.I don't think I can attend to all of them, but if both of you are available, gentlemen, might be helpful to listen in.What, what can you tell us about the process?What happens after March 8th?So I think after March 8, is that once they've gotten the feedback from the community, I think they'll start to formulate their recommendations.And then, do we have a?Oh yeah, they're gonna present to this board.Board of Selectman for, they'll recommend, I'm assuming they'll have a recommended.I think the way they've broken this down is they'll have recommended paths, recommendation for path on the Western end, central area, and eastern end, and perhaps it's one and two, in terms of recommendations.I don't know.I think they're gonna try to formulate from this process a rec.CPIAC will vote on, because again, Pare works for the town supporting CPIAC's efforts.I think CPIAC will then be presented with Pare's recommendations and they'll take a vote and that vote will.No different than before, will be presented to this board for our consideration.David, I think that's what we heard, right?I don't know what the timing is, Jim.But it could be.Sometimes after March 8th.Oh yeah, sometimes after March 8th.But I think.So, the CPIAC has to, they have to make their recommendations.So if you're thinking about, I mean, it's not Pare per say, although Pier works for us.The Community Path Implementation Advisory Committee that's advisory to this board that we formed, that will advise us and recommend to us their recommended route segments.I know there's been some objections in certain circles to the idea of scoring different alternatives.Right.But, like you, in which you reflected in your comments, I'm always attracted to scenarios.I think, that's really the way to do it.But does this mean that the CPIAC will actually select their recommended scenarios or are they gonna come to the Board of Selectmen and say, well, here's nine different ways to look at it.No, they're gonna, I mean, I don't think that would be productive if they did that because then it's back to, like, well, how do we decide?So I think CPIAC, based on, based on the work that Pare will be doing, and again, I think Pare has been, having attended a couple of these meetings.It's difficult as we would all do, to not reach conclusions meaning that, how about this?What about that?Why doesn't this make sense?Rather what Pare has, 'cause they've done this a number of times has consulted with us and really work with CPIAC on ensuring that it's a very sort of deliberate, logical process where they're really looking at evaluation criteria and the matrix.The point of view of them, of Pare, is that the matrix will then present.I'm not sure how clear it'll be.Present alternatives that will sort of rise to the top based on the evaluation criteria that they've employed.So it's a complex matrix approach that they've, in fact it might be helpful to provide that.I think we got those materials.I think that both of you are copied on it, right?You copy on Jim Williams emails.Yeah.So this is a distilling process.Yeah, it is.Okay.Thank you.Any other liaison reports.CPAC or the CPA community.We voted favorably on all the projects that are proposed, they'll come before us.Wonderful.The PQ playground.Everything was settled up on that and the Sons of Italy, the records preservation, everything.We did have one descending vote on that, but, so, you have to judge for yourself.Okay.That wasn't unanimous, but all the other projects were unanimous.Okay, great.And on that committee, I actually vote, so, you know, I do deliberate with them on the OPEB committee, for example, I don't deliberate with them.I'm just the liaison and I stay away from deliberation on that committee.That's it for me.Sami do you have anything?No report.Okay, all right, any other matters, David?Minutes?Yeah, minutes, are you here for purpose, sir?Yeah, I wanted to meet with the Selectman.My name's John Higgins.Could you go to the mic there please.Do you have a question?No, I just wanna introduce myself and my company Luxe Express Janitorial Service.Okay, we need to do that after the meeting.If that's okay, great.All right, so we have a lot of minutes here, gentlemen, are we prepared to move forward with these, I hope.I had two small comment.You said you had something David.Yeah, Selectman Baghdady, vice-chair Baghdady had a good catch on December 12th meeting where we had.The regular session.Yep, where we basically on page three, we had an extra zero.So it should have been $400,000 instead of 4 million.So that's a typo.So, and then on.Small mistakes, big consequences.And here's a change for December 28th, one copy down, okay.Oh, I maybe, okay.So under the taxi cab number.Hang on here, December.28th.No, go back on the $40 million error.On the 12th, on page three.The minutes are wonderful.I mean, I very rarely, I don't have any comments, usually.The next to last what?Paragraph on page three of the December 12th meeting notes.Where's the number?Third.4 million.Right.You wouldn't like 4 million.Sami, great catch.Great catch.I actually read 'em.Appreciate that.I know you do.That's why I know that when I reprove them, I know you've read 'em.Yeah.I look at them at a high level.And then on page three of the December 28th, there's a small change in the wording with regard to the taxi cab moratorium report provided by Vice Chairman Baghdady.Stated perhaps a moratorium should remain as no one has requested a license during that time.Now the changes is no longer needed.No longer needed.Right.Good catch.Okay.So those are the two amendments we received.But do I have.Let's go through the minutes quickly then gentlemen, it's 8:30 PM. So there a motion to approve.We do these all at once?Let's do it all at once.For a motion to approve the following minutes, Lisa they're in your agenda, right?Right, I'll just take the December 12th and 28th and write as amended.So, I will do those separately, right.Oh, okay.So a motion to approve the July 11th, 2016, regular session and August 22nd, 2016, regular session, the September 12th, 2016, regular session, in the October 24th, 2016 executive session, the October 28th, 2016, working session.Then November 7th, 2016 joint meeting with the Warrant Committee, the November 14th, 2016, regular session, the December 2nd, 2016, working session and executive session, December 12th, 2016, executive session and the December 19th, 2016 regular session.A motion to approve those minutes.So moved.Second.All in favor.Aye.And do I have a motion to approve as amended, the December 12th, 2016, regular session and the December 28th, 2016 working session.So moved.Second.All in favor.Aye.The next meeting is February 2nd, 2017 at 9:00 AM here in the board of selectmen room, it's working session, and then we have a meeting on Monday evening, February 6th at 7:00 PM. Isn't that the joint meeting, David?The.Isn't that the joint meeting with the, it is, isn't it?No, that's the 13th, I believe.Okay, then on February 13th.I'm sorry, the 13th, we'll be presenting the budget.Is the budget presentation, the joint meeting with the Warrant Committee and School Committee here in the Board of Selectmen meeting.Okay.No further business, do I have a motion to adjourn?I'd like to ask that the working session be on camera because it's gonna be about the financials, I think in the spirit of open transparency would be good to have that meeting on.When you said the financials, but does that mean?That is to report to the board where we are, prior to budget submission to inform you about where we're at in terms of the budget process.I mean, that's fine.I don't know if it's necessary, but that's fine.I mean.Okay, and then my second question is.I mean, it's really more of a working session Jim, so I mean, it's really not a formal meeting per se.Although we are meeting formally.It's an open meeting and you really need camera to involve BMC in that?I've been asked.Okay.It's open meeting.Yeah.Its open meeting, okay.Secondly.You folks can attend the meeting, and then we'd have the BMC come out.Eight o'clock on Friday.It means we wear a tie.We can't dress as casually as you do.Go ahead.The second thing is the executive session we were referring to, can that be scheduled for February 2nd?What the executive session?The one that David was talking about.Humbly, I don't believe you're gonna have enough time to do all you need to do on 2nd.It's important.So wait a second, I don't even know what executive session you're talking about.No, no, no, that's the topic that you wanted raise tonight.David advised should be an executive session.Right.Right.Is it 10 minutes discussion?I mean, it's scheduled for.Will we be prepared by then?If you're not gonna be prepared?I don't know yet.It's something that the three of us discussed.Well, you can post that executive session if you're not prepared, then we won't be known.Well, we should spend 10 minutes deciding that we're not prepared then, because of the three of us need to discuss.No, I mean, why don't we plan to meet in executive session to understand what Jim is thinking about.Yeah, that'll be helpful.We don't necessarily have to.That's fine.No, if I have to.So we have a scheduled meeting.Is it at nine or eight, David?It's at nine?That's fine, nine works.But that was Thursday, February 2nd.Cause we had tried it Friday, we changed it 'cause you weren't available.I'm indisposed.I'll tell you why.So 9:00 AM. - David knows.9:00 AM works right?Let me just look.Is it 9:00 AM because it's after the VHSVC meeting.That's why.That's right.Okay, 9:00 AM it is.We start at 7:30 and then leave it - Yes.Okay.It's Groundhog Day as well, so.All right, we have a motion, anything further?Adjourned.So moved.Second.All in favor.Aye.Pass one.Thank you.Take yours and pass it down, please.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/BOS_012317.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/BOS_012317.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/BOS_012317.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/BOS061617/BOS_061617.mp3", "text": "Are you ready?It doesn't matter.Are you ready?My name is Jim Williams.I'm a selectman.I'm the Chairman of the Board this year.And I'm convening the- - June 16th - June 16th, I almost said April, June 16th, 2017, Board of Selectmen meeting.I'm joined by Mark Paolillo, Selectman and Vice Chairman, and Adam Dash, Selectman, Phyllis Marshall.And we are going to do the last thing first.No, we, the schedule was, the meeting was revised.So the first item is going to be the application for a Common Victualler's License at the Belmont Bookstore.Oh, it's not this agenda?No. - It's okay.No. So tell us, tell us what we need to do on this one.So, we have an application for a Common Victualler's License at the Belmont Books, 79 Leonard Street.All of the departments have signed off on the application, and it's good to go, pending your approval.And I need to make this statement about the conflict, if I may, before we do it.Yeah.I just wanted to state that I've filed with the clerk's office and with the Chair, my Statement of Conflict of Interest, in that I am friends with actually the owners of Belmont Books, and my daughter has a summer job, who's going to be working there.So I'm not going to be voting or deliberating on this license at all.Just a point of order.And I understand that this, that when you reposted the agenda, Phyllis, did you indicate that the start time was 8:45 am?Yes.That was the purpose of - Okay.Great, perfect.Yeah, the revised agenda.Good job.So I just want people to understand that our information says nine.We're starting the meeting before then, but you posted agenda 8:45.It was revised, yeah.Mr. Chairman, I move that we approve this Common Victualler's License.I second.All in favor?Aye.One recusal.Is that an abstention, or recu-?Recusal.I'm not voting at all.All right, now, I'm leaving.Okay.Do you have to take over, or something?I do.I'll just sit right here and take over.You're going to take, are you nervous or anything?No, I've done this before.I've been the Chair for four years out of seven.Phyllis, you'll take care of this for me?I will.Thank you.Great to see you all.Good to see you, Jim.Thank you.Well, since the, thank you, have safe travels, Mr. Chairman.Since that we have, waiting for Myron Kassaraba on the Logan Airport Community Advisory Committee, I will skip that for a moment.I don't see any questions from town residents.Do we have any community announcements, Phyllis?We do.They're in the flap of your book.They're not in the flap of my book.Oh. Here you go.All right.So, oh, we're back to cardboard recycling.So, yay.Yeah.That's hard to do isn't it?This is such a useful thing.And the big one.Oh, but we are going to do a proclamation on this.Right?Sure, yeah.So first and foremost, this Board wants to recognize the Belmont girls' rugby team.They are the state champs.Yay.Great job.They had a win over Algonquin.I don't know what the score was, but- - We got more points than they did, Mr. Chair.Yeah, I think that's right, Mr. Dash.So I think that's just terrific.Congratulations to all of them.And I know that we're planning, in a future meeting, to have them come in.We're going to read a proclamation and congratulate this incredible performance.Franklin was here.How long has the girls' rugby team been in place?Do we know?I know they've had a boys' rugby team for a number of years.I do not know.How many years they've had the team?Yeah.Oh, they've only been about two years.It's not a, - It's pretty new.It's not a sport town.It is.It is.It is now?It's for the first year, this is the first year that girls' rugby has been a recognized MIAA sport.What is it?It is it?It is now.Yeah.The boys recognized as well as an MIAA- - Yes, the rugby, this is the first year rugby is, in any state in the country, Massachusetts- - So there's no longer clubs - For girls.Franklin.No, for girls and boys.Oh, for girls and boys.Oh, that's great.So the first champion, the first champion.Sorry to say I wasn't at the game, but Franklin was, it was a great game, you said, right?Oh, an amazing game.Yeah.So congratulations, congratulations to them.Absolutely.To read a proclamation.That's just a wonderful, it's a wonderful sport.My son played and broke his leg.But it's a difficult sport to be a part of.So anyway, congratulations to all of the girls that participated in that terrific win.Okay.And I think you're sharing this with each of us right, Phyllis?Yes.One for you, one for me, one for- - Thank you.the Chairman, if he so desires.Okay.Cardboard recycling will be taking place on June 24th from 9:00 am to noon at Town Yard, 37 C Street, Saturday, June 24th.That's terrific.We have, we've sent out, This is the committee.Matt, have we sent out mailings on that?Committee volunteer interests?Yes, the letters went to the chairs of the committees and boards.Okay.People need to respond back by July 7th?Yes, that's correct.And I know one of the things we're looking at, perhaps, is revising, Mr. Dash has brought to this Board, which I think is helpful, a revision of the procedures around committee appointments.Looking forward to discussing.And I slightly tweaked it from the last time, but the one thing I would, what I would like to do, is to take these draft comments, 'cause these draft committee appointment rules, because we have no committee appointment rules, and to circulate them to all the town chairs of the various boards, committees and commissions, to get comment, maybe ask them to respond by July 31st, 'cause we clearly are not going to be able to implement these rules for the current round of committee appointments, 'cause those are happening as we speak.And this, these rules would, these new rules would require certain deadlines, which would actually be good to hold our feet to the fire to make sure things happen in a timely fashion.I agree with that.And that would also give people an idea, when they say, how do we, how do people get on committees?You can point them to a procedure, 'cause right now, there just isn't one.So, to just circulate this, maybe as a draft, get comments from the chairs of the various boards and committees, have them respond by the end of July.Then we can talk about it.Maybe see about implementing this as of September 1, or some version of this.No, I think that's fine.I think that's right, Adam.And, I know you're looking at best practices as well, and that's important.Right.And this is sort of, we looked at a number of towns, I thank Susan and Phyllis for pulling that together, that, but it looked like Weston's was the one that was sort of more like where we wanted to go.But obviously it had to be \"Belmontized,\" if you will.And so we went and we changed some parts of that and clarified it.There's no, just so you know, there are no term limits being proposed in this version- - Not for this current round.But for future policy, maybe.I think we have to get chair comments.It may be the comments from all the chairs is that they want them, in which case then we'll have to talk about 'em.I think the one thing, and I know that this is a concern of yours as well, or just, I don't know if it rises to the level of concern, but one comment, when we tried to put in term limits, the point that was made, and I know you've made the same point, is we have a lot of younger families that are moving to town, a lot, you got a lot of individuals, younger individuals that want to get involved in town affairs.Committee participation is a great way and a great vehicle to get informed about the community, in that you expand, you know, what you do in town.Many times, there's no room on these committees.Right.And it was amazing.I went to the Vision 21 Implementation Committee recently, one of their meetings.And they have a couple of people who are relatively new to town, who are younger and they bring an entirely different viewpoint as far as how to do outreach and PR and how things should look going forward.And I was taken aback by that.And you don't see that in a lot of the committees.So I think it would be, I've been telling anyone I can, you know, if you want to get involved, and I say it to the people on TV, if you want to get involved in committees, this is the time to do it because the applications are open, and go online on the town website, you can fill out the form, submit a resum\u00e9.There are committees and commissions on every topic under the sun, I'm sure you are qualified or interested in one of them.And this town's mostly run by volunteers, to be honest.And if you don't volunteer, it's very tough to run the town.We couldn't do the work that we do without all of the volunteerism on these committees.I know I started in the Traffic Advisory Committee.I know you started on a committee as well, and this sort of grew from there, you know.Yup.Then I became a Town Meeting Member.And then eventually I was appointed to the Warrant Committee.You know, I followed you from committee to committee to here, you know that.I was at the CPA Committee with you there.And then the Warrant Committee and now here.I was wondering- - You weren't on the Shade Tree Committee, though, right?I somehow missed that one, yeah.Former colleague of mine on the Board was on the Shade Tree Committee.But you weren't on the Pool Committee, but nevertheless- - as well.I was wondering if maybe, I mean, I know the chairman isn't here, but I don't think this is terribly controversial if we could vote or just ask to submit this draft that we have here.'Cause all I want to do is submit a draft and get comment and I don't want to waste a lot of time.That's fine.So I move that we, so this is a draft of this year's procedures.It's a draft of procedures.It doesn't have a date on it.My feeling is, I would not implement until the fall, because I think it's too late to start implementing it now.This is the draft here, you want to share with the chairs?Right now- - The chairs have all - about term limits, or number of, - That's right.or number of committees you can serve on, any of that?That is correct.It sets procedures for new appointees and for renewing, renewals of committee members, and how we do outreach, and the timelines by which those things have to be done.And then how the votes happen.It just, it codifies pretty much what we kind of do right now.I don't know whether we need a vote.We'll just have it, I'm fine with, you know, I'm fine with sharing this draft form with committee chairs and getting feedback.Just getting comment.And,- - And more formal procedures.and if we could tell them to respond by July 31st, 'cause I don't want to drag it out.Adam, I do think that, you know, the more controversial topics like term limits, perhaps, or numbers of committees, number of committees you can serve on is an important consideration for us.There are two things.One is to have rules at all, because, you know, if someone ever complains that they were not appointed to a committee or something like that, and they say that they were then treated or discriminated against or mistreated, - Right.we can point back - to some rules that we followed, that are clear and public.So I think that helps insulate us in that regard.And second, and also the people who are going to be on these committees, know what the rules are before the game begins, so to speak.Great.So, putting in the controversial stuff is really not the point right now.The point is, get some rules on the books.And if we decide from getting committee chair feedback that we want to tweak it, I'm perfectly open to that.Okay, right, great.Thank you, Adam.So you,- - Were there a couple other announcements you wanted to- - Yeah, there are.I'm going to go through them right now.So, you are going to share this with committee chairs and we'll get feedback.Mm-hmm.Yes, asking them to respond with their comments - Yup.by July 31st.Thank you, Adam.And making it clear to them it's just a draft.This isn't the final final.Yeah, thank you Adam for, thank you for doing, we app- We appreciate it.Okay.There's the Meet Belmont event this year is being held on Tuesday, August 29th, 2017, from six to 8:00 pm at the Chenery Middle School.This is run and sponsored by the Vision Implementation Committee.It's a wonderful event, for those of you that are new to the town.And then, Phyllis, Pavement Management projects.I think I've been experiencing it every morning.So, is this a broader point of view here?Tell the listening audience and those in attendance that, have patience, we're repaving the roads, we're at the start of the construction.So you're going to run into traffic in the early morning.It's that time of year.That time of year.As opposed to what other time of year is that?That you're running into traffic, you know.Oh, no.The construction gets, can we get sort of specific routes about, that are being paved, so I can avoid those in the morning?Is that possible?We can give you the routes.I don't know that you can avoid- - Can I have a little siren on the top of my car to get through?Talk to the state about that.Yeah, I'll talk to the state.There's also a Housing Trust meeting, I don't know if you went- - Oh, was that in here?That was last night.Okay.It was last night.The Housing Trust met last night, so.Oh, and also we want to, we also do want to, I'll bet you'll recognize, what's Aram's last name?I forget it.Postaljian?Aram's coffee shop or diner.It's a diner.All members of the Board were there yesterday in celebration of his three decades within town.I think all of you know who Aram is.In Cushing Square.You know Aram's, and there's quite a feast for lunch, so that was a terrific celebration.So on camera, let's congratulate Aram for the wonderful service he provides to this community, and it's iconic and he's an institution now.And I love going there for breakfast.And he told us last night, yesterday, which I'd never heard.I didn't hear this before, and asked my daughter about it.Apparently the high school kids, after the all night party, they all sort of go down to Aram's for breakfast.Did you know that, Lisa?Did you?I did not know that.He said like 50, 60, 70 kids go down there for breakfast.It's sorta like a tradition.Like at 5:30 in the morning.5:30 in the morning, he's the only one there.And they're very patient.They're very cool.A little tired, but they sit there and they get breakfast and he cooks it up for them.And I just love going there.It's just, it's sort of like the place in Belmont to attend - Absolutely.and get going in the morning for breakfast.So we wrote it, right, a nice proclamation and we congratulated him.So again, Aram, congratulations on your success.Okay.We're right at nine o'clock.So I know Myron is here.We can move right into, unless there's any other community announcements?Do you have anything further?Are we doing any of- - Oh, Brendan's Home Run, Phyllis, it's not in here.Brendan Grant Home Run, Father's Day run, is this Sunday.It's always on Father's Day.I've run it a number of times.Unfortunately, I'm not signed up this year.I have a conflict, but I forget what time it is.It's online.You can go to Brendan's Home Run.What time is it?Usually it's 9:30, it could be 10 o'clock.9:30, ten, and there's hundreds of runners, correct, Franklin?There's a ton of runners, and there's some, there's a possibility that we might have a 5k record.Oh really?Well, I know that's not going to be me.Who's that going to be?Some very feminine, very fast young lady.I have run the 5k, you know, I'm not, you know, not in record pace, but- - No. - That's just wonderful.This is just, and I think Casey and Leonard probably came in front of us for approval at some point, Phyllis, I don't remember when.But this is just a wonderful event.He's taken an unfortunate experience in his life and his family's life, and turned it into this wonderful organization that raises a lot of money within our community and gives back, you know, especially to the athletic programs and the fields and things of that nature.And so, those of you that are available, I think you can walk on and run, or you can go down and participate, there's all kinds of activity and it's on Father's Day and it's kind of a cool thing.Anything further?Andy, do you have any?No. For community announcements?No. - Okay.I think Myron's here.Any questions from town residents?Some that showed up here now.Does this little boy have a question?You'll have to use the microphone back there, Julie.Julie, you'll have to come back here.Yeah.Do you wanna go first?Identify yourself.Okay.Sure.My name's Kate Bowen.I live on Bartlett Avenue.Hello.We came, a couple of us have come to represent folks in the neighborhood who live on Bartlett Avenue or abut Bartlett Avenue, because we're concerned about the way it is being finished.So the road was on the reconstruction list for last year, but nothing's happening to the sidewalk.Some neighbors have opted to pay in for curbs, including myself, but nothing else is being done.So I came, I have to go to another meeting, but I came just to ask and to share about Safe Routes to School.This route is part of our Safe Routes to School route.And it only has one existing sidewalk.That particular road serves a major bus station at the end of the street there, on Trapelo.Harriet and Bartlett and Trapelo kind of all merge together right there by the dry cleaners.And that's a bus stop of the 73.And as you know, the 73 is one of the - Yup.top ten, top seven, maybe.Abut Palfrey Square?Yes.Yes, yeah.The sign's no longer there.Just the people down at the - Yes, right.Right.So a number of roads were looked at in our Safe Routes to School walk assessment, which was done in 2015.I'd be happy to provide that report to you, if you don't have a copy of it.Several of our department heads participated in that walk.I won't go on to the other streets, but it does seem like there's some information that needs to be shared about what Safe Routes to Schools is.It's both a state organization and a national organization.And in Belmont, different schools are active at different levels, but the program itself works to help schools identify safe routes, increase participation by walking and biking.There's, you know, largely programming.And then there's also, as you know, some infrastructure, financial support through grants.Belmont's already received one, that grant is still in process.That was back in 2014, that it was awarded for Wellington.Again, that was an area where the sidewalk wasn't fully reconstructed from a major intersection to the school, just the school frontage.So we're concerned about Bartlett 'cause nothing is happening with that sidewalk.A second layer of concern is a lot of areas.You know, there's a lot of inequality, basically.We're looking at driveway skirts that are being treated with asphalt.We're looking at repairs that are being slathered with asphalt.So it really looks like a widening of the road, and not a distinction between sidewalk and- - I think we, I think we got an email on this.Is this a road that's being repaved under our Pavement Management program?Correct.Community Development is working on this issue with the- - Okay.We have, - the various people- - We have sidewalk funds as well, right?So if this is Safe Routes to School, - We can have Glenn speak to them - Let's look at whether we can prioritize that sidewalk replacement as part of the pavement.It is part of, it is being addressed, looked at by Community Development.They are, they have received comments from folks and they are still, it's a work in progress.Yeah.My understanding from having, Mr. Vice Chair, from having dealt with this issue of, with some of the residents recently and with Mr. Clancy, is that there's a two-part process.They went and did a part of the work.Then they went to do another street, and then they're going to come back and finish up.And then the contractor, I guess, controls the timing of which street they do when, within the whole contract.So they are coming back.So what you see is not complete.However, that the final plan, I don't think goes as far, as from what I understand the residents want.That's correct.The final plan would include sidewalks, Adam, is that it?Curbs.I mean, there are not even curbs on some of these.I take my daughter to play soccer down at PQ and we park on Bartlett sometimes, and there's, you can pull right up onto the sidewalk.I mean, it's not.The street's in horrible, horrible condition.I know that's being addressed with the Pavement Management.So it will be better, but it won't be great.Can we look at this a way, especially if it's a Safe Routes to School?We're looking at it.We are looking at it.It's obviously a part of the plan and it is being addressed, as described.It's not as fully addressed as people would like, but.Well, can Glenn look at that and then feed, you know, in coordinating with him, get back to us on this matter?Yeah, that- - This should be in the summer months, and we can take care of this during the summer months before school begins in the fall.I had emailed Glenn about that, but I believe he's away this week and next, or something like that.So, yeah.There has been, there is a response.I understand it is not to the extent that folks would like it to be, but we, you know, we're, we're trying to manage it within the plan because we're trying to be sensitive to where the funds have to go, and what it costs.And you know, I'd be willing, if the neighbors would like, when Glenn is back, to have a neighbor, if you want to, and all of us or just one of us, have a neighborhood meeting.Maybe down at the school or something like that.If you don't mind then, if you wanna, since you've already sort of reached out to Glenn, to sort of take this on?Sure.Yeah, I'd be happy to do it.If there's an opportunity to do more here, then let's think about it.I think that should be me.I know, for instance, I was involved with the Burbank parents when they were, when the crossing guard got hit and they brought in people from the state Safe Routes to School and all, and they told us they had no more money to give Belmont.And even if they did, they wouldn't give it to us, 'cause we just got the grant in 2014 for Wellington.Right.However we, and that's why it ended up going on our budget, our capital budget, instead of on the state money.So I would assume they'll probably say the same thing again, but we had a really good meeting.Glenn came, Chief MacIsaac came, and it was a really ni-, really good turnout of parents.Maybe, you know, if you guys could arrange a date at the Butler School once Glenn returns, we could have a bigger discussion outside of sort of the formality of this, and maybe get to see if there's anything more we can do.Okay.I just, can I offer one more suggestion as you think about those trees, and siting trees are sort of the last measure to make site lines that prevent people from parking up.And they're parking onto the pedestrian right of way, - They are.and we know that the enforcement is limited, we have limited ability to enforce.So really, infrastructure and key infrastructure changes are what's going to enable people to access the road.We'll look at it.Okay.I'm just going to work on this directly with you.If you give me, - Thank you.pick some dates in July, we'll sort something out.Okay.That sounds good.We want to do something.And it would be great to meet on site.I know Butler's- - I'm fine, I'm happy to meet at your house or anywhere else.You're welcome in my home.have been on it, but I gotta go down and check it out again.If we go in July, we can just be outside.Then you'll experience the true nature of Bartlett.Yeah.Thanks for coming.Thank you very much.Thank you.Any other questions from town residents?I think Julie has.Hi, Julie Crockett at 232 Trapelo Road.I'm here for a similar reason that Kate is, and Mark, you've already gone to the crux of this, which is, where is our sidewalk money being spent?And so I just wanted to share what what I've observed.So, for the 2016 Pavement Management money, several roads, including Sharpe, which we are aware of, needed help.Sherman, Middlecot, and Bartlett were all on the list for the Pavement Management that year.And then somewhere in between when Town Meeting gets that list and when construction started, they decide which sidewalks they're going to do.And once they've started work, you can go on the website and click on the various streets and you'll see whether they're doing, you know, water and sewer.And you also see whether they're doing sidewalks.And for Sharpe, Middlecot, Sherman, sidewalks say the date they're doing it, or complete.At this point, they're all complete.And for Bartlett, the sidewalk said non-applicable.So I'd really like some more transparency in terms of how we're deciding, out of that list, which sidewalks are done.And also looking at the 2016, 2017 and 2018 street lists as a whole and seeing which of those are Safe Routes to School.Because when I look at 2017, 2018, nothing pops out at me more than Bartlett, which was on the 2016 list.I mean, I didn't know that when I wrote to Glenn about this similar issue, that he said that the Safe Routes to School streets are ones adjacent to the school, like Sharpe to Burbank, not ones that are near the school, more like Bartlett.However, I can't say whether that's true or not, that was just an email.And then I wanted to get more information and he was on vacation.So the discussion is sort of open right now.Yeah.So we, we'll get more information.And certainly if we have that meeting, we can get, we get Glenn there, we can do that.budget funding last year, is, there's a report that, I don't know if it's quite completed yet, but didn't we- - An assessment of the sidewalk conditions, to parallel with the road construction.So when is that report coming, can we complete it?I think it is this, later this summer.It also goes in conjunction with- - Julie, one of the things that we, part of the Capital Budget Committee, one of the things I pushed for as a member of that committee last year, because, look, there's a endless list of sidewalk repairs.I mean, you can't walk in down any street in Belmont and not say, gee, that's unsafe.Let's just be safe, let's just be real about it, right?That's because of trees and tree roots and things of that nature.And I think we have invested in sidewalk repair, but we're investing more because of the override.One thing that we thought was important is how do we decide which sidewalks to do, right?Which are the worst in the district.So we engaged a consultant report, as you've heard, it's being completed.It'll inform the Capital Budget Committee, which informs, which is part of the, looks at the Pavement Management program and sidewalk repair in terms of how we spend, I forget what we have each year now.A couple of hundred grand?Yeah, a couple of hundred.How we spend our money on sidewalks.Now, that being said, at least this Board, and I'm sure the Capital Budget Committee feel strongly that Safe Route to School sidewalks are probably a priority as well.Okay.So Bartlett, I believe is on the blue route.And we'll share with you the report.Yeah.We're gonna tell you, you just heard that.Yeah.I just brought a few pictures for you to see.Great.Thank you.So this is the general condition of the Bartlett sidewalk.Yeah.And this is - Thank you.where it shows that they're not only taking out concrete sidewalks, - This is Bartlett as well?That's Bartlett.They're not only taking out concrete sidewalks, but they are replacing them with asphalt.So we're actually getting downgraded.And then these are pictures of, these are pictures of Sherman.There's a driveway apron, that's cement.And these are pictures that are looking north and south on Sherman.And you can see- - You're suggesting the Sherman gets concrete and you guys get asphalt.That's what I'm suggesting, and also that Sherman and Bartlett- - Well, every neighborhood needs to be treated equally.Yes.No matter what we do.I mean, I think that's only fair.I don't know why we decide to do asphalt rather than sod.I don't know that that's the final decision.That's why- - Could be temporary.The asphalt could be temporary, I don't know.You can't take it out and not put something in.So, we need to, we will, it is a work in process.I think the sidewalk needs be concrete, not asphalt.Yeah, it may be that that's just the temporary solution until they put the concrete in, I don't know.Yeah.So Glenn's latest response was simply that the sidewalk money had already been spent, 2016 sidewalk money had already been spent.And so that's just a general condition of two roads that were both on the 2016 Pavement Management list.Okay.Thank you very much.We appreciate it.Your son's a doll.Thanks, Julie.How old is he?18 months.Wow.Seems like only yesterday.Okay.Any other questions?Hi, good morning.I'm Tammy Calise.I'm at 29 and 27 Walnut Street.Morning.I just wanted to bring to your attention, I had the police department do a speed study on Walnut Street last year between August 15th and September 30th.And there were 38,501 cars reported coming up and down Walnut Street during that time.I'm not sure if you've spent much time on Walnut Street, but cars drive extremely fast.40 miles an hour was the maximum speed posted.And while, you know, the 85th percentile was 18 miles per hour, I've noticed that cars significantly slowed down when, during the day, there are cars parked on the street, and they have to slow down because the road narrows, and the fact that I see a lot of people on their cell phones, looking down, texting, on calls, it makes me extremely worried with my four-year-old and six-year-old, there're also 15 other kids that live within either side of us on Walnut Street.And I know that the police, I appreciate the fact that there's limited budget for maintaining streets, but I do work with cities and towns across the country doing this kind of work, and painting, striping the streets, just to even give it a more narrow look, has been shown to reduce speed.And I just want Walnut Street to be considered.And the sergeant told me last year that, you know, the tree-lined streets, you know, were settled and therefore it wasn't necessarily a problem.I don't have a tree on my, in front of my house, and there's a number of other houses.So I wouldn't necessarily say that Walnut Street's tree-lined, but the fact that folks can travel the same speed on Trapelo Road as they can in front of my house on Walnut Street is a significant concern, especially when there're 15 young kids that live just within a small vicinity, and that's just me knowing some of the neighbors.I don't know, kind of to the outside of, the ends of Walnut Street, how many kids live there.Appreciate it.That's a lot of cars.So two things.One is we, I don't know whether it's one of the, we are moving towards, what's the- - 25 miles.We are moving.You understand this?We, the Board sponsored an article for the last Annual Town Meetings Warrant.We're moving to a 25 mile per hour, town-wide.Which the Town Meeting has.Look, I think part of the issue is enforcement.You know, we're kind of thin in the police department.We'll certainly convey your concerns, if you haven't already, to the police chief, and they're very attentive to neighbor concerns about speeding, especially on streets where there are a lot of kids.And they can move around those portable signs saying \"Your Speed Is,\" I mean, there are things that they do.Yeah.Yeah.I mean, absolutely.And I, you know, I appreciate the- - Is it a cut-through street for tra-, in the morning?Yeah.We can go from where to where again?Cutting through Trapelo - Where's it go?to White Street, - To White Street, yeah.to Belmont Street.It's a major, Bartlett Street, major problem.And I appreciate that the speed limits being reduced.But as you said, as you said, in order for that to work, there has to be enforcement, and I've never seen one cop sitting on my street.OK, we'll forward your concerns to the police chief.Have you taken it to the Traffic Advisory Committee, as well?We've started that process.That would probably be a good step to take as well.We've noted this, we'll let the police chief know, I think speed and, look, traffic is a big deal in Belmont.We are a cut-through community.We've done any number of things.I've been on the Traffic Advisory Committee, on this Board.We tried to narrow streets, the reconstruction of Pleasant Street, we believe, has helped hopefully to change behavior.I think the reconstruction of Belmont Center, it's narrowed that, even though we get complaints from a lot of residents that traffic is backed up.We're hoping it just changes behavior, not as many cars cut through, but it's just a convenient community, access points to Cambridge into other parts, you know, Watertown, Lexington, it's a cut-through town.And that being said, we need to do more around enforcement.Right.And I think Julie may have mentioned, but Butler is 95% walk-to-school, whereas kind of the national average is 12%, so.So perhaps we can, you know, inform the chief about this concern, and maybe they can ramp up for a couple, you know.People don't understand that there's tickets that are given out, or there's postings or the police are there, you know, maybe it starts to change some behaviors.It's probably one of the densest neighborhoods in town.Thank you.Yeah.And just one final comment.I, you know, giving notice to the police, I think is important, but again, there are cheaper options to making those cars slow down, like striping, speed bumps, or raised beds, planters, trees.But that's why I'm suggesting the Traffic Advisory Committee, because they're more into the technical stuff than we are.Okay.Thank you.Thank you.Thanks for coming.Thanks.All right.Any other questions?Yes.I'll just chime in and, for everything- - Identify yourself, please.Oh, I'm sorry.I'm Azra Nelson.I'm a Town Meeting Member for Precinct 5, and I'm a neighbor on Vincent Avenue for many, many years.I walk to playground, to school, for over probably 12 years now, daily on Bartlett up and down.And for everything that neighbor Tammy can say about Walnut, it's pretty much the same.Vincent, Harriet, Alma, everything, every street, especially with the traffic calming measures on Trapelo, which, which is amazing, I feel, and it's wonderful to actually see how nicer, and I'm always very amazed and thankful for that big project that we accomplished, for all of those traffic calming measures that we have along Trapelo and Belmont corridor.Right now, we have this huge issue of people essentially moving toward our little cut-through street, and Bartlett is extremely afflicted.It wears so many hats.And I think that nobody mentioned that it's not just walk-to-school street, but it's also walk-to-playground and huge field street.We have a humongous amount of traffic just because of that.And we lacking any signage.There's not even a sign that there's a playground there.People take straight shot from Harriet all the way to Maple Terrace or further.We don't have a lot of trees.We don't have a really sense that it's a residential neighborhood.I think its current condition invites speeding, invites disrespect.And I would urge you to consider more trees, a little bit more curb appeal, with having pedestrian buffers.That was a big bone of contention with all the neighbors, that we're essentially asphalting all the potential pedestrian buffers, and asphalting essentially its previous condition.We do not really doing any improvements.And there's a zero pedestrian safety at this point, even with this new reconstruction that happened.Yeah.If we can put, when we put that meeting together with Mr. Clancy and all, - You'll be very, very- - This is a good topic for that conversation.Thank you very much.I appreciate that.Thanks for coming.Okay.I think that's it.Right?So thank you very much for your comments and input.Myron, want to join us?Mike, I know you're here for the search.We're behind, so I apologize for that.Morning, Lisa.Phyllis.Good morning.Adam.Myron.Nice to see you.I'm doing well, thank you.Identify yourself.Myron Kassaraba.I guess Town Meeting Member, Precinct 5, and the town's representative to the Logan Community Advisory Committee and the Massport Community Advisory Committee.So I think you got it in your packets - We did.an update.So I'll try to be efficient, since you've got a lot of things on your agenda.Not something, not an anniversary to celebrate, but this marks the fourth year since the flight path changes.So it was in June.You've been serving on this committee for four years now?Almost four years, - Wow.but the flight path changes actually happened in June of 2013.So that's when we were RNAV'd, so to speak, by the FAA. And so it's been an interesting time, and I think that there's some good news, but again, these things take a long time when you've got the federal government involved.So, go through a couple of highlights, just on the current events.I think that Senator Brownsberger mentioned this at Town Meeting, but if people have experienced a greater frequency of noise and overflights for the past four weeks and probably for the next two weeks, it's because one of the major runways at Logan's been closed, it's been in the news.There was a notice that went out too, a press release that went out this week.Yeah, I saw it.I think everybody's got a copy of it, but in case people weren't aware, this runway handles about a third of the arrivals.And so basically, what's had to happen, is that that traffic's been spread out to other runways.The runway that affects Belmont, Arlington, Cambridge, Medford, Somerville is typically used more in the winter months because of northwest winds.And so we, in June, in May, usually didn't get this level of a frequency.So I think that that is, I think they're gonna wrap that up by the 23rd, hopefully.And it should go back to sort of a more normal pattern.So more traffic has been pushed to 33L because of- - Right, 33L and all other runways.Yeah, but we've gotten more, and- - It's just been at a time when people are outside, windows are open, you know.We getting a lot of emails on this?I mean, I've noticed the planes more often in the morning.Oh yeah.There's a lot more - Definitely.coming over the town.Yeah.But that should subside.And you know, the other thing is that June is a really busy vacation travel month.The economy's doing well, and Boston's a very desirable destination.And so I think, you know, we are going to see increased utilization of all runways.I think, you know, it's become a, I think we've got direct flights to 60 international destinations and they're just expanding that further.And some of those flights, the Cathay Pacific Hong Kong flight takes, is scheduled to take off at 1:45 in the morning.Ugh.So, so, - When do you have to get to the airport for that one?No traffic, right?I've taken the nine o'clock flight to Italy.It's kind of cool.That's an early morning flight, yeah.Yeah.That's the kind, you don't sleep at all- - Runway 4R has been closed.You don't sleep, you have to sleep on the plane.There's no way you go to bed and then get up and try to- - That'd be crazy, the time difference, it'd be awful.Yeah, so the second issue is to give the positive update on what's been going on with trying to reevaluate these concentrated flight paths that were implemented four years ago.And I think as you know, the efforts of myself, some of the local CAC reps, the Boston West Fair Skies group, our legislators, our congressional delegation, finally, after a couple of years, got this issue up on people's radar, so to speak.And and it has resulted in this study called the RNAV study, which is being done by Massport, funded by MIT. And we saw the results, first results of that, back in February.And they're encouraging, from the perspective that there's a couple things that could be done to the procedure, both a modification of the speed that airplanes are departing.The MIT guys figured out that at the current speed of 200 or 220 miles an hour, you actually get airframe noise from the airplane in addition to noise from the engines.And that if you slow down the speed to 180 miles an hour, that airframe noise goes away.So that could be a way of, again, just by making a slight procedural change, could decrease the- - But Myron, read that, and he said, that's interesting, but is that, are they still taking off over Bel-?Meaning that, - Yeah, that's - still in takeoff mode - flight path.are they still take-, they're coming over Belmont, but are they still in takeoff mode, even eight miles out, I guess they would be, right?Yeah.It's not very far, yeah.Yeah.And then the second thing, the more impactful one would be that they're looking at how they can mimic or go back to some sort of distribution or dispersion of the flights back to the way they used to be, when we never had any problems.So as think, as you know, you've seen the flight paths, they go over Medford and then they split onto these four rails, three of which go over Belmont.The thought right now, and they did this in Charlotte, is that they could go back to having the airplanes reach a certain altitude.And at that point in time, have air traffic control vector them more randomly, which is essentially what we had.Isn't that zero-sum?Other communities now start complaining that their airplanes are over there.Well, I think the argument is going to be, to some people, like in East Somerville or East Cambridge, that what you used, they used to get these airplanes, and now they're just coming back.They're not getting them, we're getting more of them now, they're coming back and- - Yeah, but it will be a, you know, an issue, especially to people who moved into those neighborhoods in the last four years, that didn't have airplanes.But I know in your office, in Davis Square, you've gotten a lot more impact in Somerville, that area of Somerville, versus the rest of Somerville.Oh, definitely.Well, when I used to live in Somerville years ago, you could tell it was 11:45, 'cause the FedEx plane went over.Yeah.You could go, it was clockwork.So, I've actually posted this update up onto the Belmont town, town website.11:45 pm.At night.At night.I'm sorry, Adam, I apologize.No, FedEx was always the last plane out at night.Yeah.And there's some links to the updates, if residents want to take a look, so.Are you getting a lot more, so Myron, first of all, thank you for your wonderful service, and I know this has been a contentious issue, and we do have Congresswoman Clarkson, I've been involved here, correct?Absolutely.Senator Brownsberger and Representative Dave Rogers have really helped out on this.I mean, it seems to be moving in some positive direction.What, where's the end here?I mean, what, what we just, it's just an ongoing continued dialogue and we certainly need to continue to have our voice here.You mentioned in the memo that perhaps we need to think about whether we continue participating in what you're currently participating in, in the CACs. I mean, is that- - Well, it's a complex, it's a, that's a- - Where do we go from here?Complicated- - I know you hadn't decided that, but what more can we do, and where do we go?Well, I think that anything that this study comes up with is going to have to be agreed to by the FAA. And so I think one step is keeping a close eye and I'll keep you informed on what happens with the study, and if they come back and they say, yeah, we can do this dispersion, but it's going to need to get approval.We may need to weigh in to encourage them to obtain that approval, but that's, you know, probably still a 12-month, 12-to-18-month process that has to happen.I think maybe the confusion between the CACs is, is there's actually two of them, and sort of the Logan CAC had been around for, you know, 15 years working on this Boston Logan noise airport study, which was a legislated group.And it's been, I wouldn't say replaced, but the legislature formed something called the Massport CAC, which is now really being looked upon as the going-forward agency.And I'm the treasurer of the Massport CAC. And it's been a struggle.We basically have kind of built a state agency from scratch and are now getting to the point where, you know, we've made some proposals to Massport.We've got John Nucci, who is representing the Massport CAC on the Massport board.And so things are moving ahead.And I think that Massport in general is taking an attitude that using the Massport CAC, you know, I was in DC probably a month ago for a noise-related, I happened to be in DC for business, and I attended a noise meeting with the FAA and the industry.The industry sees noise as the single biggest obstacle to aviation's growth.So it's gone from sort of, \"Oh, this is just a few people complaining and eventually they'll stop complaining,\" to now, on a national basis, the industry realizes that dealing with this is something that is gonna prevent them from growing the industry, so.If they don't deal with it.If they don't deal with it.More people are flying, I mean, that's what people are doing.It's more common to fly.I think neighborhoods are getting fed up.Right.Yeah.Right, and long-term, I think that, you know,- - Is it the equipment that's causing it as well?Changes to the equipment?No, the planes have gotten a lot quieter.They have.Yeah.I think it's, to some extent, awareness, social media, you know, I think that- - Before you were willing to live with the noise, now you're saying, you know what, I really don't appreciate that.I think taxes go up to a point where you start to expect things.But if you start, if you talk about, and I said this to Myron, I was sitting outside of my yard and my mom was there.And I said, you know, and I focused on the one issue, and I said, and all of a sudden I noticed all the planes going over.So once I maybe became aware that this was an issue, I said, \"Oh my God, they're coming over like every 15 seconds\".You know?So I think people are just aware of it and complaining more, and it is noise.Noise pollution, right?And it's important for your group, it's important for the CAC to keep pushing.I mean, I think it's a, it's going to be a long slog.Is there- But, you know, there- and I think some of the things you just suggested here is positive developments and change, but ultimately what really can be done?I mean, 'cause- - I mean, we haven't, we and other, you know, LaGuardia and other places where urban airports that have close proximity- - LaGuardia is adding new terminals.I mean, the airline industry is nothing but expanding.Yeah.And, you know, in Denver, what they did was moved the airport, you know, 20 miles - Yeah they did.outside of the city.So we don't really have that option.Yeah, we're not gonna be able to do that.I mean, we could look at, you know, I think Worcester just, JetBlue just started flying to a couple more Florida destinations out of Worcester.You know, there's been sort of this regional- - Is that a Massport decision though, Myron, or is that just the airline industry decision?Well, Massport can provide incentives, but they can't dictate.It's just like the Cathay Pacific flight at 1:45.The FAA rules are that if an airline shows up and they want a landing or a takeoff slot, it can't be denied.So it really comes down to the industry.Now, we could all call up Cathay Pacific and say, could you reschedule your 11:45 am departure, but they're doing it because of landing slots in Hong Kong or, you know, or whatever.So I think that, longer term, I think there's, you know, there's some work being done on the health issues, certainly for communities like East Boston and Winthrop and South Boston, where, you know, you're closer and there's greater impact, but- - Particulates and fumes and stuff.So what more can we do, Myron, I mean, thank you for your efforts, and hopefully they'll continue.You're not getting worn out by it.I think there's been some positive change since we've added our voice with you to the CAC. And so thank you for that.Is there more that this Board can do to support the effort?No, I think that, you know, the key to what we've been able to accomplish, I think, has been to do it on a regional basis.And so getting Arlington, Cambridge, Watertown, not just Dave Rogers, but Representative Hecht and Sean Garballey over in Arlington, and other people, I think has helped tremendously in, as well as the citizens' group, the Boston West Fair Skies that expanded from \"quiet Belmont\" to being more encompassing.So in general, I think we've approached this in as responsible and, you know, the best way possible, but there are no easy answers.I mean, it's a zero-sum game, as you said.I've always kind of felt that way.Now we, at one point, I think, wasn't it Bobby Riddon that that was helpful here.Now he's no longer, he's now a police officer - Right.in another town.Do you have any other folks that are supporting you within the town- - No, I think that, you know, I guess I'll open it, open up for, there is no alternate on the Massport CAC. Phyllis has been serving as the town liaison - Okay.with the Logan CAC. And I think that, again, the Logan CAC may be disbanding.So that may go away as a committee to be on.I'm looking at probably one more year of trying to get the Massport CAC established, but then would be happy for other residents that might be interested in serving.I wonder, Adam, whether the, we, so with that mind, Myron, does it make sense to consider, during this appointment process, adding, I don't know, do we have, is there a formal committee for this, within Belmont?No, there's a designee, which is Myron and then there's a staff person, - I wonder whether we need to- - which is me, so.Yeah, there's no alternate.But the point I'm making is that if you're looking to transition in a year, it'd be nice to have someone associated with this process be informed and it'd be an easier transition.Well, you could just have people contact me - OK, all right.and they can get involved.The last thing that I'll mention is that we did try a little bit of an experiment.I think David, when he was here, supported and Phyllis helped out in spending $500 to get a portable noise meter.You know, one of the things that you'd like to be able to do when somebody complains is to say, well, we're going to go measure what the exposure is.What we learned is there's a reason why consultants make lots of money doing all of these noise measurements.It's not as easy as just buying a meter.And we got a good meter.You can leave it outside and say, oh, there you go.It has to do with matching the noise, because it's not just airplanes, but it's leaf blowers and traffic and other things.And so there's a lot of sort of analysis work that needs to be done in order to make sense of that noise.I'm still working with David Waite, who's a local Belmont resident, at seeing if there's a way that we can do more of a sample, but it's harder than it, we thought it was going to be difficult, but it's even harder than we thought.So I think that if, the best thing is that if we want additional noise measurement, it's probably to request that from Massport and they can, they can do that, but.Thank you, and- - Thank you.And I'll keep you, - Thank you, Myron.keep you informed.Appreciate your service.You're doing a great job.And even though it may seem frustrating, keep at it.We'll get there, we'll get some improvement.We're getting improvements all along.Even in four years, Adam, I think we've seen, through Myron's efforts and others, we've seen increased involvement from Congress, our Congresswoman, our state reps, and they're listening, you know, to the communities.Yep.Just have to keep at it.Yes.Chair.I would just like to mention that Myron is rather humble about this, but he really is one of the most knowledgeable and articulate spokespersons for this issue.And that he's very well-respected by the rest of the committee and his shoes will be hard to fill.I agree, I mean, I've known Myron for, I've known you for a long time and I'm not surprised by those comments.So thank you, Myron.Well, thank you.All right, take care.Thank you, Myron.Okay.Now, when we go home this weekend, we're gonna notice all the planes coming overhead.You got to stop flying places more.Oh my God.I mean, you know, I don't know if you travel, how much you travel, but the airports are just packed.Every flight is packed.There's more and more flights.I think it's just expanding.More people are flying today.Clearly.Anyway.Jessica, could you please join us?Update on the Town Administrator search.We are behind about 30 minutes, almost.So I apologize.Thank you for hanging in there.You've been with us since early this morning.All right.So the RFP evaluation committee has completed its process.The committee consisted of myself, Jessica Porter, the HR Director; Glenn Clancy, Community Development Director; Jay Marcotte, DPW Director; as well as Brian Higgins, our HR generalist.Of the four proposals we received, we are recommending the selectmen interview two of the firms: Municipal Resources, Inc.and Groux-White Consulting.Both of these- - What's the second one called?Groux-White.And you're going to provide us copies of all four?It's these two, and then the other two?We're giving you the two that we're recommending.Who were the four that presented proposals?The other two firms were GovHR and Community Paradigm.It was determined in our review that those two firms did not meet the minimum criteria.Which was what?The minimum criteria had to do with, let's see here, the RFP, two years' experience conducting searches in Massachusetts and completion of five comprehensive town administrator manager searches in Massachusetts, and the signed Statement of Non-Collusion.So the other two firms fell short on 7.2.2, which is the completion of five comprehensive manager searches within Massachusetts.So then we proceeded to fully rate the two that I've given to you for review.Mm-hmm.And again, they came across as highly advantageous on all points of the comparative evaluation criteria.So again, we're recommending that the selectmen review the two proposals.I did also give a copy to Selectman Williams before he departed earlier.Okay, we can get copies of the other two as well?I mean, we can provide you copies of the other two, but they're not being considered.I know they're not, but I wouldn't mind seeing the other two.I know you circulated that article from the Municipal Association magazine, where they talked about the process, and I don't want to run afoul of the rules, Mr. Chairman, so that's sort of the preliminary, yeah here, the preliminary search committee, which is not supposed to be us, which I guess was you.Right.We've completed our process.So, I mean, technically you can look at them, although there's really no way we can consider them, given that they didn't- - I'm not saying that we should, I just would like to be informed.And I read the article as well.I hear you.And I want to answer that.I just don't want there to be an appearance of any impropriety.Yeah, I saw the article, I didn't understand, and I appreciate you sharing it, but I was trying to understand the point of getting it.I don't think there's anything that we've done or will do, and had done in the past, that in any way violates any of the sort of things that were outlined.Well, we clearly have not.No, it was just, it was timely, is essentially where that came from, and I just thought it was worth sharing.I appreciate it.Thank you.So again, we would like to, like I said, we're recommending these two firms for interview by the Board of Selectmen.I know there was a date circulated to try to get that set up.And I've accepted the date.Are these proposals fee blind, at this point?We have opened the price proposals.But they're not part of this proposal here?No, you don't have the pricing information.We don't know the cost.When we interview these candidates, these firms, will we know the cost?Um, I mean, Phyllis, I'll defer to you in terms of disclosing the price.At this point, I'm kind of, of the mindset, I'd rather have the selectmen kind of go through everything.Do the interview.Price wouldn't be a consideration?It will be, once you complete everything.Yeah but, we choose one over the other and find out that one is double the price of the other one.If it's a close call, how do we - The two prices - take that into consideration - are comparable on the two proposals.Why wouldn't we want to know price in advance?Well, the Request for Proposal process is that you evaluate them, you interview them, and then that's the last part that you look at.So, if you look at it- - But if we choose one and we don't know the price and understand that their price is substantially higher than- - We're not going to choose them until we know the price, we just have to - Right.interview them first, and then get the price.And rank them.And then you would begin negotiations- - Okay.That's my point.So we'll get, we'll know the price before you, - Oh yes.before you make the decision, yes.You would rank them - I'll disclose the pricing.one and two, and then you would begin negotiating the price with the first one.If you didn't reach an agreement that you thought was acceptable- - Oh no, no, no, Hang on for a minute, no.I think price has to be part of the evaluation.It will be, at the- - But you just said to me, I rank 'em one and two, then negotiate price, but I'd like to understand price as well as part of the evaluation.Okay.But you only rank that- - Is that not appropriate?It's the last factor.You'll just be ranking them based on the interview only.Adam, I mean, if I'm gonna make a decision on, - No, no, I'm not talking about making that decision.if they're equal in sort of experience and skill, and I might like one more than the other barely, you know, slightly, I want to know what the price issue, what the price is, what the scope of the service is in terms of that price, as well.So you would rank them, then you would look at the pricing, and then you could determine if you- - Why would I rank them before I had the pricing?Because the- - That doesn't make any sense to me.The whole purpose of a Request for Proposal is to get the proposal, and to rank them not based on cost.And then if you, that is the statutory- - Really?procurement for the Request for Proposal, as opposed to an Invitation to Bid.If one is double the cost of the second one.They go one and two.Then what do I do?I'd like to- - Yeah, go ahead please.Okay, so the process is that you would open the, you would rank them, and then you would, then you can look at the pricing.If in fact you, and it is a factor in terms of making your final decision.Because if you, if one price is exponentially higher than the other, and it's for the same service, then you would have, and you, then you have the option of going with the second firm, because the pricing is a factor, but it's the last factor.It's not the first factor.We're hearing the prices are comparable.Right.Yeah, they're - So it's irrelevant.not so wildly apart on these two.Well, but here's the other point, though- - And then, you would be required to defend if you chose- - I'm not completely- - the price that's higher.I'm not trying to be difficult.I'm not completely understanding why the Board, can't know price at all until the end.So I'm a little concerned about that.I don't know why we wouldn't be, why that would not be shared with us.I think I would always take that into consideration.That is- - Especially if the firms are comparable.You know, in one, and then with the comparable prices, but what's the cost?Yup?Right?I would offer to you that is the same process that you- - Is that Chapter 30B?Yes.That is the same process that you followed with regard to selection of the firm that you chose for the Community Path as well.It's just the process.It's not the final de- - We didn't know the price on Pare versus .Until the end, until you ranked them.You picked your first ranking.If those, the rules are the rules.I don't necessarily have to like it.If those are the rules, those are the rules.You interviewed.It's very similar to this.It's almost identical.If you hadn't interviewed- - Is the procurement rules that when we put, send out an RFP, the Board is completely blind to price.Then we get to select- - The path, right.You know the price.We don't, we're not informed at all, we're the ones - Right.Because - that make the decision.the evaluation committee - Then we decide - has completed its process.based on the interviews who we grade, then after that, we get the pricing.And then we vote.So you can take the price- - No, we've, we voted, - But you haven't picked one.It's just the process.You've just ranked them based on an interview.You haven't voted on who you're going to hire.Right.You vote that based upon knowing the price too.The whole package.So- - It's a multi-step thing.It's what it sounds like to me.I don't, I'm not an expert at these things, but I know you are, so.I just think it's better for the Board to kind of look at these, you know, objectively, without having the price in mind as you do your review, go into the interviews, then that will be all part of it.And that's part of procurement law?Yes.Yeah.I mean, again, the evaluation committee has done the full evaluation, which is why we're able- - So just as you did for the Community Path, you rank them one and two and three, and then one and two, and then we opened the price proposals.We looked at them, we were able to negotiate a price that was great for the number one firm, based on the process to that point, - And then if we can't, - and then we move forward.then what do we do at that point?And that point, then you would go to the second person.Or throw them both out.Yeah, the.So, so the, so that, and then, you know, we've talked before and you informed us that, you know, we also have, they did not submit a proposal, the Collins group, right?Yes, they decided not to propose.They didn't propose, but they did send us an information, and I don't know what you call it, they sent us the scope of services, right?Yes.They sent the tour email.So I've read it.We have it.It's a public document.They've done work within the state.They didn't submit here.In order for us, we could decide to then go through this process, then through your process, look at these firms, understand price and decide we're not gonna move forward either one.And then switch over to the Collins Center?Well, as you recall, when we, before you issued the second RFP, the one that you got these responses to, that was one of the options that was presented to you, was that you could go directly to the Collins group without doing a Request for Proposal, and the Board elected to do another Request for Proposal.That's right.So we, it was also sent to the Collins group and they declined to submit a proposal to you.So they're not in that process.Okay.So again, my question is, we could decide not to move forward either one of these final two candidate firms.And they- - If you have a reason to do that, absolutely.What does that mean?Well, it means that when you issue a Request for Proposal, if you find that no proposals meet your criteria, then you can elect not to, you can throw them out again.Okay.But the issue is that you've got a process that's in place.That's designed to give everyone a fair opportunity to, under the same rules, to submit a proposal.Okay.And so you've got four firms that elected to participate in that process, and one firm who elected not to.And so you would need to go through the process and determine whether one of those firms meet your criteria.They clearly have met the minimum criteria.And so - And they met- - if you're unable to- - negotiate pricing and finalize- - We would have to decide, as a board, not to move forward with either one.Right.And again, the evaluation committee rated both of these proposals highly advantageous on all of the comparable criteria.So, I mean, it would be somewhat challenging, I would think, for the Board of Selectmen to reject both of them.Well, one of the things that you see with the Collins Center, they have extensive experience.They've been involved in dozens and dozens of searches.I know they chose not to, not to submit a proposal.It's too bad.They've made it clear that they're not subject to Chapter 30B. Yeah.I was disappointed they didn't submit it.But that being said, I don't think it, for me at least, excludes them for consideration at some point, if in fact we decide, or I decide, that neither one of these firms matches the same experience level as the Collins Center.I think we review them and we see what we have.I mean, we may like one of these firms.Thank you, Jessica.So thank you for the process.It was not, can you, I don't remember now, which one, which firm, which, is one of the last two finalists, either one of them were involved in the Cambridge search?No. HR Gov was the firm that did the Cambridge search.They didn't reapply?They did, but they didn't meet the minimum criteria.They didn't have five searches.So HR Gov was the Cambridge, and so they weren't - Right.selected?Okay.Okay.In terms of experience, we have, we'll have that in the prop-, we can look through that?It's all in here, I think you'll find that both of these firms.If they've met the references and all of that?Yeah.And resum\u00e9s.Yeah, we've checked - Okay.references.We may like one of these two quite well, in which case- - I'm not saying we wouldn't.So it doesn't, it was keep an open mind, we'll see what we have.I'm keeping an open mind.I'm not saying you're not.Okay, so what's the format for the interview?I mean, I've accepted it.Is it just sort of, you're going to provide guidance on questions we ask?We can definitely give some guidance on questions to ask.That might be helpful, 'cause we're going to go all over the map here.Right.So I think what we'll do, is give some guidelines in terms of questions that would be asked of both firms.And then some questions of course, might be a little off the map, because there'll be specific to the - But I know one of the things - individual proposals.that we did on Pare, I think on the CPIAC, you could help me understand this, is that we were very careful to ensure that we asked the same questions - Right.of the same- - Right.So again, we'll be, - And Warrant could do that?it'll be the same questions as a guideline for both.But again, there might be specific questions that you have for each firm based on things within their respective proposals.You'd have representatives - So those things would have to be - of the team that would be working.Yes.Mm-hmm.I think what's important is, we want to meet the team members - Absolutely.that'd be working on this.Yes, they would, they would be here for the interviews.That's.Anything else, Adam?Yep.No, I mean.OK, so what's the schedule?We're gonna be doing the interviews soon.Two weeks?We were looking at, I think the 26th - I accepted it, yeah.or 27th of June.I accepted it, too.Okay.I don't know what the date was.You don't mind sharing the other two?I know it was the last week of June, to give them to us.I think it just informs me.I'd like to read all four of them.Sure.I know that, you know, we're going with these two, - June 27th.I've read the Collins Center.And so we'll think about it, you know.It was June 27th.What's the timeframe?To award a contract?Yeah.I mean, I think- - So we can rank 'em.Then we have to meet again to decide on what we're gonna do, right?We're not going to meet, decide that day.I mean, in theory you could, unless you wanted more time to digest that.But in theory, you could have the interviews, and then have a discussion afterwards, - I don't think I'm gonna - get the price information.be in a position to decide immediately that day, you know.You wouldn't deliberate your decision in front of them.You would, after the conclusion of the interviews, just as the Pare, - Yeah, we wouldn't have to- - the decision with regard to the Community Path.We had a subsequent meeting, didn't we?I think we did.Okay.I think we'd have to, right?Right.And Pa- So we can ask Susan to send out a meeting notice that week, if you want.I won't be here, but.We'll interview the two and we'll rank them, and we'll have to meet to discuss and vote.Jessica can convene your meeting.I thought you, we're, we were trying to be careful about making certain that she led this effort, which is- - She is leading this effort.That was my point.I'm not here.So we'll have Susan.And Jessica said that.I mean, I'm not here.I wouldn't be if I was here.You're not physically in Belmont, anyway.All right, Mike, did you have any comments?Mike Widmer, Town Moderator.By way of context, I have done a lot of recruiting in my career.I ran HR for a major Fortune 300 company for several years.Yup.And then obviously I've been involved for the last quarter century in municipal affairs, state and municipal affairs, and so forth.And so I just want to put in a word for the Collins Center.They have done vastly more searches than any company, that, in Massachusetts for this kind of position.They were the, they worked with the town of Belmont the last two times.I was on the search committee that the most recent time, that brought David Kale here.And so I worked closely with them, and they were superb.And I know the Collins Center from my work at Mass Taxpayers Foundation and other capacities.So they're a thoroughly professional operation.They served Belmont very well in the last two searches.They're more experienced than any other firm.And they're probably the cheapest.So when you put all of that, they, in the proposal, they have a dollar amount in their proposal, including a reduction for Belmont.So when you put all of that together, I don't know why we would not pick Collins Center.And I frankly think it would be a serious mistake if we did not.Okay.Thank you, Mike.Appreciate your input.Thank you.Anything further, Jessica?No, that was all I had.Okay, great.Thanks for your efforts.Appreciate it.Please thank Glenn, Jay and Brian for their involvement as well.Absolutely.Thank you.Thank you.Thanks for helping, thanks for hanging in there.You've been here since eight.It's all good, it's my job.I appreciate it.Have a great weekend.You too.Thank you.Thank you.for a second?Okay.Phyllis, discussion related to lottery and keno monitors.That item has been moved to the agenda for the 26th, after the trash discussion.Oh, it has?Okay.The informational presentation on the trash is at six until seven thirty.Okay.We're moving this item.George Hall will be there to inform us about what's taking place.I read his memo.That's helpful.Yes.His memo was that- - No, I understand the litigation is, the appeal that's taking place.Right.Before the lottery.So we're going to expand on that, the chair- - We don't have any information on that, other than what you have, there has been no discussion by the- - So the, is the discussion on the 26th just about this, or is there a broader discussion?The discussion on the 26th is also with regard to your consideration that you look at the- - Our current policy as it relates to- - Yeah, the policy regarding, - liquor licensing - from the Board, regarding the lottery sales by license holders who are authorized to sell alcohol.And then I wanted to, and I wanted to revisit the liquor licensing regulations anyway, as you noted, about requiring that people be paid, applicants be paid up with the town and the Light Department, and that the notice for provision- - I know this is your area, so- - But this is the lottery sales for places that have liquor.It's just one of several things- - I know, I think we really need to look at it.I know that we've gotten, what's the gentlemen from the, Michael Sweeney?Yes.You had- - expressed a lot of concern about our decision-making on that, so.Right.And when he appeared before you in April, your commitment was that you would respond to him with regard to your policy discussions, by the end of June.And I don't think the monitors are tied to liquor licensing.After Town Meeting.It's separate issues, perhaps.They are, in our minds.Yes.Yeah, yeah.Exactly.Okay.So based on your commitment to give a response to them, with regard to the lottery sales in, by those establishments that have liquor licenses, you had committed that you would get back to him by the end of June, after Town Meeting.And so we're trying to get this - On the 26th.before you so that you can - Okay.All right.at least have more information to them- - Would it be possible?I don't know if you mind, if it would be possible to get a, to draft or have George Hall or whoever, would draft the revised regulations for the liquor, to add the lottery language.So at least we have something in front of us.Um, sure.Or strike the prohibition or whatever the lan-, whatever the language would be.I don't think we have specific pro-.I don't think it's in the regulations, I think it was- - Yeah, it wasn't.a consideration by the Board of Selectmen.It was just a Board consideration.I thought it was in the rules.I thought it was in the liquor rules that you couldn't.All right, well, therein lies another issue, but, all right.You know, and I think you're right, Adam.I think, you know, part of, I mean, to me, the frustration I've had with our licensing process is that, it's a lot of distraction and perhaps that's fine, but we seem to just have, you know, we came up with this position and appointed you, just as part of a meeting, and then it became somewhat, you know, that's the condition we're going to apply, even though it's not part of any regulation.Right, right, it's like, we've been applying that you have to be paid up with the town, but it's not written in the rules in any way.And I think it has to be.Yeah.And I think you had suggested, and I support this, that we need to do a rewrite on that, to provide more guidance to the licensing board, that serves, the Board of Selectmen serving as the licensing board in terms of how we award liquor licenses.Yeah, it's like the committee appointment rules too.Find it in other communities, and Somerville in particular they have specific rules.Oh yeah.They've got a book on the rules.I'm not suggesting we go to that extreme, but - But we need something more formal.Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely.Great.You have a comment?No, I just shivered.I got cold all of a sudden.Like 80 out.Okay.So. - So under the 10?Yes.Submit it.So you can look at that.We will have a copy - Thank you, Phyllis.of the regulations in the book.I think that the follow up was with regard to updating the lottery with- - I know they're very concerned.On our process.on the considerations about that particular matter with regard to them, and there is still work needed to be done with regard to the regulations.I know that that's an issue for all of you.If you want to send it to me, I could mark it up.So it's the current regulation, there's an expansion of awarding license component that you're going to look at, perhaps Adam, but is there a more immediate decision on the moratorium we've placed on retail sales of alcohol, and not selling tobacco and lottery?I don't think the tobacco plays into it.Do we need the regulations in place, and vote on that before we can reconsider that position?Or can we reconsider that position, and then put the regulations in place?We could do it.We could do it piecemeal if there's a time consideration on the lottery piece, which it sounds like there is, from the state level.We could certainly, if we decided to undo the prohibition on liquor establishments also selling lottery tickets, the tobacco, we're going to leave that prohibition in place, I would assume.And then we could go back and revisit some of the other stuff I've been talking about.I'm less concerned about the tobacco prohibition than I am about the lottery.Or we could go back and do it all together.Yeah, okay.So I think that the intent was that you would get back to them, and then there would still be a need to make adjustments prior to making a change allowing those establishments to resume or elect to have the with lottery.How can we do that- - I think what George had suggested to you when this came up before was that it would be something that you would make the decision on.And then the implementation could take place in December, when the renewals came before you.And that that's when that would allow establishments to know how they would want to consider this for their business.As we renew the licenses.I think that makes sense.Then the state would also know that we'd taken some action, even though the implementation might have to wait a little bit.Right.All right, and I think you could tell the state if they asked that we're committing to take this issue up.I mean, I've been trying to get it on the agenda for a while, so- - Right.Yeah, I mean, it's just the Town Meeting sort of has taken a lot of our time.Yes.It's an evolved process, so.Excuse me, Phyllis, did you say that these agenda items will be for June 26?Yes.At 7:30 - Got it.on the agenda that's been posted.Got it.Okay.a report in- - So I just wanted to mention also on Monday there, we're going to be looking at asking you to look at the, there's a loading zone.There are loading zones on Leonard Street, and they are currently posted for dual usage.I saw that, it's not working.Which is, yeah.What's the plan?We thought that was a good plan, and- - 30 tickets given out in a month, that's a lot.We talked about this in our last, one of the meetings- - We're having some glitches.What do we do?The loading zone, that was a wonderful idea because we can't have trucks double-parking on Leonard Street, we're not going back to that.So we're gonna discuss that on the 19th.I won't be here.You know that.I know.But we discussed that at one of the meetings we had at the high school, about just making it- - But we didn't do about that.We didn't vote on it, but make it just a loading, just make it a loading zone, no parking, period, so there's no confusion.That was the suggestion.Yeah.Double parking trucks on Leonard Street is not the solution.I would just throw my two cents in because I won't be here on Monday.So the, so that item is coming for you to consider having that just be a loading zone.So Adam, you think that, and I agree that, I know it reduces two spots, right?Is it two spots?Something like that.Having a loading zone, having it painted, that no parking at all.So it's clear.It's clearly load, because the problem is we're trying to make it every, give, please everybody, and it's pleasing nobody.What I'd suggest as well, Phyllis, is, if it's the loading zone, then it's the loading zone, which means that it's the only place you unload.I think that is the concern.And that's why there are people who are frustrated because they parked there and they- - You have to have enforcement by the police of trucks that double park anywhere on Leonard Street during the day.It has to be zero tolerance.That's an excellent point.Please pass that along.I know what they're doing their best, and you know, I'm not suggesting they're not doing this, but it can't be any sort of consideration.Oh, I'm just dropping something off.If a truck double parks, they get a ticket.I mean, if, yeah, if, if you're, I think the point being, if we're going to give up permanently two parking spaces for loading, then that's where - They double-park, they get - they have to load.a ticket.I don't care if it's five minutes, they get a ticket.I think it's confusing to people.And so, we thought it was a good idea.It's confusing to people that park there, but not to- - The trucks.The merchants should be telling their vendors that there is a loading zone, and you have to unload then.I don't know why they have to come in the middle of the day, or, you know, when there's a lot of traffic.Come early in the morning or late at night, and unload in the loading zone.That's it.Yeah.I've seen trucks there, double parking when I'm out there.It has to stop.Okay, so- - Phyllis, I'm fine with what you're recommending, but I won't be here on Monday.Well, it's going to come, yeah.Yeah, well, if the recommendation is to move towards just a - Straight loading zone.straight loading zone, - We're asking you to consider that.I would support that.But after we paint it and all that other, you know.Right.Yeah.Oh, yeah, whatever regulations require.Absolutely.Anything else?Okay.No, we talked about the committees.I think that's it.That it?Thank you.We have minutes.I don't think any boarder, selectman, .I can't vote on them because they're prior to my time.Then let's wait.On the liaison report, I don't have anything.I was hoping to have something today.I don't know where we are on the CPIAC and the Community Path, and whether there are public meetings that are coming up.I know they- - They said they were gonna come back to the selectmen with their options in the summer.And I guess here we are.I'll follow up with them and have a report out in the next meeting I will be at in terms of CPIAC in terms of, you know, where we stand.Yeah.I think they're sort of turning, coming at the middle of, all of our activity around Town Meeting got in the middle of, sort of trying to continue to move that forward.So we, that is one of the things we carry on your agenda and we'll, we, to keep it in front of us.Yup.And so we will try and schedule a time when it's valuable to have an update by them.Okay, cool.To let you know, did you want to speak about- - Oh, I've done two, the Belmont High School Building Committee, we met yesterday.And we've been talking about updating, getting the website live.There's going to be a new website for the High School Building Committee to inform the public, so they can see where we are, and to be a place to post news and updates and plans as we get them.And that will be coming up live shortly.Probably in the next few weeks.We talked about outreach and PR, and having public meetings to gather information.We're also, I'm working with the OPM. We got our rankings, they interviewed them.There was a subcommittee that's interviewing the architects, and they came in and ranked the architects, and they knocked out some of them and they have it down to four.And then the interviews are going to take place.And then an architect will be chosen.I think they're looking in the next couple of weeks to wrap that up.Yeah, the MSBA convened their board, their meeting earlier this week, Tuesday.And that's how the, we have three designees who are on that group of, with 12 representatives from the MSBA. - So, pretty much the MSBA. - What is their, does hiring their architect makes sense?When are final winner configuration decisions finally made?Well, that's going to be part of the whole feasibility study, which, once we get the architect on board, then the feasibility study gets done.What is the timeframe?You're away?There are all these modules from the state.I don't remember- - From the MSBA. - They're all dictated deadlines.Okay.The feasibility study will have to require all three grade configurations that were in the pot, the enrollment report that you had signed when you were chair.And then there were will also be three configurations within each of those, to look at.Renovation, renovation and- - And then there'd be a final recommendation by the, the building committee to MSBA, in terms of configuration at some point, - post-feasibility-study?The feasibility study is due within a timeframe prescribed by the MSBA. - So there're gonna be nine configurations, basically that we're gonna have, based on three grade configurations and then three configurations as to whether it's a renovation, renovation and addition, or total rebuild of a new building.So, and those, all three of those are for each of the grade configurations.So they're gonna be nine evaluations to do, and then evaluate.So there's work to be done.And then also the Community Preservation Committee, we met also this week, and we talked about setting up the public hearings, public meetings rather, that we're going to be having to get ideas and to find out what people want, and to get comment.And we also, I was trying to advocate more for what we're trying, and I think the committees likes to do this to outreach more, to get a wider range of applications in for community preservation funding, so that we have a larger pool to choose from in each of the categories, or whether we decide there's an ability to rather just pool, save some of the money each year, rather than spend it all.And there seems to be some desire to do that.I know we talked about that in the Warrant Committee as well.That, just because we have the CPA money, we don't have to spend all of it every year.We can save it, and then we'll have a big pool when something big comes along that we want to do.Yeah.I agree with that.So I think, but those are all things under discussion.Okay.That was like a lot of work, Adam.Thank you.Well, it's what we ran for, right?Yeah.Anyway, anything further?All right.Motion to adjourn.Second.All in favor.Aye.Thank you, Phyllis.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/BOS_061617.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/BOS_061617.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/BOS_061617.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/BOS2016Jan12/BOS2016Jan12.mp3", "text": "Okay, thank you, Frank Cable Access.Good evening, everybody.Welcome to Foxborough's first 2016 Board of Selectmen meeting.Today's January 12th, I'll go through the agenda.At seven o'clock we always have citizens input and anything that's not reasonably anticipated in the last several days.At 7:05, selectman's update, at 7:15 we have Saga Hibachi Steakhouse for two items.One is to provide an update and a report and the new procedures concerning the recent alcohol violations.And the second item is a discussion and action related to the penalty that we imposed at the last meeting.At 7:40 we have a discussion with Assistant Town Manager Mary Beth Bernard in the board and discussion and a vote on the Foxborough Highway and Water Employee Union contract.At 7:50 and at 7:55, we have, I'm sorry, 7:50 we have the special town warrant review and any changes in discussion.7:55 and 8:05 we have the town manager and assistant town manager updates.At 8:15, Mary Beth Bernard, the Assistant Town Manager will represent the board, the vehicle use policy in anticipation of a vote.At 8:25 Mary Beth Bernard and Chief O'Leary is gonna re-present to us the Constable Policy and I think we're ready to vote on that.At 8:35 we're gonna go into executive session simply to approve the December 15th and the December 29th, 2015 executive session minutes.And then in between we have a dozen or so action items.So Mary Beth, could you lead us in the pledge of allegiance.I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with Liberty and justice for all.Thank you.Okay, is there anyone here for citizens input?Thank you.If you could just come to the microphone and introduce yourself, your name and address for the record.Yes, my name is Graham Silliman.I am the owner of Tavolino at 274 Patriot Place.We are a member of Fox Cares.I want to address a hope about your impact as our town's licensing authority in looking at the redevelopment of shopping plazas in town.For example, at recent meetings you have shown an interest in shaping and cultivating the town's economic livelihood.In your role as a licensing authority I urge you to also consider that broader interest and not just be a punitive body.That has some relevance for things you're looking at tonight.And I'll broaden it a little bit.You know that late ending concerts and games create a time squeeze to serve guests before the usual closing times.If you agree that the restaurants at Patriot Place are a useful tool for crowd and traffic control after events for these late situations, do you have a responsibility to develop a proactive policy?For example, extending closing times could be a standard checklist item that you have when you approve late ending event licenses.If Patriot Place licenses had been extended one hour on January 3rd, what violations would the police have found at Saga?Or would they have seen an okay operation?As for the license holder you're looking at tonight, Saga, they're a small business with few resources, very little wealth, depending on your decision tonight about holding their penalties in advance.They're already looking at, can we go to court?Do we go to court?They have expenses, okay?And that stretches them.Again, they're a small business, they are not a large operation.Your actions have been 100% punitive so far.If in addition to that lights violations however you look at the bigger picture of what that restaurant does every day and what its role is in the town and in the place that it is a Patriot Place.You could see this business as a perfect fit for the town and for Patriot Place, by their deliberate design of the allocation of seats between the dining room and the bar, their menu, their price points and the style of service.This is an operation that opens its stores every day as the kind of restaurant that you should want.Under the radar, every day, you're not looking at them, they are not before you, they are not in the police blotter.Please consider that with these guys.We watch Saga from across the street from where we are.For me the biggest concern I can see is maybe they're a little bit unsophisticated and they may encounter some language barriers.As a restaurant owner, I mean, the type of thing I think of is are they getting the best deal from their suppliers?I mean, it's a broader issue but they have regular business struggles.And at the same time I worry that this sets them up for some mistakes.We've begun to work with them a little bit.And I can also say that we see that they care, they learn, they're serious about running a good business and being a responsible licensing holder.I guess what I would say to you then is are you willing to nurture that?Do you wanna cultivate that?You've talked about cultivating economic development in town in a broader sense with other issues.Dealing with a small business owner who's not a native speaker is different from dealing with corporate faceless national chains.However, if you want authentic local Asian food you might wanna find a local Asian to help produce it.It might be desirable.Again, the question for you guys is, are you interested in cultivating that in the business mix?Let's boil this down finally to a very specific action item tonight, Saga has already announced that they're going to appeal your decision.I have no other information about this.I read about it in the Reporter.There is in this country, a constitutional respect for due process.You guys know that appeals can change your decisions, including changes to penalties.And knowing this may happen, I ask you to hold the remaining penalty in advance for Saga until they and the town have completed the appeal.Other towns do this in Massachusetts, it's only fair and not doing it is just being a bully.We are also other license holders, we're small businesses.We watch what you guys do.Please consider this in the broadest possible terms, you have to enforce the laws, we respect that.You have to enforce the regulations.You also have a role in setting what the broader regulations are so that things operate efficiently in your town, so that it's possible and easy for people to stay within the rules and still do the right things and the best things for the town in each of their operations.Please consider that broader role and more specifically tonight, think about the impact you have on that business and the respect for due process, that's it.Okay, thank you, sir.Very well said for the record, with the exception of being a bully.I think I agree with everything that was said.So and actually, if you wanna wait around the item is on the agenda.I have to get back to the restaurant.Okay, had you stayed you'd be welcome to participate.Might be somebody else, might be somebody else- - Yeah, might be somebody else.All right, just on a quick update.Being one to three inches expected tonight, just to remind everybody there is a parking ban in effect.If you go to the town website it shows there, I think it's from 1:00 a.m to 6:00 a.m. So the town is in its right to ticket or tow.And if it's a really nice car, we get to keep it.The other items if you notice in the packet and in some discussion back and forth to get it on the agenda, we get a meeting Thursday night and that is for Judy's Flowers to come in and Mark and Judy on the municipal conversion and what that is is when a town is auctioned or properties auctions are sold.This provision allows them or requires them to come in front of the selectmen to share their ideas of redevelopment or development or nothing.And then you have a say in that.So there'll be a Thursday at this room at 6:30.And then we're also scheduled, we schedule all the meetings with the Advisory Committee now.so thank you for all of you guys who go to those meetings as well.Each week or each meeting we put on the town meeting warrant items for discussion.And I wanted to just run through them quick at the beginning as a summary because the meeting is coming up in February and I think the more people understand it and come in and talk about it and participate the better.So there's eight articles, the meetings on February 23rd, it runs a couple of hours and it'd be great to see some of the new people there in town and some of the...For the most part, it's been 100, 130, 150 people, maybe that come but there's a lot of work that goes in this all year round.So I'm gonna go through the eight articles quick.The first one is a home rule petition where we're asking for two things for the child abuse training sessions.One is to add mandated reporters to the list of people in town.Basically people required in their profession or their job.If they see something they mandated to report it.And then also an article one is to require training.We have a group in town that provides a training under the state law.It just says training and there's no provisions on when, how, where to do it.So those two items is, added mandated reporters and a provision for training.Article two, we are asking the state through the town to provide two additional liquor licenses in town.Article three is what we've termed the United Steelworkers AFLCIO Union which is the middle managers department heads and clerical employees contract for the year 2015 and 2016.Article four is the police contract for 2016 and 2017 that's been negotiated and will be in on the warrant article.Article five is the Boyden Library employee contract for 2016 and 2017.Article six is interesting because it's removal of the police chief from the civil service back in 1931, it got enacted in town and the town through its discussions and process decided that now's the time to remove the civil service from that.So that'll be an article to be voted on in February.Article seven is a water main.That's coming from Main Street up to Lake View Pavilion.And that's sponsored, I think, through the CIP or the Water Department, Water Commission.And then article eight is the one that a lot of people have been working on that's the new Town Hall and demolition of the old Town Hall.So again, it's only a couple of hours, February 23rd would be nice to have a robust group there to go on this and this is what the town is all about, the rules and the process that we follow.So that's it for selectman's update unless there's anyone else that wants to add anything.Okay, 7:15, this isn't a public hearing we can go a minute or so early.So if representatives from the Saga Hibachi Steakhouse wanna come up.So in this one, this is a little bit of an anomaly and I'm just gonna give a little bit of a background.The first item that Saga is here to discuss going back on November 24th, there was a alleged violation for serving or for, I think there was three, four of them that not clearing the tables, et cetera.We're familiar with that.We had a hearing on the 29th, on December imposed penalties.On December 31st that letter was sent by certified mail out to Hibachi Saga.And then we received a letter on January 6th that says there is going to be an appeal on the 10 day suspension.And the PLC stated it was arbitrary and capricious, not the decision to find them at fault but the penalty as we heard earlier, it was a 10 day going from January 8th to January 17th.So we're right now halfway through it there, I think five days into it.Yeah, so when Attorney Stopa sent the letter, it would have required this board to have a special meeting at the tail end of last week.And I talked to Town Manager, Bill Keegan and I think we decided that we would put it on the agenda tonight to decide halfway through the merits of that.So the two things that we wanna talk, we intentionally put the first item to see what provisions, if any, that they've come up with to make changes.So this doesn't happen again.And then the second one, because it's under appeal I just wanna caution the board that not knowing where it's gonna go, I do not wanna revisit the items of discussion when this board makes a decision.I'm assuming that the person on the other side of the table put their best foot forward, made their presentation, we did it in a unified way and then we did our homework and we made the decision.I don't like when people come up and try for a second pass at it.But on this particular one where it's a respected business and a respected attorney, I thought it would be worth discussing if this is something that if they have something new or some background or history that they wanted to share to sway us to maybe reconsider, if we do wanna reconsider, we follow the Robert Rules of Order.We would have to go back in and not rescind the motion but amend something that was already approved because this wasn't the way that the Robert Rules of Orders plays out is to avoid having to revote things at the opportunity every meeting.If this was up at the last meeting, say we're gonna revote it and we participated tonight then we would need a majority vote but because it wasn't brought up this is the first time we're discussing under the Robert Rules of Order we would need a two thirds vote.So that would mean two thirds of the five people.David did not participate last time but he informed me that he did go back and look at all the tapes.He looked at the tape, read the meeting minutes.So he certifying that it will be a 5 person vote, correct me if I'm wrong, regular to vote so- - Counselor's advice that he can certainly vote on that.He can, okay, all right.So two thirds out of the five means four out of five have to vote to revote this.All right, so just so you understand that.So that second part we can talk about again, after the first part of their presentation.I just thought it was important for everyone to understand the history and where we're going with this.So having said that, welcome.If you could just introduce yourself for the record.Mark Stopa on behalf of the Saga Hibachi Steakhouse.I'm joined by Eni Chen and Steven Lynn.They are the managers of the restaurant.Mr. Lynn is the Liquor License Manager.Eni Chen runs the restaurant side and does most of the day-to-day activities at the restaurant.They were both here the last time that we were here, they didn't come up and join me at the table because it was crowded at the table at the time.But thank you for that introduction of where we are, what we're doing and so forth.And since we have number one and number two, we'll start with number one.As I had indicated at the time of the hearing, even before there was a notice of violation, Saga Hibachi Steakhouse investigated the circumstances thoroughly and took action even without having been told to do so.And just to remind you of what they did at that time, they had fixed the cash register timing, which had gone out because of a power failure.They moved the last call for drinks from 12:40 to 12:30 just to give themselves a 10 minute buffer.And again, I know it doesn't necessarily need to be reminded but this was an entirely unusual set of circumstances that happened that night with the game running so late and it cut them off guard and everything that happened just became an innocent mistake that just snowballed.But that having been said they decided that just generally speaking they'll move it to 12:30, that way they don't ever encounter that problem again.Or at least they buy themselves another 10 minutes or so of time to be able to react to exigent circumstances.And lastly, on that evening, I indicated to you that they had already gone through retraining with all of the personnel in the restaurant to remind them what their obligation was regarding closing procedures and the timeliness of it.Since that meeting they've continued to make improvements to how they operate their business.They've reduced those closing procedures to writing as well as some of the other important aspects of managing a liquor license in a restaurant bar.And again, emphasize because they put it in writing and presented it to their employees, again, as part of a secondary retraining, they thought that that would have more emphasis because they can actually see what was being said to them.So they, again, reviewed that in completion.They've also now become part of Fox Cares, which is why the gentlemen from Tavolinos was here, I suspect and there are fully involved with that activity and look forward to participating there.And as indicated during the public input segment, Saga Hibachi Steakhouse is a valuable asset to the community and employs people and entertains people it feeds them.And I would also implore you to try to help nurture that relationship.They don't want to be in an adverse position with the town.It makes them uncomfortable.They don't want to be having to do battle on issues.There was no way that they expected to be caught in the middle of those circumstances that evening, they're embarrassed to have to go through this process.It is very costly to them to have to go through this process.They've now been out without their liquor license for five days.And just so you could have an appreciation of what the net effect of that is to them, again, a small business with not big margins, they've lost at a minimum of $21,000 in the last five days, including tonight as a result of having had to return their liquor license.It was not an easy decision for them from a financial perspective to decide to appeal but they felt that they had to.And again, they don't want to be in that position.They don't wanna be adverse to the town.They wanna cooperate, participate and be part of the community but that we filed an appeal.The second part of what you had indicated is we're asking that this board stay the balance of the punishment so that we have an opportunity to appeal this matter to the ABCC as reasonable business people.You can appreciate that sometimes we'll have differing opinions as to what's appropriate in the set of circumstances.I think with our system of justice to have you have the power to hear the facts, decide what the penalty is and also virtually decide what the appeal is, because you impose the penalty in a quick fashion, you eliminate the possibility of an effective appeal with the ABCC because most of the traveling public who deals with these kinds of things knows it will take them at a minimum five to six weeks to get to it and they're usually busier than that and it takes sometimes two to three months to have the issue heard.So there is that sense of fairness that goes along with that.And not the least of which is you have in fact exacted a very, very serious penalty on the Saga Hibachi Steakhouse with the five days of closure, the impact on their business from the regular public knowing what has happened there and the actual financial dollars lost as I had indicated.Clearly after the notice of appeal was filed one of the considerations that we had was and we suspected that there wouldn't be time nor interest to call an emergency meeting just to deal with the issue of staying the punishment.The other alternative at that time would have been to go to court.And I worked with the council for this board and the town.And we had made arrangements where I would let them know what court we were going to, what judge was going to be assigned.And we had intended to be there that next day.We decided not to do that for multiple reasons.One, huge cost but also it would have been huge cost to the town.My clients didn't wanna do that to the town.Again, hearkening back to the whole cooperation, being part of the community aspect.As indicated in the appeal documents that I filed with the ABCC, we weren't taking issue with the fact that they had the violations.There's no question that those tables weren't cleared and the bar wasn't properly cleared in time.No questions that happened.So they were willing to step up and say, \"Yeah, we deserve to be punished for that.It was a mistake and it was an honest mistake or an innocent mistake but a mistake, nonetheless\".They have an obligation and they understand that obligation.So they decided that they wouldn't do that and they would wait for this board to hear what we had to say this evening.So we are before you on that issue, whether you will stay the balance of the punishment or take some other action in hopes that we might be able to resolve this.Okay, a quick, I guess I put on the category of clerical, should this go forward to the courts, what's the duration to bring it from appeal through decision of the court process?Are we talking weeks or months?Oh no, if we are caused to have to go to the courthouse it would be done on an emergency basis.Everything would get filed tomorrow morning.I would file a what's called- - I don't know and maybe misunderstand, I wasn't clear If there's a stay to get through the court process, not under the emergency situation.Okay, let me be a little clearer.There would be two aspects to it.The court process would only come into play if you decided that you did not wish to stay the balance of the punishment.We would then use the superior court to try to get a judge to order on an emergency basis that the punishment be stayed that would give us an opportunity to go through the balance of the process with ABCC. How long that process is?They tell you, you get a hearing within five to six weeks.I don't think so, I think it's probably two months but I would say that, it probably fair to say that three months is the outer limit on them taking a decision and coming back to the town.Again, because it's an appeal the town would be involved with that appeal as well.Okay, thank you.This isn't a public hearing so this is just an agenda item.So any questions from the board or discussion items?Yes, just one, Mark.Your clients, they owned up to the violations which was nice.The board, we assessed the penalty within our guidelines.Can you tell me where you think we were arbitrary and capricious?As I tried to touch on that evening.And obviously there were a lot of things going on and I had a lot to say about, probably too many issues.I think it involves not just this situation but also the one the year prior, where there was a shift in how this board decided it was at least, again, these are just my observations, a shift in how this board decided it was going to handle liquor violations in town.And I've been to more than a few of the meetings where those violations have come up.I've represented a couple of few liquor license holders in response to violations received from the board.And my observation in November of 2014 was that there was a distinctive difference than where this client who I represented at that meeting was given a penalty very different from several other liquor license holders just the year before and it we went from a mere letter in the file to my client's being suspended for the maximum amount.Now I've been doing the practice of law for 31 years, if I could just, for 31 years.And judges oftentimes have ranges of possibilities for what they can do in criminal cases and civil cases or whatever.And my view is that and I think my client's view is that there has to be some recognition of what actions led to it.If they had come in here, they were a poor community member, they were thumbing their nose at the board, they were rude, they weren't making an effort to be a good citizen.I could see amping up the punishment to whatever the maximum is but I think in the November 9th, 2014 issue, I reminded this board that the quote unquote, sting operations that the police department runs by the very words of the ABCC are intended to be teaching tools for liquor license holders in town, not gotchas so that the town could just put the hammer down on somebody.And I think if we were to look at it from that perspective it is a very good tool.It can show where there are potential weaknesses, okay?It was a sting, it was a set-up and it showed a weakness.So that's good.The liquor license holder then a fairly knew business in town learned from the experience, make changes so that doesn't happen again.I think that was the intention of the ABCC and the police department.And coming up with that kind of a plan.Very similarly in the present circumstances it was a bizarre set of facts that just spun out of control that resulted in them violating.And I assure you while there are suspicions on your side of the table as to whether or not it was a purposeful act on their part, I've gotten to know these folks, there is no way in the world there was anything purposeful that night.I'm telling you before you even sent a notice they were already calling me saying, \"We don't even understand what happened.This is what we've sorted out so far.What should we do\"?And we started talking about it even before the notice of violation came out.So bringing it full round to specifically answering your question.I think when a board just all of a sudden hammers the fullest extent of the punishment they can without in my view and my client's view, taking proper understanding of the set of circumstances.I think that that's what becomes arbitrary and capricious.And I would hope that the ABCC would see it our way and say, \"You have to leave some room here.There are ranges of behavior and there are ranges of punishments that go along with that\".Going back to the sting operation, the board took a look at that and found that the young man that they used as an operative was so appallingly young looking, that's why we went to the three days for everyone.We have to act as judge and jury in a lot of respects to find out what was the extent of the violation?And in that particular case, there was nobody at the switch.In this particular case and it was awfully nice to say, yeah, we were owning up to it, that was to their credit.But the thing is had the police officer not been called, you have to wonder how long would it have continued?Well and I'll quote Jenny, \"Our names are on the license as well and we're responsible to the community for making sure that the license and the rules and regulations surrounding that license are upheld\".And I know that you've said before that these should be a teaching moment.How long do we have to teach?Well, actually that goes to perhaps another point that I should've made, had there been a repeat of a specific violation previously and have it come in the second time, I could understand putting the hammer down more so in that circumstance.That's why when I opened my remarks at the time of the public hearing I said this is very different from what happened previously, not related at all, except that it is a liquor license holder and they have an obligation but it's very different set of circumstances.They repaired if you will, the problem with the operations with regard to the sting because we haven't had any issues with regard to that since then but now we've presented with this bizarre set of circumstances.And I'll just harken back to November of 2014 because there was something else that this board had said that struck me and it has stayed with me and I can totally appreciate, there was a level of frustration that was palpable that was coming from the board with regard to either increasing or a level of hits on these sting operations.It's almost seemed like the liquor license holders weren't learning a lesson.And to that extent I can understand that frustration but with all due respect I don't think the frustration with people who had failed the process previously should have resulted in a punishment that hurt these folks because they weren't part of that process.And again, that's why I think that there are ranges of penalties.And if somebody is repeating the same violation multiple times, I think that's what that range and the upper end of the range is intended for.Again, just my view but having been before a lot of administrative boards and a lot of courts and so forth, that's the way I think most of the world views that.And I would ask that you folks do that.But our regulations don't say that.Well, they don't say that specifically but what they do is they give you discretion.Of course, of course.So that's where your discretion and the concept of arbitrary and capricious comes into play.And there's a crossroads to that where there's discretion on your side if the facts and circumstances to a reasonable person suggest that it's egregious enough that you should go to the worst of the penalties.Then of course, that's reasonable.If however, the circumstances and again, I would implore you to accept my version of this.But if circumstances are such that it's not that egregious and you have a range of penalties, then somewhere in between is probably inappropriate place to be.And again, I don't sit on your side of the table so I'm not gonna tell you how to do your business.It's my observations and I'm representing a client here.But I would like to think that if I were on that side of the table and I were judging someone, something in that regard that I would be able to understand that fairness aspect.And I would say that arbitrary and capricious are acting outside of our authority and outside of our guidelines.No, that's not specific, that's a term of art if you will in the legal world for purposes of an appeal on decisions like this.Arbitrary and capricious are the buzz words that the ABCC knows to see that suggests to them what were the circumstances?Does the circumstances warrant that kind of a punishment?And that's really what the arbitrary and capricious in respect to the way I wrote it, the way I intend it, my client's intend it and I think the ABCC intends to read it is that circumstances, does the punishment, do those circumstances warrant that level of punishment?And that's where it lies.So I would ask you to not take any personal offense to those words because it's not meant to suggest you operate outside of the realm of what was appropriate.My view is we completely disagree but I think I've got a clearer perspective on it.Thank you.Other members of the board?Yeah, I'd just like to touch on a couple of things that you mentioned.One in relation to November of 2014, the boards change, okay?So people bring different views.I think one of the alarming things was the sheer number of violations.And I think that was a wake-up call to a lot of us that we need to act and maybe not send a message but act within the guidelines of our regulations.And you talk about teaching moments, you can learn from the mistakes of others.I think one of the positives that came out of all that was the recreation of Fox Cares.They do a great job, they really do.I see Vick in the back and he's a member.He's been one of the original members but if you participated in Fox Cares, some of these things you would have been alerted to, they invite the ABCC and they did a presentation on fake IDs. They talk about best practices.They talk about some of the problems that they have with staff, they do really good work and yeah, some bad things happened.This is one of the positives that came out of it.And I'm glad that you're gonna be a member of Fox Cares going forward.And listen, I understand you're contrite and you understand the mistake but we have rules and regulations that we need to uphold and we need to be clear that public safety comes first.Liquor licenses are a privilege and not a right.And when there's violations we're gonna act accordingly.We don't wanna do this, believe me.We wanna support our local businesses but when there's mistakes they have to be accountable for those mistakes and they have to be responsible for them.And I understand that and then just following what you had to say about what happened in 2014 and the board changing its perspective on that.I'll share with you what I suggested that evening is I appreciate the fact that there was frustration with the board, I live in town, my business is in town, I've been here more than a little bit of time.And I share with you that same frustration because we don't want to see those problems come up.We'd like to think that people learn.The point of that though, with regard to my clients, that evening back in 2014 was I think it's, again, just my opinion but I think it's a better perspective to come out after a volley of these things where you've treated the business owners the way you have treated others in the past to close that, do whatever it was you're gonna do and then look in the camera and collectively say from this point forward, men and women, boys and girls, we're going to do the following, no longer will there be a letter of reprimand in your file, but you will in fact, if you fail one of these sting operation and I apologize, I forget the actual term for those but we all know what I'm talking about.If you fail one of these sting operations you will in fact be suspended for three days.That is what this board is going to do from this point forward.I thought in 2014 that that would have been the more appropriate thing to do.And I'm a little disappointed that we didn't have an opportunity to appeal that one to the ABCC because I think that they would have shared in that perspective.Didn't work that way, here we are, it's 2016 but I think it's important to understand how we got to where we are today.Some of the things that have transpired in between and maybe that makes life easier for you folks in how you conduct your business.So I think the way we get the message out is through our rules and regulations that go along with each license on the renewal each year.That's how we get our message.Our punishment as defined, not looking into the camera like you said.How many people really watch?How many of the license holders are really sitting watching this meeting?Yeah but if you say it, it gets reported, they pay attention and I pay attention and I represent not just them but I've represented the liquor license holders.And at that point I can have a conversation.And I would add, if you folks had said something like that and I had read it, saw it, heard it, I would have then contacted my clients who hold liquor licenses in town and I would have scheduled some time with them to say, \"Okay, there's a game change here.No one ever intends to violate the rules but you need to understand that the penalty for doing that has just been amped up.So whatever you were doing before, if it's important to you, if money's important and continuing to be able to operate your business is important, then you need to revisit these issues and make sure it doesn't happen\".In my world that's exactly what would have happened.So what you say from here, even though there's not a lot of people here and I don't know how many people watch you on the television or watch it on the tapes or whatever, the word gets out and particularly to the business owners, and particularly through Fox Cares, everyone will would know.Right, through Fox Cares.And I don't wanna have this go back and forth 'cause there's no point in that.I think everybody knows where this is headed.But Fox Cares reached out to your client in November of 2014, they never got back to them.They reached out on two or three other occasions and it was we're not interested or there was no desire to join.Now, all of a sudden there's a desire to join and I get it, they don't know what it's all about and they have their own own business to tend to and it's a commitment, a meeting a quarter and some dues and everything else but it's sharing best practices with other license holders, other license holders that have been through exactly what they're going through.So it would have been to their benefit back in November of 2014 and had they taken that opportunity they might not be sitting here today.You may very well be right but we can't go back and undo history, we're here today.But one of the things I'll remind you because I have had a conversation about this with my clients is that, the Saga Hibachi Steakhouse but that's just a building and a sign, it's people and we discussed the numbers of life related issues that had come up in between that prevented them from doing all the things that they should have done maybe with regard to that.There is in fact, some cultural and language barriers that have gotten in the way with some of this.And now that they are involved with Fox Care maybe and those folks understand that there are some of those limitations as well and they have in 2014, a fairly new business they're trying to make it work.You don't just open a restaurant and say, \"Yay, we're making lots of money\".It's a lot of hard work and as anybody else here knows who has had a business, it's relentless.So not by way of excuse but by way of understanding, I think they knew that that's something they should have been doing there just wasn't time in life to get that done.I won't go into any of the details but it sounded semi reasonable to me that why they hadn't had an opportunity.But I think in large part because of what this board had to say and perhaps some of the things that I had to say afterwards, they understand that that has to be a priority item because this is an important piece of their business to have a liquor license and to be able to operate that responsibly and protect it because irrespective of it being a privilege, it's also a valuable asset and they don't want to waste that.Well, now we've moved into the next agenda item.So I'm gonna step it up a little bit.Chris and Jenny, any additional comments on this?Well, my comment is everyone who applies for a liquor license in the town of Foxborough is given rules and regulations that they have to read, understand and obey.And we have with 4749 other establishments that have liquor licenses.We don't get people here all the time before us.We only get the people who violate those rules and regulations and that's why you're here.And I feel very comfortable with the decision made by the Board of Selectmen at the last meeting in regard to this violation was a very fair one.And I don't believe that the ABCC will find that it was not fair.That's just my comment.Chris.One quick thing, Mark, you had mentioned that right after the December 29th hearing you were thinking about immediately appealing but then you didn't want to.And then I heard a little while later if we decide tonight not to change anything, you are going to appeal tomorrow morning.Well, if you don't change anything I'm left without any other options except to go to a Supreme Court judge and ask for that judge to stay the punishment so that we have an opportunity to be heard at the ABCC. - What happens in the case of an appeal if...Actually I didn't even ask the question 'cause it doesn't matter.But I'm just saying like what if the ABCC found us that the punishment was too hard, they've already served five, tomorrow will be six days.By the time something hears that you could have already served eight days of a suspension.So what happens if they say we only should have given you a five day suspension?What happens?Well, that's the downside of us waiting but again, we chose to wait because they don't wanna be at issue with the town, they don't wanna be costing the town expenses in the form of legal fees and so forth.They just wanna do business and they wanna be treated fairly.And that's why we didn't do that then but we're at a point now where we wanted to come back and have this conversation so that perhaps the board could either reconsider how it wants to handle their punishment or at least stay the punishment so we have an opportunity to flush it out because I respect all of your opinions and hopefully you respect mine and who knows who's right.I think I am, you think you are, okay, so we'll let somebody else call it and that's what the system is set up to do.It's just when this punishment came out so quickly it didn't leave room for that if you will.I mean, I personally am not gonna change my mind.We were within our guidelines, it was four violations.So everybody knows our guidelines when they every year sign that license, they see what the possible penalty could be so- - But if I may just say one thing about, yes, there were four written violations but they were four ways of saying the same thing.You didn't clear the tables in time- - If you're driving and you hit somebody and you cross the lines and a violation is a violation.It's one incident but that gets identified four ways.I appreciate that.Any other comments?So we're at the crossroads now.If there wants to be consideration for an amendment to something that was previously adopted, someone would have to one, make a motion, two, it would have to be seconded.Once it's seconded would have discussion then would vote on it.And in order for that motion to pass we would need four out of the five selectmen to vote in the affirmative.And if that motion was to and just to be clear, it's not to reduce the number of days it's to take the remaining days and put it off to a period to be determined to let the appeal process play through the court system.Everyone understand that?So do I hear a motion in the affirmative?I'll make a motion to let's see, hold the remaining penalty in abeyance until which time the Saga Steakhouse has had a chance to appeal to the ABCC. Okay, motion made, do we have a second on that motion?Asking once, asking twice, asking three times.Not seeing a motion, the motion fails to move forward.Okay, thank you.Thank you, counsel, thank you.I say these are never easy decisions to make.Next item, we're few minutes behind but Mary Beth, you wanted to bring forward the Foxborough Highway and Water Employee Union contract for discussion?What you have in your packets tonight is basically a consolidation of the previous contract and memo of agreement that you've seen before.So this memorandum of agreement covers July 1st, 2014 through June 30th, 2016.It was ratified by the union and came to this board and was approved on March 3rd, 2015.It was funded at annual town meeting.So what you're seeing in front of you is just, we had brought you a memorandum of agreement and this is a consolidation taking the old contract and the memorandum of agreement, the previous contract preceded both Bill and myself.So you've already ratified the terms of it as of last March, 2013, the union ratified, you approved it and it was funded at town meeting.But we're starting contract negotiations again with this group and everybody wanted a consolidated document.So this incorporates the memorandum of agreement that town meeting and you have already agreed to.We're beginning our FY17 negotiations.We wanted a clean consolidated document.Both parties have reviewed this as well as town council has looked at it.And we just wanted a clean for our record books consolidated document.So that's what you have in front of you.I'm happy to say what started negotiations, were well into, I think we have our third session coming up and this is sort of the template for our next set of negotiations.Yeah, so is there anything that's highlighted in here that's different from last time we saw it?No, what happens is it incorporates the old contract, the memorandum of agreement, any side letters of agreements, so everything is now up-to-date in this document and we're starting on negotiations with.So this was presented back to the board more as an FYI at this point.Yeah, we wanted to tell you why we asked you to sign it.Okay.So as you can see, the union has signed it, Bill has signed it.There's been no, officially no changes?There's no change, it's just a consolidation but we appreciate your attention to what we know.You had a thick packet, this one.Okay, comments, questions, concerns from the board?I would just say next time check the numbering on the bottom of the pages.It's very confusing.Goes from two to five, to four to seven, - I think it's flipped.There you go.I commend you for double siding.I think of Chris just flips his paper and figure it out.No, I agree, though some of the pages- - This is a disaster to find something.All right, in that case not seeing any further discussion.Thank you very much.Now we're discussing points.Thank you.Okay, the special time warrant review changes.Again, we keep this on for any discussion and I'd invite anyone from the audience if they had any further discussion or comments or concerns from the eight warrant articles that are going forward.And I know some of us have been going back and forth to the Advisory Committee but as of now no changes since the last time and everything's on track.The one thing I will say is that we have officially posted it on the website so anyone can see it tonight.It's still in draft form.Officially the board will sign this document if you feel it's acceptable at your next meeting which should be on the 26th.Okay, you're sure we haven't signed it already?Yeah, I don't think we have.In order for it to get to the, we approved, it went to the Advisory Committee but it didn't have our signatures.Okay, we haven't signed yet, okay, very good.And if anyone at home, obviously it is on the website but toggle or click onto the Advisory Committee section and there all the meetings are posted and the different items are scheduled on there.But any questions on any of the warrant articles?Another meeting tomorrow night.Next item, actually we'll combine these at the time manager update and the assistant town manager update if you wanna run with this.Sure, it's heavy meeting season actually in case everybody noticed, moving on just one every night of the week it seems but the Audit Committee met last night, first time in seven years that the committee met, I guess but it was actually a very good meeting.We had the committee reformed as of last night.Primary purposes is to start looking at formatting financial policies that we can actually use in our attempt to try and increase or improve our bond rating.That was the one thing that certainly was indicated that they'd like to see our policies in writing.So that committee is working on getting that done and they'll have that hopefully completed by April, so in time for the next time we go out bond.The Housing Trust Committee met tonight for first time.So I'm glad, I know you're actually here happen.So we actually and John attended tonight so I had the first meeting.So we have a meeting again probably in another couple of weeks to try and get or try to get some professional assistance to help guidance in the process.We covered a lot of ground in 45 minutes.We did actually, actually was a lot of stuff talked, discussed, so it was good meeting and good interest and good discussion around the table.The CIP meeting met last week that was to cover three items.One was the Water Department article that's on the special town warrant.And there was a police vehicle purchased that the chief made, as well as a...And then it was, well, of course the town hall project that was just on the town meeting warrant for the special town meeting in February.So those items were discussing and were recommended by, all three items were recommended for approval by the committee.I wanna say budget meetings are around the way in our office right now.We're also meeting with the ad comm on a regular basis.We have another meeting scheduled for tomorrow night and I know that there's more discussion on one of the articles for town meeting for the Child Safety Committee, Child Safety and Sexual Awareness Committee.And also I wanna congratulate the fundraising committee for the flagpole, so it was meeting their goal.And I am told that the one of the last major payments was made by the Partisan and Patriotism, so appreciative of that.And then Thursday night we have another meeting scheduled, which will be for the municipal conversion meeting.And this board is required to hold prior to the closing of the sale of the property, both the fire station and the funeral home.So at that point, you'll be receiving information from the prospective buyers of the property as to what their plans are for the redevelopment of that parcel.So that's scheduled for 6:30 prior to the Planning Board meeting that will also be held in the same room.Yeah, Bill, I had sent you some questions, I'm I able to get answers to those questions?I've given those quite that information to town council, town council is actually gonna be providing those answers to me for that by tomorrow on that information.Also, can you get information that the auctioneer had given to the perspective bidders, exactly what he told them, what they understood to be the expectations of the- - Well, yeah, it's all in writing.They actually announced it prior to the sale itself.Can we get a copy of that?Oh, sure, yeah, that was read right into the record.Okay, well, I wasn't at the auction.Yeah, yeah, it was a very lengthy document.It's actually the purchase and sale agreement, which actually describes the whole process.But can that be sent to us electronically so we can?Yeah, I think so.Yeah, I believe I can send that to you today, tomorrow.Okay, thank you.Yeah and then and also there was additional information on the website as well that that was just, it was only, we're getting zoning statements, things on nature too.So a lot of that information was disclosed and I think that's it for me, for my report, Mary Beth.Mine is brief.Contract negotiations continue.We're trying to wrap up the police contract.Were very, very close in time for the warrant article to be reviewed and for this board to look at the contract, we're not there yet but we think we will be.And we've also begun negotiations on all the next groups.So dispatchers and DPW negotiations have started for the next fiscal year.Also recruitment efforts are underway.We've been very, very busy with, we're interviewing payroll coordinators to fill the vacancy as well as public safety dispatchers right now, we're in that process.We're also recruiting for two DPW positions because one was a promotion and one was a retirement.So those are underway as well, so we've been really busy.Also personnel wage board is gonna start the meetings up again for the year on January 20th.And that's in preparation for a warrant article at annual town meeting regarding the personnel bylaw and some new policies.So been working on a lot of HR stuff and making some progress.Well, that's going on.Yeah, thank you.Great, thank you both.Just two quick items touching on two things that you brought up, Bill, the CIP. I received an email, traditionally the chairman of the Board of Selectmen is on the CIP. And I think the email went out to John Silbeck at the Advisory Committee and he accepted for the advisory.I had asked, just so you know, I had asked Jenny to represent the Board of Selectmen on the CIP. I'd been on it for a number of years and I just felt that it was good to get a fresh set of eyes and different perspective looking at stuff.So I think Jenny accepted, you went to that meeting?Yes.So we have to appoint her I believe before she votes on it, correct?I don't think that's been in the packet yet to appoint Jenny.No, it was on hold pending, she had one back in May but then it was put on hold to determine who's gonna do it if it was gonna be you or if it was gonna be Jenny.And she never got sworn in but we do have one laid out for her.Okay, so if we could, I guess put that in the next packet, if that's not gonna hold up anything, do you have any meetings within the next two that you would have to vote on something?No, we're all set.All right, so we'll put that on the next and we'll appoint her if the board sees fit.Yeah, she was able to attend the meeting and take all the information in so.She's good at that, better than me at the CIP. And the other item, just so you know, I will not attend Thursday's meeting, I don't have a conflict but it's probably a perceived conflict because one of my offices is in the building that the owner of the fire station own.Which leaves Thursday with a board of four people.So just be cognizant of that and that vote is needed before they close.So if it's a two, two vote, try to work it out so it's not a two, two vote but if you have any questions or you want my insight I can send something to the board if you want my opinion on that.Bill, is Mr. Castillo gonna be at the meeting?I can have him here.I hadn't planned on but certainly can.You guys knowing that I think it'd be good to have town council.Well, actually its two council.We've never been through this.And I think it's just so that we can navigate the waters if we have to put some guidelines.Jim Coppola was- - I was gonna say there's two councils on this- - Is the attorney that handles the actual transaction on behalf of the town.He does all the legal work as far as the bidding and all the things that could done at that level- - From Castillo's office?No, no, no, he's special counsel to the treasurer collector and the finance department handling this whole thing.So he would be the counsel to represent this because he was at the closing, not the closing, he was at the auction as well preparing documents.So the question is, is this town, but I think the question, are you referring to the question about whether town council can weigh in on the question of the bylaws or the application of this law, the zoning bylaw?Well, I think there's gonna be questions about- - What you can and can't do.Yeah, I'm looking for guidance on the depth and breadth of municipal conversion so that we stay within bounds.It was interesting, I have spoken- - Is special counsel really financial or is he more?Oh, he's strictly the financial, he's seeing this particular deal.Okay, yeah, no, but I think we need not.Well, the financial is nice but I think what we need is someone who can interpret the municipal conversion bylaw first.It is interesting, I will note that town halls had never seen one of these in 30 years.That a bylaw of this nature, I've never seen one.I asked Paige a few weeks ago when she said she was familiar with it.I've never seen one.Can we get a copy of the parameters of this?Yeah, it's in a zoning bylaws.So you can probably click on it on your webpage.But just as far as certain other case law that's taking place if we started heading to the boundaries, we can get drawn back.I honestly, I think- - Oh, if there's any case law on this to be honest with you.Well, I looked online to see- - I don't think there really is- So we're really, new territory completely, this is a new one.And also will the Planning Board and the Asset Review Committee- - The Asset Review Committee plans to attend as well as the Planning Board.The Planning Board is gonna be here 'cause I think they're gonna be here for their meeting anyways.They have a meeting at seven.Yeah and it's gonna be fairly good representation from the Asset Review Committee.Okay, sorry, I have to miss this one.Lucky you.I know I'm sharing, I mean, it's a unique process, I'd like to see it.It is a unique process.I think it's important, we just want to- - Oh no, I agree.Do the right thing by all participants.Yeah, I mean, look, this property sat there for a long time, there's a lot of, I mean, the eyes are on it to make sure it's done the right way.So no problem with bringing council in and having a robust discussion.Okay, next on the vehicle use policy.And I think this is- - Yeah, if you have this, it's a 16 page policy in your packet.I think that it's been vetted by this group a couple of times with some really good questions and edits.It has been circulated to...Counsel has looked at this, the department had grouped the operational group and users of town vehicles.So the policy is here for your adoption.As policies get adopted we're hoping to include them in a policy manual rather than, as we go forward and change the personnel bylaw to a real bylaw and have a town hall policy manual.This would be incorporated in that.Yeah, there is a policy manual at town hall.Don't know the last time it was opened but it's there.Yeah, we're one by one looking at the policies.That's what a personnel wage board has been looking at, going through it.And we have HR counsel that's helping us with it, so.This is consistent with Maya.This is Maya's template sample policy and fact, I think- - But with our additions and changes- - Yeah, we took our old policy which is about a four pager and put it in with this.And then we presented it to our loss control group which Maya has representative on there.And in fact, I think we can, once it's adopted, we can submit it and get Maya reward credit for doing this, for updating that.We've had the chance to unfortunately apply this past week, we had an employee who had a damaged vehicle and we were able to turn to the policy and say, what did we do to have, how do we handle it?So it's already been helpful to us.No policy is good until you actually have to apply it and it worked, so.Do you wanna make a motion to adopt?Yeah, just one question first.All the people that this affects that they've all seen it, agree with it way.I know, I probably asked you that the last time- - Yeah, we've circulated it to the department heads, to the users of town vehicles, to our operations group.In fact, we've been floating this round for quite a long time.One of the first edits we had from Sharon Watson on it.So I'm just going through the file today looking at everyone's comments, finance director gave his comments.So we've been vetting it through as many groups as we can, as well as personnel wage board and our loss control group.Okay, I'd like to make a motion then we approve and adopt the vehicle use policy.I'll second that.Okay, motion made and seconded, further discussion?Seeing none, all those in favor of the motion.Motion carries five-zero.Thanks for all the hard work on it.Thanks very much, good to check that one off.I don't know how this happened but we're ahead by 20 minutes.Nice, you better get going- - Okay.'Cause what I'm always driving.Chief O'Leary is here and his gonna come to a screeching halt now.So the Constable Policy, chief, would you like to come up to the table?You're on the agenda with Mary Beth on this.Welcome.Okay, so in our packet there's a policy of appointment of constables and in it it's somewhat color-coded.I think those are a lot of the changes or suggestions that we've had in the last couple meetings on this.So the last time this was brought to the board by the chief there was some discussion on...We had looked at this, reviewed other towns policies, chief put this together, we met a couple of times and the board asked us to re-look at some of the inconsistencies between the application and the actual policy, so we've done that now and the policy statement, you'll see an edit in color that the board shall appoint not less than 10 people to constables and on page two, the residency should be in or proximity to Foxborough.So that's now consistent throughout the entire instructions, the policy document and the application.This application and information was sent out to all our current constables that we have listed for the town.The chief is constantly reappointed as a constable and with the exception of four people from our former list did not reapply but I have a list today, I don't know if we have on the agenda view to appoint the actual constables today, is that- - No, no agenda.No, just to approve the policy.Okay, so we'll have that for you next time to look at the constables.Right now we will have nine to appoint.So if anybody out there was either a former constable and wants to get their application in or if anyone's interested, we would still be able to entertain applications to present to you.And they get approved by the chief and recommended to the board.Especially where the board will hopefully take action within the next two weeks 'cause some people's appointments have expired in the time period since we started discussing this fall, if it could be moved on next week people still have time.If they put an application to us that I could do the background investigation and be able to add them to fill up potential vacancy that we would have.Okay, could I bother you just to, could you just give a brief summary of what a constable does?Generally who's eligible to apply for it?So the primary purpose is to serve civil notice on different residents and or businesses that are here Foxborough and have a legal address here.Many of it has to do with civil litigation issues, potentially divorce papers and other minor type of court orders that are result of civil action.And the regulations which we had not had in the past we were just going on state law.It spells out the duties in a particular nature and also limits some of the legal action that they would take.From time to time state law does allow constables appointed in very restricted areas.If necessary, they could make an arrest but we've tried to limit that by the wording of our policy and all the time that I've been in office I think there was only one constable from some other community that actually ended up arresting somebody that was trying to flee with a car that was trying to be repossessed.We assisted the constable but he handled bringing the person to the Dedham Court.Okay, so if our next meeting will be on January 26th, do you have that complete list?Maybe I'll supplement it with anyone that wants to join.Yeah, we have a list that we will present you on that day.We will, if the board approves the policy tonight, we'll have it on our website.So the instructions, the application, the Cory form, anything somebody would need to apply will be on our website.Okay.I just had a question, there are two tiers of bonding.Yes, there are.And do we have a, how do we keep track of the tiers that the people are in?They would demonstrate to the town clerk that they have the necessary bonding in place.They would go to a agency that does bonding and submit a fee to get a particular level and the level that they get or the nature of the paperwork they're going to serve.And from what I have seen many of the people have the more extensive bonding level so they can serve a greater variety of papers.But do we have like a copy of that for their file or?The town clerk would manage that file.The level of bonding could be- - Added to a spreadsheet.It could be, we could add that to this.Mary Beth are the current applicants or incumbents, are they all in good standing relative to the town with payments and fees?At this point we only have one with a reported, that was one of the reasons for redoing.We needed to do a reminder to these folks that in order to be appointed as a constable, you needed to have a reporting process.So that's spelled out in the new regulations and anyone you reappoint will need to complete the reporting- - Okay, so we're only looking forward and we're not looking back, okay, fine.I only have on record one person filed a report of 14 on the list.Okay, so next time around, I'll ask the same question.Yeah, exactly- - You have a column for that.If I could, they're required by law to file a report this coming April for any work done by them during 2015.And that would be a good way of seeing what is being done by each of the constables and the expectation that if they are doing work on a community they have an obligation to pay the town a percentage that's spelled out by the state law of the work that they've completed.So having that one of the catalysts why we went in this direction, back in April of 2014, wasn't that law in effect as well?It was and- - And just nobody did it.No one complied because we didn't really spell it out in our regulations.And I think that now that it has been spelled out, I would have an expectation those that are still active constables serving papers would have to file the necessary financial report.We'll keep that and we'll ask that later.Yeah, well, I'll be honest it's just a little unsettling where money's due to the town.It was a law you would expect the constables to understand that and pay their fair share of what it did.Well, they're supposed to be upstanding and a good moral character, that's part of the requirement.One thought that I have in that point though is the fact that where they do provide a state, they're provided by the state report now on in April, one of the things we require is that you get a copy of the state report along with a local report indicating all of the activity they had done here in Foxborough.So it'd be like an addendum to the report.Would it be out of the realm to appoint them, the people that are getting reappointed to ask for that report for last year?Well, it's a good idea, well, no, I mean that's- - They're not required to you submitted until April, so- - No, no, no.I'm talking about the report that was due April, 2014.I don't think, I think the requirements for this year, right?The 2000- - They have to report the 2015 by April of '16.And if there was work done in the community there should have been a report.Although we didn't have a regulation, report should have gone to the town clerk.But that's the town regulation but doesn't the state require?No but the state law requires they do the report.Did they require it in '14 and '15?It was state law.It was.In other words, Jim's your question is should there be a report from the calendar year '14, that was submitted an April '15.Yeah, if they work for the town in that calendar year to get reappointed, provide the report and see where that goes.To be honest, it's just bothersome that it's a state requirement by a constable.And regardless if we enforce it or not because it wasn't in our regulations, it shouldn't be an excuse not to provide the report to the state and copy the town.So is that reporting requirement in this policy now, which is this policy needs to be tweaked again?No, it's there.No, it's in there under fees.Fees?Yeah.Okay, okay, good.So where it's already in the regulation, I forget was the motion made yet?Not yet.So the motion, we could still vote to approve this but at the next meeting when we get the list make a note that a requirement that that report has to be subject to being submitted before they get appointed or at the time of, with their application or what have you.Yeah, so you wanna require that they provide a copy of the report filed with the state prior to appointment.Would it be helpful that a letter goes out to the pending appointments and reappointments this week so that making sure that they have that time opportunity.Absolutely, sure, yeah.By constable or by regular mail?And we're not gonna serve it.All right, so- - Oh, the irony.They may actually do all for money and why we wouldn't we collect the money from?Well, let's try the honor system with the application and see what we get with it, so.I make a motion that we approve and adopt the new Constable Policy.I'll second it.Motion made, seconded, further discussion?Seeing none, all those in favor.Motion carries five-zero.Thanks, chief.Thank you very much.You're welcome.Okay, before we go into executive session for the two December executive meeting minutes approval, we have seven action items.And you just see in your packet one of the action items the Friends of the Flagpole is updated tonight with the new list.One second.All right, so article the first one is for selectman approving selectmen meeting minutes from November 3rd, 2015, December 15th, 2015 and December 29th, 2015.Okay, can we do these separately?Sure.We'll start with November 3rd.Anybody have any changes, tweaks and issues?We'll just make the motion of this.I'll make the motion that we approve November 3rd selectman's meeting minutes.And I'll second that.Motion made, seconded, discussion on the November 3rd?All good.All those in favor, motion carries five-zero.For the 39 pages of notes.That's good.Like to make a motion that we approve December 15th, 2015 Board of Selectman meeting minutes.Second.Motion made, seconded, any discussion on the December 15th notes?All those in favor, motion carries five-zero.And before the motion is made, I'm gonna make a recommendation to hold the December 29th meeting minutes because that has to deal with the Hibachi.I'm sorry, I keep saying Saga.Where it's under appeal right now.It's lengthy, that's another 26 pages so I wanna take a second look at that.All right, that's good.Take a motion that we hold the December 29th- - Just take no action.Yeah, okay, item two.All right, Council on Aging, I'd like to make a motion we approve the appointment of Janet O'Neill to fulfill the Vivienne Fitz term expiring May 1st, 2016.And I'll second that and thank you, Janet for volunteering.Very much so.Motion made, seconded, further discussion?Seeing none, all those in favor, motion carries five-zero.Item three, animal control.I'd make a motion that we accept the gift donation of the amount of $176 from Eric Kieran for adoption fee.I'll second that.Motion made and seconded, further discussion?Seeing none, all those in favor, motion carries five-zero.All right, number four, Agricultural Commission make a motion that we reappoint Rosemary Smith to the Agricultural Commission expiring on 12/14/18.I'll second that, thank you, Rosemary.Very much so, motion made, seconded, further discussion?seeing none, all those in favor, motion carries five-zero.Council on Aging, I make a motion we approve a gift donation of $50 in memory of Renee Carter for use with Council on Aging programs from Mr and Mrs.David Lowe.And I'll second that with gratitude.Again, thank you, motion made, seconded, further discussion on the acceptance?All those in favor, motion carries five-zero.All right, number six, Friends of the Flagpole.That's the one that was updated.Yep, I have it right here.I'd like to make a motion that we approve the remaining gifts and I'm gonna read the gifts.Albert Jones Sozio, $50, Foxborough Jaycees, $500, Kevin and Dwayne Weidenfeld, $100, Kevin and Diane, sorry, Roseberry Smith, $25.William and Kathleen Havertz, $50, Sandra and Donald Norton, $10.16 Rock Hill Street, 19 Centennial Drive, $20.Eugene and Alice Cummings $100.$10.$10, I'm sorry, Earl and Sandra Brown, $100.Phillip and Tracy Costa, $25 LBP Solutions, $1,000, Historical Commission Donation Jar, $14 and 31 cents.WePay GoFundMe, $140, another GoFundMe for $40.Colby's Cleaner Donation Jar, 71.25, Spoodles Donation Jar, $7 and 67 cents and the Partners in Patriotism Fund bringing us over the top for $12,000.So the grand total of all donations to date into the town is $41,940 and 90 cents.And I'll second that and I just wanted to thank everyone that's participated.It's quite a list and it's quite a community project.And I can't wait to see the new flagpole.So exciting, we've got a meeting scheduled this week, right?Yeah, Thursday morning we're meeting with the DPW Director, Roger Hill with one of the vendors out of Rhode Island to look at the pole, look at the base, trying to get quotes for approval, construction and then have everything ready in May for Memorial Day.And because of the winter, if it doesn't work, it's definitely Founder's Day but we really shooting for Memorial Day to have that ceremony there in turn and see the new flagpole.Sure, can I just put a shout out to the facilities folks who actually did a good job of actually fixing all the lighting around the Common.So everything's operational once again and it was a couple of lights that were out for a long time and then they managed to get those all fixed.And so I know one person who's particularly happy to see all those lights back on.And I myself I'm happy to join in praise of that work, that's really come out nice.Yeah, I mean, Jack of Lesbourne, I wanna say pet project, but this was more than his pet project, this his soul out there and I know he was concerned about the lights and that whole process and he puts his heart into this and the 41,940 raise by the community, plus the donations and municipals.It's a nice partnership to have.And I think a lot of people, and I was just joking with Chris before when this started, I was doubtful that whole sentiment would catch on and I was told that it would and it did.Oh yeah, you were doubtful that we would raise it in the short of a time.There's a lot going on and you ask people for money without the passion behind it, it was gonna be hard to do but it's a great committee and exciting project.Looking at that list too, so many different walks of life donated to this businesses and individuals, well-to-do individuals and people that can only afford a little.And it's a great testament to what the flag means and what it means in Foxborough.Is it to see the $7 donation jar and then the $12,000 donation.Of course, every one of them are just as important.And while we appreciate the major donations, we also know that those little ones were just as equally important in sharing and the excitement one of that new- - I know one of the committee members had their kids at Walgreens on a table and for a rainy day.And look at the JCs that gave 500 and that came from greeting cards that they had made up.So if you wanted to buy greeting cards with the Common and things around the town, I think it was $10 a box to make up $500.A lot of work that went into that, so.Mr. Chairman, may I make a suggestion that the group that puts together the town report consider using the photo of the thank you sign with the flag as the cover of the annual report, the picture of the- - We did it.Yeah, we did it.Because that really symbolizes the community effort.Well, there were two things actually where we were struggling with on the decision was the soldier came back this year too.And that was a nice picture that we thought we would but I think we're gonna do a story on that.Jack actually agreed to write that story on that for the inside of the other report.Well, maybe you could do both or something.Yeah, well Jack's involved in both of them, so maybe...Yeah.That's a good suggestion.'Cause I thought that was, when I went around that Common the first time I saw it, I thought hat was just a fabulous photo op.Yeah, it came out well.So that's a good thought.Okay, so we go to our- - Thank you, so that's it for the- - Motion made, seconded, we didn't vote on that one.Oh, okay, motion made, seconded, further discussion?All those in favor of the acceptance, thank you very much.Motion carries five-zero.All right, number seven, New England Patriots Charitable Foundation, I'd like to make a motion that we approve two one day all alcohol licenses on January 16th, 2016, from 2:00 p.m to 4:35 p.m at the Empower Field House Hospitality Suite at Patriots game.And the second one is for January 24th, 2016 from 12:30 to 3:05 the Empower Field House Hospitality Suite contingent of the Patriots making the AFC Championship game.I'll second that.Okay motion made, seconded, further discussion on the two licenses requests?Seeing none, all those in favor, motion carries five-zero and good luck this weekend with Saturday afternoon game.The last thing you should say, Go Patriots.Yeah, it's gonna be a miserable rainy whole day but- - Hopefully we play well in the bad weather from what I've seen in the past.All right, that concludes the regular items, we'll close the hearing, all those in favor of going into executive session raise your hand.Hold on, we just- - Oh, I'm sorry, sure.Sure, yep, no, I think if you could just introduce yourself for the record.Well, of course, I'll start with a meeting.Barry Duna, Foxboro Reporter.I just want to clarify a few things before we get out.First, the gentlemen, I apologize for being late.The snow, I nearly, what's the word, spun out.So I was going slowly, so everyone be careful.The gentleman who did public comment, what was his name?Graham Silliman.Graham Silliman and then he is the manager or owner of what?Tavolinos.Tavolinos, yeah and I think he's also involved in Foxborough Cares is as a leader there or just- - His partner, town hall patron as the vice president.Okay.Excellent, so that'd be Graham Sullivan you say?Silliman.Silliman, Silliman, excellent.And did I just understand that correctly that you guys approve the final funds for the Foxborough flagpole?So now it's all set and I should give Jack a call tomorrow?Yeah, we had a $50,000 estimate.So a certain percentage was donated or contributed by the town DPW or the labor and some of the materials around the Plaza, the majority of the funds were privately donated.So what we did tonight was we've had a tabulation every meeting and it's come up to 41,000.So we formally accepted the donations.So once we accept them then they go into the town fund for the flagpole.Excellent, so you don't need to take any more donations now?You could still donate Barry if you'd like.Yeah, the estimate is an estimate.Obviously if we go over then we'll need it but I'm pretty comfortable that we should have it and never wanna ask for more than what we need.So you have estimated 50 and you have 41 now?Correct.And so that's enough of the money that you're comfortable meeting with a vendor- - To get the job, yeah, the installation and fixing the Plaza and the flower planting bed and all that stuff around it.Okay, just wanted to clarify.Yeah, that's about every or did anybody else speak in the public comment period before I came in?No, it was just that one gentlemen.Okay, well, thank you very much.Okay.Drive safe.Anyone else?Okay, all those in favor of going into executive session.Roll call.Yes.Yes.Yes.Yes.Jenny and Chairman says yes.So we'll see you in two weeks and conclude.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/BOS2016Jan12.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/BOS2016Jan12.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/BOS2016Jan12.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/committee_01_07_2013/committee_01_07_2013.mp3", "text": "All right, I'd like to call City Development and Planning Sometimes to order.First item on the agenda is a presentation about Gateway Plaza.We welcome Mary Moore Wallinger.I'll just start with a few years back, we started doing a few studies on lower state street area to get ahead of the development that's now starting to occur there.The second phase of it was looking at the Liberty Park, and if you were at Chief Collin's swearing in this morning, you heard him talking about the design of Liberty Park, and one of the things we looked at was that it really wasn't very user-friendly and wasn't very safe, and we wanted to see if we could do some kind of redevelopment there that would basically enhance the redevelopment efforts downtown.So this study, which is the outgrowth of a previous lower state street study was funded, did not cost the city anything other than our staff time.It was funded by Metroplex and the Chief Capital District Transportation Committee, and I just like to recognize, who is their staff person who helped us through this.So for a quick presentation, I'm just gonna hand it off to Mary Moore from Synthesis.And it was excellent work right here.Thank you for everything on this study.It's been a great project to work on.So, we worked with a great large group of the Steering Committee organization, you can see the list here, and worked together very closely.We had an insensitive three-day workshop to kick it off where we looked at existing conditions and brainstormed about some potential design ideas, and then worked over the next several months in developing those, and also had two public meetings as part of the process getting feedback on the existing conditions and preliminary ideas, and final feedback on the final design, and it was a very positive process and great to be engaged with all the people who participated.So, as Steve mentioned, it really grew out of the Route 5 Transit Gateway Study.We proposed the Gateway Park to located at this important intersection in the city, and to include some mixed use infill around the park to help bridge the gap between the community college and the downtown.This is the existing conditions area.You can see Liberty Park in the corner parcel there, and Water Street, which has now been closed down now that the dormitories have been included, and students are going up to the intersection.There are four buildings within the study area, the two AAA buildings, which are currently owned by Metroplex, the Insurance Agency which is currently for sale, in the Trailways terminal building .So, the project was looked at in two phases.The yellow area is phase one, was designed as phase one of the park, which included the closing of Water Street and incorporating that into the new park, and then phase two would include the area where the four buildings are between phase one and roughly where the edge of the student housing was constructed.So this is just an aerial view of the park the way it is now, and a couple of close ups of some of the structures.There's a lot of history within the park dating all the way back to the founding of the city, and including more recent things like the Statue of Liberty that was dedicated by the Boy Scouts.And this is kind of interesting, they were having an article just before the study about how there's a time capsule under the Statue of Liberty, and some people were kinda looking forward to finding out what's under there, so that could be another interesting component of improving the park.And as Mr. Chairman mentioned, the park now with the berms and the vegetation, it really isn't as safe as it could or should be.A lot of the vegetation has been cleaned up, which is definitely improved the conditions, but the berms still create limited visibility, and if nothing else, the perception that the park is not a safe and inviting place.So really looking for ways to open up the park and make it much more user-friendly, and to cater to a whole range of audiences.So another layer is, as you may remember from the tropical storm Lee and Irene, that area gets a lot of water.So having a park, there is actually a perfect use for that space.And also, when we keep in mind that if we do do some mixed-use infill behind it, you would need to raise the finished floor, which actually creates a great opportunity for being able to incorporate parking below the buildings so that you could meet that city requirement and not lose those valuable parking spaces.So, these were just some of the key concepts we looked at really, providing visual safety, pedestrian connectivity, accessibility, flexibility of uses, creating an important gateway that would welcome people to the city.Another big part of the study was really looking at how do we get people from the college to the student housing, and to downtown safely in this really big intersection.And so, the three main options that we looked at, we worked with Craig Manning, they really specialize in transportation planning and engineering, and so they really studied it and looked at traffic counts.And so, the three options that we looked at was channelization, which basically would use a fence or a structure to direct people to the appropriate intersection.We also looked at gray crossings where you might have a crosswalk in the middle of the road, as opposed to at the intersection.And then the last was grade separated, which would be a bridge.Looking at all these, we came to the conclusion that regardless of which option you go with, you would still need to have a fence because the temptation is too great to just run across the shortest point.And we know that students are famous for taking the quickest route to the class they're late for.So, we felt like, well, the fence is also the cheapest option.Nobody has money to spend on the bridge.And so, why don't we start with fence, since we're gonna have to have anyway, and see how it works, and then determine whether something else would be necessary.And with bridges, people don't really wanna have to go out the extra steps or down the extra steps, and how do you control the injuries, and so that was kinda the least realistic option.The idea of a mid-block crossing, surprisingly, it was actually something that DOT was receptive to, but they felt like it needed further study.And so, now that we have the fence, if it seems like there's enough traffic that could be revisited.But at this time, the fence seems to be actually working very well, even with the temporary measures.So, we took it as a basic concept, this idea that the park had to cater to two very different users, the vehicular user who's driving by the park at a very fast speed, and the pedestrian who's lingering and walking through the park and looking for a more detailed experience.And so, we created a series of two cross axes using Water Street as the main pedestrian axes, and use these as sort of two contrasting walks that would divide the park into a series of rooms.So the pedestrian axes is really enhanced with more detail, it would use ornamental grasses and sculpture, celebrating Schenectady's, the arts movement that's helping to revitalize Schenectady, and also a lot of the history in the city, and using plants that are relatively low maintenance and the DSIC's had a lot of success with it, that don't require a lot of extra work.So then the vehicular axes would contrast with that in that it would be a very clean open lawn, directing your eye directly to the focal point in the center of the park.So as a vehicular user coming into the city, you would automatically be directed to sort of this big icon that would welcome you to the city, and that would join the two axes in the middle.And we thought that an interesting idea for that might be to use a sculptural wind turbine that would celebrate the arts, as well as Schenectady's role as sustainable technologies, and might also be an interesting opportunity for looking for sponsorship, perhaps from GE or someone who'd be willing to financially contribute to the project.So, then the four rooms that this divided into what top of the bus area, which is kind of the busy room in the park, and by having the two axes also takes some of the pressure off that people walking down the street with all the people waiting for the bus, it can be quite busy.So this gives you a chance to go slightly off route without having to go too much out of your way, and allows that area of the bus stop to have its own space.And that's where we're also proposing to relocate the Statue of Liberty so she's a little more in scale with her context, and so she's more visible.Then the area to the left would be more of a quiet plaza.This is a bird's-eye of what the park would look like.And so, there would be kind of a quiet plaza at the bottom where you'd have a sculpture.It would almost feel like fountain, but not come with the maintenance of a fountain, just a quiet place to sit.And then you'd have, in the center, of the large open green, which since this Schenectady County Community College doesn't really have a big flat open green, we think it would be a really great way to draw the college into the city, and to provide a place also for people from the stockade to come and potentially to host different events in that area.So this is just a rendering of what the pedestrian way would look like if you were coming out near the end of the student housing.And this is a rendering of what the vehicular vehicle corridor would look like with the sculpture drawing your eye to the sculpture in the center of the park.So again, having the on the back, we think would really bridge that gap between the college and the downtown, sort of encouraging people to come.This step's this business, and then another step's the next business.And we really see that as something that could really be market driven.So, if there was a developer who wanted to build it today, that would be great, or if it was something that waited until there was more of a need, that would be another possibility.And it also might be a great location for the college to consider including its bookstore, or again another way to, especially with student housing having over 240 beds there, it seems like a very easy fit for a pizza shop, or a place to do your laundry, or just any of those kind of college uses that would help bridge that gap to the downtown, and also add some nightlife.And because it would be slightly elevated and overlook the park, it would be a great opportunity for some interesting restaurants with overlooks.So, the Trailways terminal, because it is still in the park and it's gonna stay there, we thought would be a great opportunity for them to include sort of a news stand or coffee shop, just so if you're a student you could grab coffee, or if you're catching the bus, or changing buses, there's a place right there.And so, we'd integrate the building into the park, and really create more use of the park through that building, seemed like a natural fit if the owner was ever inclined to do that.And then with the open one, being able to use it for outdoor classroom space, just for playing a ball game, or having events that the city or the college could even host sort of an after five type thing, that that would have a lot of use.And it wouldn't have sort of formal steps receding, but it would be slightly sloped so it could function as an amphitheater, and again, some quiet reading areas.And the historic Railroad Street, we thought would be interesting to make some kind of a tribute to that, just with a decorative statement or something that would allude to the history of the separate railroad that used to run through the site.So as you can see, that's phase one which, because of the way that the access is tapered, allows a nice buffer between the existing buildings and the pedestrian ways, that you would feel like you were in the park and less like it just stopped right at the edge.And phase one is certainly very doable, especially since Water Street has already been closed and the city already owns the park.Phase two, the really big game would be to have that grade one, which will add on to the uses of the park, and might be a really strong selling point for the college to engage with the park more.But even that being said, there's still plenty of spaces within phase one where you could have sort of smaller informal similar events.So I think those are the highlights.If anybody has any questions, I'd be happy to try and answer them.Questions from anybody?In terms of the maintenance of the park, you mention DSIC. So, are you saying that they would kind of do something, the entire part of it, or just?Well, they as well as the city were part of the Steering Committee, and so there was a lot of discussion about how do we create something that's maintainable and is not gonna draw too much.And so, it would be a combination of the city and GSIC. Right now, DSIC does a lot of the maintaining the sidewalks and weeds growing in a pedestrian way, and there's certain beds that they maintain, and then the city really handles any of the mowing.I think DSIC does a lot of the plowing as well, but the city does some.And nothing's finalized.Obviously we'd be looking for partners to see if maybe the community college, or another developer in the area might wanna adopt a piece of it.But in terms of plans and things that have worked well.I've worked DSIC a lot for the plantings downtown when we tried to create some of the beds so that they're more maintainable, and also so that if we do get the occasional weed, it's not really noticeable.And so, that was how we talked about the grasses as a very simple plan to maintain the ever rich texture and multi-season.And it's easy to, when you plant them, you can plant them so they don't catch a bunch trash and that type of thing.And so were the design that's in place now with the berms, it's very labor intensive to maintain it.So by going to this format, even though you're gonna have a larger area, it's conceivable we could do it with the same amount of manpower and resources that we're doing on a much smaller format.And the big emphasis of this is that the majority of the plants are really geared to being sort of like heights, or catch below the knee and well above the head, so you have that open middle section throughout the park.Lighting?Is there a plan with lighting in there?Yes, there is.There would be lighting throughout the pedestrian access in particular, and then you have lighting along all the sidewalks on the edge of the streets as well.So, when you get further into designing, we'll just decide exactly where and what style.But yes, there certainly is time for lighting.Surprising.I just wanted to say that I attended both public meetings that Mary Moore kind of glazed over quickly, but they were very, very well attended meetings.I would say probably somewhere between 40 and 60 people hold meetings, then a lot of input was given, and a lot of back and forth.So I think the citizens of Schenectady are well represented in this design, 'cause it was more than one design initially.I got to one of them, but that one was good.Is any of this land designated park land?Liberty park is designated parkland, none of the rest of it is.So, what's the plans for that in terms of redeveloping or adding on to existing park lands?There's no existing grants that we have.We're not alienating anything, getting rid of anything.So, expanding a park is not a problem.And we didn't come across any outstanding conditions that were there, requirements from previous grants that we needed to improvise.So, what are next steps?Well, the next step is to work with some partners.We've been having some discussions about getting phase one rolling.Phase one is easy to do, it's implementable, the city can do a lot of work removing the berms.So, we talked with Metroplex about potentially doing some fundings.Phase two, a lot more money, and is further out.But I think the initial thing right now to do is start working to try and do phase one.Because this study was done in May, doing that fence down the middle and making the walkway for the students safe, and pretty much proved that while there has been some impact to the business owners there, it still works down there with the part of the grove shut down.Do we have budgetary figures for phase one and phase two?We do.I don't have them with me.Phase two was I think was about $1.8 million.I think that's inclusive.That was not inclusive of the buildings, which is two million.I think that was the entire thing.We applied for a grant through, and then we did not receive one this year, so we'll probably apply again next year once we get through the consolidated funding application in which they're using some of the buildings as matches, using some of our work as matches.We actually delayed this presentation by about a month and a half because of all the budget issues, and we understand that the city doesn't have money to do this so we're gonna have to leverage as much as we can to find services, get grant funds.Good idea to partner with the different organizations.I think it was like 400,000 for one, I think like 1.6 million approximately for phase two.Looking at the picture, it looks beautiful.Any of the existing, larger, more established trees being preserved to go into that planning?Yes.So this tree here is the really big arching tree that you see from also.We wanted to keep that, 'cause we feel like it's a big part of the park and it looked like the grades would work fine because a lot of the berms were built over a lot of the roots, and that area's an area that's actually, the base of the tree's roughly at the .So we kept that, so you'll still have that really wonderful sense of the canopy, and it'll make the park seem more established and less barren.And we kept one or two over here too that are also large trees.But the rest, obviously in phase two there's really not any trees over there now, it's all here.It looks big 'cause it's been opened up here.It's actually relatively small, and so three big trees is gonna give you a nice ceiling effect.But right now it's so dense you can't see five feet into the park.So at the same time, we think it's gonna open it up and make it lighter and make it more inviting, but you'll still have the sense that there's a really nice, well-established canopy over the park.Okay.Anything else?Okay, thank you very much.Thank you.Thank you.All right, let's just strike them as done, as all the rest of the items on the agenda.I waited until you had a quiet night to present all these things.The second article is North Side neighborhood designated survey area.If you remember, in July, Mayor McCarthy discussed his north side initiative, and we were looking at the potential other funding sources that we'd like to look into, one of which was tax increment financing.And at the time we discussed in a town, like everybody was in agreement that we would designate the area surrounded by the bike trail, Knox Street, Seneca, and almost to Van Vranken, and can actually the river properties on Van Vranken, as a survey area just for us to look at, it doesn't commit anybody to anything, to look at the potential of doing some redevelopment in that area, does it work, how could you do stuff?And then I went on vacation and we never did the resolution designating the survey area.So like you, we we just designated that a survey area.It doesn't commit to anything.We had been doing work since July, and we should be back in a couple of weeks with just some presentations on how redevelopment could work, how it could be funded.Questions?If not, I'll entertain a motion.I'll move it.Second.Second.All in favor?Aye.Aye.Should I just go?Keep going, yeah.Okay.The next one is just a call for public hearing to abandoning paper streets in certain city owned properties.Sheltingham avenue landfill, which has 34 tax parcels and six paper streets, and the area between Steinmetz Park and Kailberg Park, which has six tax parcels and four papers streets.This is just a record keeping problem.We have all these tax parcels out there.Every time somebody comes in and looks to do subdivision, asks these questions, we have to cycle through 34 properties.The attempt here is just to consolidate all the lots into one lot and make a Cheltenham avenue landfill, instead of 34 parcels and this area between Kailberg Park and Steinmetz Park.So this is just a call to abandon those paper streets.Once they're abandoned, then we would do a consolidation of the lots.You would never use those streets in that configuration.There will never be redevelopment of the park above the .And if you ever wanted to do anything in the Kailberg Park, you would certainly put new streets in different locations or the same locations.Mr. Ericson.The city owns the lots though?The city owns all the lots.There's no question of that there's a lot that has no access, correct.And then eventually I'll be doing the same thing in Woodlawn, 'cause there are in Woodlawn 'cause there are court closing on three properties right now that would create that problem.Other questions?I'll move it.Okay.Second.All in favor?Aye.Aye.Okay, and my final item is MCTAP, Minority Contractor Technical Assistance Program.The city council has approved previously, funding through Empire State Development, $87,000 for the renovation of 818 Albany Street, which is just about done now.It looks beautiful.They're getting applications now to start getting tenants in that their board has to approve.Empire State Development has been fronting us the money.Because this is the last drawdown, they will not front us the money, they like to hold something back.So, since the work is done, Empire State needs to see the receipts for payment, MCTAP needs the money to make the payment.What I'm asking for, what the town's asking for is a bridge loan for about three weeks.In my application, we're talking about $20,000, but actually it's only $11,199.So we have all the paperwork ready to go.Once the money comes in, it will be paid and the will be submitted to Empire State Development Corporation.Questions?Yes, Mr. .Is there any chance that the bridge loan, they wouldn't get the money within that three weeks, and what are the risks?I don't really believe there's a problem.We've been working with Empire State on this, and it's tough 'cause it's an older program, getting them back up to speed on this program, but they're working with us right now and up to speed.They've just stand up some money, and are ready to do that other process, that other one rapidly.So I don't think there's any risk for us.It might be a month, but I think it really should be about two weeks.Anything else?Just, I have a question.Yep.Cost to the city in terms of lending the money, or?I didn't do the interest cost on 11,200.I could submit that back to you.I don't know what we're gonna lose on interest in two or three weeks.And where exactly is that money coming from, to give the bridge loan?Where's the money from the city coming from, out of what line ?Well, that would be something I have to create in the resolution and ask, is Maniford the exact line item and just basically get them out of the general fund.It's usually when we have grants and we have these drawdowns, we create these budget lines that pay upfront and get reimbursed later.Unfortunately, not here.We'll lose about $10.76 on interest.I'm just more concerned as to what line it's coming out of, seeing as we didn't have a line there to begin with.I can tell you I have no idea.The resolution will most likely have a line in it.Well, it has to have a budget line in it, most likely.Right, did not apply a budget, so it'll be in there, so I don't have that yet.And I know that we can without the figures.I mean, we're certainly talking a minimal amount of money.I understand that, but I just don't know where it's coming from.Okay.Well, would you entertain approving it pending the information?Mm-hmm.Okay.So you'll move back?Pen something.I think I'll accept it.All in favor?Aye.Aye.Okay, good.get all the information to you guys.It'll be on a resolution or something Wednesday.It's just a public hearing, right?Call a public hearing?Yeah.One other thing that I didn't put on here that I would like us to do is a resolution recognizing Buyer Fur Company.I actually meant to do this last year, which was their 175th year of existence.And I just think, as one of the oldest businesses in the city, it would be appropriate to just recognize them.Sure, I'll move that.Second.All in favor?Aye.Aye.Good, thank you.Okay, if there's nothing else to come before the City Development and Planning, I'll entertain a motion to adjourn.Second.All in favor?Aye.Aye.I'll call to order W -- - Regarding sick leave, where will I get the information?I got some down here.Okay, thanks.Call to order Government Operations, and first item is selection of new council president.I think it's just Denise.No, it's just Denise.And Barbara .And Barbara.I do not know the procedure for this, Denise.Ms. Rucker.Well, I would just put forth council member King as the new council president through our committee, and then it would go on the consent agenda for Monday night.Any discussion or questions?Okay, I'll second.All in favor?Aye.Aye.All right, and appointment of the official city newspaper.I assume same, make a motion.I thought this was usually done at a the first of the year meeting.The organizational meeting.The first formal meeting of the council will be next Monday.We do it yearly?So in theory, we only have an official newspaper for.Last year's was only for one year.The resolution wasn't ready for two.Do you understand that, do you know why?It's usually we always do it every two years.I've been always familiar were it being done every two years, and apparently last year when they did the resolution, it was only for one year.So we're gonna make .So Metroland, I would yeah, I would suggest.If you have a newspaper within the city that publishes, you have to designate that paper so you can solicit bids, get things, but they have to give it to the Daily Gazette.Oh, oh well.That's kinda fixed, right?Fixed!All right, so do you wanna make a motion, please?I've gone down that road.Yes, I'll make a motion.To make the newspapers.Yeah, apparently the new newspaper in Schenectady.Our official city newspaper, and I will second that.All those in favor?Aye.Aye.Excellent.Any other business to come before Government Operations?If not, we'll be adjourned.All right, second.To name Brian Kilcullen the new Police Chief, and Chief Kilcullen is here tonight.He did a presentation at the announcement today, and of summarizing some of what the department has done last year, the last several years, and outlined some of the goals and objectives for the coming year, and wanted to make them available to the council tonight to answer any questions or comments, or just start the ongoing dialogue.I think that he was ready to do a PowerPoint presentation, but they'd taken all the equipment away, so.Supposed to do one of this shows with his hands he can make.One of my first requests will be to find some PowerPoint training, 'cause mine wasn't anything like that.But I think mostly we did see it today.But briefly I can go through it again and talk about some of the activity results from last year.Again, we had a goal early in year, 10% reduction in crime.Through the end of the year we actually had a 9.2% reduction.One of the focus crimes was car larcenies.We had a lot of car larcenies over the course of the year.They were actually down by 35%.And I know some of you even had some in your neighborhoods.We focused on that pretty heavily this year, and we're actually down 35.1%.Now, even though we were short of our goal by 8/10 of a percent, crime was was actually up slightly in New York City, and down just slightly, throughout the state there were actually some impact sites that had some slight increases.We were an impact site, which is , where non New York City crime occurs, and we had some pretty good successes over the course of the year.Chief, I don't mean to interrupt you.I neglected introduced Nick Macherone, who is with the New York State Association of Chief of Police, and Nick serves as the law enforcement liaison with the governor's Traffic Safety Committee, and he's been working with the department in terms of some of this data-driven analysis that we do in the deployment of the department, and we're thankful that you're here tonight.Again, Nick, there's some information that he has also compliment to things that the chief is talking about.I apologize, Chief.I'll open some of these, and then the last thought actually DDACTS, Nick, and we'll talk a little bit more in a second.Some of the figures over the course of the year.We we actually had over 6,000 arrests resulting in over 10,000 offenses over the course of the year.Our car crashes, again, through DDACTS we actually decreased our car crashes by 13 and a half percent, down from 3,515 to 3,041.We responded to 85,000 calls for service over the course of the year.We implemented an online reporting system for minor offenses, which really abdicated need to respond to certain minor offenses, freed us up to do other things.We expanded our neighborhood camera system by 27 cameras.Issued 25 new and revised policies meeting the standards.Received over a million dollars in grant funding over the course of the year.We participated, and this was a big thing, we participated in an NIJ funded police legitimacy project with Fin Institute, and this was highlighted at that national conference in Washington, we call it our customer service project.But again, the idea is like the customer service survey almost, how are you doing?And the idea is, if the level of satisfaction increases, then the general population tends to cooperate with police more, tends to obey the law when the police aren't present, and that's the whole idea.There's been a lot of research done, mostly out of Yale university.And actually, I was on a panel down in Washington with one professor from Yale who did a lot of research on this.So that's great.It's not finalized yet.It's us in Syracuse that participating in the study.And again, we're hoping.The idea is, a satisfied general public is more cooperative with us, helps us to solve crimes and do all the other things we wanna do.Then the other thing I mentioned with Nick here, if you can elaborate a little more, Nick, it's that we instituted that our data driven approach to crime and traffic safety, and the idea is, what we do is we map out our crime throughout the city, we map out our crashes, overlay the two, and where they overlap, that's where we do our enforcement, and it's shown to reduce crime in those areas.Went to a Mount Pleasant neighborhood association meeting in November.It was one of the hotspots.We had started this about September.At the time, crime was down about 7% in the city, and in Mount Pleasant was down 12.3%.This is a few months after we had started at Mount Pleasant, and not just that, but one of the target areas was Mount Pleasant.And the good thing about this is we can go to the neighborhood association meetings and everyone wants more of a police presence, we'd all like that, but we then tell neighborhoods why we can't be in their neighborhood more than we already are.And in this particular case, the good news was, yes we'll more of a presence.The reason we're here is because it happens to be one of the hotspots.But we could also go to neighborhood associations and when they ask for this, make the same request, we can tell 'em, unfortunately we are trying to do more with less when using this approach to really pinpoint where we need to be and when we need to be there.So, the good news for that group would be, hey, look, things are relatively quiet here, but for that reason, we can't necessarily be here any more than we already are.So we can use it kind of at both ends of the spectrum.But again, we went through the training provided through Nick's organization back in April, and our Impact grant actually is up in calendar period July 1st.So in May we start our application again.After going through this training, we said look, let's use this strategy, but to use this strategy we're going to need to leverage more resources from the state to provide more analysis.Because we are producing a number of intelligent products with our crime analysis.About two years ago, we had about a 100 hours of analysis a week.We were down to about 40.So, he was really at his max.But by deploying this strategy to our Impact application, we were able to learn more resources from than to provide another half-time person.So we're back up to about 60 hours of analysis a week.And again, we're the first in the state to use this.And Albany's just getting going with it, and they actually really took reports that we're doing and kind of doing exactly what we're doing, is it a real good report?We were shown a number of reports, a number of intelligence products produced throughout country, and Matt Douglas did a great job kind of taking it and then making his own, and it's great.It's easy to read, it clearly identifies the target areas, shows everyone where to be and when, and its worked for us.So, Nick, if you want to elaborate on that further.I just gotta say that we're extremely impressed at the way that Schenectady is using data, collecting and analyzing their data, directing their resources more efficiently and effectively.That's the whole operational model to reduce social harm in communities.It's a proven operational model that's going across the country.We're really happy to see our Tri-City partners moving this forward, probably the first agencies in New York State to do that.We've done four workshops in a year.The most recent was again in April with Schenectady, Albany, Troy, Herkimer, and other sheriffs and state police agencies.And again, when I saw your article in the paper about you Mount Pleasant neighborhood and the impact it's been having on that in the number of reduced calls for service, and talking to the assistant chief who was at the workshop along with his team, I was really impressed, reached out, and he says, yeah, we're utilizing it, we're moving it forward, and we're there to support that in any way we can.And again, we're very, very pleased with that, and that's it.Good, thanks.And we're gonna expand that a little bit further and we'll go up to 2013.As you know, and again, I think everyone today .Thank you again for restoring the third to the chief position.But going forward into 2013, we'll continue to have a Field Services Bureau with an assistant chief, an Investigative Services Bureau with an assistant chief, and an Administrative Services Bureau with an assistant chief.And rather than combining two and giving it all to one person, what I did was I took some responsibilities from the two that were combined and moved them were.I kept some.Some of the functions that I had as an assistant chief, I'll keep as the chief, the budget, procurement.Media relations was formerly under an assistant chief, I'll keep that.Professional development falling under assistant chief, I'll keep that.Again, to try to spread the tasks amongst the entire command staff.But as I said, generally, Field Services will stay the same.Fleet Management, formally under a support service, will come under the Field Services Bureau, partly because most of the cars are patrol cars.So, most of the needs are easily communicated to the bureau commander of those using the cars.We'll move the fleet management too to that bureau.Investigative Services will pretty much stay the same.And other than that, like I said, the Administrative Services Bureau would generally be what was formerly our Personal Management Bureau and our Support Services Bureau.And again, I tried to take some things from that bureau because again, that's where accreditation falls, and we definitely wanna finish, as I said before, we've been talking about this for over 20 years, and we made more progress in the last three than we did in the previous 17.So I don't wanna lose anyone there.And at one of our earlier meeting I'd given you a copy of pretty much what we just talked about.We mentioned DDACTS, and as I said, I wanna expand that a little bit more to really take the records of a code enforcement, to get them more involved, and came up with another program called SCOPE, and again, it's Schenectady Cooperations and Police Enforcement, and it's using the DDACTS model, kinda mapping out pro issues or con issues, and concentrate or enforcement there, and then going further and having monthly Compstat like meetings that we're having, but including Code Enforcement and the other city department that has any sort of involvement in this process, and that Compstat process will provide the forum for accountability and feedback.I spoke with Eric Shown, he's going to participate in our in-service training.As I said earlier, we respond to 85,000 calls for service, so we wanna explode that.Now, we don't know necessarily what we're looking for in a house, what the code issues are, but there some that comes to our in-service training that we've started this month, for any one service training, and to kind of give us some ideas what to look for.Walk by a smoke detector, press the button.Does it work?If not it's a violation, we'll refer it.As I said today, a lot of these things aren't necessarily situations that we can arrest someone for, but it may be a problem location.So, if we can't do anything about it in terms of an arrest, well, what else can we do?So again, exploit the fact that we're in these houses all the time, especially problem locations.So we're gonna work more closely with Codes and any other city department.CPTED, the Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design.We've got the training and it's scheduled for the last week in March.I'll be working with the major to identify stakeholders we think should come.As I talked about Liberty Park, commissioner can tell you on the calls received early this summer, halfway through summer, the calls for service down there was astronomical.It is just a haven for activity.You may have seen some panhandlers down there between the park and the college.Well, that's where they were pretty much camping out, right in there.You can't see 'em.It was pretty well secluded.Went in there to drink and doing other things, were down there regularly.And until we actually made a few arrests, we were there regularly.We're dedicating a lot of resources in that one area again, which could've been avoided had that design been proper.So, we're gonna do this training in March.And this too, funds for this training provided by the state through Impact.We developed a very good relationship with those running Impact.They like what we're doing.We have a annual round table where half the Impact agencies go to one meeting, the other half goes to the other.But they like what we're doing, and for that reason, I think we've been successful in leveraging more resources from them.So, we'll continue to do that.One other photo we're participating in is, again, it's a federally funded project sponsored through DCJS called Ceasefire, really.The idea is to minimize gun violence in the community.And so, we're targeting parolees coming out of prison who where identified as violent offenders, we're bringing them in for a meeting as they get out, and the first meeting was actually last month.We have 18 parolees.It's us, it's the U.S. Attorney's Office, the District Attorney's Office, and ex offenders kinda who have been there.We're bringing them in and tell 'em, look, this is our community.It's your community, it's our community.We had enough, okay?Enough with the gun violence, it's gotta stop.You're here because you were identified as a violent offender.If this continues, this is what's gonna happen.And I'll tell you, the message from the U.S. Attorney's Office, you see jaws drop.Because once they get into felony, and the they possess a gun, or even a bullet, or a part of a gun, an inoperable gun.A bullet's as good as a gun, federally.So the message from this U.S. Attorney's Office really hits home.So, this was shown to be successful in Chicago, some others around the country.And again, we've been one of the few areas in the state that have been selected by .Actually , it was back in April, the mayor were out at the capitol when this was first presented in competitive process.And us, Albany, maybe two more places were selected to participate.So that's what we're doing.Now, as far as our goals, again, we're gonna continue to target part one crime, reducing it by 10% again.We're doing the right things, I think, with some of our strategies, with our DDACTS and expanding that to SCOPE. Number of outstanding warrants has been up, hadn't come down a whole lot.So I've already discussed this, what we can do with some of the agencies involved, one being a the court.We've got a number of, take traffic violence, for example, or even traffic misdemeanors, warrants are being issued, and we talked about possibly suspending the license rather than issue a warrant and even to reduce the number of warrants being issued.Now, there are other ways to address people not showing up in court.For people committing certain fences we're going to go through and reduce warrants by at least 30% of this year, again by doing a number of different things.One other thing, one of our goals is to, and I may have hurried through this, but I'll expand that a little bit and mentioned today, reduce our house antics by 25%.This was prepared last month when we met a few times trying to identify an agency that might help us on the collections.Through their experience, typically, tickets that are one to five years old, or 20 to 25% of the tickets that are one to five years old are collected on through any sort of collection efforts.So we, again, as of last month when we prepared this, there was $952,389 in tickets that were one to five years old.We expect to be able to collect 20 to 25% of that.Tickets greater than five years old through collection processes, typically, 10 to 15% of those tickets are collected.So we expect to collect between $309,00 and $441,000.Now, there's a cost associated with that, obviously, about 20% commission.So this is one thing we're looking at.But even after that commission, we expect to collect between 247,00 and 353,000.So that's one thing we'll be doing.We're looking to do some other things with towing and some other things, but I'm not ready to talk too much about that yet, but we've just done some things differently through the course of the year.And as I said, one of our other goals is to cement our application for accreditation by year's end.So, hope we'll have a successful year, and talk about next year what our successes has been when all these goals will have been met.So, any questions?Well, you're right, we've got one.So this one says Chief, this one says Assistant Chief.We don't have money to buy two badges.Congratulations and thanks very much.Thank you very, very much.Okay, so if there's no business to come before Government Operations.Okay, I move.Second.All those in favor?Aye.Aye.Call to order claims, free items, anything not executive session?No. - I have a motion to go to executive session.So moved.Second.All in favor?Aye.Aye.We're going into executive session.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/committee_01_07_2013.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/committee_01_07_2013.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/committee_01_07_2013.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/committee_03_02_2015/committee_03_02_2015.mp3", "text": "Somebody introduces it, take a vote.Yep.And I know -- - Oh yeah.Should we have an update?I've got but I could be -- - Right, yeah.Yep.A little breakfast Saturday if anybody's interested in going.One for you, one for Marion.Breakfast in the morning, - Awesome.Okay.I'd like to call to order the health and recreation committee.Do we need a motion to recess?No, we're going to do the committee, then we're going to go right to the council meeting.Okay.Health and recreation committee.The first item on the agenda for the golf course tree removal, .Sure, if I could address that, they previously asked the council to award a bid for removal of some trees at the golf course.The bidder that the city had attempted to award the contract to was unable to obtain good bond, sufficient credibility for the city.And so I'm asking the council now to go back to the list of bidders, we would go to the second lowest bidder and, appreciate the council's consideration in this special meeting, because this is somewhat time sensitive, or maybe hard to imagine today, the frost will eventually go out of the ground.And that they want to be able to course while the frost is still in the ground, so it minimizes the potential for any damage for moving the trucks across the fairways or grounds.Are there any questions?Yes.Mr Kosher.Thank you.So the one that was going to receive this was the RIA Wickes, is that who it is, that's who it is?Yes.Yeah.And their bid is nearly double what the other bid was.And we're still comfortable going with that here?It is under our original estimates, but it is, again, the first one was a very good price.They're not able to meet the terms and conditions with the package.And so we go on to the next highest bidder?Correct.Which is under our original estimate, but higher than what we were going to go with.Do we have any other questions?I'll entertain a motion.Second?Second.All those in favor.Aye.Okay, is there anything else coming for health and recreation?If not, entertain a motion to adjourn here?There's nothing else, okay.I need a second.I'll second.All those in favor?Aye.We're adjourned.All right, I'm going to call order the special city council meeting for this evening, if the clerk would call the role.Mr Mutabaron excused.Mr Ferrari?Present.Mr. Riggy?Here.Ms Porterfield?Here.Miss Parrasso?Present.Mr Kosher?Here.Ms King.Present.And if the clerk would also read the notice of the meeting and proof of service.Notice of meeting dating Friday, February 27th to the council.An emergency city council meeting has been requested for Monday, March 2nd, to accept the bid and award the contract for golf course tree removal.DNO Tree Service, who was awarded the contract on January 26th has been unable to secure a performance bond for the contract.The awarding of a new contract is time sensitive for the listed reasons.The time period contractors must honor their pricing is expiring.Number two, the contractor needs to be ready to go soon as possible.A new resolution will be introduced at Monday night's committee meeting and needs to be acted upon at a special council meeting on the same night.Chuck Thorn, city clerk.Proof of service comes from email tracking.Recipient Ed Kosher delivered 2/27 2015 at 11:14 AM. John Ferrari delivered 2/27 '15, 11:14 AM. John Mutabaron delivered 2/27 '15, 11:14 AM. Lisa Parrasso delivered 2/27 2015, 11:14 AM. Marion Porterfield delivered 2/27 '15, 11:14 AM. Peggy King delivered 2/27 '15, 11:14 AM. Vincent Riggy delivered 2/27 2015, 11:14 AM. - Okay.So at this point I would entertain a motion to approve the resolution, to award the bid and contract for the golf course tree removal to Wickes Arborists.Mr Kosher smooths it, Ms Porterfield seconds it.Any discussion?If not, all in favor, signify by saying aye.Aye.Opposed?Okay, motion is carried.So there's nothing else to come before the special city council meeting, I'll entertain a motion to adjourn.I'll make the motion.Okay, Mr Kosher, second by Ms Porterfield, all in favor?Aye.All right, we are adjourned.The next item on the agenda, I did not put in a committee.Mr Kosher and I've had some conversation about reinstituting the intergovernmental relations committee.This is a committee that still exists.It was active for many years.It went inactive a number of years ago.And now with, I think, everything going on in terms of the governor's expectations that we're going to be looking at consolidation and all of that, Mr Kosher thought it would be appropriate to maybe get it really active again.So, Mr Kosher, do you want to speak to this?Yeah, if I can, again, I think it's a very important committee, again, as Ms King spoke.With all the incentives that are out there and regulations regarding the governor's budget and the tax stamp and so on, and with my previous experience as a county legislator and sharing the shared services committee with Schenectady county, I just think it's a very important committee that we reestablish and bring it back to light.Because there is so many great things happening here in the city and the county.And I would just like to make sure that we, as a city council, have a seat at that table, and we can continue to work with the county local businesses, including the school districts and municipal housing authority as well, which is another entity that we want to make sure we bring into this.So I appreciate the presence of concern and I just hope that we can move on with this committee, forward.Thoughts, comments?Ms Porterfield?Does it make sense, I know that it was a standing committee at least in our city code.Does it make sense to make it part of the existing government ops committee?That's certainly a possibility, but I guess my thinking is more, calling it intergovernmental, really, to me, addresses very specifically what we're trying to do here.So I think, my own feeling is I think I would like to see it reactivated.I understand that about the name, but what I'm saying is, could we make it government slash inter-governmental?Is it so different in terms of the government operations that it doesn't make sense to have it all one?Is it that different?That's really basically the question I'm asking.Other thoughts on this?If I may, the government operations are really concerning the city services, for the most part.So I understand what you're saying, but I just think this is a very important committee that it's a standalone committee, there's just so many opportunities that we have out there that we need to work on, and again, I just think it's something that we really have to have a separate committee for.And I'm just hoping that we can move it forward and continue to work with the county and the school districts and other agencies through this committee.Other thoughts?Yeah.Had you proposed committee members for the committee?Not at this point, but we will be, assuming we do reactivate it, then we would definitely look at that.So if there's no opposition, then as I said, I would like to reactivate it, and we'll kind of see where we go with it, and.Mr McCarthy?It's never been abolished, it's still on the books, right?No, right, yes.It's on the books, it just hasn't been active.Yeah, okay.Well, in that case then, I recommend we reactivate it.So, and I know several of us attended the meeting that the county held, I know Mr Hughes is here, and Mr Fullman is here to talk a little bit about that.If we can, we can have them both come up.If you don't mind.Again, Rory Fullman is the county legislator, and our fellow legislator here with the city, Gary Hughes.Rory is the chair of the shared services and in government cooperation with Schenectady county.And Gary, of course, is the county legislator representing district two.So again, as Ms King had said, there was a few of us that went to the forum that was held by the county.But I just think it's such an important topic that the few of us that were not able to make it, I would just like to give them a very brief overview, maybe talk about the timeline and where we go from there.So again, Mr Fullman, or Mr Hughes.Well thank you councilman Kosher, and it's always in pleasure to meet with the city council.We won't take much of your time tonight, but as prologue, we're all aware that there is increasing pressure on municipalities to reduce their operating costs by finding ways to share services, by finding ways to consolidate.I think both the city and Schenectady county have been very good partners for a number of years.Kosher and I have worked on a few things, we have with other members of the council as well.The impetus this year is some changes in the governor's proposed budget, in the way that the property tax rebate would be administered, and requiring communities to reach certain thresholds in terms of savings.I believe we're both in very good shape in that area, I know the county is, and I believe the city is as well, but there are opportunities out there that we can and should explore.Legislator Fullman resides in Scotia, represents district three, which is Scotia Glenville and Niskayuna, and chairs the county's intergovernmental cooperation committee.We, as really the only countywide municipality are in a good position to assist other municipalities when we can to coordinate, to facilitate, to take part in.We have engaged in shared services arrangements that have saved the county money.And in some instances we have engaged in services where other municipalities save money, and the county has held expenditure neutral, and we're certainly open to any and all of those sorts of relationships.And we're really just here at chair Kosher's request tonight to start a dialogue.With that, I'd like to introduce my friend and colleague from Scotia, Rory Fullman.Thank you, Gary.Thank you, too, council, for having me, thank you, and Gary for initiating me coming down.So I chair the county level committee on intergovernmental cooperation, just as Gary had mentioned.The city and the county have a long history of many successes with shared services, whether it's the sales tax agreement, the salt shed, different services being able to be traded back and forth, and we've already had a proven track record of saving money.With the governor's initiatives, we are all well positioned for the upcoming June 1st deadline of having a 1% proof of a shared services plan on your total budget, I believe for you folks, that's going to be about $313,000 or $330,000 proving in years 17, 18, and 19, how you're going to take 1% off your budget through shared services.Now obviously, the big thing over the past year has been UCC, which has been a tremendous success.Schenectady alone is saving $249,000 for the year.You'll be able to cap that every year, under the governor's tax plans.So, again, the county and the city are positioned.And so really what we're talking about is just looking forward.Prior to the UCC coming into formation, which really, the talk started six, eight, you talk to some people, up to 15 years ago that those talks were started.So what's next is the big question.Obviously it took a very long time to get the UCC up and running, it is now, so it's time to look again and to look forward into how we can continue to share services.The county itself wasn't a dispatcher.We weren't really in the business of having a dispatch center, but guess what?It's revenue neutral for us.It helps every single municipality that came in.So it just makes sense to really honestly, look at things.We had our meeting on the 17th, we're having another meeting coming up on the 10th, March 10th at 10:00 AM for supervisors and or designee, to really come and first decide at what level of the plan are we gonna go in together for June 1st, which has to be certified by the CEO and the CFY of each municipality.And that's coming up by June 1st.And I believe somewhere around May 15th, we'll need to know from the city, from the towns, from the villages, what extent we will be coming together for a joint plan.But if not, that's okay too, because again, the second purpose of this meeting is looking forward again, what can we do next to share these services?Obviously, between group purchasing or looking at public works, or whatever we're doing, how can we save, how can we go forward in the future and work together?So again, I appreciate everybody having me, Derek, thanks for having me, Ed, thanks for having me.My phone is always open, anybody has an idea, or a comment, or wants to talk to me, please give me a call, thank you.Any questions or comments?And I think, Ms King, another important thing that came out of the meeting that we had was to engage the public as well.And perhaps that's something we can work on with the mayor in the future is to have some public meetings regarding shared services and cooperation, to get some input from our neighbors, from our communities.Because again, it's not just the folks sitting at this table that really have the good ideas, sometimes it's the folks that are in the neighborhoods that really can lead us in the right direction on the project, in particular savings.So again, working together, I think it's an important piece as well.And the UCC is United Communications Center, central dispatch, for those of you who are trying to figure out what UCC is.And again, that was long time coming.Any other questions of the gentleman?And again, thank you very, very much for coming.We appreciate it, and we look forward to our continued working relationship with the county.All right, thank you, appreciate it, thanks, all right.Thank you, okay.All right, I will now call city development and planning to order.We have a number of ceremonial resolutions.The first is for the ancient order of Hibernians.Someone propose that, okay, move by Ms Porterfield.Second by Mr Ferrari, all in favor?Aye.Aye.Okay, the second one is the ceremonial resolution for the Persian film festival.Yeah, my name's not on the agenda, but -- - Okay, I was wondering.Yeah, the film fest's goal is to mark the spring Equinox and Persian new year.And it will run on Friday, March 20th, 21st and 22nd, screen over 20 Persian films in all genres.And I think this is, Iranians as well as other Persians, speaking of community, Afghan, several things I can't pronounce.India, Pakistan.But I think that this is a really wonderful effort, in light of what a diverse community that we live in.And we saw that at our last council meeting.I just think recognizing the effort for all of us together, a local man who teaches at Sianna, just think it would be nice to heighten awareness of his efforts, and maybe bring additional people to the film festival.So I want to entertain a motion to approve this, okay, Ms Porterfield, second by Mr Ferrari, all in favor.Aye.And the third ceremonial resolution is for Jennifer Lawrence, the Northeast Parent and Child.Well it seems like we're having youth build program here every week and every month, but it's a great honor.I just found out recently that Jennifer Lawrence was, is our youth build director of the year throughout the entire United States.There was over 250 applicants that applied and Jennifer won the nationwide recognition as executive director of the year for youth build.So I think it's certainly a wonderful honor and it's always good to have her back with her students and staff.So we expect a lot of folks here for that.And I appreciate the support from the council on that resolution.Okay.Move it, second, all in favor?Aye.And women's history month, Ms Porterfield.Well, as we all know, it's March, it's women's history month, so I just thought it was important that we recognize that and have a ceremonial resolution for that.So I'll take care of getting the information, putting that together.Okay, very good.You want to move that, Mr Ferrari, second by Ms Porterfield, all in favor?Aye.Okay.And our vote for permit for Bel Cibo Bistro.Good evening.You see in your packet, it's a typical signed revokable permit for Bel Cibo Bistro.It's looking to operate at 96 J street, which is across the street on the corner of J N Liberty.It's a restaurant that's relocating from J street, looking to put a sign on the existing overhang, as shown in the renderings.I really have no issues with it.Questions?Move it, okay.Second, all in favor.Aye, that was easy.Thank you.There you go.Any further discussion on the Brandywine and State street project and zoning changes?We had the public hearing, we had two people speak in favor.I had another gentleman come up who owns property right in that area come up to me after the meeting and say he's very enthusiastic about it.So I think this is probably good to go.All right.So anyway, I'll entertain a motion to approve that.Okay, second, all in favor.Aye.Okay.And last is 126 Robinson street, but I see that we're going to be holding that for executive session.So at this point, I'll entertain a motion to recess city development and planning.Mr Ferrari, second by Ms Porterfield, all in favor.Aye.Aye.Call to order public service and utilities.We're gonna call Mr Wallen up about the discussion about the possible closing of a pedestrian tunnel.Thank you Mr chairman, if I could address that.There's a tunnel that runs under Ivy that goes from Last street over into Grout Park.The tunnel is owned by the state of New York.The agreement is it's maintained by the city of Schenectady.There's been a number of complaints received where it may be fostering criminal activity, undesirable people moving back and forth from one side of 890 to the other.We've had several requests to actually close it.The tunnel now is not in the best of shape, can become subject to ongoing vandalism where there's been lights there in the entrance ways.And so DOT had requested that if we were going to close it, that we have a public hearing and just get people's input on it.Internally, the staff is making the recommendation we probably should close it.Police department's perspective, and just our inability to keep up the ongoing maintenance, and utilization of it over time has dropped dramatically.People just aren't going back and forth.When Grout Park was in a fact a middle school city school district, probably more traffic there that no longer exists, and so, asking the council to consider holding a public hearing, to just allow people to comment one way or the other, if they want to have it open, then we review that, or if they want to close it, we close it in some way that would be acceptable to DOT. - Any questions?I just think having a public hearing is a really good way to make people aware that we're talking about this and get their input.That's been a problem for years, that's why I think that building got blown down in Grout Park.The vandals exited through that tunnel, it's been a problem for a long time.You have any questions?So we just need a motion to call for a public hearing?Okay, I move it.Second.All in favor?Aye.Aye And next we are going to call Mr Wallen forward about the bid and contract for the city hall boiler replacement to Campetel Plumbing and Heating.Hello, as you may or may not be aware, the boilers at city hall are outdated and in a state of disrepair.We've had a consultant come evaluate the boilers.We've had some mechanical contractors come and repair the boilers, however, from all accounts and purposes, they are on their last legs.We have had the boilers checked for asbestos, we do have a little bit, but we'll be addressing that.We did put out a spec to have the boilers replaced, and it was awarded to Campetel Plumbing.We believe that the bid is in good standing, and that we would like to move forward with this as soon as possible.Any questions?I'd like to entertain a motion to move this.I'll second.All in favor?Aye.Aye.Thank you.Thank you.Is there anything else that needs to come before public service and utilities?I'd like to entertain a motion to close.To move.Second.All in favor?Aye.Hi, I will call to order government operations.First bid, our favorite topic, the abandoned, extended parking.I said a couple of scenarios to Mr Falletiso this week, one of which was what if we change to read, if the car is impeding entry or egress, that would be decided by the chief of police, that the car could be removed, or hardship, but Mr Falletiso didn't like the word hardship, he wanted more of a definition of hardship.So I'll turn to my colleagues in the next couple of weeks to see if we can get that nailed down.My second suggestion was still with the entry or egress, but then, or if a resident didn't live within 200 feet of the vehicle, because what I thought, in this case, the owner of the car didn't reside within 200 feet of the vehicle.So that somebody that still park on the street for 48 hours, legally, without any issue, it would address the issue that Mr Riggy brought up of garages parking their cars that had been fixed and waiting for the owners to pick them up on residential streets, and it hindering other people from parking there.But it would still allow people who live there to park for more than 48 hours.So Mr Falletiso is looking into that, he wasn't sure if that was something we could do, because it would be kind of similar to what Albany did with the residential parking thing, but really quite different.But some of the same legal, like if you reside in this neighborhood, kind of thing.So, still working on it, not willing to give up on it.We have four council members that want to see a change, at least, and maybe more support than that, if we get to a place of legal good standing and a good solution for all, with it being trackable and all of that, so we're still working on it, stay tuned, I'm happy to receive any input from anyone else on this as we go forward.But I still think that the way it's written is just not necessarily a good thing for the residents in the city.So unless there's any questions or comments on that, we'll just move along, excellent.I also brought up with Mr Falletiso, D, the issue of people parking in the driveway.Not sure there's anything legally that they can change with that, because it's a private property.Which is kind of crazy.Well, I don't understand that, if we've written into the code the 96 hours, how can we not change the code?We have it, it's our code.I think it was a matter of who gets to tow the car.Well, now, the way it's currently written in D is after 96 hours, you can do something.Why couldn't we just change the timeframe?It doesn't say we can never do anything.It says after 96 hours, the person could do something.So I'm not sure why...Why don't you give me a call on that tomorrow, and we'll talk about it, if there's something that I'm missing that it looks like we can do something with, we'll definitely go in that direction, and, from my review of it, if somebody's parking, if they abandon the car on somebody else's property, and it meets the legal definition of an abandoned vehicle, that's actually a misdemeanor.So in those cases, the police would be obligated to go there and move the vehicle, because we have the obligation as a municipality to remove abandoned vehicles.But in general, if you just and you park in your neighbor's driveway, not a nice thing to do, really may not give rise to the criminal activity where our police department would get involved and pay for the cost of the tow, instead of the homeowner doing it themselves.Well, I think we should take a look at it.Because D clearly says after 96 hours, you can do something.So my recommendation is that being a lot fewer hours.So, definitely, I'd like to talk more about that.Because it doesn't make sense if you can just park in somebody's driveway and say, \"Hey, do something\".It just doesn't make sense.But doesn't someone always have the option to have them towed?Yeah, absolutely.On private property, yes.Yes.Because it's on private property, right?Right.Our correspondence.Okay.Okay.And next up, housing standard review board.All right, there was an email sent around with proposed changes, as discussed in prior council meetings.So everyone had a chance to review that, entertain questions or comments.It does include the change that we had proposed of having a multiunit property owner on there, and outlines the council as it would function for our discussion.Yes.Well, I just got this this afternoon, with the changes, So I don't know if There's just a couple of other things I think we really to add in there, if we can, as regarding the membership.And I know, we understand that, but it must be a city residence, that's not in there.And I know the mayor always insists that we appoint folks who live in the city, but I think that whoever we're appointing must be a resident of city of Schenectady.And also down where it says chairman, two things I saw, chairman, can we limit the chairship to two years?There should be some limit to how long an individual can sit as a chair of a committee, at MHA it's two years, here as council presidents, two years.What about our committees, do we have limits on those?Well, that's what I don't know.That's why we're in discussion here, that's what I was just asking.Well, the term of office limit is two years.So if you have to cycle out and be reappointed, then you would have to reappoint a chair, right?I mean, does that cover it?Or, I mean, we can certainly add that line.That's not going to be -- Well, is there a problem with somebody being a chair if they're being appointed and then reappointed as the chair, by the group?Again, I'm just bringing it up as a suggestion.As the chair of the BZA for many years, I don't know if that's good or bad, just -- - Because if someone's doing a job that everybody's appreciating, why wouldn't you reappoint someone that -- - Whose leadership works.Exactly.We've done it here at the city council though.MHA board limits them to two years, everywhere, it's just a change of leadership, a change of direction.But Peggy's on her second two year term.Two year term, that's right.No, no she's not.No, because I filled Denise's -- - Oh, but the same chair can be reappointed?Right, yeah, we don't have anything written to the effect of it's going to change every two years, it's just that I had an understanding.You don't have to, that's all right.I will entertain other people's comments, but I also agree with Mr Ferrari, if there's leadership in place that's working and building consensus, I don't see why that shouldn't continue.I'm fine with that.I also don't think that we should apply something to one committee that doesn't apply to all committees.So if that's the case, we would need to take a look at all the committees and what the length of the chair is.I'm all right with that, yeah.And I would think, like I think you mentioned earlier, if a person is on there for a two year term, has to be reappointed, then I would think, yes, you also would have to, that would be the opportunity to make a change in leadership if one was needed.Other comments, questions?I might ask that you give me the authority to designate a chair for the first appointment.the environmental or the energy advisory board, reappointed that, and then people were questioning, they're supposed to elect their chair on their own, or who's going to be the chair, and so that board is kind of languished, so that they're not looking to but put some organizational structure and responsibility as we're looking to ramp it up and get it started initially.Which makes sense, because if you have people that don't know one another, how do you decide who chairs it?Yes, Ms Porterfield.So this is really a question, so are you just asking when the board initially get started?Right, just should the council move ahead with this, we're gonna discuss the names, we'll make the appointment, I'll designate somebody as the chair for that initial one year, or two year term, whatever the council want it, and then it would revert back to the prerogative of the board.Yeah, I'm comfortable with that, but I would like it at a year, because after a year, the board will know each other enough, and if they feel there's a change in leadership, it should be their prerogative to be able to change it, before a two year term, anyone else?My only other comment, and I'll pass this on, is when we're doing things like this, to make sure it's gender neutral.So chair instead of chairman, and he slash she, that kind of thing.Yeah, this is an old committee.Yes.Other questions or comments?Now, the next step is to call for a public hearing on this.So, yes.If I may, in respect to John Mutabaron, councilor Mutabaron, who's not here this evening, and again, I just received this myself.Is there any way we can hold this for two more weeks, just so we can review this?And again, because he might have some changes that he might want to include or take out of this, and then we'd have to have another public hearing?Or would we not have to have another public hearing?Because the public hearing is on what we're including in this document as it is, correct?Right, but that would be for Monday nights -- - Two weeks after that.And then we can still make changes.So that gives us another -- - Based on the comments that you have received at the public hearing, you might change one thing or the other, maybe you make the terms longer.Maybe you make them shorter.As long as councilor Mutabaron will be able to insert whatever comments that he wanted and concerns that he had regarding this legislation, I think it'll be fine.He can speak at the public hearing.Yes, Ms Porterfield.68.3 for terms of office, where it talks about the members currently serving on the municipal residence board?Multiple residence board, what is that?That's this board, the old title, which to reconstitute.So then should that be changed to the name it's going to be?Right.It wouldn't really have any effect either way, because when this was written, there was another board, the multiple residence board, that already was existing, so it's just handling the fact that there are people who are on that board, who are then going to be coming on to this one, because once it's been dormant, that clause wouldn't have any effect.We could take it out if you'd like to.We should take it out.Yeah, if it doesn't have any effect, it doesn't need to be there.Other questions?In terms of membership, it states who, but will any city staff be part of this board?I'm not looking to appoint any city staff.They would function in an advisory role.Okay, thank you.More questions, comments?The council had a strong feeling, so the way I first consider -- - Okay, so if I could have a motion to call for a public hearing?Thank you, a second?All in favor, aye.Aye.Okay, great.One more thing that's not on the agenda that I bring to the committee, and that is Wednesday night, the board of zoning appeals will meet, and there are a couple of advertising companies that are seeking a variance.They are putting up new billboards, and wish to not adhere by the zoning requirement of removing two existing billboards before they put up the one billboard.In this particular case, there are electronic billboards.And I'm bringing this to the council's awareness because I believe that there are other billboard companies also putting up billboards that are adhering to the zoning regulations of removing two.And after discussion or questions, if we agree as a council, I would like to consider that we draft a memo to the board of zoning appeals, asking them to please stand by our zoning, in that if these companies want to put up a billboard, that they remove two others.So open for questions and comments on that.So prior to the public hearing, you want us to, there at this hearing on Wednesday, you want us to draft a recommendation that they stick by that, before we even hear what they have to say?Right, I feel like my thing is we have other companies coming in, they're adhering to these rules.And I think it's a crucial time in our city, of growth, that we need to be cognizant of what our city looks like, especially if we have a lot of electronic billboards going up, and we have the zoning changes, or these zoning requirements in effect for a reason, and I feel strongly that we don't want the city covered in billboards, especially with the electronic ones going up.Yes, Ms Porterfield.Well, I think that there's a reason that we have variances, and we allow people to come and make their case, so I personally would say, we should hear what their case is and what their reasoning is before we would make that recommendation.That would be my preference, to hear what people have to say, as opposed to, because we're offering the opportunity to say here, if you need a variance, come and ask us for it.So they're doing that.But I think if as a council, we say no, before they even make their case, it just doesn't seem like it's very fair to make that decision before they made their case.Maybe there are other people that have not asked for them, because they don't need that.This group feels like they need it for whatever the reason is.And certainly I'd like to be able to hear those reasons.Fair point, Mr Riggy?But can the CVA vote on that, that night to allow the variance?Absolutely.So then maybe we should make a recommendation that if they could hold it for two weeks, until we get to see what may be presented that night, because otherwise it could be voted on that night, so we have no call in it whatsoever.Another great suggestion.So if they could hold it for two weeks, instead of granting it that night, to hear from us.Or whatever, I don't know what their, it's a once a month they meet.Yes, they would hold it for a month.Okay, so they could hold it for a cycle then.That way we could weigh in, that way, otherwise we can't weigh in.The deed'll be done, right?Right, and point being also that, and I respect Ms Porterfield's point, but anyone can go for a variance, right?Anybody can go for a variance, so you have some other people that are putting up billboards that may not think they'd get the variance, but they're taking a chance on it, so, but good point.Other questions or comments, yes, Ms King?Another thought too is whether to do a letter just saying that unless it's a really unusual request or special situation, that they, so in other words, we're not saying don't award it, but just make sure, if you're awarding it, it's a really special reason or unique need or something to that effect.I think doing something like that just kind of sends a message to the board, and I think that we should just wait to hear, because that kind of, whether it's intention, whatever the letter says, the fact that it comes from the council, it kind of sends a message.I think we should just be hands off until we hear whatever it is that they're asking for.Go to the meeting, make your comments at the meeting.I try to go to most of them.Right, that's what I'm saying, right.We can do that, but then we're not acting as a council.We're acting as a single person, so I think the discussion was to act as a council, and that's only if everybody's in agreement, right?So, let me work with Mr Thorn on this.And if anything, we'll just, I'll see, I'll ask Mr. Strikeman if this is time sensitive in any way, and if we draft anything, it will be a memo simply asking them to hold their decision until we can review the circumstances.I'd be agreeable to asking them to hold the decision.Yeah.Yep.And I'll put it out to everybody before we actually formally send it to the chair also, so that everybody's in agreement, if we're acting as one voice.So, okay.Anything else to come before government operations?Ask for a motion to adjourn.I'll second, all in favor.Aye.Call to order claims, - So moved.I'll second it, all in favor?Aye.Also just say, I'm going to pass this around, the letter we sent to governor Cuomo after the death of his father, we've all seen the letter we got, but this was also the program from the service.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/committee_03_02_2015.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/committee_03_02_2015.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/committee_03_02_2015.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/committee_08_18_2014/committee_08_18_2014.mp3", "text": "All right wanna call someone from operations to order please?First up we have Mr. Wands for the I Love New York revocable permit.His son's first birthday is today, we wanna get him in and out.So what do you have in front of you is a application for a local permit for I love New York pizza.What they would like to do is replace their deck that they currently have.The deck has been there for quite some time.Condition in disrepair, I'd like to repair the deck.Three feet of that deck, the deck goes to the back of the sidewalk.However, the property line as in most cases is not the back of the sidewalk.So 3 feet of the deck is in the right of way.Coast will be inspecting the deck.The city has no objection to this being in the right of way, as long as they are granted this permit.Questions, comments?Someone should take care of the sidewalk.This is not gonna change the sidewalk at all.The sidewalk right now is, I believe there is a two foot utility strip, and then there's a five foot sidewalk, and then they have stairs that are internal.They're not external, so they're stairs that are internal to the deck and it's a flush back.They're not gonna be coming out at all any farther.I believe this deck is original from Ben and Jerry's.So I don't know it's been for quite some time and we're gonna be able to maintain at least five feet of clear space.All in favor to give permit.I move to approve.Second?All in favor.Thank you very much.We'll have pictures of dates go get your party hat on.Okay, uniform rental and laundry service, Mr. Howard?So this is for the uniform rental that we'd like to enter an agreement with Unifirst Corporation, which just went out last year, for bid, we've had two respondents to the bid.One did not meet the qualifications and the other came through with everything.So we'd like to enter into that contract for one year, and then next year we would reach out even further and try to get more bidders to come aboard.Questions, comments?It talks about all the uniforms and lab coats and all this.So every one these people are wearing some type of uniform.Everyone has a certain, either uniform or laundry service that is provided for by Unifirst, whether it be uniforms, whether it be towels, mop heads, things like that.So we're all affected, you know, between facilities, fire, sewer street, wastewater treatment plant, water department, and between the pump station.So yeah, everybody has a little piece.Correct.Okay.How does this price compare to last year chairman?Last year, they are right on the same numbers as what we had last year, they've held us to the same numbers.So there was really, no increase at all.So they've been a very reliable vendor for us.None of our departments have had an issue with them and the products that they supply to us.So that's why we really feel that Unifirst is one of the better quality people that you can go through.That is 25,500?Yes sir.And that's culmination all the departments.All the departments listed here?Okay.I'd like to move this.Any other business to be brought up for operating.Okay so second, all in favor?Thank you.I'm gonna call order city development and planning.First item on the agenda concerns the land bank, and Mr. Hoffman is here to talk to us about that.Good evening everyone.Good evening.As you have on your request form, this exciting time for land banks, to revitalization, it's connectivity, but it's time to get down to the nitty gritty.We have to put our application into the attorney general for the funding that we're requesting a million dollars and maybe more, for the land bank for Amsterdam, the county and the city.And in order to put that application in the way we have it planned right now are gonna be asking for approximately 31 properties in Eastern Island neighborhood and maybe some others.But we need a resolution of support and a commitment to transfer the property so that when we put the application in the city and from the county and from Amsterdam go along with the application.So that's the basics of it.I'll answer any questions you have about it.Raise here to answer any questions.Thank you for assisting us in this as a city.We're talking about the 21 properties .Not just on the street, but in the neighborhoods in the back there, the city owns some vacant lots and some other properties.We wanna do as throughout a job in that neighborhood as we can .Yes, we hop to demolish and to rehab and some of them were vacant now we hope to clean them up, maybe do a property next door, maybe do a community garden.And we also have a facade program going in Eastern Avenue neighborhood right now where homeowners can apply to the land bank for $5,000 in assistance to help with the outside of the properly.This million dollars is coming to where it's connected.The land bank is what Amsterdam, the county and the city.Okay, so part of the 3 million, they pretty much said they're is 3 million's available it needs a land bank we may ask for a little more because Amsterdam has some things going.And you know, the county has a couple things that we may wanna ask for too, but we said, we wanna get the 3 million for the land bank it will all go to the city.We're hoping the lion share of to two and a half, two and a quarter.We're gonna ask for a little more, you know, with specific projects in mind, we're calculating all that, getting the application ready.So all the properties that you're talking about .I believe someone when we're in the most recent round of foreclosures, I'm not quite sure how that is but...Thank you ma'am, just a couple of comments here and a question.Again, wonderful partnership with the land bank, with metroplex, Sir, and IDA for working in our neighborhoods.We've been talking about the, Metroparks not getting into the neighbors for a long time.We know they've been doing a great work with downtown.And again, my theory is the city of Schenectady, the heart is the downtown and without the arteries, we are now gonna move into the arteries and start working into the neighborhoods.Eastern Avenue is certainly an area of need.And again there's many of those buildings that you have said are vacant and just completely need to be taken down.The other question is how often does this application come forward from the state?Is this something that's a yearly basis or with land banking funding?They've announced it last year, they announced the first gate pins about another one.So then they announced another one this year, and they've also indicated they're more unlikely there will be a third round next year.And the reason I ask that is.As you're well aware with this many city school districts.Reorganize every district, the buildings 2016 over Alvern Avenue school is slated to be closed I'd really like to see a triplex and then the land bank, and continue to work on that Eastern Avenue corner.And what the school does perhaps maybe turn that vacant, building into some housing for seniors or for veterans as we're talking about some of the other neighborhoods.And I think it just be a wonderful way to partner with the school rather than to wait for a building to burn down like we did on Brandywine for so many years.So again, if we can keep that in the back of our minds, you know, the long range plan to work with, partner with the school district on the next 180, and then take a look at that, utilize it for some potential housing.The land banks have generated a lot of credibility around the state and not only the attorney general but some of the other funding sources, we hope it will be coming forward.As the attorney general settles with the large foreclosing banks settles their, you know, the lawsuits with them, that's the funding.And they wanna make sure that it's used for revitalization in areas where those foreclosures took place.So they don't wanna get, let us get too far off the dime there, but they had indicated that there will be continual funding for land banks, at least into 2015.Thank you.Any other questions?Mr. Gellen did you wanna add anything?Yeah, just an interesting point bank data we were thrilled to the attorney general stipend and it's connecting with the mayor of Amsterdam, and many of you were there.We really appreciate it, and we put to good use the $150,000 that you provided us last year, leveraged it with Metro bikes dollars and IDA dollars to see real gains and progress take place one Eastern.It's a great opportunity, they're said to acquire for 3 million dollars.This state funding that is available is all money that's bearing very well at the event is all money that he won in legal actions against these large foreclosing banks.So it is not taxpayer money, it is money that he won for the efforts and legal actions on foreclosure cases.So it's in effect found money from the state and we're working very closely with the land bank and the mayor and his team to try to bring home this next win if you will and this next allocation of dollars and we're really appreciative of your support.You need to send forward a strong resolution for the city.Say that we want this money .We have had some other discussions with the school district on that school.A great idea to do conversion to housing We've had very preliminary discussions at this point.There's more intake .Thank you, any other questions or comments?If not, I'll entertain the motion.We really set a solid foundation to work off of, and it's exciting to see it starting to really fall into motion, but at a critical time of being well-organized to move forward, not just willy nilly.So I'm thrilled.The second point is Porterfield all in favor.Aye.Okay, thank you.All right, second item on the agenda was ceremonial resolution for Paraikus.They just had their hundredth anniversary.Second by Porterfield.All in favor?Aye.All right, there's nothing else to come before city dealt development and planning.I'll entertain a motion to adjourn.Second, all in favor.Aye.Okay.Public safety, dog holding facility.Assistant chief?Good evening.Good evening.Good evening.Everybody knows where we came from and the challenges that we've had in the past with exorbitant amount of dogs that we take into custody every year then with that we built a facility, the facility is in nice shape, it's brand new, it's kept clean and neat and the temperature is fine and adequate for the dogs.We tried to adopt many dogs or transfer the ownership to them.We evaluate all the dogs prior to transfer and hopefully, in hopes of having the transfer dog as opposed to euthanizing.Do you have any questions?I mean, I'm not quite sure, what are some of the issues.We know that the city works on a tight budget.We know that all the city workers are super busy.So I think what came out to me strongest was how can we leverage people who have this as their passion, not necessarily their job, right?Because we certainly saw that there's people that wanna come into the facility that wanna help take care of the dogs, we walk them, they're certainly already donating food and toys.So how can we safely leverage that?Because to me, it's just like we encourage our neighborhood associations to get into the parks and you have, you know, litter and, you know, maintain a healthier city atmosphere, overall.How can we use that?Leverage that volunteer.We do work with a lot of other agency and have and still do as far as some guidance, because let's face it, this is relatively new to us and we've been searching out guidance and we've been attending training sessions to educate ourselves and learn on best means and best ways to handle situations like this.I think some of the questions that you have regarding some other volunteers coming in, to me, I see that as a legal issue that probably would sit better with corporation counsel.But certainly we're not opposed to that.And again, we have been working with other organizations or associations to help us with the dogs.There's something, there are things we can do we can study, it's mostly just, our support groups wanna come in do we can evaluate, what things are possible, what things aren't.What is the policy right now, when a dog is brought in as far as, what are they fed?How many times are they fed a day?They're fed, they're watered.everyday there's water.They're fed, we kind of changed that a little bit because we were feeding them twice a day.And what happens here of course is you feed them twice a day, then they excrete twice a day.So we've scaled that back to feed a once a day, but they're also giving treats throughout the day as well.Whose job is that to do that?The animal control officers, we have two full-time and one part-time.We just lost one, and I just received four applications.Hopefully this week I'll be conducting interviews to hire.I'd like to hire a couple more, and fortunately it looks like I have some good applicants.So I'm going to hire hopefully two, maybe more, I don't know.But I have a budget, obviously we work with it and I'm not worried about that budget for spending it.I think we can live within and without.Within your budget would it be possible to hire someone to be there?Because from what I understand, I don't think 24 hours is acceptable I thought it's supposed to be 12 hours.Well.Especially for water.It's recommended that they always have water, and we check on them.Five days a week, they're checked on, there's somebody working two shifts.And then on Sundays we have a part-timer come in, we have one coming in on Saturdays of course, she resigned about three weeks ago.And yeah, some days like Sundays and Mondays could be a stretch a period of time where there's no one there, but we make sure we check on them and make sure they have water.So this is a manpower issue then at times?It is and hopefully soon that would be resolved.In what way?By hiring more part-timers.Do we have money in the budget to do better?Absolutely.Because it seems to me like the biggest complaint too was interaction, I know this is a short-term facility.I understand that.But sometimes it's turning into a long-term facility for some of these dogs.But that's rare.I understand, but they don't have any real human interaction as far as somebody to take them out.Mrs.Parasso brought up you know if we have people that are willing to do this.The dogs are the ones that are manageable.They're exercised, they're taken out on walks, the dangerous dogs are a different story.That is rough.By the animal control officers?Yes.However, we had a meeting recently with the mayor and one of our humane societies that is willing to help us out some more.They already do work with us on a daily basis and they wanna help us some more and we're looking at possible outside run for the dogs.We can let them run outside, they can't stay caged in there.So we're researching that now.Just one other question, and I know it's come up other times with all the things we ask of volunteers.Is this gonna be a human work problem, if volunteers come in?Again, that's to me, that's a legal question.It would depend on what is exactly wrong here.Could you be more specific as to if they came to walk the dogs, is that helpful?Not helpful right now giving the specifics of different situations, I wanna sit down on track and hear what exactly people , get a case by case answer.How can we set it up so that the animal control officer's position defaults to another position?Because I mean, how are we protecting to make sure that one of our full-time animal control officers steps out of the street and gets run over by a bus, God forbid, right?How are we protecting that defaults somewhere else?Can we have a fail safe method, right?In other words, if somebody needs to go on a vacation, if we lose a part-time person or whatever, and that can we have a backup person that's always available or a backup position that always defaults to ensure that that's constant.Exactly, and that's one of the challenges right now, especially in the losing one of the part-timers.So we've been managing, we've been taking care of it.But more that's why I requested permission to hire possibly a couple extra part-timers.But instead of hiring additional staff that would tax the budget, if we have a default person.So you know, whatever, you know, I don't know who.And that's something else I looked into today, I spoke to Carl Olson the guy getting some help and he said, \"whatever I can do for you, let me know\".Again, we're checking all options, all options.I just feel like it's up to us to work as hard as we can possibly work to make sure this happens as fast as it can possibly happen.And that we're better, you know, not to say it was bad, but we're better.Absolutely.Because we can always be better, you know, and especially for this vulnerable population, you know, even if it is a temporary situation.And again, I would love to see the passionate people who love animals, I would love to see them be able to have the ability to assist the city because we have some wonderful programs with our city that will give eagerly of their time and effort.I don't see why we incorporate that in this part of the city too.Sure, absolutely, yeah.Absolutely.Is there any way within the budget, we have to look, 'cause we're coming to a actual facility, with a person there at least on a regular basis.So we to don't have to worry about somebody's on vacation at least on a five day basis and somebody can fill in on the weekend, that would be the best thing or somebody looking for a dog and they know where to come, or they lost their pet.Is that a possibility?Yeah, I mean, if there's enough money.That's always the question.Could we hire a professional, somebody that is familiar with this type of facility and managing, that would be ideal.Another piece that really jumped out at me that I thought was a very strong point that we can easily rectify is the amount of information on our website.I'm sorry that I don't know, but is it the county function or a city functions that it looked like it went to the county but I could be wrong.Where it says, you know, who they call, if we could have pictures.And again, if we have, I think one of the volunteer services available to us, as somebody who was willing to do web work.Somebody could snap a picture and say found in this spot on this day, you know, any kind of picture or we can even call because, I mean, that's, I think an important resource.And then if we can even link out to like local shelters and things of that nature, where the shelter can say, okay, click here to visit the city's temporary holding and find your dog.I mean, you know, we're in the world of information technology now that's the way everyone navigates, and it just seems like that's an easy lift for us.We've met with...I'm sorry, go ahead.I had a conversation with Steve Carrizo, we're looking to implement that type of program right after Labor Day, to be able to get photographs of dogs as they come in, be able to post them in again, the real goal is that we don't have any animals in that facility.We've started over the last year is doing the dog licenses so dogs have the tags on that we can identify when they do get loose and we're able to return them to their owner.And it also narrows down and group of owners that probably should not have a pet to begin with.Because they create an environment where the pets and dogs really become vicious or not really conducive to the city at all.The pets become victims when it's really the owners that have facilitated that or created an environment that allows it to happen.I respect that, but I also think there's another contention of people whose dog digs under the fence and takes off you know and they're great owners.And I think, you know, again, it's almost no cost to the city to have that website.But again, if that dog has a tag on it, when it gets out underneath the fence, it is very quickly identified and able to be reunited with its owner.My question is regarding feeding the dogs, you said you're down to once a day.Well, that's after consulting with people that are very familiar with dogs, they said that's fine.So once you have people that are hired part time, is that now because you don't have enough staff?Is that why, that there's no one to clean up behind the dogs after they've gone back.So there's no one to clean up.So once you hired more staff, which is what you're talking about, will that change?Will they now be able to be fed more than once a day.I don't know, I'm not sure.I mean, that's something that it was recommended to me that, you know, they only have to eat once a day and I got it from more than one source, so - I don't find that acceptable myself.I mean, I'll certainly look into it again.And you also mentioned they're going to be creating an outdoor run so the dogs can get out, exercise.That's yes, something that we're looking into.I don't have a commitment yet on that, but there's some issues with that we have to be conservative and there are diseases and what kind, you know, is it gonna be grass?Is it gonna be pavement, how do we need to clean it?We have to seal it, I mean, there's issues in how it's gonna be designed so, I mean it's early stages that we're looking into that just, a lot of questions.But obviously there's people have it, there's facilities that have it, so we'll tap into them and we'll question them just the same way we did when we built this facility.We went out in the field, and talk to a lot of people, went to different facilities and figured out what the best way to do it.Go with this one.Is there any way at some point you're partnering with the county to have a county run facility?I mean we can look at those options, it was put in place because those options were, some were just not taking their dogs.The cost was so high in terms of running it and transporting them .I mean, it's a clean facility where we have it, you know, for what I've seen at the time.And of course we're talking about, it may be cleaned off if we're not feeding the dogs enough, but we'll put that aside.It's not even Brad Shear who said that .No matter how my facility is taken care of .So I'd like to see maybe at some point we can talk to the county in a partnership, you pay towards it with the county to try to combine or maybe have this facility replaced.It might be more conducive having volunteers to come in.'Cause that's not the ideal place for anybody to go, actually and I know again, I understand it's a short-term facility, but I think that place has an issue.That's my personal feelings.Any other questions?I was just gonna suggest too, we may wanna ask for kind of regular updates as this stuff happens.Three part time.Two full time and hopefully, three part time.Well I would like to see 'cause it's possible for us to do so volunteers safely for the city and police contracts.And also where we like to sample control position to another position should we come up in a situation that we're short-staffed.I think those are needed things that we have to look into.Other things will take time, but those were met in I understand the mayor's work, in the website and that'll happen after Labor Day.So those would be my three priorities right now.in the meantime, I'm just gonna be a little looking into the feeding thing.'Cause we couldn't be perfectly in line with that.I mean, I don't know what the guidelines are, but I'm willing to do a little bit of research on that too.But those are some things I'd like to see at our next committee agenda and that had this doing here.So you're asking for another update to two weeks?I would like an update on the possibilities of whether that animal control position can default to and what our legal safety zones are in utilizing volunteers, how we might utilize volunteers to work for us.Two weeks.Sure.Thank you.Well, any other business before public safety?Second, all in favor?Aye.Thank you.And recreation, the 1954, anniversary - The 60th anniversary world series.This August is when I think it's happening .Some people will be here from Saturday.Second?Second.All in favor?Aye.Anything else ?Yes.Maybe we should discuss some options .They did say they could take care of the field.They have volunteers to take care of things.I think it's sometimes .And would that have an announcement that Helen Recreation will meet this Wednesday morning at 9:00 AM here in room 110, recreation will be discussed.Additionally, the Affirmative Action Advisory Committee will have their first organizational meeting on August 27th at 6:15 PM, in room 209.Is there anything else for Helen Recreation committee?Oh, I'm sorry, we're in recess.Second.All in favor?Adjourned.So we're adjourned.Okay, call to order public service and utilities, energy efficiency and water system improvement project, Mr. Johnson.Good evening.Good evening.Any information you have an agreement with Johnson Control System for the professional development agreement.The last couple years we've been looking at our water meters throughout the city, we have about 1,450 after the counts, meters range anywhere from one year old to 75 years old.It's a mishmash of meters where we have reiterated below take an actual photograph of the meter.It goes back to the office, we subtract the last present.It's very time consuming and not efficient.So professional development agreement is performance contract plays.With Johnson Controls does, we recommend doing in-depth evaluation of the meters, of typing and sizing.The revenues gained will pay for the project.Cost of this is $53,500.It's only paid if the city doesn't enter into an agreement to do the full meter replacement, these are, automatically read meters.So they'll just go through a meter upgrade.They get about 4,000 meters with Johnson Controls.Right along with them 500 meters in less than an hour.They'll be 1,450 meters in stickiness .We've already done some attrition over the last couple years with the meter reader and that's in the office.And if we move forward with this project, those positions don't have to be.We don't move forward with this project and we're gonna need the help because we're not efficient in pulling the guy off the distribution to read the meters and put it in the distribution system.If the project moves along with the $50,000 rolled into the cost of the project.And we do have funding set aside the last few years we have replaced in capital funds we have put aside, that will come out of there.Any question?You said for the total project so you have an estimated possible .No, not yet The city doesn't want the meters.So one of the problems we have is all those replaced meter meters so if this project moves forward .We will take responsibility for the meters especially meters through the meters we're building, they're not accurate.We're losing revenue every day.And we know that there's a number of meters, 50, 60, 70 years old.They're not accurate anymore.And one thing I know is they're doing the sizing of piping.When you put a meter in, you don't go and just put a meter in.It has to be sized, it has to be perfect.Pat is familiar with that.And that's something that's very important is extremely pleased with the work that they did.We reduced vehicle on the road every day of the week for 10 months out of the year to couple of days out of the year.Just follow up, you said that Scotia has 4,000 meters?3,700 meters, yeah.So what statement they did residential or commercial.We only have commercial.That's not my question.So they didn't do residential?We're limited to commercial and .A few years.I think there's was about 1.4, $1.5 million set aside to do meter upgrade.It's an expensive process.I'm not sure what but I can actually find out.Okay, that'd be great.But again, they did almost 4,000 meters.Are there other questions?Yes, yes, at around 3:30, just above the break.There happened to be .Yep, it's already closed.They've already got it open.It should be done within a couple of hours.And feed of 70-year-old pipe.The rest of the pipe is about 85 years old.Just so I know..From Campbell to Broadway going into the subway.They should be done within a few hours.Typically the crew is there, they get in and get out, the backup is there.They already have the hole opened up .They will be working on another plan, valve replacement at four or five, this morning.So that's a plan about .Yes, they're gonna form of health departments.When are you gonna start this project?This study?Yes.We'll enter it once the professional development agreement is signed after next Monday night, it's signed by the mayor.We'll have them start.We've already started getting them some information.The way we generally, we extract information out of Munis meters.One thing we realized is the Munis system is only going up to six inch meters.Now right now we have a couple of eight inch meters in the city .Munis system have enlisted .They start with the large meters because We're trying to extract the information for them.Thank you.Is there any second?I'll second.All in favor?Aye.Okay, anything else ?Thank you.All in favor.Aye.We're adjourned.Area, turns out this is part of the Paper Street didn't have an SPL, the resolution was great that the council passed.It only was for this area because the SPL covers the whole area, So we would really like to see amended resolution - For future reference.I'll move it.Second.Aye.Aye.Right, that move will go into executive session.Second.All in favor.Aye.Give me an extra second, I'm short handed here today.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/committee_08_18_2014.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/committee_08_18_2014.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/committee_08_18_2014.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/committee_10_01_2012/committee_10_01_2012.mp3", "text": "Come to order for public safety.First item on the agenda is Chief Seever.Our state traffic law enforcement terror prevention program.Chief?Order.Homeland security grant and we got it broken down into three components.Our new modems and wireless connections for any number of police cars.As well as new computers for many of our cars.We have that.Thank you.Sp put that in place, so it kind up brings us up to state of the art, as far as the economic portion.Questions anyone?No match.Chief, is this for houses we spent in 2012 or is this for next year?It is, assuming we get all the paperwork in order.Generally, it takes about another, once council approves it, another 30 to 90 days to get that done.As soon as we can, we'll order it.We are in the process of purchasing new cars as well, so when we get these cars out, we'd also like to schedule to get those in, get all those in there.It looks like it goes through 2004 to now.So there'll be- - There's a two year window of extension.There's no extension for the program.Homeland security historically has provided extensions if needed for a lot of this technology, and our newer technology in the next three to four years.On this case, they're trying to shorten the window, even though the signatory page, if you're wondering, we have mailed it electronically, and they'll send it back to us, so it expedites the whole process of events.Okay, so is this revenue, then?What will be quarterly Is it in the budget?No, it's not.2013?This one is not.It's created for, it's T line or T, I put a what I called T minus within our budget and we'll have a separate line for our grants and then have it all draw down right there on the T line.Until you get a separate fund, it's called the M fund?Not the T fund?T is for seating.And you put all the grants in the separate fund, because they're much easier grants?Yes.So it's separate, it's not gonna be part of the general fund.You can't separate it in a separate fund and try to separate it.Okay.Any other questions?I second.Okay.All in favor?Aye.Thank you, Chief, for that.I have one more item to come before public safety, I was just given it tonight.It's a ceremonial for the month of October being Domestic Violence Month, and so I would like to have a resolution for Monday night for that.Mayor, are you going to turn the lights on tonight, do I understand?I don't know if they did it today, or if the window- - Okay.Okay, great.Any questions about that?Group said those in favor?Aye.All right.Seeing nothing else to come before public safety, the meeting will be adjourned.Second?Those in favor?Aye.We all agree.We're adjourned.Sheriff?Call to order the finance committee for the monthly hearing concerning the proposed 2013 budget.As you know, that mayor proposed, presented his proposed 2013 budget yesterday, and everybody has a package.Maybe Gary can go over that a little bit afterwards, but we are calling for a public hearing on the 22nd of this month.And I apologize I wasn't here.I was out of town, so I missed the full presentation.Is there gonna be another presentation today or is it going to be next week, or was that it?The what we called full presentation, it's a summary of the details of the upcoming project- - The budget project.Securing reviews of the budget kind of line by line.It's just the statutory evaluation for the public hearing on the public calendar.Did you get a copy of the PowerPoint?I got a copy of the PowerPoint, yes.Not the budget, just the- - Oh. It's already on the website.It was put on the website.I can, yeah, I can give you a package.I can give you a copy.I brought actually a package for you.It includes everything.The PowerPoint and everything.And Lisa needs one as well.I already gave it to her.She came in late, so .It's on the 22nd of October, call for publicating.All right.Moved.Second.All in favor.Aye.Next thing up, CSCA benefits trust discussion.As part of the, it's really been a year-long review incorporated into the budget, posted it today to the council.We need to switch over to CSCA strategic benefit trust.We'll shift, and last year, we incorporated roughly a million dollars in savings in healthcare, and that again was done without any reduction in benefits.This budget that was presented council incorporates approximately a half a million dollars in savings that is projected through shifting to the CSCA trust, and again, that is being done in a manner to maintain benefits at the same level, and we have Laura Bilag here out from CSA who could pave over just a quick summary of it, and then any specific questions the council has, because a lot of this is very detailed in nature, that if individual council members want separate briefings, they want a full presentation at some time, then by the time you go through all the, I mean it can take sometimes two hours or longer.We just wanted people to start to understand the process that we're looking to go through.With your permission, I'd love to- - Okay, thank you.As the mayor indicated, my name is Laura Bilag.I am the fund manager for what is called the CSCA strategic benefit trust.It's a 501C5 Taft-Hartley welfare fund.It does state CSCA in the name.It was CSCA's initiative, although it is a separate and distinct entity from the labor union.We are allowed under this filing as a trust to bring in the various unions that are represented in the city, as well as throughout the state.And we have a lot of flexibility as a trust, it's also a labor management trust, so there is a board of trustees with both labor and management sitting on it.It's not that that board of trustees decides what the benefits are, they just kind of gear, you know, and bring the trust into different areas that may be relevant in the industry as far as what we offer.In the case of the city, we were asked to come in and meet with the mayor, the various unions, and propose some suggestions to save the city some money without changing benefits, because we do recognize that you have different unions within the county that negotiate their own contracts and have their own benefit structures.We can actually take your current existing plans through MVP. You have an EPO and a PPO, and I see you do have my sheet, so you do have some information in front of you, and switch that into the trust without, as the mayor said, changing any of the benefits structures.As you go forward in negotiations, if those benefits should change, we can just follow suit and change them with the carriers.So, basically right now, the city has an EPO plan that is insured.You already have the city plan, which is self-insured.Your EPO plan though, has twice as many members in it.Approximately 578 covered lives or participants I should say.What we have proposed is to self-insure that.That saves you money on taxes, it saves administrative fees there are various components in insured arrangements versus a self-insured arrangements that can bring money to the table.So our proposal effective 1-1-13 is to bring it back under the trust, again no change in the method of design, convert the current EPO over to a self-insured arrangement, looking for stock-loss insurance, and stock-loss insurance protects the city because when you self-insure, you're taking the risk, okay, but you're large enough to do that, but you also want to prevent any high cost claims.So you have what's called stop-loss insurance, so if the claim reaches a certain threshold, there's a third party insurance company that insures that claim for you so that the city is at risk for that high cost claim.The other thing that's a little bit different, but it's not a change of benefit is that we're going to carve out the existing prescription drug component which is now covered under MVP through Medco, and we're going to transition that benefit to a Syracuse based PBM called Pro-act.Pro-act has a relationship with the already international drug vendor that's used under the city plan, CanRx, for the international drug benefit.Pro-Act has a relationship with them, which is a positive relationship because what they do is they interchange their data.So there's what's called DUR, drug utilization review, which has always been somewhat of a criticism of the international drug program, because if you know the PDM and the international drug benefit don't know what drugs you're on.If you're filling drugs through a drug store and then through the international program, they can't always tell if it's going to have a side effect or maybe you shouldn't be on it.Pro-act and CanRx actually work together.So they do real-time DUR, so there's an extra safety precaution there, and also by taking the planning, going fully self-insured, everybody will be extended the voluntary benefit of the international drug benefits.So that's gonna generate some savings as well.Or without being, so no problem with the 90 day prescriptions being filled or anything.Nope, it'll be, you'll still have- - The same benefits as Medco?You'll still have your retail pharmacy network, you'll still have your mail-order domestic 90 day, plus you'll have the voluntary option of doing the international drug through CanRx, which is a 90 day brand medication only plan.There may be, and what we're going to look at this in the very near future, there made me a very slight change in the formulary, which happens every year in every prescription plan no matter if you change a PBM or not, just because- - What does that mean?That means like Lipitor, for example, recently went generic.Okay.So when you have a formulary- - PBM is a pharmacy benefit.Thank you.You usually have a generic, yeah.If you have a generic, it depends on how it's set up.Sometimes you have preferred drugs and then non-preferred drugs.Anytime a drug comes out with a generic or brand name, like a Lipitor, it'll automatically put the brand name on the non preferred column, meaning the highest co-pay and the generic on the preferred, generic the lowest co-pay.So your formularies do change no matter what, but we're going to look at this and talk with the city to see what the actual disruption is, and, you know, we can do a couple of different things.We can grandfather in those folks that are on those drugs that might have a change in what tier they go in, we can grandfather them in altogether, but any of that, if you decide that you're gonna change the formulary, which again would have changed anyways under Medco, I need to stress that, because I don't want you to think that it wasn't going to change, there's a way to communicate that.And there's always a transition period.So if you're on something that's going to go to the next higher tier, you'll have like at least 90 days to continue to use that medication, talk to your doctor, and find a different medication that works.So that's discussions that we'll be having with the city.I don't see a major disruption at all, so it's a really, it's a positive thing.Pro-act also is very, not to be redundant, proactive in when a person is on a medication and there is a generic available to steer them towards a generic, because it's a generic equivalent, it's the same drug, and when they need to be on a brand name drug, they'll steer towards the brand name drug, and if it's a brand name drug that's handled in the international drug program, they'll steer them towards that because that not only, that has a savings of about at least 40% we've seen over the years to any employer.That the drugs purchase internationally are 40% cheaper.It has stood true since the day we implemented it in Schenectady County many, many years ago.So that will also produce a savings.The last thing that I think we're pretty excited about is the wellness initiatives through MVP. They have that \"Live Well, Work Well\" program, but as you may know, the city has been talking, MVP has been talking to the Ellis hospital system about not only promoting some wellness initiatives, but possibly arranging some initiatives with MVP directly for care, meaning that, you know, there might be some arrangements, and I've seen this personally out in Lewis County, whereas if you can steer members to what you feel are quality programs through your local hospital system, or urgent care systems in the system itself, you know, you can not only save money in your claims, but you typically incent the employee to go there by removing a copay.So it's a win-win, but it saves the city money.If you want me to go step by step on the savings, I can.Basically, when you go from an insured product to a self-insured product, you have a one-time cash flow.It's not really a savings, what it is is is that you don't incur claims right away on your medical side, your prescription drug, you do, because that's real time at the drug store when you fill a prescription, they slide that card, that's real time.Claims tend to come in a lot slower.So you'll see a 15 to 18% cash flow savings, which is just about over a million dollars that'll be put to reserves to pay your future claims.An increase in the medical loss ratio.Medical loss ratio you may have heard in the press recently with healthcare reform.That basically is for every dollar spent in premium, you expect something in return, and in this case for every dollar in premium, what we saw was about an 80, I believe it was an 81%, of that dollar being spent on medical care, okay?The rest is administrative, whatever.What we're proposing is that we can increase that medical loss ratio to about 89, 90%, which will generate some savings.Changing the prescription drug vendor to Pro-act as well as extending the CanRx option to the remaining employees that don't currently have it will result in additional savings reduction in the stop loss expenses.Stop loss again, ensures the county for claims over a certain threshold.There was some reductions in expenses there with a total savings on this sheet, I think shows about 800,000 conservative, probably five- - That's what we're carrying the budget is roughly $500,000 or again, as we start this up, there is some transition, it's a little bit unknown, but there's a lot of opportunity to better manage our care and do some of the wellness things.We're going to emphasize that we would still stay with MVP. This really becomes a seamless transition in terms of the employee viewing this.So somebody who has a claim in December, somebody has a claim in January wouldn't see any difference.The benefits are still gonna be paid out, but we're going to have the opportunity going down the road to have better just review of our actual costs, and how do you manage that?How do you keep employees healthier?How do you, you know, take advantages of what I will call the dynamic changes that are occurring in healthcare?None of us know what's going to happen in Washington, election, November, what's going to happen in January, but this positions us to be the most flexible in getting, kind of plot our own destiny in terms of controlling costs and maintaining the high level of benefits for the employees and their dependents.Yeah, it really gives us, it gives the city in working with us a lot more control over your claims because it makes it that much easier because it's your, you are the one that's, a claim is a claim.Claims incurred, you pay the claim.It's not, you know, yes, there's a third party, MVP or ProAct or whomever, but it really becomes your data that you can go through and find, you know, what are your percentages of diabetics?What are your chronic conditions?And then how do you go in with a wellness program and try to help those folks and then reduce the overall expense.I have just a couple of questions to ask, just because I'm not understanding it fully.So I understand right now, we, I think just a basic perspective, we pay MVP, you know, a premium, they employ, they ensure our employees.Employees get sick and we pay it as a bill, we pay the premium, just like your car insurance, you know, you don't have to do it individually.What do you, I mean, Jerry said that we'd still be going through MVP with it.What are you bringing in?What are you adding to that?The trust brings in the ability, because MVP has formed a relationship with us to reduce their administrative fees and to work with us closely as we work with our clients, in this case the city, to try to steer the population into healthier lifestyles, better claims experience, better utilization of the healthcare dollar.So MVP is still on the backside paying the claims because it's their network.They're doing the processing of the bill.They're doing the processing of the claim, okay?So the mechanics of that is, you know, the member will still go to the doctor, will still have an MVP card, they don't have a trust level on it, but it'll be a MVP card to an MVP network doctor.They submit the claim, the doctor submits the claim to MVP, MVP processes it, and MVP then bills us, we bill the city.So we're kind of an intermediary there, and we also help in tracking that and reporting it and working with the city through their healthcare committee or however in the future.And so MVP then takes that hundred dollar bill from the doctor's office, they mark it up to a hundred, a certain amount- - Typically, it's the other way around.They negotiate it down.Okay, so, whatever they end up paying the doctor's office- - Yeah.We pay them plus a processing fee, right?You're paying them an administrative gain, which we've knocked down from the current.So what is an administrative fee?Do we know?What is?Is it consistent or is it variable?It's a consistent fee per member per month.Okay.Just so I can take a sum of that, how much is that fee?Do we know?Roughly $60.We're going to be providing that final accounting number after, but that's per contract per month, and right now it's in the twice stacked range, - So $60 per month per?Employee.Employee.Member.Per member per month, which is an employee.Per member.We have about 800 covered lives, just under 2,000.800 employees, just under 2,000 covered lives.It's a family of four, it's 60 for each person?No, just for the employee.Just for the employee, okay.$60 a month per employee.Okay.And that's what they had marked up or that's their processing fee.That includes all the services.That's what they get paid out of pocket okay.And then from there, it goes to you, right?You are then adding up functionality in terms of helping send our employees to the right direction, right.Choosing the generic versus the name brand, things like that.Well, that's the proactive component, but yes.Okay.And so then what is the- - With each of the vendors, there is a built in administrative fee that will come to us.Each of the, vendor meaning doctor's office?MVP. - MVP, okay.Pro-Act.So that's included.Okay, so- - There's no additional charge.So MVP is gonna get 60 bucks and they're gonna get a portion of that $60 to you?Yes.Okay.Yeah, it's called, I like to call it an administrative service credit.We can't take as a trust any commissions, so you're saving money as you are what I said before, by going self-insured, you're saving on the insurance tax, because when you're an insured product, you have to pay the state of New York tax, which is typically about 2% of premium, and so we save you that, and that's where some of those savings is generated.All right, so this is basically $60 per employee, that's our total costs on top of whatever medical expenses anybody- - Claims or claims.Use, right, claim.And then you have the medical loss, I guess, the stop loss, which is kind of the, if there's a huge claim, someone falls out of an airplane, and it's $10 million worth of expenses right- - I don't like the airplane, but yeah.But some high dollar metal, one time, you know, unusual circumstances, very costly, that kind of limits or liability so to speak, right?That's a $500,000 limit?It's a $100,000 limit.Oh, a $100,000 limit.Per employee, or?Okay.100,00 per employee.And then what is the cost of that insurance meaning for us?Do we have an estimate?Currently, your stop-loss costs on your city plan, which is already partially co-pay, $125 per employee who participates per month, and currently our quote on that are significantly less, in the $80 range per employee who participates.Yeah, just to understand, and I apologize, this is Eric Lentilla, he's our senior consultant for the trust, just so that you know who's talking.You currently have stop loss for your city plan, so this would just be an extension of that.But we actually feel as we can reduce that amount drastically to bring in- - It's going to be in the $40 range per employee, even though we won't know that until we actually go out.Right now, it's 125, right?And so you said about 80.80 something.83 and change, so $40 less.Oh, $40 less, okay.All right, so 80 plus to 60, right?It's $140 per employee on top of whatever medical expenses they have.Okay.I just wanted to bring to light too, 'cause like we kind of glanced by it.I believe our per employee administrative cost is now about double what you said.This is in dollars, right?I thought that kind of got lost, and I think that's important too.Absolutely.Any other questions?Just one more question.Is this, a function of this trust, would they be looking at an audit of employee insurance?People who may have double insurance, if they work at state?People have insurance from where they work, somebody works for the state, somebody works for the city of Schenectady, both their insurers are through there.Is there a way to determine that a city's not paying, certainly not twice, but somebody is already insured under a spouse's insurance or a family plan, is there a way to determine that wouldn't include that person, that they're already insured?Quite honestly, that's probably something that would have to be negotiated.There are things that I don't know.Does the city offer a buyout currently?Yes, we do.We also opt the buyout to single members and to families.They're not advised to take advantage of that.But what about our retirees?Or maybe who have lost a spouse in their retirement and yet there's still- - Well, there is a thing that you can do, which is called eligibility And what that does is it looks at dependence.The state of New York actually just undertook a huge study.Unfortunately, the results of that that came out, then the governor passed the expansion of dependent students, and then through healthcare reform, you can now cover your child up to age 27.So everybody who took a walk had to be put back on, but there are, I'm not sure that we could find a company that would do it for you, it's a very specific focused type of study, and you know, you've got, you have some HIPAA stuff that you need to be careful of, but there are studies out there.It does cost money.I don't know what the ROI would be, return on investment would be for a group of your size, but if it's something that you've never undertaken, it might be something that you want to talk about considering the future, because sometimes there are savings there.I just said, will employees be required to have reenrollment now too?Since, you know, you just talked about how the part's changing, so are our employees going to have to complete new forms to get this new insurance?No, what they'll do is go through your typical option transfer period that you have.They will get new cards that show that it's the trust, but as far as re-enrolling, no, because it's the same exact two plans.Okay.So during the actual transfer period, we'll be around doing employee information days and what have you just to explain the change of the administration, but there is no change in benefit or plan.We want to try and start this as early as we can so we get as much information out in what I also call this dynamic review of health care on an ongoing basis.Generally the unions have been fairly open and willing to discuss scenarios, give better healthcare, you know, manage health problems better, and just ensure the wellness of employees, retirees, and dependents.Is this a, would this be a term agreement with the city trust or?This is done annually.Annual grants?We're looking to do it January 1st through December 31st.Even though I would say we're looking for a long-term relationship with this in terms of the flexibility there is afforded under this scenario.I just would like to turn in my one thing.As far as CanRx is concerned, right now you're offering CanRx only to the guys who are in the city plan on a water-trip basis, but now, we need standing on a water-trip basis for everyone who's in that Ethio plan.Right, right.You mentioned the unions that, I mean, does there need to be more discussion with the unions?This would transfer in place so that none of this shift would have to be negotiated.Even though we have negotiations open with some of the unions, and there's discussions on how to just better use the wellness plan through MVP, how do you do things with Ellis Medicine that are not directly dealing with the benefits so that everybody still gets the same level of coverage, but it's somewhat, just the added discussion of how do you better help the employees?How do you manage chronic conditions?How do you avoid conditions to the people, you know, having an annual physical, just staying ahead of the curve, early diagnosis of problems or symptoms.Who currently, MVP provides the processing, who currently provides the stop gap insure, that limit, the liability limit insurance?Is that MVP as well, or is it a different insurance company?It's AII. It's- - Are you talking about, provider of the stop-laws, we're looking at renegotiating that, as well if we can have a competitor's quote as less.So we're seeing if we can maintain the current provider, but if not, then we will switch providers.You have the ability to go out and bid it out and get- - Just so you know, there are specific carriers that only deal with stop-loss.It's typically not the health plan.Okay.Alright, cool.So part of that was where that number may vary a little bit where it's, the projection is $83 and change or something coming down from the 120.So that may vary a little bit based on the actual quote, but it's still a significant number of dollars on the table.Hopefully comes way down.Okay.Well, we'd like to get it down by better managing some of this things.You see the opportunity, some of the stuff that Jim Kelly's talking about at Ellis Medicine, some of the things that are in place with MVP, it's all here within the community.And again, we don't have, we've got a group that's big enough so that you can stand alone on it, but it's still small enough so that you can do some of these creative things, and again, better control the cost.I agree.Sounds like a good idea.Great.Any other questions?Do we need to move anything on this, or we just- - I need a resolution to- - Effective January 1, as far as the budget.Okay.And so, I mean, even though we don't have the exact given given bid out the price- - Well, this would start that process.They then would take a while to get the quote and finalize those numbers.Okay.All right.Looking for a motion to enter an agreement with CSEA trust, is that what we're looking to do?Yes.Just one more question before you go.Are we going to be able to see what the city uses as an existing plan right now, like cost benefit analysis side-by-side with the CSCA plan?Yep, we can do that.You mean the side-by-side benefit comparison?It's the exact same.The benefits are going to be exactly the same.Not the benefits.I mean, the cost.Cost analysis.Yeah, we can do the summary of that, and actually some of it is, it's summarized here without the cost being on the other side.So these are the estimated changes, you know, you know, like stop-loss, with the prescription change, the medical loss ratio, we're going to pick up the cash flow of the roughly 15% lag in that first, you know, 30 to 65 days.The last benefit management folks that we have is what?First Niagara.First Niagara.Flirts Niagara?Can we get something though that kind of shows our savings from this to this?Yes.Yes, we can.Okay, great.I think that's going to be helpful, because there may be questions coming up from other individuals about why this company and not that company, and just so we have the figures and we're convinced it's the right way to go.I mean, I certainly trust what you're saying, but it would just be nice to have it there too.All right, thank you.I appreciate that.Anybody have any questions?I'll move that we enter into contract with CSCA benefit trust.Second.All in favor?Aye.Can we have that summary done by Monday?Will it be ready for council?I know, again, most of it's outlined here, but we'll get it down so that you can- - Sounds good.Anything else before finance committee?Just going to say, did anybody have any general questions about the budget?I haven't seen it yet.I haven't looked at it yet.It was my understanding that the mayor was giving his presentation again tonight.Is that changed?I was going to do this summary again if you wanted it, so- - That would be helpful.Yeah.I too was out of town.You say you got, we got the PowerPoint.The actual budget proposal is a reduction in overall spending of $378,000 for a little under a half a percentage point cut.The kind of second summary is our overall tax levy, which has been fairly stable, but there's been an upward trend in that, in the proposal for 2013, is $32,120,000.It's a ongoing problem here in Schenectady where you just compare the state aid formula, our friends in state government, you look for some rationale in the formula, Schenectady gets a little over 11 million, 11.2 million.Troy, our good friends in Troy, nice people, there are 16,000 people less in Troy, they get a full million dollars more.You know, Utica, sister city, which is more comparable in size, even though there's 4,000 people less, it's a full $5 million more, and Niagara Falls, which in the, had some rough times like all upstate cities, they get $17 million.It's a huge chunk above, you know, what ours is in the $11 million.And there doesn't seem to be any rationale in that formula.It puts the city of Schenectady just at an inherent disadvantage.Looking at revenue items that increase payment lieu of taxes goes up by $880,000.That's from some of the pilots that are in place and they ramp up each year.So that there's a greater amount that's paid, and it's also something that is because of the GE island dream that is in place.The county sales tax agreement with the money for the demolition gives us an additional 719,000, our trash and refuge charges go up by over $400,000.Our interest in penalties and real property tax, projecting an increase of 400,000, the sale of properties that we're taking in foreclosure and doing the rehab, projecting approximately $300,000 on those, and Eric in the code office, we still have such a high rate of noncompliance from the rental certificate fees and just getting rental certificates in place, the code enforcements and the neighborhood sweeps now, we're getting better data on that, better follow up, and they're really doing a great job in code enforcement.A full year ago, we had Tom Wilson come in and reorganize that, put controls in place, better objectives, put measureables there.I believe that we can bring in, so he's added all of that in a additional $280,000 in rental fees, or rental certificate fees.The outstanding issues from parking fines and related citations of the police department, 10% of that is $235,000.It's a conservative number.That number has grown to what's owed us is in excess of $2 million, and I believe also with confidence that the police department with a more aggressive inspection on trucks and some other vehicle and traffic enforcement activities, we can bring in additional $100,000 on that.And those are primarily vehicles that exceed the weight limit.They have, like anything in life, you have people who engage in a high level of compliance and then people who kind of push the edge and you get a lot od trucks that are overweight and are non-compliant.They tend to have the greatest wear and tear on our roads.And there's also a fairly steep fine structure in place there where the revenue goes to the locality.So looking to be more aggressive in that.Yes, sure.Three things.The pilot, could you provide a detail of the pilot breakdowns?Yeah, we can do the full summary of that.Okay, and the other thing, for the rental certificate fees and the delinquent parking fines, do we have a number on that in terms of percentage of compliance with the rental certificates?Are we, you know, I think in terms of measuring, if we're at 10% compliance, we say, hey, we have a goal to say, we want to get to 50% the complaints by one year- - Eric's not here.You know, and with the delinquent parking fines, similar, you know, we write a hundred tickets, do 20 of them get paid, or- - The rental certificates.If you asked me that a week ago, I could have told you the number.Tonight, I'm drawing a blank.On the delinquent parking fines, the police department's grossly inept that we're not doing the follow-up.This number's roughly just 10 cents on the dollar.That's what, are we currently getting, in terms of, are we getting- - What was our current number?We, do I have that folder here?Stand by for slides.Right, and that's why- - This is from memory, but the rental certificate will get you the information in the pilot.The other slide farther down may answer your question on the parking.Okay.Major expenses, last year, we paid our retirement bill in full.This year, I'm recommending that we amortize it.That results in a net savings of about 1,300,000.Again, that cost has gone up.Our bill this year will be 11% higher than last year.It is a substantial number that, and we have no control over, determined that the state total.What's the number?Our total contribution for the retirement dues, - If you want to advertise it, it would have been 2.1 million for the ERS, for the employees, and about 6.5 for the police department.That's what we have here.Do we anticipate having to amortize it in future years?Or is this just a onetime?I don't think we've amortized in the past, have we?No. I don't know.I would like to say that we would not have to do it, and it really becomes a component of the growth rate.Controller's office has taken a very conservative projection in terms of the growth rate of both the common retirement fund and then the police and fire retirement fund.And as a result of that, it passes the costs down to the localities, local governments, and- - Just the retirement payments are a third of our tax money, right?I mean, running the numbers here.That's kind of an unsustainable situation.I mean, I think amortizing it isn't necessarily solving it.Not that I have an answer for how you solve it, but it just seems like- - It comes to the rate of return and the management of that fund at the state level.In some years, the city's contribution is pretty close to zero where the fund was aggressively managed, profitably managed, aggressive may be the wrong term for pension funds.But again, now the assumptions there I believe are overly conservative.But we don't have any, so discretion.They send us the bill, we can pay it.We can either pay the full amount or can they've allowed local governments this mechanism to amortize some of it, so it levels those payments off a little bit and minimizes the impact of these years when we've had, again, double digit increases.Is there any interest associated with that?Yes.The 3% for this year, they don't know, you know, what is going to be for the next year, but these are cardinals, like in 2004, the city did the same thing, but we ended up paying it back in two years.How many years were we amortizing?That's for 10 years.10 years.You have the option of it, but it's payable in 10.What do we think, we're going to run out?10 years?I don't know the answer to that.Probably in the three to four year range and assuming some stabilization at the state level, then- - What's the interest rate?Last year, it was 3%.This year it was 3%, so we want a good long cardinal- - They have that issued the number for last year, but it's gonna roughly that range.The post cost of the police department this year down 264,000, overall employee salaries down 121,000, our debt service is down $85,000, we see an increase of employment insurance by 132,000, we're looking to budget $225,000 increase for judgment and claims.In our hospital and medical insurance, again, even we're objecting the half million dollars in savings from CSCA, we'll still see a $680,000 increase in overall cost.What's driving that?Claims and just medical expenses.And that's why I believe shifting to this format gives us better controls, and again, if you want some of those more detailed numbers, Matt can provide those to you where we've just gone out for quotes with the MVP and other vendors.The fire department budget has an increase of $741,000.That is being done now with, where those staffing increases would offset some overtime costs and getting the command staff in the fire department to be able to explain and articulate the reasoning behind those as we get into the individual budget reviews of the council.So is that, so what you're saying is the offset is not figured in here.You're going to spend 741 more, but- - Staffing, yes.But we're not going to see these savings in overtime, 'cause the overtime budget may get caught by equal amount?Some of it is, and some of it is a net increase with staffing, where we've done more in terms of the arson investigations.I viewed them at 2.5%, and then obviously there were contract increases.Proposing a increase in the waste collection fee.It's about 38 cents a week.We are still not seeing the level of compliance in terms of our recycling.We have to do in a more aggressive citywide campaign to up the recycling.Because when you do the recycling, you reduce the tipping fees, which drops our overall cost.And that is something that I look forward to working with the council on to deal with that.Again, that's the right thing to do.Not bad.Why have you on their fence?Maybe they'll sell it.That could be.The slide, the 2013 budget has a reduction of 22 positions.Saving's there $180,000.Of those again, the swimming pools, or individual departments, position here and there, that full summary is available.The next page has, really the big problem is our collectibles, where you have outstanding property tax, 12.5 million, and there's an excessive $2 million out of the police department parking fines, and other summonses.We will have a presentation on some of those corrections techniques that we're looking to implement two weeks from tonight.You have to schedule it to put in on the calendar.The next page looks at the delinquent property taxes from 2001 through 2007.The actual numbers there are fairly low on each year as we've sold a lot of those to ATF, and again, we had some people clear those up as we went into the foreclosure process and you can see the balances that are outstanding.You know, beginning of this year, we had 18 million outstanding.We're down, as of the end of August, we're down 12 and a half million.People are paying those every day.And as we go through the next round of foreclosures, Jeb, how many houses are on that?Potentially taking back about 140 at the end of this month.So there's another round that where we start out with a large number of houses, people come in and pay up, and if they don't, then we're going to take the houses, go through the process to convert them back to some level of productive use, and hopeful that the, you know, what we've lost in property taxes, that we'll be able to recoup in the value of the property.And some of those we will do well on.Some of them, it's more of a challenge, but I believe that we cannot just leave the blighted property and pretend that these problems don't exist.We have to deal with them one way or the other, and it's getting that message out that we're going to be aggressive about this.That we want to work with people, and the council has been very sympathetic to owner occupied properties.In those cases, we want to continue that message, we want to work with homeowners, try and do it, but you have a high percentage of this where they are absentee landlords, they're property owners who I believe largely just should not be in the business of owning property.If they don't maintain it, if they don't keep it up, and people who haven't paid their taxes for 3, 5, 6 years, there's no other message that we can send out except that we don't want you here.And Carl, this is a summary of some of the numbers from parking tickets.So it's the ones, you know, people are getting through that first month, 36,000.And some of our actual writing of tickets have dropped a little bit.Like some of the staffing is down, some of the call volume has gone up in other areas, so that looking to refocus some of this effort with the traffic enforcement, with the truck interdiction in some of these other areas too.Again, when you have some of the traffic enforcement, the positive benefit is reduction in auto accidents, you get a higher compliance for just vehicle and traffic safety and the rules, and you get a safer city.And then where people don't comply, you have to pay fines, and this is the number where we're again, today sitting here where there's Two million, 300 and some thousand dollars outstanding.So in this bunch of predicts, collecting 10% of that, which I hope I can sit here next year at this time and tell you that was a very conservative number.Gary, what is the partial PD/DSIM?What is DISM?D-I-S-M. The one, two, three, four, five, fifth column.Dismissed, maybe?Partially paid.Partially paid or dismissed?Or dismissed.Yeah, basically, right, in the formula, - Okay.It may be that somebody was ticketed at one level, the court may adjudicate it, and say they had some reason for it, which was a lower fine for other things.Okay.I just didn't know what it stood for the top.Great.And there's no way to tag numbers on this that DMV could hold their registration like they do with?I have had that discussion with people in the state.We're looking to make that part of a formal presentation.There are some mechanisms to tag your registration or your license renewal, really looking for stuff that is more comprehensive, that in the past, where you had somebody who ran up a lot of parking tickets, they would put the car, register it in the spouse's name, sibling's name, child's name, and we're looking to find ways to avoid that and actually hold individuals accountable.The- - Could I- - Yes.About the parking, could, you know, in times past they've done amnesty, which people, you know, they get an opportunity to get a break and they owe lot, they'll come and pay it.Is that being considered at all?We've done it a couple of years ago and the net result was not as positive as we thought.You do get some people that do it, but it's not this big tidal wave of people realizing their civic responsibility and all of a sudden showing up Monday morning and wanting to pay.We can look at that, and get it some, like we could do a more detailed presentation kind of do an analysis on that.We're, in this point, more skeptical of it, but more than willing to discuss it or look into it.You're wanting to see in this slide is the total number of tickets issued, so we can say, okay, in 2011, we issued 10,000 tickets and only, you know, 5,000 got paid or did 1000 get paid or did 9,000 gt paid.And I know, of all the tickets issued, how many people are paying them?How many people are not paying them?Look at the one thing, like when you said, why don't we get the property taxed?We put that list out in public access and kind of, there's some names that you- - Scan.Yeah, and so we put that, you know, we may not run everybody that's got $10 ticket outstanding while we're doing this, but, you know, pick a threshold of a hundred dollars or more, put it up there, get that out.The next page deals in property tax rates, where there it reflects relative stability, but an upward trend.After the reval, which was a, new numbers were used in 2010.In the 2012 year, we're looking at a tax rate of 1335.This is on a budget I'm submitting, we increase the tax rate to $13.91.Next page says a summary of the difference in using the house placed on a hundred thousand dollars assessment.$1,391.Page after that, again, water fund, sewer fund, and golf fund, posing no rate increases in any of those.The water fund proposed budget is actually a slight decrease of $84,000.The sewer fund projected expenses going up by $287,000.There's actually a bond issue that was paid off this year so there's more money in the sewer fund to be able to deal with that.Some of that's just the old aging infrastructure, and again, with the golf fund, projecting revenue growth of approximately a hundred thousand dollars and no projected increase in fees there.Is there any, I know in the past, we've had the discussion of the laterals in ownership, and we had not- - It was still a fine.Is that part of the budget?There is a component of that that is part of this budget, but it is going within the existing fee structure.And this done somewhat humorously, but this is the 2% tax cap.Sounds simple.Makes sense to me.You take the prior fiscal year tax levy minus the reserve amount including interest earned, multiply that times the tax based growth factor, then you add the pilot's receivable in the prior fiscal year minus the tort exclusion amount of the prior fiscal year, and then you multiply all that by the allowable levy growth factor minus the pilots receivable in the coming fiscal year, and then plus any available carry over, and that comes up with your net number.And I will not deal with any questions on that.I don't think I came up with any, surprisingly.Okay.Thank you, Gary, for doing that with us again.If I do it again, I look forward to the ongoing discussion.It's part of the budget review.It is a dynamic process, and given we always look for ideas and concepts to try and do things better and more efficiently.Any questions?Not right now.Anything else to come before the finance committee?I move that we adjourn.I second that.All in favor of adjourning?Aye.Aye, we are adjourned.Alright, I will call to order government operations.Italian-American tribute, Mr. Brady.Yeah, so October is Italian American cultural month, so I'd like to propose that we honor Italian Americans for my proposal.As my last name being Parazzo, I concur.I hope so!Extended invitation for everybody to come down next Monday night.Free pizza.Everyone becomes Italian when there's free pizza.We should have people from the Sons of .I assume you're going to take care of all that?Get the information from Mr. Thorne?Terrific.I think the displays went up this morning, too.Yeah, Delores Scooly, you said, I think was going to put them up, yeah.Great, okay.Who's gonna draft a resolution?It looks like there's, I thought I saw a copy of one in here.Yeah, it's here.Oh, is it?Okay.Yep.It's in our packet.It's right here.It said \"draft\" on it.Okay.Oh, look at that.As long as I got the information.You already did it.I already did it?It's already been done.You know about- - Someone to move that?Okay, all right.I'll move that.Okay, I'll second.All those in favor?Aye.Any other business to come before government operations?We adjourn.Okay, I'll second.All those in favor?Aye.We're going to call city development and planning to order.Mr. Strikeland?Thank you.The planning commission has held public hearings on 14 developments.And right now I'm requesting a call for a public hearing, and on your memo, is says October 22nd.However, I just found out I cannot be at that meeting, but I'd like to have the public hearing on November 12th.And about two weeks after that.The four changes include number one, waterfront zoning.Right now, we have a current height restriction of 35 feet within 200 feet of the river and 56 feet, which is four stories, beyond.The intent of waterfront zoning is issued to preserving the character of the waterfront and doing appropriate development there was also to create some new urbanist, higher development density there and limiting the heights to really four stories did not make sense, especially as you get, 200 feet is pretty far away.What we're requesting to do instead of making it require variance, we're basically just allow for 56 feet.Anything over that requires planning commission review with a special use permit.And most likely, at least with Alco, I believe they will probably be coming in with an overlay or planned mixed use district.It's not definite yet, but planning commission will be reviewing the whole site together as one comprehensive unit most likely.So that's the first change, and then there's just a few minor changes.You can see there, funeral homes changes not permitted, nursing homes changes not permitted to special use permit, and OTB parlors, I'm not even sure why that's its own thing in the zoning ordinance, is permitted.Waterfront OTB parlors?The waterfront yes.It's on the water a lot.I don't know.It's a water enhanced activity, I guess.So we're going to have an OTB parlor on the waterfront?Riverboat gambling!If you wanted it, it's allowed now.If you approve it.Item two, historic district review.When we passed the comprehensive plan in 2008, we added in requiring review of any state or nationally registered property.And New York state has come back to us and asked us to remove that.It's a disincentive for anybody who wants to become registered basically, and actually they stated in a letter that I think I included with your copy.I have a copy.Is it in there?No. I have a copy, I can put in your mailbox.It's a letter from New York state parks, historic preservation requesting that that be removed.They say we would have to basically designate any one locally anyways to be able to review it locally for a start.The third item, I believe we talked about this already, but we didn't hold a public hearing.I pulled it.This is just changing the zoning on half of a parcel on Kings Road.Does that sound familiar to anybody?When I was on the voting board, yeah.Okay.It came up.So in 19- - We never moved forward with it, but it was, they were selling, they were trying to sell the building and like half of it was zoned commercial and half was zoned residential.So they got variance.55 resolves on the Marshall, when the 55 zoning ordinance changed it somehow, and split it in half, and it took us another 55 years to figure that out and it was same ownership all that time.So basically it's just changing the whole thing to C2 commercial, and the final one is just technical corrections.One of them is off premise time and on-premise time at the same definition, so we just have to add a word in there, and the rest are just corrections of numbers that are referred to in its own ordinance.Questions?Thank you.Now I'll entertain the motion to call for the public hearing on November- - 12th.12th.So moved.Okay.I'll second that.All in favor?Aye.Okay.The other item on the agenda is this is disability awareness month, so I thought it would be again, appropriate to a resolution.Adopted.Okay.Second?Second.All in favor?Aye.Okay.There's nothing else to come before city development and planning.I'll entertain a motion to adjourn.I will so do.I so second.All in favor?Aye.Call to order claims committee.I believe this is a quick succession.Claim?Yes.And so a motion to go to an executive session.So moved.Is there a second?Second.All in favor in going into executive session?Aye.Moving into executive succession.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/committee_10_01_2012.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/committee_10_01_2012.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/committee_10_01_2012.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/committee_12_07_2015/committee_12_07_2015.mp3", "text": "Ready?We are ready?I will call finance committee to order.We have a final review of the DSI, well the DSAD 2016 budget.Do we have anyone...No one spoke at public hearings.Yep.So, any questions?Or comments?No, so, I will ask for a motion then.I'll second.Okay, all in favor?Aye.Very good.And then the Upper Union Street that was in 2016 budget once again.No, no speakers?Great, easy.It's very similar to last years.Questions, comments?I'll move it.Second.All those in favor?Aye.Thank you very much.Any other business to come before the Finance Committee today?I move we adjourn.Second.All those in favor?Aye.Thank you, we're adjourned.All right I'll call City Development and Planning to order.First item is a ceremonial resolution for the annual toy run by Lee Sykes and Broadway Choppers.Ms. Parazzo?Yep.I know that we've certainly noted some other Toys for Tots efforts, and Mr. Sykes has been a business owner in the city for a considerable amount of time.And this is his seventh annual Toys for Tots run, and he really organizes it all himself.And they get between, depending on the year and the weather, of course, anywhere between 30 and 100 motorcyclists that deliver toys from his shop on Kings Road down to the St. James Square Plaza.So I thought it'd just be a nice recognition of some grassroots efforts.Um hm.Okay.Any questions, sir?No. - I'll move it.Okay - Second - All in favor.Aye.A revocable permit for Ya Ya's House, Mr. Wallan.Good evening.Good evening.This is the first of two revocable permits.Number 600 Ya Ya's House at 170 Lafayette Street.This is a former cafe that is being repurposed as another restaurant.Has gone through government's approval.I see no reason for not issuing it.Questions?If not, I'll entertain a motion to approve it.Okay, Mr. Ferrari.seconded by, Ms. Gruefield, All in favor?Aye.Okay.And second one?Second, Number 599 is for a sign that you might recognize.It was a Metro PCS, the tenant is now relocating down the road from the building that they were in.However, the insurance and all of the permits are address specific.So they needed to apply for a new revocable permit for the new address.Questions?Entertain a motion to approve it?Okay, Mr. Ferrari - So, - Did you have a question?I'm sorry.It's okay.So this is currently, it looks like near Hewlett and looks like Saint Hewlett.So it's there now, and it's moving further down.Is that what you're saying?Okay.Okay.So then I'll entertain a motion to approve Second?All in favor?Aye.Okay - Thank you.Yep - And final review for the electric vehicle charging stations, and they didn't have any comments, Mr. Shykeman?Didn't hear of any questions.Okay, so I'll entertain a motion to approve this, moved?Seconded?all in favor?Aye.Alright.Then I'll entertain a motion to recess.I'll move.So we got one in Planning and do Executive Session later.Okay.Moved and seconded all in favor?Aye.Called to order Public Safety.First item on, What?Were you watching us?I wanted to make an entrance, sorry.First item on the agenda, 2015 State Homeland Security Grant Program.I'm so sorry.I apologize.I thought we were further down the agenda so, not that we don't want to get in.I'm sorry.Homeland Security first.Yes.All right.This is obviously Homeland Security looking to participate.I have a cold I apologize.Albany in Rensselaer County, Troy, Albany PD. And with us, it's a yearly application we make to Homeland Security for, let's say infrastructural needs.We requested more than $130,000 dollars.In that we requested 110,000 would be for license plate readers stationary on intersections.And 20,000 , sorry for my for voice.Twenty thousand for more portable radios for the department.So again, the license plate readers, we have some out there right now.There are three different intersections within the city.Not allowed to say publicly where the are at this point.Well we could say, But they're more for the higher crimes.This money here, will kind of be earmarked towards entrance places, cities itself, Homeland Security for bridges, infrastructure and so forth, that may be added And again, with the portable radios they're kinda replacing old ones.Stockpile some newer ones, so if we get a major incident, we can share them with other people and so forth.That's all I got.So the plan is to use 110,000 for the license plate reader, - Correct.and 20,000 for the portable radios - Yes.We're trying to grow our license plate.License plate readers really enhance our capabilities from the neighborhood camera projects that we have.Right now we only have approximately with the county, 180 cameras within the city.The license plate readers obviously, give us that much more data, and intel if we have an incident and proactive policing, so.Any questions?Go ahead Mr...So how many, approximately how many, readers do you think we're going to get for the amount of money.I don't know, last time we, we, we used approximately, if I remember correctly $100,000 or so.But that, we had to build a, we had to get a server, you know, we had to spend some infrastructure money.So we can add more cameras on road.Also, anytime mobile cameras that we get, we can add onto the system.So we had to build some infrastructure.It also, I can't answer it because it depends on the intersection.Okay.One intersection we did, we needed like five cameras.Yeah.Because it's just such a big intersection.So depending on, we haven't really kind of designated which exactly.We're gonna have some meetings on it.Which intersections we want to do, but it may only do a couple of intersections.It may do five intersections.We can kind of present that to you at a later date if need be, but that's where we're at with it.Very good, good, good funds.Any other questions?I have a motion?I'll move it.I'll second it.All in favor?Aye.Next item, on the agenda the 2016 N.Y.S Special Traffic Options Program to stop DWI. - Apologize, my voice again.I'm losing it.This is a yearly thing again, it runs through the county and then they kind of break it up, disperse it to the agencies within the county.And against participate in statewide DWI saturations throughout the year.I, kinda marked the calendar year wrong.It's my fault.It's 2016.So obviously we don't have to use this in three days.Can you do that?We can, can trust us.No, it's for a year.And again, more easily to join the initiatives that we hope.You know, you see some of these things that initiatives go up around holidays and so forth.Then we, we participate in, the state obviously reimbursed us for overtime for those.Again, this is a yearly grant that, the amount has gone up every year, and I pray that Lieutenant Stickton is with us tonight.It's really his, his baby, his efforts.He's the one that makes the wheels turn so, - Good.Questions?Do I have a motion?I'll move it.I'll second it.All in favor?Aye.I get to sit down.Nice doing business with you.Thank you, thank you.The next item, on the agenda is, a police vehicle fitout bid to Niskayuna Tire & Service.Ms. Dechano.I give you the fiscal overview of what's before you.In the, in 2015 the city determined that eight new police vehicles were to be acquired.And the city would afford to do that earlier this year.Specifically got delivery around May of 2015, and certain fitout of the vehicles, needed to be done outside of the city.There were a few things that were done inside of the city, some painting and that type of thing, correct?Yes - And, and so we've gone out to bid for the rest of the fitout.That's like the light bars and that type of thing.At three bids were received, with the lowest being 71,361.20 as shown in your legislative request.That was your Niskayuna Tire & Service.A vendor that, from this perspective is new to the city for this type of work.So Anthony Ferrari, Richard and these two gentlemen, Assistant Chief Falbo and Lieutenant Stickney, worked together to kick the tires, pardon the pun.and make sure that everything, you know, that Niskayuna Tire can, can meet the needs and the service requirement that we have.And it was determined that they can.This will be coming up under budget from what we had projected would be for these vehicles, with the fitout.And we're requesting that you consider such an award.Questions?So, just for clarification.We don't have a vendor in the city that does this type of work, or they're bid came in higher, or?Historically the city had worked with another vendor, which is, is in the local area also, but they came in as the second bid.Their bid was about $11,000 more, 11,500 more.Significant - Yep - And it's really sort of a good thing from the perspective of in the past we haven't really seen a lot of activity, but we had quite a few downloads of the bid.And then three people that did respond, and staff was able to take a look at this new vendor.New to us from his perspective and determined that it would be appropriate to move forward.This is going to be fitout for eight vehicles.Eight vehicles, right.I know you checked out this Niskayuna Tire.You think their capable of doing because it's pretty extensive work, isn't it?It is, but the, the vendor has received training in certain areas that regarding the installation of some of the components, so.What exactly are the components that are to be installed?The lighting system, the communication system.The camera system.Our in-car video actually requires a separate certification because we're still under warranty with that.So they went out on their own to get certified, to be able to install the items that we currently have.In-house we're doing the painting and the decals.Yes.Things like now I understand there's a problem with decals not appearing though.No. - Is there no problem?No, we've had in the past, but nothing recent.You've taken care of it now.Yeah.I know there's some vehicles in the lot that were that were failing.I don't know if it was the vendor or the applications.I don't know.Yeah.I mean, some of the vehicles that had had some peeling and stuff are older vehicles.They don't have that much of a warranty with them, the decals.The vendors are guaranteeing us a certain amount of time for the bid for a 100% warranty on any of their work.Materials, and craftsmanship, so.Any other questions?I move this.Second?All in favor?Aye.Thank you.Thank you.Any other business before Public Safety?I move we adjourn.Second.All in favor?Aye.Thank you.I'd like to order, call to order Public Service and Utilities.First item on the agenda is the adoption of various sections of streets to be incorporated and to consolidate the local street and highway improvement program.Mr. Wong.Hello.The item in front of you is kind of a general housekeeping item.Every year the New York State Department of Transportation sends the Department of Engineering our local inventory of highway and streets and we review it.This year We decided to do a thorough evaluation of it, and we came up with a couple of additions to the streets and some clarifications that we wanted made.Only added up to about a half a mile of road but we wanted this to be our.It is our state official document that they use every year.So we wanted to make sure it was accurate as possible.The list that you have in front of you is what we found to be either changes or admissions.The reason that it is in front of you today as a council is that checking our historical books.And I guess what we would call, Chuck, what were they called?The legislative books, prior we could not find any history of adoption of these streets.And since we couldn't find any history of adoption of the streets by the council, we needed to pass something that we could put with our paperwork to say that the city officially recognizes that these are city streets.So, we can't just have them on paper like this, so that the resolution that you're in front of would be the adoption or the recognition that these particular segments of city streets are in fact owned and maintained by the city.Cool.Any questions?So let's just take a look.Do you have the list in front of you by any chance Chris?No. - The very last one Strong Street.So that column all the way to the left.What is that?And what are the other two designates at the far right?What?Street name.Yeah.So Strong Street between Hewlett and Summit.That's what it is, between those areas.Correct.Okay.Revised beginning and revised end.Very good.So in some cases too, the street might've been recognized, but the ends were blank because the DOT didn't know where it began and and, began and ended.We also picked up a couple of smaller alleys and roads.So yeah, you see, it says 1.62, as there is a change in length.We actually found some that they were actually had a little bit long.So the total balance, we ended up picking up, I believe three quarters of a mile.And that's what goes into the evaluation of our chips money.So it's not going to change much.It's just to have this as accurate, so.I think we said, we had 171 miles and now would have 171.75.There you go.Thank you.Any other questions?I'll move.I'll second.All in favor?Aye.Second item on the agenda is a call for public hearing to incorporate 810 Arch Street.So we didn't have any backup, but this is a call for public hearing and we can have more backup as we go forward, but we just wanted to approach this for now for a call for public hearing.810 Arch Street was taken down by the city.810 Arch Street is parcel 44 on your map.And it was a very odd parcel, probably one of the most unique parcels in the city as it was in, appeared to be in the road.And it was actually in front of two houses.Wow.So the roof line actually, snow from the roof line would actually fall onto the adjacent houses sidewalks.And it was a very odd situation if you were to see it.If you Google street view it, it's a very odd situation.So the house is now down.So the idea is that we would like to incorporate that as part of Arch Street.So that it now part is part of the road and that these two houses, parcels 45 and 46, will be on Arch Street.Any questions?I'll move it.I'll second.All in favor?Aye.Thank you.Any other business to come before Public Service and Utilities?I move we adjourn.Second.All in favor?Okay, thank you.Call to order Health and Recreation.One item on the agenda is ceremonial resolution of the greenhouse.Ms. Parazzo.So a group of volunteers have gotten together and done yeoman's work at the greenhouse under the leadership of Mr. Soran.They've done regular cleanups every Thursday throughout the summer.They had a plant sale in the fall.Proceeds going to make repairs to the greenhouse, heat the greenhouse, to protect the glass.We did have some glass breakage last winter, and I understand that they were there today.And we was it 36 panels I thought I saw?Thirty something, yeah.Yeah.That they either repaired or replaced or screwed in tighter, you know.So, we're protecting our greenhouses, which are very, very important.And again, group of citizens that have gotten together on their own time to work really hard to protect an important part of the city.So I would just like to have that recognized.I'll move it.Second.Second - I'll second.Okay.All in favor?Okay.Okay anything else to come before Health and Recreation?If not, entertain the motion to adjourn.Adjourn.Second.All those in favor?Aye.We're adjourned.I'll reconvene City Development and Planning and ask for a motion to go into Executive Session.So moved.Seconded.All in favor?Aye.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/committee_12_07_2015.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/committee_12_07_2015.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/committee_12_07_2015.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/committee_10_07_2013/committee_10_07_2013.mp3", "text": "So I'd say we'll probably get out of here in plenty of time.Okay.Do you wanna wait for Denise, or just get started?Michael will be home tomorrow.Actually he's back from Saudi Arabia, but he's coming home tomorrow for a week.He hears bang, bang.* - Yeah, oh, yeah.Bang.Bang.Bang.Yeah.A lot of this stuff's goin' on anyway.All right, I'm gonna call to order City Development and Planning Committee.* First item on the agenda is entitled \"Schenectady's Economic Strengths\".And this was the brainchild of our deputy clerk, Chad Putman.And I'm gonna ask him to tell you about what this involves.Sure, thanks Peggy.So I'd approached Peggy and the idea is to have the city council, at the direction of the city, or the city council president, would host an economic strengths review, in a public, structured, and scheduled way.The presentations would take place at the beginning of the city council meeting once a month and last about ten minutes or so.And the presentations would feature locally based leaders in corporation, industry, area business districts, healthcare, education, and non-profits.And the presentations would focus on the industry or businesses' generated revenue, the number of jobs the business or corporation creates or offers here in the local area, the innovation and production that's taking place, along with a review of the businesses' history and future planning.So it's an opportunity to bring in a lot of the great economic strengths that we have and have them do a quick presentation at the beginning of the city council meeting over the next 12 months.I figured it'd be a good chance to show off some of the positive things that are happening and highlight some of the good stuff.So I think it's a great idea, and we're gonna start on- - We have scheduled for November Phillip Morris from Proctors has agreed to come in and be the first presentation.And we're working on finalizing plans to have Transfinder* come in and speak to city council in December, so we're underway.Okay, I just wanted this for information purposes.Good, thank you.All right, ceremonial resolution for John Senisi.Ms. Brazzo, are you gonna ask for that?Yes, we just recently got an email that Mr. Senisi, which was one of the founding partners of Synthesis, would be retiring after many years of service in the community, and also commitment to the community.And we thought it would be nice to recognize him with a ceremonial resolution.Very good.So, I will entertain a motion to approve that.I will move it.Okay.Second.All in favor?Aye.* - Okay, the next two items deal with the alcohol waivers that we've had a public hearing about that and just needed to get it back on the agenda.Ms. Brazzo, anything else you wanted to say on those?No, actually it's funny because I was just about to email and say, \"Look what's * to this\"?and I opened up the agenda and it was there, so.Do you have an update, Mr. Pelisepo, on the two?You were going to go to get support to put a cross* at Central Park Pavilion alcohol waiver and also the closing the streets off regarding the * side that we saw that we had on the agenda.* - I should have....I'm sorry, I don't have any specific information about that today.What we were talking about before, the situation is kinda different.But we- - Put it on the agenda for two weeks.For two weeks.I'll make sure that we something to- - And I know that Mr. Erikson was just looking for maybe some more specific costs associated with the closing of the streets* so we can make sure that proposed * And we're looking at somewhere around $200 or so, but I have to make sure that we at least covered our costs with what we have And then the park fee...We had a public hearing on it already, didn't we?Yep.But nobody came.No. - No. So, just what we proposed to do.* - Okay.So, we're holding this for two weeks then?Okay.I'll call for a public hearing regarding the zoning change.Mr. Shikeman.* - Thank you.When we adopted the new zoning ordinance in 2008, we made a change in the way information goes out with presenting a zoning ordinance.The R3 district, which is multiple family district, basically, and you can see in what I handed out, it's intended to accommodate new and existing residential development at a moderately higher density and it's intended to permit, subject to a special permit, higher density residential development.So that's what's in the intent but when you get into the actual language there, there's no mechanism by how we'd do this or anything that sets guidelines for it.So it's probably the planning commission about it and they made a recommendation that, basically, and the other thing they say is that the R3 district, which is supposed to be at higher density, the density is the same density as what's allowed in the two family district, okay?So basically, the proposal that the planning commission would like to do is keep the residential density at 2,250 per dwelling unit, the same as the two family, but also allow it to go for lots that are larger than a half acre, up to one unit per 1,250, subject to the issuance of a special use permit that gives some kind of a mechanism by how you get this higher density.It's only for larger lots, and I should also state, at the same time, this came to light when there was a proposal to redevelop the lot across from Home Depot on Cambridge.So they wanted to go to a higher density that was * free but all they could do was the same that was allowed in the two family district.That's the first piece.So if anybody has questions on that before I get to the second piece...Is there a specific area that you're talking about right now?Is there a specific area that has to be developed*?Well this one here, I mean, it came to light because of the R3 district, which is the area around Wait Loopy Towers* on Cambridge over by Same Golf Course.There are many multiple family zoning areas: Netherlands village, Netherlands, Sheridan village area.There's also, along the union street corridor*, multiple family districts but most of those wouldn't be allowed because those are smaller lots under 1/2 acre.So mostly this would impact the larger areas.All of Kings Road on the same side as the * development, the Serafini* development, and the * Parkland senior housing.So that's another area where it would be.Mr. Erikson?Would it also play in, like, Alcove* or any developments going on there, or not really?No, Alco is commercial and it makes use of development and that's already allowed at a higher density, the 1,250, as of right...There was talk of doing residential...Right, high density residential areas*.They can do that.Oh, they can do it under the current...They can do that.I mean, it's within the guidelines, but Alco allows for higher development than R3.Oh. - Downtown allows for higher development than R3.Any questions?And the other one is just a clean up of uses requiring site plan.Again, with the 2008 ordinance, the special permit changed from the zoning board to the planning commission and language was put in there that basically says that any case where a special use permit is required, no separate site plan review shall be required.What that was supposed to imply was that you didn't have to come in twice.You could come in at the same meeting, but what it implies is that if you come in for a special use permit, you don't need to come in for site plan review.So we just want to strike that language, which means you're gonna be doing both.So this is a call for a public hearing.Any other questions or comments?I'll entertain the motion to move that.Okay, second by Ms. Brazzo.All in favor?Aye.* - Okay.A revocable permit for Tie Tie, inc.* - This is a revocable permit for the Tie Tie* Bistro, formerly the Bangkok Bistro on the corner of Erie and State*.A little unique to the Tie Tie Bistro is that it is on a corner, and that this is for both a sign and an awning.Both were existing, however, they will be new now due to the building's name change and ownership change.I went out to the site and examined where the awning currently is.If you see here, there is lighting already installed.And it looks kind of bad right now because it's not covered by that, so this is to replace it like you see in the rendering with a new front awning and then a new sign on the Erie Boulevard side where there originally was a sign that said the previous business.Questions?Generally, though, the same dimensions...Yes, *.Yep.Everything is generally the exact same setup.I'll * it.Okay.And second.This board appeal*, all in favor?Aye* Okay.Thanks.Thank you.And then the 108 Brandywine* will pull that for executive session.So I'll entertain the motion then to recess city of...* Oh, wait, we have one more resolution.* Go ahead.Yes the working * which is we put I just want to remind you that we'll go on the 15th*.Yeah, that's already been passed.Yes, we've already approved that.Yes.And also, Friendship Baptist Church* I believe are having their 74th anniversary and they want a ceremonial resolution but to be given at the church, not city council meeting.Okay.I move that.All right.Second.All in favor?Aye.Okay, so now I will entertain a motion to recess City Development Planning.Okay, movement is processed, second * is supported * All in favor?Aye.* - All right.Health and rec.Call to order Health and Rec meeting to breast cancer awareness month.Yeah.This is an annual resolution we do.And representatives from the fire department will come, you know, with their pink shirts and also from their foundation* to accept it.All those in favor?Aye.* - Okay.Italian-American heritage month.Mr. Riggey*.Yes.We did that last year for the first time in a while, I think, so * the same resolution designating October as American heritage * month.I move.I second.All those in favor?Aye.* - Okay, domestic violence awareness month is *.Again, that's another one I think we've done.We do annually.So I would just recommend we do that.I'm all in* - Second.All those in favor.Aye.Okay.And next we* the Woodlawn reserve.They have a hundred different topic,* but it's going to be pending.* So, Miss Peraza.* - Okay, if you remember, the city is holding some grant money that belonged to the Woodlawn preserve and the Woodlawn preserve strategic plan and things of that nature.And the * officer Vinny*, he looked at me and he said, \"You know, It would be great if we could have that money\".And I said, \"Well, we * will give you that money.We just ask you to please provide us with some documentation as to what the land is gonna be used for, what would going out of the preserve, that kind of thing\".And I just say, \"Here you go.This is for *\" You know?So in your packet is a tremendous amount of documentation as to what they've accomplished along with receipts from...And I think it actually exceeds the amount of the grant money.We need to find out the exact amount of that *.And I know you think it was 20.I think it was 2000 and something, if I remember right.But I just wanted to put it in there for you to review because, you know, it is technically money that's earmarked for the Woodlawn Preserve and * here has been doing a tremendous amount of work.So I wanted to put forth the council consideration to reimburse the committee for your work.That's already been expended.Well, I'm not sure there's money left.Ms. diGenova was looking into that.Did you?Yes.So * took a look at this and it appears that the grant was quite a while ago and the city did apply for Mr. Ritner, particularly, did apply for a $3,000 grant, but the state only allowed for $23,600 of grant funds.And the city actually along with and supporting Woodlawn disbursed $29,500 already using some of its own funds.So not that this should stop the council if you wanted to do something other than this, but the grant has been exhausted.Okay.That's good to know.If you could just send me word* of that and then I'll get that out * The last week, we had a balance hanging out there, but that was probably based on the 30,000.Yup.Okay.Thank you very much.Anything else from the Board of Health and Recreation?If not, * - So moved.Second.All those in favor, say, \"Aye\".Aye* - Adjourned.All right, I will call to order government operations.We're gonna talk about setting some parking rates * - It's my * hearing.And then at this point in time, the council didn't address * for what the parking meter rates could be, either set by the mayor or his deputy.So I guess if you just tell us what you were thinking for an upper limit, you could rewrite the legislation.Have you...* this question.Now, have you thought in terms of what you would recommend as an, you know, like a range?I mean, like, are we talking- - Something like five dollars for an hour.I don't think there was, you know, off the top of my head, how many times it would actually go up that high, but...I'm not sure only five dollars- - Too little power.* - I know in downtown *, like in the theater district, right around Capitol Rap, it's $1.25 for an hour.So it's, you know, that's at the highest rate that I've ever paid anywhere in the city.I mean, my thought is, you know, if we can do it this way to have kind of a two tiered rate, one is the general rates, right?Any day of the week, do you want to go down there?And we should set a limit of, like you said, $1.25, whatever our current downtown premium rates are.Maybe you get a little bit of room for movement on that.And then a special event rate.And we say, okay, special events can be no more than X number, you know, X amount.That way it would kind of, I think the resident community people that were coming here are sure that we're not gonna jack up the rates to $3 a minute or something ridiculous because, hey, we got up to five.So maybe if a two tier for two different situations.* One is for events and then one is for regular non event day.So whatever those numbers are, I guess we'd have to figure that out.But I think the two tiered approach might be maybe more appropriate *.Well, we had originally talked about setting a maximum and letting the parking people use their professional discretion as to anything up to that maximum.So, I mean, I don't know.Do we want to limit it totally two tiers?What if there was a third situation and...You know what I mean?I mean, there could conceivably be times it'd be free, too.Sure.Like, you know- - Right, but I think essentially what we with pop limit,* right?Setting a maximum.So if we said, $5, just the number that was thrown out, for an event that might be too low.But for an average Tuesday at noon, it might be too high.And so they're two different scenarios we have, especially events are clearly times where the rate is probably going to be higher, you know?And then...Personally, I think, you know, from someone who pumps money into meters on a regular basis, you know, it's that act of putting in a million quarters that makes you feel like, oh my goodness, you know, and differently than a new parking system, right?But my personal opinion is the $1.25 an hour is a decent maximum rate.I mean, when you're putting five quarters in, you're watching the change drop 12 minutes, you know, it's...But you know, that's just, I'm just throwing it out there.What are their current highest areas?$1 now.Is it $1 now?$1.Yeah.$1.I think * is $1.And* the other thing in conversation with the mayor, he used to say rather than designating him or his designee, that he would, correct me if I'm wrong, that you would like finance commissioner and I forget which the other one was.It was between the police chief and fire* even though the legislation was worded so it would be me or my designee that seemed to generate a level of controversy, just the nature of doing business here.So would you like us to officially change that, or?At this point, it's the product of the council except the rate to determine who's gonna sign it.I- - And * already asked, we should make a decision.Yeah.I personally think it could be the mayor.The council should decide what it is.In this case, I think the mayor would have the ability to make, you know, adjustments as needed, right?That's the job.I don't know.I wouldn't know if I'd be comfortable delegating that to, you know, somebody one layer, two layers below the mayor on a hierarchy.I think either the mayor or the town should be doing it.Right now, it's our job.We're saying, hey, we'll let somebody else do it.We'll have the mayor do it if that's more efficient, as long as we set the limit.Well, I think that if we set the high limit, having it be the mayor or his designee is...If the mayor is gonna designate somebody who's going to designate someone who has the ability to set it in a proper manner, right?He's not gonna say, you know, hey.Yeah, I agree with you.Joe, what would you like partner * today, you know?So my opinion is we set the maximum because it is a function as capital and then allow the mayor or his designee as he sees fit as the business person overseeing the city to change the rate within that structure.I agree.I agree.Is there- So is there any other discussion, or does- - No, we're gonna go with the $1.25?Does that $1.25 accommodate for events?'Cause I know there was concern with the special rates.I don't believe that we're in a * to have to do it separately, I mean, for us*.So this is just for regular parking?Correct.Back in business.* - All right, so do we want to handle both of them?Do we want to address both of them tonight, regular parking days and then special night parking rates?What are we going to do, what will be done with the existing meters right now?They're talking about setting all of the meters that way.Well, I think the existing meters we're looking to just leave as is, and as we phase them out and put the pay stations in, we would adapt the new flexibility * - And are there police stations in already?* - Yep.* - Okay.When do we anticipate they're going in?I have an order coming in...What did you have 'til the end of the month because you have to do something or we're gonna have meters that are programmed with the existing rates that we're gonna have to turn around and pay to have them reprogrammed for something different.So if we set a maximum rate, why would we have to have a different rate for special events?I mean, it would be at your discretion to adjust the meters, whether it was an event or not an event or everyday parking, the police have- If you set it at $1.25 an hour, and we decided we want to charge in the evening where it's now free parking, we wanted to charge for an event or on a Saturday or something else.I'm not sure the $1.25 would...Okay.So what we're talking about right now is within the parking limitation does connect to the say,* from eight in the morning till six at night or nine in the morning until six at night on Monday to Friday.That's what we're talking about right now.So you're talking about off hours- - It's the total unionization of eight or so if we want to do an event evening or some time there's multiple things happening, I think some places are getting up $10 for off street parking.Most department proctors are downtown.So you want the ability to be able to charge up to $10 and at this rate, it wouldn't get you there?For...I want an event rate so * council - So as the chair of the government operations committee there, could I ask that you put a proposal together, of what you would like to see happen with the parking and then we can work out- - We've gone back and forth a couple of times you're done hearing*, so it's really the decision of the council at this point.It sounds like we're going with $1.25 an hour, and then special event, $10.That would be the maximum...Mr. Walden.I just wanted to check with you, what would be the rate and what would the procedure to change the rate *?Because if we wanted to change the rate for the mayor, then we want to change it quickly or would it be via resolution or be a- - *, while they're talking, what's on the table right now?Is that the council will set...The council would set the maximum...Right.Excuse me, the council would set the maximum rate and then the mayor could use his discretion up to that maximum.Thank you.If he wanted to change it five times a day, you could continue to get five times a day.One of the issues that came up before was something that * and I talked about.I don't know if it was...It wasn't* an email regarding downtown, specifically the main corridor station.And it is a dollar right now, but going without...One of the discussions was about getting the...* The word was the items you rate * you wanted a certain vacancy rate, and you don't want the downtown in front of the property.And that lot being constantly filled.And what I would like is to doing this with the mayor and his designee, being able to set up the rates would be if we move it off, Just in that particular area, we're seeing a lot of camping out parking, to a woman of $1.25 and then observed for four months and possibly $1.50 and observe until we're getting that opening an attorney because that parking is meant for two hours.It's meant for people coming in is not meant for people to just feed the meter.So you have to find that balance.I just want to make sure that we're putting enough flexibility into that specific rate where we can find the balance because the new meters will allow us to zone the city a little bit easier.And that particular zone is what we're seeing a lot of low term and other areas we're going to be able to keep it right in that.But I just want to make sure that we can bring it to where we can find our baskets.Well, I, for one feel like the council certainly isn't, our specialty is not parking rates, right?But our specialty is oversight so that we make sure everything's fair.But I think we always want the department leaders and Mayor to come to us and say, this is what we propose, and this is why, not necessarily that we want to make it up from scratch.So, if it's your recommendation that we start at $1.25 but that we keep in constant communication with one another.I certainly feel comfortable with that.And then it seems like the special event issue is something different.Correct?So do we need to take a vote on this and then put a special event with a special event on for two weeks?Is it something we want to talk about tonight and put legislation together for?I wouldn't refer to council, make a recommendation for legislation, so we can put those upper limits in place and go forward.Again, we're basing us in to where you have, I call, a small footprint, which will initially utilize the pay station, But, where we have the base stations, we will have a lot more empirical data in terms of utilization of those parking spaces.So, as we phase those stations across the downtown, we will better be able to see some of those points * was talking about where people were staying.There were getting higher turnover.And again, trying to create a user friendly atmosphere in downtown.Okay.So I take what a hearing is that we're looking to pass a resolution that maximizes the parking rate at $1.25 an hour.And then we're going to revisit this with Mr. Weill, as we go forward?Well, you're going to come, and we're going to have you feedback?Yes.Mr. * I mean, everybody wants to keep it low, but the maximum rate's $1.25 right.You have no vacancy.And nobody knows what price you want to set until you have some experience that you should probably set it a little bit higher, then it's a maximum break.You want to give some flexibility that's higher than what it is now.Okay.Mr. McGee, did you ever make a comment?No - * I'm thinking because I've seen it.I think you can start in $1.50, then take it up 50 cents more than what we're currently charging.And then we can revisit that after we see 'cause I'd be willing to * not think twice about it* - How you program it for a minimum, for 15 minutes, I'm going into the post office to buy stamps.I don't know enough about them, but they have* - *Might be for you.Well, we're talking about these kiosks.You put in the amount of time that you want credit card.So that's how you get the amount of time that you want.But the amount that you're getting could be you're getting 15 minutes* That's going to be like 12 and a half, ten minutes.Right?At the beginning of the first phase, I'm looking to have these have to be programmed remotely.As we get more of the base stations in place, our ability to just program them in-house would evolve with those.Right now, you'd be set up for the vendor would have to program for what we have them put in place.One set of criteria, and then once we go down the road, modify it based on new data and utilization rates.Mr. Harrison, did you have something you wanted to add?I just think that this whole conversation started with this request to * the public hearing.There's something on the books to that * limit that we council sat that at some point in the past, we've been requested to change it.And then we said, \"Hey, let's instead of changing it every other moment, as we try to figure things out,\" we said, \"Hey, let's do a limit\".And so at this point, short of what it set at today, we need somebody from the administration to say, we suggest the limit to be set at this number.Going forward for regular parking and a limit to be set at this amount for special events.Because right now we don't have accommodation for special events.And so you need to accommodate special events.Right.I said it before that.So someone just needs to roll down a number.Yeah.So. - I think just in the conversation here, I'm hearing like maybe $10 limit for special events and $1.50 for the meters.and again can go back and revisit as, as we get more data.I think its - Yeah.I think I'm fairly comfortable with $10 an hour for special events, - $10 flat fee.Yeah.That I'm okay with because we do have all, all of our * and lots are charging the premium ones and state students premium parking.$10 - The other, the surface lot down beyond garage five.And keep in mind, that the parking garage for event night*.So we are talking about keeping the parking space on state street.Okay.So it sounds like we are looking at a maximum rate per hour on non-special event times of $1.50.And we are looking for a special event rates of $10 for a flat fee in separate legislation.So is that what everybody understands.Okay.So I left.That might be able to be incorporated into the legislation.Yeah, I was about to say.Okay, Okay in same legislation.So, that'd being...Okay, I'll do it.Thank you.Do I have a second?I will second.Excellent, an all who's in favor?Aye* - I now feel very powerful - Good.Excellent.Anything else come before government operations?I ask for a motion to adjourn.Second - I'll second.Okay, we were all having so much fun.All those in favor?Aye.* - Excellent.All right.I'll call into order public safety.One item on the agenda is the citizens.This is the recommendation for legal women voters.Right?Excellent.I think it's wonderful, I'd love to move that.I'll second it.All in favor.Aye.* - Motion to adjourn.So moved.Second.All in favor?Aye.* - Adjourned.Okay.Call to order public service and utilities, couple contracts, Mr. Olsen and Mr. *.First, the weekly cover.Okay the legislative request form we have in front of you * to cover construction, They go out to bid.We had three responsible bidders respond a carpet construction that gave us the lowest possible rate of $755,990 to replace.The * should cover it.We talked about this for a couple of years now, and we have an advantage of doing it this year because national * is doing their portion of the * in their property up to Weaver street.So they're actually handling all the bypass parking.So we don't have to do any bypass parking.If we move on this project.There's also a restriction currently that runs through the culvert of a * Lane, which is 36 inch center In addition to the replacement of the culvert or something base and put it in for the culver*, for the flow of water.We were trying everything to try to minimize the flooding that exists in here.Broadway.That has been an issue in the past.This will not completely solve that issue.This will not completely solve the issue of flooding on Weaver street or this *, but it should help.Not every time, but there's no guarantee.You have that colvert runs underneath the railroad, down*.And in fact, Gary, you and I saw that pipe*, one night, you can only just get so much water through there, which has caused it to backup, these improvements will help.They will not put the salt in the problem, but they will help.And we are taking advantage of the fact that national grid will be providing the bypass pumping of that *, which is significant.That's, that's a lot, a lot of money.We get to match our systems together as well.So it is if there's ever a time to do it, this is the time.Construction would begin.It takes four to six weeks.Sometime first week of November, hopefully.Yeah, it takes about four to six weeks to get the precast material for the sections of the culvert.It would be be very similar to the work that we did on *.It's all covered?Yes.Is this in the capital budget is a capital budget project.So I'll cover, yes, would be a budget.How much are you budgeting for?We had 668,000*.There was some remaining money in some of the old capital loan.So we're fine.Any idea why we came in over budget in terms of - Why?Yeah.Well, this was a budget that was done a couple of years ago.We did put an escalator in there.It was budgeted at just under 600,000 with an escalator in here for today's prices*.There's an inverted siphon in that road, which is going to be a little bit of extra work.And then we also did the engineering came out of that budget, which was not allocated for in the original budget.to be an issue.We always anticipate national grid doing the bypass break and all that kinda stuff, or?No, they're under a consent order to box that prick in other property because of the contamination on the property.So what they had to do was they had to bypass to put that precast in as they go through their property.So we're going to just piggyback on that bypass.We do ours.But I mean, if they weren't new we always anticipated that being tied in - No - We saved a bunch of money by having them do the bypass.No. - On the originally the budget with the first set.We did the 600,000.Okay.We did anticipate, we'd been looking for them to make this improvement for probably nine or ten years.We have leads that go into that crick that are salted in, we can't do the maintenance at the end of our outfall.Which plugs up those stormwater lead in front of 7-45, 7-97 and 8-45 Broadway.So we want clear passage of that water into the culvert.So this is the methodology that they chose and negotiated with DC for their consent.So did anticipate them putting their culvert in when Paul* originally set the budget, but that was some time ago.* in the works in the past few years now.But that's it.Thank you.Carl, this has been a recurring conversation regarding, this particular contractor, and they're hiring the women and minority.So I'd like to know how that's been addressed in this particular contract, - They have affirmed actually the requirements for this contract.I know this contractor has offered to have a job fair.He would like the opportunity to be able to hire more women and minority.If you'd like, I could set the time that you sit down and discuss that with either he or his HR people, but he did offer that to Marian quite some time ago.So, he's trying.I had a question.When is this going to start this project?Hopefully, first part of November.First part of November?We got to get shop drawings in to get shop drawings turned around and approved.And the precast stuff to be ordered.The sections of precast culvert have to be ordered.That'll take four or five weeks.So this, this will go on until the winter.The good part is that we can close project.I guess that's my next question.Three months.Yeah.Will there be much destruction?That's my next question.Well, that section of road.You can easily bypass that over*.So, we can afford to close that section of Weaver street for an extended period of time, without really hurting anyone.Trucks will come in from the one side for the transportation and local traffic on the other.There's only two businesses: the machine shop, the engine shop there and another small car repair shop, - They'll be able to access their businesses.There'll be someone* where we had to close the road.The, the advantage of Weaver street is it's only an' eight-foot-high inch overpass.So you don't get a lot of truck traffic through there.All the truck traffic goes on*.So it'll just, the only inconvenience will be.People have to take * avenue rather than Weaver street to cut over to *.Which isn't much of an inconvenience.Any other questions?I'll entertain a motion.I will move the vote.Second.All those in favor?Aye.* - Unfortunately, it's that time year.We should discuss specifications again this year for for assistance with, from private contractors, with our snowfall, cover construction was not only the lowest bidder, but the only bidder and the rates I believe are the same as last year.We put this on bid net and we had a couple of people we had like like seven people view it.A couple of people picked it up, but we didn't get any additional hits.This also includes bidding for snow removal.This contract, we usually activate our private on average, about five times a year.We usually get 12 or 13 storms that we had to go out * about five times a year.This average in cost $8,000 - $9,000 a year.The bigger advantage to this is the pre-bid removal contract and the volume of equipment necessary.So that if we do get a big storm or when we get a big storm similar to that, if we had about 12 years ago, we have the opportunity to be able to mobilize equipment very quickly to remove shelters in the streets, which is really important.So we're fortunate that we have a bidder that has that capability.Well good news is were only getting a few * this year, so.Well, you're getting the forecast.Well, I appreciate you bringing this to us a little bit earlier than before it literally snows right on us.So we'll talk about at the other meeting.Good, good.Obtain a motion.I will move it.Second - All in favor?Aye* - Thank you.Okay, anything to come before public service and utilities?I motion to adjourn.I second.All in favor.Aye* * So, I will move to a second.All in favor?Aye*", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/committee_10_07_2013.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/committee_10_07_2013.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/committee_10_07_2013.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/committeee_10_06_2014/ManufacturingWeek.mp3", "text": "Sorry about that, whenever you're ready to get started.We want to welcome everyone here to Schenectady city hall, a few seats here, people should come up and relax.And first I want to thank Chad Putnam, who has really been the driving force in putting this all together and really it's reinforcing how important manufacturing is.You look at the history of this city.You look at the history of the region.Many times we were setting the agenda.We, Schenectady, Albany and other places and so there's that crowd foundation that exists within the region and sometimes we take those things for granted and to have a day like today, which is national manufacturing day, but also we've expanded it to a week because of Chad's perseverance to give it a little bit more recognition and to remind people of just how influential manufacturing is and the difference that it makes in our communities.And so I'd like to now introduce our great Congressman Paul Tonko, who is a driving force on so many levels, making a difference in the lives of so many people and representing us in Congress with the station and the level of pride that we're so proud of.Thank you, mayor McCarthy, and thank you for leading the city so very well.Leading the cities in this country today, it's not an easy task and mayor McCarthy, awesome job.Great focus and great structure to the efforts that he makes with the city council and that I see our members of the city council out there too.So thank you for all the great work.Manufacturing week is a great way to focus on the strength of our manufacturing sector of the American economy.There are those who would love to suggest that manufacturing is hit its heyday and it's over.And the message is very straightforward.It's not dirty, dumb, disappearing, but strong and sturdy and providing a shot in the arm as we go forward.I serve on the energy and commerce committee in the house, and it is there that we have a lot of hearings concerning the innovation economy and the retrofitting of our manufacturing sector.So as to be of most competitive standing on the international scene, and I'm part of an effort in the house that has been introduced as a programmatic concept called, \"make it in America\".It's a collection of several bills that includes an emphasis on exporting.It includes an emphasis on retrofitting our traditional manufacturing to carry it into an advanced mode.It talks about training, retraining dollars, education, higher ed, and certainly in the investment in the clean energy high-tech innovation economy.We are gifted in this area to be recognized as one of those powerful regions in the country.We're just visited for a repeat visit, I would add, by assistant secretary of the department of energy David Danielson, and in his visit, he touted the fact that we are one of the five hottest areas in the country for innovation, clean energy, job growth.That's manufacturing, that's manufacturing.Many of us were at one of the local ribbon cuttings when they introduced GEs new manufacturing center in the step park, which is a strong bit of encouragement, but being one of those hottest beds of innovation, job growth is also sparked by the news that the secretary shared that of those five regions we are one of the two most exponentially fast growing regions of those five.So there are underpinnings of support that we need to provide.Research, research equals jobs, make no mistake about it.Research, developing the prototypes that when tested and proven true, then provide for new product lines.There are jobs not yet on the radar spring, that will be accompanying the manufacturing growth in this country.And there are certainly all this clean room science now to accompany the theme of this region.It's being offered at our community colleges and the like.So it's a great feeling for manufacturer and we celebrate great growth in this region for manufacturing sake.When I'm asked on the house floor to pinpoint the district that I represent on the map of the US, I say first, it's the confluence of the Hudson and Beau Hawk rivers, but then also my proud selling point, we are the donor district to the Erie canal, which sparked an industrial revolution, which gave birth to a westward movement.And that was all driven by the development of mill towns that became the epicenters of invention and innovation that pioneer, snip spirits still exists in our region.And it's part of our DNA. And it's that spirit that will feed this resurgence of manufacturing.And that will enable us to compete robustly on the international scene because we have the know-how, we have the intellect, we have the research capacity we need to invest.And I encourage my colleagues to support the, make it in America, America agenda.And I'm just proud to stand here with colleagues from the elected ranks, but those who serve our business community, those who are involved with the chamber as to check over there, all who support the manufacturing resurgence, which is a powerful thing on our many, many tours that we do routinely as representative for the district we're sharing best kept secrets about what's happening in manufacturing and our given area.And it's always great to unveil some wonderful empowerment that's going on, providing meaningful jobs with great backgrounds and great benefits.So it's just great to join in this celebration.I now have the distinct pleasure of introducing Michael Tucker, who leads CEG, our center for economic growth, who does a great job in coordinating, collaborating the efforts of the business community to communicate with the forces of government and their partners and private sector and academia, to make certain that we have all the cylinders working to make certain that all the parts of the puzzle are there.That all the pieces that spell success are advanced either in government, as programs and budgeted areas or in partnership with exchange with our business community.So please welcome our chief from the CEG, Michael Tucker.Thank you Congressman and thank you for your leadership in this resurgence of manufacturing in our industry clusters, in our innovation economy here in the capital region, we're certainly focused on the semiconductor industry, nanotechnology, clean energy, biotechnology and information technology.And if we are truly to have the opportunity to leverage the tremendous public private investment that's been made in our region over the last 15 years, we need to ensure that not only do we have manufacturing technology and advanced manufacturing jobs, but that we have the full economy to support that aspect of our region's economy.The center for economic growth is the region's 11 county economic development organization also serves as one of 10 nice star designated regional technology development centers, providing technical services to manufacturers and advanced technology companies in the region.And we are part of a program run by NIST at manufacturers extension partnership.There are 320 centers around the country to promote manufacturing.And we serve in this region to be sure that the opportunities for companies at every level, from the smallest two person manufacturer to general electric and global foundries and Regeneron have the employees that they need.Today is part of a national effort, national manufacturing day, national manufacturing week.And when you look at the programs that have been put together by the group organized by mayor McCarthy and our state elected representatives, and all of you from business academia, our science museum, it's been a terrific opportunity to bring people together for a important project.We focus at CEG on manufacturing by also serving as the facilitator for the chief executives network of manufacturers, which is a 75 member company or organization representing large and small manufacturers throughout the region.We work closely with our economic development and chamber of commerce partners.And we're very pleased to have Chuck Steiner here from the county of Schenectady chamber, but more importantly, we're creating that pipeline from the K through 12 system through our community colleges and four year schools through our technology and advanced manufacturing companies.And it is a great day in the capital region.As the Congressman said, there's been a tremendous resurgence.Our employment numbers reflect the strong manufacturing base that has been rebuilt in the capital region.So thank you all for your participation.And this is a great day for manufacturing in America.Good afternoon, I'm Glenn Tabolt, president of STS steel and represent the manufacturing component of this committee.I want to thank mayor McCarthy and the city council for spearheading this effort to promote a better understanding of the economic and social benefits of manufacturing.When Chad Putman and the city, the city of Schenectady, contacted me to sponsor a showing of the \"American made\" movie, and then to become a member of the committee to build on the message of the movie, I was honored to get involved.The message of that movie and manufacturing day is not only important to me as a manufacturer, but I believe it's also important to our country and local community.There are many statistics, as the Congressman said, showing the economic importance of manufacturing as a spurt of job growth.And innovation manufacturing is a jobs multiplier.Every new manufacturing job creates at least 4.6 new jobs to support it.And the manufacturing sector accounts for 80% of our country's exports and 90% of our patents in R and D spending.But there's also another side to manufacturing.There's an emotional side and that's important.It's pride.Working as a team to solve the many challenges required to build complex products is rewarded when a completed 62 ton lock gate for the Erie canal or 140 foot plate girder bridge leaves our facility.I see that pride in our employees, whether it's a welder or CAD technician, engineer, accountant, everyone feels part of the team that contributed to that final product.And when they drive around the area and they show their friends or families, these structures, they say, I helped build that.This concept of dream building manufacturing day supports is really meaningful.Seeing a product take shape as rewarding and the effort of this committee to bring that message to others in the community is also building something.Bridges connecting academic, government and manufacturing sectors.We at STS are particularly interested in sharing our experiences with the academic community to help them share with their students.Not only the economic opportunities offered by careers in manufacturing, but this true satisfaction that comes from making something.As part of manufacturing week, we will open our doors on Monday to the students of Mohonasen school to show them what we built.We have also purchased the \"American made\" movie curriculum for Mohonasen school so they have a new tool to use in helping their students gain a better understanding of manufacturing.We are pleased with this new relationship and we look forward to continued success and building a future in our community where young people find rewarding careers in manufacturing, while fostering a vibrant and growing local and national economy.And now, to talk more about the exciting activities taking place upon us, I would like to introduce Mohonasen board of education president, Dominick Cafarelli.Thank you.Good afternoon.I'm very pleased to be here today, to speak briefly about some exciting new programs at Mohonasen high school.Recently we've experienced devastating budget cuts, and we are facing increasing costs from our elected officials to find ways to become more efficient.And all the while our education standards are rising, skilled labor jobs are going unfilled and college remediation rates are very high.Thinking outside the box, we've used our imagination to develop new programs that will give our students real world training that will prepare them for today's and tomorrow's jobs.We've partnered with Schenectady county community college Capitol region, both cities to bring to life the center for advanced technology at Mohonasen to our community through this new and exciting academic collaboration, high school, college and adult students will be able to take advantage of world-class high tech programs and environments that mirror the real world.We are focused on 21st century skills like interviewing ethics and communications to make our students more marketable.And we are researching equipment to make sure we have the tools that we need so that our students are learning the skills that they need.The programs we will offer in the new center will include modern machining and welding, alternative energy, nanotechnology, health science, and athletic training, gaming, computer programming, media arts, and production.Another positive, through our partnerships, is that the cost of these programs will be shared.And the support of these programs will be greater than otherwise would have been.Our main goal is to expose our students to a variety of college and career paths.We believe the more opportunities the students have, the better chance that they will have to be successful.We are looking forward to working with our elected officials as we continue down this path.Make no mistake, what we are doing is new and exciting.And we are very excited about this.I would like to thank my colleagues on the board of education, our schools, administration, especially Dr. Catherine Spring, our superintendent who is here today and all of our schools' employees for their input and helping us develop this vision.Also our outside partners, Schenectady community college Capitol region posties, and our architectural firms, CSR, but most important, our Mohonasen community.We are very lucky to have community residents that see the value of this project in our region and what good it will do for years to come for our students.Thank you very much.I would like to introduce from Schenectady county community college, Mr. Matt Grattan.Good afternoon everyone , I'm pensioning for Dr. Asalyn.So she sends her condolences got torn into one of those last minute urgent meetings, but Schenectady county community colleges is really thrilled to be part of this week.And I want to thank mayor McCarthy on behalf of the city and the community college is, is immensely thrilled to be engaged in the education of our future workforce, specifically in the area of manufacturing.I've been at the community college now for about three years as the executive director of workforce development, and prior to that, I had a 19 year career at the state department of labor.I used to do a lot of occupational and industry analysis, and you do not find any vibrant regional economy without a strong manufacturing base.So this, this day, this week is so critical to be able to continue to educate young people and attract more youngsters into the world of manufacturing and into the career choices that are available in manufacturing.And many know at the community college for years, we were really known as a culinary and music school over the last few years some of the new programs that we've developed in alternative energy technology and nanoscale materials and storage battery and we're currently in development of a new, a new program in mechatronics.We're really at the cutting edge of some of the most involved in, in demand occupational skills training that is necessary.And with our partnership with Mohonasen that Dominic mentioned and superintendent Spring, we're very excited to be able to look at the facility that is, and there's a rendering over there, the facility that will be built at Mohonasen.And it's really just an exciting time to be engaged and continue to advance the, the need for manufacturing workers.And I want to put a quick plug in for the actual screening of the movie.And I got a chance to see the initial screening that Chad organized back in the spring at the GE theater, the \"American made\" movie, if you haven't seen it, please come out and see it.It is, it really is a phenomenal piece.And we're going to be showing that on Thursday of next week, October 9th at the community college in our SOC 8 1 0 1 lecture hall, it's at 6:30 PM. And again, in SOC 8 1 0 1, please come out and see it.It really is a well done piece, and I think you'll thoroughly, thoroughly enjoy it.So on behalf of the community college, we are very happy to be a part of manufacturing week and it is now my distinct pleasure to introduce the Senator over 46 district, Cecilia Tkaczyk .Well, it's great to be here.Thank you, mayor McCarthy and Chad for organizing today's event.And we've heard a lot of really positive comments about manufacturing there, right?It's coming back, but the jobs that people need to be prepared for are high skilled jobs.So the manufacturing jobs, we need people who can run million dollar machines.So we're looking at a different type of person to be in those manufacturing jobs and education is key.We need to make sure our kids are being given the opportunity and the skills to be able to get those new jobs that are being created through our investment in nanotechnology and through our investment in local manufacturing that we've heard about.So engaging our businesses with the schools and with the community colleges is the cutting edge of the future.And we're doing it right here in Schenectady county.So you guys are looking at the future and when you were faced with cuts in education, you didn't just say, you know, \" we're going to cut back our educational program\".\"We're going to rethink it\".We're going to rethink how we're educating our kids and make sure that we're giving them the best opportunities.So it is our, our goal as your representatives in Albany, to make sure we're reducing the costs for manufacturing.So we're supporting that infrastructure.This year, we reduced income taxes and energy use taxes for manufacturers.We're doing what we can, we need to do more, but clearly we've got to support our economy and our schools and our local manufacturers.So I'm really thrilled to hear about the synergy going on right here in Schenectady county.And I have one last thing to point out.I mean, there's, there's many events to go to this week, but one of the other things that it's important for us to understand is we all have choices.People have choices when they purchase products.Even the state has choices of where to buy products from.We should be doing more local purchasing and as consumers, you know, maybe we need to go out of our way to buy a local product.We need to help buy and seek out those components.And that's why manufacturing week is so important because you're letting us know tough travelers here and have great bags.You know, the gatherers makes great granola, things like that.So it's important to get the word out.And I have, I have a little announcement that I'm starting a new manufacturing process.This is wool from my sheep that got processed at a local mill and Batten kill fiber.They turned it into yarn for me, and they made it to the specs that Newberry knitting company needs so that they can make mittens.They're going to be making mittens from local wool processed at a local mill manufactured at a local company right here in your own backyard.So, yes, we've lost manufacturing jobs, but we need to make new connections and make sure that we're starting new ways of building up our economies and supporting each other.So these mittens will be made locally.Hopefully they'll be a time for Christmas.All the, all the proceeds are going to programs that assist victims of domestic violence, because it's also domestic violence awareness month, but it's, I'm trying to tell a story.We have resources here and connections that have been lost, that we need to remake and support each other.So when you're going out over the holidays, buy something local and when you're go visit these businesses, understand their challenges, what they're working on and support them.So I'm really happy to be here and to support all of you.And this is an awesome week.And thank you, Chad, for giving us the opportunity to celebrate it.And now we have a reception in the room, 1 10, which is just down the hall, and hopefully everyone will join us there again to have a round of applause for Chad.I'll just remind me too, that the movie was shown in DC. And if you haven't seen it, it's really a great thing.What time is that next Thursday?6: 30.So if you will mark that on your calendar.It was a joy to welcome Chad and others who produced the film into DC. It was introduced that evening by minority web standing, Hoyer of Maryland, who is one of the chief architects of the, make it in America agenda.And it just great to be able to site, again, this district with all of its manufacturing history as the agent that really produced that film.So I'm sure that, you know, so many took great pride and Marion and Peggy, obviously sitting in that front row, there are smiling and nodding approvingly it's, it's great to know that we're producing great things here, even films so good going.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/ManufacturingWeek.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/ManufacturingWeek.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/ManufacturingWeek.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/snafuinfinityBelmontDrivesElectric_0417-CL19/BelmontDrivesElectric_0417-CL19.mp3", "text": "All right.I think we'll get started with the information session part of the event.Welcome everybody.My name's James Booth.I'm a volunteer with Belmont Drives Electric.I'm also a member of the Belmont Energy Committee, one of the partners in Belmont Drives Electric.So we're going to have a information session first and then the ride and drive event that test drives various vehicles out there.Next slide.So to give just a quick overview of what we'll talk about, tell you a little about what Belmont Drives Electric is, it's community-based initiative.Talk about what are some of the reasons for why it makes sense to drive electric, and particularly how it's good for the environment, but it's also good for your wallet.It's very affordable to do right now.Then we'll hear from Klaus and Addie, two Belmont residents who were very happy driving electric about their experience and try to answer some of the questions you might have around things like, what are your options for charging electric vehicle?And counter some popular misconceptions of things you might have heard and say how why they they love driving electric.And answer any questions that you have.So, so to start off, Belmont Drives Electric is a community program for Belmont residents.It's sponsored by Belmont Light, the Belmont Energy Committee, Sustainable Belmont, and just a number of electric vehicle enthusiasts here in Belmont, who volunteering their time to the program.So the goal of Belmont Drives Electric is- there are two goals.One is to promote the adoption of electric vehicles in town, and also to encourage owners of electric vehicles to charge them- to charge smart.Charge them at times of day that work well for everybody.And what Belmont Drives Electric is doing, is providing information through events like this and connecting people with deals at dealerships and test drives to help make the decision of how you can get behind the wheel of an electric vehicle.So the first reason why the Belmont Energy Committee became interested in electric vehicles is the environmental benefits that are associated with driving electric.So to put this in context, Belmont has a climate action plan for trying to reduce our emissions of the greenhouse gases that drive climate change.And this was adopted several years ago with a goal of reducing emissions, 80% by 2050.We recently looked at how we've been doing on this, over the last seven years or so, from 2007 to 2014.And we're moving in the right direction, but not nearly fast enough to the goal of an 80% reduction.So we need to be doing more to meet the goals that as a town we've set ourselves, in terms of reducing our carbon emissions.And so when we looked at where Belmont's carbon emissions come from, it's clear that vehicles are a big part of the story.So for the town as a whole, if we look at what the different sources of CO2 emissions are, vehicles count for more than a third of emissions.And if you just look at the residential sector, at people's households, there it's almost half of emissions.So for many households, your driving of your vehicle or vehicles accounts for more than half of your total carbon footprint.So there's clearly, a lot of potential.We need to address the transportation sector to make a dent in our carbon output.And this is where electric vehicles become, you know, very attractive to think about, because the emissions associated with driving an electric vehicle are much lower than for a comparable gasoline powered vehicle.Typically less than a half.So this chart shows for a sort of standard, new, mid-sized car you're producing about 400 or so grams of CO2 per mile driven.Whereas a battery electric car driving solely on battery is associated with less than half that amount of emissions.And if you look at the emissions that are caused by the producing the electricity that you use to drive, to charge the car.And then there are plug-in hybrid electric vehicles, which have both a gas motor and, and can be plugged in and driven on electric and those fall somewhere in between, depending on how you drive them.How much of the time you're driving in electric mode.So if we compare the impact of switching your driving, from gasoline to electricity, it becomes one of the biggest single things you can do, as a household, to reduce your carbon footprint.So depending on what car you're switching from, you can be seeing a reduction of two or three tons a year of CO2 emissions.Which is in the same sort of range, as taking steps like, switching your heating from natural gas to an electrically driven heat pump, or a five kilowatt solar array.So again, it'll depend on the household, but for many households simply changing what vehicle you're driving can be the single biggest carbon reduction step you can take.To put this another way, switching from driving a sort of a standard new car that gets 29 miles per gallon, to an electric vehicle, without changing your driving habits, is equivalent to driving over 6,000 fewer miles a year or it's about the equivalent of your entire electrical, the emissions from all of the electricity you would use for other things.There's some other benefits.There's no local air pollution from tailpipe emissions.Some, you know, straight electric vehicles don't have a tail pipe.So you have local improved air quality.And as you'll hear out in the parking lot later, reduce noise pollution since they're very quiet machines.There's also sort of big picture considerations.I mean, there are these immediate benefits you'd have from, from switching.I should say the part of the reason why there's so many fewer emissions from driving electric is that the electricity grid in new England is relatively clean compared to other parts of the country.We're not, we don't have coal powered electricity generation.So that's part of why there's such a big impact from, from going electric.But in the bigger picture, we think of, people think of large scale, moving to driving electric is going to be an important part of bringing more renewable energy onto the grid.So as, as the new England grid has been getting lower and lower carbon emissions over the years, so if that continues, then it just makes driving electric that much greener.But also as, as thousands of people start to have cars with batteries plugged in, this provides a way that intermittent renewables like solar and wind can, can be more easily added into the system because they can store that electricity in, in a fleet of electric vehicles.So the, one of the big motivations for Belmont Energy Committees, Sustainable Belmont, and a lot of, lot of people who buy them or lease them is the environmental benefits of driving electric.But from a personal perspective for an EV driver, another big appealing thing is the affordability right now.And part of this is that it's a very affordable time to buy or lease an EV because of several incentives that are available.So there's a state rebate of $2,500 for electric vehicles.If you buy an electric vehicle, or if you enter into a three-year lease, and this is basically a check that the state will send you right away, as soon as you've leased or bought your vehicle.So you get that right up front.There's also a federal tax credit of up to, up to $7,500 that you can claim on your federal taxes at the end of the year.And the third thing, with in Belmont Drives Electric, with this program, we've had a number of deals with dealerships where we've pre-arranged very competitive and transparent leasing deals.So an example is something like the Chevy Volt, where you can be leasing it for less than $200 a month.So it's really a very attractive option.So it's a, it's a very inexpensive time because of these incentives to buy or lease an electric vehicle.But there's also savings to be had in operating it.That it costs less to drive a mile on electric than it does to drive on gasoline.So for comparison to a sort of typical mid-sized gasoline car, if you're driving electric and charging in Belmont, with Belmont Lights rates, you'd be paying the equivalent of about a $1.65 a gallon of gasoline.So even with today's low gasoline prices, electric works out to be cheaper on an operational basis.And then beyond that Belmont Light is offering an incentive, as part of the Belmont Drives Electric program, where for EV owners, if they charge their cars over, during the overnight period, which is when we want them to be doing that, then there's another 15% incentive, basically rebate off your electric bill on, on the electricity use charging overnight.So that brings down the cost of operations even further.It's also worth mentioning, this is if you charge at home, with the electricity you're paying for, but a lot of public charging stations are available now, that many of which are free.Or a lot of people have the similarly charging at their workplace with no charge.So there, there are plenty of options out there to also get free charging, which brings your costs further down.Another point that's worth mentioning is that service costs are much lower with electric vehicles because you don't have oil changes and spark plugs and so on.It's just a much simpler machine, and so you're, you're not paying the routine maintenance that you do with a internal combustion engine.Okay.Some number crunching, which don't want to get lost in but I'll just say, looked at comparing, say a, a Chevy Volt to a Chevy Malibu.So two similar cars from the same company.And if you look at, for example, at leasing these as a, as an approach, then the cost per mile, that you would get for leasing a Volt when you figure the incentives and your fuel savings comes out to roughly around half the cost per mile of driving a Malibu.So putting it together, basically electric vehicles are, are good for the environment, they're lowering our carbon carbon footprint, and cost less to, to buy and run.And this is a nice analysis done by a lab, a Trancik lab at MIT, a nice tool that they have online called carboncounter.com, where they looked at a bunch of different vehicles and what the graph shows on the vertical axis it's the, the carbon emissions for driving per mile of the vehicle and on the horizontal one, it's the cost per mile of driving when you figure in the leasing or purchase costs or, and the cost of fueling.And so the higher, as you go up the graph, it's polluting more and as you go to the right, it costs more.And the yellow dots are a variety of electric vehicles.So, what it shows is really electric vehicles right now are both some of the cleanest and some of the cheapest vehicles to be driving.So they, they score well on both of those points.So, so the advantages and the reason Belmont Drives Electric is excited about promoting this are, both for the climate change implications and, and that it can save Belmont residents money.I'm going to turn it over to Klaus, to talk about some of the issues around what is it like to drive electric, including how do you charge these things?So charging an electric pump is a delight relative to going to a gas station.You know, you go to the gas station.Sometimes you have, you have to wait in line.Then you grab the grip and you oh, you know, smell your hands, it's a carcinogen, you know that maybe, so that's not so fun either.You a fuel, you wait, that's not how it works is an electric pump.You come home, you park, you step outside, you grab the pistol grip , put it, your done, you walk inside.So charging is really simple.When you, when you own an electric pump, this is one of those things that you come to appreciate.If you're like me and you travel for work, whenever you have to get a rental car, it's such a downer.It's noisy.It stinks.And you have to go find a gas station somewhere.Electric plugs you have everywhere, right?So I think the, the main issue to be aware of is, if you live in a condo that might not apply.So, but if you have, if you're in a detached home or you have a place at work where you can change, the time you spent charge and the sort of inconvenience and smelliness and cost of is much better in an electric car.Next cue.You can charge just like you plug in your toaster at home, you can plug in your electric car that works great for almost every person with normal, with normal driving habits, you will add about four miles of range every hour.So if you get home at seven, leave at seven, you have, you know, almost 50 miles of range and fewer than one in eight Americans have, have bigger trip to work and home than that.If you do have a little longer trip then cars like the Chevy Volt, which is able to make its own electricity from gas is something you can consider, that will, that will provide you with ample range.If you want to charge a little faster, we can go up to a level two.That's the pistol part I was talking about.And that will add up to 25 miles of range, of range per hour, meaning that you can top off the car very quickly if you want to turn it around and go someplace.Many places have free charging at work, in the workplaces, it's all level two pretty much.And I think we heard from the gentleman who works in the charging company, that there's about 3000 electric vehicle chargers in Massachusetts, of which two thirds are free.So lots of places you can charge for free.And you probably haven't noticed because you're not looking for them.But if you, are in say Lexington, behind the restaurants there's a corner there there's four slots right there.So while you're eating, you can fill up your car for free.We're putting in chargers here in Belmont, down by the Clafin lot.And you still have to pay for parking like everybody else, but you don't have to pay for the electricity.My work, I don't pay for the electricity.And so I haven't bought fuel since, I mean at least a year.I haven't spent a penny on gas.So when you're looking at the, the rates for the leasing, which is sub 200, you need, you should subtract out of that whatever you spend on gas, if you have workplace charging and most people who work in Boston will have it.So, that's pretty great.You can go even faster, this what you call, VC charging, direct current charging and that can give you a ton amount in no time.The Tesla is the undisputed king and of that, and that is in 20 minutes, you get 150 miles.Yeah, in 30 minutes you get 170 miles.Yeah - depends on - ] 10 miles- - per minute basically but isn't it?So, 10 miles a minute?Yeah, you could say that.It's up to 300 miles, 350 miles.So that wicked fast, right?So you can, you can spend 20 minutes charging, drive two hours, and then spend 20 minutes charging.And the chargers for Teslas are typically next to a Starbucks or a restaurant.And, and you should probably take a break every two hours anyways, so, so that's a good, good thing.There are in this situation of their own but, but the Boeing, for instance, that we have several versions of outside also has fast charging.And will, will give you 50 to 70 miles in the same, in the same time.On top of it's almost 250 mile range that it comes with, with if it has the battery filled up.So charging options are, there's lots of them, but most of you will, will be able to live very happily with the charger that comes with the car.Which you just pop into your garage.Next.So charging stations, if you want to buy a faster charging station, they'll set you back anywhere from a couple of hundred bucks for, for one that you can buy on eBay, typically from a, a car that was, that was in an accident or something with it where you can buy the, the charger and you can buy one, outright new and that's like 400 bucks to get.You can spend up to about 900 if you want to get something really razzle dazzle that'll hook in to your solar panels on some.So this is quite a bit of a choice for you now.Next.Public level two chargers, this is a ChargePoint charger.They are the biggest vendor.You need a card to swipe.The cards you get just by, by going to the website and asking for it.And you swipe it, it goes beep, and releases the pistol brick, which you then plop in.It's all very fast.And you can also use apple pay, so I can use my phone.Oh, I didn't know that.Oh yeah.Yeah, there's cell networks like EV, or is it EV connect and- - And you, if you have a credit card with a chip in it, you can use that too, just to swipe that.So, so the, so the convenience of electric charging is really high.It's very easy to do.And, and most of the time it's free.So, at the airport, for instance, you see those, they have dozens of them so you can get- - A we're getting them downtown.Yep, we're getting them downtown- - When do those go on?And then on Lights Place right?Probably, May 1st.And next.And then there's all the different fast chargers.These are amazing pieces of technology.If you fast charge, the first thing that'll happen is it'll say, congratulations, you're charging.And it'll say, you're putting on, you know, 110 amps.I don't know if you, if that, if you know understand that, but your house probably rarely draws more than 10.So over a hundred amps is a really wicked amount of power that, that they take off.So this is, this is pretty impressive technology.And again, Tesla is the, is the leader in that.So you can, is this quite the gambit.But like I said, most of you will be quite happy with just the charger that comes through the car.Next Yes, you have all sorts of flexibility.You can program the cars to charge when it's cheap.If you're in the Concourse, for instance, you have cheaper than nighttime rates.That's where Belmont is moving to.So that means that you'll have a significant discount on, on the electricity.And right now the, the equivalent cost of a gallon of gas is like $1.50.But with the nighttime rates, it'll be the equivalent of getting 70 cents gallon, 70 cent gas.And importantly, that's locked in.So where the gas price fluctuates has been low for a while, but it could go up the moment shots are fired in the middle east.You know, that's one of these connected things.But that shouldn't ever impact the electricity prices because that's based on hydro and wind and solar and so on.So by, by having an electric car, you, you secure a cheap source of fuel for your car.And you can program your all sorts of sophisticated ways.You can ask it to be charged when the electricity prices is lowest, but you can also, for some charges, you can ask it to charge when the power is the greenest.If you buy a juice box charger, which I have, then you can ask it to do that and it'll automatically check the weather forecast and all sorts of other things.So there's a lot of choices.It's pretty cool.If you, and you get lots of data.So if you're a data geek, you will have a lot to play with.Yep, next.Tons of chargers.I think it comes out to about 50 thousand.I think you could have stopped at 3000 chargers.And they are two thirds a month free.Next.These, so Logan, I talk to all the time they find a flight and then hospitals, public parking.So you can find them on your phone.If you download the PlugShare charging.How does that work with Logan, for example, let's say, you're going on a family vacation for a week.Yes.And you go to this spot, there's a charging thing, you plug in your car and then you leave for a week.And you just leave it there?That's what a lot of people do, but they actually have a regular, 110 volt plugs.So that's what I do.I just pull in to them and then I just plug in there.And that way I'm not up taking up- - Are the spaces pretty wide there?Yes.Yep, the other thing is that you can, I think that's more, but yes it's, but it's not ideal, you're right about that.Because the car has charged in hours and you're gone for days.That's not ideal But usually it's not a problem to, to find a spot where there's a plug.Hotels.They all will always, they will always let you charge.I travel a lot for work.And even if they don't officially have charging, if you ask them at the reception, they always are willing to, to let you charge.Bring us a charging chord, an extension chord.Next.Fast charging is coming.This is going to be much more common in the future.And what that means also is that hybrid's are probably gonna go away because you don't need them when you can, when you can fill up the battery really fast.My fiance just bought a Volt and she lives basically at the far end of 84 and the charging infrastructure that she, that was there when she boughted in January was basically Danbury- and nothing in between, there were a couple in Hartford that were unreliable.Yeah.Five days before her car arrived at the dealership, two new ones went in, in Hartford, - Yeah - one in Manchester, one in Hartford, EV goes and net worth is, there popping up.Yeah.Everywhere.And Auburn is awesome.You have the Chilies, they have two sets free.Level twos right?And you'd have the 99 restaurant also, they have two changers for free.I mean, the DC chargers.The fast chargers - Yes, okay.that you use for your traveling, long road trips.That's also called level three.Okay next.Yep.I think, do you want to take the or shall I?So electric cars are really fun to drive.They, they have violent acceleration.They are very quite, so it's, it's a very luxurious feel to drive in them.It's, it's a fun car to, to drive because they tend to be very high-tech and all of that at a price point below $20,000.I mean, it's just the value to enjoyment.Price is just amazing, I think.And the, what do you, what, what tends to detract from that is that people worry about running out of juice and that's really, shouldn't be a concern.One is if you get a pure electric car, it's, it's often a second car.So you really just tootling around in the neighborhood.And in that case, that really on any, any problems.But if you wanna, if you sometimes go farther, if you have a cabin up in Maine or something like that, you can consider the costs that have a backup.The Golf has that, the Volt is what I have.They, they, it comes with a gas tank and a generator, so it can make its own gas.And that bumps your range up to over 400 miles.So in my Volt, which is outside, and you're welcome to try it out, you can go from here to Manhattan and back and not stop.So if that not range enough for you, right.I don't know it's you can just fill it up and going another 400 miles.The Volt, can you just keep filling it up with gas?Yep, Yeah.So it's a, I drove to Chicago and down to Atlanta and all in one, one time, over a week.So I just kept filling it up.It killed my average, but it Most people over estimate the range that they need.So they'll say things, now but 80 miles doesn't work for me, but actually 80 miles works for almost all.So you can't transport a piano in your car either, right?So people shouldn't dimension their car needs to the unlikely event.It's important to remember that if you just drive once a year, well, maybe you should get a rental because you will save so much money on that electric car that it will more than pay for the full rental car for your trip with your family.Then you get a convertible.Plug in hybrids?The Chevy Volt?Love the Chevy Volt.That gives you, that takes totally takes away range anxiety.Next.Batteries, a very reliable it's, people tend to think of lithium batteries as the one they have in their phone, where you have notable degradation in as short a time as year.But there's, if you look at cast iron and high tensile steel, right, that's mostly iron, but it's totally different.Same with lithium batteries.This I think is lithium cobalt hydrate, I think it's, and in the cars it's lithium phosphate, heightened or something, I forget, lithium iron phosphate.And they're very, very different.They're designed to be completely different.The batteries in the electric car are not, are not designed to be fully discharged.So in the Volt, for instance, in the first-generation Volt, you have a 16 kilowatt hour battery that you're only allowed to use 10 kilowatt in the middle of.That way you are never fully charged or fully discharged which is hard on the battery.In your cell phone, you fully discharged the battery or more you fully charge it.Because it's a weight issue.So you cannot take that experience and move it over.Batteries are very reliable.They have sold over a hundred thousand Chevy Volts and they've never replaced a battery.And because all the cars communicate back to GM, the state of the battery and how much it's driving, they're collecting all of that information in exchange for that you get free OnStar subscription.They know perfectly well, how well that batteries are doing.And there's not a single battery out of that, that has ever had, that's ever lost charge.And some people have over a hundred thousand electric miles on it.The record is 140,000 electric miles on the Volt.And, and so- - It's hard to do 40 miles a day, right?Yeah.So, yeah, so, so it's just, these are very, battery, the battery is not going to have to be replaced.It's a, it's a total myth.Put fake news.And, the Chevy's are particularly good in battery management, the Tesla's are very good too.Nissan Leaf they, you might have read that they had some issues in very hot states, but they fixed that.So it's, so this, these were caused in New Mexico and they simply had, they got cooked and that they did the batteries didn't like that.But quick, next.We talked about the range.You'll, most new electric cars now have over a hundred miles.Next, you have a lot of choice in electric car.The, the, you can't get a convertible.So that's say that's a limitation if that's your thing, but you can get roomy cars, like model Tesla X, can seat seven.You can get the most of the other cars seat five.But of compact cars, there are hatchbacks, those are they, they have room for a lot of stuff in them, you can get some that are, you know, very fast, some that will park anywhere.There's a Chrysler Pacifica that's just come out.That's right.And a plug in with an LG battery- - Yes.with a liquid thermal management, just like the Volt.Yep.So, so that has a, that has a gas engine also as backup.So there's this really a lot of range.And VW has said that they're going to put out 25, I think a new electric cars by the year 2025.So they got busted on cheating.Everybody's cheating by the way, not just VW, but they sort of fessed up to it.So they paying, they're paying amends.But the Mercedes is coming off and they've just accelerated their program.There's a lot on offer.But even today you have some really great choices, and we have them out on the parking lot and you should try to test drive them, try out different kind of cars.Next.Oh, winter time.It's another sort of story.People often ask how do go in winter?Well, take the Volt, which is my car.It has a 400 pound battery that is moved sort of towards the back.So it has almost perfect 50/50 balance and sits nice and heavy, they're great in snow.And if you want to see that, that inaction, just go to YouTube and Google a Chevy Volt snow, and that goes for the electric cars.They are, they tend to be very good in snow.And also the moter is very light.So when you spin with a gas car, there's a lot of moving mass, so it takes a while before the wheels, slow down, back to the speed they should have to give you a grip.Electric cars, the motors have much less internal spinning mass and therefore they get traction faster.So they're very good.Next.Yes, this is true.That one.That was the point.Yep.Good?Next.Yeah.So in the winter time, you, you all cars, gas cars also reduce range, You just don't notice it in the gas car.However, the it's, it's not actually a big deal.Usually what you do is that you, you can try to avoid heating the car while driving, you heated before you leave.And that really helps.So drawing heat to, to heat air, takes a lot of power, but you can do it while it's still plugged in.So on the gas car, it, you shouldn't be idling for a long times before you go, right.That's that's not good for the environment.But with an electric car, it's the way to go.So you have an excuse to, to warm your, make your car nice and toasty before you go, because you're drawing straight from the, you're drawing straight from the, from the net.Yeah.I'd like to go and tell the fact that if your car is in a garage in your house and closed, you really can't turn on a gas- - That's right yeah.Car and fumigate your garage.That's right.Whereas, I have a timer or a remote control and I can start warming up the car half an hour before I leave- - Yeah.And to get into that toaster and - Yeah.I won't turn on the heat for the rest of the time.That's a good point, yeah, yeah that's right.So you're not going to asphyxiate your family with an electric car.Okay.Next.Alright.Thank you.Hi, I'm Adam Batista and I'm fortunate to have two Teslas.I have a model S and a model X. That is actually a rental, by the way, someone mentioned about renting a car.You could rent them.I actually rented that in, in LA before I decided to get the model X. And so, so basically I've had a few of these talks, but I'm gonna focus on like, you know, I think one of the advantages that Tesla has is around the range and then the charging network.So I drove my model S from Boston to Atlanta for a surprise work trip, had to hit Virginia, North Carolina and Atlanta on this about 15 day trip.I did not pay for electricity once on the entire trip.And so Tesla has a pretty amazing network of superchargers.So I was able to charge along the way.And then when I stopped, several hotels had either destination charging that was, you know, sponsored by Tesla.So it's Teslas, you know, charging system for level two charging, or they had, or they had a, you know, like ChargePoint chargers in the area.Even one hotel in Virginia has a plug, Tesla's level two, cheaper level two solution is to give you a NEMA 14-50 plug, which is what you'd see at sites.You could charge at 40, 40 amps.And one hotel actually had that.Let's just, you know, you could see the, the panel box and someone probably either had a Tesla, or the guests said, can you put this in?And they just put it in and it's probably like 40 bucks for them to do that work and that, so I actually literally took the cable that's in my car and plugged it in.When I woke up in the morning, the car was fully charged and ready for my next next trip.The, the greatest advantage around the Tesla itself, around driving those long distances, is autopilot.And so I was able to actually, at parts of my trip, I drove, I drove basically I came off the, you know, they came on to the highway, set it to autopilot the car, you know, kept itself in the lane.It, you know, kept itself at a distance away from other cars, stayed at a certain speed, as I set it, it just like cruise control.And then I was at one stretch I was on autopilot for about, you know, about 95% of the time on the highway.And then I turned it off to get back off the highway, to charge it, about two and a half hours later.And so, so it made that trip pretty amazing.Can I say- - Sure.The, the Volt, and other cars out there I'm sure, are not so sophisticated as the Tesla, but they still have a lot of the components.So the speed sensitive cruise control, I use that driving to work.So, so you set a speed and it keeps track of the distance to the car in front.And when, you know, in Washington rush hour traffic there's stop and go, it'll stop the car, and then with the cars move it starts the car and it stops it again.You have to point the car to do it, so that's the difference to the Tesla.But it's the electric cars tend to be really pretty sophisticated.If, if you like that kind of stuff.Right.Right.Yeah.And there there's a difference in price points too.The Tesla's a little bit more expensive than the Volt.And so, and it also has it's fully electric.My, the model S is a 90 kilowatt battery.It has about 280 miles range.It's lost a little bit over the year I've had it, but I've put over 20,000 miles on it in the first year I've had it And so it lost about 4% of the range.The model X, I got that in December.I'm sorry, January.And it hasn't really lost any range yet.The, I think that the best advantages of electric car, we, we discussed it before.The fact you could charge at home, I'm charging at home, I don't think about fueling.I have more than enough range for a given day.You know, I could heat the car.The one I think I even sent the picture to you guys.It was 14 degrees.I, a detached garage, not, not heated.It was 14 degrees inside my garage.I knew that cause my car told me that it was 14 degrees in there.And I was able to turn on the heater from, you know, basically my bed and, and said, okay, warm up the car from me, please.I don't want to go into the car, you know, cold.And it was able to do that.Got ready, got downstairs, car's nice and toasty, you know, pulling that off of the, off the grid.And then I moved on.And so that's just a fantastic thing.And, and I think that even also another advantage, just in general, not even just around Tesla, is that if you are able to, if you have your own home and you have the ability to put solar on your roof, you now are, you know, basically even seeing, realizing more savings over the long term.I don't know if anybody has any questions, but I know I could, I could drone on about so many different things about Tesla, maybe be pointed into some questions that people may have.One pedal driving you should talk about.Sure, sure.So regenerative breaking, I don't think we mentioned that yet.Right?So that's a good question.So the Tesla, you know, one of the biggest advantages of electric cars is that is regenerative breakings.If you have a Prius, you might notice a little bit, but you know, if you put, you take your foot off the pedal, the car will slow down itself and it's basically the motor running in reverse to slow the car down.Tesla is very aggressive around that.And they actually made it more aggressive over time with software updates.I have both cars with dual motors.And so when I take my foot off, the pedal, both motors are running in reverse.So you can basically come to almost a complete stop.It's like three miles an hour with, with just the you're just one foot.So I, I rarely tap the brake.Therefore you don't have to replace the brakes as much, right?So the guy who has the record for the Volt, he has almost 400,000 miles on his Volt and still has 45% left of the original brake pads.And that's because you learn to, to just drive with one foot.And I know it's hard to describe, but it is so nice and to just drive that way.It's not an accelerator.It's a go pedal.Yeah.You're not jumping back and forth one pedal to the other if you're in slinky traffic, it becomes intuitive and you stop thinking about it you just adjust your foot.If your going 30 and then 18 and then 25, you're just lifting and pressing your foot - So it's like you hit molasses, you know.Yes, yes.It's very nice to- - And it's, it's very, it's instantaneous sorta response.So it's like the car is connected to you.Like, if you want it to slow down, you let your foot off the pedal and it's slowing down.It does take a little bit of getting used to and Tesla, I don't know if other EVs have it, it just has a setting that you could make it a little more lighter a load on you.But, but I, but I, after the first like day or two, I, I just, you know, I got completely used to driving re gen.And you're putting energy back into the battery.So, you know, and another advantage of Prius's originally had, right?You're, you're putting that energy back into the battery as a regenerating.So one example, I drove from, in another rental Tesla from Frisco in Colorado down to Boulder.And I, at the point of it, I was my efficiency, they, they measured it in watt hours per mile, but it was negative.I was actually gaining energy in my battery going down the hill because it was mostly downhill.And so I was like, you know, basically keeping my foot somewhat on the pedal, but it was putting energy back into the battery as I was going down, which is, I mean, it's rare, obviously I used a lot of energy to get up there in the first place, but, but, but it does help you, you know, extend the, you know, your range of driving.And so it's kinda kind of nice to be able to, you know, instead of, you know, when you break, normally your that's all heat and light, some light, and sound, a lot of that energy is going right back into the battery instead of just being used for all the other senses.Right?No, sorry.Yeah so, so I could, so I can warp, any other questions?So we have about five minutes - Okay, Do we actually want to do, do anybody else want to talk?Can I just do a very quick one?Sure.For those of you who can't afford Teslas.So the rest of us, there was one thing I, I disagree with in the first initial talk was he called us EV enthusiasts were just normal drivers because once you get into the car and you drive it, that's when you become an enthusiast.But before that, you learn about it, you educate yourself.I looked at the numbers, I have a Volkswagen Golf.It gets about 90 miles range.My daily commute, including driving around town is about 25 miles.So I could go three days without plugging it in.I plug it in the wall.I don't have a fancy charter.I've never had a fancy charger, never been a problem.I don't, if I plan a trip, I don't assume I'm going to have a charger when I get there.So I keep my trips within 90 miles.Otherwise I take the old car, or if you going to take a long trip rent a car, but 90% of my driving is with the electric car.I got the $10,000 off.So it became a very reasonable priced car.The brake pads are gonna last.The one pedal driving is really fun.I've always had a stick shift.So I thought it was going to be really boring, like an automatic, but it's so much fun when you take your foot off and you're in re gen it's like downshifting to second gear and letting the clutch out and letting the engine slow you down.The engine is slowing you down at the same time, it's become a generator and it's jumping juice back into the battery.You can watch it.You can watch it recharge your battery as you slow down, it's phenomenal.It's so much fun to drive.It's so practical.And there are deals out there where you can get really good leasing options or really good buying options.And the range anxiety is really not an issue.And, and I'm, I'm talking about one of the lower end cars, if you want to call it that, but it's a Volkswagen Golf.It's the same Golf you see around town, except it's all electric and you can come out and go for a ride in it.You could also, you know, buy used Leaf or e-Golf under $10,000.Yeah really reasonably priced.It's amazingly affordable.So if you, you need a second car, just go around town.It's almost a no brainer.I mean, it's, you know, - You're really saving- - like 30,000 miles in the car and you get one for 70,000, just look on, you know, Leaf or any other older EVs. And, and, and you did the amount of money you'll save it'll, over the lifetime that you drive the car, it'll probably pay for itself.And so it's a pretty, pretty, pretty amazing set up - So don't think of us as, as, as enthusiasts and geeks and all that and special people - Even though we are.even though we've become that by, by driving a car.A year ago, I knew nothing about these.And I went out for a drive and said, I gotta have one of these.They're phenomenal.They are, they are for everybody.They make a great first car for some, for someone in college.If you, if you seize up because something's happening in front of you and you don't have the experience to deal with it, the re gen actually is slowing the car down so it's going to minimize what kind of damage someone would cause in an accident.Just to- - And they are very safe.So, so, Becca, do you want to let people know what the next step is in terms about how the sign up sheets on the side and which vehicles.Yeah, sure, so let's open it up to test drive.If you guys are interested and want to hear each car is going to have its' own sign in process.Also have the test drive right now.But if for any reason you have to run off or something, you can always go through our website to set up in the future.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/BelmontDrivesElectric_0417-CL19.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/BelmontDrivesElectric_0417-CL19.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/BelmontDrivesElectric_0417-CL19.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/snafuinfinityBelmont_Election_040516/Belmont_Election_040516.mp3", "text": "Good evening, everyone.And welcome to election Belmont 2016.My name is Jack Kelly, and I'm a freelance reporter with the Belmont Citizen Herald.The polls have closed and I'll be a host tonight giving you election results.Joining me as analysts are Belmont residents Anne Marie Mahoney, chairwoman of the capital budget committee, a form of select woman and several other positions in Belmont.Steven Rosalez, also a former selectman and a lawyer by trade, and Parker Lutz, an eighth grade student at the Chenery school.Welcome to you all.Welcome.Thanks.Nice to be here.Today's ballot has several races with competing candidates seeking them.These include the office of selectmen, the school committee, the housing authority and town meeting membership.Let's first turn to the selectmen race between incumbent and two term selectman, Mark Paolillo, and newcomer Alexandra Rubin.Anne Marie, how do you see this race turning out?Well, I think it's an interesting race.I think it's probably an uphill battle for Alexandra as a very newcomer.You know, Mark has lived in town for a long time.He has served for a long time on many committees.He's been on the board of selectmen for two terms.I think it's hard to unseat a selectman with that kind of track record.I think on the other hand though, it's always nice to have new blood.You know, it's nice to have a race because you do get an opportunity to discuss the issues.But I, I guess I have to see Mark coming out of this on top.Steve, what, what do you think?I would have to agree.I mean, I've known, you know, it's a small town, it's a lot of people, but it's still a small town.I've been here, I don't know, 50, 55 years or so of my 60 years.And I've known Mark since high school.So, and that's way back in the seventies, the, the 1970s.So the white guy here wants to do anything, but you know, he comes from a, from a large family.I have the race, similarly handicapped, if that's the right word, I came from a large family.So, you know, we've been in town, you know a lot of people, you know a lot of generations he's got.So the name Paolillo is known.Right.The name Rubin, I suggest, probably isn't as well known among people outside of her social group or the school or in the neighborhood that maybe that's just an, an assumption, I've met her once.She's a wonderful woman, very well, very well spoken.I give her a lot of give her a lot of props for, for running.I mean, someone that admittedly says I've been 20 years in, not in the community, but in the greater community coming from Summerville, but you know, she stuck her hat in the ring and, you know, it's, it's not an easy thing to do having done it, Anne Marie having done it, for those that have done it win, lose, or draw, I won one, I lost one, but it's, it's, it's.A lot of work.It's a lot of work, and it's, it's nerve wracking.So I give credit to anybody who does it, that being said, you know, I I've known Mark for a long time.I'm a supporter of his.And so I'll disclose that, that's no secret.My name is out there.And, but, you know, he seems to have done the job.At least he has the credentials.He's, he's done a lot of things.He's been there.He's been the sitting chairman, he's, I think he's done a good job on the financial analysis.I don't agree with everything.Nobody agrees with everything.Right.But, you know, by and large, I think he leads with his gut.I think he's a numbers guy, understands how that works.And the fact that he has having been in this town and been through a lot of races.Some for me, some for other candidates, you get to sorta know the groups and you get to sorta know the faces and the, and the, and the political philosophies and where they would tend to, to, to, you know, fall given to candidates.And I think Mark has put together quite a broad coalition of people that would be his natural s- well, what I call his natural supporters.And then the, the, which would be maybe the more traditional Belmonte-ans and then, but he's put together the newcomers, put together the PTA mums, he put together what I'll consider the more liberal, at least to me a little bit, what I'll call from the more liberal or progressive faction.And he's really cobbled that together.Cause that list of endorsed names.I mean, people that have been around a long time.It cuts across all the various constituents, absolutely.People that you would expect to be one or the other.There's a lot of crosses.And they're not, he's pulled them in.And he's pulled them.So if the numbers then sort of bear that out, if that has any type of indication, I think he'll do well.Okay.I, I just feel, it's important to mention that both of you uh- - Both of us endorsed him.Are supporters of Mark Paolillo.I've known him a long time, and that's sort of what happened.Okay.Parker, what's your take on this?Well um, as you said that Mark Paolillo, his name is better known in the, or I think it's more known in the Belmont community.I haven't really heard about Alexandra Rubin until recently.And I think with him being a Belmotean, I think that could help him out.Well, I think the other piece too, is that he's sort of done the groundwork.He's come up from the grassroots level, town meeting member, traffic advisory committees, kind of, you know, done your part at the lower levels and then worked your way up with that kind of experience to be on the board of selectmen.Having also served on the warrant committee, Mark and I have worked in a number of different capacities and he's got a wide background that really helps you when you step into that office.Yeah.Anne Marie, and Steve, you both served as select, select, select - Well we both have gray hair.Well I do too, but I have...But what do you think the two candidates are feeling tonight?What did you feel on election?Oh, it's well, it's, it's nervous, but it's, it's excitement.There's, there's a bit of relief that, you know what, the campaigning is over.Okay.I don't have to, I don't, there's not coffees.I don't have people yelling at me.I don't have people writing bad letters about me.The support letters.There's, you know, you read the good, the bad, you're in the newspaper business.Some of it is it's infuriating.It kicks you in the, in the, in the butt ego wise a little bit, but at least it's okay.It's, it's everything I could do has been done.And at least that's how I like to try to figure it out.Now it's up to the voters.You sit at home, we didn't have this instant technologies we have, we'd go down and we'd have our people down at the town hall, waiting for the paper ballots on those little punch sheets with the hanging chads to come in.But that was nerve wracking and you know, counting votes and literally counting the votes.But, but it's, it's, it's it really is excitement, butterflies, at least that's what I experienced.And what, what about you?It was.It was fun in its own way.Yes.The day itself it's long, you're tired.You're cold.You're hungry, but it is exciting.And in the end, in the old days, you're right.You were in your house, you weren't, you know, when your people were down at the town hall, you were surrounded by your family and friends and party atmosphere win, lose, or draw.It, it was a lot of fun at the end.And then you could just go to bed and sleep for a little bit.Yeah, you got it.Yeah.Cause if you, if you run the campaign, it's, it's exhausting for anybody.Okay.Parker, you are the president at the Chenery school.I, you told me earlier, what was it like on the night, the, or the day that your election took place?What was it like for you?Um, I guess it's, so we make speeches when we're uh doing, well running.And I think I'm just right after it, you're kind of nervous about what they're going to do, how you're going to turn out, how the election is going to turn out.And I think, just it's nervous, but it's, you're enjoying it at the same time because you know that it could go either way.The elections surely on the national level have changed markedly over the past couple of presidential election cycles.Do you see any changes in the way elections are run, for selectman at least, or any of the town-wide offices in Belmont?Anne Marie?I think you have access to media and communication in a way that is unprecedented even, and we're not out of office that long, the idea that you can do the robo calls, that you've got, the social media, that you have everything online.And so everything tends to be instant.The good side of that is you can get a lot of information out pretty easily and you can get more detailed information.It's not just bullet points.It's the ability to explain these are my positions, and this is why, but you also are getting hit in the face with the opposition just as quickly.Okay.We have some election results right now.So let's turn to those, here we are.As you can see on the board board of selectmen three term Mark Paolillo has 2,333 votes and Alexandra Rubin 1004 uh 40 that's seven of eight precincts reporting.So that's a pretty hefty lead at this juncture.I would think you could call that with one precinct left out there.I mean, I don't.There's no way she's going to make up at 900 votes.No, because it was a very light turnout where you can see from these numbers very light.Right.Why do you think there was a, we, we did get some numbers earlier.So why do you think there was a light turnout?I- personally, because I sometimes work at the polls, I think weather hurt, with the snow yesterday, but I think there's a little bit of voter fatigue because of the national level.And I think that's trickled down and affected this particular election, absent a question or an override.People just aren't tuned in to selectmen school committee.Those kinds of raises, unfortunately, because this is where people can affect the most change the most easily.And it's the biggest chunk of their tax dollar is local taxes.People really should get more involved.But I think that March 1st election took all the energy out of the voters.Yeah.Well, - It certainly was energetic.I mean, I certainly, when I was voting today and I was, I was about maybe 9:30 in the morning and it was at 1:40 at precinct eight down the Windward school.Whereas the same time when I voted, what a couple of, - March 1st - March 1st, month, a month, five weeks ago, I was probably 500 at that point in time.And there were lines out the door and you had to wait, all the booths were full and, and there was a buzz.Good, good, there was a vibe and a buzz that, it was really sleepy up there today.So I don't know, I don't, I don't do the, the, the, I don't set the dates for these things, but you certainly could have a couple of them together and had then who knows what happens?Yeah.My personal experience voting today, there was not many people at the polling, precinct three polling, and there wasn't a lot of activity outside either.So. - And there wasn't really much of a buzz overall.I mean, you had had two or three contested races, but most of them probably uncontested, I mean, two candidates for both the two spots.I mean the slipping race usually brings them out, but I didn't really detect the usual.I don't know that the passion that use, just by, you've just got a sign holders folk Saturday morning.I mean, there was always competition.Right, well door to door.Door to door.Maybe it's all underground.Maybe it's all social media.Maybe it's all Facebook and Twitter and that's what it does.But I didn't see that, that, that real excitement for race to prompt people to get out.Just excuse me for a minute.We have a one, a, a result from one precinct for school committee.I'm told.And so let's see, I'll read that off, for Sabri Murat Beecher 242 boats, Kimberly O'Mahoney 195 and Andrea Presswich 246.So Andrea Presswich has a slight lead for votes with one of eight precincts reporting at this juncture.We don't know which one, right?I, I don't, it wasn't indicated up on the screen.It was a prec- precinct two I'm being told.So does that mean anything precinct two, you seem to know what each precinct might have a certain meaning or orientation?What can you, why don't you tell us about the various precincts?Anne Marie.Each of the eight precincts really has a personality and you see that year after year in the voting, no matter what it is, candidates, questions, overrides.Each precinct has a personality and votes a certain way.They also have a fairly predictable turnout number.In this case, you look at who lives in that precinct.So I think you indicated that Andrea does live in precinct two.So this might be her home number, whereas Beecher lives in precinct one, actually around the corner from me.And I think O'Mahoney lives in four.Okay.So we should look at those three precinct numbers coming in, to see how they tally.How do you see the precincts?It is true to a general extent.I think that there's been some shifting, but back when I ran, you know, I have more precinct eight guy that was probably more of the traditional, I was probably the more traditional candidate, than the less progressive candidate what they call now the liberal progressive candidate.Precinct one, which is around the Burbank and around that area is always sort of seen more of a progressive area if a conservative candidate did well in precinct one, that voted pretty well.Eight was a heavy voting turnout, precinct eight in the Windbrook section that you always seem to get a pretty heavy turnout there, racing seven down by Oxford and Marlborough street down that area, you would think would have a bigger turnout, but it always seemed to be relatively light.And I couldn't quite figure it out maybe cause there was a lot of rental down that area.I think it's a lot of rental housing.W would that impact how you campaigned?Would you, would you focus on certain precincts?Oh sure.Oh yeah.Absolutely.You know, the, at least, you know, back in the back in the day, it's been 20 years, but it is what it is, but you'd say, you know, we're going to try to, you know, precinct one probably wasn't my territory, but if I can hold ground, just dealing with me, if you can just sort of tread water there and then come back in my home precinct to precinct date offset, any of that, you know, that would be a strategy then get, cause it's all down to people it all down to, you know, get the people out and get them to vote and dragging them to the pole.Let me interrupt for a moment.Steve, we've got, I think the final precinct is in for the board of selectmen and it looks like we have a definite winner in Mark, the incumbent Mark Paolillo, to 1,432 votes versus a 1,428 votes for the Alexandra Rubin.That's with eight of eight precincts reporting.So we do have a winner.Mark Paolillo will serve his third term as selectman.Congratulations to Mark.I would think congratulations to Mark and congratulations to Alexandra, who did, at least in this man's opinion, surprisingly well for someone who's been here for uh...I'm surprised....for two years, I mean, it shows that, you know, you hard work, you can get some votes.Right.And she obviously had a message that the board is going to listen to, I would think.And that, that message was a, transparency was one issue that she talked about.And then I think, particularly as regards to contracting and bidding with, if I remember correctly, mod- co-moderated, a debate between Mark and Alexandra.And so that seemed like what was her bread and butter issue.I guess you have to ask the question though, is it really a legitimate issue?You know, some of us who've been around the block would say, you have to understand municipal bid laws.You have to understand the process before you can start suggesting that we're not transparent.You know, I, I guess because I'm still heavily involved.I have a hard time with that.Knowing how hard people work to in fact be transparent and to be out there in the public.Excuse me.We have the, a winner, Marc Paolillo on the phone.Whoa.Okay.Mark, are you there?Oh, excuse me, Mark.Congratulations.Are you there?I'm here.How are you Mr. Rosalez?Well, that's a, this is Jack Kelly, but Steve Rosalez...I'm doing outstanding...Oh, I didn't recognize the voice.Thank you very much Jack.Okay.Congratulations Mark.Tell us how you're feeling and what.You know, we ran a really hard campaign.We ran as we ran as a, as an underdog, we really worked really hard for this campaign and just, tonight was just the fruits of our labor.And I, I can't thank everyone enough in Belmont for their support and their confidence in my ability to continue to serve.I'm really blessed by the support that I've received, across the entire political spectrum.It was just incredible.The outpouring of support.So we're thrilled.We worked really hard and, you know, work begins again.Yes.Well, congratulations.We're here with Anne Marie Mahoney, Steve Rosalez, and Parker Lutz, who's a student at the Chenery school.Do any of you have questions for Mark or congratulations?I guess congratulations Mark.Good job.Thank you Anne Marie, I really appreciate it.Hey Mark.This is Steve.So, you know, good job so far.Let's see.Tomorrow's another day.I have a pothole near to my street needs filling.Have a budget next Thursday, Mark.Yeah.You know, we didn't want to take anything for granted and we really got the vote out.I had worked harder at this campaign than I did in 2010.And again, you've seen the results tonight and I want to thank my, my, my opponent, Alexandra Rubin, who I think ran a, a good campaign, a gracious campaign.She was a formidable challenger and I hope that she stays involved in town affairs that took a lot of courage to really step into a selectman's race.It's really tough.And I give her a lot of credit for stepping in and really waging what I thought was a very good campaign.And I want to thank her supporters as well.So my role now, as a member of the board is to unite the community and we have a number of things that we need to focus on.We've accomplished a lot over the last six years, but the challenges remain.And so I hope that Ms. Rubin's supporters and the rest of the town join hands and we work together to, you know, to face those challenges.Briefly.Mark, what were some, what do you see as your key issues that you need to focus on now?Well, I think, you, you know, and I've said this and we had a lot of questions during the campaign, but you know, I think Jack, I think the, the challenges were remained in terms of growth.I mean, I think our enrollment will continue to increase and because of that, we'll continue to feel the fiscal pressure on our schools and in also the demand on town services.So our challenges ahead is to, the override helped us stabilize both school and town budgets, but that work needs to continue.We need to do everything we can to stretch out the utilization of the override funds.We find ways to manage our costs more effectively, more than we've done in the past, and look for ways to deliver account services in a different way, because we are faced with a, a very important decision on our high school.We can't let that, enough grant application lasts.We need to stand behind that as a community and put all of our efforts into that being a success for us.And because of that capital need, we really need to focus on the operating budget and, and the growth that we're going to experience.Cause I think that enrollment will continue, which projected to increase by 20% by 2019.And that will continue to put pressure on our operating budget.So that is a significant challenge for us.And I think there are other issues in town that folks are really concerned about.I mean, I heard a lot on the campaign trail about the community path.We absolutely need to solve that issue.There's been too much divisiveness on that and I'm, and frankly, I'm just wanting to unite everyone behind a solution for that.And let's just put down sort of the divisive tone and rhetoric and work together to solve that problem.And there are many other issues as well.We have major capital projects in Reno's, that's chair of the capital budget committee.And we're faced with our capital needs are endless, our major building projects remained.And so we need to develop a sound realistic long-term plan for a major building projects going forward.So like any other community, nothing's, nothing's been completely solved.There are challenges ahead and we need to continue to focus our efforts there - Well, congratulations again, Mark.And please enjoy yourself tonight before you fix these potholes in the morning.Yeah, absolutely.Well, you know, I got a, I know I got a lot of grief on the campaign trail about our roads and, you know, frankly, we have increased our investment, but it still remains as an issue for our community.Not only our roads, but our sidewalks.And we have increased as Anne Marie knows.Right, significantly.And roads and sidewalks, you know, 300,000 on perpetuity on our roads and 200,000 on f-, it's still not enough.And so we need to focus our efforts there.Belmont is becoming known as the, as the community with bad roads and we need to, we need to put that away and finally address it.And I think we've done a good job over the last three years in doing that.And we need to do more.So Steve, your potholes hopefully will be fixed soon.All right.Well again, congratulations.I'm sorry I can't be there in person, I'm I'm here at the house.We have a lot of folks here celebrating.Well, well, well deserved.Congratulations, Mark bye-bye.Thank you, thanks.And I think we have some more reporting from precinct two for the school committee, the, excuse me, the housing authority.And so let's get to that.Okay.For the housing authority, which is a three-year term, Thomas Cena Olson has 211 votes, and Paul Richter 179.And that's with one of eight precincts reporting.W well, Anne Marie and Steve and Parker, what does the housing authority do?They oversee the, the public housing in the town.And so when you look at well, what I know as the, the veterans village.Belmont village.Belmont village, it was originally built as veterans preference housing after world war II, that is no longer the case, but that's a big development that needs, you know, care, upkeep.I got a little more knowledge about it sitting on the CPA committee, when the housing people came to the CPA and said, we need money to upgrade our electrical systems, and we're not getting enough from the state and we don't have enough here, but we've got to fix the electrical systems in those units because it's a safety issue.And so the authority oversees those kinds of things.That one, yes, the Belmont village and what I'll call Sherman guidance, which was, I would, I think originally for more of our senior citizens, but that again has, has changed in the composition.And then the, I don't know, what'd they call it the Waverley Oaks apartments, I guess, right across from the, the Waverley Oak spray park, right.The corner of mill street.And there may be a smattering of some others, but those are what it's.So, you know, there's a lot of units.There's a lot of management.There's a lot of maintenance as people in there's people out there's people trying to get in, there's lists you've got to maintain.So it's, you know, it's qualifications it's.So it's a, it's a big job.Well, there's a lot.I wish I knew off the top of my head, the number of units, but it's, it's...It's big, I don't know either.It's many hundreds, if not several thousand, over, spread out over a whole bunch of buildings, with a whole bunch of their own individual problems.Right.So it can be a, it's a challenging position.Position.And it's a very important position.It's important in the town, that those buildings be kept up.Were the two people who are running, are you familiar with them?I know Tommy Olson sort of socially.I had the opportunity when I was holding a sign today to meet Paul Richter and had a brief conversation with him.You know, b- both people I think brings something to the party.And so I think whichever one is elected, hopefully we'll have some positive influence on the board, but certainly they will bring some energy and some new ideas.I think that's important.I think they both have passion and compassion for, for their mission.The overall mission.They both, I know Thomas and Olson, Tommy Olson I'd known for many years and she's got a financial background.And Mr. Richter, he lives in my neighborhood.I haven't had the pleasure.Seen his names.I've heard him.I saw him at the debate.I've seen him here on TV. You know, these, nobody running has any lack of credentials, everybody running for anything, even town meeting brings something to the table.Right.And, and that's, that's important because you know, enough of these positions, town meeting and town wide, I've gone without opponents.I get a lot out of debate, unless of course I was the unopposed opponent, which didn't happen to me.Well, you, you were a selectman from 95 through 98.95 to 98.And what about you?My mother refers to them as the golden years of Belmont politics.You have to love mothers.Absolutely.That's right.They always wrap with rectitude.What about you?You were.I was on from 2000 to 2004.I actually left in the middle of my second term due to some family issues.It just was the right thing to do at the time.And before that she was.12 years on the school committee.On the school committee.which is probably even a more thankless job in many ways than the board of select.Do you uh, just a question that came up in the debates for selectmen, was Alexandra Rubin, was saying that she works part-time and that would give her sufficient time and opportunity to work as selectman and Mark of course is a full-time CPA. And I sure you're a full-time lawyer, et cetera.How do you, how do you manage both your responsibilities as selectman or any town-wide office and your day job?Well, you do, you know, when you, when you, you don't go in there with blinders on, when you do this, you know, all the previous, you've talked to the previous people that have held it and they all lie and say, it doesn't cause, it doesn't take much, but they're all liars.Cause it does.And, but you know, you make do.At least when I was on the board, I had the, the, the pleasure of serving with William Monaghan who had been on the board for, I don't know, probably 20 years around that point time and knew what we were doing.We had Mel Collector, a very good town administrator.Bill Skelly, he was on the boards when I was the rookie.These, these, these gentlemen, you know, they knew the ropes and we were a policy-making board.The issue that I had, the transition I've seen, or the transformation that after I left, seemed to be, we met once a week.We met probably for a couple of hours, seven to nine.We had our agenda, we'd get our stuff at, at, at, at Friday, Thursday or Friday, we'd go through it.We'd have our meeting and you hire good people much as what Mark has been preaching.I let the police chief do the policing.I let the fire chief, did I let the DPW, there are problems.We'd say there's problems and they'd fix them.Or we would deal with that.But it didn't require, I didn't tell them how to dig the hole.I didn't tell them how to police it.Didn't tell them how many offices they needed to have way.I left that to the professionals.And, and, and you make do, you have to, the other thing you have, the thing is that your phone is always on.Cell phones were probably in their infancy then, I'm glad because they'd have, but I'd have time.You'd have a phone machine back in the nineties, back in the old days, but you know, citizens, they would call with potholes.I made fun of Mark, but potholes, barking dogs, late nights, - Granite curb.Granite curbing.How come this one doesn't do my sidewalk?I mean, the constituent, it's all local.It's itp O'Neill.Right.And that's what you have to do.You have to be accessible.If you don't respond, they may not like your answer.There's only so many things you can do, but you have to respond.So, you know, that was, that was a good thing.And you know, at 10 at night it was a bad thing, but it was so, but you make do, yeah.You're in the arena.You have to do that.You know, it's weekends, it's nights.And depending on how much you want to do meeting wise, you were out a lot.Parker.What about you?How does your responsibilities as a president impact your other school activities, your studies?Well, I think I stay up later because homework and all that after, but you really like, I do work.We do like the main thing, what you need to do with other people in the meeting that we have.And then we are, we go into other groups and we do outside work that doesn't take the whole group.So we're working with a couple of people, but we do a lot of work outside of just our meeting, just like, so we're doing things that like, aren't like, you don't need the whole group to do.So you're doing the big things that you need to do with the group.And it's kind of budgeting your time, the best possible way.Yeah.Let me interrupt for a moment.We have some more results, I think on the school committee, which will be up on the board shortly.Here we are, the school committee.Okay.All eight precincts who reporting.We have a winner and it looks like, by a very small margin Sabri oh, excuse me.This is two winners.Excuse me.Thank you.Sabri Murat Beecher and Andrea Presswich are the winners with 1959 votes and 1931 votes, respectively.I think Andrea Presswich, if I'm not mistaken, is a astrophysicist and Sabri Beecher is a venture capitalist.I'm I uh- - That's my understanding.Yeah.So we have two people who have a very diverse and important capabilities and congratulations to both of them.Yeah, do- do you know either of those two.Not, not, not- - Not personally, no.Not personally, just from what I read and the debates and, but, you know, I'm very impressive.I mean, astrophysicist, I mean, they don't meet an astrophysicist everyday.That's right.She, I was reading today that she, I think runs a 10, $10 million program of NASA's Chandra x-ray laboratory, which is a satellite that tracks x-rays and uh.Okay, and I'm told also that Morat Beecher's house was...This Old House.On This Old House, which was, I think, a restored, uh, Victorian.Victorian, actually, it's around the corner from me.They did a beautiful job with it's on school street.They did a really lovely job.I recall seeing Joe Cornish being interviewed by one of the This Old House guys.And he was very smooth and did Belmont proud.Well, congratulations to those school committee members.And I'm hearing that we also have the housing authority finals.So here it is, we have one, a three year term, and that was won by Thomas Cena Olson, 1,600, uh 680 votes, DePaul Richters 1,523.So congratulations to Ms. Olson on her victory for, in the housing authority.And we talked about what that responsibility is earlier, and that's all, that's a, the final on that.Well, that's some nicer.That's interesting, yeah.So we're moving along here on election night.And I, I, I did want to get back to something you said, Steve earlier, you mentioned that selectmen was, in your time, was a policy issue.I did I, are you suggesting that there's movement away from that, that the, the select men are getting too much involved in nuts and bolts issues and not stepping back.Well, I can't speak for this particular board.I know that Mark Paolillo wants, envisions it as, as I've heard him say, even in this, campaign that he wants to get back to making, being a policy making board board of directors and have the, the personnel of the various departments do the nuts and bolts, that's their expertise.Right.I can say that, it's my impression and my observation that since I left the board in 1998, that my hair was back and it was a lot thinner, but people that came after me were more involved in the day-to-day operations, in policing and fire in DPW to the point where I thought it was meddling.Personally, because my different strokes, I didn't get elected reelected.So, you know, that's to the victor go the spoils, but, but it, it, it's not their expertise.It's not the job of the selectmen.Right.Hire good people.You don't like, they're not doing it.You hire other people.That's how you do it.That's how it all sort of works.I believe in sort of that vertical chain.And wasn't sort of looking over the whole.Right.How that was done.So I just personally think that that's not the role of selectmen, though the people obviously have differed.I kind of speak for Anne Marie.I have to say that I agree with Steve.And I think that, but I, I also agree that there was a transition and it was certainly taking place while I was there on the board.And that was a piece of the tension on the board for a number of years.I agree with Steve, that the board of selectmen should be a policy board.You hire a town administrator, you give that individual, you know, power and authority and you let them do their job.And as you say, police chief, fire chief, you know, whoever it is, we have a number of other, you know, boards, whether elected or appointment like the board of health, like the board of library trustees.And they oversee their department.Board of selectmen should just be the policy board.But I will say in the years that I was there, we did get way too into how many police officers should we have and uh- - And what equipment they should have.What equipment they should have.And other issues.I said, granite curb, when you were listing things, because I spent more time on the board of selectmen on dogs and granite curb.And none of that is policy.Barking dogs were the worst.The barking dog, but I went to court on barking dogs.See, I didn't have that joy.Yeah.Lucky me.And so, yes, I agree.And I think you've had different personalities and different styles on the board since then, I think with someone like a Ral- Ralph Jones, has tried to pull back to just be a policy board, Mark, and I think that's a good thing, to start getting away from that is not a good thing.Well, that should be an issue that is watched.And in the next with the selectmen, we have some information of the 17,000 registered voters.We have a 23% voted.Three, 3,900 approximately voted in today's election.That's, uh, somewhat dispiriting.Yup, it is.Where were we just the other day, were we at 70%, 60%, 70% on match one, I mean it was a, it was an astounding number.It was in the 60s, it was a very high number.Right.Well, so maybe there is something to your point about there was an overload, you know, that the presidential primaries.And so people are thinking about other things now, maybe there is something to that.What, what's your take on that Parker?How do you.Well, I think a lot, people are more informed with the presidential election.You see it on the news a lot more.And I think a lot of, you get a lot of information, not like you go on websites, CNN, it's all politics.When you come like Belmont, you get information about these political people, but you're not as well informed.And I think people aren't trying, they're not trying, they want to make an educated vote.And I think they're, if they're not educated on someone, they don't want to just vote for them to vote for them.They want to know what that person's about and know about that person.You've been lucky enough, I think, to be on a panel with two former select select people and have held other positions too.Do you think you'd like to get involved in local, state, federal politics at some juncture?I think in the future, that would be something I'd be interested in, like to make it better.Didn't get back to, as you said a p-, a policymaking system and the gov-, town government.Okay.You will still have to fix up potholes when we call, you know.I know.You know, it's, precinct one.And I don't know how he did.We had a person running for town meeting who was a freshman in college.He was just graduated from uh- - Belmont high school.Derek uh- - David.Oh I have it, I have it here, hold on.I have it here.I got actually have uh- - Here it is, Daniel Furnick.Daniel.Yes.And he, he was saying, one of his concerns was that the, the voice of youth is not being heard and that they have some very good ideas that that should be heard in the political forum.Town meeting.Absolutely.He also mentioned something that he was quite concerned with.One of his teachers was dismissed uh- - The high school last year, I think.At the high school, yeah.And I wasn't aware of that.So, but that was one of the catalyst for him seeking office.I think, so.So I think you said earlier you were 14.So in four more years, you'll be able to vote and run for town meeting.Well, I think we've come to the end.He's got an excellent uh- - I'm sorry Steve.Go ahead.An excellent political name.Yes.That'd look great on a, Parker Lutz.It's going to look good on a sign.Parker Lutz.Yeah.People will remember that name.That's right.Vote Lutz.Lots vote Lutz, vote Lutz.There you go, there you go.Well, I want to thank our analysts tonight.Starting from my far left, Parker Lutz, who up from Chenery school, Steve Rosalez, say lawyer and former selectman for his commentary and insights and the same for Anne Marie Mahoney.Also a former select woman and a holder of many positions.Yeah.I want to also thank everyone who voted tonight and congratulations to all the winners and to the losers too.It's important to put your name forward and get into the arena.Thanks very much.And we'll see you next time.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Belmont_Election_040516.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Belmont_Election_040516.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Belmont_Election_040516.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/snafuinfinityJournal062218-CL19/Journal062218-CL19.mp3", "text": "Hello everyone and welcome to Belmont Journal.Your one-stop destination for hyper-local news and community information.My name is Todd Bloniarz.Pleased for the opportunity to take a turn in the host chair this week, as I've been a volunteer here at the Belmont Media Center for over 25 years, that goes back to a time when there was only one local access channel and the studio was working under a different name in a much smaller space over at the high school.I also produce and co-host my own show Time Out For Sports Talk, which just like Belmont Journal, airs on the BMC public access channel and can also be viewed on demand at belmontmedia.org.We begin this weeks show with an important reminder about the upcoming trash and recycling collection program here in town.First of all, the new carts that you'll be using for the collection program, they're going to be delivered during the first or the last week in June and in the first week of July.So over the next couple of weeks, if you're not going to be home during that time, just make sure you make, the necessary arrangements so that the carts will be placed on your property.And if you're looking to purchase any overflow bags, for the collection program, you can get those at Hollingsworth 5 and 10 located on Trapelo Road, the Hillside Garden True Value on Blanchard Road, and also at the DPW office on Moore Street.Now time for a fun fact.Did you know that there are 351 town clerks that work all across this Commonwealth?I bring that up because earlier this month, the Massachusetts Town Clerks Association awarded Belmont's own Ellen O'Brien Cushman, as the Massachusetts town clerk of the year.Chosen the best at her job out of 351 worthy candidates.Ellen has been Belmont's town clerk since 2010.And in this segment town administrator, Patrice Garvin tells Belmont Journal why she submitted Ellen's name and what Ellen herself thinks about receiving this honor.Honestly Ellen Cushman is by far the best clerk I've ever seen.She's smart, she's dedicated.She lays out things in a very clear and concise and logical way, which I really respond to.I've had lot of fun working with her, and I believe that good work should be recognized.And when the nomination papers came through, I couldn't find any reason not to.So I submitted her name.I put in a couple of things that I've observed, even in my short time being here.And then that was enough to get the nomination committee to notice Ellen and recognize her in this great way.You know it's a huge honor for not just me for my office.I mean, we work really hard and I'm the leader of an amazing group of people.I mean, that's really what that means to me.Obviously we all know anybody who works in an office that has more than one person, because the town clerk is not just the town clerk, it's the town clerk's office.And so with Meg and Nancy and Dan together, we're a pretty formidable team.I think that's what that means.And we hope that we take care of the people in the town of Belmont, that they come to us with their issues and they just sometimes need a little bit of extra guidance or handholding and they can come to us and also rely on us for the more predictable parts of our job, like running, helping to run town meeting or the elections and produce their vital records and marry them, etc.I mean, it's a pretty big deal that people put their trust in us to do that.For many Belmont residents, the opening of the Underwood Pool marks the official start to summer.The new Underwood Public Swimming Pool opens for its fourth season on Saturday, June 23rd.Belmont Journal's Fr\u00e9d\u00e9rique Rigoulot talks with Frank Sartori about keeping the pristine pool clean.It's about 10 to 12 weeks to prepare the pool.And we begin around the first week of April.The parks division comes in and does an initial inspection to see how badly the winter has affected our pool, that pretty much governs how much work we have to do in the beginning.How much time we need to prepare for the opening.All of this particular week, we're trying to get the water cleared up and running properly in balance so that the pool can open on Saturday.It has to meet the state requirements or the priority levels and the balancing of the pH and chlorine.So the ideal range for the chlorine level is between one and three parts per million.The ideal range for the pH level is between 7.2 and 7.4. And we try to maintain those ranges consistently throughout the year.The parks division checks it five times a day.We also have life guards that check the chemical levels several times a day, and we have spot inspections from the health department.The main thing we do is to try to keep as much debris out of the water as possible.Maintain bacteria level checks daily.We used the automated vacuums in the evening to clean some of the sediment around the bottom of the pool.It's a Neptune Benson sand bottom filtration system with an ultraviolet disinfection backup system, which helps break down bacteria in the water.So we use less chemicals that way.The facility is fully ADA compliant.We try to make everybody happy and to accommodate everyone.Enjoy.Time now for This Week In The Belmontonian with editor and publisher Franklin Tucker.Franklin, good to see you once again.And I guess there was a meeting of a task force in town this week with some big decisions coming out.That's right, it was a recommendation by the Superintendent's Vocational Education Options Working Group and that has an acronym.Yeah, which we don't have enough time in the segment - - Right exactly.to tell you what it is.And it was established after Belmont decided back in October of 2016 to leave the Minuteman School District because of differences in what they should be paying in terms of the capital costs for building the new school.Which surprisingly enough is being built faster than they ever thought it was going to be built.And it's going online in 2019.So maybe that's something we can look for in our high school.But so we go back to the task force and what they decided is that after doing a lot of reviewing and looking at other options, including programs such as a collaborative among Cambridge and Somerville and Waltham, where they have vocational programs and also looking at Shawsheen Tech as another option, they decided that the best thing for our 30 to 40 kids who go each year to a vocational education is to return to the Minuteman School District as a full member.Now, I don't know how that's going to be, how people are going to react to that.But this has been a very thoughtful taskforce.It really looked at everything that we were, that Belmont students need, whether it was social, emotional, and extracurricular and what type of education they're going to receive.And it just turned out that Minuteman was the best buy for the dollar.Does some of it comes down to location as well?Just the fact that Minutemans a little bit closer than some of the other options.That's another big thing You can basically take kids and put them on a bus and bring them to, I guess now the school is no longer in Lexington.It's now in Lincoln, but it's just feet away.Sure, right down Trapelo Road.Exactly.And that closeness will also allow them to take extracurricular, such as sports, which is always important for kids.So now what's going to go forward, is that the superintendent, John Fallon will be bringing this to the Board of Selectmen.Again, it's just a recommendation, they don't have to follow it but it is a very, like I said, very thorough look at this, at this need that we have.And then it will likely go to town meeting, probably not in the special town meeting in the fall, but probably in the annual town meeting, because the decision does not have to be made until September of 2020.While we're on the subject of high schools, the Belmont High School, you actually have some official dates as to when the new high school is going to be built.That's right.Skanska, which is the construction company that is building the - - Is that another acronym?No, no, no.That's a big - - It sounds like one.It's a big Swedish company.Okay.They are, they've been talking with the architects, which is Perkin and Will, and Skanska is also the firm, that built at the Wellington Elementary School.So they're familiar with Belmont and they've come out with a four year plan and starting as soon as well, first of all, the money has to be paid for it.You know, they have to, the town has to pay for the debt exclusion, which could be up to a $120 million dollars.It could be even less than that, but they have designs already done, it's beautiful.It looks great.And if the money is approved, then they will be putting piles, pilings into the ground in April next year.So we're talking very quickly.They're going to be moving as, faster than most people think, because that's when they'll really begin starting the first construction.Which will be the new high school section will be the nine to 12.And that will be basically from the, from where the gym is, where the field house is all the way out to about where Harris Field is.And they'll be building that and not touching the high school that is.Oh, well for more on all these stories, don't forget to follow The Belmontonian on both Facebook and Twitter.Thanks for joining us this week Franklin.Thank you very much.After six years on the job, Belmont High School Principal, Daniel Richards is stepping down at the end of this month to pursue similar opportunities closer to his home on the North Shore.As he leaves his office on Concord Ave.Richards talks to Belmont Journal about the challenges that lay ahead for the high school.There's been a variety of them, you know, budget we challenged with every year, but also just the growth and the culture shifts for the building.When I started, we were about 950.We're about, we're over 1300 right now.And as that growth happens, culture shifts along the way and taking that culture and aiming it in a direction of creativity, innovation, risk-taking, as they adapt to tighter spaces.Classrooms out in the mods.To keep that rolling has been a challenge.But I will say that it's a challenge that I'm really proud of and that the faculty and staff have embraced and they're well on their way to being innovative, creative educators.Keeping that direction, creativity, innovation.This new building coming on board is a huge opportunity for them to expand on what they're doing.And I just wish everyone the very best in creating an environment that people absolutely thrive and love to come to every day.Time now for This Week In The Belmont Citizen-Herald with Joanna Tzouvelis, the senior multimedia journalist for the Belmont Citizen-Herald and Wicked Local Belmont.Hello Joanna, nice to see you.Nice to be here, Tom.Nice to have you as our host today.Yeah well, it's been fun.It's been fun giving this a shot.So, and let's talk about, it's been a busy week, I guess there was a public meeting earlier this week to discuss something that you had spoke about last week, the results of the incinerator site - - Exactly.Over on Concord Avenue.So the selectmen wanted to get ideas from the public for uses for the incinerator site, which is about 25 acres of town owned land.A lot of it is wetlands.It was used for an incinerator and there's actually a building on there, the actual incinerator is still on the land.It's now just used mostly for public works, storage of leaf composting, and concrete waste and stuff like that.And it'll continue to need to be used by public works even after they determine what the use is.Yeah, a lot of interesting suggestions came out of the public meeting, a bike and skate park, a hockey rink, and a anaerobic digester.Which to me sounds like some advice you'd get from your health club instructor - - Do you know what it is?I do not but I'm hoping you could explain it to me and our audience here.I'm gonna do my best to do that.But from what I understand, it's used to collect organic waste.It's an enclosed facility for organic waste.And what happens is the organic waste turns into electricity in this anaerobic digester.It's a process and that actually, they said could generate income for the town.There's two ways it would generate income.You would pay a fee like if you're a commercial business that collects waste, you know, and you need somewhere to dispose of it, you would bring it to our anaerobic digester and you would pay a fee.And then it would turn into electricity, which is also revenue for the town.It's very scientific, it's very technical.And there are some negatives.The negatives are that you need good odor control, because if something goes wrong with the odor control it'll smell.It'll smell really bad.I grew up in a rural part of Massachusetts where, you know, we had our own compost pile and yeah, it can get pretty, I mean that itself even on our little yard would raise quite a stink.Even though it's enclosed something could go wrong with those controls.The other thing is traffic, there are commercial vehicles that will be delivering this waste.So it could potentially cause some traffic on Concord Avenue, which is where this site is located.Which, yeah, there's not that much of it right now.I mean, you know, there's never really been traffic issues on that part of the road there.Right so that those are some of the negatives.And let's say the selectmen do votes, because they collected all these ideas and now they're going to study the ideas and decide, you know, which ones might be the top three.And then they're eventually going to vote on the top one.So if this makes it to the top there is some more evaluation of the land that needs to be done to make sure it's even feasible.And from what I understand, an anaerobic digester, they don't really exist around towns like Belmont, they're more in farm kind of towns like Western Mass and more farm land kind of thing.Out in my old neck of the woods right where I grew up.It's interesting, the resident that brought it to the selectman's attention, his name is Bruce Haskell and he works for an environmental consulting firm called Langdon.Do you want to hear about some of the other ideas?Well, yeah, no, I was just gonna just to kind of follow up on that though.This might be, you know, I can understand there might be a push for this anaerobic digester cause in the segment we're gonna have coming up a little bit later on Belmont Journal.We have a conversation with Julie Wu - - Oh yes.from a group Belmont Compost.So there's definitely citizens here in town that want to really push for the, you know, compost.In fact, Julie Wu was at that meeting and she said, why don't we just use it for composting, for food and leaf waste, but I'm not sure how that would work.You know we do have a rat issue in Belmont.So - - Really?Are you aware of that?I was not, no.So all that comes to mind when I hear composting is rats.But I'm sure Julie would know of a way to prevent that from happening.So she was there with her idea.Another gentleman had a lot of great ideas, a pet cemetery, a dog park, a driving range, that came up as an idea.Wow, that sounds like fun.All these ideas was written down, playing fields.Yeah that's an option.You know what, unfortunately, Joanna, we're going to have to save this.You'll have to talk about it at a future time.Well this will be coming up - This is ongoing - I will definitely keep you updated.Appreciate that, for more on this story don't forget to read the Belmont Citizen-Herald, or you can go online to Wicked Local Belmont.Joanna, thank you for joining us here on Belmont Journal.Thank you Todd.Up next Belmont's own Jane Peters brings us this week's installment of the Belmont Community Calendar.But first she talks with Julie Wu of Belmont Compost, a newly formed group that wants to reduce Belmont's trash by developing a low cost curbside composting option.I promise the segment will not be a waste of your time.See what I did there?Hi everybody, we're here in a new location on this week's Community Calender.We're here with Julie.Julie is the founder of the Belmont Compost Group in town.Your goal is to increase composting within Belmont and also, you have some other initiatives going on.So thank you so much for being here today on the show.Thanks for coming and letting me talk about this.So yeah, so we recently founded Belmont Compost, which is a group that's mission is to increase curbside composting and decrease Belmont's trash by increasing awareness of the different curbside composting options, and also making it possible to have low cost composting for the citizens and also businesses and the schools as well.Great, cool.So can you give us just the quick rundown of the difference between a curbside composting versus home composting?Yeah, so actually we started out with home composting.We love to garden and so we've always had our own compost pile in the back.This past winter when we closed down the compost pile, I just felt terrible about throwing food waste into the trash.So we started out with city compost and then once a week they come and they take away the food waste and they take it to a composting facility.And so, we tried that this winter I was really impressed by how much more you can compost in a professional facility than you can compost at home.Because actually you can put in meats and dairy products and cooked foods, you can put in paper products of all kinds.And so actually it really dramatically reduced our trash.That's great.Yeah, so I was very impressed by that and I was thinking, why aren't we doing this - - Sure.townwide so I started looking around to see if there were companies that could do citywide composting, and also would give a group rate.And I found this one company Black Earth that gives like, 50% discounts for groups of over 300.And then I found out that actually at Chenery, they're trying to start a composting pilot there.And it turns out that Black Earth gives a referral discount.If you sign up as a resident, then Chenery will get a $10 credit off of their composting.So I started this campaign, you know, hoping to get 300 people in Belmont signed up.If we got 300 people to sign up and if they all named Chenery as their refer.Yeah, that's huge.Then that's about $3,000.Right.And that would pay for about a year's worth of composting for Chenery.So we really want Chenery to succeed because all the other schools are looking at Chenery and seeing how they do.And if Chenery does, if Chenery's project with composting goes well then they might start there.Yeah get the ball rolling.Exactly.Yeah, and then otherwise you can check out our Facebook site, which is Belmont Compost with an exclamation mark and, lets see, we'll be at the Payson Park Music Festival concerts, and in July and August, we'll be at the farmer's markets as well.Great, so people can talk to you at any one of those events?Yeah, so we'll be there.And they can learn more?Yep.Great.And can people contact you if they're interested, if they have any questions?Yep, they certainly can, they can contact me.Well, I think it's a really great mission and it's great to, you know, to be educating people about it in the first place and to be signing up for these programs to kind of incentivize people, to hopefully sign up for some of these programs.So we wish you tons of luck.Again, almost a third of the way there.If you're interested in signing up, you can learn more on their Facebook page and they can sign up on Black Earth's website.If they're interested in joining in on that program.And don't forget to refer Chenery if you do sign up so that they get that credit.But thank you so much for being here.Thank you very much.Here at your house.Thanks very much for coming - Having us here today and for talking about this really great group.Thank you.And with that, we're going to bring you next week's events on the Community Calender.Many great kids write average or even bad college essays.Essays about life lessons learned from football or how my trip to Europe broadened my cultural horizons.Better tales are there for the writing.Collegewise brings an essay writing workshop to the library on Monday at 7:00 to show you what admissions officers really look for in a great essay and offer suggestions for finding and sharing your best stories.Play baseball trivia and enjoy singing baseball songs with Howie Newman at the Beech Street Center on Tuesday at 1:15.Hear stories about his days as a sports writer and enjoy baseball and classic songs from yesteryear.Newman spent years covering baseball for the Lynn Item, Lowell Sun, Patriot Ledger and Boston Globe.We're all artists at heart and collage lets us express ourselves with our choice of materials as well as design, make a beautiful and meaningful piece of artwork in a fun and social setting with other Beech Street members on Tuesday at 2:30.Artist Ann Miller will share specific collage making techniques.Materials will be provided, but feel free to bring your own clippings, photos, textures, or painting and drawing materials.Social Documentary Network and Digital Silver Imaging present Documentary Matters: Community Night.If you're looking for feedback on your documentary work or a place to meet with others involved or interested in documentary photography, you can apply to present your work for critique and discussion on Tuesday from 6:30 to 9:00 at Digital Silver Imaging.You can register on Social Documentary Network's website.Fireflies are a natural joy of summer, learn about them and search for them around Belmont Habitat on Tuesday from 8:15 to 9:45.This program is designed for all ages, but be aware of the late time, it needs to be dark to spot them.Sign up for this and other programs on the Mass Audubon website.Join U.S. Senator Ed Markey and the leading climate change experts for a summit on one of the greatest crises of our time.Following a discussion of the current state of affairs on climate policy and possible solutions.Questions will be taken from the audience.You can join the discussion on Thursday from 7:00 to 8:30 at the HS. Powers Music School presents a powwow session to performance of \"Cows in the Kitchen\" on Friday at 9:00 AM at The First Church in Belmont.Students, ages five through 11 will perform the musical theater piece that they have learned over the two week program.You can register your children now for powwow sessions, three and four at powersmusic.org.And that's it for this week.If you'd like your event featured in Belmont Journal's Community Calendar, you can send your event info to jane@belmontmedia.org.Up next, the story on BHS Senior Service Day, where students give something back to the community through volunteering.Here's how they felt about it.This is Senior Service Day.We're here at the Community Farms in Waltham.We are cleaning some buckets to fill fresh produce with, to give back to the local citizens.Our community service was at Peace of Heart and we painted around the wall, the wall outside the park.And as we were painting the wall, a lot of the neighbors, they walked by with their little kids and their families and they said thank you.And that made us, that made me feel good about it.I felt like I was helping the community.We are out here volunteering at a soup kitchen in Watertown.We're mopping the floors and cleaning the kitchen and we're gonna help with food.They really, it really makes me appreciate what I do have.You know, what I often take for granted.It makes me feel like I'm being helpful because you know, I feel like their first priority isn't, oh like, today we have to clean out all of our stuff.It's kind of like today, we just have to keep giving out food.So it's nice to do like little things for them and make it a little bit easier.So we are at the Belmont Public Library and we're working with two members of the Garden Club and we have been digging out what they call a hell strip.I feel pretty good about this, it's really fun.We're having a ball out here and I definitely recommend it.I would definitely do it again.I love it, it was a lot of fun.And it's nice to be outside on a nice day.Remember that the success of Belmont Journal depends on you the viewers and your support.Please email your story ideas to executive producer, Fr\u00e9d\u00e9rique Rigoulot at fred@belmontmedia.org.We conclude this week show with BMC's program scheduled accompanied by some smooth jazz for all of our contributors and the entire crew here at Belmont Journal.I'm Todd Bloniarz saying, thanks again for the opportunity and so long for now.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Journal062218-CL19.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Journal062218-CL19.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Journal062218-CL19.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/snafuinfinityMeet-Belmont_082818-CL19/Meet-Belmont_082818-CL19.mp3", "text": "Hi, this is Bob Feldman from Belmont Media Center.We're here at the festival, the Chenery School, about to talk to some interesting folks about their situations and roles in Belmont.How are you?Very good.Claire, I'm Bob Feldman from Belmont Media.We're just filming and checking in.I love it.See how everyone's doing, what do you folks do for Belmont?What is the neighborhood club do?Were the newcomers and neighbors clubs.So it's not just for newcomers.It's also for all of our neighbors here in Belmont.Existing neighbors.Existing neighbors.So we're made up of anybody who would like to join us and meet their neighbors in a social environment.So we host events, once every couple of months, and get all of the neighbors together so that they can meet people that they have not been able to meet in the past.How many people do you have at any one time in your group?We had an event at Conley's a couple months ago, we had about 50 people who joined us that night.And we've got an event coming up in October that we're finalizing and we'll be putting up on our Facebook page.So you can find us on Facebook and see the latest updates.That's great.Sounds like you're doing good things.We love it.I'm glad.And you're smiling and you're happy.That's true.Thank you for talking to us.Thanks, Bob.Hi, I'm Bob Feldman from Belmont Media.What do you folks do?We're Danbury Cross Morris.What does that mean?I don't know what that means.It's old English dancing.Sorry.Old English dancing.Old English dancing group.Particularly a certain kind that's called Morris dancing hence the name.I got you, and are there groups like you all through the United States?There are a lot of groups in the Boston area, a few up in Minneapolis.They call it New England for a reason.Morris dancing comes from England, we're New England, there are a lot of groups around here.So these are English groups, not Irish groups.Or are they both?They're from all over all over Europe?Depends on the style.So when's the next time you're dancing publicly around here?Spring.Excuse me?I think it's in the spring.In the spring.I have to wait for the spring to go see, you?The adult team might have enough people to dance tonight at this event.But we also jam the children's team might as well.But I think this weekend, we're doing a performance up in Vermont with a whole bunch of other groups.Right.That's a little far to go, but okay.We'll keep our eyes out for you.Good luck.Bob Feldman from Belmont Media and your name?Priscilla Hughes.I'm sorry.Priscilla Hughes.Priscilla Hughes.And your name?Elaine DiGiorvani.Hi there.And tell me about the garden club.The the garden club has been around since 1930.We do all kinds of things that we feel are very important for the town.We maintain many of the deltas, all the trees on Concord avenue were bought and purchased by the garden club.Those flowering trees that bloom in the spring, the garden club maintains and plants the garden next to the library, which has been a place that everybody enjoys during the summer time.Sure.We give scholarships to both graduates of Belmont high and for residents of Belmont.A couple of years ago, we realized that Belmont was drawing from a larger community, so we decided to revamp our scholarship and give it to anybody who graduated from Belmont High, regardless of residence.And we also of course have a residence scholarship as well.And the scholarship is given so that it doesn't affect their financial aid, but to go with it, we give a $400 book allowance so that they get a scholarship in essence of about a thousand dollars.How many members are there?135 members, two of which are honorary, eight of which are provisional.When you join the garden club, the first two years of your membership are provisional.And what that means is you try all the different programs that we offer; community planting, garden club at the Manor, junior gardeners, Woodland garden, all of the different things that you see listed on that form.I'm exhausted just hearing about it.They try and then they pick and choose where their membership.And we have programs for our members, flower arranging.This year We were presented with a proclamation by the selectmen for all the work we do in the town of Belmont.And we are very proud of that.That's wonderful.It sounds like you do great work.We try very hard.And it's a club that just enhances the town tremendously.For everyone.We try very hard to give back to the community because we love it and we want others to find it lovely too.Well, thank you for talking to us and thank you for having a wonderful club.And your name is?Adeen Storer.How are you Adeen?I'm great.That's great.Tell me about the Belmont Cultural Council.Well, the Belmont Gallery of Art is on the third floor of the Homer building, which is one of the government buildings on Moore street.And we do shows again and again over the year.Maybe once every two months, we've got this music show that's pairing up with Porchfest.The art is art inspired by music.And then we have a special pop-up fundraiser with African arts, like I'm wearing.Wearing right here.Right.And that's going to be on, on September 10th.And then the next show coming up is called the Emotion of Color.It's abstract art for abstract artists.It should be really interesting to be able to compare.Very nice looking, yeah.And we have all kinds of events, artists talks, concerts, some craft making things and stuff like that.So if your people check out our website, Facebook page, Instagram, there's always something new coming up.How many people make up the Belmont Cultural Council?Oh, well now the cultural council, this is the gallery.I don't know how many people make up the cultural council.But I know that the gallery, the director of the gallery, Rebecca Richards is on the cultural council, too.Sounds good.Sounds like you do a wonderful thing.Thank you, you come up and visit us.I will, definitely.Thank you.Nice to meet you.Hi there.I'm Bob Feldman from Belmont Media.Hi Bob.How are you?I'm Naomi Allenburg Ducasse and I am in the Belmont Art Association and also part of Belmont World Film.And they're both great organizations and Erika Hartwick is our treasurer.Erika Hartwick, I'm the treasurer of the Art Association.And an artist and you can see my pictures here.I'm a printmaker and I was assigned to sit with my team.Sounds wonderful.I like that.It's a very talented group.Once a month, people can share their work and we hope to take our meetings to the media center so that we can have them for a larger group of people.Sounds like a good idea to me.Tell me, you mentioned the film, is that part of?No, I'm just the chair of the board and the founder.All cross-cultural sharing in Belmont.We have to collaborate more with the gallery.We're going to be having our upcoming show.It's an event that the Belmont Cultural Council funded and it's portraits and fabric February 22nd.But we're also having a members meeting at the Beaumont Gallery of Art, and that will be February.I'm sorry.I said February, I meant September.I knew you meant September.September 22nd.We can see it.September 11th, we'll be having a members meeting where somebody will be presenting their artwork.And that will be at the Belmont Gallery of Art.Tell me about this fire and rain.The fire and the rain is a play, all female cast, 28 casts of characters.As you can see over here.It's a play or film?It's a play.Likely it's going to be held at Belmont Town Hall Theater on Saturday, 22nd of September and Sunday, 23rd of September, and is being presented by SETU, SETU, which stands for stage ensemble theater unit.And what we are is a nonprofit group and we get together and we put up plays year after year.By and for women?No, no, usually we have we have all men and women as well.This play, this particular play is all female cast.Right.But anybody can come and see it.No, no, I didn't mean that.They're all in English.I just meant the presentations are women.Sometimes they're men and women?Most of the time they're mixed.Like the world.They do a really thorough job, as far as, the script, as far as rehearsals, as far as wardrobe.And usually we have like three to four show runs and then, sometimes six months later, or five months later, we'll do a rerun and bring in, do an Encore.This is the Encore.Our original run was already back in April, end of April.Right?We had it.Right.We already had it.So now we are doing the encore.So, this is the Encore.Yep, 2 show run.Hi Tom, Bob Feldman, Belmont Media Center.Hello, Bob, how are you?Good.And you are a member of the Board of Selectmen?I'm a member of the Board of Selectmen and a member of the Belmont high school building committee as well.Tell me in general how the program is going.The program is actually going very well at this point.So our major milestone coming up on November 6th will be an important town vote where the town will decide whether or not they will choose to support the construction of this new project.The committee has been working for the last couple of years in developing a design concept and trying to make sure that we've got a plan that meets the enrollment challenges that we have as a community that take care of the dilapidated or, failing infrastructure in town.And that meets the educational needs of our students.That work has all come together.And now we have a schematic design and a plan to put in front of the voters to ask for their support.So basically this has to be approved by the town-wide voters.Correct.So at this point now the Massachusetts school building authority has provided their stamp of approval.So we have the $80 million dollars commitment from the state.Now we have to go to the voters of Belmont, get their support for the funding that Belmont residents must provide.And once that's done in November, if it's successful, we can then begin construction.So you're a politician.You must have a sense of how the town voters are feeling at this point.I think there's a lot of support out there for it.I think the town residents recognize the challenge we have of growing student enrollment.I think they realize the challenges we have with our aging schools.And I think there's an acknowledgement that we need to provide 21st century education experiences for our students.So I think there's a lot of support for that.I do think the town also is concerned about the cost and the residents have legitimately looking at, you know, the expense of this building and saying, is that the most efficient solution for our community?And is this something that the community can afford?So I think we're seeing support, significant support.I think we're also seeing significant concern, ultimately, from my perspective, as a member of the community, I think it is the right path forward for Belmont.I think with one project, we actually address a lot of those concerns that I mentioned.And I think we do it in the most cost-effective way that we can.But I acknowledge it's a big number.All right.And it's, you know, I grew up in Brookline.I live in Newton now I'm used to the building of high schools, renovation of high schools.I'm an old real estate developer.And so I come at it in a lot of different ways, but all towns are facing very similar situations, sometimes a little different, but in the end, the generations of a certain age has to be willing to support the new high school, the new grammar schools, otherwise the next generation gets cheated.And it's a toughy, but that's what make America great again.Thank you.And what is your name?My name is Anne Lucier, and I am a former business manager at Waldorf high school, but I live in Belmont.So I'm here to join the director of admissions.I was talking to, I'm not from Belmont, I'm working in Belmont and I asked someone who's graduating Belmont high school next year, cause I saw Waldorf high school and the thing I said, I think I drive by that.It was a big school.I said, what is it?She said, I have no idea.So tell me about Waldorf High School.We're a small private school that many people don't know we're here.Why is that?Well, we're on Lexington street.As are we.And there's St Luke's church and we're in the top two floors of the old St Luke's school.So we're in a classroom setting with a gym and all of that.And Waldorf education is something that's very prevalent in Europe and south America.And now increasingly so in China, as well as the United States.And it's a more holistic approach to education that not just keeping subject separate, they really try and weave in a lot.As a high school, it starts at 11:50 in the morning, which is already an hour and 20 minutes later than Belmont High.So, Waldorf high school is not for any one particular kind of student it's for a different approach to high school education, - That's right.would you say?We have all sorts of students, we do a lot of exchanges where Waldorf students come to Belmont from other countries and those students go to other countries for six, eight weeks.How many students attend the high school?There are between 60 and 75.So it's small.The most we can have is 20 per grade level because of our facility.Sounds exciting.I used to teach.What did you teach?I taught at BU law school, London school of economics, et cetera.But I always thought like history is one of my subjects.I always thought history is totally taught wrong in this country, and it should be interchanged with sociology and archeology.Well, what the students do, so for example, there's history every day, and the first 90 minutes is call the main lesson block.And it goes for four weeks and students do a deep dive.So they're studying the history, but it's incorporating art, it's incorporating religion, and then they create what's called these they're like a portfolio and they convert their notes into their own book.And that reinforces how they learn.So we're not big on tests and we're not big on homework.But you're big on learning in a new way and a new format.Yes.And I would tell you, it's actually an old format.It sounds great, it really does.Get into the same colleges.I read about that a hundred percent.Thank you.Hi, I'm Bob Feldman, Belmont media.Hi, I'm Rich McLaughlin, Belmont PD. - Nice to meet you, sir.How is Belmont police doing these days?Doing great.You are, really?Indeed.Got a lot of good people doing a lot of good things.That's good to hear.Crimes under control?We do a very good job.People are out there and about, and they take their job very seriously.We've got a great community.It seems like.And I'm not from Belmont, but I've been working here about a year and a half.And it's sounds, It's very expensive.It is indeed.But, I understand what you're saying.Let me ask you a crazy question.Climate change.Does it effect law enforcement at all?I know the firefighters say it does.I don't know if it really has the, I mean obviously when temperatures rise and things like that, people get a little less patient.Every town in the world.Yes.But then, you know what, I think overall, you know, I know, I dunno if it really doesn't impact us.I mean, it's where we're fortunate here in New England where we have the change of seasons.So if it gets a little warm, like it is right now in a little while, a couple of weeks, we'll be maybe thinking and hoping back to this weather.Fall is great around here.We want three months fall.That's all.Spring also, on the beginning.But like I said, it's a great, great community.Thank you for talking to us.Have a great night.Thank you.Tell me what your name is.My name is Paul Roberts.Paul Roberts.Bob Feldman.So tell me, tell me what you do at Cypress security, even though its sort of...So I'm the chairman of the IT advisory committee or ITAC, and we're actually a venerable committee here in Belmont.We've been around for, I think about 20 years, if not more.And we are, we advise the various town committees, including the selectmen, the school committee, and the library board of trustees, all of whom appoint members to our committee, but really the other committees in town and really the population as a whole, we advise them on matters related to information technology.And as everybody knows, information technology is really playing a greater role in all of our lives.So one of the things that we've done in the last couple of years is to do a series of fireside chats on topics related to technology that we think where we think there's a lot of interest or need in the community for information.Cybersecurity has been an area where there are in which we really feel like there are a lot of people who, a lot of people who need good information about threats that are online, protecting their personal information.We're doing a talk this fall on fake news and how to spot fake news as well as on artificial intelligence and some of the changes that are coming in our economy and our society with machine learning and artificial intelligence.Sounds fascinating.And these are broadcast where?Okay, so a couple of things.So these fireside chats are covered by Belmont media center they're at the library, usually in the community room at the library.And our first one, I believe is Charlie, September 27th?Tech talks?Tech talks.Yes.September 27th.The first one is September 27th is our first one.It will be covered by Belmont media center.So you'll be able to see it on Belmont cable as well as on the website.In addition as a committee, we record and stream live all of our own committee meetings.So we're trying to sort of lead by example by making all of our full committee meetings accessible to the public online.And you can find us if you go to YouTube and type in ITAC or Belmont ITAC, you'll find our YouTube channel.And we have recordings of all of our meetings on that.And we're working with the selectmen to see if there might be interest in making some of our other committees in Belmont, actually working with Belmont media center as well, making some of our committee meetings internet accessible, allow people to participate remotely and also make them available online.Sounds great.Sounds like you're doing good stuff.Thank you, we're trying to.Thank you.Hi, I'm Bob Feldman, Belmont Media.Good to see you.I'm Adam Dash.I'm the chair of the Belmont board of selectmen.How long have you been on the board, Adam?I've been on the board about a year and a half or so since April of 17.You're a newbie.If you look at it, I'm not the newest but I's a new-ish.What is going on in the town that's of any concern to, or any troubling issues or just, normal?Well, there's a lot going on, but I got to say a lot of positive things going on, getting our community path moving is the thing we're working on very hard now, 25 years in the making, getting that rail trail.And then also the underpass Alexander avenue to connect, you know, the Windbrook neighborhood to the rest of the town.We're moving on that.And we got a financial model from UMass Boston's Collins center.So we can try to figure out where we need to go financially in this, going forward to make sure that we are being fiscally prudent and see if we can prolong the need for Novarad as long as possible.So I think things are going really well.God willing a new high school will be started very soon.That is up to the people in November.I understand.I hope everybody votes.I hope to get a good turnout and a have a representative answer in the question.Yeah.Okay.Thank you for your time, sir.Nice to meet you.Nice to see you have a good night.Hi, I'm Bob Feldman, Belmont media center.You are?I'm Harriet Walker representing the habitat intergenerational program.And you are?Marion Miller from mass out of UN-Habitat.Nice to meet you, question.Yeah, I do have questions.How is climate change affecting Umass Audubon and Belmont or is it?I think it is, but.We're seeing changes in the plant community.There are some changes in the animal community.Ticks might be an example of one thing we're seeing more of that's being attributed to changes in climate.It's affecting all the animals.I would assume.It's a big statement to say all, but many of them will be affected by either extreme heat, extreme wet, extreme cold, and conditions that are very changeable.So do you do things to try to attenuate changes for the animal habitats?Or can you?Or?Well, I'm an educator, so I can't speak to the organization as a whole, but we do things that are ecologically sound.So we have solar panels that help to generate most of the electricity that we use.We have a car charging station.So people with electric vehicles could be viable in our parking lot and we promote ecological practices to mitigate some of the carbon that's affecting the environment.Do you do any of the things you're saying you do?Do you spread any of that material?Education-wise to.Absolutely, all our education programs have some reference to climate change, often it's subtle, so when you come and walk our trails, you will see over time, the evidence of some of the changes our property manager would talk about what we're seeing in terms of changes in invasive species, plants, and animals that are also affecting the environment.So yeah, it's part of everything that we do.Sounds like you're doing a lot of good things.Here is another good thing.Ask Harriet about some good things.So education is a big piece, of course, of what we try to offer is experiential education for children, teenagers, adults, and seniors, to work together and help to look after the sanctuary.So they're out in the woods, they're helping to maintain the trails, they're pruning and trimming and taking out invasive species.They're doing all kinds of tasks that are part of looking after our environment.And younger, the younger, you get them out, the better off it is.The younger you get them out they get to experience the interdependency.Ingrained in their, in their head.That they feel such pride and ownership in being able to help do something.I see more and more programs like that.It's wonderful.It's heartening.Hopefully we can double and triple it every year because it's because of the wonderful carbon emissions that we still have.Builds awareness.And I think doing that from the younger generations is crucial.Great.Thank you for your answers and your questions.Thank you.Okay.So we're here with Therese with sustainable Belmont.It's correct.All right.Can you tell us a little bit about what we're doing here right now?So we have a Penny poll, we have 10 pennies for anybody who wants to vote for, or to tell us what issues and what environmental issues they think sustainable Belmont should be working on this year.We have a sign up sheet for our newsletter that comes out once a month.We have a list of activities that are coming up in the near future.So we have a garden tour on September 8th, our next meeting, which is going to be September 12 is all about greening your back to school experience.So it's for parents.It's a kid friendly event for parents of school aged kids.We'll be talking about safe routes to school.We'll be talking about trash bashers based right here at the Chenery.We'll be talking about the program to help kids understand reducing greenhouse gas emissions.And we'll be talking about reducing plastic waste.We also, on October 3rd, that meeting will be about a roadmap to meeting our climate action plan.And Belmont has a climate action plan with targets for 2050.We want to bring those targets in a little bit so that it makes a little more sense and that's about it really.And we also are advertising our Belmont goals, solar Belmont drives electric campaigns.And just for those who might not have stopped by your table today, can you give us just a quick description of what your mission is, what you guys do in town?I mean, I think it's pretty, you know, self explanatory.So we are the environmental organization in town.Our goal is to help Belmont be a sustainable environmentally friendly community.We like to partner with other municipal organizations like the DPW and with the vision 21 implementation committee.And you know, I'd say that's about it.Right.Well, thank you so much.Thank you.Okay.So we're here at the Belmont food collaborative and farmer's market table.I'm with Anne and Kim.Thanks for talking to us guys.Can we talk a little bit about some of the things that you're promoting today?We've got our farmer's market that runs every Thursday afternoon through the end of October, we're two, two to six, starting after labor day.And we have all kinds of different foods.We've got fruits and vegetables and meats and fish and entertainment, Storytime for kids.What else do we have?There's more.Yeah, we have music entertainment.We have breads and pastries and it's just, it's a very congenial, atmosphere.It's very social and a pleasant place and lots of fresh produce, right?Great local food, a nice place to run into neighbors and catch up.And so that's a fun thing to do.Awesome.And I went to the farmer's market couple weeks ago.It is, there's a lots of stuff going on.Lots of different vendors there.Anything else in particular that you guys are working on right now?Well, the fungal food Collaborative is a 501 C3 nonprofit.And we do a lot more than just the farmer's market.That was kind of our first project, we do a work in food assistance, getting fresh produce to people in need.Some of that work, we do through the food pantry, making fresh produce available, but we also provide benefits to the people who are on the SNAP program at the market, so they can use their SNAP benefits and we match it.So they get up to $20 a week.So that's one thing, but we also have other jobs.Opportunity for both the farmers and for the recipients so that everyone wins.And that's been a really great opportunity at the market.And we have education.So. - We have garden, you have a garden at rock meadow, one small garden plot where people take turns, taking care of it.So a family will sign up for a week.They'll come two or three times weed water, take the produce home.So we give them all the instructions they need and meet them there if they want to.So it's a fun way to kind of try out the garden and see what's growing and maybe grow something they haven't grown.Well, and is that something that's open to anyone in Beaumont?Open to anyone in Belmont, they just go sign up for their week and then I send them instructions and then they go, so it's a great fun way to get involved.And it's hard to get in there, right?To get a plot there?Its hard to get your own plot.So this is a good way to check it out.Maybe if you want to get on the waiting list for your own plot, or some people have a garden at home that doesn't grow well, and it's fun to try out someone else's garden where there's maybe more sun, someone else's already planned and stuff.So it's a great, it's a fun learning opportunity.Awesome.All right.Well, thank you so much for talking to us.All right.All right.So we're here at the Yes for Belmont table.I'm joined with Ellen.Ellen, Thank you so much for talking to us.Happy to.Can you talk a little bit about what you're here to talk to the residents about today?Absolutely.We are talking about the Belmont seven to 12 school.This is the school that is going to be built to replace a lot of the current high school.And it's going to be two schools in one.So there'll be a high school wing and a middle school, seven to eight wing.Okay, great.And what would a yes vote mean if people do vote yes?So a yes vote means that we get to build the school.The voters are going to be asked whether or not we want to fund the school.And it's really important that the town desperately needs it because the school is very old and needs a serious renovation because there is tremendous overcrowding in our schools and this solution solves overcrowding throughout the whole district, all six schools.So it's a great project.A yes, vote means we build it.We solve our problems.Great.Awesome.And I'm assuming there's been lots of research.Obviously that's gone into this and lots of people who are involved with trying to get this through.So we appreciate all the hard work there.Do you want to talk a little bit about what might happen if it doesn't go through?So, I mean, you mentioned that there's been a lot of work.The building committee is the group that has done a tremendous amount of work.They've been at it for two and a half years.We are trying to help communicate and have the conversation with voters to understand why this is so important for the town and why we need to vote for it.If we don't pass it, then we still have the problems.You know, we still have to fix the old school.We still have to fix overcrowding.Any other way of fixing it is more expensive.We have right now, an opportunity with the state, they're going to give us an $80 million state grant to build this school.If we don't take advantage of it, now that goes away because that's their rules.And so this is really crucial if we want this $80 million, if we want to make it cheaper for Belmont residents, we got to vote yes now.Great.Well, thank you so much.Thanks.This is fun.Okay.So we're here at the Belmont against racism table.I'm here with Meg.Thank you for talking to us.Do you want to talk a little bit about just what your organization is and what you, what you guys do?Absolutely.The president is coming around the corner so she can tell more but this is a group that's been around a long time.It started in the seventies in response to some of the race rioting that was going on and the community felt they wanted a way to talk about the discussion and they decided they wanted to work locally to make sure Belmont was a place where families of any race, religion, and any orientation to come and be welcomed in Belmont.And again, there are many issues that we've taken on over the years, we work very closely with the schools.We support the METCO program by providing after-school transportation.So, students can stay after school and participate in drama or theater or sports or whatever.We're working closely with the schools and brainstorm ideas about making sure that the schools are supported around diversity issues in the school.We support all sorts of programming, especially discussions around some nice books.There's a group called story starters that we support that will help parents talk about race with their kids.So we have a wide range of things, and we have programming coming up in November about social justice issues or in like the new criminal justice laws.So we have plenty of programming that, across the board.And so you have an event in November.Is there anything else you are promoting today?Kathryn, do you want to talk about the programming, the criminal justice program?Oh, just jumping in.Oh, so the program in November 15th.So on November 15th at 7:30, at the, you know, unitarian church, we're going to have a program on restorative justice and it will include Senator Will Brownsburger.It will also include district attorney, Marion Ryan, Arlington police Chief Ryan, our police chief Rich McLaughlin and members of the community for restorative justice.And we're going to talk about bringing the restorative justice model to Belmont.So we hope lots of people could attend.It will be very interesting evening.Great thank you so much.You're welcome.Thank you.We're here with Ms. Elizabeth Warren.She's looking lovely tonight, Elizabeth.Thank you so much for being here.She looks great.Isn't she lovely?", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Meet-Belmont_082818-CL19.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Meet-Belmont_082818-CL19.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Meet-Belmont_082818-CL19.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/snafuinfinityPos_Beech_St_Ep3-030119/Pos_Beech_St_Ep3-030119.mp3", "text": "Good morning, and welcome to Positively Beech Street.This is our third episode.We are here at the lovely Belmont Senior Center.I'm one of your co-hosts Bart Fellowmen.And I'm Rich Berger.Are you my other co-host?Yes, I think so.Okay.I think so.I was here last week, so I- - Yeah, I know, but- - There sure are a lot of comedians here today.Yeah, well, I figured I'd show up again, because why not?Exactly.Exactly.You never know what's gonna happen, particularly in the senior center.That's true.Oh, that's true, and our wonderful producer is Jeffrey Hansel.There he is, twiggling, wiggling and all that good stuff.And I want to make mention, that we have plenty of notepaper because we forget a lot of things, and we have yellow note paper, so we can even see it.Right?There you go.But, you don't wear glasses like me, so I- - I have glasses in my bag, in the office.I've never seen you with glasses.I don't dare wear them, because I'll lose them, you know?So I figure if, if in case I need them, I have them, but I'd be better off not wearing them, because then I'll have them for a long time.So I'm sorry, it was, someone was taking- - Someone was trying to steal your chair?Yeah, they were trying to steal my chair!I had to say, we need that.I thought there were about 300 chairs behind me, but- - Well, - I didn't, you know.We have tons of chairs here, we do.But going back to glasses, you can read something small print without your glasses?Well, I have a lot of eye problems right now.Right.I have a cataract in my right eye and- - Oh, you were going to tell me, I got interrupt you.Yeah.'Cause we're having that conversation, you were going to tell me you to speak to, we need that, I'm sorry.Put chains- We would speak to it, what a lady with SHINE, or who knew about the SHINE program?Or?Yes.Yes.Well, what happened was I scheduled a cataract operation for this month, first day of spring, the 20th.And then I, it dawned on me, that perhaps I would owe a lot of money on it.I didn't know if I was fully covered by Medicare.So I found out that without supplemental, I would owe some money.So I went into an emergency session with myself.I cancel the appointment.I cancel the appointment, and I rescheduled.I'm going to reschedule.In the interim between now and the rescheduling, I'm going to get a bit of supplemental insurance to help me out.So you spoke to that woman you had told me about?Yes, I spoke to this SHINE person here, Alicia.She's excellent.She is, she showed me- - Knew all the rules?Oh my God, she not only knew all the rules, she showed them to be in a way, sequentially, step after step, where it was very easy to, to understand.And if anybody has any need for a SHINE counselor concerning Medicare, I would, I would recommend her highly.Was she able to tell you how much it would cost you out of your pocket?I'm just curious.No, that the, you know, it's a kind of, it's kind of complicated, but what you need is, you need a diagnosis code and a procedure code to find out- - Excuse me, but we have a special guest just, oh, pulled up, and- - We need to pull over more chairs.Well, we- - Yes, we're going to do it.So anyway, you know, Medicare's is so complicated.It really is.It is very complicated.You never know what you're going to get hit with.We're gonna move over, a little like this.I'm going to move this over here.Sure.'Cause you want?You gotta get close.We gotta huddle.Oh, we gotta huddle?Yeah, well, only because of the, the way the vocals go.Oh. - And so- - I wonder what was used for decoration- - So- - Did it actually work?Well, welcome to the show.I asked, I have on my right Dana Leavitt, who's the Assistant Director of the Senior Center, and to her right, is Social Work Intern named Deborah- - Sarah.Goldberg.Sarah?I liked Deborah.Oh, okay, Sarah Goldberg.I guess if Dana and Sarah combine, maybe you get Deborah.Why not?Only if wandering in the desert.English is a living language, it's very fluid.So if you're given the go ahead, - Yeah.To do basically anything, - Anything we want, all right.Well, I'm going to let Sarah- - And that includes Groucho imitations, all kinds of good stuff, and there you go.Yeah.Younger folks like you, who still know Groucho, it's important.Yes.I forget, given my age, someone who's like 30, 40, years younger than me, they're not going to know that reference, you know?All the time, I say, do you know what I'm talking about?And they go, 'I think my mother told me about that'.And I was like, okay.Just get me two hard boiled eggs, would be good.Yeah, be glad you have a yellow pad, that's that's the color of this episode.Oh, yellow.Yup.Excellent, all right.Well, I'm going to let, I will let Sarah go first because Sarah is a newbie at this.So I am a newbie, just doing a little plug for the new group I'm leading on Mondays.So this group is on right now.It is an expressive arts group, Mondays one to 2:00 PM. Artistic skill, not required.It's an open group for all levels of creative ability.All you need is a desire to express yourself, as Madonna would say.Through art?Through art, yes.So, it will be a guided group where people can come, I will lead the structure of the group, and we'll get to creating based on that.And it's open to everyone.You know, you can participate, you can observe, but we definitely encourage you to come check it out.Mondays went one to 2:00 PM. I also wanted to let everyone know, I'm here Mondays and Fridays, feel free to come see me, and ask about Beech Street's budding phone program.I know a lot of you are interested right now in finding out how to get those smartphones, and start signing up for shared driving opportunities, such as Lyft and Uber, and I am here to help with that.Oh, wonderful.That's great.Do you have, do you have any art therapy background from your social work education?I do.I graduated from Lesley University, which specializes in expressive art therapies.I have facilitated groups all around the Boston area related to expressive art.My specialties are bringing out the more, kind of deeper, messages that we hope to express in our day-to-day lives that sometimes we just can't find the words for, and I do that through imagery and therapeutic writing, and have found it to be a very soothing and enjoyable way to facilitate different types of- - No, the reason I ask, I used to have a sister-in-law who gone to art school, and who did a lot of therapy work with her art.She was a Potter, and so kind of an exciting medium, because most people probably have never tried to create anything in pottery.And when you have someone, and when you have an elderly person, and they indicated a willingness to get deeper, and they start creating art, it's like I observed some of her classes and it was like 'A-ha' moments because it was like, wow, the emotional uplifting for some people, they just got so into it, they wanted to do pottery every day.Yes.It was just- - Well, you know, I would like to, on the same, the artistic realm, I'm about, with virtual reality here, bringing the virtual reality to the senior center.So I live in virtual reality.So I, I don't want to be so lonely anymore.I'm going to try to help people come.So I would like to extend to you, the offer of collaborating your, your projects and ours.Maybe we could have a co-event of some sort?I think that would be a wonderful idea.Figure that out.Yeah.Yeah.I think there's so many wonderful sensory experiences, whether it's pottery, or virtual reality, and I think it stimulates us all to go deeper.Yeah.Yeah, a virtual reality for me, it's the explosion into the human imagination.Yes.And I think that everybody likes to go there.We're all kids at heart, and then I think everybody likes to go there.Sigmund Freud rides again.Sigmund- - I mean, you know, if you think of, you know, there's lots of things he did that were great, and things people don't agree with, but think of the massive cultural influence he's had on human life since he was in Indiana doing, inventing psychoanalysis.Well, and you know, talking about imagination and that kind of mind thing.I think Plato had some sort of, if I'm recalling correctly, I think it was Plato, he had some sort of world that he imagined where there were primitive shapes, ideal primitive eternal shapes.And I've seen some of these, yup.I love it.In virtual reality.Were you around when Plato was alive?You have- - To tell you the truth, I came a little bit later, - I was going to say it was your- - But I knew his son and his daughter.Right.You're uncle, your uncle was hanging out with him, I heard.In the desert, you know, wandering together.So, you know.We do nothing but tell the truth here.Yeah, I know you guys do.There's historical truths, you know?You got to- - That introduction, by the way, of the show, the podcast?It's brilliant.Oh. - What Jane created.Oh my God.Hilarious.I mean, so good!I'm gonna have to check it out.You'll have to check it out, it's great.She even chose the music.Yeah?It's great.The music is great, too.It's so good.So, so the theme there was kind of a yellow, yellowy green, so we're trying to keep that going.Keep that going?Yeah.I support that.We were going to paint the office Tuscan Okra.It will be nice, but I don't think that's going to- - Oh my God.Keep it exciting.So I have a question, and it's to both of you.Sure.So one of the things Rich and I would like to accomplish, is find them a medium, or a way, to get people here to share some memories, some origin type stuff, family situational, maybe with even some pictures.I think it's a wonderful way, if they're comfortable enough, that an older person- Where I live in Newton is a senior building, and there's a new Social Work Intern actually, who I have not met, but they post things.They, they, they have more things going on in the day.I mean, I get exhausted just reading the list of things that are planned, but this fellow, Luke, is doing a memory project and I haven't spoken to, but I can imagine what it is, and it makes, you know, it makes a whole lot of sense.People who were either shy or whoever, past memories, but would want to share, and there are some who it might be too painful to share, but it's hard to- I'm trying to find a mechanism or medium to approach .that subject.Yeah.We, I was literally having this conversation last night when I was talking with Nava.We were talking about someone and their life, their story.And then it sort of, I had said, well, if there was a way that we could do it.And I know my grandparents, we still have the receipt when they got married at the Waldorf Astoria in New York.It's such a cool piece of history that would evoke a story, and would be able to share.And so, yeah, I mean, I would 100% support that if people had something that they wanted to bring to tell their story, that would invoke that.Yeah.It's trying to figure out, and maybe we should, Rich and I should sit with you, or both of you, whatever, depending on schedules, how to think of what the methodology is to approach people.Because saying it was one thing, right, but doing- - But doing is another.I mean, you talk about, you gotta think of your parents.I'm, in my apartment, I have a picture of my parents at the Copacabana in New York, with little beer bottles, and champagne, things on the table.That's awesome.And it has to be, let's see, they were married in '39, and this was before they were married.So probably about '37, you know.Wow.And I always remember they were married in '39, because that's when Gone With the Wind was first aired.Oh, I love that.So, they're married on the 31st, and my mother made it through the marriage because my brother was born on January 1st.January 1st.Right.Three years later.Any way, so give me a memory that you have from your past.From my childhood?Well, from your past, it could be childhood.It could be, it could be stories you were told by your family.Well, one thing that comes to mind is after I graduate, I had, I had an English teacher in high school, and one day I came home from a college break.I was, to visit my folks and I went to the store for some reason, and I actually saw this teacher carrying a bag of Ope.Carrying a bag of groceries?And I almost fell over.I mean, I didn't even realize that she ate, I didn't think she ate.I mean, I kind of realized something important about teachers, you know, they do eat, and they do have a life, and they carry groceries.They exist.They're people, too.Have children and families, yeah.So it was a revelation.It's funny how you look back and you, you know, you kind of, as you get older, more experienced, your vision increases.I think I embellish that a little bit, but the heart of it was there.I was very shocked to see her in another context, so.I hear you, I hear you.We're gonna- - So, what's going on here?Anything new, anything different?Lots of, oh gosh, lots of stuff.I know, lots of things.Who can keep up with you guys?The first thing is, I want to put a plug in for the beach party, 'ause that's going to be a lot of fun.So we're having an indoor beach party, - I was going to say- - Because we're on Beech Street, and because the winter months are long.There's going to be no sand, there's no requirement to wear a bathing suit or flip flops, or, you know, no.But if- - But are you doing Pina Coladas or Cuba Libres?I mean- - If you have a Tommy Bahama, or you have- We're going to do like a fun punch in a non-alcoholic, obviously.The Spirited Gourmet is donating a tray of passed hors d'oeuvres, so we'll have those, hotdogs, I'm gonna get ice cream.Like what you remember as a child eating on the beach.Hoodsies.Hoodsies?Yeah, I'm going to get the strawberry shortcake bars, fudgcicles, I wish they sell, they sold the two ball screwball, you know, the ice cream that had the two gumballs at the bottom.That was the most fun part.But I don't think they sell those by the bulk.So we'll get, you never know.Oh my God, you look like you would go to Nantasket Beach.Did you ever go to Nantasket Beach?I did, but I was first dragged to Revere Beach because my mother grew up in a place called Beachmont, which is in between Revere and Belmont, and overlooking Revere Beach.Okay, okay.And I hated Revere Beach, - Yeah.And I would tell my mother, I'm incredibly fair and I burn, I'm not going.And she said, 'You're six years old, I can't leave you at home'.But I would say, 'Why not?I'll play', you know?So I didn't start going to Nantasket until I was like 14 or 15, you know, that type of thing.Yeah, no, those are the memories of the ice cream.When I would get the ice- - And when is this beach party?March 19th from 4:30 to 6:30, and we're going to have a steel drum player, Toby Tobas.So he'll do Caribbean, Reggae, Latin, - Oh, excellent idea, I love that man.And we're going to play corn hole.I'm telling people if they have beach toy, beach games, you know, paddle ball or whatnot, it'll just be a lot of fun.So that's coming up.I'm gonna bring big inner tube.Yeah?I'm gonna wear it.Yeah?Yup.Do it, do it.That'll be a lot of fun.Are there gonna be any children or, you know, or is it, you know, a beach day, you could have children, grandparents, you could have, you know, any number of things.Yeah, I'm encouraging.I mean, we cater to people 55 and older first, you know, they're the priority, but I don't see why not, but I think we'd probably stick it, stick to adults only.Well, we can probably find a 55 Year old kid.You're right.We could, we could.A lot of them.I think we could find one.Yeah, but that'll be a lot of fun, I'm excited for that one.And then we've got a lot of great music programs.The Sarah Gardner Trio is coming.She brings her dad, he plays the piano.That'll be a lot of fun.The Brill, the music from the Brill building, they were here last Friday and it was quite a jam.Oh, they were great.Yeah, it was a lot of fun.Hopefully we'll have them come back, 'cause we were talking about, not necessarily a prom, but like a throwback Thursday party.So we'll have ice cream floats, do like do-wop and stuff like that.Ice cream floats.So we're working on that party at some point.Yeah, when's the last time you had a root beer float?A year ago, at a cabin.Last night.Yesterday.So we're working on that.We're having a great program today to talk about affordable housing, which is important for people to hear in case you have to move or downsize.So the Metro West program, they're going to come and talk about housing, and then what else do I have going?I think I have a lot of stuff going.We're having a, Barry Pell is coming to talk about climate change.There were two islands, I couldn't give you the names of them because they're hard to pronounce, but basically, what is climate change doing to impact these small islands, and the people who are still living on these islands.So that'll be a really important conversation.The other thing I really want to plug, is the social bullying program that we have coming.Robin, is a woman from Jewish Family and Children's Services, who's coming to talk about social bullying among older adults.And it's present, you know, whether it's in housing, whether it's here at the center, whether it's at an assisted living, in a nursing home, I mean you can, bullying, doesn't go away.So that'll be a really important program that we talk about, too.So lots of good stuff happening, and I want to see everybody.we're going to the service dog graduation this weekend.So that'll be a lot of fun.That's on Sunday, we'll watch the dogs from Golden Opportunities for Independence, we'll watch them graduate.So now they're fully completed with their service training and now they're ready to be service dogs for their owners and go out in the world.I think we just can't wait to see you guys at the center.Yeah, all right.Thank you so much.Thanks guys.Thank you very much.Thank you, pleasure.But we need to sit sometime, get into methodology, and pictures.Pictures are important.Everyone has them- - Yes!I think.I have a few, myself.That's good.I'm surprised at how little I have, family pictures.Probably, it's a reflection of how much your parents probably collected, no?My cousin, one of my cousins has a, she's kind of like- - The family- - Repository.Stuff, photos, and genealogy.It's such a strange thing, I have a lot of pictures cause I have a brother who, you know, I'm the one.So I'm the repository, and that was that way with stamp collections too, which cause we were a big stamp collector family.'Cause my grandfather was in the steamship business, and he would get letters from all over the world constantly, for business.My father became a stamp collector anyway, but with pictures.So, I used to go over them with my mother, 'Who's this'?, you know, it was mainly with my mother's family, and now I have all this stuff and occasionally I'll look at 'em, because my daughter wants, she's always looking for missing relatives.She thinks, 'Why aren't, why don't I have more relatives around here'?Well, Julia, most of them are dead, but you know, it's true.But you know, people can't remember who these people are, and I, and I have the memory, but I was never given the full memory.That's why I was coming up with this thing, pictures, shouldn't be kept in albums, in my mind.People should have them out.Like, I want to make for my kids, a couple of collages.I used to date a woman that did collages with all these pictures and be framed like a picture.So you can point, and look, and see, rather than having it on a bookshelf, in an album that you never take out.Yeah, well you know, that, pictures are perhaps, you know, the most popular thing to record memories.But in this day and age, we're starting to get to the point where we have other technologies, you know, like video.I mean, video has been around for a long time, but a lot of people with their portable devices will record some sort of an event.And that will become part of the pictorial history.Right.Excuse me.I always have a question, you know I'm not very technical, but I see these people with their phones, their iPhones, their smartphones, taking, like zillions, a lot of pictures.And I was with my son and a friend that came over, and they were talking about their storage capacity and they had like 1500 pictures on there.And I go, 'What are you doing with them'?I mean, if you got to look in a little, can you print them out and you show me what, you know, and it's like, 'Oh, they're just there'.It's like, the repository is in their hand.Yeah.And also, you know, I found, I'd take photos with my phone, too.And I found that at various times, I think to myself, I didn't even see what I photographed.I mean, there's some, like I'm seeing this microphone, and if I really pay attention, I can look at its detail and really see it.But if I say, oh, that's a wonderful microphone.You know, I'm like this, , and I I put it away or walk away.My camera saw more about that microphone than I did, you know?Well, so my question would be, in that, how often do you think after, the day after you took those pictures of the microphone, would you go into your phone and start scanning the pictures?Would you remember, or it just sits there and say, 'Oh, look at that microphone again a month later', or?I do, I do go back.Yeah, I do.I, the thing that I'm finding frustrating is, finding how, you know, you think, oh, I took that picture, but how far back was it?And my phone is not sophisticated enough so that I can say, you know, such and such a month and you know, and they will retrieve it for me.I think some cell phones have the capacity when you get that many photographs and you can't remember where they are.Or when you took them, but yeah, where they're located on the- - See, it's like the, to my mind, it's the, it's a device.It's an assembly of order put around, or organization put around the pictures.But it's like, I wanted to do a cookbook.And the reason I bring this up, is because it's a similar concept, and people said, 'Well, everyone's done cookbooks'.Why do you want to do a cookbook?Says, ' I can't remember where all these', because a lot of recipes can lead you to think, if you're a cook, to get to experimentation or another recipe.In other words, it influence you in what you know, 'cause I always, I'll take a recipe and I'll change it to my format, and I'll add things.So it becomes my recipe in effect, not someone else's template.But, but the point is I wanted, I thought there would be a way to develop collecting recipes that you could have a cookbook that someone could develop an algorithm or whatever so that you don't want to be stuck going through 500 pages of recipes.But you wanted to say, well, if you have in your house, if you had olive oil, anchovies, garlic, and like three other ingredients, show me what things you can do with that.You know something?I can give you a suggestion.I'm a big search guy.Right.I think of something, I go right on the internet and I get a little phrase or a couple of keywords and I, - Follow it.I would go to Google, put in some, you know, first do recipe software and see what comes up.There might be, some people might have invented an app, or a program that does a lot with recipes and maybe some of the things you want.and correlations between ingredients.Right.You know, I mean, explore- - Yeah, it's- - I'm sure you'll find something that's interesting.Maybe.You know, my son says, 'Dad, I don't need a bunch of cookbooks' and he's he cooks also.So he says, 'I just look.If I want to cook something, I look it up on Google or wherever'.I said, wait a minute, what are you asking Google to tell you, you're giving input, questions.So what if you don't know part of what you want to tell Google?Well you see, yeah, I would say start out general, you know, like recipes software, and then, you know, some findings will come up and then you can, you know, go to a website, take a look at what it means to the producer of that piece of software to be labeled recipe software.Maybe it's how to better organize your recipes.Maybe it has, it has all these.Maybe there was a way of searching for those three ingredients.What could you make with this?You know, you never know.I know, but I've tried a little of that and I don't think it exists what I'm trying to do, but I don't know.It just seems like- - Well, maybe some time you and I can sit down and- - An inventive way to help people who want to cook without necessarily having a recipe, but you have ingredients.Right.You and I are having a tough time, I'm having the same thing.It's the dry- - Heat.Air here.That's why I'm drinking orange juice today.Does it affect your skin?See.it affects my skin the dry.I don't know.Do I look kind of, I hope I don't look yellow, that's not a good sign- - No, no, no.When you look yellow.That's not being transferred.I don't think there's any transfer to yellow, but you know, it's a- - I'm in it for the Vitamin C, and I love orange.I love the color orange, and this bottle is really cool.It's a very nice bottle.I'm not plugging Simply Orange, I'm just plugging it- - I get it.I am a real shopper of food.I mean, I know what different markets have.I know what the price, just because I got it from my mother, but like I started buying orange juice again.A few months ago, I stopped.I like orange juice, but it was too fattening, and I'm on a diet.I don't want all the calories.And now they're doing 50% less calories, two brands, which is significant, 'cause it's less sugar, it what they're cutting out, you still get the orange taste.And so, same prices as the regular orange juice.So now I'll have orange juice.You know, I personally have had the opposite problem in my life.Now that I'm older and you know, I'm getting a little more sedentary.I'm keeping my weight.I was very, very active being a carpenter early on, and being a kid you're run around.But anyway, I had just the opposite problem.I - - Couldn't keep enough weight on.Yes!During college, I was so thin in the middle of my college years, that I went on a crash diet.The crash diet was two meals of pancakes or waffles with butter and syrup, and anything else that I could put on top of it to give me caloric intake, and then a bag of malted milk balls.There must have been like 6,000 calories in that bag.I ate every single malted milk ball, and I didn't gain an ounce.I didn't gain an ounce.Yeah, it's your system.No, it was my system, and also I smoked for a long time.When I gave up smoking, BOOM. - Oh really?Yeah.So that did, 'cause- - 15 Pounds, 15 pounds all at once.I lost seven of them, but I kept the seven.I still have those seven pounds from 30 years ago, like a bank account.Right?Yup.It happens.It happens when you get old..Did you get any interest on that?It's compounded, it's compounded!And it hasn't gone up to eight pounds at all.At Thanksgiving I was with my son, I was with my ex wife.You know, we have to share the children and all this, blah, blah, blah.And she always nice figure, blah, blah, blah, but someone's said something.And I said, 'Well, I've been on a diet and I've started to lose, I've lost seven pounds'.It was after two weeks at the time, and 'I want to continue this and go to more plant based stuff', blah, blah, blah, it's my diet.I wouldn't need to explain it to her.And she says, she came over to me, my ex-wife, and said, 'You want to give me some of what you got'.At first I didn't know what she was talking about.She was talking about, weight, she can't, she has lost weight and she can't gain weight.She likes to eat, but when she gets unhappy or depressed, whatever, she says 'Give me 10 pounds of yours'.I said, 'Here it's free, it's a bargain.Take it'.Somebody should work on that technology.Yeah, well, I believe if I could sell her 10 pounds, I do it in a minute.Yeah.But- - I would go, I would buy, you know, an eighth, ninth, 10th pound.I would really go, I'd go for maybe like up to 12 pounds.I tell people I've always aspired to be heavy, and they're like, 'What?You've always aspired to be heavy?Because you're always thin.Nobody understands that.I think there, there is a problem.I mean the, you know, the bulimia, and people being thin, - Right.They think they're not thin enough.I mean, that's a problem in a different way, 'cause the person wants to get lighter and lighter and lighter.I wanted to get heavier and heavier and heavier.You're starting at the point where you have less pounds.Right.Just going in one direction or the other.Exactly.Well, I tell you a funny story.I went to graduate school in England, I think, you know?And so I'm over there, and I don't have a lot of money.I had a, I remember very specifically, and I should have just complained to my parents, but I didn't.So I was always looking for, to eat, the money to eat.You know, it really was tight, so I had $3 a day for food.Now, this was way back when, but still you couldn't get a lot.I did okay, generally.If I had gotten $4 a day for food, it would've changed my life!It's that close.So I traveled all over Europe, I was very excited.I had a great year in Europe, and I got my degree, and the war was raging, and all this craziness was going on, and I come home and I fly into New York, 'cause that was, there were a whole bunch of students returning and it was a set flight.So my parents came down from Boston to New York and picked me up and it was like eight in the morning.So they had stayed over, and I'll never forget.I'm on a second floor, and I could spot my parents way across on the first floor of the floor below.And my mother, I see her looking at me and she almost fainted.As only a mother could.Yeah.Because I had forgotten how thin I became in England because there were no sandwiches.I'm a hamburger guy, you know.There were no, they just, so my whole diet change.Yeah.Constrained by money, and so I didn't realize I weighed like 169 or 170, which is thin for me.And she could notice, you know, mother's eyes notice things.Yeah, yeah.We stopped on the way, they got breakfast, and I had a couple of cheeseburgers at 10 in the morning in Southern Connecticut, you know, - Oh my God.Because I want, I just wanted the taste more than anything.It was just, it was strange.It was strange how thin I got, and then not realizing it, because I was still eating.It was just, I wasn't eating the carbs that I had in the American diet.I would eat scrambled eggs for lunch at school.It was subsidized, it would be 40 cents.You know, you get a big plate of scrambled eggs with chips, fries, you know?So when you, if you change where you live, and you change your food intake, it becomes, it seriously can change your body.Yeah.I have pictures of me and my apartment in London, and my roommate was from Montreal and his girlfriend was over from Montreal, and I had my arm around him.He was taking the picture and it's like, my ribs were sticking out.Crazy, absolutely crazy.But anyway, it's just, it's harder when you're older, but I am losing, so it's- - Yeah.It has to be like a year and a half parcel, you know.I'm at a point now where I think I have a good weight.I don't feel thin.I don't feel heavy.Right, you don't want to be anemic or, - No, no.Or anything like that, but I think unless you have anything else important that you can think of, maybe we should wrap it up.Let me check my notes here.'Cause budget is- - I don't think so!Budget is pulled up, and they may be moving us out if we sit here.Budget, oh my God.You know, you never know.Somebody called Budget on us.Get the table.Get those guys out of there.Get those tables!Well, on behalf of Positively Beech Street, I'm Bart Fellowman - Rich Berger.And we're going to wrap up our third episode, and we thank you for your attention and listening.Thank you very much, and we'll see you in the future.Someday over the rainbow.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Pos_Beech_St_Ep3-030119.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Pos_Beech_St_Ep3-030119.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Pos_Beech_St_Ep3-030119.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/snafuinfinitycontemp-science_life-on-mars-CL19/contemp-science_life-on-mars-CL19.mp3", "text": "Welcome to the Science for the Public lecture series.Science for the Public is an organization committed to bringing science information and issues to the general public.Visit our website for our program listings and blog.Good evening.I'm Yvonne Step for Science for the Public and I welcome you to tonight's contemporary science program \"Looking for signatures of life on Mars\".To explain how that search is conducted we have Roger Summons, professor of geobiology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a participating science in the NASA Mars Science Laboratory Mission.Roger summons received his PhD in chemistry from the University of Wollongong in Australia.And before joining MIT in 2001, he held appointments at Stanford, Australian Iron and Steel, the Australian National University and Geoscience Australia.In a remarkable career he's developed analytical techniques and made discoveries that are today, essentials in the field of geobiology.Along the way he's received many prestigious awards.His distinctions include an appointment as a Fellow of the Royal society.Dr. Summons is particularly known for his investigations of biological traces in very ancient earth sediments and oil shale.His contributions to the identification of earliest life on our own planet are now applied to the analysis of sediments on Mars.Tonight.Dr. Summons explains how organic matter leaves its signature in the form of biomarkers and how that information can be decoded millions or billions of years later.We are very honored to welcome Roger Summons.Thank you.Welcome, sir.Thanks very much.And I'd like to ask to start with what's geobiology?What do you do?Geobiology is the study of how life on this planet has co-evolved with the planet.We know that earth has changed over geological time, over the four and a half billion years that it's existed.And a lot of the changes that we know took place on the surface of the earth being driven by life.And for most of earths history that life was entirely microbial - Yeah.that is growing slime.Yeah.Yeah.Microscopic organisms have dominated the planet for most of its history.And are you saying that the geology wouldn't have developed in the same way if it had not been for biology and maybe vice versa?Exactly, exactly.Okay, all right.One of the most profound changes that people recognize is that the earth was formed with no oxygen in the atmosphere.Yeah.And now we have an atmosphere with 21% oxygen and we know that oxygen was formed by the photosynthetic organisms that we can see around us, but mostly from the cyanobacteria in the ocean.They were the first, they were the organisms that invented the ability to do photosynthesis - Yeah.and produce oxygen at the same time.Right.And that oxygen has determined how the way rocks have weathered.It's determined the minerals that we can find in rocks.So there's very definite evidence that the activities of microbes have profoundly affected the surface environment and probably the subsurface environment as well.When we see, say, documentaries or books about fossils we see these things sometimes very problematic little fragments and so on and it is your field and you, substantially, who developed other ways to trace this early life.You've worked on oil and coal and oil shale - Yeah.and things where we don't think we see fossils.Could you please tell us about it?Well, the fossil fuel that we're burning to power our cars and our homes is organic matter.It's organic carbon compounds that have been formed in the past by living organisms.All the organic matter, practically all the organic matter we have on the planet is a consequence of the activity of life.Um hm.So you look at a piece of coal and it's a piece of black stuff.Yes.You look at black liquid - Yeah.coming out of an oil well, it's black stuff.Right.But really it's individual molecules.It's individual compounds that we can use chemistry to determine the structures of those molecules.And the structure of those molecules are clearly related to the different organisms that have made the molecules and those organisms are doing, making their living in different ways.So the structure of a single compound can tell you an awful lot about the organism that made it, and the process that organism was using to make a living, whether it was photosynthesis or it was eating something else or eating somebody else.Molecules have a story to tell and that's what I've been very fortunate to be able to work on for the, you know, the last 40 years of my career.So it's this combination of chemistry and biology.And I don't know what else.And geology - Exactly, all of that together.But again, I think most of us are just not aware that you could look at oil and coal and find a history like this.And so you do this sort of chemically with looking for markers.Is that the idea of tracing?We use a technique called gas chromatography combined with mass spectrometry.And to explain that a bit more, gas chromatography is a way to, you can separate molecules with incredibly high resolution.So you can separate molecules that only have very, very subtle differences in chemical structure.And the mass spectrometry part is an approach to getting a fingerprint of those molecules.And we can compare that fingerprint with molecules that we can make in the laboratory or molecules that you can buy off the shelf from somebody.So it's a lot of comparison.Sometimes we find molecules in rocks that we've never seen before.And in that case we have to do a lot of chemical experiments - Um hm.to determine the structure.Once we've determined the structure then we have that sort of a chain of connections that we can make to, through biochemistry basically, - Um hm.to the organisms that made those compounds.When the Rover drills a hole in a rock or in the soil in Mars you can really look at this.You don't have to see the fragments in a rock, these, that's, we are usually shown with fossils when we think of fossils.Yeah.So. - The best way to think about the MSL mission, I think, is think of it as a geologist, a robotic geologist - Yes.on wheels - Yes.and the MSL or the Curiosity Rover has a whole suite of tools that a geologist would normally have.It, for example, has a hand lens - Yes.and the hand lens produces beautiful photographs.It's just this most spectacular instrument - Takes little selfies.Takes selfies and takes mosaics.It's a brilliant, brilliant camera.Yah, yah.And were there microscopic organisms on Mars that hand lens would be able to see them.I mean, they would need to be a certain size before it could resolve them from the rest of the rock, but it, with a hand lens, you could see your, you know, a moderately sized, small fossil, if they existed.That's amazing.Well, I've got a cartoon of the Rover and the cartoon explains that what the primary mission is.The primary mission is not about detecting life.Ah. - The primary mission is about determining whether life could have existed in the past at some place on Mars.We can't explore the whole of Mars.Obviously.It's very, very difficult.Right, right.But there was a very detailed selection process that chose a place where they thought they knew a significant amount of the geology.Uh huh.There's no point going to a place where you have no context, - Yes.because in this sort - Right, right.of work context is everything.So a lot of selection went on to choose a place where they thought they would have rocks that could preserve life signatures had they - Had they been formed at the time - Right, I see.and as a consequence, they chose Gale crater - Okay.As the landing site - All right.And within Gale crater then the tasks that Curiosity was charged to perform.Curiosity, and of course, the team of scientists that runs the mission is to evaluate the biological potential of that place, to understand the geology and geochemistry and their interrelationships.Particularly to try to understand the role of water in that particular environment.Hm hm.And because life is profoundly affected by radiation, - Yes.both beneficially and deleteriously.If we get too much solar radiation, it's not good.So evaluating potential for life to exist really depends on understanding the entire environment, including the radiation environment.Okay.So that's the mission - Yes.not to detect life, but to see if life could have existed.Okay.This is the another cartoon of Curiosity and it's got the various instruments labeled such as mask cam, Kim cam, Marty.These are all imaging systems.Yeah, yeah.I think there's altogether nine cameras.So the mask cam takes big images, it's stereoscopic and color images.Uh huh.There are hazard cameras that on the wheels that the Rover drivers can use to evaluate danger like that.Yes.And it also shows the instruments that are inside the Rover, the main chemistry instruments.There are two of them.One of them was called SAM, - Yes.SAM for analysis on Mars and that's the experiment that I was selected to work on.Okay.And then another one called KIMIN which is an x-ray instrument that can determine the minerals that are present and the minerals that are present give you a lot of context.So if you get the information about what minerals, quartz, olivine, carbon eight, those sorts of things, it helps you evaluate the information that you're gonna get from SAM. SAM collects data on soil samples, on sediment that would be drilled by the drill.SAM also has the capability of looking at the gasses in the atmosphere.The gasses in the atmosphere comprise carbon dioxide, - Um hm.water vapor, a little bit of oxygen, argon, some nitrogen.And those gases and their isotopic compositions can tell you an awful lot about the history of the atmosphere.So, the mission is not just about looking for organic molecules, - Um hm, umhm.but evaluating the context of the samples that we're analyzing.Okay.It's an ongoing evaluation process.Uh huh.They're using data that's collected by the Rover itself.They're also using data imagery from satellites that are orbiting Mars and taking high resolution images of the surface of the planet.I see.So it's a combination of information on the ground using the cameras and information from above using the satellites - Ah, right.to place the Rover in a position where they might find an interesting rock.And it's not no point in looking at any old rock when you're interested in those rocks that best preserve organic matter.Uh huh.And on earth the typical place we would look would be in a shale.That is a very fine grain sedimentary rock.We don't find organic matter typically in a basalt - Ah. - or granite or an igneous rock.I see.And we don't find it in a sand stone because the grains are so big anything that was in there would leak out.It's very fine, muddy, silty, sediments, that best preserve organic matter.Also laminated sediments, layered sediments that have been put down over a period of time.If the cameras can show us a layered sediment that's another indication that the sediment was deposited underwater.Yeah.It's one of the main factors that we look for on earth to find organic matter, whether we're doing it to find coal or oil or whatever.It's no use looking in sand in the Sahara desert - Yeah.that's exposed to the atmosphere that wasn't deposited underwater.We're looking for fine grain sediments deposited under water that stayed or had low concentrations of oxygen.If you got a lot of oxygen in the environment organic matter is good food for bacteria.So, it would be consumed, eaten, oxidized.It would ultimately disappear.So we're looking for places where organic carbon and other signals are preserved.It's called the science of taphonomy, it's a long word.Taphonomy, hu?Taphonomy is understanding all the processes that lead to the preservation of a fossil, whether it's a molecule or a microbe or a bone or a human skull.Taphonomy is the science of understanding where best to look for well-preserved material.Look at that.And we apply the science of taphonomy to looking for the ideal places on Mars where something useful, - I see, I see.Or interesting might be preserved.So there's an ongoing process every day.Members of the science team are looking at the images, evaluating where the Rover is, evaluating targets to look at in the future.And then they develop a list of priorities.Um hm.Those priorities are uploaded to Curiosity and it goes through its steps doing the experiments one after the other, the designs team have determined is going to optimize the data that they're going to get down.So it's ongoing.Well when their mission first started it was 24 hours a day.Yeah.Now they've gone down to five days a week, - Oh, I see.12 hours a day.A couple of days off for the - A couple of days off for Curiosity - Yes.and for the Scientists.Yes, yes, I guess so.You have written about the difficulty, I think you just mentioned it also, on a planet like Mars.Radiation is a really serious destroyer.So how do you get around that?And first of all, I think you mentioned there's not really an atmosphere like we think of atmosphere now, so it would be worse.It's an atmosphere that's very thin - Aha.and earth has an atmosphere we call seven, yeah, one atmosphere.Mars has an atmosphere about 1% of earths atmosphere.Ah, right.Yeah, yeah.So for every hundred molecules in Earth's atmosphere there's one molecule on Mars and that atmosphere is not dense enough to stop or to inhibit the radiation.Okay.And consequently, the surface of Mars is getting a full dose of solar radiation.Right, so - Even though Mars is a little bit further away from the sun than earth, - Yeah.that radiation is not stopped by the atmosphere.Okay.So that's one thing so that you would have to go internally.So you pick a rock and you know you have to dig for this, correct?Yes.When you get the samples and the project is sending you the data, sending this enormous team of people all this data, you have the machines in your lab to do, I think you said analog - Yeah.kinds of experiments.Could you tell us, so here's some data that looks interesting.Yes.It's part of the whole, the process of ground-truthing.Ground truth - Truthing - Ground truth, yes.And you know, all science relies on ground truth.You have hypothesis, - Yes.you do an experiment and then you query that experiment.You try to find fault with it.Your job is to disprove yourself.And so there are many people on the SAM team doing these experiments daily, not just at MIT, but there's a large group of people at the Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland.There's people in Houston, Johnson Space Center, all doing analog experiments and testing various aspects of the results that are coming down.Um hm.And one of the things we do is make a mineral or a mixture of minerals that we call an analog soil, for example, - Um hm.or an analog sediment.We take the information that we've got from the Rover about the mineral composition, and we make a similar mixture in our lab, - Uh hm.and we run the experiment as close as we can to the way it's been run on Mars.And it's those experiments then determine or inform how the experiment might be done on Mars, better than it was last time.So for any rock that we look at on Mars, we might look at it, do six or seven experiments based on a combination of the results that came from Mars, but also the results that came from earth.There's actually a SAM instrument, testbed instrument, that it's operating under Mars atmospheric conditions in a chamber at Goddard Space Flight Center.Oh. - And that's the main place where analog experiments are done - I see, I see.using an instrument that's almost identical to the one that was flown and that way they can test the software, they can test many, many more aspects of how the experiment works and check them for truth.Yeah.And it's a constant backwards and forwards of experiment on Mars, some experiments on earth, redo the ones on Mars, redo the ones on earth, and you're finessing your understanding.Right, I understand.Right.And obviously a lot of cross-checking among the scientists themselves, correct?Yes.So that's one of the most interesting things that I read about your work with, looking at fossil life is that DNA and other proteins don't preserve well and certainly would not do on Mars.Yes.Then you look at lipids.Can you tell us about this?And what's lipid?What's lipid?This picture shows some chemicals that we might find on Mars, okay?Um hm.And on the top row, - um hm.are very, very simple molecules, acetic acid, vinegar, - Uh hm.there's a straight chain hydrocarbon, simple hydrocarbon that you might find in gasoline, for example, and then the compounds with the rings called poly aromatic hydrocarbons.And those sorts of molecules can be made by all sorts of processes, not necessarily involving biology.Okay.they are formed through biological activity, but they're not diagnostic for - I see.biological activity.I see.We find those molecules, for example, in meteorites that land - Yeah.on the earth or in interplanetary dust, it's always landing on the earth.So they're not particularly informative about the processes that made them.Mm mm.Now, the second row of molecules, - Uh hm.Are typical of the structures that are formed by biology.And on the left we have amino acids - Mm mm.and the one shown there is alanine.So it's part of our proteins, for example.Of that 20, that make up life here on earth is - it's one of the 20 - Okay.Has another feature to it and that is a handedness.Aha.What we call Homochirality - Yeah.and all the amino acids have the same configuration.That's a very, very different thing to the sort of nondescript or not that, that's a bad word, but less informative characteristics to the molecules on the top row.Aha.The molecules on the bottom row have structural complexity that can only be imparted by biology.Okay.And the molecule on the right, large complex molecules with three-dimensional qualities.And the one I'm showing there is cholesterol.Yaha.And we wouldn't be here without cholesterol.Yes.Cholesterol is essential to making our membranes work.It's a very complex molecule and it's made by a complex series of reactions in our cells in biochemical or biosynthetic reactions.And this is a lipid as opposed to the protein.Is that correct?Yeah, the molecules on the left are amino acids, because they have, the chemistry makes those amino acids rather unstable over billion year timescales, - Aha.stable over our lifetime.Yes.And we could find them in fossil humans, - Right.from Olduvai Gorge, for example, places where people looking for early hominids.They are stable over that sort of timescale, but they're not stable over billion year timescales, which is what we're looking at in Mars.Because Gale crater we think was formed about three and a half billion years ago, 3,500 million.That's a lot different to a human timescale.Yes.But also that would be true for earth when you were looking back 3 billion years on earth at what you hope are fossils or something, you are, you emphasize the, these lipids as opposed to the protein, right?The protein I just need to understand doesn't last so well.Protein, DNA, sugars, - Right, Okay.Nucleotides - all of those sorts of molecules.Right.They're unstable for several reasons.There's a chemical reason - Ah. - that they have what we call functional groups that are easily attacked by bacteria, but they're also good to eat, because they have nitrogen and phosphorus.Yeah.They have elements in them that microbes like to eat.So if we've found an amino acid in a very old rock, you'd have to be really suspicious.Why didn't someone eat it in the that have gone on.I see.But it's much, much more difficult to eat a molecule like cholesterol.Wow.I often use the example that when we're dead and buried and we sit in a coffin for, I don't know, a couple of hundred years, most of our biomass will have been consumed.The thing of us or the part of us that's the most recalcitrant type of material are our lipids.So our cholesterol is going to last a lot longer than we do.That is quite interesting.Yeah.And so therefore that's what you're looking for - We're looking for molecules that are very difficult - Right, right.for organisms, other organisms, to eat.But they would still clearly signify biological or I don't know if prebiotic, but something along those lines, right?They would preserve the qualities that we associate with.Okay, all right, all right.That is quite interesting.Has that gone on for a long time?And the rest of us just don't know it, that you've known this about fossil residuals anywhere.The field really took off, Well, it was started in the forties and fifties in a little way.Yeah.A gentleman by the name of Alfred Tribes identified a molecule in rock that he could relate to chlorophyll.And of course, chlorophyll, - we wouldn't be here without chlorophyll - Yes, right, right.and identifying a molecule it's called a porphyrin, which has got the center of a chlorophyll or that's found in the center of a chlorophyll, - I see.clearly tells you that the organic matter had something to do with biology.And then for the next 50 years, people explored that idea in greater and greater detail.And you can ultimately show that every molecule in every drop of oil on this planet was formed by life at some time in the past.Not only that, the type of life on earth has evolved over time.Yeah.We started out with mostly bacteria, those bacteria or parts of them were incorporated in more complex organisms to form algae.Yeah.Those algae evolved into more complex organisms we call plants and that process of evolution can be traced in oil.The composition of oil has also changed over geological time corresponding to the way the plankton in the ocean has changed over geological time.So. - So, it's a very faithful marker of the evolutionary process.Yeah And it's totally complimentary to the fossil record, the visible fossil record - Yeah.and the micro fossil record.Yeah.So, we have colleagues who study microscopic organisms in sediments, and they can see the evolution in plankton through time.Yeah, yeah.And just the same as they see rocks dominated by cyanobacteria, for example, and later at some later time rocks with green algae, and then at some later time more complex algae like diatoms - Yeah, uh huh.and dinoflagellates, you can see those transitions in the fossil record, but you can also see those transitions in the molecular record.Which is amazing.Yeah.Yeah, that's because that's a very, very accurate, I guess kind of markers.It's accurate.Makes sense too - Yes, yeah.I mean we, all science is about making sense of the environment - Right.around you and making sense of the phenomena we experience.And we live in a very, very complex planet, and it is very complex, largely to do with the presence of life.Yeah.And the history of earth is very, very different that we now know to the history of Mars, largely as a consequence of Mars being smaller than the earth and Mars having lost its water.It may well have had as much water in the beginning as earth had, but that radiation from the sun and the smallness of the planet means it lost its heat more quickly than the earth did.And didn't develop the cycles that the earth has developed that help us preserve the water.Um hm.The water in the atmosphere are what's blanketing us and protecting us in a large degree from solar radiation as well as the magnetic field.Mm mm.Mars probably had a magnetic field very early on, but also lost that.So it lost the ingredients that would have made the planet habitable, we know that.Mm mm.What we're trying to do is understand something about the very early history of Mars.Uh hm, uh hm.And when it still might've had a magnetic field and might've had an atmosphere, - Mm mm.might've had an ocean, - Mm mm.and that's the sort of logic that Curiosity is trying to develop.And of course Curiosity is just one theme in a long history of exploration - Uh hm.of planets by largely driven by NASA, but increasingly by Eastern, the European Space Agency.Right.And now China and India.Right, everybody will be in on it.Everybody's in the game, but it's all about sharing knowledge.Yes, and that's the other thing the sort of a real community maybe peace will break out or something big in this community, because there seems to be a fair amount of sharing with.I think science as with like arts and music.Yeah.There ways of soft diplomacy - Yes, exactly - and that's why I - But pretty effective - Well that's why I love being a scientist because you can interact with people in any country - Yes.in the world on common ground.And we're not concerned about our differences.We're concerned about our common ideals and our common hopes.Exactly, yeah.And I think that it's one of the great joys of being scientists.And that's why I would recommend that science as a career for young people.Well said.Back to Mars for a minute.There has been this controversy around methane.Yes.I don't know whether it's controversy, but that methane can be, they're always careful with the modal \"can be\" an indicator of life, but it isn't necessarily.Can you explain that to us?And then in the last several weeks, sometime in the last several weeks, that was sort of confirmed a methane like cycle on Mars.What do you think of that?And first of all, though, about the methane itself.So now I'm showing a picture of SAM. - Okay.And the SAM instrument is really three instruments.Yeah.It's a gas chromatograph, which I explained - Yes.is used to separate molecules.It's a quadrupole mass spectrometer which is used to identify those molecules.And it's a tune-able laser spectrometer, TLS is the acronym, - Mm mm.that can look at gases and it can measure the spectrum of gases.Okay.And it's been used to largely to evaluate the atmosphere, but if we heat a soil up or a crushed up rock and heat that in the system, the gases that are evolved can be looked at in the TLS. - Okay.And of course there had been reports of methane on Mars in the past - Okay.based on information from telescopes on earth, as well as orbiting telescopes or spectrum, a combination of telescope with a spectrometer.So it has this equipment, it can identify and presumably it was instrumental in determining this thing, but what is the issue then with the methane?Well, the issue with the methane is that it had been detected from earth, but when you look through earths atmosphere there's methane - Yeah.in our atmosphere.Yeah.So the difference between the signal they are looking for is teeny weeny on top of a much larger signal from our own atmosphere.So if you're using - Oh I see.a telescope - I see, I see, yes.on earth, you're hoping to see through the atmosphere, but there'll be methane in that, and see a little bit more signal - Right.when you look at a particular place on Mars.So there were a lot of controversy about how real was the little signal when it sits on top of a much bigger, noisy signal.Right.And being able to measure it in situ - Yeah.in Mars' atmosphere on the surface of Mars was considered to be a much more reliable measurement.And so the instrument takes in a sample of atmospheric gas, freezes out the carbon dioxide and some of the other components to enrich the sample.And ultimately they've made, I think, four measurements where methane is just a little bit above the background of the instrument.So in all of this work, you're looking for a signal on top of inevitable background.I see.What we call it, yeah, signal to noise ratios.Okay, okay.And the signal that they're getting from methane on Mars is very tiny.It works out to be about seven parts per billion.So it's minuscule compared to the amount of methane - Ah. - that's in the air we're breathing.Okay, okay.Very, very small amount.All right.And not only that, it was not there in the early part of the mission.The Rover got to a certain place and suddenly they made four measurements, four or five measurements where they got this small amount and just as quickly as it appeared it disappeared - Hm. - and the appearance and the disappearance of the methane does not correlate with any other measurements that Curiosity's made.It doesn't correlate with day night.It doesn't appear to correlate with the amount of radiation.Mm mm.It doesn't appear to correlate with what month of the year.There's no other measurement that Curiosity's made that bears any relationship to the appearance and the disappearance of the methane.So that bothers people.You should, if it comes and it goes, - Mm mm.you should be able to understand why that is, - Mm mm.but that was the same as the experiments when they detect that it using earth based satellites, earth based telescopes, sorry.That was interference, yeah.Well, it appeared and disappeared.I see, yes.And so it appears that it's coming from somewhere, but in very small whiffs.I see.And there's no really solid understanding of what those whiffs mean.Okay.On earth a lot of the methane comes from biological processes - Right.and those processes overwhelm the formation of methane from non-biological processes.Okay.And so even though you can identify a small amount in Mars' atmosphere.There's no way there's enough of it to get any other information that would tell us whether this is biological or non-biological.Okay.So it's a really interesting and intriguing scientific - Yes, yeah.problem, but it's also an enigma.At this point.At this point.Right, so you were not speculating on it even.There many aspects of the behavior of materials on Mars that are different to earth.One of the things is Mars' surface environment is very oxidizing.Ah. - Over its history the water has been what we call focalised to hydrogen and oxygen.Mm mm.So H2O - Mm mm.goes to H2 and O, or O2 - Mm mm, mm mm.and the hydrogen, because the gravity is lower, the hydrogen can be lost to space leaving the surface enriched in oxygen.And that oxygen is mostly tied up in minerals like sulfates and perchlorate, strongly oxidizing minerals.And strictly speaking the processes that form those minerals should also destroy the methane.Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.So the fact that there's some methane still there tells us that they, if it's true, if the measurement is real that there must be some process still generating the methane and that is even more intriguing.Some people would like to think it's biology, but there's no evidence for it.Of course, everybody wants to think it's biology.I have to let you talk to the audience here very soon, but is there anything that you would speculate on about Mars in terms of this project that you'd like to tell us about?It's proved very, very difficult to find any organic matter - Mm mm.on the planet.Mm mm And organic matter on the earth is a bio-signature - Mm mm.and the failure to find organic matter on Mars might be interpreted as the absence of a bio-signature.Mm mm.But again, we think it's a strong radiation environment and the presence of these oxidizing materials like sulfate and perchlorate - Mm mm.and oxygen itself, - Mm mm.this destroyed it.Mm mm.So, the drill can only go in a couple of centimeters.Mm mm.We can't go deep enough - Mm mm.that where you might find material that's been separated from these nasty processes.Right.A lot of people want to have life under the surface of something or other, you know.Yeah.I remember Thomas Gold he's a scientist here, speculating that the earth very deep down was full of bacterial life, you know, - It is.and evidently it turned out, but he was laughed out of the room when he first mentioned that, I think.But he also said that fossil fuels aren't formed by biological processes.Yes, all right don't go there .So, he was right about the deep biosphere.And very wrong about a few other things.Yeah.But in any case, people want to find life out there in the worst way.Do scientists sort of, are they optimistic, pessimistic, or just totally bewildered, like it's too hard to reconstruct.Not so bewildered.Again, it's taken hundreds of years for us as scientists and particularly geologists to understand and put together some history of the earth.Required all sorts of scientific inputs like the discovery of radio activity - Mm mm.gave us a tool to date rocks precisely.Mm mm.people used to estimate before they had real - Mm mm.dates from uranium led decomposition.It's a very long iterative process to understand the history of the earth.Mm mm.Paleontology, geology, geophysics.And now you need all of it, seems like.Yeah, and that same series of streams of logic and knowledge are being applied to Mars.Mm mm.But what we're finding out is Mars is very, very different in all sorts of interesting ways.And ultimately people will come to an understanding of those processes through this mission.And hopefully it continues for a few more years, the Rover stays alive and then that.Amazing this machinery by itself is.And it speaks in a spectacular way to the engineering skills - I agree.of all the people that work - Yeah.on developing the Rover itself, the delivery system, - Yeah.the landing system.It's just the spectacular - It's a real tribute to humanity I must say - Absolutely.isn't it?Yeah.Yeah.And a lot of those scientists are US-based, but there also a lot of them based in other countries.There's Russian scientists and there's French scientists working on this mission.So it really is international and it really is a spectacular scientific and engineering accomplishment.Yeah.There's one other important aspect.And that's leadership.The leadership of the mission has been spectacular.And the principal scientist, John Grotzinger, who used to be a professor at MIT - Oh. led that mission for the seven years, the most critical seven years.And I think his way of getting people to work together - Yeah.and be critical of each other without cutting each others - In a positive way - Yeah.a productive way I should say - Yeah.The whole job, your whole job there is to do good work, but also to prove someone else wrong and to get people to do that in a constructive way is really a remarkable achievement.Yes, the hole mission is spectacular.I have to leave it there so that you can talk to the audience.Dr. Summons, thank you ever so much for being with us.Thank you for having me.Yeah", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/contemp-science_life-on-mars-CL19.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/contemp-science_life-on-mars-CL19.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/contemp-science_life-on-mars-CL19.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/Inside_Media_Weekly_13_-_Feb._5_2013/Inside_Media_Weekly_13_-_Feb._5_2013.mp3", "text": "Welcome back to another exciting edition of Inside Media Weekly.I'm Ryan Boni, joined again by Kevin Bastos over here on the left.Thank you, Ryan Boni.Welcome back.Over here on the right, Derek Bonner, back again.Quickly, I wanted to start the- - Didn't we switch chairs in the past?Oh, should we do that again?I don't know.Let's do it right now!I don't know if the worlds ready for my left side.It's too bright.Nobody else has seen it, other than the people who actually know you.I want to start off the show with a quick apology to Mr.- No, no, not to Bastos.Of course not.To Brad Bird, the director of the Incredibles, Ratatouille, and the Iron Giant.Yeah, a big fan of Inside Media Weekly.Last week, we were talking about JJ Abrams directing the new Star Wars and I kept saying, and JJ Abrams directed Mission Impossible and Ghost Protocol.When Ghost Protocol was directed by Brad Bird and you know, JJ Abrams actually directed the far superior, Mission Impossible Three and was producer on Mission Impossible and Ghost Protocol.So apologies out to Brad, sorry.Stop sending all the emails already.Phone calls - And another leftover we have from last week, Bastos asked did, asked did, I asked-d- Asked what the market share for the iPhone in the United States of all phones?And we were talking about- - We had no idea.what that might be.The crack staff, crack research staff, jumped on that from the Insider Weekly.Ryan!And looked it up, and ComScore is a company that actually provides this for the industry.So this is, ends October, 2012 because you know, it goes to the paying customers first and then us cheapies who don't pay for it, get it, you know, three more months after that or whatever.Anyway, we were talking about whether it was 10, 12, whatever percent, I think were kind of the guesses on how- - I said it was higher than that.And you'd be right, a little bit higher.Of all phones in the United States, this would be a feature phones and smartphones.Apple has 17.8% of the market share.I would've expected it to be higher.Samsung is at 26.3 This is manufacturer Samsung 26.3, Apple 17.8, actually is pretty much tied with LG at 17.6. Motorola at 11, and HTC, which is starting to have some problems at 6.They had a bad quarter.That's surprising.Now if you go to, and we should say that smartphones found all kinds of stuff from this ComScore.Smartphones are at 51.9% of mobile phones, this past quarter or two quarters ago.Third quarter is expected to be about 60%.Now, if you go just smartphones and get rid of all the feature phones, and you go by platforms, Google is a 53.6%, the Android platform.The Apple iOS is a 34.3%.Rim is at 7.8, which of course is, is Blackberry.Pretty much Blackberry phones.Microsoft is at 3.2, and surprisingly pulling in the rear here is Symbion at 0.6%.And I don't believe a Symbian phone has been made in a couple of years.It was Symbian, for those that don't remember, it was, they could Nokia, Sony, Ericsson got together and supported Symbian and then they all abandoned Symbion.Nokia being the last holdout, just went to making Windows phones.And it's probably still relevant just because of all the Internet memes with the Nokia brick.But so, so there's 0.6% of all smartphones are still Symbian, which leads you to believe too, that people aren't necessarily, you know, everybody thinks- - There's a problem with the reportings as - Well, there can be that!But people might not be as quick- You know, we always assume, oh, you know, wealthier area people would just get by the newest, greatest thing.But people were holding on to things that work.I'm not even buying them.I'm just getting them for free.And there you go.I mean, hello, what's the free one?And hence my piece of garbage.Although there's talk that that kind of stuff, the subsidized phones may be going away and everything may be going into okay.Don't talk about it.Which is worse.We have a \"which is worse\" this week because there were two food oriented items in the paper yesterday, so I thought let's, let's discuss these.So which is worse?Jainy will pull the plug on food perks, now don't get excited - it's not fuel perks.This is the one that when you buy the gas and you go back into the store and you, you get a percentage off of your food, which for whatever reason, no matter how much gas you bought came in at 1%, it seemed to be all the time.Well, when you have a 10 gallon tank, you're getting, you're getting your percentage based on buying 10 gallons.That's what it- - Or McDonald's introducing the fish McBites happy meal.See, everybody laughs, just saying.Which is worse?Smaller than chicken nuggets, fish Mcbites happy meal.Which is worse?From a real perspective?Which is worse?Well, of course.That's all this show is!The labor that's being reported- - Either way.What am I angrier about?I'm angrier that they're getting rid of those food perks.I- truly, and that's dumb, but I mean, I could care less about what McDonald's is.I mean, I'm not going to say, oh gosh, now McDonald's is unhealthy because they're selling fish sticks.I'd perceive them as this panacea of a good nutrition up to this point.I mean, yeah, it's silly, but I would say I'm a little ticked that I'm getting rid of those.We went to the store, I don't know, two weeks ago, and got 10% off of our entire food bill.Nice!I don't mean to brag or anything, but we're hoarders.Do you have something that's worse out of the two?I mean, I could play devil's advocate- - that the fish would bite, I just, really gets on my nerves and they're trying to pretend like this is such like a health kick.Like this is the healthier alternative to the happy meal.This is, this is yours eating balls of bread.That's basically what it is.There's gonna be a little bit of some kind of fish parts inside of that.It's Lent coming up.Everyone's doing fish stuff.You've seen the Arby's fish commercial, right?This is their, this is their latest episode, their family dinner.Lent.You remember that, kids, right?From, uh, advertising unit?There you go.Targeting based on religious needs.They don't introduce fish Mcbites in October for a reason.This is true.Now, yeah.And I-I'm hoping that the, well I'm assuming the McBites is much more about jumping on the, the Lenten thing than necessarily trying to pretend to be healthy because it goes back to- if you're going to McDonald's on a regular basis, you're going to any fast food.Let's just say, if you're going out to eat on a regular basis, you're not going to be as healthy as, as you could be eating at home, I guess.I don't want to say that you necessarily would because you may make junk at home too.And the food perks, I got to say, I'm food perks because you're taking something away from me.So I guess that makes it a bit worse to me.But I think there's something more to this food perks thing because they're saying it's too confusing of the system.But if you remember, I don't know if you guys remember when food perks first kind of came into being, there was concern about the fact that they could counteract the, the price floor on milk.I get the United Dairy Farmers were upset, saying, \"Oh, you're going to be able to just-\" 'cause you can't, you can't have a sale on milk.I get it now.Somebody has to explain this - Capitalism exists in the United States, except- - Except when it comes to dairy in Pennsylvania.What else is the minimum standard?Liquor, right?You can't sell liquor and cigarettes.So you can't have a sale on cigarettes.I'm sorry, you can't go below a floor.But I don't understand, how is that different than having a $50 gift certificate to Walmart and you go by all milk?I mean, you're getting price off.Gift cards are different.You're putting actual physical dollars into account to get those dollars back, but they also, they wouldn't, they would accept milk anyway.You can't give a discount on milk.So it was done that way.I mean, I mean, I remember when the fuel perks, I'm trying to get this correct, first came out.They, um, you could, you know, spend money and then get a discount on your gas.'Cause I remember when, I remember when the fuel stations first opened and no one was in them, no one.I mean, no one does anything, and then they started giving discounts on gas and more people started to use them, but I was still hoarding my gas and looking for the lowest possible price.So, I mean, I was waiting until my discount got to be $2 or $3 and then I would take my two little cans and go there and fill up and get the discount and everything.Introducing both made it beneficial to get all of my gas at Giant Eagle, whether or not I was getting that discount.So I think it became something that's now a regular thing.And now I'll buy my gas, too, at Giant Eagle and the encouragement to do that.They are replacing it with something, but it sounds more confusing.They're basically adopting like sheets as method, I guess, for gas.So they got rid of their food perks, and now they're giving you an additional 3 cents off instantly at the pump.But the idea of it being too complex, and I believe the statement that I read was it's too complex for the consumer.Mhmm.All right, let's go in, I swipe a card.You tell me how much I'm earning.When I go to the store, I swipe my card.Do I have any, oh, I don't have any.I'm still buying the groceries.I already checked out.That, I think that is just utterly ridiculous.Mhmm, yeah.Inside that weekly.If Johnny was looking to sheets for their inspirational for the MTO, the next thing after.Exactly.Well, they have their mates.That's true.Caffeine- - You got a sandwich at Giant Eagle?I got a sandwich at Johnny , oh yeah!Pretty good?Very good.Aw, dude!He needs- Oh yeah.I am not going to Johnny - Not, not, not the get-go for a sale.Gas station food's great.Ever had food, whenever - I had fish man bites this morning!Of course!So there was this football game over the weekend.And amongst the blackout of the football game, which was, you know, all the talk, there was, there was a few commercial, and the game itself, there's a few commercials, and you know, I don't want to talk too much about commercials, 'cause it seems like it's the most talked about thing, but- - We also have parallel opinion on the commercial - Marketing Land, a guy, a guy at Marketing Land tracked mentions in Superbowl ads, and he looked at the 52 national commercials that aired from the kickoff to when clock hit zero.And was- He did this again last- He did this last year, um, seeing social networks, how often they were mentioned, whether it was actually said, or just a tagline at the bottom of the graphic at the end.And this year, Twitter had 26 out of 52 or mentioned.Now that's the Twitter logo.That could be a hashtag, which to me, I know everybody associates Twitter with the hashtag, but it's, can, you can search other ways with the hashtag.You can go to Google Plus or to Facebook and search the hashtag because people are using it.And I think it's funny too that- - I remember yesterday, you were putting hashtags on your Google Plus.I- But, uh, then I think it's funny that Twitter didn't invent hashtags themselves, that a user had to do it.But anyway, Twitter, 26, Facebook, 4, Google plus, 0, YouTube, 1, Instagram, 1.We didn't have a commercial for ?Last year in 59 national ads, Facebook had 8 mentions, Twitter, 8 mentions, Google Plus, 0.Is this a trend?Is this showing the power of Twitter?The fall of Facebook?Is it both?What do you think?Yes.Absolutely.Okay.Next- - I mean Facebook, Facebook is over.It, it is.Right.I forgot your soapbox on this one.Sorry.I went on Facebook last night.I like Facebook.It is not terrifically uncool.It is not at the front end.You guys remember movies from two, three years ago, the number of Myspace mentions in them.Sure.Of course.Movies take a year to produce and how antiquated it seemed in the theater to have Myspace mentioned so many times of an essentially dead social network at that point.I mean, it, it just seemed with the hashtag alone and just associating that with Twitter, it's something that's free and you have this big event, that's one of those exact use for something that's trending.You already spent this much money on it.I think it's foolish that not every single of those commercials didn't have a hashtag.That's something you just throw at the very end.Somebody liked the commercial.How are you going to talk about?And that creates the buzz.So you have your little time slot, and now you have the footprint on social media.I mean, it's, it's such an easy way to branch out to the people that aren't even watching.All right, I saw my friend's feed.They talked about the Mercedes-Benz commercial.All right, let's go check it out!It's free.Yeah.Well, uh, I think the consensus seems to typically have been that the Superbowl ads themselves were kind of underwhelming this year and have, it's been kind of an ongoing trend in Superbowl years.Are we allowed to say Superbowl?I guess we are.Critical commentary or reporting?Big gain.We're not advertising it.We're not selling it.Let's talk about their work.There's a ton of- - Did you remember when they tried to trademark the big game?The big game?NFL tried.He talked about it in he Samsung commercial.But let's talk about the best Superbowl movie trailer spots.Um, and there were quite a few during the Superbowl.Iron Man 3, Fast and Furious 6, Star Trek: Into Darkness, World War Z, Brad Pitt and zombies.What is not to like about combining those two?And it's not at all the movie at all.And all the book at all.No part of the book in it at any segment at all.Brad Pitt's not in the book?Sorry.Oz, no.Pretty good.Oz. And the great- Oz: The Great and Powerful, The Lone Ranger, and Snitch.Now, best trailer or movie out of those that you think is going to be the biggest here or what most interested in seeing if you didn't see all the spots?I mean, I, I definitely think Iron Man 3 is going to be the biggest movie.I thought the best trailer was the Wizard of Oz, or Oz: The Great and Powerful.Just because you saw a lot of footage that you hadn't seen before, and it was one that I was, I was when I was watching the game, there was a lot of people around, so I didn't have to necessarily listen to the trailer as well.It's going to be a lot of, a lot of noise or a lot of people were watching it, and that was based on their visual, showing the actual world of Oz. And that just, yeah, I, I didn't really care for the movie before that.I said, all right, this doesn't look like it's gonna be that great.I don't happen to particularly like James Franco.And that made me want to watch it.I would probably agree.Out of those trailers, and I don't remember all of you, all of them that you said, the only one that was an Iron Man 3.We traveled in the middle of the game and I still think it's going to be the biggest movie.I think it's the movie people have been looking forward to the most.I think it got great attention through both the fact that the first one was outstanding.The second one was good, and Avengers was pretty darned good as well.I think it will be the biggest film, but I think you're right.The biggest legs are probably from Oz. Did anyone else get the feeling that Fast and the Furious was old?I mean- - Number 6 at the end of the movie struggling.Yeah, I mean- I don't think, and I may be very wrong because I thought similar things about the 5th one, how many cars flip over in that movie?I mean, it was just 1 car flips over, and then 2 cars, and then another car flips over.I thought, oh man.It's crazy, these guys are just the car drivers, now they're secret agents.They're all over the place.They are blowing up helicopters.He's driving a car.I have a license.Well, and I think you're talking about Oz. I think too, that the struggle for a movie like that is that there's going to be a lot of skepticism.Iron Man 3, you know what you're getting.Fast and Furious, despite all that, you know what you're getting.It's popcorn candy, you know - Star Trek, people were kind of assuming it's going to be uh, as good as- - Well, I think that trailer looked excellent.And again, I didn't see the Iron Man one, but I, I think so much positive buzz was generated around the first one, especially from people who weren't necessarily Star Trek fans.And we talked about this before, I don't like Star Trek.I thought that movie was fantastic.I know it sort of, you know, thumbs its nose at a lot of that history that already is there, but I think it's going to be humongous.I think it was very smart they showed a lot more of the supposed bill and in the movie with .Oh, and he is, he's very hot right now.He is huge right now.And that's getting a lot of people to talk about it all, like Sherlock or anything else they've seen him do.And that's a connected audience as well.The Star Trek fans are more than likely general big fans of that.I mean, unless you're throwing in some Downton Abbey stars as well, I mean, I don't think you're going to get more attention to that, so.What about Snitch?The Rock; Snitch, huh?Ah, - I do wanna ask you though, did you see Journey 2 last year?I do want to ask about the Lone Ranger.I feel is this- The more I see of it, the less I'm interested in seeing, and actually I probably wasn't all that interested.Is, Is this going to be a humongous flop or is Johnny Depp enough of a draw to get people in to?I mean.I was very surprised that they had a game time TV spot just because of how much over budget they've already been with his movie, and it still looks like garbage.In my opinion, at least.Special effects did not look amazing.And I didn't understand why they were making the movie to begin with.I don't understand what the appeal is right now of the Lone Ranger.And then you get the movie and this is- If you're going to be going to a blockbuster movie during the summer, it isn't even a summary.It should be something that primarily, can be enjoyed by a family or has an appeal to a broader spectrum than just, you know, people going from the nostalgia.I have no, no desire to see that.I can't imagine anyone even younger than I am wanting to see.No, I think you've got, you're targeting a really strange audience.And I noticed in the preview, it is not rated right now.My guess is, they're shooting for that PG rating.I don't know if they will get it, but with Disney's, I would say, strong backing.I think there's a strong push to get that PG rating, and if that were the case, someone like, I mean, my dad's age, 60s, grew up on the Lone Ranger.That could be something that they could take that back interest in.And at the same time, Disney's always trying, well trying to push for that next new thing.Taking over that Star Wars market was very smart, but more than likely, this was, you know, in the workflow before then, and trying to get that boy market.And this could be a vehicle for that, I, I don't foresee it happening.I'm with you.I think it will be not a great success, but depending on when it's released, it could make some money.I mean, we're still waiting on GI Joe, right?So. - Well, it just seems to me like this would have been a better vessel as restarting up the television series, if they wanted to go with this kind of thing.Like, do something like the WBS arrow.Yes.So something along those kind of like- Yeah.That kind of, um, tone to it or something.A little bit, a little bit darker, but still.That has a low budget feel to it as well, - Right, but I mean, you know, - But- - I don't see why you need this big of a budget for the Lone Ranger.That's why I want to know what I'm missing when you watch the trailer, side from a train- I don't know what's going on.How many perspectives on that train getting wrecked?Yeah, that must've been like legit, like that must've been a steam engine or something they had to reassemble.Took up half the budget.Well, and I wonder if they're just trying to cast too wide a net here too, because you know, you're talking about an older generation might be interested in, in the Lone Ranger, but then you cast Armie Hammer as the Lone Ranger and it's kind of like, you're trying to get the young audience, and I get that they're trying to, trying to appeal to as many big wide audiences as possible, but I, I'm feeling this is going to be to miss.Well, I think a lot of movies that cast that are big flops anyway.I mean, you've got to go with that one specific target and hit hard at it.And I keep saying, you know, you do a good job in anything, it will make money.I mean, the Avengers is a perfect example of that.It's just a great film.It's a very narrow market, but, I mean, really beating that drum for it and making a pretty darn good movie versus, well, X -Men a few years ago had made money, but Wolverine was a tank because the movie was garbage.So, if you do the right thing in the right way, people are going to see it.Well, and it's like you just saying that, I was thinking about Iron Man, you know, Robert Downey Jr. being the perfect cast because he's kind of, he appeals exactly to the demographic that was interested in Iron Man, as opposed to trying to bring some young actor and trying to bring a younger audience they were going for.It's reflective of the real character portrayed in comic books.We told that before, you know, guy with problems, alcoholism, facing things.And that's a real person in that, doing that to the best of that ability, versus no offense, poor Lou Ferrigno.I can't relate to that.I just can't.Speaking of problems.He's still working.He's still working.Microsoft Surface Pro!It's coming out next week.$899 for the 64 gigabyte version.Plus, you got to pay $119 for a touch or type cover, Intel core I-5, five hours of battery life.And then a smarter move, demo units are already popping up in retailers a week in advance of the release of this.Is there still life for Windows 8 for the Surface Pro?I mean- - Surface Pro thinks- borderline missing their window, completely.All the buzz I'm reading about it is all the people are talking about: \"Oh, I'm buying the 64 gigabyte model, but how much am I really getting with the hard drive\"?There's a substantial amount of it's being taken.41 gigs of it is taken out by the operating- - Strictly the operating system.So I'm buying a 64 gigabyte tablet.I'm getting 23 gigs.Well, I mean that, that's a concern for a lot of people, especially the people that I had imagined might be interested in buying the Surface that don't already have their tablets or not even the people that are going to be upgrading.That's a number that, it's a buzz number that will stand out to them.And if they find out that kind of buzzing, I'm like, \"Wait, why is it only 21 gigabytes\"?The same time, Windows 8 is not going to be exclusive to the Surface Pro in the full version, which is, I think, a huge thing for the product maybe not being as successful as it should be because now you're going to have all these other companies.Windows 8 will be successful, but as far as the standalone product, I'm going to just look for the cheaper knockoff that's going to come out, so maybe something that's not first gen.We'll wait and see all the problems that's going on with that.Wait for the applications to catch up with it.I, I don't, I don't know.I'm still holding out on that computer thing.Nate Doty's running that little, uh, separation for him, but I I'm- That makes me nervous.You know, that amount of stuff on there, I, I, I will more than likely not buy one.I will more than likely buy a computer, also running Windows 8.But I don't see the reason to go for that kind of investment when something else nearly as good or better and proven is already out there.And it's cheaper.Netflix has been having a very busy, busy, busy year already.Of course, they recently signed the deal with Turner Broadcasting, Warner Brothers Television Group, meaning Cartoon Network, Warner Brothers Animation, Adult Swim shows are all coming to Netflix.They just signed the big deal with Disney before that.And just being released was the House of Cards, which is Netflix.It's the first series that they're doing completely on their own.They did do Lillehammer, which was kind of a combo thing.All the shows coming out at once, you can watch it completely from day one, David Fincher is producing and directing I believe the first 2 episodes of it.Kevin Spacey is the star.Is this the new trend?There's kind of two sides of the coin.Some people talk about, \"Oh, you need word of mouth.The builds people watch week to week and waiting and waiting\".Whereas others are saying, you know, this is great because you can get instant- You know, if you're interested in seeing how it's going, you can watch it in its entirety the next episode, without having to wait.And so you may stick with something longer because you, you get a better feel for it.Your thoughts on Netflix?On both of those, signing with the ticket, the Cartoon Network and all those kinds of stuff, and they have Disney.I think that is absolutely brilliant.They're going to have the stranglehold on all of kid's entertainment or the animated stuff.That's going to be a huge thing that could be, you know, potential distractor for the kid at home.Maybe I want a couple of minutes by myself, let's put on Netflix.They can watch all those kinds of things.That's going to create a lot of subscriptions that way.And then at the same time, when you look at House of Cards being released completely on the same day, I've mixed feelings about it.Because from a business standpoint, I don't know if I really understand it because if I want to watch House of Cards, maybe I'm only getting Netflix to watch it.I only have to pay for one month of it now.Whereas, if you spread that out, - Right.now you're getting my business for multiple months, but they're also adhering to their business model.Anybody that watches television shows on Netflix is that binge kind of watching where they're going to crank out those seasons.Some people even wait for the television show to be done running on television so they can watch it all right in a row on Netflix.So that doesn't seem to make sense financially, at least the way I'm thinking about it.But at the same time, I think that's going to make a lot of their customers very happy that there are saying, all right, this is what works.We understand this is what you want.So we're actually going to give it to you this time.Right.I think it's the, what cable should be doing kind of a perspective.You know, cable is the, let's buy everything for $200 a month, where Netflix is piecemealing it.You want a little bit?Here, we'll take that.So I think they're smart to segment that business model, as well.They can't compete with something like Amazon, which has just this huge mega corporation.And I think it's becoming far bigger than just a shipment organization in that instant run.So I think you're going to have, more than likely, a lot of people who are dropping that cable line, but very comfortable picking up Amazon prime and Netflix at the same time.You know, I've got to get this or this.I mean, it's the same thing that was 20 years ago with premium cable networks at the time, you know?I'll get HBO because there's these kinds of things, but I'll get, you know, Showtime, because it has these kinds of things.If they both have an Allegiant audience and you know, I keep remembering Amazons, I'm sorry, Netflix is talking about the Arrested Development in the future.So if there's something always a carrot out there to keep you watching, yeah, I'm probably going to jump in.Sure, I'm going to stay with it.And my wife has told me already, we are back on Netflix when Arrested Development comes.I mean, it's, we love the program and we never watched a show when it was on.Not wanting to.Me either.Wow.I mean, it's, it's, it's, I would say one of the best shows - It's great.in the last 20 years, without questions- oh yeah.Oh yeah.Yeah.Well, I think that Netflix definitely is ahead of the curve on this.I think this is a very smart move, and I know- - They had to be.I mean, their survival was in question, even let's say a year ago when the business model changed and they had so much criticism for doubling the cost, you know, paying for both parts of that.They had to be to survive.Okay.Well, there's lots of other stuff, but we're kind of out of time for this week.I do want to mention that Warm Bodies was the number one movie of the last weekend.Sorry.18.8 million.Armageddon.Bonds on Gretta was number 2 at 9.4- - I've heard such great things about it.Silver Linings Playbook, Mama, and Zero Dark 30, Roundup.Bullet to the Head debuted at number 6.It was sliced alone, 4.5 million.Slies worst opening weekend since- - Black Hawks in 1981.Are you meaning to tell me that Sylvester Stallone is over the hill?What's the next Arnold Schwarzenegger?Awake.2 movies coming out this weekend, Identity Theft or The Identity Thief.Jason Batman, Melissa McCarthy and side effects.Possibly Steven Lederberg's last movie, Jude law, Rooney Mara, Channing Tatum, and Catherine Zeta Jones.So we're going to see how all those movies do or both those movies do this weekend on next week on Inside Media Weekly.Thanks for joining us.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Inside_Media_Weekly_13_-_Feb._5_2013.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Inside_Media_Weekly_13_-_Feb._5_2013.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Inside_Media_Weekly_13_-_Feb._5_2013.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/IranBetw1954/IranBetw1954.mp3", "text": "All the gardens are covered by rose leaves.All the mountains have put on their holy dress.A thousand years ago, the poet Ferdowsi sang the praises of spring among Purges mountains.Today, the people of Iran still look to their mountains for water, precious water for the high arid plane on which most of the people live.But too often, rivers flowing down from the snows disappear in the great central desert of Iran.East and west lie other Muslim lands, Turkey, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Afghanistan, North, the Soviet union lies beyond the Elburz mountains.Iran knew greatness in the days when it was known as Persia.From this vast throne room, part of his renowned Capital Persepolis, King Darius ruled over the first great empire in history.The hall of a hundred columns, the halam for the many royal wives and a wonderful sculptured stone stairway were among the marvels here.Focus of the sculptures was the life sized carving of Darius himself seated on his throne, receiving tribute from the peoples he ruled, from Europe, Africa and Asia, came men bearing gifts.In the procession was Syrians, bringing golden bowls, bracelets shaped like horse shoes and small horses from what is today Arabia.This was sort of tax day 25 centuries ago.There were medes, there were sapiens to what is today Southwest Russia, there were sheep from what is today Turkey.There were vessels with exotic shapes, full of precious liquids.There were hunt back cattle from what is today, India, all these part of the Persian empire in it's days of gracious glory.There was a chariot like those of the pharaohs, even Egypt was ruled by this Persian king.And there was a Bactrian camel from what is today Afghanistan.The tax collectors were the men of his mighty army and on these golden tablets, various inscribed.\"I am Darius king of kings.The great God Ahura Mazda has given me the rulership of all races, this is my kingdom\".Here in gold was outlined the empire, which was handed him to Xerxes his son.Xerxes at the head of vast armies, extended Persian rule to the limits of the known world.The Persian armies met defeat in Greece at the Battle of Marathon.Under Alexander, Greeks pursued the Persians back to Persepolis.Through this gateway Alexander the Great strode and triumph.Conquerors of a different kind came a thousand years later, went in from the Arabian peninsula, swept men with flaming sword and a fiery new faith.As this new faith of Islam grew and mellowed the followers of the prophet Muhammad built great churches called mosques.The mosque Judi Shah, the Royal blue mosque of Isfahan was completed in the 17th century by Shah Abass.He ruled during Persia's second golden age.Polo was developed in Isfahan and played in the great square while the Shah watched from this porch over the palace gateway.From his palace, Shah Abass ruled a reborn, expanding Persia.He built roads, irrigation systems and great bridges like this one, but even his empire finally crumbled.Centuries later in 1925, Reza Shah rose to power and a new era began marked by a turn from old customs toward Western ways of thought.Under Reza Shah's son needed land reforms or changing old patterns and bringing hope to the people.The young Shah's palace is typical of the architecture of modern Tehran.Former rulers lived in the Golestan, a rose garden palace.In it's mirror throne room, is one of the world's most fabulous objects.The Peacock Throne.This golden seat of state was designed so that its occupants sat cross-legged with his back against the bolster crusted with pearls and rubies and gold settings.Built for the great mogul of India, it was captured by Nadir Shah and brought to Persia 200 years ago.Above there's the jewel peacock from which the throne gets its name.Tehran is the capital of Iran located in the north with the Alverez mountains in the background.Tehran is a modern city with roots in the past.The great Muslim religious college of Sepahsalar is one of the intellectual centers of the Islamic world.These young men are studying to become mullahs religious leaders.Their tranquil place is contrast with the busy life of the city.A woman wearing the enveloping chador.is a reminder that even here in this modern city, has strong links with Eastern tradition.New buildings and modern apartments are among the visible signs of progress in Tehran.At their national university, young Iranians with a growing spirit of national pride are becoming the doctors, teachers, engineers, and leaders of the future.Isfahan is the art and craft center of Iran.As it was in the days of Shah Abass, when her people boasted, \"Isfahan is half the world,\" much of the Imperial splendor survives, and then the Bazaar, the ancient crafts like copper smithing continue little changed.Modern machinery has come to Iran, but it still as far less difficult to hire a skilled hand craftsman by the day, then to find capital, to buy an important machine, to do his job.The hands of Isfahan craftsman turn with special skill to the creation of fine articles of silver.Machinery will never be able to replace all its craftsman like these silversmiths.Their skill is not easily acquired.For 50 years, these hands have guided tiny chisels, none over a 10th, the size of a finger.With never ending taps of his hammer, one of the world's great silver masters, Mohammed Zufan, creates things of lasting loveliness.This small case is ornamented with figures of legendary heroes, hunting lions, and a scene from a Persia of long ago.The shop windows of Isfahan display other traditional arts.Here are miniature paintings.Themes use today, a little changed from those of the time of The Great shah Abass and the technique is also, little changed.Men sit all day, seeming scarcely to move a muscle.His brush, three Camel hairs.And this is some of the work he does.The best known product of Isfahan hands is of course the Persian rug.An average rug is made up of at least a million tiny knots.Every one of which must be tied by hand.The knots make the woolen tufts or pile of the rug.The woof or foundation of the rug consists of cotton threads wound between large wooden rollers.Rug industry wages are low.One of these skilled weavers earns less in a week than an average American laborer receives for two hours work.After a few rolls of knots have been tied, they are founded tightly together with this comb faced hammer.Children's tiny hands tie the smallest knots of the most delicate designs.Although employment of children and rug factories is discouraged by new labor laws As modern industry like this Textile Mill come to Isfahan mill owners and workers alike face the problems of sudden adjustment of the machine age.Shiraz is the capital of the province of Fars from which Persia took its name.The monumental city gates and the princely palace of the Kashkari suggest the beauty of Shiraz, whose history is full of the names of astronomers, philosophers and poets.The climate is agreeable here.Oranges grow near reflecting pools in which Muslim poets saw the tranquility they sought in their faith.With this monument Shiraz honors its most beloved son, the poet Sadi.700 years ago, he wrote poetry of such beauty that it still is the basis of the living Persian language of today.The people of Shiraz are among the most progressive in Iran.Behind the caravan still used for transport rises, their modern grain elevator.They build a fine new technical school where young men are learning to use machine tools and thus reduce Iran's dependence on foreign manufacturers.They point with special pride to their rapidly expanding medical school in which young people are being trained to fill the Syria shortage of doctors.Some of the students are women evidence of change disturbing to the conservative Muslim clergy.Medical care has not yet reached much of rural Iran.About 90% of the people live in villages like Kinare.Kinare exists because it has water, water drawn by this primitive hoist.Three centuries ago, elaborate irrigation systems operated.The land fed twice its present population.Today, this hoist reaches only 60 feet its capacity to goatskins about eight gallons of water a minute.Here are the people of the village come to wash their clothes.And in this same water, they do their dishes.They see nothing wrong about having the sheep and goats come to drink at the same source from which they draw their water to take home for cooking and drinking.A girl named Zara carries on her head the quarter of water she's walked half a mile to get.There is no spool in Kinare.So Zara has not heard of the dangers of bacteria in drinking water.Kinare is cold and dusty in winter.Hot even dustier and much more uncomfortable in summer because of the flies.At home, Zara's mother makes bread from wheat flour.That was the family's share of the crop.The landlord owns the fields and also the house in which Zara and her family live.Sickness breeds easily here.It comes from dust, flies, unclean drinking water, and often just from too little soap, because soap is expensive.Main food is bread.Only occasionally are the vegetables and a little goat.Meat is scarce.So the diet is mostly bread and not much else.Yet for all that poverty, these people are kind and decent, honest, honorable, and friendly.They have bedding is the most precious thing they own.They have a copper samovar.I broken kerosene lantern, a teapot, a few cups and saucers, a mirror and a picture of the Shah.Together with their clothing and cooking utensils, these things are all that this hard working family owns.The house has two rooms, a sleeping room upstairs, and a cooking room downstairs.This is the only stairway.Mother is baking bread this morning.Although Iran is rich in oil, oil products are still too expensive for this family.So mother walked 15 miles to gather twigs for her fire.Zara's father, Mustafa walks to work.He realizes that he is neither much better, nor much worse off than his neighbors, or neither much better, nor much worse off than most of the 16 million people of Iran.And as he works in the fields with the landlords oxygen, he knows that little has changed in Kinare in 25 centuries.There is still the old system of land ownership, which sometimes requires the tenants to pay 80% of their crop for the privilege of working the owner's land, the only changes most of is clothing.And now the steel tip on the wooden plow.Like most people in the middle east, Mustafa wants the benefits of mechanized civilization.Change is coming as the great natural resources of Iran are developed.The most important resource is oil.At Abadan is one of the world's largest refineries.Built to serve customers of many nations.Developed by British interests, Iranian oil has been the subject of bitter dispute.With no tradition of mechanical experience.Iranian technicians are developing skills to operate complex machinery.High industrial wages, have attracted men from all over the country to work in the unfamiliar Dingle of technical equipment.Men from the highland tribes, men from the city bazaars have put on the workman's helmet.This then is the new man of Iran, a man who looks with hope to the time when with further development of industry and her great natural resources.Iran may know, again, some of the glory it new when Darius ruled the Persepolis over the mightiest empire, the world had ever known.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/IranBetw1954.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/IranBetw1954.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/IranBetw1954.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/Its_A_Local_Production_-_John_Billingsley/Its_A_Local_Production_-_John_Billingsley.mp3", "text": "Here we are in Richmond, Vermont outside of our most famous landmark, the Round Church.And with us is filmmaker John Billingsley from Breadbox Productions, Richmond based production company.And we are hoping that he'll tell us a little bit about his production company and the new film that he made about the Round Church.So just for starters, could you say a few words about Breadbox Productions?Sure, Breadbox Productions, I formed with my partner around my first project, which is Liemba.We really formed it in order to make that documentary.And that was several years ago now.And so since then, I've used it as my production company, the name for my production company to continue forward and do smaller projects here in Vermont.And just to talk about Liemba to start with, cause while I recently saw the film, it's about this 90 year old ship that goes up and down this huge lake in Africa.Could you say a few words about that project is full of music?Sure, yeah.That project we shot nine years ago now.I went into it blind, my first documentary.I had not done one before.I was just finishing up grad school which I went to The New School in New York and had studied media studies and media production.I was actually shooting 16 millimeter film.So that was the foundation.My background is as an audio engineer.So this project, Liemba, the ship is just an amazing story.I first came across it moving up to Vermont after finishing grad school my wife and I had put everything into storage and traveled overland from Nairobi to Cape Town in Africa.And along the way, traveled on this ship, Liemba for one part of the journey.We were just drawn into the whole story and the drama, that experience of actually riding the ship is just incredible.And I got back and we moved to Vermont.Actually we moved to Jericho.We rented a cabin in Jericho.And that's when my brother-in-law who had finished film school a couple of years before pitched the idea of doing a documentary.We were talking about the Liemba and he had spent time in Africa, in the '80s in Kenya when he was in college and knew about the ship then.And so that's when it started.We didn't know what we were getting ourselves into to pick a ship in Africa to do your first documentary on.Had we known what we were getting into we probably would never have done it but there was a huge learning curve.It was an amazing experience.After raising the money to go, we went with a small crew, spent 10 weeks in Africa.This ship was brought in 1913 by the Germans to the coast of Africa in pieces in 5,000 crates, transported over land by train and on the backs of porters to the shores of Lake Tanganyika where it was rebuilt.It served as a gunship in World War One.It was scuttled at the end of the war.The Brits brought it back to the surface eight years later, and it's still in service today.So it's this amazing history.Our story was really about the role that it serves today in modern Africa, this relic of colonialism.Some people travel business, some people travel smuggling.The MV Liemba travels the expense of one of the largest lakes on earth playing a critical role in the lives of those in her way.We recorded all the music over there.For me like I mentioned my background in audio engineering, this was a dream come true.I had a range from that first trip to work with a group of musicians who were refugees from the Congo, who I had had the wonderful opportunity to play music with on that first trip.Had their contact info arranged.The first thing we did when we got to Africa was go into a house that we rented with them and record music for a week.And then during the course of the 10 weeks of production, I came across a bunch of other musicians as well.So there is a whole CD accompanying the DVD. - And what was interesting about it too, is that just like the Round Church film, it's about layers of history and things kind of coming full circle.And I was wondering if you could say a few words about the Round Church film and how that started.I think the allure of a local hometown project was great.The main inspiration was a contest.The Margaret George Short Film competition that was put out by the Green Mountain Film Festival.Liemba had played the new year before opening night.And in all honesty, I had just gotten a new camera, a new HD camera venturing into the world of HD, this is 2010.And they announced this competition and I thought it was a great opportunity.I don't know about you, but for me to really learn either a new piece of gear or new software, I need a project to sink my teeth into.I read the contest was to do a short piece about a local historic landmark or public space and how that place reflects the community at large and the spirit of the community.And I've always loved the Round Church since I've moved to Richmond about seven years ago.I drive by it every day and it's just such a wonderful building that it was a great opportunity to learn more about it.And chipping away at the history, what are some of the things that you discovered about this landmark that everyone drives by that you didn't really know by making a film?It's really its origin.How it first came together, how it was really truly a community effort.Five different churches came together and it was volunteers.And through this great community effort built this structure where they could all share.And I think that that sense of community is also something that you still find here today.That's what I think is the most amazing thing about it.And doing this film where they wanted this historic building to reflect the community at large, it was pretty easy.You come to the Round Church Christmas sings or a snowy day, and it's still a very much a vibrant part of the community as it was intended to be 200 years ago when they set out to make it.And I guess we're standing on not only a historic site, but one of the best sledding spots in town.Yes, indeed.Yep, my kids love it.Can you say a few words about some of the architectural points of interest about the building?They always call it a round church for instance, but in the film you go into some more detail.Well, it's actually 16 sided.It's not round, it's 16 separate panels that are put together to create that round church, the round field.There are stories about why it's that shape.One is to keep the enemy from hiding behind the corner outdoors and another it would keep the devil out of the corner.I just think it's an amazing architectural achievement when you're inside it feels as if it's round, but yeah.And how its origins may have been in New Hampshire from one of the points that come out in the film from one of the fellows that constructed it.It was inspired I guess by a place- - It was inspired by a building in his hometown.He had moved here to this community.He was originally from New Hampshire.He was commissioned to build the Round Church and he took his inflation from another round church that is no longer around, this is all through historical documents.And I must tip a hat to Harriet Riggs who is Richmond's treasure of a historian.She literally wrote the book on it.As far as my historical research, my historical research for the most part consisted of sitting down with Harriet and really spending some hours with her going through her trove of pictures, historic pictures that she's collected about the Round Church.And she was just a wealth of information.We sat down for the interview here in the church and that was an hour plus of just everything, just detailed information about the church.And so it made my job easy.And there are a lot of people that are really culturally invested in not just the Round Church, but just Richmond and its history that show up in the film.I mean, I see Gary Brestford's house right here and he's the guy that rings the bell.So if you can say a few words about that.Whoa, yeah.To tell you the truth, that first Green Mountain Film Festival, there was a cutoff, there was a 10 minute limit to the film.And I had tried to arrange an interview with Gary and I had not been able to do it before the deadline.And I knew it was incomplete without an interview with Gary.The second cut and final cut, which we showed this summer here for the bicentennial celebration includes Gary.And I'm so glad I was able to get that in there because he is been the caretaker for the church.He first started working on the church about 50 years ago in his teenage years, that summer he worked on the church and he's been working on it consistently, ever since.And he's also the bell ringer which is a great story within a story about his devotion towards ringing the bell for all the wedding services.But it's people like Gary, there's a list of folks, all the volunteers with the historical society who've come out and through all the fundraising and community has come outpouring support for the church.But it's people like that that keep it going and keep it alive.It's a great part of the community.And you weren't nervous bringing your new HD camera all the way to the top there on those sort of rickety looking steps?I don't know if they really are.That was fun.I had to pass the camera up cause I was more worried about myself getting through than the cameras.It was a little tight squeezing through some of those holes.It was very interesting to get up there and see the inner workings, the bowels of the church and the sprinkler system too, which is one thing I didn't get a chance to because I couldn't capture it.I didn't have a set of lights when we were up there and it didn't quite come through in the film but that's been a recent addition relatively speaking.But it's very important and it's elaborate and it's great how they've set it up so that there's no heat in the building.This sprinkler system is set up in such a way that it does trigger from heat and melts a cap and release water.So the church is protected from fire whereas it hadn't been in the past.But there are remains around the Round Church.And this came through, throughout the bicentennial year with all these events that MMCTV was filming concerts and things.And there's still an urgency around the Round Church.It's not like all the work is ever done, there's still- - No, I think it's like a boat in that regard.The upkeep is constant.There's always a new project to keep it going.Whether it's the roof or some other issues, they've found some decane wood in the back, some of the structures that they needed upkeep.I think as being a center of the community, I think people understand its importance too.I don't think it's at risk of falling into disrepair.I hope that people, as Gary says in the film, that there'll be other people around who care enough to look after it over the next 200 years.And that really comes through in the film how things do come full circle.It was founded as a meeting house 200 years ago.It's still a meeting house in a lot of ways maybe a broader sense today.That's what I was trying to achieve with that was trying to convey that that it's still serving its original purpose.It really is.And I had just a one last question before we show the film here.If you could just say a few words about where it's been shown so far and where you hope this film travels.We showed it at the Green Mountain Film Festival and it's been shown on your station here.It's also on the Richmond Historical Society website.So if somebody wants to see the film on their own time, they can just go to the film society website and find it there.Yes, you can find it there, it's available to watch online.And any other future documentaries we should keep our eyes out for in the next few years?Several ideas brewing, I haven't pulled the trigger on any one of them yet.So I'll let you know but kind of sifting through different ideas and seeing where the next one will take us.Hopefully, I'm very interested in...It's now with three young kids as well, keeping it more of a local perspective.And doing some sledding, I guess in a few weeks.Yeah, let's hope so.Well, thanks for joining us and talking about your film.Thanks so much for having me, appreciate it.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Its_A_Local_Production_-_John_Billingsley.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Its_A_Local_Production_-_John_Billingsley.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Its_A_Local_Production_-_John_Billingsley.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/Jericho_Selectbd_10-18-12/Jericho_Selectbd_10-18-12.mp3", "text": "So, call the meeting to order at 7:02.Most of you probably already have, but make sure you sign in, so that we know you're here with us tonight.And the first item on the agenda is Public to be Heard.Is there anybody here who wants to talk about something that's not on the agenda tonight?There are agendas going around.I have one.Yeah, right here.Okay, so we'll get right down to business.The first item is about CCTA Bus Service, and I assume that you are Meredith Burkett.Yeah, I just need to hand out...Thank you.Is this the same thing that's in our packet?Probably, maybe I slightly revised it.Oh, okay.So, then no .95 percent the same.Okay.This is great.Do you wanna come up here and join us?Oh, changed the bullet points.Added a little bit.So, I thought I could go through, just these major topics an then take any questions you might have.So, we're here because the CCTA Board recently, in this past Summer, selected the Jeffersonville Commuter Route as its priority project to seek funding for in this fiscal year.This follows CCTA adopting a transit development plan in September of 2010, that laid out a vision for an expanded and improved transit system.The Jeffersonville-route was included in that.Definitely pointed out is, one of the major corridors into Jennings County that doesn't currently serve, the Route 15 corridor into Burlington.So, the General service overview of what we have in mind, is a Monday-through-Friday commuter service.It'll connect Jeffersonville, Cambridge, Underhill, Jericho, Essex Town and then into Burlington.It'll travel primarily along Route 15, revision four round trips per day, two morning, and two evening.Our commuter routes tend to start with 2:00 AM and 2:00 PM trips that serve the peak commuting times.We would say the stops, including downtown Burlington, Fletcher Allen UVM, given that's such a large employment center.Champlain Bell, where there's connecting service.Essex center, Jericho, Underhill, Cambridge and Jeffersonville, and the exact stop locations would still have to be determined through a public process and discussions with the local towns.But it would not stop at all the stops in, along Route 15 in Essex.All the St Mike's- - Oh, sure it could.Yeah, so we have- - But that would make it a longer bus for the people who are coming from out here.So they would only stop if there was somebody wanting to getting off there, as for get on and you'd have to kind of flag it.Our commuter routes tend not to stop as frequently as our local routes, obviously for that same reason that it would take too long.We designate what are called Time Points, which are major stops that we can't leave early.So, those are the times that people can absolutely depend on the bus never departing earlier than the time it's put in the schedule.The intermediate stops, you'd have a little bit less clarity about exactly when the bus was gonna be there.I see, okay.So, then we would also offer connections to the rest of our system in Burlington and Winooski.We offer free transfers, so that expands the reach of the route.We envisioned the fares would be $2 per one way trip, which is what we charge for our Milton and our Hindenburg commuter route.So we would have the same fare structure.Our Roughriders, estimates at this point are about 70 passengers per day by the end of the first year of service.It usually takes about three years for the routes to really mature.So, we don't expect it to be total gangbusters in the first year, it does take time to fill.This is 70 riders per bus?Per day.Oh, per day.Oh ,I'm sorry, I forgot day.Sorry, 70 riders per day by the end of the first year of service.So that's basically 35 individuals, in and out.We estimate a 100 percent net cost of service, so that's after we've deducted any fare revenue, to be about 210 to $215,000 per year.And we think the earliest service could start depending on these two funding scenarios, which I'll lay out next, would be the summer of 2013.And depending on how it goes, it might be the fall, but somewhere in that range.So, this is the part that gets a little bit complex and I'll describe why.There are two potential funding options for the service.The first is called, the Congestion Mitigation Air Quality Grant.That's the typical way CCTA has funded new services over the last probably 10 years.CMAQ was the abbreviation for Congestion Mitigation Air Quality.Those are federal funds that are awarded by the Agency of Transportation through a competitive grant process.So all the transit agencies in the state compete for CMAQ funds, usually on an annual basis.There've been a few years where that funding hasn't been available, but it's usually annually.80 percent funding of the net operating cost that's provided in federal funds, and then there's a 20 percent local match.And so, CCTA would be seeking on that local match from Jericho, Underhill and Cambridge, Jeffersonville, to share in that 20 percent match.We estimate the 20 percent match to be about $42,000 a year.Again, if fair revenues come in higher and more people ride, and we collect more fares, that lowers the net cost.And so, of course, the 20 percent match is lower as well.And we've gotten some indication from Re Trans that the same background obligations will be due sometime late November, but they haven't said exactly when.So, that's the normal way we would move forward with trying to seek funding for a new service.But this year, there's something called the CIRC Alternatives process, and I'm not sure how familiar the select board is, but given that the governor announced that the CIRC isn't going to be built, as originally planned, he had a task force set up, that's being led through the CCRPC. And there've been a certain round of implementation projects that are providing funding for projects that benefit the area that the CIRC would have served.So that includes Essex Town.We feel like this commuter route would absolutely reduce the traffic and the vehicles traveling through the CIRC study area.So we think this is a great candidate for potential funding through that process.It appears that a 100 percent funding might be available for a period of time for the service.So we're actively seeking that.Then, talking with people at the RPC and trying to figure out exactly how we can introduce this project as one of the potentials to be funded through that process.There hasn't been absolute confirmation that a 100 percent funding will be available, but that's the indications we're getting.So if a 100 percent funding were available, obviously that full 20 percent match wouldn't be needed immediately.We don't expect a 100 percent funding to last forever if it's available, but hopefully for a period of a few years.So, when this opportunity came forward, I went to the CCTA board and asked them, \"This is very different than how you've treated other communities who are getting new service.Are you comfortable going to Jericho, Underhill, Cambridge, Jeffersonville, and not asking for any funds in support of the service\"?And their answer was, it would be nice to have a commitment of some sort from the towns to show commitment to the service.It doesn't need to be that full 20 percent match, but something, relatively substantial to show commitment that we've placed in escrow for future years, if you didn't need it immediately.So, I'm thinking something probably in the range of $85,000 a year.The full 20 percent match, a third of it- - 5,000 each?Yes.Yeah.Turning over, the last section on the handout that I run through, or what I see is important next steps and questions that we have, first and foremost, there's the select board support CCTA moving forward with this service proposal.Obviously, if there is a local support, we're not gonna push the issue, if there's going to be support for funding and the service at a local level.Assuming that there is support, we will be looking for a letter of support either for the CIRC Alternatives process or CMAQ application, just committing to your support the route.In terms of funding, I'm curious to talk about what the deadline for CCTA to inform Jericho of that amount, whether it'd be $5,000 with a 100 percent fundings available or potentially $14,000, which would be a third of the local match share.So, what's the timeline we're working with for that?And then if you have any particular concerns or questions, now's a great time to start those conversations, so we can make sure to work out the details.I have a question.Sure.We've had indications, and I'm not quite sure where they came from, that a go no-go requirement to bring bus service out to Jericho would be for us to find a parking line location, which could serve as the bus.We're all in favor of such a thing, but it's turning out to be difficult to find the location.The question is, would finding a park and ride locations, be an absolute requirement for this program?I think we absolutely need to find some sort of park and ride location to support the route.I don't think that needs to be the prominent municipally-owned lot.CCT has entered into lease arrangements in support of some of our link routes.Kind of as an interim, until something more formal can be developed, we rented space at Country Home Products in Vergennes before the fares for park and ride was constructed by the state.So there are interim things that can be done.I think providing some level of commuter parking, so people can drive to access the route, is gonna be integral to its success.We agree with you.That isn't the problem.The problem is finding a suitable place.That's hard.Now, do you need a space initially that you can turn around in, or can you stop on Route 15 with a bus stop or do you have to- - So I think we can stop on Route 15 as long as, when going in the opposite direction, there's a safe way for people to cross the road.So, obviously we wouldn't wanna do that and probably anything over 45 to an hour zone.So, if it's a low speed area and it's clearly relatively pedestrian friendly area, we can stop on the road.Another question is, how do you determine the...Is it just equal spread among all the towns or is it proportioned out by population or things like in terms of the match?So, what we're proposing is an equal share.We anticipate that more riders, would come from Jericho than from Jeffersonville, but the cost of those passengers from Jeffersonville would be higher because they're riding further, so, it's not an exact match, but I think for ease, I think a third makes sense.That's what we did in support of our US 2 Commuter out in Washington County.Marshfield, Plainfield and East Montpelier, all share equally in the local match, even though obviously East Montpelier is far shorter than the trip in from Marshfield.But that seemed to- - Have you talked to the other towns yet?No, I'm going to Underhill next week.And I spoke with the Cambridge Town Clerk and again on an upcoming meeting in Cambridge.And one of our board members has already had a conversation, kind of an intro conversation, with the Cambridge select board.And they seem interested?They seem interested, yeah.So the meeting, I had an initial meeting with Underhill staff, it wasn't with the full select board, so, we'll see how that meeting , but we're hopeful.There's been residents over the years, who've contacted us, definitely expressing interest.We think this is certainly an important corridor to offer our transit service on.So, we're hopeful that there'll be public support for it.So assuming that this happens, when do you anticipate us having to pay you the match, so we figure out which budget to got to?So it would be for our FY14, which starts July 1st, 2013.So the one we're preparing for now.Yes.So, the budget that would go in coming day, this year.In terms of a budget deadline, I mean, we're preparing a budget now.Okay.And of course the final is March 14th, but the budget goes to the town, well before that.Right.So the question- - It goes to the publisher at the end of January.Yeah, so, it's not unthinkable by any means for us to reserve a certain sum of money, put it in the budget to be expended if the program goes forward, and not if not.Yeah.That's something that you're comfortable with?I think that would be great.I'm hoping to have a lot more clarity than I have right now about the potential funding sources and the amounts needed, in a month and a half.By early December, I'm hoping that it's been honed in, a lot more than it is now.The CIRC Alternatives process definitely is complicating the proposal.Normally, I would say, CMAQ grant, this is what we're proposing, this is the cost, but it's such a great opportunity to potentially get service on the ground for a lower intro cost for the towns that I think- - Exactly.I count four towns.Jericho, Underhill, Cambridge and Jeffersonville.So my understanding, is that Jeffersonville and Cambridge might be...I don't think Jeffersonville has its own municipal budget.I think they fall under Cambridge.It's a village, I think, of Cambridge.It's a village of Cambridge.Oh, I see.I didn't know that.But I'll get clarity with that.Okay, fair enough.And when I do I'll let you know.I didn't know that, shame on me.Why not apply for CMAQ and have the CIRC Alternatives money pay for the 20 percent match?I think it's not allowed.So I think the pot of money is actually ultimately gonna be the same.So I'm not sure that that would...I have to think about that.I didn't think of that before, but I'll...Yeah, it's all coming from the same pot of federal hybrid money.The money that would fund the transit service, I think, is coming out of the same pot, as the money that would fund CMAQ. It's really a question of, if we get it into the CIRC Alternatives process, I think if it's selected by the task force, as one of the projects they wanna advance, I think there's a very high likelihood that it will be put into the state budget.CMAQ grant application is competitive, so we'll be competing with other services throughout the state.I think it'd be a strong application, but I think the CIRC Alternatives process might be a little bit more firm.The other question is, since this is a competitive process every year, it's not unthinkable that we have this service for three or four years, and then we lose a competitive bid, and it all goes away.So the competitive grant, is a one-time thing to get the funding.But it's an annual...Running these things is an- - We don't have to raid biannually.So once you make the grant, and if the service is proving to be successful- - So it's not competitive every single year.Correct.Ah, okay, fine.It's a one-time.That wasn't clear, okay.And then how long does it go on?The CMAQ grants have historically been three-year grants.There might be a change to that in the recent transportation re-operation- - So it was one time for three years, and then you've got to come back and try again?Well, after three years, the practice has been...If it's a successful route, the state has provided another source of funding to make up that 80 percent.So our Montpelier link, we started to see that funds about 10 years ago.It's been a great success.The CMAQ money is along since run out but the state has found other ways to meet that 80 percent requirement.Okay.Another question, it's $2.You're proposing $2 each way.Yeah.Does this commuter link bus route count would be the monthly passes?Yep, we have a monthly pass for our local commuters.I believe it's $75 a month or there's a 10 ride, which is just 10 times the $2.So it's a $20 really just for convenience, as the 10 ride.Okay, so you don't really save a lot of money by doing the monthly, unless- - If you're gonna ride every day, you'll save money.It'd be, probably 20 to 22 weekdays.So it might be 80 to $85 a month, if you're just going to pay cash.So you'd say $10.But given the cost of gas for one gallon right now.Absolutely, we're definitely seeing an increase.We've been having a lot of standees on some of our commuter routes, so.Well then, I also think that the state is clearly going to have more buy-in for public transit anyway, to keep it in the future, given that they wanna reduce their greenhouse gas emissions by 50 percent by 2028.Reducing VMT is gonna be a key component.That's a big deal, is to get that VMT reduced.So I'm perfectly prepared to make the motion.There are two things you'd like for us, one is motion on the first item.The second, no motion is required, you just want some information, which I think you've already got.Yeah, sounds like, as soon as possible, but early January would be the- - Well, even then, it's not absolute.If it's pretty clear we're going forward, we'll reserve some money.Okay, that's perfect.Is there anybody in the audience who has questions or comments about this?David?I know you have a problem with the parking, right?I think I have a temporary solution anyway.Fantastic.That I believe, the people that are familiar with along Route 15, at least a temporary basis, depending on the area, how many cars and a lot of different things that I thought I would write down.Maybe we'll let them use that.Wow, cool.I'm not familiar but we can chat as soon as this goes forward.We've had a hard time finding something that works.Your land is in the mill area?Yeah.I have some commercial land, it's along Route 15, across from the Irish flower place, if you're familiar where that is.And I also have 24 acres of land on Route 15 where it used to be the sawmill area, across from the substation area.And at least in that area, depending how long and so forth, it's a little more critical to me.And it might work out for some kind of solution long-term, for at least.I don't know how big a parking lot put in there, depending what we would have, probably would do, but at least on the short term, there's plenty of land there.And the basis is, your not gonna have to do anything .Right adjacent to 15 is key.Yeah, I think the commercial actually has the most long-term viability because we can't do municipal other, which is a parking lot in the village center, which is David's sawmill property.Unless there's a zoning change or something like that.Interesting.Yeah, but it's not- - But it's not.That's not an absolute insuperable.Let us worry about it.This is good news.Good news, we at least have something worth doing.We have two viable options anyway.That's fantastic.So I'll move that- - Is there anybody else who has any questions or comments about this?Okay.Oh. - I just like to make the comment that I support doing this.And I think that I would be one of the people riding the bus, at least occasionally.This particular route doesn't serve my commute, but it definitely would serve some of my other needs.And absolutely recognize that it's sort of a starting point.And hopefully, it's at least, in a way to show support in use of transit and something we can go from.So I would move that the select board...Oh sorry, do you wanna- - You said, earlier on, 35 riders are 70 each way.Where does that number come?Actually, we have commute data from the...It's not the census anymore, but it's a survey done at the federal level, and we can get numbers on a number of commuters from towns in Vermont into Burlington.And so, I took those figures and apply the market share that we get on other commuter routes and applied it.And so how long, worst case scenario, how long do you run empty buses for?Like at what point do you say, \"Wow, it turns out nobody here \"is getting on the bus\"?We usually do routes three years and that's usually when the state, especially, at this point with CMAQ, will come in and say, you know, it's not working.You need to either make significant changes or we'll, you know.And it would be one-stop in Jericho, one-stop in- - I don't know, we might do more.There will be two, yeah.Obviously we don't have too many stops 'cause it slows it down.But if there are two places that really make sense, parking right in another place that's walkable, that's certainly feasible.And if it moves forward, there'll definitely be public hearings in each community, as we're designing the group to figure those things out.All right, thanks.All right, cool.Now you can go team.Go for it.So I move that the select board vote to indicate it's support for the proposed Jefferson-Burlington commuter route, and declare its willingness to write a letter of support for the CMAQ grant application.I'll second that.All those in favor?Aye.Thanks Meredith.Thank you so much.Thank you.Oh, it's exciting.It's very exciting.It's about time, man.We talked about it for a long time.Is there going to be wifi on the buses?See it was a good question.Did you hear that?There is wifi on the buses.We're getting there.Oh my goodness, I'll be able to multitask on my way in, yes.Thank you - Thank you very much.so much for coming.Thank you.Yeah, the others very nice, but David's idea of it, maybe we could hit one of the churches in this area, so that quiet somebody down .Yeah, definitely.What about the school area?Because it's slow there.Where's the other one?The elementary school.Oh, the other ones up further, but I'm- The elementary school.That's a good idea, yeah.We might look at that too.The other one I was thinking - At the post office.it's down by The Red Mill.I mean, there are a number of possibilities for just to stop.The Red Mill is not a possibility.There's no shoulder.That's true.There's no- - Okay.But you know, maybe by the church...You can try the church and Mrs.B's barn there has a circular parking lot.Yeah, there might be.They'd have to be able to stop on both sides and it's fast there.And she said it had to be less than 45.35.35, so that's why- - Yeah, we will work on it.It gives the Energy Task Force something to work with.Because it's spread out so long, here are two what might be practical.Yeah, I mean, at least the Energy Task Force has something to hang it's head on then.I mean, there's a lot of sense for having one each in the two big population centers, which is here in the flats.Yeah, yeah, absolutely.Anyway, okay.Okay, so the next item on the agenda, is the Safe Routes to School Grant Application.Pat.Yeah, this really came up pretty recently.This may be one of the last opportunities we have to apply for a designated Safe Routes to School Grant because of some of the changes that Meredith was talking about in the transportation bill.Safe routes to school grants are a hundred percent federally funded.So as long as you don't go above the maximum grant award of $250 000, there's no local match required.What we are proposing to apply for, are really two grants.One would be, we could refer to, as an infrastructure grant, which would look at on River Road, installing permanent radar speed feedback signs.And then at the crosswalk on the curve with Dickinson Street, installing a pedestrian-activated rapid flashing beacon.The other part would be the other end of Dickinson Street with Route 15, installing a crosswalk there.And again, also the rapid flashing beacons.That's one application.Another application, would be to conduct a feasibility study.The town did something similar almost 15 years ago, but again, looking at the River Road, Route 15 intersection in terms of vehicular movements, pedestrian safety, there's been a lot of talk.Recently about the crosswalk in that area or lack of crosswalk in that area.And recently the school held a Walk to School Day and believe had a survey.And that was one of the high...One of the main concerns was that intersection as well as when we did the AARP walking audit, that was, I think the priority intersection for the town to look at in terms of intersections, and looking at pedestrian enhancement.So that would be a feasibility study to look at what types of improvements could be made to the intersection.What sort of pedestrian improvements could be made, wouldn't result in any construction, but it would be the first step in getting to any construction, if that's what the town decided to do.Does this go along then with the email train that was with Randy Clark and the crosswalk by the park?I mean that's for the park.No, it would be the same thing.'Cause you can only have so many crosswalks within a certain distance you cover.So it's related, but it of didn't come out of that.That's just another concern that's been raised at the intersection from a different person from venue.Doing a feasibility study will help deal with that particular issue?Yeah, and see what what options there are, what things people might like to see there.And then the board could decide if there was an alternative that they liked, that they wanted advanced.Do feasibility studies of this kind cut any ice with the state, with D-Trans, because this is a state road.Anything we do, we can do a feasibility based off wazoo.Yeah, I mean that you have to do it.I mean, without...You can't really get anywhere with D-Trans without starting with at least a scoping feasibility study.Has it been observed in mankind's history that they respond to something like this?Well, you know, the street scapes is one.This is Route 15, it's their right of way.Depending on what we did, it may likely end up that it'd be something that the town would have to maintain because it would be our project, but you just have to go through their review process and they'd have to approve it.So this isn't hopeless?No. - It's the stuff that Randy Clark had talked about.I mean, we as a town, wanted to do that a long time ago to get some way of getting people across the street to the park.Right.Mainly the concern, or question really, is about the Safe Routes to School money can be spent on sidewalks, right?I mean, we could just...And doesn't the RPC often pay for the study or aren't there a lot of grants for studies?The money through the RPC won't pay for engineering.And this is engineering?The feasibility study?The feasibility study, it's planning.So we could apply to the RPC, but they will require a 20 percent match.This would be a 100 percent funded.I don't believe we could apply for the beacons.And even if we could apply for the beacons, it would likely be more than the grant available for their sidewalk program.And do these things total up to the 250,000?Oh, not even close, no.So, why don't we come up with some sidewalk stuff to pay for?Because we don't have any design that we could apply for it.You have to have...With these anywhere, you have to have a completely engineered sidewalk.And this is the last one.Right, so that's why- - Yeah, it's the MAP-21 program or something.They're changing it as of October 12th.So we don't have plans from the street scape process that never got built out to fruition that could be used.No. - Because I know in the beginning of the street scape project, there was a lot of brainstorming and a lot of different proposals and there was talk about more sidewalks going further.No, no.It got built out as far as it could.No, it didn't.But that was the grant that they got and they spent every nickel- - No, I know, but I thought there were a lot of studies done before because early on in the process, there was different proposals and some of them included more sidewalks going up all the way to Sullys Hill, sidewalks going down the river.But I don't think they got engineered is the problem.You're probably right, I'm just asking.Right, and the approach that we're taking here, is there's been a lot of discussion in this area about trying to make some improvements for pedestrian safety for quite some time and not much has really happened.So we see this as something that's...The beacons and the speed signs, it's something that's pretty easy to implement.So, it can be on the ground fairly quickly.That's why we're not proposing and moving any crosswalks, like the one on Dickinson Street, proposing to move it, 'cause you'd have to add sidewalk.It's just, let's try to make what we have safer than it is now, knowing that, down the road, there may be bigger improvements that are made.And you don't conflict, so that's- - Right, I mean- - These are movable, mobile.Right.Now, could we move the actual, can we move the hardware?I mean, if we were to- - Yeah, you can move it.I think it sounds okay.What do you guys think?Fine, absolutely.It's at least something we can do.Anyone have any concerns?All right.I don't have any concern, rather a question, just to sort of keep constant prodding.How you said that none of this stuff would get in the way at all, down the road.Other stuff, if either something happens, where is down the road looking like, at this point?Next month?Depends on what you're talking about .Next year, two years, 10 years, 30 years?Well, we do have in the capital budget money to do a sidewalk priority study, so that we actually can talk about all the different sidewalks or trails that are needed in town and- - Oh, town wide and not- - Town wide and actually begin to prioritize 'cause right now it's just sort of hit or miss.I mean, there's some good ideas and we'd go with it, to they have a whole unified plan is our goal.And then we can prioritize it and then- - Where all the places in our dream world, we would have sidewalks.Now, what is an orderly way for prioritizing this so that we know, and the citizens know why we're doing it here and not there on any given year with any given pile of limited money.Beyond that, that's something.That's really different.But it's all funding constrains.In relation to the whole Dickinson discussion, that's been happening for the last, five, six, seven years, where is that going, if anything?That isn't anywhere at the moment, frankly.It's a million and a half dollars.The town can't bond for something like that.Dickinson is connected with whatever ultimately happens with the property that David owns.Is the property dependent on Dickins?No - No. - No, the two things have to go together.I mean, it's not a chicken or an egg.There has to be a joint program because we can't spend a million and a half dollars to make a road nice that is not connected to any large development.We just don't have that kind of money.'Cause I think the rest of the town can- - But you can't develop until he gets Act 250, which means you have to have a plan- - No. - No. - That 250 is not a barrier here.We've been down the rack 250 road with that.The problem is we need a plan sufficiently large, sufficiently valuable to generate a reason to spend the million and a half dollars.We can go out and build a nice million dollar and half road through the middle of a cow pasture.We don't do that.Do you still have those plans from Tridel?Who did it?Tridel.There are some amazing, inspiring plans for what- I mean, it would have more iterations, but we all looked at the presentation and drooled, but then, the price tag is prohibited.Well and I think because Act 250- - We're just looking for action from the town that the town will do something.The fact that we spent all this money on the planning process, first we did the study, and then we updated it with the Tridel Engineering.So it was much more engineered to be a full street scape.I think Act 250, would except that, it's the fact that the town has done.At an earlier stage, there was a discussion.David was in negotiations with the lady who owns the- - The rehab.The rehab center.And there was an Act 250 process associated with that.We the select board said, here's what we would be willing to do, to support that.And the Act 250 board accepted what we said we would do as sufficient.So we were not the reason that stopped, that failed to come to fruition for other reasons.What we were prepared to do on Dickinson Street satisfied the 250 board.And what I mean, it should be fairly clear, that we can't spend that kind of money on something that just as long as it's a very small road.How about others much, much more minor, not the level of that big picture, but we talked about making tickets in two ways.That's doable.That's doable.Small changes that don't cost a lot of money are still on the agenda.But it's still a lot of money because of the buses.And it still has to be...I don't know, what was the price tag on making in two way?I can't remember.Well, there were many different price tags of bidding on how ambitious you got.You can do things that are pretty cheap.It is real cheap.It has to be widened and rounded.But it is that in conversation?It's in conversation, yeah.But we also have a road priority list that generates where we need to be spending our limited budget.We do have a road priority list, where we don't yet have a sidewalk priority list .So it depends on where it falls in and what makes it bubble forth to the surface.But there is this list and how deteriorating the road is when you need to fix it.And so that's what we're working down.Right now, the highest priority is kind of low.That's a big chunk of money.Kelly.I'm just wondering if started proposing safe route to school, will make any difference in two way big part of that study.And is that possibly part of the safe routes to school, that even if we do it in the least expensive way that doesn't allow the buses, but does allow that...Would that help any with...Could a study be done to see if that would help at all with the traffic such that it would be safer for the walk-ins?That's a good point.No, right now, one of the main reasons we could apply and it's possibly feasible that we could have a crosswalk across Route 15 to Dickinson Street, is without making any real improvements on Dickinson Street, is because of the very low traffic volumes on Dickinson Street.So if we increase the volumes on- - Then we can't do this other thing.Then we can do this other thing without providing a side walk in that sort of- - And this clearly addresses the more immediate issues.That's the intent, yeah.To get something on the ground more than we have currently.All right, David.Yes, I don't know if I totally understand what you were trying to say.Are you saying that if the traffic, for example was opened up, then you couldn't do what you're thinking of doing this current months?If the volumes on Dickinson Street were any higher than they are right now, then the only way we could...When you have a crosswalk, you need somewhere for the people to land.There's a sidewalk on the other side of 15.So because of the- - Which other side of 15?Well, the- - North side of 15.Around 15?Yeah, so because the volumes on Dickinson Street are so low right now, it looks like we could have a crosswalk at that location.Have the people land essentially on the shoulder of Dickinson Street without having to really do anything else to Dickinson Street, because the volumes are so low when it's one way.If that were to- - Put the crosswalk itself.Correct.If I may, maybe difference in opinion, clarification or whatever.Well, a couple of things, one on the sidewalk on the north side of 15, it's now in the process of closely being built, talking from Palmer Lane up through to the Old Underhill Garage on the North side.There was some study and some work done on the right side that couldn't be implemented at all, thought or anything could come under that program.We had to drop that after conceptual design because there was so much...There wasn't much support for that segment, so that didn't make it to engineering because- - It wouldn't fall under because of the engineering?Right.I just wanted to about that part of the sidewalk.Okay, that's my question on that part of the sidewalk but on the Dickinson Street process, I don't know really where I'd start here.I guess I would say my interpretation, the Dickinson Street, Linda's brought it up a number of times, we had a federal study and then we got into...though we didn't dot our eyes across all the PDs before that.So like board of act, we needed another study that we had done, I forget the name of the last study.It's not 30, $40,000, whatever.And then vote come out of the whole situation after that was done, I was under the impression that we possibly could move forward, work out some kind of solution.And then they did another sectual plan, that Tridelity stuff.And that's a nice plan, and you can say, well, we can't move forward because of the million $700,000 you would have to spend.But my feeling would be that the town should look at that study, or whatever was drawn there, or something to adopt long range, which they just said right now, there's nothing done other than that plan and all that, they would look it over and say, this might be the plan with exceptions or whatever.Then after the overall plan, and you might look at, they finally accepted the plan.So then we could say, okay, and we could do this in X number of stages and so on and so forth to get it accomplished.I think they've got to decide whether they'd like that plan long range or not of what plan they would have.But in the interim, it's kind of gone from one level years ago that we need to correct the traffic problems in that location.Whether I build there or not a traffic problem exists, it has existed, and it's existed for a number of years.And the solution was gonna be, that we open Dickinson Street, should it be one way this way?Should it be that way?Now with the traffic study, that was the last traffic study said that they could, some streets should be open two way and so forth.After that study came out, I entertained thought to the select board that I'd like to meet with them here.It's never happened for whatever reason, but I'll say it again what I said now, if I build nothing there, I offered to the town that I have estimates to fix that road for two way traffic and so forth.It was in state estimates and so forth.It was in figures from Tridel and another local company in Westerns Earthmoving and so forth.So it's, I think a fair estimate to do the job, make it be looked at and so forth, a figure to correct the traffic and add the two-way, which is basically the same as the long route from long range plan B maybe $300,000.And if that was done, I have offered and still offer to hear tonight, moving forward, and try to have some discussions in the town that I would do all the labor on that.Build that street for absolutely nothing, except that they pay for the materials and so forth, and they can have...And I have one stipulation that Tridel, because they've done a lot of the engineering on this project, as well as the land for myself, storm water, a bunch of things, I have a better knowledge, they are the engineers that you have that one stipulation.But on the other hand, you could have other engineers that check on them.That's because they worked for me and we won't want a conflict or some other thing with the town, but it could be looked at, worked at, plus they work for the town.So I'm willing to do that.And if the down drilling put up the materials and so forth to fix that, and I, is whether I ever build anything there, or I don't, that's because of the existing problem in the town to keep the traffic from going down by the schools with children and so forth, and safe.Yeah, well, we've discussed that at length and we appreciate the offer, but that's not actually what we're talking about right now, what we're talking about- - I'm just clarifying, what's gone on here.And then to one more point- - But David, this is a select board meeting and we have a lot of people here, who are waiting to talk about other things on this agenda that we're already behind on.So why don't you have this discussion with the gentleman, if he wants to hear all this stuff outside, or we'll set another time for you to come to the meeting and talk about what you would propose for Dickinson Street.That's fine, I'm willing to have a meeting anytime, and I'm not trying to take up your time, but if I can make just one quick point, what Mr. Palpy said that we had a solution before Act 250, that was acceptable.That I don't believe was the outcome of the discussions at that time.I just wanted to correct that for the record.It's my interpretation.All right, so noted.So, do we agree that we should try and grab some money for some beacons and a feasibility study?You guys wanna make a motion?Yup, well, a little bit, we accept the staff recommendation and authorized submittal of a Safe Routes to School Grant application for pedestrian safety improvements in the Riverside area.I'll second that.All those in favor?Aye.Thank you, Todd, coming up with that proposal, And the next item on our agenda, is the discussion with the Mobbs Farm Committee.Is that right?Yeah, that's right.Only 20 minutes behind, but sorry about that.If the board of members were having to discuss on the capital budget, they included their trail where we had some questions about it and next thing to come in.So here they are.That's solved.And can you guys introduce yourself real quick?Who's on the Mobbs committee?Sure, I'm Heather Furman, I'm the Former Chair.Andy Dumas.Harry Kurtman.Excellent.That's it?Yeah.We are seven.Seven total, and do you guys still meet?Oh, yeah.Monthly or?Absolutely.Excellent.What do you mean?Well, I wasn't sure.I don't know, we haven't heard from you in a while.We're down there, and work on it and- - Well, I know you do work and I know you bring us proposals and all I wanted to know if you were having monthly meetings because you're not tasked with the giant charter or whatever you had to come up with.Right, the original proposal from the select board was first to develop the manual plan, which took us three years.And basically, we've just been implementing it and doing trail work and managing property.Okay, excellent.So, we had a couple of proposals that came forward.I know that the budgeting process is starting.We had applied for some funding through the Recreation Trails Grant Program, and that is wrapping up.Now we've replaced four of the five bridges on the property that fell apart over the last year between April, 2011 and April, 2012, all the bridges on the property collapsed.And we've been really fortunate to get the grant and also had some support from the town to cover the material costs for those.As part of that, we also had an assessment done by two different organizations.One was Timber and Stone, and that assessment had, I think, eight different projects, and we've done three of them using rec trails funding.And then we also had a proposal request recently come forward from fellowship of the wheel.They are offering their services to improve a lot of the trail that was damaged in the December of 2010 minutes storm.We lost a lot of trees on Mobbs, and the trail network was pretty heavily impacted by that wind storm.And we were very fortunate to have volunteers and Scott Morel come out and help us to address the issues and get the trail network back open.But there's been some rerouting of the trails that are located in places where it's really not appropriate to have the trail, it's just because that was the easiest way to connect to locations, but they're wet and not really supporting the use on the property.So we currently have two assessments, which both assessments include separate materials costs and labor costs.And we have a total of 10 projects now, that we don't have funding for.So our volunteers and the committee is doing a great job of trying to get as much done as we can with volunteers, but we really need to address some of the trail infrastructure problems on the property.We have a fifth bridge on the property that needs to be replaced.It'll probably collapse this winter if we don't address it soon.And then just some significant erosion issues that need to be addressed.So the committee has not gone through the process to prioritize these 10 projects.That's kind of our next step.And Todd and I had started having a conversation about the budget.And it sounded like you all had some questions about the posts that were developed.I mean, just real basic question, is why don't we ask the Fellowship of the Wheel, for some money?They're a nonprofit organization that does a lot of advocacy work for mountain biking in Chittenden County.They are actually offering services to the- - But at cost?Yeah.And we pay them for the labor and then they use the property for free.Let me clarify one thing, I think there's a misunderstanding.do, as I read this, the Fellowship of the Wheel is proposing to do all the labor costs for free.And we come up with the- - No, they want us to pay them the labor.And the labor is the bulk amount.If you look at this proposal, it's like no material costs, but project number two, $1,200 in labor to- - Right, the material budget says $6,700.The Fellowship of the Wheel, so that these can be better mountain bike fields.Well, like I said, we haven't really had the opportunity to fully vet the Fellowship of the Wheel proposal.It was just presented to us at the end of August.We had other things on our agenda for September.So I was going for October.We had a trail day in early October, so we haven't really had a chance to vet the Fellowship proposal.I will say that we've identified these as areas of priority for the trail network that supports multi-uses, it's not just about mountain biking.Fellowship of The Wheel is offering their services as a consultant, just like Timber and Stone did do the work on the property.Yes, there's labor costs involved, but we also, the committee has put a lot of volunteer hours that help offset these labor costs and a proposal, a final proposal that we would bring to the select board for funding projects, would include primarily costs that would go towards payment of materials.And then the labor costs, we would look to cut that with volunteer support.So in the past, like we've been working with the Vermont Youth Conservation for the last couple of years to replace the bridges, the town is covering the material costs.The UICC, is volunteering some of their time, but working for a little bit of the labor, but we're also offsetting those labor costs with volunteers for moving bridge- - I confess I misunderstood this.if I had been correct and the Fellowship of the Wheel, were prepared to do this work gratis, if we came up with the material, that's obviously an offer we would have to take seriously, but that's not the case.And they're simply being a consultant like any other consultants.Then, I don't want to denigrate it.I'm sure their work is professional and knowledgeable, but you know, there are other people we can get this from .And there's an inclination to do this on some kind of competitive basis, who comes forward with a proposal.And the conservation core has a track record with us.So, if it's just a proposal from a consultant, like any other consultant, I've done probably $400 million of consultancies in my life.I mean, dealt with them Side by Side is just another one.I understand what that is.So I think we'd wanna have a meeting with your committee, in some kind of forum in which we can get opinion on what's the best way to go forward.Maybe it's their priority list.Rather than just one consultant suggestion .And it does bother us a little bit.We're aren't really prepared to put forward a proposal yet.And we've worked with Timber and Stone.We've worked with- - This is presented to us to approve, correct?No. - In bringing, the capital budget together, my question to Heather was, does the Mobbs Committee potentially have any projects on the horizon that we could possibly plug into the capital budget?And this was an example of some of the projects to come up with a number to at least start with- - That makes sense.That makes perfect sense.Then you'll come back with- - All the damage that you've described, all the work that's needed to be done, I don't think there's a lot of argument.We get down there not very often, but probably every other week.And there's no question, you're right.And there's no question things should be done.And I don't think we have a lot of problem reserving a sum in the budget for doing some thing.And if that's all you were looking at, is that sum $5,000 or $50,000 or 500, or is it 500, we're doing?Even 50, it's hard.I did some quick math here.We have probably between 30 and $50,000 worth of work that could happen at Mobbs.I think that's probably a little excessive for one fiscal year.Probably, yeah.Several fiscal years.That kind of work we had, the committee can prioritize based on what's most urgent.No, this is just support for a notional sum- - Yes, beyond what our operating budget has been to maintain the fields.We brought water to the fields and just to do basic infrastructure work on the property.This is just to point out that we've done these assessments.We've actually asked people to provide us with costs for the various projects that we've identified on the property and that the need is there.This gives you an idea of what the cost would be.And so it would be helpful if the select board would consider to hold a spot for us to be able to fund some of these costs in the coming fiscal year based on proposal, that is more concrete than what I have right now.That, I personally speaking for myself, I'm much more comfortable with that, than what I thought we were being presented with.I don't know if a motion is in order.I think we're gonna be putting together the budget.And this is calling into our attention to the need, and the magnitude of the need, and asking us to keep that in mind, when we put the capital budget together.Yeah, and I agree.Needs to be finalized in January.Yeah, and right now there's $8,000, in addition to their normal budget.How much?Eight.What, eighty?Eight.I thought you said two.If you understood the budget process, you'd have known immediately that wasn't right .It sounded like that, but I'd know it wasn't.Which would buy all the materials for the Fellowship of the Wheel to do the work.Or maybe they load here the labor, and they have to actually...Part of this process, we'll just say, has been to kind of reestablish a relationship with the fellowship.And they have been very good at educating the mountain bike community about when the committee decides to close trails and try to manage for other uses and close the trail, the trail network for hunting season.They've been a great partner in these last couple of years in trying to get the word out.And they've also sent us a lot of volunteers for our trail days over the year.So they are entering a new phase of their organizational kind of structure in offering this consulting services.And so, they offered to supply us with this proposal and we were glad to have it.Since we have people here, where are we on the gate?There's something later on the agenda, we finally, were able to get the parties to agree on the negative easement language, which had to be done as part of the agreement.So later this evening, I'm gonna ask you for permission to sign those easements in with that, then we can start planning in earnest day, to do all the infrastructure that's required in the Spring.Can I personally say thank you very much for the work you're doing.Oh yeah, absolutely.Now that I understand what you're doing, I'm fully in support.Knowing that they gave in the fiscal year, I just wondered where it was in the process.So knowing you have a meeting coming up, after that meeting, if $8,000...Realizing that, any request isn't necessarily gonna be put in the budget, but if you could let me know if that's a workable number or not then- - Yeah, we'll try, we'll do with it actually.And put on your letterhead.Is that beyond our kind of operations?Yeah, it's above and beyond.It's two separate pots of money.Okay, great, that's good to know.Thank you.What's next?I lost my agenda here.Oh, there's my agenda, thank you.So next, we're gonna discuss the Jericho Center Speed study results, with Bob Schermer.Yeah, this is a bit of my fault.I had been communicating with Bob of the results and I thought it afforded him that he would actually be independent, but I didn't.So I told him I would put it back on the agenda.We already have that actually, I think.No, yeah, I emailed him.I don't know if you printed it off.Yeah, somebody printed it.Somebody printed it, 'cause we have copies.Yeah, I made those.Thank you.We have a couple of extras.The history of this goes back.And I know Kim asked last time, whether this was a sudden thing or whether this had come up, big community began leaving in March.And we had three different meetings wanting to discuss the issue in general.Two to actually walk and along with the engineer and Todd, to see what kinds of ideas they could come up with.And three then to finally discuss concrete ideas.So there were three different meetings involving about 35 residents from the Jericho Center Community.And then finally, Todd and Mike, Visiel, I and John from the store, actually looked specifically at the front of the store to see what possible solutions might be there.I think that anecdotally, anyway, the increased policing has slowed traffic somewhat, and the pedestrian, the mid-street pedestrian walk signs have also contributed to some slowing in front.My understanding is that the last meeting, that because the speed has appeared to have dropped, that the further traffic slowing measures, that money for those, will probably not come in the next capital budget.That was too strong.I think as one of the people who spoke at that meeting quite a bit, I think, you've over interpreted our reaction.I think the reaction is more, holy cow, there's been more effects than we anticipated.And therefore we ought to think carefully about whether we're gonna spend really large sums of money, or at least whether we should do so quickly, that there might be ways to increment since that relatively modest expenditure appears to have had an impact.Maybe we should approach this more incrementally, but to say, no, there's not gonna be a $20,000 speed table, that's strong.Well, actually it was, because we talked about putting $20,000 aside, not for a speed table, but for a real re-look of the whole process and rethinking like that whole plan, as opposed to just spending money on a speed table.But this is, we're not gonna spend money on a speed table.We didn't come to that conclusion.We've come to the conclusion that we might want to sneak up on this a little more gradually rather than suddenly.But we were gonna spend money on a full look at the entire center, in terms of really outside the box stuff, because there has been a significant decrease in the speed through the center, but clearly it's not where people want it to be, particularly with pedestrian crossings and there- - And the outer sections.I mean, we recognize it's not perfect, but out of means- - But there's been a great reduction, but the idea is because these have made a difference, we can continue with little bits while we do this larger study, so that we can maybe rethink how you even approached the center on the design it needs to be engineered better, and so it cost money in terms of maybe moving all the parking in front of the store and rerouting a road, you know, putting in a- - Putting in a road - A roundabout.Where the parking lot is.I mean, without changing the total amount of paved area, not encroaching on the green itself.In theory, and it has Dan Nelson put a proposal, whether the measurements are right and whether they work to meet code, I don't know.We don't know that the concept is a new one and is interesting and would possibly mean we don't have to put speed tables.We would get the result from changing the flow of traffic.And these are things that are worth looking at.Had the things we done, had no impact, there'd be a lot stronger feeling while we got to really crank up the- - The speed tables and what not.To crank up the speed tables.But since we see incremental actions, resulting in incremental results, maybe that means we need to do more of that.Let me try and express what my concerns are.I remember it was Mark Twain that said there lies largely lies in statistics.And one of the problems as I looked at some of the results of those studies, was that yes, 85% of the traffic going by north of the score, is traveling at 29 miles per hour or less.What that doesn't say, is that there are 718 vehicles every day who are exceeding that.Yeah, I take your point.And it is those seven- - Those are the kill your kids.That I'm worried about, as I go back.I just didn't want the select board to sum, I had this feeling with these statistics, that 85% sound probably- - We have not come to the conclusion that all is well.No. - In fact, only three or four days ago, I was at the store when Ingrid mom and his kid was nearly killed.And it was really close, that close kid was...I might actually have been a hit, but he managed to fall back.The car stopped and he wasn't actually killed, but it was that close.And that's the one person that was going, 40.And the real bad thing was the visibility was poor.So this person having decided they couldn't see very well, decided quickly to go faster in order to get past before somebody pulled out or something like that.And she was a young woman, and she was devastated, and crying, and hopefully she'll never do that again, but it wouldn't have helped with the kid who'd been killed.So, it's the one person out of a hundred, not the 99, that'd beat the rule.So that tells me, we need solutions that guarantee that every single person, not one, not 85%, but 100%.And you can't get that with policing, because the police can't be there all the time.You have to get it with things that are unpleasant.Like speed tables, but there might be other ways and Nelson's proposal would possibly have a similar effect.And you just couldn't go fast around this chicane.All we're saying is incremental action did appear to have an impact.We can't pretend it didn't.And that suggests that we should do more incremental and not get revolutionary to- - Yeah, 'cause clearly at this point, when it's time to repaint, we can repaint the crosswalk, make it more visible, the one in front of the store.And the other thing, is with fog lines are wearing down.And once those are out, we can go ahead and restripe them inward, which automatically makes people think the lanes...Reduce the speed again as well.So these are small things that we can do, while we're doing the larger picture.Because when we looked at the cost of what doing one speed table would be- - It's just huge.Against the cost of doing a- - And they don't last that long, they wear down.We thought the value is in a long-term study, that we could actually rethink how the traffic actually flows through that whole center, to make it again, a more walkable community.And the point which you're at, your letter makes, and many people have made, which is away from the store, there's a continuing problem.So we have to deal with that.All the points you make are well taken, and your statistical points are well-taken.We don't take this statistics imply everything's cool, now we can forget about it.We've done enough.Don't worry, we do not take that as that.I do think you overreacted and over interpreted where we got to last week, and this is not gonna go away, we're not gonna forget about it, we're not gonna stop moving forward.All we did say, is maybe we don't have to take really big, expensive steps right now.Maybe we can have incremental steps.I agree with everything you've said, what I would advocate for, how I live, I officially request that you in this, I think it is a mistake for us to go into the winter with no visible crosswalk going across to this tour.And I think that two things should happen that are not terribly expensive.One, there should be a Y crosswalk, very visible from roughly, if you can do it, that we're in the parking area is not way off the other side to the center of the store.So that motorists get hint with this visual that says, this is a crosswalk over to the store.Can you still paint, at this time of the year?It's one of the problems with where it is now, is because it's stuck up there.The vast majority of people, including myself, don't use it.We walk in the middle.I don't see it either as a motorist.There is a sign at the side, but you do not see the crosswalk at all.And secondly, that as you come from the south and north, and pass the entrance of Jericho Center Circle there, so just before you get to the store, if we could put one more pedestrian walks on there to take the motors before they get to that parking area.So those two minimal things, as we're looking at long range solutions- - No, those were exactly kind of- - And I think that that's got- - We can move the whole line down.I just don't know whether you can paint this time of year.Well, I know you can paint it.You can, of course, you can.You can't, like whether it'll stick on the road for the winter, that's the problem .I know that Arizona in the winter, I don't know when it's winter starts.I would like to proposed that we consider that, those are minimal steps.They don't cost a lot of money.I did just see a kid come within one eighth of an inch of being killed.And personally he wasn't as far away, as far as she is from me.And that seems to be pretty minimal.Right, and his point is hit, because most people don't walk the crosswalk.We walk right through the middle.I just wanted to say, I don't wanna sound cheeky here, but you said you started by saying that the history of this and that, the extensive history, this will six months in terms of how we move with our traffic project.I'm sorry, but that is yesterday.It's like we're town budget.That's fast.It is, it's really fast.It's like, whoa.Well, hey, we would do a lot more on Route 15, if we were allowed or frankly.Six months, whoa.We got to talk about this and plan to plan it for at least three more years.I'm only teasing.I know, and I know that things don't happen overnight.I think that for the residents of the sander, that they are aware almost on a weekly basis of either a car coming to a screeching halt, or as you said, somebody getting close to getting clipped.And so there's this sense of urgency somehow that with you, we are able to deal.I sat out there for one hour, from seven to eight o'clock in the morning on a weekday and we had 627 cars go by.And 40 of which stopped at the store, but the traffic is just amazing.And the pity is of all the awkward spots in town, almost all of them are outside our jurisdiction.That's one of the few we can address and that frustrates, we know and we have a lot of things to do.I wanna thank you for the work, and for pushing it forward and coming up with concrete ideas and understanding the constraints as they are and just for staying on it, and sorry that it feels like we're not responding.Let me ask, I'm gonna take a completely irresponsible straw polls sensitive meeting.I asked Todd, what would happen if we asked the state to let us take over route 15 and make it a town route?Thinking I was being completely off the mark, just as an absurd idea, that of course was ridiculous.And he said, he didn't think they'd jacked it off.They mostly liked to get rid of their town, that responsibility.'Cause we don't have to maintain it.And I'm not sure I actually liked that bargain as a whole, but I think it's something, given the importance of that road to the life of this town.Of course, it's important to the life of other towns too, but see, this is our road.It goes through our town, right through.It's the aorta of our town.Just with no responsibility, nobody remembers, nobody says, what do you think of that?It would cost us a bundle of money.It would also generate some revenue.I don't know whether the one matches the other, but it would certainly- because we could do things with it that would make...I think, maybe, that would enable us to do...Would create development along on it, it would generate development.I mean, there's a way of looking at it, not as simply a through route.Make it as fast as possible.Get the people through who don't pay, they don't contribute.You could make that into something that was a little more that generated, that helped stimulate development, that would help the town.Maybe, I'm not sure, but it's not impossible.And I'm not sure it's a good idea.I'm not advocating this idea.Please, I'm simply entertaining an idea, it would among the other things, that would enable to start doing things, to deal with traffic that we simply can't do now, and are very frustrated.I think a lot of citizens that we can't do things.Todd, you must have a pretty strong opinion about this, because you worked for the village and the village is responsible for route 15 there, right?Yeah, I worked for the town, but the village took over route 15, but they've been able to do a lot of things in a short amount of time because they own it.It's been a good thing then, they also have a larger budget.Yes, but doesn't a lot of that money - - No, it's really do, not really.Oh, that's interesting.So maybe this isn't as crazy as I thought it was, somebody has done it.There's always trade-offs.You would likely need to add probably a plow truck, if not the driver, because I mean, it's a super main artery that you have, if clear.Not personally irresponsible for 15 only.So I mean they're cost based, if ultimately you're looking to have control and be able to do what you would like, and that's the way to do it.Might be worth it.That's a long-term thinking process, cool.Thank you.Before this discussion, I had one thing I didn't hear about knowing that it's more important to fix the problems right at the store.And everybody mentioned all the Joes, but as a resident who comes mainly into Jericho center from the south, there's still this slingshot effect as vehicles and drivers leaving Jericho Center, get to the bottom of it.It's like, well, we're in Talladega and- - I think I mentioned- - It slammed on the accelerator and there's no site that's on site there.You're absolutely right, I thought I mentioned that, even if we solve and we've made some breakfast with respect to the territory in front of the store, 300 yards out in either direction, 400 yards out, either direction.There hasn't been a lot of it.There's been some lately.But not much, it's still a problem.This is the number, if you wanna look at the speeds, the current speeds.We still have people approaching the two crosswalks at the community center- - And that's where they slow down.They're still close to 35 miles an hour, coming in from- - No, you're right.That's still better than it was in the nineties.Well, that point is well-taken, Tom that point is well taken.We haven't forgot that puddle.Mr. Valanou.Yes, if I may kind of just ask a question or make a comment when the ARP study was done, and then it broke out in the end with some different committees.And Todd, I hope you're listening to this really more of a question, but one of the things that we were looking at, in some of those committees, I wasn't on it was the idea, and it comes from the house of representative.One of the people I think was on it- - There was a committee.To look at the idea of taking over 15, the pros and cons of them then you can have two- - And you got about what I got, which is just- - They weren't ready when we had some of this stuff come to the overall- - I didn't realize that it would surface.That was part of the .Is the ARB thing, and did it four committees that looked at...One looked at, I think the jolly intersection, one looked at the park street intersection, one looked at the gateway, right.And one, look at taken over 15.And I feel like I remember, coming across my inbox, it said not gonna happen.Did you say you worked .Worked for my husband, I think he might've.Oh, yes, so I'd love to talk to him and see what they thought about it.Surface the email.I'll ask him to forward that.So they met for an afternoon, or something like that, or in the evening?.I think that the take over 15 committee ended up being one or two people.And I think it basically consisted of a couple of emails, like, email Todd, or email the state, or maybe trans and said, how does this work?And then, maybe the response was, yeah, you could have it as Akasha Boatload have fun.I think that was then, and then the whole- - That would be the time of that...Just repaint it.Kind of petered out.And I gotta say, it felt like we were doing good work and moving that conversation forward.And it filled the whole thing, kind of just wash away, it evaporated.Well, I will say the ARP is a big reason why we're asking for the safe routes to school.Improvements, I mean.At least something's coming out of there.I think for one more additional comment on the speed calming thing, I think- - They need your name for the records.Dennis Nelson, I'm the one who's...Oh, okay, yeah.So you're the one who gave us this list.Wow, we should think outside the box.Well, I think you should.'Cause sounds very interesting.It was very interesting.Yeah, I'd like to see it go forward in some respect to the cut.I don't pretend to be a traffic engineer at all, but I was looking for some other solution that might help the parking for pedestrians as much as anything else.I think the biggest issue is whether literally, whether the thing like that can be engineered that meets all the codes, and so on and so forth.And I don't know that obviously we could.That's why I put money aside for a study to see what we could take out of that- - Have you seen that the- - Oh yeah.That was fast then.The other question that comes up, is the memories to the store, and- - Right, these are things that have to be- - All kinds of- That's why we need to study, actually to think about how would you do this?Because that gives you a much longer term livability than a speed table.And I like speed tables, but it's not a holistic...It's not a whole approach to the problem.It's a span date.It's annoying, - That's right, that's it's sole view.That's it's sole virtue.We didn't let him finish.Yeah, sorry.'Cause we get so excited about your list .But the only comment I was making, as a very simple inexpensive expedient might be to take the speed limit sign that's on the incline and Brown's trace going up.Again, we're going from the north to the south, up towards the fire station.I believe that reads 35 miles an hour right now.And you know, as a motorist, you know, your car is working hard to get the 35 miles an hour.And then you crest the hill, and immediately we want people to slow down to 25.So what I'm saying, is why not just drop the speed limit sign on that hill section to maybe 30 or something.It just takes five miles an hour off the speed that someone just gained going up the hill.I mean, it's simple enough and it might help a little.Your right, mine would be a real question, whether if they're going pay attention to it, the problem is, they don't pay attention to that cross- - But it's true if you're puttering along, trying to get the- You're putting the pressure on to get the- So you're over 35, by the time you at the top of the hill.But Catherine, we're not worried about the 5% of the people who are dealing with, as opposed to...We're worried about this 15%.Those are the ones that kill somebody.And that's the problem.There's a significant percentage the population is not paying any attention to the speed limit, period.Unless there's a cop sitting there.And it's not a statistical question.It's a one-person .It's something physical with- - Something physical than really close on that, and speed tables are the extreme version of that.But there are other things that actually slow people down, speed limits, they're really a better way to collect some money.We pay for the study.Everybody else set with Jericho center of speed issues.Can we move on to the next item, which is the big one?Big one.Dennis, thank you for that.We really.I wasn't sure how it will be received.It was received very positively.Whether we can do it, I don't know, but it certainly stirred up the absolutely, - The other thing is some possibility beyond just throwing traffic to - To the aesthetics of the town center.Definitely does.There's no question.It was appealing on a number of levels.I actually understood that, that's what you were talking about when you were here in person and I was excited about it then, and then comments were misconstrued, things went out on online discussion forums about how we were gonna pay for the green blah, blah blah.So what you did, is you actually clearly drew in the lines and your proposal was something that we all could really understand and discuss.She's smarter than I am.I didn't realize that which she was saying .I'm not smarter.I was like, oh, that's an interesting idea.So anyway, thank you for taking the time.If further on there's any need there, I would be happy to contribute.Cool, cool.Thank you.Land use.Yes, so here we are.Purpose of tonight is to report back to you with the issues that were discussed.Oh geez, I don't even remember when they were discussed.Two or three meetings ago with some recommendations on the policy level of where you wanted to go with issues that were raised.Assuming you said, are those tonight, then who would come back at your first meeting in November with the complete package, with the changes that you assumingly would adopt and more to public hearing on, or I believe I said it's December 6th, and then you have that hearing and then adopter, not the amendments.So you look at the memo from Jan.What I will start with, 'cause I think there's someone here from UVM, perhaps.Yes.The planning commission discussed on Tuesday the issues that were raised your last- - That's not in here.Right, 'cause this was prepared before they met yesterday, Tuesday actually.And so they had discussed issue that was raised about the UVM requests and changes and what they would- - I'm sorry, was this something that was discussed last evening?Yes.Can you bring me up to date please?The UVM requests?Yeah, it came to light that after the planning commission adopted their regulations and passed them on to the select board, at some point in the past, near the end of Seth's 10-year here, there was discussions with the planning commission and UVM about possible changes to the open space district, based on what UVM would like to do with the research forest.And it appeared.Octobox?.Yeah, 'cause they wanted to do some structures.It's mainly structures for educational purposes.We don't really know for sure exactly what it is, but- - What I've took notes is it said, they want facilities to improve the classrooms, the bathroom, things like that.We've never given us a master plan or anything that shows exactly what they want to do is.But anyway, so some language was worked up and then Seth left and that never got back.Appears to the plane commission discussing it, folded into these current amendments.So the UVM, their planner found out that it was coming here, and saw that they weren't included, so they want to just raise that issue.And what the planning commission suggested on Tuesday, was that they would like the select board to keep the changes that are in the regulations now for open space, during dealing with dormitories.They think they should stay in, and they will work over the next year or whatever it is.The other changes that were discussed with UVM, to be incorporated at a later time, they didn't think it made sense to take out the proposed changes that were to happen there now, they were limited to those dormitories.I didn't bring my copy of that, but I guess it doesn't matter what it says.Do you happen to have something that says British is?I can go get it, I'm realizing I might need it.You know, I looked at all the other changes with my copy, but I didn't bring that.Where are my keys?Let me see if I can go get one quickly.Sorry.In the meantime, can I bring up another business?Your chair , you can.I talked to Ann Squires, about the pumpkin and glow.Oh, yeah.And she's real concerned about not having traffic, because she feels like a lot of people bring their kids through, after they're in their jammies, and you know, elderly people like to drive through and they wouldn't wanna get out and walk.And I agree with her.She said, what if somehow...This buffet is a great idea, what if somehow we just could distribute blinking lights, like the kind that the police sometimes give out on Halloween?I don't know if you know what I'm talking about, 'cause the real problem is when people turn lights off, they can't see the pedestrians, so all the people walking were given a little trick or treat light to hang around their neck, even if there's a box where you drop it off on your way back out, so the next person can use it.I like that.Yeah, and in fact, I know that the Essex police, because I happen to be trick or treating in one of their really nice towns, nice neighborhoods with a cul-de-sac and the houses close together 'cause- - You get good stuff .Right, they have police out and about handing them out already to all the kids.So I don't know if that's something that we could just ask the state police to do.And if they didn't, we could spend $50 of the town money to buy these little lights.Sure, that sounds like a great idea.Maybe you could do it with volunteers.To distribute them, yeah.You just got to stand at one end of the- - You just stand and hand them to people, yeah.Everybody comes in from this end of Cilley Hill.And it's even possible that like Hannaford has him to give away, you know what I mean?I've seen him before with a logo on them.So you can have a sponsor, a pumpkin glow sponsor.Have we ever been round the question of actually shutting down the Cilley Hill?We talked about trying to make it a pedestrian thing, so that there weren't the cars and the people at the same time.And you know, obviously for this year that's not gonna happen, because I dropped well until now.So, her point is well taken, that the elderly like to drive very slow, 'cause they can't walk.And then we have to figure out where are we gonna put all those cars, and it's just another whole nightmare.And that's a lot of kids who can't walk, who can't walk there.Not really.That's true.Even if it's bigger than that, but not being able to walk- - Well, I wanted to make...I was thinking it should be a one-way thing, where you drive and you have to come out the other end.But it's a lot.Of Cilley Hill?Yeah.It's a hall.It is a hall.It is a hall, really.That's so way up on the other side of- - Yeah, it's really up too.I know it's a hall, but there's...Where you have is two-way traffic.They all turn off their lights, and then you have people walking on the road in the dark.I think we are very certain about that not now.I mean your proposal, I'm absolutely in favor of it.Let's do it, I'll make the motion if you want and proceed.But I think we are good, serious thought of making it- - Well, I can do what I can to try and find a source for these things, but can we spend some of the town's money?If it's gonna cost 50 to $100?Is that how much it's gonna cost, or whether you get a sponsor?We're not gonna have a meeting before.Well, that's right, Halloween's coming up, isn't it?Yeah.So let's decide, we'll spend up to a certain amount of money if necessary.Okay.Do you have any idea how much those little glow sticks cost?'Cause you have little kids too.I'll look into it 'cause you can buy- - Yeah, you can buy them online.So shall we say 150 bucks?Yeah, that would be fine.I move that we authorize the chairman to investigate the purchase and distribution of little blinky things.Not more than 150 up to, but not more than $150.I'll second that .Awesome, I'm gonna try and get them for free.Hey, I'm thinking one of our senators is up for election and he likes to put his name on everything.So maybe...Well good, take the vote then we quit.Yes, we do.He made a motion because it's money.I made a motion.Oh, all those in favor?Aye.We're all on records of supporting this outrageous irresponsible expenditure.$150 blinky things.The only change was adding a dormitory hostel as a use.Did you read the whole section then?Sorry.I mean, just that paragraph or whatever it is.I can read you the description of dormitory hostile 'cause that's the real part of the thing, what it is.So that's one that's not in here.And that's been changed, so that's gonna be in there, but they don't want any of her other changes, like whatever the issue is.Yeah, they're not gonna incorporate anything else in at this time, just stay with what was proposed to you, in regards to the open space district, and they'll deal with the rest, another time.Next time.Right.'Cause there is gonna be another iteration obviously.Right, so the one that's in here now, in regards to open space district, is additional, the use of a dormitory hostel, which is an overnight lodging facility, offering temporary lodge educational programs, and or other goods and services to members, affiliates, or partners, lodging still not exceed 30 days in a four-month period with no more than 14 consecutive days.I think that was her problem.Is that the timeline didn't work, is that correct?That would be true.By the way, it's really four year.And I work with Lonnie, I'm a planner as well, and sort of filling in, but I think the concern at that time was that, 14 days for a dormitory, would be hard to fill the dormitories so we can house somebody for 14 days, but we're not objecting to this at all.Like we think it's probably a better approach to wait and start over again with the planning commission.And I think they encouraged her to send a letter, if I'm not mistaken, right?To reintroduce those needs that the university needs up there, at the Jericho research .Are you sure any sort of master plan that they may have, that wasn't done before?It's just for, I think it's nice to have.If there's any, there wasn't much nervousness.it was pretty clear that we were comfortable with that solution that had been arrived at and lost, but it would be even more comfortable, if you had an actual plan of what was gonna be built.It wasn't open-ended.Or at least work with the planning commission to what you need.I think that's what they suggested to Lonnie, that she put that information together and come back again.We missed the boat.We weren't on your schedule watching when these amendments were being worked on.So, we're happy to come back and she'll put it together- - And this will work for you in the interim then.I think it will.'Cause rather than totally eliminated, that's good.Okay.Go ahead.So, and go through the issues here.The first one, concern that was raised, was this addition of language about accessory structures of not being able to have a small accessory building associated with residential use, that was more than a hundred percent of the gross floor area.What is the gross floor area?Is that all the floors or just the footprint?No, it's the square footage, the gross floor area.So if you have a three story house, it's three times the footprint?Right, so the recommendation, is that proposed change just be dropped there, they have.Yeah, that makes sense, that they worked with what they were trying to...'cause I think it was the quantity that one of the members was actually concerned about more than anything on point.Right, so- - Good, I can build that ballroom I've always wanted.Oh yes, and you don't have to tear out your living room, like a friend of ours has done.Well, this is an accessory structure, it's the- - Tango, I'm gonna give tango lessons Saturday night.Okay, so the next one was drive throughs.And the first part of that, is where a drive-through as an accessory use could be allowed.In the current draft, it's allowed as an accessory use in all districts- - It became a real issue.What the select board, the options they have are to obviously just leave it as it is.You could place restrictions, you could limit the actual areas, if you wanna allow them in any districts, you can limit those districts that they can actually occur in.And then you could...Or you could choose not to allow them in any district, and then a separate discussion if you allowed them anywhere, then you know, what sort of primary use are they allowed to be tied to?Because obviously you don't have just to drive through that.That's the accessory.When do you want us to discuss this?'Cause obviously I have something to say.But now I'm just telling you that uses your- - I think it would make sense at this point to put a moratorium on him for silver reasons.One, even in the discussion, they said that they needed to go back and talk about whether they wanted to just limit it to certain things.This gives them the opportunity to more research.The other issues have to do with all the stuff with ECOS and the new regional plan, because it's gonna be very important for the planning commission to really think about how they want the town to grow, to be a sustainable library community.Because the idea behind the new regional plan, is that 80% of all plannings going to take part on 15% of the growth districts, just the growth districts.So that if you put like a house in the rural, you better have four structures in the growth district to keep it to the 80%.And that's because they're trying to really concentrate.So you really wanna make sure you're building your growth district the way you want it.What is our growth district?We have our little, three-village growth districts.The villages are the growth districts?Well, the village centers.We have our designated growth districts.So what about all the commercial property?That's part of your growth.Well, the commercial properties aren't in the village.It's the villages and the commercial areas.But that's where 80% of your growth is supposed to happen.So that- - It's a pretty radical change from the way it happen before.Well, actually that, they did the history and that's historical growth patterns.And they're trying to get- - Up till when?Up till...The last 30 years.Exactly.So they're trying to get back to the historical- - Like the way it's been, I've been growing for 30 years.They're training it back to the history because the idea is for us.Are we gonna start a milling company at the mill?I mean, are there going to be industries in the mill?It's whatever you want, but I'm saying, that's why I'm suggesting a moratorium on the drive-through, so that people can decide how you want you're, what you're really looking for in your town rather than really start thinking about this, cause this is actually going to be happening.The answer to your question is no.That's what I'm saying, why do we wanna increase- - I'm just talking about drive through.The concept she had, is concentrate development.I understand the concept.It doesn't mean that every, that the growth areas, can be used for anything.You don't build factories in our village center, that's not gonna be appropriate.Well, no, you're misunderstanding, maybe where I was going with it, which is that I think people should live close to other staff.So when that was a mill and these little houses came up around the mill, that makes perfect sense.Now there's nowhere to work.I see what you mean.There's nothing there except- - And that's what the idea is, to push more and more people to your centers, - And to bring the commercial support that goes with that.But that's why I'm suggesting.But that's the idea.That's why I'm suggesting the moratorium, I drive through it.So those people, the public commission actually, has time to really think about what's going to make our vibrant communities.What do we wanna see?How do we wanna see it?Because this is really gonna be a limiting factor.the other issue, is we are on the state under its comprehensive energy plan, wants us to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions, by 50% by 2028.And they can't do it without Chittenden County, and Chittenden County can't do it without the municipalities.And as part of the ECOS regional plan, we're gonna have a climate action plan, and that also will give...So it gives them also...I'm trying to give them time to think about the research, to find out how much greenhouse gas emissions do you have for Eileen under specific kinds of drive-throughs.We talked about this at length, and I know where you're coming from, but I'm on the fence with this, because I filed a very valid point that people drive out of their way to get to businesses.That's why I want them to hate the time.I'm not saying it's forever, I'm not saying forever.I'm saying a moratorium to develop these ideas.To get a plan?To get a plan.Where we want them, what we want it to be.'Cause they even said, they needed to think about, do they do restaurants?Do they do banks?So you can do the research to find out how much greenhouse gas of this uses comes from banks or from, you know, so you really have to- - But that's not the only factor.No, it's the greenhouse gas emission, but it's gonna be the regional plan.You've got the regional plan that has to deal with where your growth districts, how you want them to develop.All these things are coming together in the next year.Also, there's going to be form-based zoning.And that gives them another tool to figure out what they wanna have and how you wanna put it.So that might be another way of looking at a structure that has a drive-through.So when you say moratorium, you mean, we should go with the third option that Todd proposed, which is no drive-throughs at all in any district for any reason.For the time being.And then we come back with- - Two years or something.And then they can come back with these really great results, 'cause there's all this new stuff coming in, in terms of form-based zoning and stuff.So you can have ideas of...It could look much more like a European town, but you'd still have a drive-through.Right, that'd be a different guy of drives through.B ut it'd be different than a through.That's what I'm saying.So we really can get an idea of how we want our town to grow, to be this vibrant community that we want it to be.I'm not saying never, I'm just saying let's- - Yeah, I'm not anti drive-through at all.And I don't think there's much evidence that the idling, a, we don't even know that- - There is- - Well, let me finish.The idling, it produces more toxins than the extra trips to get- - There's statistics on some of that, but you have to get it.So I'm just saying this gives time to actually look at all those numbers because I mean, you're right.Greenhouse gas emissions, the most impact we can have, is to reduce the vehicle miles traveled, which is what we're trying to do with the bus, is to increase the mileage of the fleet and increase the amount of electric cars.I mean, that has to be- - We want development.We want the money in this town, we want businesses to go to in this town, so that we don't have to spend all our money and assets in south Burlington.I'm not sure if drive-ins are positive or negative about that.I'm not sure either.I'm just saying- - But that's why I'm trying to give them the time to think about what the new plans are, to just, let's say, let's go with not doing anything right now with drive-throughs, to really fulfill what this will look like.I've been a bit agnostic, I'm not ideological and drop it right through, it's either way.I just don't think we've fully vetted.I think Catherine has a point about, we're really not sure where we want to go with this.So why make decisions that you can't back out on?Yeah, I understand.I just didn't want it to be like a statement about drive-throughs.No. - I'm just saying this gives the them time to do research and things like that, really fully think about what we want our community...'Cause you're right.We wanna be able to live and shop and stuff in our community.But there's all kinds of things gonna be happening, including form-based zoning, which will make, this really charming little village and you can shop, and do things and stuff like that.Walk around.Walk around, sure.I'm not saying get rid of it, I'm just saying, let's think about it.Figure out how to do it best.All right.So it sounds like there's a consensus on that.Yeah, I think so.Okay, number three, was there were some comments regarding the natural resources.Staff is proposing that you hold off on any of those comments until the next round, because the planning commission had planned on taking up natural resources issues.In fact, that's a great idea .My husband actually mentioned it after I talked about this.And he said, Tom has actually talked about this for years, is that the planning commission does not use our advisory committees when they're doing these things.That the first time they ever get to hear any of this stuff, is when it comes to public hearings, which is we have the advisory committees of the Energy Task Force, and the natural resources committee, and the planning commission should be using them.Conservation commission, you mean?Yeah, conservation commission, because it actually gives the planning commission actually more resources, because especially the conservation commission right now, they have a lot of actual real expertise there.And that's what the advisory committees are for.And they should be used by the planning commission to help.And state statute says, that with the energy coordinators forest, will provide input to the planning commission.So, I don't know, it hasn't been done in the past.I was the DRB when I was chaired, did use the conservation commission as an advisory, as we needed it.But, I don't know.Do we just give a sense of the board or just say they should be using them?'Cause they should, that's what their role is and they don't hear about it until it comes to public hearing, which doesn't make sense.Yeah, we can communicate that back or we will communicate that back.Okay.Fuel sales, so the first one was to remove the fuel sales as the only specified use that's under PUD. So we're suggesting to remove fuel sass from PUD, 'cause it just doesn't really make any sense.The discussion that they had last time made sense.In the definition of fuel sales there was reference to in the village center.And since they're no longer permitted in the village center, it made sense just to remove the reference to in the village center.And so then obviously if you were taking out the PUD section that you have to take it out of the definition of planning unit development and- - So these are essentially the technical- - Clarifications.Correct.Darry, do you have a question?I just remembered something about the discussion about needing to go back and look about someone with one of the select board members asked about that something needs to remain in there retroactively.Do you remember that discussion about the fuel sales thing that I thought Todd was going to go ask?Yes, it didn't have to.Check.So that was it, sounds good, and fuel sales, landscaping requirements, something that staff caught that you may wanna consider, if you want to disregard it, that's fine.It's just that.And we caught this 'cause it came up recently in a DRB hearing.There's a proposed change in the landscaping requirements and the sentences in red, which that is currently being proposed for deletion, and it's an evaluative landscaping requirements.Credit may be granted for existing tree cover or for site improvements other than paintings, as long as the objectives of this section are not reduced.I think the discussion from the plank, which is how do you put a value on the existing landscaping?You can't really do that, so we should take it out.The staff thought it was important to keep in because you wouldn't want to see someone remove any existing tree cover if it is valuable, just because they're gonna have to make way for something else because they're required to spend so much on landscaping and it's discretionary that the DRB doesn't have to consider the existing vegetation they can, if they feel necessary.Perhaps I'm thick, but it's the only place where an actual quantity is 3%.So that's of the new construction improvement costs.I read that, which you do know the cost of.I know what they're saying is how do you put a value on the existing tree cover or site improvements to say, well, you know, the construction cost is a hundred thousand.So 3% of that, you need to spend 300 or whatever on landscaping.And they have some trees, what are the values of those trees?Oh, I see the 3% is not new.It includes whatever's there already.The DRB has the discretion to say what you're proposing to do, isn't disturbing the existing.I have to say, this is the way I read the language.So it seems to me is the problem that doesn't exist.You've got a solution to a problem that doesn't exist.I would read this for all site plans.The DRB may require a minimum planting costs of up to 3% of total construction improvement costs.That to me says, you're spending $350,000.You have to spend 3% of that on landscaping.And whatever's there before, doesn't count.This is new, new 3% expenditure of your new .Correct.And what the DRB can do is in that sentence in red, which is proposing to be removed, but the DRB can do is say.Well, they can take it- - They can take into account the existing vegetation.I got it.So the planning commission wants to remove that until they figure out how you value it.Well, what they are trying to say is, how do you put a value on it?You never can.They just simply say, we think this needs another $10,000 worth of stuff in order to make it presentable, but that's on top of...The credit makes no sense.They don't have to just 'cause there is existing tree cover.They're not bound to count that towards the 3%.What they can do, is say if it's an extraordinary existing landscape and why make you do more if you think this is appropriate?Take it out.Makes no sense.That's right, okay.Good, that's what we wanna bring up.Makes no sense.If they want them to spend 3% more money than that's new money on top of whatever happens to be in place now.And that's, if they don't want to make them spend it and they don't make it bad, it's there, that's fine.You're right, that sentences is there, right.Is pointless and redundant.Okay, and then the public versus private shoes it was brought up that there was an error really, and- - Just the two words were the same.The two words, right.So that's it.So what we'll do, is we'll come back with these changes in the final document at the next meeting.If you don't want a public hearing.Well, that's when it will be proposed.That's what we do.That's what you do.Catherine, I think you were wrong because Tim was chair in August.So September, October, November, it's three months.No. - We go four months.No, we go three months, remember we started- - In the middle of March.So it's March, April, May, June, July, August.You were chairs September, October, November.This is October, he's gonna chair next month.Oh, okay.Yep, so that's two more months.Then December, January, February.Yep, 'cause you said I was done tonight.Right, I thought we'd done tonight.Yeah, exactly.Just thinking about Thanksgiving already.You get another month.You get another month.Oh goodie.Yeah, you're right.I was giving you extra credit.Job!You stayed this long.Was there something you were here for?About the land use.Actually next year, it's gonna be very exciting for by-law construction on natural resources and part of the longterm ECOS project, because they had done research in all the town plans and zoning, and found how much flowery language we'll have, but how little teeth anybody had , or how inconsistent the language was.And that's one of the things that is going to be beefed up in a regional plan.And because of this focus on the land use plan where the growth is, the new focus is gonna be on developing how to preserve our working landscapes and the natural resources and things like that.So you probably you and your commission will be busy helping with that next year.Job] It'll be easier to make sure that somebody gets to every planning commission meeting where that is part of that discretion.So, looking forward to that, very good.Thanks.So for the budget at this point, what I wanted to do is show you how the revenue side was looking at this point.And then I plan on bringing a few departments at a time and- - Okay, so it wasn't a mistake that the expenses stopped.Yeah, I know I went back to the website, to see, did I drop something?Other than in the subject of the memo, I guess it wasn't really clear about what it was.So not really a whole lot of changes in the revenue.I've mentioned all the changes here in the memo.I'll just hit on the biggest ones.Line number eight, we're anticipating a class two grant to cover Goncalo works.So we're budgeting that $175,000 in revenue, grant revenue, nine 20 increasing the anticipated law enforcement funds of $10,000 from what we had budgeted previously, it's still below what our actual was for last year.So I feel it's pretty safe.And this is just a projection.I mean, it's a budgetary projection.Yeah, right, but it's- - It's a safe- - It's an expectation.Based on historical numbers.Right, and line 25 is slight increase in recording, these two come a little closer to what the actual spend, just because it looks like with interest rates continuing to be low for awhile, that we'll probably continue to have pre-finances reduction in less than a thousand dollars of a merge license revenue.I think we ought to make a push, to get back revenue item up.Marriage?Yeah.I think we should do that by advertising that we are a friendly home base for gay marriages.All of them come here and pay you a thousand dollars.Get married in Mills River.Yes.Through the gazebo.It cost a thousand dollars?You wanna make some money or not?But we don't have any facilities.We will.I haven't built my ballroom yet.It's a joke.The tango tell us, I think I like that.We're in 33, an increase in- - I was like, Olivia, Olivia!Did you actually know this is a fact, that Vermont is the number one state for destination weddings?I know, yeah, we have some good gay friends in Philadelphia who want things passed like this- - It's not even that, there are straight people who come up here, because everybody who lives in Connecticut and New York, they think they want this quaint thing, but they don't necessarily want to haul everybody too far away.This is driving.No, they gave us a call.But as soon as it was passed here, we wanna come up and arrange the whole thing at your house, will you have us?And they say, of course, we'll go.Oh, awesome.Awesome, that's great.We'll go with whose in charge here.So line 33, the increase in snowplowing revenue.We did at the end of last winter, increased their rates by a good portion that had been discussion at town meetings.Or we raised them as much as we thought we could get.Anyway, and then- - Why is there two dollars in the town library?To see if you're paying attention.I don't know, but I don't have their revenue projections yet.So you can ignore me.I just wondered dummy, and went well, okay.Attracting a really dismal year for their books, and regular use.No, I don't have their numbers yet, so you can put this here.For this you have the budget from FY, the school year- - Oh, look at here.Yes, number 34.'Cause it says fiscal year 13, we have zero.And then we have two vikes .Let's see here.And then we get to the use of the reserve funds.This is where you can see the capital budget tying in.The first one you come to, is open space fund that's 8,000 we're talking about for the Mobbs projects.Above and beyond their regular project?Correct, correct.To do their projects with which they can't find out- - Where did you come up with that $8,000?Their- - Last year's request?No, that trail proposal that you weren't here.No, you were here for that meeting.I had asked them to give me an idea of some projects they would...Did they have any projects and give me an idea of some of the projects that you had, to come up with a not justifiable number to put in for projects that are above and beyond.And that's when she gave me the Fellowship as an example of the type of work to come up with a dollar figure.The total of what that proposal was?It was like 67, so I just plugged in the numbers.But she said tonight, based on the consultant, the actual Timber and Stone that they had come through.Plus they're looking at anywhere 30 to $50,000 worth of trail.Actually that was a really broad estimate based on...'Cause that consultant, that proposal, some of it's already been done and- - Yeah, but some - Yes but he'd asked for a broad...And everything's still drafted.It's just a working- - Well and it's only $500 more than we funded some of those bridges this past year.Well, that 7,500 is actually for the parking lot.Yeah, that's right, it's the parking lot.Finally get through.And we put money in when we did the transfers, we did put money into the open space fund land improvements, So that's- - Is there any reason why we wouldn't put in parentheses Mobbs repairs under oath that line item?Well, you'll have that in your budget when you have your full budget, you'll have what we're doing with that.Yeah, what you're doing with it.But I mean for when it gets printed.Yeah, right, 'cause what you'll see, is actually we did it last year in the capital budget description.We put the line item that referred to in the jet, in this budget.So they could hire.And you'll have a description like you have now, but I don't want to put it in the budget presentation because then it just gets messy.So further down the sidewalk and past fund that's $20,000 for the comprehensive pedestrian bicycle plan for the town that's coming out of the sidewalk and past fund, the 47 buildings and property fund that's a placeholder for painting and repairs to the exterior of the town hall.We have some feeds that have holes in.Yeah, they were supposed to have been painted when the town hall was renovated, they never got up to it.And then 48 is from the road improvement fund, $20,000 for the Jericho center reconfiguration planning, whatever you wanna call it.And then also plugging in $2500 for Goncalo improvements, as part of that package.It's up to 50, no, 45, you just said 25 and 25?No, I said, 20 and 25.Oh, I'm sorry, I heard you wrong.That's fine.And it's possible, we might not need to spend that much, because these are both planning projects, we'll put them in a request to the RPC for technical assistance projects, which would mean we'd only have to pay 20%.I would dearly like to not spend $20,000 for planning when we've just had a citizen beat us up for not spending $20,000 on an actual physical speed, reducing item.It looks a little bit with saying we don't, we think $20,000 for speed tables a bit much, but then we're spending 20,000 on planning.You said that that gives you a long-term view, where as you said the night- You said the 19,000 wears down.Yeah, just think of the optics of it, Catherine.Yeah, I know.Well, that's right.We will try not to spend that much, but that kind of planning costs that kind of money.I understand whether- - If we wanna look at that idea then it's gonna cost money.I understand, but- spending $20,000 on planning and then not spent the same $20,000, you put a spend on something that actually for sure reduces speed, but it looks a little bit- - Except it turns out, when you looked at my Wiesel's thing, one wasn't enough.You needed three.And not everybody's in favors of them.No?No. - Although quite a few , but you're right, I'm just concerned.Everything will look a lot better, and we'll all be better served, if we can not spend 20 grand on this thing, if we can find somewhere...I would like to not spend that much- - But we will - But if it's on a project that you wanna do, and there's no grant funding for it- - You gotta be here, but this- So it's gotta be here 'cause you can't do it then.We always look for other ways to have it paid for.That's it, right?Have somebody else spending somebody else's money .That's what I'm saying.And then just to know, as I'm doing the expenses and past budgets, I had included a salary increase as I'm doing it this time, I'm not- - It's that because we need to decide on that later, or you're not gonna recommend one or I don't know- - At this point I'm not recommending one, but- - At all?Not even like a caller?There isn't much inflation.Right, at this point, I'm not, I mean the board can always do something different, but that's the approach I'm taking to the budget.Have you seen the number for this time than 90 million social security?It's 16 cents.No, it's 1.8%.In money, 16, 1.8% of this, is the regular inflation.No 1.8% is the caller for sort of security, which is like $20 a check.Oh, is it that much?Yeah.A monthly check?Yeah, for- - Yeah, that was correct.I mean you obviously have plenty of time to discuss it, but that's the approach rather than starting one- - My main reason for concern, the inflation is so low and most people feel this is a pretty good job, but what worries me, is about getting behind where you don't do it, and then you got to have a 5% increase, and a 5% increase looks terrible, if it comes along at a time when other people are suffering.So I feel uncomfortable falling behind.I feel uncomfortable not giving any increase at all, unless there's a good reason not to.I think it's kind of a slap in the face to not have any increase.I think we're on the same side.Okay, so it would be...What makes sense?2% .One and a half.There's no standard it's a decision, but I think we're all uncomfortable with zero.For various reasons, we have different reasons.Let's think about what it ought to be.Well, as I go, I'll prepare scenarios.It's very easily with the spreads, which I have set up to spit out a 1% of 2%, whatever percent you want and- - Let's do one and a half, and a two, 'cause one half gets you around the caller.Very good, so that's all- - I kind of feel like no increase, is almost like leaving, no check.You only do that when the performance is bad.I mean, leaving a tip.Leaving no tip on service.Or a financial.or financial hardships.I mean, we didn't...when times are bad and you don't wanna go out and tax people for it.There are lots of reasons, but there has to be a reason, not just for the hell of it.So you're not gonna go through the rest of the page and just- - Just there because it's just the way it prints off.But I don't wanna go through the revenue.Okay, cool.So let's approve the minutes for August 18th.That was just you and me, Tim, and I read them over and they looked fine to me.Do I hear a motion to approval?I hear a motion move to approve the minutes?I will second that.All in favor, aye.I make a motion to approve the minutes of October 4th with...Let's see.Or maybe I didn't .Anyway, I'll make a motion to approve the minutes.All in favor?I assume you second that?Yes.All those in favor?Aye.Well I can't write .Happy business.I have some other business?I've got one business item.And that is, as I mentioned before, authorizing me to sign the easements related to the Mobbs farm parking lot settlement.Do you need a motion?Yes.I make a motion that Todd sign the easements for the Mobbs farm easement settlement.Remind me exactly what they are.We've through it and I know, it's okay, but I wanna be reminded.We agreed to not expand the parking lot, as it was approved beyond the negative, whatever this phase, for 30 years, but no longer than that individual actually lives there.So whatever is shorter.Whichever is shorter, okay.I remember.It's gone, if they don't, if they stay there forever.I forgot what a negative easement meant in this context.It's agreed to not do something, as opposed to being able to do so- - Well, we can go up to 20 if necessary.So I made that motion.I second it.All those in favor?Aye.And so last night, the working draft discussion of the ECOS plan went to the regular RPC meeting after spending a long time, discussing it at the executive committee.And the process is they will be coming to visit us, to talk here about municipal concerns, or any questions we may have on it.I believe now in December, it's going to go to the eco steering committee next week, and they're gonna talk about some more changes, but then it goes to in January, to the final eco steering committee where it then becomes the RPC. And what's interesting is even last night at the regional planning commission, there were some commissioners who went, oh, is this really gonna become the regional plan?They didn't connect that it's a totally new document 'cause it's gonna incorporate the regional plan, the MTP and the GPIC economic development plan, all in one thing, and then- - So they forget to realize that money will flow according to this.Exactly.And it's going- - Suddenly, it's serious business.The developed land use plan development map that they're using, comes from all the town plans, where are the group districts and stuff, but this is going to be the way that the Act 250 hearings and in the appendices, you're gonna have the full MTP documents, the full economic development documents, all the criteria that was used to develop ECOS, as well as the climate action plan that will be added to that.The talks about how we're going to reduce our greenhouse gases.The ECOS project is also going to actually give us parameters and targets, so that we can measure each year how we are doing with our plan, whether we're meeting these goals of- - Can I...First of all, what does ECO stand for?It's...Oh God, I always forget that.It's Environmental Community Opportunity Sustainability, because it comes up, how do you make a sustainable community?Okay, well, I know what it's about.I just didn't know the actual symbol.Now, it comes a question.This is now moving to produce the kind of document upon which in our case, tens, if not twenties and thirties of millions, of dollars of federal money, will move - That's the MTP, yeah.I mean, it always comes that way.It'll be other moneys.Are grants for sidewalks and stuff.Is this gonna- - Right, and those are all gonna change too, based on what the feds are doing, but- - Yeah, but this is a whole new- - It's gonna hold, right, because in looking at the grants that come through, if you first look at it and go, oh, but then you realize, okay, this is what the new document is, because it's talking about food insecurities, workforce training issues.I mean, it really is all kinds- - The rubber hits the ground, the dollars start moving.here, instead of there.So what I'm to suggest to Todd, I'll also pass it on, if he can pass it on, and I'll send a note to Jennifer as well, but I think it would be well advise the planning commission look at this document to see, because also the ACCD grant that funds the regional planning commission wants the regional planning commissions to look at town, and look at their municipal plan, and look at their zoning, and see if there is a disconnect between the two, and what needs to be done to make sure there isn't that disconnect.So there's a lot of things that are gonna be happening.So it makes sense if the planning commission looked at the vehicles grant and got their input in before it becomes- - This is fascinating.Yeah, it really is.Well, it's fascinating.And I think a lot of people are gonna wake up and discover some horses are out of the barn that they haven't realized.Absolutely, because you look at this whole thing on...Here's the planning commission that we've always dealt with planning, and now, we've merged and become transportation as well.And all of a sudden, we're dealing with all kinds of human issues.Probably different stuff.The education, the food insecurities, the refugee issues, it's all a whole big new package that we're going, wow, and you're right.Taking on a whole new meaning.It is, it really is.You're right, when commissioners are waking up last night, and go, this is the regional plan?'Cause it looks so different .That's interesting, I like that.That's kind of what the transportation research center is all about, was taking that old, traffic engineering part of what people think of as road plant or engineering, and really making it a study of sustainability.The principle is really a great thing.The issue being old and having scars, I discover over time that almost everything gets gamed.The old planning systems have been gained, and have sort of ceased to be anything more than a mechanical way to hand money out to people who are good at playing the game.It's good to stir those games up.As a matter of principle, it's sturdy to shake them up.And this is shaking them up for some rather good things.In 15 years, it'll be gained.But in the meantime, I think maybe some cool things will happen.There's some very exciting ideas coming out.So it must surface with wifi, hello.Starting next summer.The beginning of a whole new world.I know, 'cause I can even come and take the bus downtown and do something 'cause I won't drive .Well, and I'm saying, my office is at one church, which is literally like a couple stores down from Champion Cherry where the deep buses go.So I literally am gonna be able to like hop on it.When I grew up, when I was a little kid, during world war II, we lived in 10, 15 miles at town.We had no car.Most people have no car.And we went to town by the bus.And the bus came by, I would say every 40 minutes there, so it was very usable, more or less anytime you wanted, you got on the bus.When you had to come home, you came up.It was an old world, cost 10 cents.We lived in Rochester, New York- - Should we adjourn?Yes, I would make a motion in turn, and then we can .I'll second that.All those in favor?Aye.When we lived in Rochester, New York.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Jericho_Selectbd_10-18-12.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Jericho_Selectbd_10-18-12.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Jericho_Selectbd_10-18-12.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/mv_house_proceeding_05-06-08/house_proceeding_05-06-08.mp3", "text": "The house will be in order.The prayer will be offered by the chaplain, Father Coughlin.Eternal Father, drawing us ever closer to you.Spring rains make us mindful of your presence in our lives.Water comes down from the heavens as rain.Although it is always the same itself, it produces so many different effects.One in the tree, another in the rose bush, still another in the vine.And so in the whole of creation.Remaining essentially the same, the rain adapts itself to the needs of each creature that receives it, with the openness of absorbing life.In the same way your spirit, Lord, remaining absolutely simple in its integrity, apportions its grace upon each Member of Congress.Your spirit makes one a teacher of honest facts, another, visionary of the future.To another, the ability to remove obstacles.And yet another, the art of compromise.Still others respond with a depth of spirituality and service not easily recognized.And they all respond to this plenitude, and accomplish great deeds for this nation, revealing your glory at work in the world, now and forever.Amen.The chair has examined the journal of the last day's proceedings and announces to the house her approval thereof.Pursuant to clause one of rule one, the journal stands approved.For what purpose does the gentleman from Ohio seek recognition?Thank you Madam Speaker.Pursuant to clause one, rule one, I demand a vote on agreeing to the speaker's approval of the journal.The question is on agreeing to the speaker's approval of the journal.Those in favor, say aye.Those opposed, no.The ayes have it, the journal stands approved.Madame Speaker, object to the vote on the grounds that a quorum is not present, and make point of order that a quorum is not present.Pursuant to clause eight of rule 20, further proceedings on this question are postponed.The pledge of allegiance will be led by the gentleman from Virginia, Mr. Moran.I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with Liberty and Justice for all.You may be seated.The Chair will entertain up to 15 requests for one minute speeches on each side of the aisle.For what purpose does the gentleman from Virginia rise?Consent to address the House for one minute to revise and extend my remarks.Without objection, the gentlemen is recognized for one minute.Madam Speaker, we have a situation today where the Americans are paying almost $4 a gallon for gasoline.This morning, Goldman Sachs announced that oil is going to go up to 150 to $200 a barrel, which means that it's not going to stop at $4, it'll be about five or $6.Now think about this.This is a tremendous boon to Iran and Iraq.Iran will gain enormous wealth and political influence.Iraq will get even more revenue than the $72 billion they're anticipated this year.They got a hundred billion dollars over the last couple years, much of it, our money.And yet, Americans have already contributed over half a trillion dollars to Iraq's economy.Within the next couple of weeks, we'll contribute almost $170 million.And yet, we are paying to pick up the garbage and train the security forces in Iraq.When they've got surplus they don't even know what to do with.Who's - Time's expired.In charge of this, Madam Speaker?For what purpose does the gentleman from Texas rise?Address the House for one minute to revise and extend...Without objection, the gentleman's recognized for one minute.Madam Speaker, before I came to Congress, I had an opportunity to serve my constituents in a different way.I was a home builder, a land developer, and even a mortgage lender.I know firsthand some of the problems that the real estate industry and the housing industry is facing today.94% of the American homeowners are paying their mortgage payments on time and in full.Are some people having a hard time making these mortgage payments?Of course they are.Can the government help?Yes, in some cases, but I urge my colleagues to be very careful here.We do not need for the federal government to be the piggy bank for folks that made poor decisions, or to bail out the lenders that made loans to people that really didn't have the capacity to pay it back.It's not fair to penalize those folks that made good decisions and played by the rules by taking their tax money and rewarding those who didn't.For many of my constituents, they are having a hard time just making their own mortgage payment.What we shouldn't be doing is taking their tax money to pay their neighbors payment.Madam Speaker, I encourage folks to be very cautious about these bailout programs.Gentleman's time has expired.For what purpose does the gentlemen from Colorado rise?Permission to address the House for one minute.Without objection, the gentlemen is recognized for one minute.Good afternoon, Madam Speaker.Seven years of President Bush's economic policies have put a tremendous strain on middle-class families.Since 2001, healthcare premiums have gone up almost $6,000.College tuition has increased by $2,500, and gas prices have more than doubled.With these increases, and paychecks that have, on the average, fallen, it's no wonder that the majority of Americans say their economic situation has not improved in the last five years.While the Bush Administration is eager to give tax breaks to the wealthiest of Americans and assist Wall Street firms like Bear Stearns, it does little to help middle income families.Madam Speaker, the Democratic House recognizes the immediate need to help middle-class families, and that is why our budget prioritize middle-class tax relief, and why we are proposing a second economic stimulus package.It's time for President Bush to put the middle-class ahead of the wealthiest few.With that, I yield back.Gentleman yields back his time.For what purpose does the gentleman from Indiana rise?Oh, the gentleman from Oregon.Thank you Madam Speaker, to address the House for one minute, to revise and extend...Without objection, the gentlemen from Oregon is recognized.Thank you, Madam Speaker.By refusing to renew the county payments program, Congress has broken its pledge to rural areas all across this country, like Grant County, Oregon, where federal land covers 61% of the county.That's 300 square miles larger than the entire state of Delaware.School children of Grant County rely on the federal government to be a good neighbor.During my most recent visit to Prairie City School and the eighth grade class of Andy Demco, I was told by the school superintendent Noah Cleaver that only the county payments funds through the road department have kept the schools going.Now, our Speaker has said she'd like this to be the children's Congress.So why won't the Democratic leadership bring for a vote H.R. 3058, which is a bipartisan, four year reauthorization of the county payments timber program, keeping a hundred-year-old commitment from this government to these counties?It's been 112 days since H.R. 3058 was made eligible for a vote.It's here on the Union Calendar of the House.We've had 51 legislative days when it could have been brought up for a vote to help secure rural schools.And yet, the leadership of this House refuses to even schedule it for a vote on the House floor.When will the Democrat leadership of the House keep its commitment to rural communities?The gentleman from Oregon's time has expired.For what purpose does the Gentleman from Ohio rise?Request permission to address the House for one minute.Without objection, the gentlemen is recognized for one minute.Madam Speaker, as gas prices have once again hit record highs, Congressional Democrats are urging President Bush to take action.For seven years, he has sat on the sidelines, and even last week at a press conference in the Rose Garden, he concluded, that I'm quoting here, the cost-benefit analysis of immediate action for consumers were not persuasive enough for him to act.House Democrats are calling on President Bush to stop filling the strategic petroleum reserve.This reserve is 97% full, which is more than enough to meet any emergency we would have.Expert believe that tapping the reserve could lower our gas prices by as much as five to 25 cents per gallon.Right now, Americans need help, they're hurting.President Bush could take action today that would provide immediate relief to consumers at the pump, but he refuses to act.Once again, House Democrats urge the president to reconsider.I yield back the balance of my time.The gentleman from Ohio yields back his time.For what purpose does the gentleman from Indiana rise?Asking unanimous consent to address the House for one minute to revise and extend my remarks.Without objection, the gentlemen is recognized for one minute.Thank you, Madam Speaker.Madam Speaker, today, America's eyes are turning to Indiana and North Carolina as tens of thousands of Americans are making their decision in primary election days.And thanks to the United States Supreme Court decision in Crawford versus Marion County Election Board, Hoosiers will be voting today with greater confidence than ever before.The Supreme Court decided last week in a six to three decision that Indiana's law requiring photo identification to vote is constitutional.In its opinion, the Supreme Court noted, quote, there is no question about the legitimacy or importance of a state's interest in counting only eligible votes.It further stated, quote, Indiana's interest in protecting public confidence in elections, while closely related to its interest in preventing voter fraud, has independent significance because such confidence encourages citizen participation in the democratic process, close quote.Indiana's laws had its critics in this body, but I rise to extol the Supreme Court and all of those in Indiana and North Carolina, who, with greater confidence today, will exercise their franchise and guide America's future.Gentleman from Indiana's time has expired.For what purpose does the gentlemen from Vermont rise?To address the House for one minute to revise and extend...Without objection, the gentlemen from Vermont is recognized for one minute.Thank you, Madam Speaker.For the past seven years, President Bush has been delivering an energy policy that has resulted in the highest increase in the cost of energy in the history of this country.Last week, the president continued his call for more of the same when he touted an old plan for domestic drilling in the Arctic that would produce a six month supply of oil 10 years from now.It's not going to do anything about price at the pump now, it's not going to do anything about price at the pump later.Instead, the president is blaming Congressional Democrats for not addressing the problem, but it's the president who won't suspend purchases of the strategic petroleum reserve, which would bring down prices 25 cents immediately.It's the president who won't work with us to get rid of the Enron loophole, which is enriching speculators and clobbering middle-class families.This year, in fact, Democratic Congress has passed energy legislation that's getting nowhere because of being held hostage in the Senate, and it has no support from the President of the United States.The reality is that we have actions we can take on the short term, the strategic petroleum reserve, the Enron loophole, and in the long term to reduce our reliance on carbon.I yield back the balance of my time.Gentleman for Vermont yields back the balance of his time.For what purpose does the gentleman from South Carolina rise?Madam Speaker, I ask permission to address the House for one minute, revise and extend my remarks.Without objection, the gentleman is recognized for one minute.Madam Speaker, Americans are paying the price at the pump for inaction of this majority.Democrats promised the American people two years ago last week that they had a plan to address rising gas prices.It appears that plan was nothing more than election year politics.That's a shame because right now Americans are paying nearly $4 a gallon for gas.The effect of these rising prices is felt not just when we fill up our tank, we see the rising price at the grocery store because our food is shipped in trucks all across this country.The American people do not expect a quick fix, but they do expect us to work toward energy independence rather than simply pointing fingers and blame.We live in a global market, and many nations are competing for oil.Let's start by promoting American alternative energy.Let's invest in American oil.Let's advance American energy exploration.The co-ops of America, led by National President Jack Wolf, are leading the way.In conclusion, God bless our troops and we will never forget September the 11th.Gentleman from South Carolina yields back his time.For what purpose does the gentleman from New Hampshire rise?To address the House for one minute to revise and extend my remarks.Without objection, the gentlemen is recognized for one minute.Thank you, Madam Speaker.There's no doubt that the housing crisis and the consumer credit crunch are getting worse.Last week, we learned that the number of homes facing foreclosure more than doubled from last year.In my home state of New Hampshire, foreclosures have increased nearly 96%.And that is why it is so important that Congress pass the comprehensive housing package that is coming to the floor this week.The legislation is the most innovative and comprehensive solution to the housing crisis yet.It will give relief to the millions of working families struggling to pay their mortgage with the rising price of gas and food.It would help nearly 1.5 million Americans in need.Our package would also offer assistance to states and localities to purchase and rehabilitate foreclosed properties.Madam Speaker, our economy cannot rebound unless we act now to give relief to millions of Americans in need.We have a bold proposal to take the decisive action.I certainly hope that my colleagues on the other side of the aisle understand the urgent need, and that we will receive bipartisan support for this proposal.Thank you, Madam Speaker, I yield back.Gentlemen from New Hampshire's time has expired.For what purpose does the gentleman from Texas rise?To address the House for one minute to revise and extend my remarks.Without objection, the gentleman from Texas is recognized for one minute.Madam Speaker, during a telephone town meeting last night, I asked my constituents, do you think the media are fair and objective in their news coverage?91% of the almost 400 respondents said the media are not fair.Only 7% said that they are fair.This is an amazing result, but not a surprising one, since slanted coverage pervades much of the news Americans get every day.One of the greatest threats America faces is a biased media.If the American people don't get the facts, they can't make good decisions.And if they can't make good decisions, we won't have a democracy.The national media need to let the American people make up their own minds, not tell them what to think.Gentleman from Texas yields back his time.For what purpose does the gentleman from California rise?Madam to consent to address the House for one minute to revise and extend my remarks.Without objection, the gentleman's recognized for one minute.Thank you very much, Madam Speaker.Today, we have an opportunity, a significant milestone in Israel's history.We celebrate the 60th anniversary of truly an important time in Jewish history.My district, the San Joaquin Valley, is the bread basket of the nation, but we have a unique relationship between California State University at Fresno and Ben-Gurion University of the Negev.My constituents for years have been partnering with the counterparts in Israel to research water irrigation technologies and agricultural solutions to problems that face our world.Fresno State has a long history in working with many leading drip and micro-irrigation equipment manufacturers in Israel, and the university has a long history of exchange of information on the Agricultural Research Organization and the Volcani Center in Israel, including exchange programs that have brought research scientists to work on water and salinity issues.Fresno State continues today to have a discussions with Israeli researchers and industry on how to extend and beneficial use of the world's ever-shrinking supply of water for the important purpose of feeding our world.For this and many other reasons, we recognize and celebrate the 60th anniversary of the nation of Israel.Gentleman from California's time has expired.For what purpose does the gentleman from Illinois rise?I ask unanimous consent to revise and extend and address the House for one minute.Without objection, the gentleman from Illinois is recognized for one minute.Thank you, Madam Speaker.I rise today to ask this House, why do we continue to punish Illinois and U.S. manufacturers and farmers?In the 531 days since the U.S.-Columbia trade promotion agreement was signed, U.S. products exported to Columbia have suffered over a billion dollars in taxes and tariffs because they were exported from the United States to Columbia.During that period of time, Colombian products entering the United States come in duty-free.That doesn't seem fair.We have an agreement with Columbia to eliminate those tariffs, and every day we delay, it costs almost $2 million in higher, excuse me, $190 million a week and higher tariffs on U.S.-made products.The U.S.-Columbia trade agreement is good for states like Illinois.I represent a state that's dependent on exports.Our biggest product we produce in the district I represent, we have 8,000 union workers who produce yellow bulldozers and construction equipment.Something that's uncommon in places like, in need in places like Columbia.Let's be competitive, let's eliminate those tariffs.Let's bring up for a boat the U.S.-Columbia trade promotion agreement.The gentleman from Illinois' time has expired.For what purpose does the gentlewoman from California rise?I ask permission to address the House for one minute to revise and extend my remarks.Without objection, the gentlewoman from California is recognized for one minute.Madam Speaker, on this National Teacher Day, I rise to single out just one of the many talented teachers in my congressional district.Libby Anderson teaches second grade at Grover Heights Elementary School in Grover Beach.It's a national blue ribbon school.She's one of those gifted teachers with a truly unique way of igniting the interest of her students.A few years ago, she led a class project where each student picked a lighthouse to study from around the country.Through that project, one student learned of the federal efforts to restore the Piedras Blancas lighthouse in my district.Under her guidance, this class embarked on a campaign called Pennies for Piedras to raise money toward this effort.By the end of that school year, the students had raised $1,337 and 30 cents in pennies.I'm happy to say that our students have gone on to lead support for continued restoration of this special place.This is just one example of the many exceptional ways this teacher touched the lives of her students and expanded their awareness of their communities.Our country is blessed to have teachers like Mrs.Anderson, who sparks students' passions, encouraging them to get involved in the world around them.I yield back.Gentlewoman from California yields back her time.For what purpose does the gentleman from Ohio rise?Madam Speaker, permission to address the House for one minute to extend and revise my remarks.Without objection, the gentleman from Ohio is recognized for one minute.Thank you, Madam Speaker.With no relief in sight for the American public, as they continue to endure the cost of skyrocketing energy costs, it is once again time to look at alternative energy sources to combat this problem.China has plans to build 40 nuclear power plants in the next 15 years, investing approximately $50 billion in these reactors.United States has not licensed a nuclear power plant in 30 years, while current congressional leadership refuses to even consider the notion of a nuclear power as a viable alternative energy source.Of course, we don't have to leave my home state of Ohio, to find additional ways to increase domestic energy production.In Northwest Ohio, alternative energy is abundant with the only wind turbines in the state, solar panel production, and coal liquification technology, all adding to our energy production.Whether we look at other countries or in our own backyard, we must embrace alternative energy sources as one of the ways to reduce our dependency on Middle Eastern oil and combat skyrocketing energy prices.I yield back, thank you.Gentleman from Ohio yields back his time.For what purpose does the gentlewoman from Ohio rise?Ask consent to address the House for one minute to include extraneous material in the records.Without objection, the gentlewoman from Ohio is recognized for one minute.Thank you, Madam Speaker.Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke says Congress should do more to address the housing foreclosure crisis.I agree.However, let me respectfully suggest to the fed chairman that he, too, can do much more to help.Let him use his considerable power to bring to the table the very big banks that aren't coming to foreclosure workouts at the local level.And they just happen to be the firms the fed has been rewarding handsomely by injecting billions and billions of dollars to rescue them.You know the names, Citigroup, J.P. Morgan, Bank of America, Wachovia.Firms like Countrywide don't even show up when borrowers at the local level try to renegotiate their loans, yet the Federal Reserve has been rewarding them by putting them on their list of select primary dealers, fancy that.So, Mr. Bernanke, let me help you out.Here's a list of the firms you can invite right now.They're not responding to Ohioans witnessing foreclosure.Countrywide, Chase Mortgage, Citi Financial, GMAC, HSBC, Sovereign Bank, Indi, MAC Bank, Popular Mortgage, NovaStar, Saxon Mortgage, Option One, EMC, - Gentlewoman, time has expired.ASC, Home-EC, Wilshire.I will put all the names in the record and we'll come back again.Thank you, Madam Speaker.Gentlewoman from Ohio's time has expired, members are reminded to address the remarks to the Chair.For what purpose does the gentleman from Texas rise?Request permission to address the House for one minute.Without objection, the gentleman from Texas is recognized.Madam Speaker, Houston police officer Rodney Johnson was the best of the best, but he was taken by the worst of the worse.An illegal outlaw from Mexico, Juan Leonardo Quintero Perez shot Officer Johnson four times in the back of the head after a routine traffic stop.Officer Johnson would still be alive today, enjoying time with his five children and his wife, Jocelyn, a fellow Houston police officer, if our border was protected.This lawless trespasser had already been deported for indecency with a child in 1998, but he snuck across the border again to continue a crime spree.And after coming to Houston, Quintero finally confessed to murdering one of Houston's finest.Today, Quintero was in trial for capital murder in Houston, but the Mexican government, rather than pay restitution to the Johnson family, is paying for the battery of defense lawyers representing this cold-blooded cop killer.Mexico is meddling in the U.S. court system, but Juan Quintero can not miss his judgment day and his day with his maker because justice is what we do in America, even if the Mexican government doesn't like it, and that's just the way it is.Gentleman from Texas' time has expired.For what purpose does the gentleman from Wisconsin rise?To address the House for one minute.Without objection, that gentlemen is recognized for one minute.Madam Speaker, last week, the Labor Department reported that for the fourth month in a row, our jobs are going south.We are losing more jobs, even as the middle class is struggling just to keep their heads above water.We're in this mess because the Bush Administration and its followers have failed to establish a fiscally responsible budget policy and are continuing to borrow and spend our nation into the poor house.In response to this downturn, Democrats are taking action.Today, we're holding an economic summit to determine how best to restore our ailing economy.Also this week, we're going to begin to put together a second economic recovery effort directed at rebuilding America's infrastructure, first by enacting a housing package to help establish the floor in the housing market.And then we intend to invest in higher wage construction jobs that will stimulate local economies nationwide.I hope my colleagues in both parties will join us in this effort to build a better nation here at home.And that furthermore, the president will understand how important this is and sign the bill we intend to enact.Gentleman from Wisconsin's time has expired.For what purpose does the gentlemen from Pennsylvania rise?Revise and extend my remarks.Without objection, the gentleman's recognized for one minute.Thank you, Madam Speaker.Yesterday, I visited a waste energy facility in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania and concluded, once again, Lancaster County gets it right.This facility is a great example of the kind of ingenuity that we need to put America on a path towards energy independence.And it is disposing of waste at the same time.The plant burns solid waste at very hot temperatures, using the heat to turn water into steam, which is used to turn a turbine and create electricity.90% of that electricity is sold to the local electric utility.Metals, glass, and plastics are recycled out in the process.This process is saving pollution from ending up in the Chesapeake Bay.It's saving land by reducing the need for landfills, and it's creating clean energy in the process.One ton of solid waste has the energy equivalent of one barrel of oil.Last year, over 342,000 tons of waste were processed at the facility, and I'm told that something like 30,000 tons of trash a day is trucked out of New York City to landfills.Maybe our state and community leaders should take a cue from the people of Lancaster County's research for more energy to meet our neighbors.Pennsylvania's time has expired, for what purpose does the gentlemen from Iowa rise?Seek unanimous consent to address the House for one minute and to revise and extend my remarks.Without objection, the gentleman from Iowa is recognized for one minute.Madam Speaker, the price of gasoline is now averaging over $3 and 60 cents a gallon.House Democrats are working to provide some relief, but we face stiff opposition from the White House and Congressional Republicans, who have opposed every single energy bill that we've brought to the floor this year.When it comes to energy, the GOP doesn't want to work with us, they simply want to say no.When Democrats voted to repeal unnecessary subsidies to big oil companies so we can instead invest in clean renewable energy, Republicans overwhelmingly voted no.It didn't matter that the legislation would reduce our dependence on foreign oil, lower prices at the pump, and create new green jobs.They still prefer the status quo.When Democrats passed the energy price gouging act to punish those who take advantage of these record prices by increasing them even further, Republicans overwhelmingly voted no.Madam Speaker, Democrats understand that hardship that families are facing every time they go to the gas station, and that is why we've passed six bills that would provide real relief to consumers.It's time Republicans realized that \"no\" is not an energy strategy.I yield back.The gentleman from Iowa yields back his time.For what purpose does the gentleman from Kentucky rise?I seek unanimous consent to address the House for one minute to revise and...Without objection, the gentlemen is recognized for one minute.Madam Speaker, I rise to recognize Ms. Kayla Bass of Florence, Kentucky.On February 13th, 2008, Kayla distinguished herself when her father, Patrick Bass, a Desert Storm veteran, suffered a seizure.In a display of courage and maturity and composure that far exceeded her 10 years of age, Kayla responded to the emergency quickly and effectively.She administered first aid, called her mother and grandfather while simultaneously caring for her younger brother and two cousins who were at home at the time of the emergency.Kayla attributes her quick thinking and first aid proficiency to the skills she learned in American Heritage Girls Troop, Kentucky 727.American Heritage Girls is dedicated to developing young women through service to God, family, community, and country.In recognition of Kayla's heroism, American Heritage Girls has created the Angel Among Us award, which Kayla will receive during the regional award ceremony on May 16th.Her self-control during this event is impressive.Kayla, we're proud of you.Madam Speaker, I ask you to join me in commending Kayla Bass for her outstanding service and character, and I yield back.Kentucky yields back his time.For what purpose does the gentlewoman from Texas rise?To address the House for one minute and revise and extend...Without objection, the gentlewoman is recognized for one minute.Thank you.May 1st, just last Thursday, was the fifth anniversary of the famous words, \"Mission accomplished\".What a tragedy when April was the most deadliest month in Iraq that we have seen in a number of months.Madam Speaker, I rise today to ask the administration to recognize that this unending war must end, and in the backdrop of a newspaper article that suggests that the administration is looking at a $500 million development of hotels and restaurants and amusement parks in Baghdad.I ask the administration, do they get it?And so that's why it's important for us to support an amendment in the emergency supplemental that says we will bring our troops home with honor.This will go into effect one month after this legislation is passed.Seven months, deadliest, April, troops dying.This kind of war cannot be an unending war.And so we refuse to give more blank checks to Iraq.We thank our soldiers on the front lines of Iraq and Afghanistan, the war we should win.Bring our troops home with honor, vote for this amendment.And let's not give a $500 million development of hotels and restaurants.What are we thinking about?Gentlewoman from Texas' time has expired.I yield back.For what purpose does the gentleman from New Jersey rise?To address the House for one minute, Madam Speaker.Without objection, the gentlemen is recognized for one minute.Madam Speaker, as the first quarter of 2008 ended last week, it was clear that things are not getting any better for American families struggling to make ends meet.Americans continue to face higher costs for basic necessities, millions of families have lost their homes due to the troubled real estate market, and 7 million more Americans are uninsured.Last week, we also learned that April was the fourth month in a row that our economy lost jobs.With 20,000 jobs lost last month, our economy has now shed 260,000 jobs so far this year.That's particularly troublesome, considering that experts say the economy must create 150,000 jobs a month just to keep up with the number of Americans entering the job market, and all of these red flags show why it's so important that we work together in a bipartisan fashion early this year to pass the economic stimulus package.As a result of that action, 150 million taxpayers began receiving rebate checks last week.And that was a good start, but more needs to be done.Madam Speaker, with so many Americans struggling and the bad economic news, continuing to amount, we urge the president and the Republicans to join us to pass a second economic stimulus package.The gentleman from New Jersey's time has expired.For what purpose does the gentleman from New York rise?Madam Speaker, I move that the House do now adjourn.Question is on the motion...I second.Question is on the motion to adjourn, those in favor, say aye.Those opposed, no.The no's have it.For what purpose is...Madam Speaker, I ask for yay's and nay's.The yay's and nay's are requested those favoring the yay's and nay's will rise.A sufficient number having risen, the yay's and nay's are ordered, members who record their vote by electronic device pursuant to clause eight of rule 20 this 15 minute vote on the motion to adjourn will followed by five minute votes on the approval of the journal and the motion to instruct on H.R. 2419 offered by the gentleman from Wisconsin, Mr. Ryan.This is a 15 minute vote.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/house_proceeding_05-06-08.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/house_proceeding_05-06-08.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/house_proceeding_05-06-08.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/mv_house_proceeding_05-06-08_00/house_proceeding_05-06-08_00.mp3", "text": "Yeays and nays are ordered, or on which the vote is objected to under clause 6 of rule 20.Recorded votes on postponed questions will be taken later.The gentleman from Texas.Madam speaker, I've moved to suspend the rules and agree to the Resolution H.R.1086.The clerk will report the title of the resolution.House Resolution 1086.Resolution recognizing National Nurses Week on May 6th through May 12th, 2008.Pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from Texas, Mr. Green and the gentleman from Nebraska, Mr. Terry, each will control 20 minutes.The house will come to order.Members and staff will remove their conversations from the floor.House will come to order.Members and staff will remove their conversations from the floor.Chair recognizes the gentleman from Texas.Madam speaker I ask unanimous consent that all members may have five legislative days revise, extend their remarks and extend extraneous material on the resolution under consideration.Sound objection.Madam speaker, I yield myself as much time as I may consume.Gentleman from Texas is recognized.Madam speaker, I rise today in support of H.R.1086, recognizing today May 6th through May 12th as National Nurses Week.As a co-sponsor's resolution I'm proud to lend my voice and support of our nation's nurses.Continuing in the illustrious tradition of Florence Nightingale, the founder of modern nursing, nurses today continue to attend our armed forces overseas.These brave men and women place themselves at risk in war zones, including conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq to tend to our injured soldiers.Besides tending to the wounded abroad, nurses are also on the front lines of our healthcare system here at home.Whether their primary function is to care for our aging population or to provide immediate aid to the sick and injured, our nurses provide quality patient care and support to keep our health care system running.As the nation continues to face a nursing shortage where the projected 1 million new nurses needed by 2016, it's especially important that everyone is aware of the sacrifices nurses make on a daily basis for our country.We must continue to encourage more young people and those seeking a change in career to join the nursing profession.The resolution before us encourages all Americans to observe this week as National Nurses Week by showing appropriate recognition to nurses and creating programs and activities during the week to demonstrate the importance of nurses.I'd like to thank my colleagues and former nurses, Congresswoman Eddie Bernice Johnson, Congresswoman Carolyn McCarthy and Congresswoman Lois Capps for their leadership on this issue.And again, I reiterate they are former nurses, although I don't know if you're ever a former nurse.I urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to join me in supporting the Resolute in its adoption, and I reserve the balance of my time.Gentleman from Texas reserves his time, the gentleman from Nebraska.Yield myself as much time as I may consume.Gentleman is recognized.I rise today in support of House Resolution 1086, acknowledging May 6th through May 12th, 2008 as National Nurses Week.In addition to kicking off National Nurses Week today, we are also celebrating the comforts and care that nurses provide by recognizing May 6th as National Nurses Day.This tradition started 1982 when President Ronald Reagan signed a proclamation making today National Recognition Day for nurses.This is a week to recognize nurses as being the largest single component of health care profession with over 2.5 million registered nurses in the United States and the critical role they play in providing care not only to the citizens of America, but are also serving our nation in both Iraq and Afghanistan.In addition to the immediate care they provide to patients, they also have helped to educate, and inform and improve education and retention of nurses.I would like to thank the author of this resolution, Mrs.Eddie Bernice Johnson of Texas, for her leadership and honoring nurses that have helped promote health, prevent disease, and help other Americans cope with illnesses.I encourage all of my colleagues to vote in favor of this resolution and I reserve the balance of my time.Gentleman from Nebraska reserves his time, the gentleman from Texas.Madam speaker, I yield five minutes to my good friend and colleague from Texas, Congresswoman Eddie Bernice Johnson, who literally we served with since 1973, with just a little break in the service.So Congressman Johnson- - Gentlewoman from Texas is recognized for five minutes.Thank you very much, Madam speaker.And let me thank my colleague and friend of long standing, and also thank the minority side for their assistance, and both Chairman Dingell and Ranking Member Barton As a registered nurse with a master's degree, it is a privilege and a delight to offer a resolution recognizing National Nurses Week, which is May 6th through 12th.And I have two outstanding colleagues that we have found to have something in common.Congresswoman Lois Capps and Congresswoman Carolyn McCarthy, who are also nurses and champions of this resolution and of the profession.And I thank them for their efforts to encourage more than 110 congressional colleagues to co-sponsor this bill honoring nurses.The congressional Nurses Caucus was also helpful in promoting the legislation, and I appreciate the members' efforts to rally for the support of H.R.1086.Nurses are a key component of our nurses health care system, whether on the battlefield or at sea and a skilled nursing facility and a hospital, or even in a patient's own home, the care that a nurse provides is very valuable.Nurses are intelligent individuals, who must often make quick decisions in an effort to save the life of a patient, even before the physician arrives.Nurses are recognized as the patient's primary advocate and every poll shows that nurses are always very trusted by the patients.They are tasked with closely monitoring even small changes in a patient's health, and they are some tough directed decision-making people and under stress and in difficult situations.For 15 years I provided hands-on patient care as a psychiatric nurse at the Veterans Administration Hospital in Dallas.And the work was challenging but fulfilling, and that's why I still remain very interested in the quality care for all of our veterans.Although more than 2.5 million nurses work in the United States, our nation has suffered from a nursing shortage.Those currently in the profession are beginning to retire.There are a few individuals entering the profession, the nursing shortage is unprecedented and the depth and duration with a projection of over 1 million new and replacement nurses are needed by 2016.Nursing schools need help attracting well-prepared faculty to recruit the best and brightest for the educational programs.Loan forgiveness and educational incentive programs can help.But Congress must do more to encourage bright young minds towards nursing.Nursing is a career that has been valued for a long time and it is fitting to recognize the Navy Nurse Corps on it's 100th anniversary this year.For nearly 100 years before Congress formally established the Navy nurse Corps in 1908, women worked as nurses aboard Navy ships and in Navy hospitals as early as the war of 1812.Volunteers performed nursing duty in places that were often dangerous and required courage in the face of adversity.Members of the esteemed Navy Nurse Corps care for those brave men and women who fight for our freedoms.They contribute to relief efforts in all corners of the globe.They serve and lead roles as part of the unified healthcare system, the Navy nurse Corps practices progressive patient care.It enjoys a rich heritage accompanied by a high-tech training.A registered nurse in the Navy is also a respected officer, serving in modern facilities at home, at sea and around the country and around the globe.I'm proud to especially recognize the Navy Nurse Corps for its centuries of outstanding service for our military men and women.Today's resolution honors the good work for all nurses.One, it recognizes the significant contributions of nurses to the healthcare system of the U.S. supports the goals and ideas of National Nurse Weekends founded by the American Nurses Association and encourages the people of this nation to observe National Nurse Week with appropriate recognition ceremonies, activities, and programs to demonstrate the importance of nurses to the everyday lives of patients.Along with my many supportive colleagues, I want to thank the house leadership for bringing this important resolution to the floor, and I urge your support and I reserve the balance of my time.I yield the balance of my time.Gentlewoman yields back the balance of her time.The gentleman from Nebraska.Madam speaker I would like to yield two minutes to one of our physicians in the house of representatives, the gentlemen from Georgia.Gentleman from Georgia is recognized for two minutes.Madam speaker I rise today in strong support of H Resolution 1086 recognizing National Nurses Week, which is May 6th through May the 12th of this year.I'm proud to be a co-sponsor of this bill.I'd like to thank the gentle lady from Texas, representative Eddie Bernice Johnson, nurse Johnson, for advancing this legislation to help educate the American people about the critical role that nurses play in healthcare delivery.With May the 12th being the birthday of Florence Nightingale, the founder of modern nursing, there's not any more appropriate time to celebrate the work done by nurses.As an OBGYN position for almost 30 years, I was fortunate to work with intelligent, hardworking, compassionate nurses, and they were indeed a cornerstone of the high quality health care that we provided.So Madam Speaker nurses are on the front lines of health care delivery not only here at home, but also in Iraq and Afghanistan.Therefore because we're relying on our nurses so heavily, and because we currently are experiencing a shortage of nurses, it is critical to support nurse training programs.That's why I recently joined with a number of my colleagues in supporting Title VIII funding to provide loans and grants to our nation's nursing students.I urge all my colleagues to support the goals of National Nurses Week, and I yield back the balance of my time.Gentleman from Georgia yields back is time.The gentleman from Texas.Madam Speaker I'd yield three minutes to a colleague on the Energy and Commerce Committee and a good friend, Congressman Lois Capps, and also a nurse.Gentlewoman from California is recognized for three minutes.I thank my colleague for yielding and Madam speaker I rise in support of House Resolution 1086.And in support of National Nurses Week, I commend my friend and fellow nurse, Ms. Johnson for introducing this resolution.As we observe National Nurses Week, I hope we can work together to raise awareness about important issues facing our nursing community.And the important impact that nurses make to the lives of patients and their role in the arena of public health, this is central to our delivery of health care.We know that nurses advocate for their patients and provide personal care at the bedside.Often, it is life saving care.They're also community educators, primary care providers, and they serve in our military so often putting themselves in harm's way to carry out their duties.But we are facing a terrible shortage of nurses.we are jeopardizing our ability to provide the best quality care, which each individual in each family deserves in this country of ours.As a registered nurse currently serving in Congress, I feel it is by duty to advocate not only on behalf of my patients, but also on behalf of my fellow nurses.I'm co-chair of our House Nursing Caucus, and I was honored to be joined by 155 of our colleagues and a letter to the Appropriations Committee requesting additional funding for nurse education programs.These programs have trained thousands of nurses, but we are in desperate need of so many more.And the very fact that we are funding Title VIII nurse education at the same exact amount that we did over 30 years ago is quite frankly inexcusable.In addition, nurses face difficult conditions in the workplace, such as mandatory overtime, unsafe staffing numbers, and hazardous lifting and other workplace settings.These conditions are directly contributing to our inability to retain many qualified nurses in the hospital setting.Now as our baby boomers retire and our demand for nurses soars, let us use this week as an opportunity to reinforce our commitment to our current and our future nurses, and thereby to a safer and healthier nation.I yield back and thank you.Gentleman from Nebraska.Continue to reserve we have no further speakers.Gentleman from Texas.Mr. Speaker I yield three minutes to our colleague from New York, Carolyn McCarthy.Gentlewoman is recognized for three minutes.Thank you, Mr. Speaker.And I'd like to thank Lois Capps and Bernice Johnson for bringing this forward on House Resolution 1086 recognizing National Nurses Week.I've spent over 30 years as a nurse, and it was mentioned earlier, someone said, \"Once a nurse\".Well let me say, \"Once a nurse, always a nurse\".We carry our duties even here to the House of Representatives.I sit on the education committee and what I've been working on since I've came here was making sure that our nurses get every opportunity to increase our numbers.As mentioned before by both of my colleagues, the nursing shortage in this country is at a crisis portion.We see our nurses today are a lot older, they're at the retirement age, and we must do everything that we can to make sure that we have our young people coming into a very, very rewarding career.Nursing could be demanding, it can be tiring, it can be physically draining, but it couldn't be a better career.When I first joined nursing over 30 years ago, I worked in the intensive care unit and I spent most of my life there.And just to be able to help a patient in their greatest need, but also to work with their families, to comfort them as they saw their loved one going through a traumatic injury, we need to make sure that this country has a supply of nurses continuously.We have many young people that wanna go to nursing school, but what we have found over the years is we don't have enough professors to be able to teach them to be nurses.So in the Higher Education Act there is money in there, there's gonna be funding in there to make sure that those that wanna go into a higher education to be able to teach nursing, it can work out for us.You know when we look at the future, we're seeing today in our hospitals, such a shortage of nurses that a lot of the nurses are doing a lot of overtime, when they take a day off, they're always called to come back in.That is not acceptable, mainly because you have to be totally alert at all times.And I certainly tip my cap to my fellow nurses that go through this every single day.They stay in the profession because they love the profession.They stay in the profession because it is a calling.Not everyone can be a nurse, it is a calling, and I salute those women and men that go into nursing.And I also salute the women and men that are fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan and taking their nursing care to the soldiers and giving them comfort when they need it.There is no greater in my opinion profession than to be a nurse.With that being said, I hope my colleagues will support H. Resolution 1086 and recognize National Nurses Week.With that, I yield back the balance of my time.Gentleman from Nebraska.May I inquire into how much time Mr. Green has?Gentleman from Nebraska has 17 minutes remaining, Mr. Green has 10 and a half minutes remaining.We have no further speakers, I continue to reserve.Gentleman from Texas.Mr. Speaker I yield three minutes to our fellow Energy and Commerce member, Congressman Collins from New York.Gentleman is recognized for three minutes.Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.First of all I rise to support my colleague for bringing this resolution forward.I wanna congratulate him on that, and I rise today in support of H. Res 1086, recognizing National Nurses Week on May the sixth to May the 12th.As a co-sponsor of this resolution, I'm proud to speak out in honor of our valiant, committed nurses who make our nation and our loved ones safe and well.I pay special tribute to my esteemed colleagues in Congress who introduced this resolution and who are themselves nurses.The honorable Eddie Bernice Johnson of Texas, the honorable Lois Capps of California, and the honorable Carolyn McCarthy of my home state, New York.Additionally, I wish to pay special tribute to the nurses who are serving in Iraq and Afghanistan and the nurses who generously tend to those who suffer wounds from these conflicts.Along with other healthcare professionals, a nurse is responsible for the treatment, safety and recovery of acutely or chronically ill or injured people.They also help to maintain a patient's health and provide treatment to those who are facing life-threatening emergencies.Like 9-1-1 and Hurricane Katrina, nurses are also involved in medical and nursing research and perform a wide range of nonclinical functions.Today, there are 2.4 million registered nurses in the United States.92% of the registered nurses are women.531,000 is a number of licensed vocational nurses.1.8 million is the number of nursing psychiatric and home health aids.We cannot do without them.I greatly commend the American Nurses Association and the academy of American Academy of Nurses, practitioners, and all of the nursing associations and academic institutions who train nurses and promote the advancement of the profession.I look forward to working with members of the associations, academia and others in making certain that we continue to increase the amount of nurses.In closing, I wish to thank my colleagues again, Congresswoman Johnson, Congresswoman Capps, Congresswoman McCarthy for their leadership on this issue.And I urge my colleagues to join me in supporting this resolution.And I wanna thank you very much my colleague from Texas, of course, Mr. Green, and of course others who've been involved in this resolution.On that note Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.Gentleman from Nebraska.Thank you Mr. Speaker, and in our closing, let me just once again reiterate our appreciation to the authors of this bill, Mrs.Johnson from Texas and Capps from...Lois Capps from California, McCarthy from New York.And once again, encourage our side of the aisle to vote yes on this measure.We have no further requests for time, so Mr. Speaker I yield back all of our time.Gentleman yields back his remaining time.Gentleman from Texas.Thank you Mr. Speaker, in closing I join my colleague from Nebraska and encouraging all our members to support this resolution and recognition of nurses for this week and I yield back my time.All the time has expired, the question is, will the house suspend the rules and agree to House Resolution 1086?Those in favor say, aye.Those opposed say, no.In the opinion of the chair two thirds being in the affirmative, the rules are suspended, and the resolution is agreed to.And without objection, the motion to reconsider- - Mr. Speaker?Is laid on the table.Mr. Speaker, I object to the vote on the ground that a quorum is not present, and I make a point of order that a quorum is not present.Pursuant to cLause eight of rule 20 and the chair's prior announcement, further proceedings on this motion will be postponed.Mr. Speaker?For what purpose is the gentleman from Michigan rise?I move to suspend the rules and pass H.R.4279 as amended.The clerk will report the title of the bill.H.R.4279, a bill to enhance remedies for violations of intellectual property laws, and for other purposes.Pursuant to the rule that gentleman from Michigan, Mr. Conyers and the gentleman from Texas, Mr. Smith, each will control 20 minutes.The chair recognizes the gentleman from Michigan.Thank you, Mr. Speaker.I ask anonymous consent that all members have five legislative days to revise and extend their remarks.Without objection so ordered.Including extraneous material and I yield myself as much time as I may consume.Gentleman is recognized.ladies and gentlemen today we move to dramatically step up our nation's intellectual property laws and enforcement efforts.With so much unpleasant economic news in the headlines, the measure before us H.R.4279 puts resources toward aiding a sector of the economy that employs an estimated 18 million workers.That is 13% of our labor force and accounts for half of all the United States exports driving 40% of the country's growth as a result of less than effective enforcement.However, counterfeiting and piracy costs the United States economy, somewhere in the neighborhood of $250 billion a year, and creates the loss of about 750,000 American jobs.And so H.R.4279 will do these important things that will prioritize intellectual property protection to the highest level of our government, by creating an office in the White House that will be responsible for coordinating the intellectual property efforts of eight diverse agencies and producing a national joint strategic plan for IP enforcement.It will elevate IP enforcement within the department of justice and provide more resources for investigating and prosecuting IP crimes.It will make changes to both civil and criminal IP laws to enhance the ability of intellectual property owners to effectively protect their rights.And it will increase penalties for IP violations that endanger public health and safety.Throughout the process of developing this bill, we heard many expressions of support as well as a number of expressions of concern.But we've been able to work out these issues on a bipartisan basis at every step of the process.I congratulate the distinguished members of the Judiciary Committee, both Republicans and Democrats for their cooperation in this process.And so now, as a result, the measure is supported by the Consumers Electronics Association, the Digital Media Association, the Net Coalition, the Internet Commerce Coalition, the Coalition for Consumers Pictures Rights and the printing industries association and more.And that's in addition to the support we've already had from the Teamsters, the Directors Guild of America, SEIUF, UNI, FM, OPEIU, the Coalition Against Counterfeiting & Piracy, the Motor Equipment Manufacturing Association, the Motion Picture Association of America, even Pharma and NBC Universal.Intellectual property protection is among the key issues that will determine American competitiveness in the 21st century.The ability to create, innovate and generate the best artistic, technological and knowledge based intellectual property is the formula for continued growth in the global economy, fundamental to the promotion of human progress.And this committee of ours, the Judiciary Committee has given these items involved in the measure extensive consideration, lots of compromise back and forth, and we feel that this bill will make important contributions to the fight against counterfeiting and piracy.It was reported by Voice with strong bipartisan statements of support.And I urge my colleagues to vote for its passage and Mr. Speaker I reserve the balance of my time.Gentleman from Texas.Thank you Mr. Speaker, I yield myself as much time as I may consume.Gentlemen is recognized.Mr. Speaker at the outset, I want to recognize Chairman Conyers, Subcommittee Chairman Berman, and ranking member Howard Coppola the Subcommittee.Each of whom I've enjoyed working with and developing and advancing this legislation.Mr. Speaker at a time when many Americans are facing a slowing economy and increasing cost of food and fuel, it is imperative that Congress put aside any differences we may have and work together to promote the interest of U.S. entrepreneurs and industry.Over the past 25 years, perhaps no group of industries has contributed more to the tremendous and sustained growth in our economy, than those who rely on strong patent trademark and copyright protections.American intellectual property industries, including entertainment, high-tech and pharmaceutical industries account for over half of all U.S. exports, represent 40% of the country's economic growth and employ 18 million American workers.American technology, entertainment, and productivity based enterprises serve as the cornerstone of our economic and export strength.Because of the important role IP industries play in our economy, we cannot take these innovations or the creativity and investment required to bring them to life for granted.Unfortunately, the tremendous success of these innovators, creators and rights holders, has made them prime targets for thieves who seek out items protected by patent copyright, trademark or trade secret designation.These things not only steal the creations of others, but also reap the monetary benefits by reproducing and distributing the products themselves.And the losses attributed to counterfeiting and piracy affect more than the inventor.According to the U.S. government, American businesses lose approximately $250 billion each year to pirated and counterfeited goods.The theft of intellectual property has also cost nearly 750,000 Americans their jobs.Given the current state of the economy, preventing these crimes and enforcing IP laws must be a top priority for the federal government.H.R.4279 the Prioritizing Resources and Organization for Intellectual Property Act of 2008, which is also known as PRO-IP is a measure designed to respond directly to these challenges.Specifically, the bill strengthens our laws against counterfeiting and piracy, provides new resources to key agencies involved in the enforcement of IP rights, and mandates a new and unprecedented level of coordination and leadership on IP enforcement issues from the White House.Mr. Speaker, the incentive to innovate and the ability to profit from the creation of new intellectual property cannot be sustained without enforcing the rights that protect the ownership of such valuable intangible property.And while our government agencies are doing more today to protect intellectual property than ever before, the reality is that we must do much more.We must make it increasingly difficult and costly for counterfeiters and traffickers.Some of whom are connected to organized crime, to steal and profit from American innovations.Because intellectual property is such an important asset to both the inventor and the economy as a whole, Congress has a responsibility to ensure that IP enforcement is made a permanent priority of every administration.By supporting the PRO-IP bill, the house will send a clear message that there is a bipartisan commitment to ensure the next president and succeeding administrations have the resources, organizations and strategies required to protect our vital national and economic interests.Mr. Speaker I urge my colleagues to support this bill, H.R.4279, and I reserve the balance of my time.Gentleman reserved- - Mr. Speaker, I rise now to yield to my dear friend and chairman of the Intellectual Property Committee, who's worked on this subject matter for so many years.Howard Berman has been a bellwether in bringing together the groups and I'm happy to yield him as much time as he may consume.Gentleman is recognized.Well, thank you Mr. Speaker, and thank you Chairman Conyers for those kind words.I rise today in supportive H.R.4279.American inventors, artists and businesses rely on intellectual property rights to protect the value of their creative works.These works unfortunately are being ripped off around the world.The rampant counterfeiting and piracy of U.S. products is having a devastating impact on our economy.Counterfeit and pirated products may account for up to 8% of world trade and a significant portion of this illicit trade, are knockoffs of American products.Latest estimates indicate that U.S. businesses lose up to $250 billion a year due to intellectual property theft.This level of counterfeiting and piracy of U.S. intellectual property rights translates to job losses, lower tax receipts, and a greater trade deficit.It has also led to public health and safety threats ranging from exploding batteries to toxic pharmaceuticals and sawdust brake pads.The economic threat and safety problems that counterfeit and pirated products pose for U.S. businesses and consumers must be dealt with.Given the difficult economic times we find ourselves in, it is much more important that we address these problems quickly and effectively.I'm aware of the recent efforts the administration has taken to stem the tide of counterfeit and pirated products.The department of Homeland Security has seized record numbers of counterfeit and pirated goods coming through the border.The department of justice is prosecuting and convicting more intellectual property thieves.The patent and trademark office has stationed representatives in foreign countries to advocate for better enforcement.However despite these efforts, intellectual property theft is on the rise.More must be done, H.R.4279 is more.The act strengthens our civil and criminal laws in ways that attack the organizational structures intellectual properties thieves are using and reduce the economic incentives that thieves have to engage in commercial scale counterfeiting and piracy.The act devotes more resources to investigate and prosecute intellectual property crimes.The act also provides more resources for the U.S. government to work with other governments to improve intellectual property enforcement abroad.And probably most importantly, H.R.4279 provides a permanent and effective means of coordinating intellectual property enforcement activities.This includes the creation of an intellectual property enforcement representative in the executive office of the president, and requiring that a national strategic plan to counter intellectual property theft be created complete with clear goals and benchmarks that will facilitate accountability.I'd like very much to thank Chairman Conyers, ranking member Smith, a ranking member of the Subcommittee Cobell and all of their staffs, as well as mine for the hard work they've put into crafting this bill.The hard work shows in both the scope of the reforms and in the strong support for the bill by U.S. businesses and labor groups.And chairman Conyers outlined a number of those organizations and the broad sweep of that they cover and their strong endorsement.I'm also pleased to say that the amendments adopted in the bill before us, go a long way to alleviating concerns raised over the operational independence of agencies like the USTR and the department of justice, without compromising the underlying reforms.H.R.4279 will bolster U.S. efforts to combat counterfeiting and piracy.And I urge support of the bill and I yield back.Gentleman yields back.Gentleman from Texas.Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from North Carolina, Mr. Cobell.The ranking member of the Intellectual Property Subcommittee and a former chairman of the Intellectual Property Subcommittee as much time as he may consume.Gentleman is recognized.I thank the gentleman from Texas and Mr. Speaker at the outset.I too wanna recognize and express thanks to judiciary chairman, John Conyers, a ranking member, Lamar Smith and Subcommittee chairman Howard Berman for having made every effort to address all concerns raised during the development of this legislation .Mr. Speaker, the Prioritizing Resources and Organization for Intellectual Property Act of 2008 reflects the bi-partisan recognition and shared commitment to the scrutiny of our nation intellectual property laws.A comprehensive measure, it is not confined to making marginal improvements in the available civil and criminal authorities.Instead it incorporates bold and urgently needed provision that will permanently elevate the importance of intellectual property, IP enforcement in the future administrations .This is accomplished by providing focused and accountable strategic leadership in the executive office of the president and the key enforcement agencies.Mr. Speaker in considering why we should take steps to improve the enforcement of U.S. IP rights, members should be aware that United States losses from global copyright piracy and counterfeiting cost our innovators and entrepreneurs from 200,000 to 200 and strike that.From 200 to $250 billion each and every year.The impact in America has been widespread.More than 750,000 Americans in communities across our land have lost their jobs due to counterfeiting and piracy.Counterfeit goods lack proper control, quality control, and can be dangerous.Toothpaste, medicines, cigarettes, fake auto parts are but a small sample of the virtually unlimited supply of goods that have been counterfeited.The United States Chamber of Commerce has done an excellent job of documenting the extent of this problem.I encourage anyone interested in learning about these issues to visit the Chamber's website, for additional information or to take the time to watch the documentary \"Illicit\" which was produced by the National Geographic and the Chamber.Mr. Speaker, fighting piracy and counterfeiting, as you all know is easier said than done because most of the illicit activity occurs outside our borders.In recent years, the federal government has made progress in improving both our domestic and global enforcement efforts, but it is also clear that achieving success in the fight against piracy and counterfeiting requires government wide coordination and cooperation.In addition to all the rise in the office of the United States intellectual property enforcement representative, H.R.4279 also raises the profile of IP enforcement within the department of justice, through the creation of a new IP enforcement division.This is absolutely necessary in my opinion.The bill creates an additional 10 attach\u00e9s at the United States patent and trademark office who will be assigned to work with foreign countries to better coordinate our international enforcement efforts.And the bill enhances existing anti-piracy and counterfeiting criminal statures, authorizes grants to assist local anti-piracy and counterfeiting efforts, and directs the justice department to refine its policies for investigating and prosecuting piracy and counterfeiting operations.Before closing Mr. Speaker, I'd like to note for the record three final amendments in the that agreed to incorporate into the bill.The first is designed to harmonize the forfeiture provisions entitled to the bill.The second in section 301 places an affirmative limitation on the authority of the new IP enforcement representative that makes clear the official has no authority to control or direct law enforcement agencies in the exercise of their respective investigative or prosecutorial direction in particular cases.And the third, which amends section 323 of the bill, simply contains technical and conforming changes to make the text of the bill clearer.Finally, Mr. Speaker, I wanna recognize some of the stakeholders who have worked so diligently on this effort.Specifically, I'd like to note the efforts of the Coalition Against Counterfeiting & Piracy, which has been so ably led by Mr. Rick Cotton and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which of course is led by president Tom Donahue and the Congressional International Anti-Piracy Caucus, which is led by representative Adam Schiff of California and Bob Goodlatte of Virginia.In closing, I urge my colleagues to support H.R.4279, and I yield the balance of my time back, and I thank the distinguished gentleman from Texas for having yielded to me.Gentleman yields back, gentlemen from Michigan.Mr. Speaker, I think I have only one speaker left, but might I say a word about the distinguished ranking member, Lamar Smith of Texas, who's worked with us incredibly with deliberation, he's brought parties together.There's been a enormous amount of work behind the scenes for which nobody knows how much he's done to make this possible.I thank him publicly.And now I would yield the rest of our time to the gentlemen from Tennessee, Steve Cohen.Thank you- - Gentlemen is recognized.Thank you Mr. Chairman for the time.And I wanna thank the chairman and the chairman chairman for the work they've done and for the ranking member on this bill.I rise in support of H.R.4279, the Prioritizing Resources and Organization for Intellectual Property Act of 2007 or the PRO-IP Act.Our nation's intellectual property is the basis for our economic success and security.That is something that can't be undermined by cheap labor prices overseas, it's an American product.Therefore protecting our intellectual property must be among our highest priorities.In addition to undermining our global economic primacy counterfeit and pirated products can threaten the health and safety of American consumers, American pet owners, steal income from legitimate businesses, deprive American workers of good jobs and undermine the necessary incentive for innovation and creativity which has made America the great country that it is.It is for these reasons, I'm an original co-sponsor of the PPO-IP Act.The PRO-IP Act will help strengthen enforcement of intellectual property rights domestically and internationally through enhanced criminal and civil penalties for intellectual property crimes, better high level coordination among federal government agencies and increased resources to domestic and foreign law enforcement authorities.This bill, Mr. Speaker rightfully enjoys broad support from a wide range of industries, including the entertainment, pharmaceutical, food, automobile parts and software industries.It has such diverse partners as the Chamber of Commerce and the Teamsters.When the Chamber of Commerce and the Teamsters come together, it's like EF Hutton.We listen and we've listened well and need to pass this bill.This coalition that supports PRO-IP is indicative of the broad support and the need for passes of such legislation.I urge my colleagues to heed the words and vote in favor of this important legislation.Thank you, Mr. Speaker.Gentleman from Texas.Mr. Speaker, first of all, I'd like to thank the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, Mr. Conyers for his earlier and very generous comments.I'd also like to say, we have no further speakers on this side, so I'll yield back to balance my time.Gentleman yields back his time.Gentlemen from Michigan.Mr. Speaker, I follow suit and yield back any time remaining on this side.All time has been yielded back.The question is, will the house suspend the rules and pass H.R.4279 as amended?Those in favor say, aye.Aye.Opposed, say no.In the opinion of the chair, two thirds being in the affirmative, the rules are suspended, the bill is passed and without objection the motion to reconsider is laid on the table.Mr. Speaker.For what reason does the gentleman from the- - I object the vote on the ground that a quorum is not present and make a point of order that a quorum is not present.Pursuant to clause eight of rule 20 and the chair's prior announcement, further proceedings on this motion will be postponed.The point of no quorum is withdrawn.Mr. Speaker?On what purpose is the gentleman from Michigan rise?Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass H.R...I move to suspend the rules and pass H.R.5690 as amended, removing the African National Congress from treatment as a terrorist organization.The clerk will report the title of the bill.H.R.5690, a bill to exempt the African National Congress from treatment as a terrorist organization for certain acts or events, provide relief for certain members of the African National Congress regarding admissibility and for other purposes.Pursuant to the rule the gentleman from Michigan, Mr. Conyers, and the gentleman from Texas, Mr. Smith, each will control 20...The gentleman from Michigan, Mr. Conyers.Thank you, Mr. Speaker.I ask unanimous consent that all members have five legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and incorporate extraneous material on the bill under consideration and yield myself as much time as I may consent.Without objection sorted and the gentlemen is recognized.Members of the house, the American national Congress is a rare example of an oppressed people fighting for their freedom and then leading a successful and peaceful transition to a modern nation.The fight went on for years underground and in exile against the morally bankrupt apartheid system in South Africa.And once they prevailed the response to gaining political power was not retribution and reprisals but truth and reconciliation.Not withstanding this peaceful transition, the United States had not gotten around to giving ANC leaders the opportunity to enter this country because of certain provisions in the Immigration and Nationality Act currently require us to consider them still as terrorists.And after the attacks on 9/11, Congress sought to exclude and remove terrorists from the United States by strengthening the terrorism bars and our immigration laws.And in doing so however, we inadvertently covered groups and individuals whom we did not intend to, including allies and even victims of terrorism.These bars have been used against the brave men and women who fought side by side with the United States forces in Southeast Asia.They've been used against those who used arm resistance to defend themselves against brutal and repressive regimes, such as those in Cuba and Burma.They've been even used against women who were raped in a enslaved by armed militia in Liberia.And as we recognize today, they've been used against members of the African National Congress, including the great leader Nelson Mandela.This has had profound affects preventing us from protecting vulnerable refugees and asylum seekers and resulting in embarrassing denials of visas for Nelson Mandela himself and other foreign heads of state.We all know how Mr. Mandela and other ANC leaders suffered unjust incarceration for decades at the hands of the apartheid regime.We know how the apartheid regime labeled its opponents as terrorists, as communists, and anything else they could invent to accuse them of that was negative in an attempt to deflect criticism of their own institutions of repression and racial separation.And yet these people are steadfast, they fought for freedom and chose a path of peace, once they came to power are now blocked from entry to the United States.And so that's where this measure comes in.Congress has begun to take corrective action and last year we removed a number of freedom fighting groups from treatment as terrorist organizations.Today we do the same for the ANC and its members in addition to specifying that the ANC is not on the list of terrorist organizations under the Immigration and Naturalization Act.The bill would also give discretionary authority to secretaries of the state and Homeland Security to admit individuals regardless of activities undertaken an opposition to apartheid rule in South Africa.The bill finally would require the secretary of state in coordination with other agencies to ensure that government databases are updated so that they're consistent with exemptions provided in the bill.I'd like to thank committee chairman of the judiciary Howard Berman, but also in his capacity as a chair of the Foreign Relations Committee.And in Memorial, I'd like to remember the chairman that proceeded Mr. Berman, Tom Lantos for their work on this bill.And I would like to insert into the record at this point, an exchange of letters between our two committees as unanimous consent- - Without objection.That they be included in the record.And thanks again to the ranking member from Texas Lamar Smith, whose bipartisan discussions have enabled us to reach this point.This is a non-controversial bill, that repairs something that should have been taken care of earlier.It closes the books on the evils of apartheid, and so I'm very proud to bring this to the floor with the members that I have mentioned.I reserve the balance of my time.Gentleman from Texas.Mr. Speaker, I thank you and I yield myself such time as I may consume.Gentleman's recognized.Mr. Speaker, the African National Congress has played a significant role in history.Nelson Mandela and the ANC for many years fought against the unjust apartheid system in South Africa.Through a largely peaceful transfer of power, apartheid is a thing of the past and South Africa now has a representative democratic government.Many ANC officials are now in fact, officials of South Africa's government.South Africa provides hope, the genuine reconciliation between historically opposed groups can in fact be achieved.However, real terrorist acts were committed as part of the struggle against apartheid.There were deadly bombings of civilians, there were so-called necklace things in which car tires were put around persons necks and set on fire.I am pleased at the bill's sponsors, Mr. Berman and Miss Lofgren and Chairman Conyers, were willing to ensure that this bill will provide appropriate relief to the African National Congress without excusing the perpetrators of terrorist or criminal acts.First, the ANC is added to the list of organizations not considered terrorists organizations for immigration purposes.Such a list was created to shield certain organizations from the broad reach of the Immigration Act of 1990.Under the 1990 legislation, any guerrilla group would find itself within the definition of a terrorist organization.The groups currently on the exempt list include the Hmong who fought alongside U.S. soldiers in the Vietnam war and groups that are fighting against the repressive Burmese government today.It is understandable that the agency be added to that list.Second, the administration is granted the authority to waive the criminal grounds of admissibility with respect to aliens for activities undertaken an opposition to apartheid rule in South Africa.Congress already granted the administration waiver authority for the terrorism-related grounds and last year's omnibus spending bill.Third, the bill contains a sense of Congress that the administration should immediately exercise in appropriate instances, the authority granted under the bill to waive grounds of inadmissibility for the anti-apartheid activities of aliens who are current or former officials of the government of South Africa.I am confident that any administration will use this power wisely.Finally, the bill directs the administration to ensure that government databases used to determine admissibility to the U.S. be updated to reflect any waivers granted.Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support this bill, and again I want to thank Mr. Berman and Chairman Conyers and Chairman Loughlin for working in good faith to address concerns with the bill as it was introduced.I now reserve the balance of my time.Reserved, Gentleman from Michigan.Mr. Speaker, I'm proud now to recognize the Subcommittee chairman from which this bill came and the chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee, Howard Berman for as much time as he may consume.Gentleman is recognized.Well, thank you Mr. Speaker.It's an honor to be part of the debate on a bill being managed by the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, who perhaps was one of the first members of Congress to speak out and lead the effort against the old apartheid regime going way back into the late 60's and early 1970s, and who along with Congressman Ron Dellums and many others led the effort in 1986, I believe it was to override the veto and provide the first really tough sanctions against investment that have helped play a part in the ultimate downfall of that apartheid regime.Mr. Speaker, this bill is a long overdue one and it's the direct result of a stunning and frankly embarrassing story for the United States.The United States throughout the 1970s and 1980s had a much too cozy relationship with the apartheid government of South Africa, which had labeled the ANC as a terrorist organization.The apartheid government banned membership and political activity in the ANC and forced its leaders underground or into exile.A direct result to that ban was that under U.S. law individuals convicted of crimes, including the Nobel Laureate and former president of South Africa, Nelson Mandela, were deemed inadmissible for entry to the United States.Along with individuals labeled as terrorists by the former south African government.Much has changed for South Africa since those dark times, President de Klerk and Nelson Mandela negotiated an end to the conflict and an end to the apartheid system on behalf of the National Party and the African National Congress.In 1994 the country held its first democratic elections, in which full enfranchisement was granted.Today the ANC serves as the majority party in a diverse ruling coalition.Yet astonishingly while South Africa completed its monumental political transition, the U.S. position regarding entry for ANC's leaders remained frozen in time.Leaders such as Nelson Mandela, Walter Sisulu, Govan Mbeki, the father of president Thabo Mbeki were continually barred from entry to the U.S, and they had to apply for special waivers to gain entry.Even more embarrassing than the original U.S. embrace of apartheid policies, was the fact that few of those who opposed apartheid in the United States government, including many of us in Congress were even aware of the residual terrorist designations against ANC members.Despite recognizing two decades ago, that America's place was on the side of those oppressed by Apartheid, Congress has never resolved the inconsistency in our immigration code that treats many of those who actively oppose apartheid in South Africa as terrorists and criminals, in part because the apartheid regime labeled them as such.Increasingly stringent security measures passed by Congress since 2001 have further ensnared ANC members because the ANC used armed force as part of its campaign against the repressive apartheid regime in South Africa.Current law continues to regard the ANC as a terrorist organization, and to deny entry to members based on their affiliation with the ANC. The intent of H.R.5690 is to purge the United States of any residual effect of its former policies with regard to the south African government and to update U.S. law with regard to the ANC. The bill as mentioned specifically removes the ANC from treatment as a terrorist organization, and grants the secretary of state and the secretary of Homeland Security, the discretionary authority to determine that certain criminal and security related grounds of inadmissibility do not apply to an alien with respect to activities undertaken in opposition to apartheid rule in South Africa.I wanna take a moment just to compliment again, the ranking member of the Judiciary Committee, who has a very strong and passionate views on the issues of immigration.And obviously also as we all do in this chamber on the issue of terrorist organizations and inadmissibility for those organizations.He has truly understood and internalized the historic transition here and the unfairness of the present situation.And I do wanna affirm one point that he raised.This bill does not have anyone close their eyes to acts committed by the ANC or by the apartheid government and nothing here would preclude the secretary as she exercises her discretion from considering whether or not civilians were targeted by an individual act of civilians.We should also take into account as we decided what to do on this, the very powerful and legally binding truth and reconciliation process in South Africa, which provided a restorative justice process that solved many of the wounds of the apartheid era.Once enacted, the ANC will be removed from terrorist watchlist, the ANC will receive the treatment befitting its status as a leading party and a close ally of the United States.I urge my colleagues to support the legislation and yield back the balance of my time.Gentleman from Texas.Mr. Speaker, first of all, I'd like to say that it's always nice when the gentleman from California, Mr. Berman and I can agree on immigration issues as we did it in this particular instance.Mr. Speaker I'll yield as much time as he may consume to the gentleman from Iowa, Mr. King, the ranking member of the Immigration Subcommittee of the Judiciary Committee.Gentleman it's recognized.Thank you Mr. Speaker, I thank Mr. Smith the ranking member of the immigration Subcommittee for yielding and appreciate the privilege to address this issue before this Congress.First, I wanna point out that I believe there's been a constructive compromise has been reached across this aisle that has not necessarily closed loopholes, but made some clarification that help protect this country from a kind of a blanket waiver, so to speak with any of those formerly potentially violent members of the ANC. And for me, I come to this debate with more concern than many, because I still maintain vivid memories of what went on in the streets of South Africa during those anti-apartheid riots and demonstrations and strategic actions that took place, black against white, white against black.I also have vivid memories Mr. Speaker, of actions taken in this country and positions taken politically and the divesting of investments within South Africa by many American companies as an incentive to end apartheid, which was I believe a sin against humanity to have a policy that identified some people as being more equal than others.And I believe it's a sin against humanity to maintain those policies, whether they are in the United States or South Africa or anywhere else.I offered an amendment to the Judiciary Committee before this bill, and the purpose of it was to send a message because I have traveled to South Africa and I have met with people there who expressed to me some concerns.And I asked of them because of that, I've also dug a little deeper into their readings in the current events.And it will be not a surprise to the members of the committee that I'm concerned about the land transfer.That is part of the federal policy of South Africa to transfer a significant portion of land from right now under the deeds held by white south Africans into the deeds of black south Africans.I made it clear in the committee that I do not compare this to the things we see going on in Zimbabwe.That is far different, and that is without benefit of rule of law, but there still remains a concern.I also want to point out and I promised ambassador Welile Nhlapo, who is the ambassador to the United States from South Africa that I would make the statement.And he came to my office yesterday, We sat down in my office for a good strong hour and discussed these issues.And he assured me that there are constitutional protections that exist and statutory protections that exist to protect all property owners in South Africa, and that there will not be a transfer of real estate property into the hands of black south Africans at the expense of white south Africans without due process of law and constitutional protections.I've voiced my concern about that.He reassured me that that would be the case, and I pointed out to him that it's difficult for us in this country to reach an objective position on these issues that are racially charged, because it's so much wrapped up in who we are.And I would point out Mr. Speaker, that for the observation of the body, that to listen to an analysis of the political campaigns that are going on now, and in fact today to listen to an analysis of the predictions of those going to the polls and the Democrat primary in places like Indiana and North Carolina, which are taking place right now.You cannot hear a political pundit talking head analysis without race and gender coming into that debate.And so I challenged the Ambassador Malabo, that's a very difficult standard that we can't meet it here in this country as old as our traditions are for freedom, as much sweat and toil and blood has been spilled to keep people free, make them free and keep them free, we still can't extricate ourselves from being wrapped up in that debate.And may I have our public policy identified by how we might side, whom we might side with, rather than how we might analyze the constitution or the law.It's difficult here in the United States with our traditions, it's far more difficult in South Africa.We had that discussion, it was a constructive discussion.And I rise today Mr. Speaker, to support this bill and to encourage an open dialogue globally and continuing communication and interchange with the people of South Africa and people of all nations on the earth.I would remind also the body that the record of post-colonial Africa is not a stellar record.And there are many problems in the continent, many of those in the Southern part of the continent of Africa.And as I travel and visit there and go into the Aids orphanages in particular, and can step into villages where there isn't a single adult of reproductive age, unless they're a missionary.It has been devastating to the continent.And we need to have an open dialogue and be frank about our problems and be open in our discussion.And hiding our dialogue because we're afraid we might hurt someone's feelings only pushes the problem further downward, instead of letting it surface so that we can all address it together with open eyes, open ears and open dialogue.That's what we did yesterday and my meeting, which I so gratefully received Ambassador Nhlapo into my office and in that engaging conversation, I'm confident that we've opened up communications for a continued dialogue, and I trust that this bill will open communications for further dialogue.And I certainly support this and I yield back the balance of my time.Gentleman yields back, gentleman from Michigan.I rise to recognize the distinguish gentlelady from Texas, Sheila Jackson Lee, who's worked with Steve King and suggest that there may be a CODEL going to this part of the globe.And I would certainly like to invite the distinguished gentlemen, Mr. King, to consider joining us on such a CODEL. I yield the gentlelady from Texas at least three and a half minutes.For at least three and a half minutes.I thank the speaker and I ask unanimous consent to revise and extend.I thank the distinguished chairman of the Judiciary Committee, distinguished chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee and distinguished ranking member who has joined us in a very important and historic step that is being made on the floor of the house today.And I appreciate my good friend from Iowa who has given us a global overview, but I wanna remind my colleagues that this is a pointed and focus legislative initiative, along with the leadership of Chairwoman Zoe Lofgren, that we have gotten to a point that is long overdue.My good friends, the Congresswoman Barbara Lee and Congressman Don Payne were part of those who initiated this effort, and it is pointedly to focus on really what we would call heroes.Fighters against apartheid in South Africa who shed their blood.So that South Africa could be the reconciled nation that it is today.President Mbeki, former President Mandela, Father Mandela as he is called.And many of the seniors who are now in their retiring years, who when they come to the United States are detained, interrogated and embarrassed by our own treatment of these heroes.This goes to the very point of the expanded use in the United States of the word terrorism and the utilization of it by preventing innocent people, people who have been heroes to come into this country.This is not necessarily a strict immigration bill, it is people who are coming into the country legally.But because they have been freedom fighters, somewhat the way that Dr. Martin Luther king stood non-violently for rights here in this country, these individuals had to be in the midst of a encounter if you will, to provide the safety and security for their people.This particular legislation is an important step forward, but I might suggest to my colleagues that I hope that on the floor today, we're making a legislative statement and providing legislative history so that the department of Homeland Security and the secretary of state, or the state department will not dilly dally around.Because unlike the previous legislation, this does not order it to be done, it gives those departments, the discretion to be done as they have requested.And so we are trusting in them, we're entrusting to them this noble responsibility to do well by Father Mandela, to do well by President Mbeki or former President Mbeki.And we need to ensure that we do the right thing, and as we look to make this country and to give this country a different face on terrorism, let us likewise be assured of that we recognize that there are other groups that are similarly situated that we should take a look at.So I rise to support this legislation, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Speaker, because it is an important step forward.It does give the ability to admit these individuals were to remove the stigma if you will, of the name of terrorists because they were freedom fighters, to save and preserve and to free our South Africans so that they too might live in a democracy.That is what this legislation does, and I appreciate all of the hard work that is going on.Let me just as an aside indicate that I was not here for H.R.4279 on the intellectual property, and I support it enthusiastically.We'll put a statement in the record.I close by simply saying, good day for the freedom fighters of South Africa and the ANC. Good day for father Mandela who led the fight on reconciliation and peace along with Bishop Tutu, good day for all of them, as we stand here acknowledging that they are heroes, freedom fighters fighting for democracy and equality.To the Secretary of State, the Secretary of Homeland Security, act now, once this bill is passed.I yield back.Gentleman from Texas.Mr. Speaker I have no further speakers on this side now and I'll yield back to balance my time.Gentleman yields back his time.Mr. Speaker, I rise to recognize the gentlelady from Oakland, California, Barbara Lee, who for many years worked as chief of staff with our former colleague, Ron Dellums on this subject.So in her capacity as member of Congress and former staffer, she has stayed on the course for all of these years, and I yield her as much time as she may consume.Gentlewoman is recognized.Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.And let me thank you, Chairman Conyers for yielding and for those kind words but also for your leadership on so many issues.You are a true warrior and we would never be at this place today, had it not been for yourself.I also want to thank chairman Berman, I wanna thank our Subcommittee, chairman, Don Payne and Chairman Bennie Thompson for their leadership on so many issues, and for making sure that this bill came today to this floor in a bipartisan fashion.As a co-sponsor with this legislation and along advocate against apartheid, I am especially pleased that we are taking this important step to finally right this inexcusable wrong.Many of us were arrested during the anti-apartheid movement, myself included.It wasn't until the mid '80s that finally Congress put our country on the right side of history by overriding President Reagan's Veto to impose sanctions.This was a bill that my predecessor, a great warrior, now the mayor of Oakland, California, Ron Dellums had introduced for 12 long years.I can remember during that period, the ILW for example, protested.In fact, I was arrested with them also, the unloading of ships from South Africa, which kicked off much of the Anti-Apartheid Movement.Congresswoman Maxine Waters is a great leader, who just recently received as then Mayor Ron Dellums one of the highest honors by the South African government.She led the fight in California against apartheid, and I think we were one of the first states to impose sanctions.All of us who were involved during that time, you had to take risks.The ANC couldn't even travel outside of New York, couldn't come to Washington DC because they were considered a terrorist organization.Many of us had to go to Europe just to meet the members of the ANC, to talk about how we could help in the brutal regime of apartheid which was killing so many people, dehumanizing the whole country and was one of the most ruthless systems that we have ever known.It's been 18 years since Nelson Mandela was released from prison.14 years since he was elected president of South Africa.And this year he will turn 90-years-old, yet to this day, to this day, despite his legacy as a hero of the Anti-Apartheid Movement, despite the fact that he is a Nobel Peace Prize recipient, he received the peace prize in 1993.Despite his election as president, we still required Nelson Mandela to apply for a Visa Waiver to enter into the United States just for a visit.This is just plain wrong.Last December, I traveled to South Africa for World Aids Day with our colleague, Congresswoman Donna Christian-Christensen.And we were asked by many people many times over and over and over again, why President Nelson Mandela was still on the terrorist list?Well, we were quite frankly very embarrassed and shocked, and we were determined that we would do everything we could to finally again, put our country on the right side of history.So I am pleased and I'm excited that we are taking this step today.The ANC was fundamentally involved in a war of liberation, against the oppressive apartheid regime in South Africa for over four decades.If they hadn't been involved in this war of liberation, apartheid would still be existing in South Africa.So instead of continuing to penalize the ANC for their political struggle against apartheid, we really should be commending them for their work in transforming South Africa into a beacon of democracy, and just look at how they have moved forward in their peace and reconciliation process.I think we could learn a heck of a lot in our own country by the leadership of President Mandela and how the people of South Africa, black and white have come together to reconcile and to move forward to take South Africa into this new millennium, into a new South Africa.So let me just thank again, chairman Conyers and chairman Berman for bringing this bill to the floor today, it's really the right thing to do.And for those of us who have been so long involved in the Anti-Apartheid Movement, and now of course in the movement to stop the genocide that's taking place in Darfur, this is a day that we been waiting for a long time, this is the only thing that we can do now to say, first of all, that we understand that this should not have taken so long, but at least better late than never.Thank you very much, Mr. Conyers.Gentleman from Michigan.No further requests for time, I thank the gentlelady, Barbara Lee of Oakland, California for closing our statement and I return all and yours time.All time has expired, the question is, will the house suspend the rules and pass H.R.5690 as amended?Those in favor say, aye.Opposed say, no.The opinion of the chair, two thirds being in the affirmative, the rules are suspended.The bill is passed and without objection, the motion to reconsider is laid on the table.Mr. Speaker, I object to the vote on the ground that a quorum is not present and make a point of order that a quorum is not present.Pursuant to clause eight of rule 20, and the chair's prior announcement further proceedings on this motion will be postponed.Point of no quorum is withdrawn.For what purpose is gentlewoman from California rise?Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass H.R.1512.Clerk will report the title of the bill.H.R.1512, a bill to amend the Immigration and Nationality Act to provide for compensation to states incarcerating undocumented aliens, charged with a felony or two or more misdemeanors.Pursuant to the rule, the gentlewoman from California, Ms. Sanchez, and the gentlemen from Iowa, Mr. King, each will control 20 minutes.The chair now recognizes the gentlewoman from California, Ms. Sanchez.Thank you, Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all members have five legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on the bill under consideration.And I yield myself.Without objection, sorted.I yield myself such time as I may consent.Gentlewoman is recognized.Thank you.Mr. Speaker, today we act to restore the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program or SCAAP, to its original meaning, that which Congress originally intended it to have.Introduced by myself, H.R.1512 will help states obtain much needed reimbursement for the cost of detaining deportable illegal immigrants charged with or convicted of certain criminal offenses.SCAAP was created in 1994 to reimburse states and localities for arrest, incarceration and transportation costs incurred in detaining criminal aliens.From the program since inception until 2003, states were able to obtain reimbursement for the costs of detaining deportable illegal immigrants, charged with a felony or two or more misdemeanors.In 2003 however, DOJ reinterpreted the SCAAP statute to require that a criminal alien be actually convicted of a felony or two misdemeanors.Moreover, the reimbursement must be requested in the year in which the conviction takes place and is limited to that one year, regardless of how long the expenses are incurred.Not surprisingly, this novel reinterpretation which contradicted Congress' clear intent as well as DOJ's consistent interpretation from 1994 to 2003, caused every state's reimbursement to fall dramatically.H.R.1512 would amend the Immigration and Nationality Act to return SCAAP to its originally intended Meaning.States and localities would be reimbursed for the cost of incarcerating criminal aliens, who are either charged with or convicted of a felony or two misdemeanors, regardless of when the incarceration and conviction occur.H.R.1512 corrects the current administrations errant reinterpretation of the law and provide states and localities burdened by the cost of jailing criminal aliens, the opportunity to apply for and receive much needed reimbursement for the cost they bear from detaining deportable, criminal alien immigrants charged with crimes.The bill has broad bipartisan support and the support of many respected law enforcement groups.I would like to especially commend Zoe Lofgren, chair of the immigration Subcommittee, and Steve king, the Subcommittee ranking member for their leadership and helping bring this bill to the floor today.I urge my colleagues to support this bill, pardon me, to support this bill and I reserve the balance of my time.Gentlemen from Iowa.Mr. Speaker, I yield myself so much time, as I may consume.Gentleman is recognized.Thank you, Mr. Speaker, the federal government under the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program, which we refer to as SCAAP, reimburses part of the expenses that states and localities incur in incarcerating illegal immigrants who have been convicted of a felony or of two or more misdemeanors.And in fact, I would bring the Chamber's attention Mr. Speaker, to a report that was issued by the GAO in April 2005, that identifies that the federal government's reimbursing 25% of the costs of the incarceration of criminal aliens within the institutions in the United States.But H.R.1512 expands the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program to compensate states for incarcerating illegal immigrants who are charged with, and not only convicted as under their wishes under the current program, charged with a felony or two or more misdemeanors.And I stand here Mr. Speaker, and applaud the gentlelady from California for bringing this legislation, and because I think this is a constructive change to our policy and the language very simply adds the words \"Charged with or\" to the existing language of compensation for those convicted of.And it recognizes that there's significant cost involved and processing criminal aliens and the investigation, the arrest stage and the indictment stage.And as those costs amount and are incurred, we need to be sure that we take this position.That the federal government's job it is to guard and protect our borders.That is not the job of a political subdivision, that's essentially the job of the federal government.When we fail to do our job, when we don't have sufficient constraints in place at our borders or at our airports or our ports of entry, then the result of it is that this burden of law enforcement falls upon the political subdivisions on the states, on the cities and on the counties to enforce the law, and when they do, they incur these costs.This bill is H.R.1512 seeks to lift off some of that burden, and it certainly wouldn't be all of it.Lamar Smith, the ranking member of the full Judiciary Committee.And I both believe the available statistics on criminal, illegal immigrants in the United States leave much to be desired.There's too little data on illegal immigrants in prison in the United States.We don't really know how many there are or what crimes they are charged with or convicted of, or how long is time they spend in our prison systems.And I particularly can speak to that since I asked for the GAO study that was completed in April of 2005.I thought in that study, I would get the answers to the percentages of our inmate populations that are criminal aliens, what crimes they might have convicted, and in quite a list of things it would help us establish our policy, both law enforcement policy and our immigration policy.However, that report came back, not quite apples to apples, and there are conclusions that can be drawn, there are also gaps to their knowledge base.And because of the inspiration that's brought forward because of this bill of Ms. Sanchez, H.R.1512, we engaged into the Judiciary Committee and dialogue about how we can better gather that information.And I'm really pleased that Ms. Lofgren, the chair of the Immigration Subcommittee, of which I'm the ranking member and Mr. Smith, the ranking member of the full Judiciary Committee, have agreed to send a joint request to the general accountability office to develop additional statistics on criminal alien immigrants.And I look forward to working with Ms. Lofgren and Mr. Smith and others on this particular subject matter.And this is something we vitally need to provide statistics that will help us establish a better immigration policy.And as we move forward with this piece of legislation that I believe is a constructive move in the right direction, that helps to compensate, and it won't be all, but it'll be at least in part help compensate the political subdivisions for their costs incurred to enforce the laws against the criminal aliens, as it adds to it, those charged with the crime, not just those convicted of a crime or two serious misdemeanors.But into this negotiation also will be the formal request for the GAO study to look further at the effect of crime on the United States of America by criminal aliens.And the question has got to be constantly before us, since we are charged with the responsibility of protecting the American people.And it's very much a constitutional responsibility, and we're also constitutionally charged with the responsibility of establishing immigration policy, and the executive branch is charged with the responsibility of enforcing that policy, however aggressive or lack of aggressivity they might have.And the result is some get through the borders, through our ports of entry.Some commit crimes and some of those crimes that are committed are of a very heinous nature.And the cost of those crimes against this society can be quantified, if we can identify the numbers of crimes that are being committed by criminal aliens and in what categories they are in.Where they are being incarcerated, what length of terms they are serving, and especially Mr. Speaker, when they're released.When they're released from a municipal jail or a county jail, or a state penitentiary let alone from a federal institution.When they are released, we need to know if they're released into the hands of ICE, if they have been processed for deportation, if that happens to be the law, or if they're released back into the streets.And if they are, we need to ask the question, are there committing further crimes?So what is the level of effectiveness in our law enforcement system?How many, what percentage of our overall crimes are being committed by criminal aliens?What are those crimes?What's the price against society and how does this break down into all of these categories that I've mentioned in a fashion that will allow us as a Congress to prudently step back, take the empirical data that we are expecting to receive from the General Accountability Office, after the submission of this request and process that into policy that reflects the best interest of the people in the United States of America.I think this bill is a healthy step in the right direction, I think it's the prudent thing to do, and I think it says the right thing to the people in America, Mr. Speaker.And I applaud the gentlelady for bringing H.R.1512, and I support the expansion of SCAAP funding to those who have been also charged with the crime.And I would reserve the balance of my time.Gentleman reserves, gentlewoman from California.Mr. Speaker, may I inquire how many more speakers that Mr. King has remaining?I have no further speakers.I reserve the right to close, so if the gentleman would like to- - Gentleman from Iowa, - I thank the gentlelady I yield myself as much time as I may consume.Gentleman is recognized.Just in summation, Mr. Speaker, this is a component of taking this legislation in the right direction.And it's important that we compensate political subdivisions.When the federal government's not doing the job they need to be doing, this is a natural result of it and I expect that this has come from our request of those political subdivisions, although they aren't making this request necessarily in my district.There are many jails in my district that will be beneficiaries of this piece of legislation.And so I urge it's adoption, and I yield back the balance of my time.Gentleman yields back.Gentlewoman from California.Thank you, Mr. Speaker, immigration is probably the signature federal policy issue.Try as they might states simply can't fix failures and Federal Immigration Policy on their own.But when we fall down on the job, states, cities and counties bear the burden for an immigration system that simply isn't working.While Congress is working on a comprehensive solution to our broken immigration system, we must not forget about the local governments who are paying an extremely high cost as a result of our inaction.In 1994, Congress passed the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program, SCAAP to reimburse states and localities for the arrest, incarceration and transportation costs associated with criminal aliens.Averting a tidal wave of expenses that could have overwhelmed those state and local budgets.However, in 2003 the department of justice reinterpreted the SCAAP statute and caused as drastic drop in every state's reimbursement.Now states no longer receive reimbursements unless first the criminal alien is convicted of a felony or two misdemeanors.And second, the arrest and conviction occur in the same year.To add insult to injury, President Bush has zeroed out SCAAP in his budget proposals for the last six years.This means that state and local governments are left to pick up the tab.Every dollar reduction in SCAAP reimbursements is one less dollar that law enforcement agencies have to hire new officers, provide essential training, make critical equipment purchases and detain other perhaps more violent inmates.Following the SCAAP funding cuts in 2003, the LA County Sheriff's Department implemented a new early release policy for inmates convicted of misdemeanors.This means the neighborhoods I represent in Southern California are at risk.Sadly, these communities are not alone.Across the country, the SCAAP reimbursement cuts have had a domino effect where funding for anti-gang activities, homicide investigations, anti-terrorism activities, and even basic maintenance is cut to pay for expenses associated with incarcerating criminal aliens and suspected criminal aliens.As Arizona County supervisors recently stated, this is a huge problem because we can't keep up with fixing roads, the other cost of law enforcement, and keeping up with health agencies.While this bill on its own, won't solve the fiscal crisis many states now face, it will help in the longterm by covering a greater share of costs that properly belong to the federal government.H.R.1512 amends the SCAAP statute, so that states and localities can be reimbursed for the cost of incarcerating aliens who are either charged with or convicted of a felony or two misdemeanors, just like it was before the DOJ's re-interpretation in 2003.This federal investment will allow state and local enforcement agencies to devote more resources to important public safety programs.Law enforcement agencies and coalitions from all over the country, including The U.S/Mexico Border Counties Coalition, The National Association of Counties, The California State Association of Counties, The Sheriff's Association of Texas, and the Virginia Sheriff's Association support this bipartisan legislation.Lastly, I wanna offer thanks and gratitude to my colleagues on both sides of the aisle for passing this bill unanimously through the Judiciary Committee, and for bringing it to the floor today without any amendments.We may not agree on many aspects of immigration policy, but this bill accomplishes a larger goal making our community safer, and for that reason I appreciate your support.I urge my colleagues to support their local law enforcement agencies by voting for this bill, and I yield back the remainder of my time.All time has expired, the question is, will the house suspend the rules and pass H.R.1512?Those in favor say, aye.Oppose say no.And the opinion of the chair, two thirds being in the affirmative, the rules are suspended, the bill is passed and without objection, the motion to reconsider is laid upon the table.Mr. Speaker.For what purpose is the gentleman from- - I object to the vote on the ground that a quorum is not present and make a point of order the quorum is not present.Pursuant to clause eight of rule 20, and the chair's prior announcement, further proceedings on this motion will be postponed, the point of no quorum is withdrawn.Pursuant to clause eight of rule 20, proceedings we'll resume on questions previously postponed.Votes will be taken in the following order.Motion to suspend the rules with regard to H.R.3658, H.Cong.Rec 317, H.Rec 1109, H.2929, in each case, the no vote, and motion to instruct on H.R.2419 by the yeas and nays.The first electronic vote will be conducted as a 15 minute vote.Remaining electronic votes will be conducted as a five minute vote.The unfinished business is the question of suspending the rules and passing H.R.3658, which the clerk will report by title.H.R 3658, a bill to amend the Foreign Service Act of 1980, to permit rest and recuperation travel to United States territories for members of the foreign service.The question is, will the house suspend the rules and pass the bill?So many of us are in favor say, aye.Those opposed say no.In the opinion of the chair, two thirds- - Mr. Speaker?Being in the affirmative, the rules are suspended.Mr. Speaker?Gentlemen from New Jersey.I ask for the yeas and nays.The yeas and nays are requested, those favoring a vote by the yeas and nays will rise.A sufficient number is in, the yeas and nays are ordered.Members will record the votes by electronic device, this will be a 15 minute vote to be followed by five minute votes.A round of a four votes suspension bills, bills debated yesterday.They just wrapped up debate on four or so suspension bills dealing with issues like intellectual property, National Nurses Week, and also the African National Congress, exempting that group's treatment as a terrorist organization in the recent last week's State Department annual report on a terrorist organizations.It's a 15 minute vote here on the house floor, and we've seen some procedural votes already today.And if on the Republican side, as they are upset about the Democrats bringing the Iraq funding bill, the additional spending in Iraq and Afghanistan to the house floor.Plans are to bring it to the house floor by Thursday.So it seems a couple of procedural votes so far in the U.S. House.Meanwhile, over in the Senate, they've been working on FAA programs bill, they've moved on to the National Flood Insurance bill, and you can follow Senate coverage of course, on C-SPAN 2.Committee we covered earlier, a hearing that you'll see later in our program schedule, a congressional quarterly writing about the judiciary Subcommittee hearing today.They voted to authorize a subpoena for Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, as part of an investigation into the legality of controversy of Bush administration Counter-Terrorism Policies, the Subcommittee on the constitution by a voice vote authorized the subpoena of David S Addington, who served as Vice President Cheney's legal counsel before becoming his chief of staff in 2005.That Subcommittee met earlier today, and again, you'll have a chance to see it later in our program schedule.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/house_proceeding_05-06-08_00.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/house_proceeding_05-06-08_00.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/house_proceeding_05-06-08_00.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/mv_house_proceeding_05-21-07/house_proceeding_05-21-07.mp3", "text": "Members for lists submitted by the majority and minority leaders for the morning hour debate.The chair will alternate recognition between the parties, with each party limited to 30 minutes and each member, other than the majority of minority leaders and the minority equip limited to five minutes.The chair recognize gentlewoman from California, Mrs.Allard, for five minutes.Robella Allard.Mr. Speaker, to help address domestic violence in our country, I rise to announce the reintroduction of the Security and Financial Empowerment Act, or as it is better known, the SAFE act.Domestic violence is a personal and social tragedy that negatively impacts all of our society.On average, every day on our country, more than three women are murdered by their husband or boyfriend and nearly one third of American women report being physically or sexually abused by a husband or boyfriend at some point in their lives.The physical and psychological consequences of domestic violence are exacerbated by the less obvious economic consequences.For example, one of the key reasons survivors stay in or return to an abusive environment is because they are financially dependent upon their abuser to provide for them and their children.As a result of the abuse, employed women often lose their jobs due to frequent tardiness or absenteeism, or because their abuser stalks and harasses them at work.To help break this cycle of violence, I have introduced the SAFE Act with representative Ted Poe.The SAFE Act would provide employed survivors of domestic violence with greater employment protections and increased economic stability.Specifically, the SAFE Act would enable the survivors of domestic violence to pursue legal assistance and medical care and meet other immediate needs associated with violence in their lives without the fear of losing their job.If survivors of abuse are fired or forced to leave their job as a result of the abuse, the SAFE Act makes them eligible for unemployment benefits.The SAFE Act also helps employers address the negative impact of domestic violence in the workplace.While it is true that domestic violence is a personal tragedy, It is also true that it has costly negative consequences to employers who pay an estimated three to $13 billion a year sick leave, absenteeism, and loss productivity.The SAFE Act helps businesses save money by helping to reduce absenteeism and lost productivity and by enabling businesses to retain valuable and experienced employees, thereby avoiding the high cost associated with training new staff.In summary, the SAFE Act empowers survivors of domestic violence, it protects the bottom line of business, and it improves the quality of life of our American society.Mr. Speaker, I thank the many advocacy groups for their support of the SAFE Act and for the work they do every day to end domestic and sexual violence in our country.And I sincerely thank representative Poe for his co-sponsorship and I look forward to working with him and my colleagues in Congress to pass the SAFE Act and empower women against the violence in their life.I yield back the balance of my time.The chair recognizes the gentleman from Massachusetts, Mr. McGovern for five minutes.Mr. Speaker today is my final day on the food stamp challenge, an initiative where public officials eat for one week on a food stamp budget $21 for the week.That's three dollars a day or one dollar meal.This amount reflects the national average of food stamp benefit.Mr. Speaker, the purpose of the food stamp challenge is to raise awareness of the crucial role the food stamp program serves in the lives of 26 million Americans each month, including over 450,000 in my state of Massachusetts.Three of my esteemed colleagues, representative Joanne Emerson, Jan Schakowsky, and Tim Ryan joined me in taking this challenge over the past week.And although we may be less energetic and perhaps crankier than when we started the challenge nearly a week ago, each of us has learned a great deal.Certainly my wife, Lisa and I have gained valuable insights from our experience on a very tight budget.We have much more sympathy over how the lack of energy and the hard choices on how to stretch the budget and put food on the table might also stretch one's patience and stress a marriage.We can imagine the worry and pain of parents if we had to feed our children on this kind of budget.These are just a few of our reflections over the past week.Yet, truly our most valuable lesson came from the scores of individuals who reached out to us to share their personal experiences struggling to put food on the table for their families.Whether they posted comments on our blog or call my office and spoke with my staff, these individuals Todd Lee sent me about how hard working Americans managed to provide for themselves and their families in spite of inadequate food stamp benefit levels.They talked about having to make tough trade-offs between paying utility bills, buying clothes for their children, addressing medical needs and purchasing food.They also described the trade-off between eating to be healthy or eating to be full.These kinds of trade-offs are unfair and unacceptable.Mr. Speaker, America can and should do more for low income individuals and families working hard to survive each and every day.One way we can do that is through the Feeding America's Families Act, a bill that I introduced earlier this month with my colleague Congresswoman Joanne Emerson.The Feeding America's Families Act, which strengthen the food stamp program to better meet the needs of low income Americans.It raises the minimum benefit from $10 a month, an amount that has not increased since the 1970s, to about $30 a month.It also indexes current benefit levels to the rate of inflation, ensuring that the purchasing power of food stamps remains constant.Furthermore, because access to the food stamp program should be the right of every lawfully residing person in this country.The bill restores eligibility to all legal immigrants, a provision that was removed in 1996.On Sunday May 13th, Mother's Day, the New York times editorial stated that, and I quote, \"Bull string food stamps must be Congress's top priority in this year's farm bill\".End quote.Well, I could not agree more.In my week on the food stamp challenge has not only strengthened my conviction, I encourage all of my colleagues to co-sponsor HR 21 29, Feeding America's Families Act, and other legislative efforts to bolster and improve our federal hunger and nutrition programs.The cliche tells us that where there's a will, there's a way.But in this case, there was a very clear way.The question is, do we have the political will?I hope we do.Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.Now recognizes the gentleman from Colorado, Mr. Salazar for five minutes.Thank you, Mr. Speaker.Mr. Speaker, this morning, as we stand here in our nation's Capitol, family and friends in Colorado are gathered together to celebrate the life of a truly great American, a wonderful human being.The child of a Mexican immigrant, Eva R. Baca was born on January 1st, 1929 in Pueblo, Colorado.She graduated from Pueblo Central High School and attended Southern Colorado State College.Mrs.Baca, as a member of the first graduating class in 1965.As a widowed mother of two, she balanced motherhood in her studies while attending Adam State College and receiving her Masters in education in 1968.Upon graduation, Mrs.Baca taught at Lakeview and Ella elementary schools.She went on to get her principal certification, and in 1972 she took her first administrative position at the new Eastwood Heights Elementary School.There she instituted new reading programs for children and for low income families.Eva Baca was a strong advocate for the community in which she lived and worked to provide opportunities and increased accessibility of Pueblo's isolated east side neighborhoods.In 1983, Eva Baca was named director of title one programs for Pueblo school district number 60, a position she held for a decade until her retirement.Eva Baca has been recognized throughout Colorado and across the country with various honors and awards.Everyone who had the privilege of knowing her has a wonderful story to tell.Most recently she received the lifetime achievement award by the Pueblo Latino chamber of commerce for her outstanding educational leadership and contributions to the lives of countless children in her community.On Thursday, Eva Baca passed away in Pueblo.She was a loving mother to Joyce and Robert Anderson, Gilbert Baca, a cherished grandmother to Carl, Megan, Lindsey, and Nick.She was a fearless educator and a dear friend.In 1993, Eastwood Heights Elementary School, the school that she gave so many years of her life, was renamed in her honor.Today, 250 children attend Mr. Eva R. Baca Elementary School.A living tribute to a woman who has spent her life focused on those around her.John Lubbock wrote, \"The important thing is not so much that every child should be taught as that every child should be given the wish to learn\".For the countless children that Eva Baca had given the wish to learn, we thank her.I yield back.Pursue into clause 12-A of rule one the chair declares the host in recess until noon today.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/house_proceeding_05-21-07.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/house_proceeding_05-21-07.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/house_proceeding_05-21-07.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/mv_house_proceeding_09-04-07_00/house_proceeding_09-04-07_00.mp3", "text": "With the conference in the coming days.And I reserve the balance of my time.Gentlemen from Michigan.My speaker, thank you.I compliment my colleague.I thank you for the support on this motion to instruct.And with that, I would also then like a yield three minutes to my colleague from Utah, Mr. Bishop.Gentleman's recognized for three minutes.Thank you, Mr. Speaker, allow me rhetorically if I can, just to concentrate on one issue.The one at hand, which is the significant proposal, the motion to instruct made by the gentleman from Michigan.As a member of the armed services committee, as well as the education committee, I strongly support this extremely important motion that has been given to us today.In the day in July, when my state celebrates the arrival of the pioneers into Salt Lake Valley in a remote Pakistani town, the Pakistani police were closing in on one house that had been given as an intelligence tip that a top Taliban leader was inside.According to the Washington Post, this Taliban leader, Abdul Massoud, if I pronounced that properly, it's a very short round man in his early 30s who had been active in the Taliban commander in Pakistan for many years, amazingly though this same man had been among the first military detainees at Guantanamo and had been released in 2004.And upon his release, what did he do?Let's go back to Pakistan, once again, working with the Taliban, helping Al Qaeda infiltrators coming into the rugged mountains area of Pakistan, but on this fateful day, back in July with a Pakistani police closing in, this top Taliban leader who only the year before had been leading terrorist activities against mosques had kidnapped a couple of Chinese engineers and who knows what else?Pulled the pin on a hand grenade and blew himself up rather than resubmit to the authorities.It's memorable or reminds one of the extravagances that took place in March of 2004 in Madrid.When the subway bombings killed 200, injured 2,000 people.This Al-Qaeda inspired terrorist activity and the leaders of that were tracked down by Spanish authorities.And as they surrounded the apartment where they had the terrorists, the Al Qaeda terrorists had preplanned their own self martyrdom by having wired their own apartment.So as the police close in upon them, they push the button, not only blowing themselves up, but also almost imploding the entire building, which would have killed hundreds of other innocent victims.Now, the reason Mr. Speaker that I present these two anecdotal stories is simply these people are not nice people.They're murderers of the worst sort.They're ideologically driven to kill, and they would stop at nothing to try and kill as many men, women, and children, if possible, in their goals of maximizing the amount of pain and destruction, especially those relating to us.They do not belong on American soil nor do they belong to be released back to their own countries where they can reorganize again in this war, not just again on terror, but also the war against civilization and basic humanity.The motion to instruct asked this conference to accept the language passed and similar bill in the Senate on an overwhelming 94 to three vote that rejects transferring a terrorist detained in Guantanamo to the United States soil.Our system of, our penal system, as we envision it is one of rehabilitation.Obviously these people have not to be, have not been rehabilitated.And as we discussed, what we will do was our options.As we discuss any kind of closure that may take place.And at Guantanamo, we should all be honestly, say which options are not acceptable.Moving any of these prisoners to the United States is simply not acceptable.Returning them to their homes is simply not acceptable.Destroying the intelligence value we have at Guantanamo is simply not acceptable.The sense of the Congress resolution...Gentleman's time is expired.Yield my colleague and extra minute.Gentlemen is recognized for an extra minute.I thank the gentleman from Michigan and the speaker, and I'll talk faster.This sense of the Congress resolution simply is one of those things that this body, the people's body, the house of representatives should overwhelmingly support.I cannot imagine anyone honestly, believing it is a good idea to close Guantanamo and bring these individuals into our neighborhoods and into our backyard nor to release them back to their country of origin, where they be free to reorganize themselves.As Mr. McConnell said, in the Florida Bay, this is not a motion simply for the status quo.Flexibility of what are our choices will be, would still be allowed.But it does clearly say that the one option that is not acceptable would be closing of Guantanamo Base with the only option being a removing these people and bringing them back into our neighborhoods, back into our homes and back on American soil.And for that, I appreciate what the gentleman from Michigan has done in bringing this once again to our intention so that we can join the Senate in making sure that this is very clear of what is not our policy option with that Mr. Speaker, I'd go back to the balance of my time.Gentlemen, from California, - I reserve the balance of my time.Gentleman reserves the balance of his time.I'll reserve the balance of my time.I'll be the last speaker and I'll close as soon as my colleague yields.Okay, the gentleman has no further speakers, then Mr, Speaker, if I may yield myself this time, as I may consume..Gentleman California is recommended.I just want to point out for a number of members who have asked about what's the relationship of this reconciliation to the loan scandals that the nation was witness to earlier this year, this legislation does not contain that the language of the Sunshine Act that we passed overwhelmingly in May of this year, that will be contained in the higher education act that this house and the Senate plan to do soon, it's in the Senate bill and we've passed the Sunshine Act as members will recall that this was legislation that falls on the heels of public reports of colleges and lenders, and the relationships between colleges and lenders and special relationships were developed in some cases for the exchange of gifts, financial favors, holidays, special treatment, two people working for the colleges that were steering people to a particular lender for their loans, whether or not that was in the best interest of the student or not really didn't come into play.These practices had gone on for a considerable period of time.In some cases, they've been brought to the attention of the department of education by the inspector general, they were not properly dealt with.And the state's attorney, the attorney general of the state of New York, Mr. Cuomo brought them to the nation's attention with his investigation of some of the largest lending institutions in these practices, and entered into a number of consent agreements.With those individuals, we had hearings on this, on this matter, and the failure of oversight by both the Congress and the department.And we passed the Sunshine Act in reaction to that, to those hearings that we had that again, it was passed on a strong bipartisan vote.We think these two things are connected in the terms of our are now removing the access and subsidies that were used in many instances to grease these relationships for the benefit of the lenders and not for the benefit of the students and their families who were borrowing the money to pay for their college education.So I just wanted to bring the members up to snuff on that, on that matter.And with that, I'll yield back the balance of my time.Gentlemen yields back.Gentlemen from Michigan.Mr. speaker I'll yield myself as much time as I, 'cause I shall consume.Gentleman's recognized.Speaker, the Senate rejected transferring Al-Qaeda terrorists from Gitmo to our Homeland.That was a wise decision.That is a decision that my colleagues here in the house should support tonight.Gitmo is a facility that is working, it's working in many different ways.It's keeping terrorists, these terrorists away from the homeland.It's providing us with an opportunity to get the information that may be necessary and maybe helpful, in keeping America safe.When the Senate acted, they acted overwhelmingly 94 to three to say, make sure that these individuals do not come to the United States.Provides us with the alternatives and the flexibility that as we move forward and defeating radical jihadists, that we will have the strategies in place to keep us safe, to get the information that we need to provide us with a background to implement the correct strategies.We are safer keeping these terrorists in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, 538 miles or 528 miles away from the Homeland.I encourage my colleagues to vote for this motion to instruct conferees, it is a good motion.It's a good decision, a good direction that was put forward by the members of the other body.And I hope that we stand with them tonight.And with that, I yield back the balance of my time.All time has expired without objection.The previous question is ordered.The question is on the motion to instruct.Those in favor, please say, aye.Aye.Those opposed, please say no.The ayes have it in the opinion of the chair.Mr. Speaker, I asked for the yeas and nays.The yeas and nays are requested.All those in favor of the taking this vote by the yeas and nays will rise and remain standing until counted.A sufficient number having risen the yeas and nays are ordered, pursuant to clause eight of rule 20 further proceedings on this motion will be postponed.The chairman lays before the house, the following communications.The honorable, the speaker house of representatives, madam, this is to formally notify you pursuant to rule eight of the rules of the house of representatives that I have been served with a judicial subpoena for documents issued by the United States district court for the middle district of Pennsylvania.After consulting with the office of general counsel, I have determined that compliance with the subpoena is consistent with the privileges and rights of the house.Signed sincerely, John E. Peterson, member of Congress.Pursuant to clause eight of rule 20 proceedings will resume on questions previously postponed.Votes will be taken in the following order.Motions suspend the rules with regard to HR694 and HR3020 and motion to instruct Campari's on HR26696 and each case by the yeas and nays.The vote on the motion to suspend the rules with regard to HR552 will be taken tomorrow.The first electronic vote will be conducted as a 15 minute vote.Remaining electronic votes will be conducted as five minute votes.The unfinished business is on the motion of the gentleman from Washington, Mr. Bear, to suspend the rules and pass HR6094 as amended on which the yeas and nays are ordered.The clerk will report the title of the bill.HR694, a bill to establish a digital and wireless network technology program.And for other purposes.The question is, will the house suspend rules and pass the bill as amended?Those in favor we'll vote aye.Those opposed will vote no.Members will record their votes by electronic device.This is a 15 minute vote.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/house_proceeding_09-04-07_00.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/house_proceeding_09-04-07_00.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/house_proceeding_09-04-07_00.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/mv_house_proceeding_10-23-07/house_proceeding_10-23-07.mp3", "text": "Hey, we come humbly, thankfully to you, humbly for allowing each of us to be in our positions and thankfully for your guidance to this time, none of us knows what this day holds, but we trust you to see us through every decision we make, help us to realize that is by your hand, that we are free and well.Grant us wisdom to know the right thing to do in every decision and give us the strength to follow through with what is right, regardless of the consequences.Within the hands of these public servants, rest the destiny of this great nation, help this great body to bring peace to our nation and the world.Give them the wisdom of Solomon, the strength of Samson, the faith of Abraham and the ability of David to accomplish the challenges we face.In Jesus name.Amen.The chair has examined the journal of the last day's proceedings and announces to the house for approval thereof.Pursuant to clause, one of rule one, the journal stands approved.The pledge of allegiance will be led by the gentlemen from Arkansas, Mr. Boozman.Well, everyone join me including those in the gallery, - Without objection.The gentlemen from Arkansas, Mr. Boozman is recognized for one minute.Thank you madam speaker.Madam speaker, it's my pleasure to introduce a good friend, a man who ministers to the men and women of Western Arkansas.A man of God, our guests chaplain, the Reverend Bobby L. Johnson of van Buren, Arkansas, he is being pastor of first assembly of God in van Buren since June, 1980.Since then, the church has grown from just over 200 Sunday school to over 2000, placing it among the fastest growing Sunday schools in Arkansas and the nation.His mission is bringing the world to, is bringing the word to the people through his extensive outreach, from mobile ministry to television and over the internet, a graduate of both the university of central Arkansas and evangelists college in Missouri.Pastor Johnson has taught public high school and pastored three other churches in Arkansas.It is my honor to welcome pastor Johnson to the house of representatives and thank him for his service to his calling and to the people of Arkansas.I yield back.Gentlemen, yields back.The chair will now entertain requests for one minute speeches.For what purpose does the gentleman from Wisconsin rise?Without objections gentleman's recognized.Madam speaker, our nation's values are reflected in how we spend taxpayers' hard-earned money.Yesterday rather than encouraging us to invest in the good health of our children here at home.The president asked for permission to spend $200 billion in Iraq.Well, it's okay to ask and it's okay to respond by saying no thank you.The health of our nation's children is more valuable than making more of a mess in Iraq.My friends, enough is enough.It's time to spend our tax dollars right here at home.Last week, 44 Republicans joined the democratic majority in attempting to override the president's veto of the state children's health insurance program, known as S-chip.This issue is not going away.We will prevail.It's a matter of how long it will take.And here are some facts to keep in mind S-chip saves tax dollars by sending children in need to the doctor's office, not to the costly emergency room and over 90% of those in S-chip earn less than $41,000 a year.There is a better way of doing things in America and by working together, we'll find it and guarantee access to healthcare for all those in need and I yield back - What purpose does the gentlemen from South Carolina rise?Madam speaker asked permission to address the house - Without objection, gentleman's recognized.Madam speaker last week.America's number one, radio personality Rush Limbaugh auctioned off for charity, a letter shamefully signed by a group of 41 Democrat senators.The letter to Limbaugh's employer attack Rush for comments blatantly distorted by media matters regarding persons who had lied about their service in the military.I am happy to report that the Senate letter of infamy was auctioned for $2.1 million, an amount Rush says he will generously match.That brings the total to $4.2 million.The money will be donated to the Marine Corps Law Enforcement Foundation.This charitable organization provides financial assistance to the children of fallen Marines and Law Enforcement Officers.I wish to commend Rush for overcoming what was clearly a political ploy to chill his first amendment rights of free speech.Rush took an abuse of power by Democrat leadership and turn it into something positive.Between Rush Limbaugh and Senate Democrats, America knows who really supports our troops.In conclusion, God bless our troops and we'll never forget September 11.What purpose does the gentleman from Missouri rise?Without objection gentleman's recognized.Madam speaker.I am very pleased to have the opportunity to address the house.I am excited to be a Democrat and I always take pleasure in giving reasons for why I am a member of the democratic party.It says taking control of Congress, Democrats have worked to pass legislation that will help families once again, live the American dream.And over the last six years, college costs have shot up 40% putting higher education out of reach for most Americans.I have one son in college today, and I can tell you that I'm excited over the fact that we passed and the president did in fact sign the College Cost Reduction Act of 2007.This law is the single largest increase in college aid, since the GI bill.It strengthens the middle-class by cutting interest rates in half and subsidises student loans over the next five years.We are also able in this bill to increase the maximum Pell Grant scholarship by $500.Madam speaker, I am pleased, I'm excited to be a Democrat.What purpose does the gentleman from Louisiana rise?Without objection, gentleman's recognized.Madam speaker S-chip continues to be used as a political game by Washington liberals, sensible effective compromise does exist to bring meaningful bipartisan support for this necessary program.The Kids First bill of which I'm a co-sponsor adds 1.3 million new children to the S-chip program by 2012, it encourages the states to move children to private coverage.Kids First provides $14 billion in new S-chip allotments, and it includes $400 million in grants for outreach and enrollment.This is a sensible approach.I support S-chip and I'm committed to ensuring that it's a successful program that helps children who need it and the children for whom it was really intended for those who are in poverty.It makes S-chip a program for those who it was intended for.I thank my colleagues representatives camp and worship for their work on this bill.And I asked my colleagues on the other side of the aisle to join us in this compromise approach to help put our poor children first and a yield back.Now it's my time.What purpose does the gentlemen from Washington state rise?Without objection gentleman's recognized.Thank you.Madam speaker, I rise today to pay tribute to a US army degrade from Fort Lewis, Washington that is served with distinction in Iraq.On October 11th, the last of the roughly 3,800 men and women of the third brigade, second infantry division, we turned home to Fort Lewis after completing their second deployment in Iraq.The Arrowhead brigade has been a trailblazer for the army as the first brigade to be outfitted with the Stryker combat vehicles, the first striker brigade to serve in Iraq.And now the first striker brigade to complete two tours in Iraq.During their recent deployment, the Arrowhead brigade supported operations in Mosul, Baghdad, Baqubah and other critical areas.On several occasions, they were asked to secure down US aircraft and the sites of numerous suicide attacks.In addition to the Arrowhead brigade constantly remain prepared to mobilize and deploy anywhere in Iraq for any number of contingencies within 24 hours.And tribute to their brave service, seven members of the brigade were awarded the silver star, the United States third highest award for combat valor.In the course of their deployment, the Arrowhead brigade lost 48 of their comrades with another 700 wounded.I want to express my deep condolences to the three two brigade and the families of those fallen soldiers.Their contribution and sacrifice will not be forgotten.The men and women of the three two brigade have done everything our country has asked of them and more, we all should have the utmost respect and admiration for their service and sacrifice.Gentlemen, yields back for what purpose does the gentleman from Nebraska rise?Without objection gentleman's recognized.Thank you madam speaker.Recently, Congress passed house resolution 590, supporting the goals of domestic violence awareness month while raising awareness of domestic violence throughout our country.I am here today to voice my support for everyone impacted by this horrible nightmare.This is an issue which affects millions in urban and rural areas alike.It crosses economic lines, geographic lines and ethnic lines.No segment of our population is immune.One out of five women, and one out of 14 men have been domestically assaulted at some point in their lives.In my home state of Nebraska, there are more than 5,800 protection orders needed for those living in fear of violence.Domestic violence is an issue which too often is swept under the rug or ignored.So as part of the domestic violence awareness month, I'm wearing a purple ribbon to raise awareness about the crime of domestic abuse as we work toward ending this violence.Thank you madam speaker, I yield back.Gentlemen yields back.For what purpose does the gentleman from New York rise?Without objection gentleman's recognized.Madam speaker last week, despite the best efforts of the democratic majority and about 44 Republicans, we were unable to override the president's veto of a health insurance for the children of poor and working families.Now I listened to the argument that we can't afford providing health care for our children, despite the fact that our S-chip program was entirely paid for.Look, ma'am, speaker, I believe that a strong nation can do both.You can be fiscally responsible and you can take care of your children.Good families managed to be fiscally responsible and take care of their children.It's just a matter of priorities.And I will say Madam speaker, that I was struck by some of the, the miss priorities that I heard about.The same people who said that we can't afford health insurance for our children increased spending 7% a year since 2001 and voted to increase our debt limit four out of the past five years.The difference is that they spent on the wrong things, no spending.We can't afford healthcare for children, but billions of dollars in tax cuts for the most profitable oil companies on earth.We can't afford spending for health insurance for children, but billions of dollars in spending and no bid contracts for Halliburton, we've increased the debt we're putting in our kids' shoulders.And now we're telling our kids, we can't afford to help them with the x-rays.I thank you, speaker and I'll yield back the balance of my time.What purpose does the gentleman from Pennsylvania rise?without objection, gentleman's recognized.Madam speaker in the early hours of May 11th, seven US soldiers were on lookout near patrol base in Iraq.Sometime before dawn heavily armed Al Qaeda gunman made coordinated surprise attacks on the soldiers.Four of the soldiers were killed and three others, taken hostage.What happened next is a travesty and a failure of our public policy and support of the troops in the field.A search to rescue the men began immediately, but was brought to a halt because of our FISA law, by the need for military lawyers to jump through legal hoops in order to gain approval, to conduct the surveillance of terrorists communications, 10 hours passed before they were granted such permission.The search for a kidnapped US soldier was halted so that lawyers could find grounds to have the attorney general grant special permission to listen in on the communications between individuals in Iraq.Our FISA law as the president has requested needs reform, not the flawed bill the Democrats are seeking to pass here.I yield back.Gentleman yields back.For what purpose does the gentleman from New Hampshire rise?Gentleman's recognized.Thank you Madam speaker.Last week, the rubber stamp Republicans in this house, once again, held true to their name, by voting to stand with the president and rejecting healthcare coverage for 10 million American children.The spending priorities of the President's Republican allies in the house are simply out of line with the priorities of the American people.In fact, the 86% of Americans who support this bi-partisan chip reauthorization might be interested to know that for the cost of just 37 days in Iraq, we could provide healthcare coverage to 10 million children.You have the President's irresponsible open-ended commitment to the occupation in Iraq continues while the number of American children without access to healthcare keeps climbing.Madam speaker yesterday, the President asked Congress to borrow another $196 billion to continue his failed blank check, no plan policy in Iraq, but he and his Republican friends in this body apparently feel that spending $35 billion on a highly successful program that provides healthcare to one insured children is excessive.It's time for Republicans to stop blindly following the President and start helping American families.Thank you Madam speaker, I yield back.For what purpose does the gentle lady from Minnesota rise?Gentle lady is recognized.Thank you.Madam speaker, I want to bring before the body this morning, an issue that needs more attention, not less than that's the issue of the huge blob that ate the American dream called the alternative minimum tax.One thing that we're seeing is that the alternative minimum tax Madam speaker is set to rise at a level so unprecedented, the American economy has not experienced anything like this in the last 40 years.Right now, the tax burden for the average American and to the economy is about 18.5% of GDP. If we don't scale back on the alternative minimum tax, we're looking at the tax burden of GDP being almost 24% by mid century.We have never seen this level of taxation and our GDP. This means this money will come out of the pockets of the American taxpayer.And we'll go into the coffers of the federal government.This is a big concern, Madam speaker.One that I'm very concerned about as I know, most of the members in this chamber are as well.In 1969, when alternative minimum tax came in, it was 155 people.Madam speaker, I will close with the fact that this year we're looking at 23 million Americans impacted I thank you.What purpose does the gentle lady from New Hampshire rise?Gentlelady's recognized.Madam speaker, yesterday President Bush asked Congress to rubber stamp his plan to spend $196 billion next year on the war in Iraq.And I have to tell the President not a nickel more for this war.Since the beginning of the year, congressional Democrats have been trying to change our war policy from one where our troops will stay there for more than a decade to one where we have responsible re-deployment and bring the troops home next year.The president believes it's acceptable to spend billions of dollars in Iraq while important domestic priorities here in our own country go unmet.While the President was crafting his $196 billion war supplement the democratic house approved appropriation bills that included targeted investments in our priorities here at home.Education, health care for veterans, more police on the streets, caring for American families.Madam speaker, as Congress begins to examine the President's latest war funding bill.We will once again, demand that the president change course in Iraq and to get a responsible plan, to bring our troops home within the year.Thank you.What purpose does the gentleman from Florida rise?Without objection gentleman's recognized.Madam speaker.I rise today to acknowledge the pro democracy rally that took place in Belarus on the 7th of October.During this event, thousands of protesters flooded the streets of the capital city in support of democracy and to demand free and fair elections.The protesters shouted Belarus in Europe and they waved European union flags to express their outrage against Alexander Lukashenko.That's the person who the state department has labeled the last dictator of Europe.It is time for this dictator who cheated his way into office by stealing the elections last year, to step aside, to step down and let the people decide who should lead their country through legitimate and clean elections.The world must not tolerate evil dictators.And this one must step aside to allow Belarus to join the modern world rather than to suffer under the oppressive and selfish rule of one man.I applaud Madam speaker.I applaud the courage of the protestors who took to the streets in Belarus, and I stand with them in their quest for freedom, democracy, and the rule of law.Thank you madam.Gentleman yields back.For what purpose does the gentlemen from Missouri rise?Without objection, gentleman's recognized.Thank you Madam speaker.President Bush, and about 10 house Republicans are all that stand between 10 million children in the healthcare they need and deserve.I'm deeply disappointed in the President's dumbfounding veto of the S-chip bill and they reneged on his pledge he made when running for re-election in 2004.The bill to reauthorize S-chip continues coverage for 6 million kids currently covered and provided incentives for another 4 million kids who have been falling through the cracks of the healthcare system.The program continues to focus on low and moderate income families who are on too much for the Medicaid program, but can't afford private healthcare.The big momentum behind this historic bill is growing exponentially.It will not be stopped.To those blocking the S-chip reauthorization from becoming law, I say either get on board, get out of the way or get run over.The children's health care bill is on its way either with or without you.S-chip supporters are even more determined than ever to get this done by the mid November deadline.Let's go, I'll finish this job for children's health care in America.It's fourth and goal on the one yard line working together, we can overpower anyone left blocking the way I yield back.What purpose does the gentleman from California rise?Gentleman's recognized.Thank you very much Madam speaker.As we listened to the comments of our colleagues on the other side of the aisle, it is obvious that what they intend to do is to make this S-chip week S chip month.And you kind of wonder why they are doing this.We'll reflect back on last week when we had a most important vote scheduled for this floor, that somehow was removed, it was called the FISA vote.The question of how we enable ourselves to protect us and our children and our grandchildren against the attacks of those who are terrorists around the world.We do it in many ways, but absolutely essential is intelligence.The FISA bill, the foreign intelligence surveillance act, would have been destroyed by the bill placed on the floor last week by the majority, the so-called restore act.It actually gave greater protection to Osama bin Laden in a telephone conversation, than an American citizen in the United States accused of a crime.RESTORE, what does it mean?Repeal Effective Surveillance Techniques Opposing Real Enemies, go out to NASA and see what they're doing, understand what we need to do in this country.And then bring a bill back to this floor that restores the - Gentleman's time is exceeding - ability of the United States to find out about our enemies before the attack.What purpose does the gentleman from Tennessee rise?Gentleman's recognized for one moment, one minute.Thank you Madam speaker.The city of Memphis, Tennessee has lost one of its finest citizens.Kenneth Williams Senior, Kenneth Williams senior passed away last night.He was a pastor.He was a two time city councilman.He was a father.He was a family man.He was a leader in our community.For 30 years he was the pastor at Oliver Baptist church, and very highly respected in the community and the clergy.And for eight years, he was a city Councilman.One time as a district Councilman community known as orange mound.And then when he saw a higher calling and a need to address a higher subject, he ran it against an incumbent city Councilman at the time on heard of and was elected at large, one of the first African-Americans elected at large to the Memphis city council.He was also a postal service employee and had a career there and rose to the ranks of director of personnel.For that reason, this house, and this week with the President's action, the post office at third street in Memphis, Tennessee will be now be named the Kenneth T William senior postal building, that is attribute to his work and to all postal employees.You had a family of which the city of Memphis is proud.His son, Kenneth Jr, is a pastor and a member of the school board.His son, Kirk William is a world renowned saxophonist and his other son, Kevin is a musician with a contract and a poet.There are many, many great families in the city of Memphis to get involved in politics, but none greater than the Williams, the hair of the hypocrite never was upon this family.And the idea of discrimination and bigotry or intolerance never graced them either.He was a leader in bi-racial politics and activities in the city of Memphis.He was a leader in being bipartisan as well.There've been few people like Kenneth William senior in the city of Memphis.There'll be few to come.I share his loss greatly.He was a supporter of mine, who although he'd had a stroke and had difficulty walking came down and did a political ad for me when he could hardly get up the stairs and on television, it was like an angel speaking.When John Conyers came to Memphis in February, he made it up a whole flight of stairs to see John Conyers and a happier man I have not seen.He knew the post office was being named for him before he passed.I'm happy he knew that, I'm happy I knew him.We've lost a great leader.Thank you, Madam speaker.For what purpose does the gentlemen from Iowa rise?Without objection, the gentleman's recognized.Madam speaker, it's clear that president Bush has no intention of changing the course in Iraq in any way before he leaves office in January, 2009.In fact, both the president of the Pentagon have recently said that they expect American combat troops to be in Iraq for another 10 years.And just yesterday, the president requested an additional $196 billion to fund the war in Iraq for the upcoming year.The democratic Congress rejects the notion that our troops are needed in Iraq for the next decade.If the Iraqi government knows that we're going to be there for 10 years, they have absolutely no reason to make any of the tough political compromises that they promised they would make.When the troop escalation began earlier this year.Instead we support a responsible redeployment out of Iraq so that the Iraqis can finally take control of their own fate.And so that we are no longer sending more than $2 billion there every week.Madam speaker house Democrats are committed to bringing our troops home, but we can't do it alone.I hope this outrageous funding request serves as a wake up call to my Republican friends and starts a new dialogue to bring our troops home.I yield back the balance of my - What purpose does the gentlemen from Connecticut rise?For one minute and revising steps.Without objection, gentleman's recognized.Thank you, Madam speaker, when will it end with Blackwater?Probably not soon enough, just yesterday, the committee on oversight and government reform released findings that show that Blackwater has potentially misclassified hundreds of workers in Iraq and Afghanistan, evading taxes and costing the taxpayers in the United States, at least $30 million.This comes a few weeks after the same committee discovered that Blackwater is raking in potentially a hundred million dollars in profit off of their government contracts.We've got to get this situation under control.And that's why I, along with Mr Welsh and chairman Waxman have introduced legislation to require that private government contractors receiving more than 80% of their revenue from federal contracts, like Blackwater must disclose the salaries of their most highly compensated employees.It just isn't right for executives at Blackwater, anywhere else to make their fortune off of war profiteering.It's our money.And we deserve to know how it's being used.I urge my colleagues to join me in supporting this common sense legislation.I yield back the balance of my time.Gentleman yield back.For what purpose does the gentleman from Ohio rise?The amount of speaker on behalf of the courageous men and women of armed forces who are putting their lives on the line for our freedom and security.I offer a privilege resolution that is at the desk.The Clerk Hill will report the resolution.House resolution 767, whereas United States, soldiers and personnel in Iraq are fighting to protect innocent Americans from being attacked by Al-Qaeda and radical jihadists who are determined to kill the American people.Whereas on October 18th, 2007 and debate of HR 976 children's health insurance program re-authorization act.The member from California.Mr. Stark stated you don't have money to fund the war on children, but you're going to spend it to blow up innocent people.If we can get enough kids to grow old enough for you to send it to Iraq, to get their heads blown off with the president's amusement.Whereas on October 18th, 2007 and a press release representative, Pete stark is quoted as saying, I respect needed the commander in chief who keeps them in harm's way nor the chicken Hawks in Congress.Whereas the member from California, Mr. Stark engaged in personally abusive language toward the president and members of the house, including the use of language that impugns their motives.Whereas the member from California, Mr. Stark, dishonors, not only the commander in chief, but the thousands of courageous men and women in America's armed forces who believe in their mission and are putting their lives on the line for our freedom and security.Whereas the member from California, Mr. Stark has failed to retract a statement and apologize to the members of the house, our commander in chief and the families of our soldiers and commanders fighting terror overseas.Resolved that the member from California, Mr. Stark, by his despicable conduct has dishonored himself and brought discredit to the house and merits that sensor they house for the same.Resolved that the member from California, Mr. Stark is here by so sensors.The resolution, the resolution qualifies.For what purpose does the gentlemen from Mississippi rise?Madam speaker, I move to lay the resolution on the table.Question is on the motion.All in favor, say aye, - Aye opposed, say no.No - Opinion of the chair that I have it.Madam speaker I asked for the yeas and nays.The yeas and nays are requested those favoring a vote by the yeas and nays will rise.A sufficient number having risen the yeas and nays are ordered.Members will record their votes by electronic device.This will be a 15 minute vote.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/house_proceeding_10-23-07.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/house_proceeding_10-23-07.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/house_proceeding_10-23-07.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/mv_house_proceeding_02-07-08/house_proceeding_02-07-08.mp3", "text": "All rise.The House will be in order, the prayer will be offered by the guest chaplain, Pastor Wes Davis, Riverton Friends Church, Riverton, Kansas.Shall we pray?Father God, maker of heaven and earth, you are Lord of all things created and sovereign over this great nation.We humbly bow before you this day to thank you for your mercies being new every morning.It is because of your great mercy that we would again ask for your blessing and your favor over these women and men who gather here as representatives of our Congress.Please extend to them your mercy and your grace, remind them that you love them.Your scripture tells us as iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another.May these, your people, sharpen one another today as their ideologies clash together, as one philosophy grates against another philosophy different than their own.Help them to see this diversity not as tearing, for these are not people of sheer fabric.For they've been forged stronger by the rigors of politics and public scrutiny, but help them see this clashing and grating as an opportunity to sharpen thought, to cut through rhetoric, and to pierce conscience for the benefit of humanity.May their actions and decisions of today not become future apologies, but may they be a statement of this Congress's character, their firm resolve, and a hope for a better America.Amen.Amen.The chair has examined the journal of last day's proceedings and announces to the House her approval thereof.Pursuant to clause one of rule one, the journal stands approved.The Pledge of Allegiance will be led by the gentleman from New Jersey, Congressmen Sires.Would you all join me, please?I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all.Please be seated.The chair will receive a message.Madam Speaker, a message from the Senate.Madam Speaker.Madam Secretary.I have been directed by the Senate to inform the House that the Senate has passed without amendment H.R. 3541, cited as as the Do Not Call Improvement Act of 2007.Thank you.Thank you.Without objection, the gentlewoman from Kansas, Congresswoman Boyda is recognized for one minute.Thank you, Madam Speaker.Reverend Wes Davis left the beaches of California in the early 1990s to pastor a small church in Kansas, in the town of Riverton.He helped to construct the building that is the Riverton Friends Church in Cherokee County, and he helped to grow the congregation from about 100 to nearly 400 people.He did this while sharing his knowledge and faith from around the world, from Haiti, to Liberia, to Hungary.And in addition to being pastor, family man, and missionary, Pastor Davis is the executive director of STOA Ministries.Stoa in Greek means porch.In Solomon's day, people gathered on the area porches to discuss theology and their faith.Wes Davis is a man of faith who has made the world his porch always striving to help others learn God's grace.Pastor Wes Davis, thank you for expanding your porch to the halls of Congress today.Thank you.The chair will entertain up to 15 one-minutes on each side.Without objection, the gentleman from Oregon is recognized.Thank you, Madam Speaker.For the first time in American history, the Highway Trust Fund is running a deficit this year.What's the solution for this administration?Well, instead of having a comprehensive approach to deal with this shortfall, they just want to steal some money from the Mass Transit Administration account and walk away.This will only delay the problem for one year, and it will push Mass Transit into deficit the next year, instead of a practical solution to fix the looming Highway Trust Fund crisis.This is consistent with their consistent under-investment in our nation's infrastructure.It's why the American Society of Civil Engineers has rated our infrastructure a D-minus, and it will cost us 1.6 trillion over the next five years to repair water, sewer, and transportation infrastructure, a crisis not just for the federal government, but even worse, for state and local governments.A hundred years ago, Teddy Roosevelt had a vision for a national conference to develop a plan to deal with the nation's infrastructure.It's time for this Congress to revisit that concept, maybe have a transportation vision for this century.Gentleman's time has expired.For what purpose does the gentleman from Pennsylvania rise?Address the House for one minute.Without objection.Thank you, Mr. Speaker.On Friday, December 14th, 2007, the varsity football team from Thomas Jefferson High School in Jefferson Hills, Pennsylvania won the class AAA state football championships, clenching the Jaguar's second title in four years.With a final score of 28 to 3, the Jaguars finished a perfect season.Coach Bill Cherpak became just the third head coach in Western Pennsylvania history to achieve a perfect win record in more than one appearance in the state championship game in Hershey.Thomas Jefferson High School in the West Jefferson Hills School District also excels in academics, ranking in the top 20 of Pennsylvania's 501 school districts.Congratulations to Coach Bill Cherpak, the Thomas Jefferson High School Jaguars for being champions on the field and champions in the classroom.I yield back.Gentleman yields back the balance at this time.For what purpose does the gentleman from California rise?To address the House for one minute.Without objection.Mr. Speaker, our national budget should invest in our future.Unfortunately, the president's final budget is more of the same, missed opportunities and misplaced priorities.The president's budget is fiscally reckless, adding 1.6 trillion in deficit over the next five years, instead of becoming balanced over that same period.But you won't hear that from the president.He claims that the budget is balanced by 2012, but that's only because he leaves out enormous costs, including the five-year cost of fixing the alternative minimum tax, and the full cost of the Iraq War.When realistic costs are included, the budget runs into significant deficits over each of the next five years.This unfortunately is more of the same.The president took a 10-year, $5.6 trillion of surplus that he inherited and turned it into a $3.6 trillion deficit.The budget continues down the same path by borrowing from our children and our grandchildren.Mr. Speaker, Democrats can simply not afford this fiscal recklessness.In the coming months, we will present a fiscally responsible budget that meets our pay-as-go requirements.What purpose does the gentleman from Texas rise?Request permission to address the House for one minute.Without objection.Mr. Speaker, the border war with Mexico continues.On the Mexican side of the border, Mexican nationals hide on rocky hills and throw rocks at American border agents.These assaults have continued to increase and escalate to the point that Border Patrol recently acted in self-defense and fired tear gas at the unruly mobs.You see, these are the same Mexican nationals that later will illegally sneak into America when the Border Patrol isn't watching.After the most recent tear gas episode, the Mexican government sent a self-righteous statement to the United States that said, \"Even though these incidences are a response to hostile acts against Border Patrol agents by Mexican citizens, the actions by U.S. authorities are unacceptable\".The Mexican government seems to arrogantly support its rock-throwing nationals, but doesn't want Americans to defend themselves.Mexico needs to get its lawless house in order and control the disorderly mobs that lurk on the border.United States should use every tool available to protect our borders from invaders, rock throwers, and drug smugglers.And if Mexico cries tears about it, too bad.And that's just the way it is.Gentleman's time has expired.For what purpose does the gentleman from Iowa rise?Address the House for one minute .Without objection.Mr. Speaker, this week the president unveiled his final budget proposal, and like previous budgets, it fails to properly address the needs and concerns that are central to the everyday lives of our constituents.Perhaps most troubling is the fact that the Bush budget continues the president's legacy of fiscal irresponsibility and leaves behind a $407 billion deficit.The five largest deficits in American history have all occurred on the president's watch.When President Bush took office, the debt stood at 5.7 trillion, and it's projected to stand at 9.7 trillion by the time President Bush leaves office.This fiscal record ties the hands of the next generation, which faces growing obligations with increasingly limited resources.The Bush budget also hurts Americans struggling to make ends by cutting Medicare and Medicaid and the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program.His budget also hurts our long-term efforts to prepare Americans for better jobs in the global marketplace by slashing important education and literacy programs.Mr. Speaker, the American people do not want more of the same.This Democratic Congress will propose a budget alternative that takes America in a new direction.Gentleman's time has expired.For what purpose does the gentleman from South Carolina rise?To simply address the House for one minute.Without objection.Mr. Speaker, today I want to honor an individual who has a rich background in managing healthcare services and agencies within the state of South Carolina.His experience in education and healthcare has placed him throughout locations in the South, affiliating him with dozens of communities and civic organizations.As February recognizes Black History Month, I honor Dr. Joseph Patton, who has continuously reached out to provide knowledge, support, and service to benefit those in the community.A native of Spartanburg, South Carolina, Dr. Patton is an ordained elder in the Presbyterian Church and holds an honorary doctorate degree for his services to the church and community.Along with his service to his region, Dr. Patton has served overseas, is a veteran of the United States Army, and is currently a member of the American Legion and the Veterans of Foreign Wars.During Black History Month, I give recognition to Dr. Patton for serving as an educated leader of health, for being well-known as a caring husband, father, grandfather, and mentor to those in the community.Gentleman yields back the balance of his time.For what purpose does the gentleman from New Jersey rise?Without objection.Mr. Speaker, when Democrats do control a Congress last year, we vowed to work on behalf of all Americans.Last year, we recognized that middle class families were struggling to make ends meet.And so we work hard to ease that economic crunch.We passed billions of dollars in tax relief to middle-class income families.We increased the minimum wage for the first time in a decade, and we enacted an energy bill that will save the average family anywhere between 700 and $1,000 a year in energy cost and help families better afford college.This was a good start, but economic indicators continue to head in the wrong direction.We work with the White House and House Republicans on an economic stimulus package that will provide a real and significant short-term boost to this economy.The House Bipartisan Economic Stimulus Plan is the most progressive package this decade.It will help jumpstart our economy and will provide real assistance to lower and middle-income families.I hope our friends in the Senate will enact this legislation this week.Gentleman yields back the balance of his time.For what purpose does the gentleman from South Carolina rise?Mr. Speaker, I ask permission to address the House for one minute revising remarks.Without objection.Mr. Speaker, the city of Berkeley, California recently disgraced itself by referring to brave Marines with slander when the city council voted to tell the Marine Corps to close its recruiting station.As a veteran, as the son-in-law of a veteran, and as the father of four sons in the military, I know firsthand of the education and opportunities provided by military service while promoting freedom.In response to Berkeley, Congressman John Campbell has introduced legislation that would remove $2 million in secret earmarks for the city of Berkeley and instead send the money to the Marines.While I believe wholeheartedly in free speech, we owe respect to the very people who are sacrificing so much to defend our freedoms.I invite the Berkeley city council to visit Buford, South Carolina, home of Parris Island, the Naval hospital, and the Marine Corps air station to see how our patriotic community supports the brave men and women who serve as proud Marines.In conclusion, God bless our troops and the United States Marine Corps, and we will never forget September the 11th.Gentleman yields back the balance of his time.For what purpose does the gentleman from Minnesota rise?To address the House for one minute.Without objection.Thank you, Mr. Speaker.We're here today talking about the recent unveiling of the president's budget.I think we should give the president credit.At least he's consistent.Like all of his previous budgets, this one does several things.It leaves most Americans behind and puts this nation further in debt.At a time of a slowing economy and Americans increasingly struggling to make ends meet, the president focuses on 1 trillion in tax breaks to the top 1% of Americans.While the wealthiest few continue to prosper under the president, the president cuts vital energy, education, and healthcare investments.At a time of rising energy costs, the president slashes low-income energy assistance programs.At a time of college costs skyrocketing, the budget eliminates nearly $1 billion in grant programs.At a time of rising healthcare costs, the president proposes devastating Medicare and Medicaid that would reduce affordable access to healthcare for our seniors.The one good thing that people know is the winds of change have been blowing.This Democratic Congress will restore these and put the priorities of American people first.And I yield back.Gentleman yields back the balance of his time.For what purpose does the gentleman from Minnesota rise?To address the House for one minute.Without objection.Mr. Speaker, at a time when more and more Americans are struggling to obtain affordable healthcare, the president's budget drastically slashes healthcare for seniors and low-income working Americans.Today, 36 million seniors get healthcare coverage through Medicare.The president's budget takes a swipe at their pocketbooks by proposing to save nearly 6 billion by increasing the monthly premiums that seniors pay.If the president was concerned about seniors, he would instead go after the vast overpayments made by Medicare to private managed care plans.Instead he has raised premiums on our seniors and focused his cuts on our nation's hospitals, skilled nursing facilities, and other healthcare providers.The president also cuts Medicaid by 33 billion over the next five years.Today, Medicaid serves 55 million low-income and disabled Americans.Such cuts would force cash-strapped states to either reduce benefits or cut provider payments.Mr. Speaker, as our economy continues to face uncertain times, this is the worst time the president to promote drastic cuts in Medicare and Medicaid.Rest assured, the Democrats would not allow these cuts to become law.These provisions are as good as dead as they come to Capitol Hill.Time has expired, for what purpose does the gentleman from Florida rise?To address the House for one minute.Without objection.Thank you, Mr. Speaker.Mr. Speaker, our economy is in trouble and millions of hardworking American families are feeling the impact as we speak.Since 2001, the real income of a typical working family has fallen by $2,500, and workers' wages have failed to keep up with the inflation for the fourth time in the past five years.In December, the unemployment rate shot up to a two-year high of 5% with over 900,000 more Americans looking for work over the same period last year.Stagnant wages are not only forcing families to squeeze more out of every dollar, but is also taking a toll on our overall economy.Retailers suffered their worst December shopping season in five years, and consumer confidence fell this month to its lowest point on record.Last week, the House approved a bipartisan economic package that will provide urgent relief to 117 million Americans.This is a fair economic package that gets money to the workers, the people who need it the most, and they're most likely to spend it on necessities like groceries and gas.Economists estimate that each dollar of the rebate will lead to $1.26 in economic growth.Mr. Speaker, economists also say we have to act fast.That's exactly what this House did, and I hope the Senate joins us, thank you very much.Gentleman's time has expired.For what purpose does the gentleman from Texas rise?To address the House for one minute .Without objection.Today, Mr. Speaker, the House will address one of the most important issues in America's future.That is the opportunity to give young people a chance for a higher education.H.R. 4137, the College Opportunity and Affordability Act, does just that.It is interesting, however, that the president's budget unfortunately does not recognize that opportunity.And it is in the business of cutting those opportunities for our young people.The Supplemental Education Opportunity grants for needy undergraduates is now being cut.So I hope that on the floor today, we'll make a statement to support our schools.I represent Texas Southern University, a school that has been under siege by its Republican state government, a school that is historically Black and received money from the past administration in desegregation settlement, but yet even today, it is not receiving the funding that it should receive from the state of Texas.I'll be introducing legislation that will assure that historically Black colleges, Hispanic-serving colleges cannot be undermined by state government funding when they come under the supervision of the Department of Education.Our bill is a good bill.It's a step forward.Mr. President, I hope that you will recognize that we cannot cut the opportunities of young people.I yield back.Gentlewoman's time has expired, for what purpose does the gentleman from Kentucky rise?I ask permission to address the House for one minute.Without objection.Mr. Speaker, last week this House came together in a bipartisan fashion to address the economic uncertainty that many of our citizens are facing.President Bush worked with both Democratic and Republican leaders of the House to develop an economic stimulus package that is timely, targeted, and temporary.That plan, which was passed here in the House last week, will help jumpstart our economy by putting tax rebates in the hands of 117 million hardworking middle and lower-income workers.We should be proud of the bipartisanship that made this compromise package possible.I would hope that we could bring that same bipartisanship to bear on the continuing war in Iraq.Last month, the Iraqi defense minister said that his country will not be able to take full control of its security until 2012 and will not be able to defend its borders from outside threats until at least 2018.Democrats do not believe that American troops should be on the ground in Iraq for another decade, and neither do the American people.The status quo can not continue.I would hope that we could continue to work together to bring this war to an end, I yield back.Gentleman yields back the balance of his time.For what purpose does the gentleman from Illinois rise?To talk for one minute .Without objection.Mr. Speaker, I come to the floor today to speak about an issue that is very close to my heart, personally, as a father, as an American, and as a member of Congress.There is a plague across this nation that has taken the lives of hundreds of thousands of American citizens, and it is disturbing and upsetting that there is no public outcry over the destruction that it leaves in its path.The plague is urban violence.Mr. Speaker, over the Christmas break, I was shocked by a piece of news that I saw on \"Nightline\" which detailed how medics who are sent to Iraq are honing their skills by working in urban hospitals attending to gunshot victims.The documentary went on to say that over 75 African American and Latino males are killed in our inner cities on a daily basis.Over 75 Latinos and American males are killed on a daily basis in American streets, a number of that dwarfs the number of fatalities, Iraqi and American, that are suffered in the war zone.Mr. Speaker, we must break the silence and stop this violence, it's past time to stop the killing, stop the violence.And I yield back to- - Gentleman's time has expired, for what purpose does the gentleman from New Jersey rise?To address the House .Without objection.Mr. Speaker, one of the best ways to expand prosperity for more Americans is to make college more affordable.Today, an education at a private university is close to $50,000 a year, and things aren't much better at public universities where prices have shot up 40% above inflation in the last seven years alone.This Democratic Congress has worked to eliminate some of the sticker shock.Last year, we passed the College Cost Reduction Act of 2007, which was the single-largest increase in college aid since the GI Bill.But we're not done.Today, we'll vote on the College Opportunity and Affordability Act, which will make college more affordable and accessible.The bill encourages colleges to rein in price increases and provides consumers with helpful information so they can make the best decisions on which school to choose.The legislation also simplifies the Federal Student Aid application process, expands college access and support for low income and minority students, and increases aid for our veterans and military families.Mr. Speaker, let's continue to strengthen our nation's future by passing the College Opportunity and Affordability Act today.Gentleman's time has expired.For what purpose does the gentlewoman from Ohio rise?Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 956 and ask for its immediate consideration.The clerk will report the resolution.House calendar number 185, House Resolution 956 resolved, that at any time after the adoption of this resolution, Speaker may, pursuant to clause 2B of rule 18, declare the House resolved into the committee of the whole House on the state of the union for consideration of the bill H.R. 4137, to amend and extend the Higher Education Act of 1965 and for other purposes.The first reading of the bill shall be dispensed with.All points of order against consideration of the bill are waived, except those arising under clause 9 or 10 of rule 21.General debate shall be confined to the bill and shall not exceed one hour, equally divided and controlled by the chairman and ranking minority member of the Committee on Education and Labor.After general debate, the bill shall be considered for amendment under the five-minute rule.Section 2A, it shall be in order to consider as an original bill for the purpose of amendment under the five-minute rule, the amendment and the nature of a substitute recommended by the Committee on Education and Labor now printed in the bill.The committee amendment in the nature of a substitute shall be considered as read.All points of order against the committee amendment in the nature of a substitute are waived, except those arising under clause 10 of rule 21.B, not withstanding clause 11 of rule 18, no amendment to the committee amendment in the nature of a substitute shall be in order except those printed in the report of the Committee on Rules accompanying this resolution, and amendments on block described in section three of this resolution.C, each amendment printed in the report of the Committee on Rules shall be considered only in the order printed in the report, may be offered only by a member designated in the report, shall be considered as read, shall be debatable for the time specified in the report, equally divided and controlled by the proponent and an opponent, shall not be subject to amendment, and shall not be subject to a demand for division of the question in the House or in the committee of the whole.D, all points of order against amendments printed in the report of the Committee on Rules or amendments on block described in section 3 of this resolution are waived, except those arising under clause 9 or 10 of rule 21.Section 3, it shall be an order at any time for the chairman of the Committee on Education and Labor or his designee to offer amendments on block consisting of amendments printed in the report of the Committee on Rules not earlier disposed of.Amendments on block offered pursuant to this section shall be considered as read, shall be debatable for 10 minutes, equally divided in control by the chairman and ranking minority member of the Committee on Education and Labor, or their designees, shall not be subject to amendment, and shall not be subject to a demand for division of the question in the House or in the committee of the whole.The original proponent of an amendment included in such amendments on block may insert a statement into congressional record immediately before the disposition of any amendments on block.Section 4, at the conclusion of consideration of the bill for amendment, the committee shall rise and report the bill to the House with such amendments as may have been adopted.Any member may demand a separate vote in the House on any amendment adopted in the committee of the whole to the bill or to the committee amendment in the nature of a substitute.Their previous question shall be considered as ordered on the bill and amendments thereto to final passage without intervening motion, except one motion to recommit with or without instructions.Section 5, during consideration in the House of H.R. 4137 pursuant to this resolution, not withstanding the operation of the previous question, the chair may postpone further consideration of the bill to such time as may be designated by the speaker.Section 6, House Resolution 941 is laid upon the table.The gentlewoman from Ohio is recognized for one hour.Thank you, Mr. Speaker.For the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from Washington, Mr. Hastings.All time yielded during consideration of the rule is for debate only.I yield myself such time as I may consume.I also ask unanimous consent that all members be given five legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks on House Resolution 956.Without objection.Mr. Speaker, House Resolution 956 provides for consideration of H.R. 4137, the College Opportunity and Affordability Act of 2007 under a structured rule.The rule provides one hour of general debate controlled by the Committee on Education and Labor.The rule makes an order the Education and Labor Committee reported substitute as an original bill for the purpose of amendment.The rule makes an order, the 27 amendments listed in the Rules Committee report, each of which is debatable for 10 minutes, except the Miller's Manager's Amendment, which is debatable for 20 minutes.Mr. Speaker, last year, Congress passed the College Cost Reduction Act to increase college financial aid by $18 billion, the single-largest increase in aid in over 60 years.That legislation significantly increased the maximum amount that Pell Grant recipients can receive at no new cost to taxpayers, and was a strong start to this Congress's efforts to make higher education a reality for America's students.But that, Mr. Speaker, was just the beginning.I'm proud to rise today in strong support of H.R. 4137, the College Opportunity and Affordability Act.This will continue our efforts to make college more affordable and more accessible for America's students while making investments in critical areas to strengthen our workforce.Our nation is blessed to have the finest system of higher education in the world.There is a breadth of opportunities available to our graduating high school seniors, vocational and technical schools, two and four-year colleges, and graduate and professional schools.Mr. Speaker, the challenge we face today is to ensure that our institutions of higher education are accessible to all, and the legislation we are passing today will make it easier for low income and middle class families to achieve the benefits of higher education as they climb up the ladder of success.And investing in our students not only improves their future, but it helps our economy and strengthens our competitive edge in the global marketplace.This bill continues this Congress's efforts to strengthen America's workforce by creating programs to improve teacher training and bolster student interest in science, math, and technology.We must also recognize and applaud our non-traditional students, those members of our workforce who are seizing the opportunity to continue their education while holding down full-time jobs and sometimes raising families.These students are often attending school less than half time, and thus they sometimes benefit very little from traditional student aid.That's why I support my colleague Congressman Baird's amendment, which I hope will be incorporated into this bill, to require the secretary of education to study and recommend how best to design a loan program targeted at less-than-half-time students.One of the keys to expanding access to our institutions of higher learning is to bring down the exorbitant cost of attending college.Tuition hikes in recent years have been stunning, amounting to a 31% increase at a four-year public college in the last five years alone.This bill enhances transparency in college tuition by requiring colleges to report the reasons for tuition hikes and the plans they have for lowering costs.It also requires the secretary of education to publish a higher education price index, providing students with the opportunity to compare institutions by state, sector, and change in tuition and fees from one year to the next.This will allow students to make wiser decisions in choosing institutions that are a good fit for them and the dreams to which they aspire.A more immediate way to make the possibility of attaining a college degree a reality is to increase the aid available to our students.And I am proud that this bill does that, doubling the maximum Pell Grant amount to $9,000.And beyond the sticker price of tuition, any student will tell you that the cost of textbooks is also a challenging cost they incur.The average student spends about $1,000 per year on textbooks, which is nearly 20% of tuition and fees at a four-year public institution.Such high costs for textbooks can be the deciding factor which dashes or delays the dream of obtaining a college degree and a better life for many.This legislation requires publishers to provide specific information about pricing so that faculty has all full information when making purchasing decisions so students can help plan for expenses.And in addition, Mr. Speaker, I am proud to support an amendment offered by my colleague from Ohio, Congressman Tim Ryan, along with Representative Jason Altmeyer, which will create a pilot grant program to assist colleges in setting up textbook rental programs.These programs already exist in 25 schools, and a pilot test at Bowling Green State University in Ohio last spring saved 151 students, $11,000.We must also continue to strive to reduce the achievement gap in higher education between low income and minority students and their peers.We can do this by ensuring that all students are prepared for the rigorous demands of higher learning.This bill strengthens the proven TRIO and GEAR UP college readiness and support programs for low income and first-generation students.I have seen firsthand, Mr. Speaker, the great things that these programs can do in Elyria, in my district, which is a GEAR Up site, and the University of Akron, which has received TRIO funding.I look forward to the expansion of these proven programs so that more students in Ohio and around the country may benefit.This legislation also addresses the disappointment we saw last year as the student loan scandal unfolded.Those financial aid directors that received kickbacks and payoffs and luxury gifts from private lenders exhibited a spectacular abuse of power and betrayal of the students they serve.This legislation cracks down on that abuse and restores accountability by requiring institutions and lenders to adopt strict codes of conduct and protect students from aggressive marketing by lenders.Institutions will also be required to provide students with information about federal and private borrowing options.This bill will also encourage and make it financially feasible for students to become public servants by authorizing up to $10,000 in loan forgiveness for military service members, firefighters, law enforcement officers, first responders, nurses, educators, prosecutors, and public defenders.This bill also continues the work this Congress has undertaken to support our troops by creating a new scholarship and support programs for active duty military personnel, their family members, and veterans.It also establishes support centers to help veterans succeed in college and ensures fairness in student aid and housing aid for veterans to make it easier for them to go to college while also fulfilling their military service duties.I am also proud to support an amendment being offered by my colleague, Congresswoman Susan Davis, that is based on legislation of which I'm a co-sponsor.Her amendment will prevent interest from accruing for active duty service members and qualifying National Guard members for the duration of their activation up to 60 months when serving in a combat zone.Mr. Speaker, the dream of a college education is moving further and further out of reach for middle and low-income families.We need to put this prospect of a college education and a brighter future back in reach.Passing H.R. 4137 and building on the work we started last year is an important and priceless investment in the future of our children, our communities, and our country.I reserve the balance of my time.Gentlewoman from Ohio reserves the balance of her time.Gentleman from Washington?Thank you, Mr. Speaker.Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentlelady from Ohio, Mrs.Sutton, for yielding me the customary 30 minutes, and I yield myself as much time as I may consume, and I ask unanimous consent to revise and extend my remarks.Without objection.Thank you, Mr. Speaker.Mr. Speaker, I believe that we must do all that we can to make education more affordable so that more Americans can achieve the dream of graduating from college.This year alone, over $90 billion in federal financial aid is available to students.However, with tuition costs on the rise, students and their families continue to face the inevitable question of how to pay for a college education.I believe a balanced approach is needed, one that increases transparency of higher education costs and targets aid to the neediest students while simplifying the financial aid process and addressing the growing number of burdensome reporting requirements colleges and universities face.I share the goal of increasing access to higher education, but I have a number of concerns with the College Opportunity and Affordability Act.And I believe improvements to the bill are needed.And Mr. Speaker, apparently members on both sides of the aisle also share this view, because over 60 amendments were submitted to the Rules Committee before the deadline.The last time that this House considered a comprehensive higher education reauthorization bill was in 1998.At that time, the Rules Committee reported a modified, a modified open rule, and as a result, all members of the House had an opportunity to preprint their amendments in the congressional record and offer them on the floor.Mr. Speaker, I am disappointed that this time the Democrat-controlled Rules Committee chose a closed process to consider a long overdue reauthorization to the Higher Education Act.Unfortunately, by reporting out a closed rule, the Democrats on the Rules Committee once again chose to deny over 400 members of Congress the opportunity to offer amendments to improve the bill.Furthermore, this rule makes an order five times as many Democrat amendments as Republican amendments.By authorizing the Higher Education Act, it is important, but by adopting this closed rule, an opportunity will be missed to make the underlying bill even better.Therefore, Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to vote against this closed rule, and I reserve the balance of my time.Gentleman from Washington reserves the balance of his time.Gentlewoman from Ohio?Mr. Speaker, at this time, I yield three minutes to the distinguished gentlewoman from Florida, a member of the Rules Committee, Ms. Castor.Gentlewoman from Florida is recognized for three minutes.I thank my colleague from Ohio.Mr. Speaker, I rise today to support the College Opportunity and Affordability Act of 2007 and this rule because we are committed to making the cost of attending college more affordable and accessible.This is great news for hardworking middle-class families and students across America, and students in my hometown, which is a college town with thousands and thousands of students enrolled in the community college and at the University of South Florida.You know, there is great debate in Washington today over the economy and how we are going to provide relief to middle class families.One of the answers is to address the soaring cost of attending college, and keep the doors to a higher education open by making college affordable through grants and low-rate loans.A college diploma is a critical step towards a higher-paying job and success in life.And one of the best investments we can make for the future of our great nation is to ensure that the doors to our colleges and universities remain wide open.In my home state of Florida, unfortunately we're undergoing a budget crisis, and the funding for higher education, unfortunately, has been targeted for millions and millions of dollars of cuts.This has resulted in those university and community college doors being kept shut for many students.One student in my hometown at Tampa's Jefferson High School is Gabby Rodriguez.You know, she has a 4.3 grade point average, but because of the budget cuts in the state of Florida and the lack of student financial assistance, she may have to go to college out of state or put her college dreams on hold entirely.So the passage of this crucial bill could not come at a better time.With passage of this bill, we will increase need-based aid and make the federal Pell Grants more available to students.You know, last year, the Congress battled the Bush administration over the ability of first-generation students to attend college and work through the Upward Bound initiative.Well, we're focused on better jobs for the future, so we will strengthen the Upward Bound program through this bill today.We are focused on better jobs for the future, so we will provide loan forgiveness for graduates who decide to enter public service careers in areas of national need, such as early childhood educators and child welfare workers and firefighters.We're focused on better jobs for the future, so we encourage students' interest in math, science, and technology through this bill.Through the leadership of Chairman George Miller, who is a hero to college students throughout America, Congressman John Tierney, the ranking member, Mr. McKeon, Bobby Scott, Lynn Woolsey, all of the members of the Education and Labor Committee, I salute them and thank them for their leadership, because Mr. Speaker, this is an important bipartisan milestone for education, and I urge my colleagues to support the rule and the bill.Gentlewoman's time has expired.Gentleman from Washington?Thank you, Mr. Speaker.Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield five minutes to the ranking member of the Education and Workforce Committee, Mr. McKeon.Gentleman from California is recognized for five minutes.Thank you, Mr. Speaker.And I thank the gentleman for yielding.A decade ago, the last time we renewed the Higher Education Act, it was debated under an open rule that allowed every member the opportunity for full participation.On an issue so important to our nation's continued success, I would expect nothing less than a full and open debate.I'm disappointed that the same opportunity was not provided today.Sadly, suppressed debate is all we have known under this majority.I'm also disappointed that misuse of the budget reconciliation process last year has left us with a bill that includes many important reforms, but does not provide a full review of the largest financial aid programs.Because the budget reconciliation bill contained drastic and far-reaching changes to federal student loans, the bill before us pays very little consideration to student lending.Unfortunately, circumstances surrounding the loan programs have changed in the last several months, and it looks like now is exactly the time when we should be looking at these programs.We're all painfully aware of the collapse in the subprime mortgage market.Those financial insecurities have spread to higher quality assets, including the asset-backed equities that are often used to finance federal and non-federal student loans.As we face these market insecurities, the full extent of the cuts enacted through last year's budget reconciliation bill are just beginning to be understood.Taken together, it appears our federal loan program may be facing a perfect storm.Yet, here we are with a comprehensive higher education renewal that does not consider the student loan programs.I had hoped to offer an amendment today that would acknowledge the challenges facing the loan program.Although my amendment did not call for any immediate changes within the credit markets or the loan program structure, a sense of Congress urge the secretary of education to closely monitor the student loan marketplace so that if in the near future these market insecurities translate into a loss of loan availability, we could act quickly to protect the interests of students.Mr. Speaker, I won't be offering that amendment today.It was not ruled in order.Somehow a sense of the Congress acknowledging the very real challenges facing our nation's largest financial aid program was deemed unfit for consideration.We also won't be considering an amendment to protect students' free right speech on campus, or either of two amendments to ensure taxpayers aren't forced to provide assistance under this bill to illegal immigrants.Nor will we take up any of the other Republican amendments that were stifled by a heavy-handed majority.Mr. Speaker, we're here to consider a bipartisan bill that I strongly support.In fact, the bill was voted out of committee with a vote of 45 to 0.Yet even a bi-partisan college access bill, the majority could not bring itself to allow a fair and open debate.Just 4 of the 27 amendments we'll consider today were offered by Republicans, about 15%.For every six minutes we spend debating Democrat proposals today, the Republican ideas will be given 60 seconds.Democrats will claim that's how we ran things when Republicans were in charge.But during this same debate in 2006, when we considered comprehensive higher education reform, more than a third of the amendments considered on the floor were offered by Democrats.This is not just a problem of amendments being made in order.Republicans were blocked from even submitting amendments just three minutes after the deadline Tuesday morning.Key Republican proposals were rejected from consideration some 30 hours and 57 minutes before the Rules Committee met.Is this a majority that strictly adheres to deadlines no matter what the circumstances?Evidently not, at least not when they stand to benefit from a little flexibility.The listing of amendments on the Rules Committee website was modified at 4:39 p.m. Wednesday, just 21 minutes before the committee met.Fully 20 of the Democrats' amendments were modified or withdrawn after the submission deadline.I cannot help but ask, why are Republicans being shut out of a bipartisan bill?Why is the majority only permitting Republican amendments that align with their policy goals?Is this payback because Republicans plan to demand a vote today on earmark reform?Mr. Speaker, this is an unreasonable rule that taints the bipartisanship of the underlying bill, and I strongly oppose it.I yield back the balance of my time.Gentleman's time has expired.Gentlewoman from Ohio?I reserve my time.Gentlewoman from Ohio reserves the balance of her time.Gentleman from Washington?Mr. Speaker, I'm pleased to yield three minutes to the gentleman from Indiana, also a member of the committee.Gentleman from Indiana is recognized for three minutes.Thank you, I thank my distinguished friend from Washington State.I have a little bit of irony here.I had an amendment that we fully debated in committee on student free speech, and I wanted to offer it today, but isn't it ironic that while I was trying to argue for a student bill of rights and free speech, that we're not allowed to have free speech and a bill of rights in United States Congress.How in the world, when we're having 27 amendments, and this amendment was overwhelmingly supported by our party, we only have out of the 27, 4 that the majority party, 4 from Republicans, and two of those that Republicans oppose.If we have time for 27 amendments, why can't we have an amendment for free speech?I just don't understand.I never understood the opposition to amendment, but what an insult to the American people that when we want to debate whether there should be a student bill of rights on college campuses, which is being adopted and introduced in many places around the country, that the United States Congress can't even debate on the House floor a free speech amendment and protection for speech in colleges.This is an outrage, an embarrassment, and a humiliation to the Rules Committee.Why 27 amendments, but not one on the student bill of rights?Could it be that it's a difficult vote?David Horowitz, and I'd ask consent to insert in the record an article in defense of intellectual diversity, and- - Objection.That has been a champion of this problem.Now, we had a very interesting debate in committee.The chairman of the committee said that some of these students who have been complaining should grow up and cited a case of where he struggled.And certainly when I was in college in the late '60s and early '70s and wore a button \"I'm proud to be a square\" when most of America wasn't proud to be a square, that I certainly had my share of debates, my share of harassment, my share of being yelled down, trying to offer a different view than the lemming view that was popular in the late '60s.And some of that goes with being in a college campus.But there are examples all over this country where intellectual diversity, intellectual alternatives are being stymied in the academia.This amendment would try to protect those rights.Some of it's from the far Left, a lot of it's on the conservative side right now.In fact, next Tuesday, Ben Stein has a movie coming out, \"Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed,\" that will debut about one of those debates in science, where there is an effort to stamp it out.And particularly when you get into government economics, sociology, philosophy, and so on, increasingly there's a rigidity.And if you disagree, you are harassed, your grades can be altered, your papers can be given back to you, and alternative speakers are shouted down, and yes, there are nominal processes to do it.But if there are nominal processes to do it, what is wrong?This amendment says, for example, \"Individual colleges and universities have different missions, and each institution should design its academic program in accordance.Within the context of institutional mission, a college should promote intellectual pluralism and facilitate free and open exchange of ideas\".Well, that's...Will the gentleman yield an additional minute?I yield one additional minute.Gentleman's recognized for one additional minute.That's not very controversial.Students, \"D, students should not be intimidated, harassed, discouraged from speaking out, discriminated against, or subject to official sanction because of their personal, political, ideological, or religious beliefs\".Isn't that a terrible, risky, difficult vote?\"Students should be treated equally and fairly, including evaluation and grading, without regard to or consideration of their personal political views or ideological beliefs\".That's just awful.How could we vote on that in the United States Congress to say there'd be no persecution?There's no whereas clauses here.There's nothing in here that says campuses are liberal, campuses are conservative.We don't have anywhere as clauses that are insulting in here.There's nothing in here that's partisan.I just read you the guts of the bill.Why can't we vote on this?Why is this opposed?Why is it opposed so much that we're not even allowed to debate it on the floor of Congress?How can we say in a higher education bill that we believe in inquiry, that we believe in searching for knowledge, but when we had an amendment to protect students who might have a difference of opinion, that we wouldn't even allow a vote.Yield back.Time has expired.Gentlewoman from Ohio.Thank you, Mr. Speaker.I'd like to take this opportunity to refresh the memory of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle on past rules.The last time the Higher Education Reauthorization bill was considered in the House was just two years ago, in the 109th Congress.It too was done under a structured amendment process using two rules.Those two structured rules allowed a total of 22 amendments out of the 113 submitted, fewer than the rule we are offering today.This is a very fair rule, and I urge my colleagues to support it and the bill.The rule makes an order 27 amendments on a wide variety of important issues relating to the higher education of our nation's youth and others seeking a post-secondary education.Members on both sides of the aisle will be able to offer amendments that they believe will further improve this already very bipartisan bill.This bill is one of the most bipartisan products of the 110th Congress, reported from the Education and Labor Committee by a vote of 45 to 0.There is no arguing with those facts.And Mr. Speaker, the benefits of higher education are undeniable for students, their families, and for our country and society at large.As a nation, we recognize this, having always been a global standard-bearer in our high regard for the merits of higher education.Reaching the American dream of leading a secure and fulfilling life is a goal that we can make achievable when we open the doors of college to all.The fact that this bill passed 45 to 0 out of the Education Committee is a testament to the great work that the committee has done on this bill and to the fact that we care tremendously about the future of our children.Listening to parents from my district, Mr. Speaker, and across the country, I hear about how the ability to send their children to college weighs on their minds.And talking to professors, counselors, and administrators at the University of Akron, Lorain County Community College, and other schools across Ohio, I also know that student debt is a tremendous factor in determining which professions our students are choosing to enter.Nearly 2/3 of all students at four-year colleges nationwide graduate with loan debt these days, with the average amount of debt surpassing $15,000.This bill we're passing goes a long way to changing that distressing fact.By increasing aid and encouraging colleges to rein in tuition, this legislation will enable more students to pursue their passions and give back in service to their communities and our country.I am proud that this bill continues the work of this new-direction Congress in making necessary improvements for the workforce of tomorrow.We have seen the necessity of investing in STEM education, and this legislation continues the effort we began last year in passing the innovation agenda by improving teacher training and development programs and focusing on recruiting teachers into high-demand science and technology fields.In today's global economy, it's essential that America's workforce remain competitive at an international level.Mr. Speaker, the Higher Education Act has not been reauthorized in a decade.The Senate has already passed a reauthorization, so we must act expediently to pass this vital bill so the president may sign it into law.I hope that my colleagues on both sides of the aisle will join me in voting for this bill and supporting a brighter future for our students, our families, and our communities.And I reserve the balance of my time.Gentlewoman from Ohio reserves the balance of her time.Gentleman from Washington?Thank you, Mr. Speaker.Before I yield to my friend from Utah, the gentlelady made the point in her initial remarks when she was talking about reauthorization two years ago.It was done in a bipartisan way, and it was done successfully.But we know that this process already has some, that the administration already has some problems with it.While they haven't issued a veto threat, they have some concerns.And with that, Mr. Speaker, I want to yield three minutes to the gentleman from Utah, Mr. Bishop, a member of the committee.Gentleman from Utah is recognized for three minutes.Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and I appreciate the gentleman from Washington yielding me the time.You know, if you remember back in the 1960s when Volkswagens were very popular, and they had this wonderful self-deprecating campaign going on for their advertising.For instance, putting a Volkswagen in a carport and the caption would read, \"It makes your house look bigger\".My favorite one was taking a Volkswagen, ripping off the fenders, putting big tires on it, putting even a spoiler in the back, a painting stripe, jacking it up on the back, and the caption read, \"Is nothing sacred\"?Sometimes while I've been here in Congress, I've often wondered if nothing is actually sacred.Education, even higher education, is still the purview of states.10th Amendment gives them that parameter.And yet it is possible that we often ignore that.It is possible to soup up a Volkswagen, but we never should.It is also possible for us to tell states how to run their policy on education, how to appropriate their money to education, but it never should happen.The provision to which I object is called Maintenance of Effort.This is the provision that was added to the Budget Reconciliation Act, or attempted to, and it was removed.And most of the people in local governments are very surprised to see this effort coming back in here in this particular bill.Now, it's one of those things that this was also not discussed in our committee to any detail.It is one of those things that the Rules Committee will always talk about how these things should be discussed in committee.But when we in committee after committee have major pieces of legislation held close to the vest and only brought only hours or days before the actual markup in a committee, oftentimes we find things within those bills that are surprising.This provision was found in this bill, and it was not one of those pleasant surprises.Maintenance of Effort amendment that was put into this bill requires the states to maintain a five-year rolling average of their funding for higher education.And if they ever go under that five-year average of education, their LEAP funds, which are now renamed in this particular bill, will be yanked from those states unless they go to the Department of Education and grovel before the secretary of education to try and get some kind of penitence so they can get those monies back.This proposal is counterproductive.We all know that states have cyclical budget years like we do.In 2002, the average state increase in higher education was 1.8%.2006, it was up 9.3%.If I was a state legislator, again, responsible for those budgets, realizing this proposal was in here, when we had a chance to add more money to higher education, knowing we would now be judged on a five-year rolling average, there is no way I would ever put that kind of increase in there.This is gonna be counterproductive to actually states funding their higher education system.But even if this policy worked, we should not do it.H.L. Mencken once said, \"There is always an easy solution to every human problem.It's neat, it's plausible, and it's wrong\".Even if this federal stick to states was effective, it is wrong.It is wrong to tell states how they will appropriate their money.It is wrong to give them more federal mandates.Now, the chairman of the committee, Mr. Miller, will soften this proposal in a managed amendment.That is good, but doesn't go nearly far enough.Mr. Hoekstra had a perfect compromise amendment that was refused to be considered by the Rules Committee on a technicality.It is wrong.It should have been considered.And I had an amendment to remove this, to put it back to the status quo until we can have a chance in the committee to discuss this issue, and it was not allowed to be made in order.That is wrong.The proposal is wrong.The discussion process is wrong.It should be, if we're not gonna discuss these issues in the committee, it should be the purview of allowing people to come here on the floor and ask these issues, which are not just technical in nature, but philosophical in nature of what the federal government ought to do and what it ought not to do.This particular provision in here should be discussed.We should know full well what we are doing to states if we move forward in that area.And for the Rules Committee not to make that in order I think is wrong, I yield back the balance of my time.Gentleman yields back the balance of his time.Gentlewoman from Ohio?I would inquire of the gentleman from Washington if he has any remaining speakers.I have several speakers that wanna remark on this.Okay, well, I will reserve the balance of my time.Gentlewoman from Ohio reserves the balance of her time - Mr. Speaker, at this time, I'm pleased to yield two minutes to the distinguished ranking member of the Rules Committee, Mr. Dreier.Gentleman from California is recognized for two minutes.Speaker, I .Without objection.Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend for yielding.This is a very important piece of legislation.We all know, and I was happy to hear my friend from Ohio talk about the importance of our global competitiveness, and we have to have the best educated people as we proceed to make sure that we can compete in that global economy.But I have to say, Mr. Speaker, that the process around which we're considering this very important legislation is just plain wrong.We had 61 amendments that were submitted to us in the Rules Committee.Now, the last time that this was successfully authorized, as Mr. Hastings has pointed out to our colleagues, was 10 years ago.It was done under a modified open rule.Now, we had four Democrats sit before us on one of the panels last night, and they complimented the Rules Committee members for the hard work and the very distinguished chair of the Committee on Rules proceeded to talk about how life was tantamount to a living hell when we as Republicans were in control versus this great new day that we have.Well, Mr. Speaker, let me tell you just a little bit about this great new day that we have.There have been more than double, I repeat that, more than double the number of closed rules in the first session of the 110th Congress, and during this month of January, leading up to the 1st of February, than we had in the first session and leading up to the 1st of February in the 109th Congress, more than double the number of closed rules.And as I said, the last time we authorized this bill was in 1998, and it was done under a modified open rule.Yes, there was an attempt two Congresses ago to do it, and when we had a structured rule, it failed.Why don't those colleagues of ours who are in charge learn from the mistake of having not done this under an open amendment process?So we continue to hear, Mr. Speaker, this is a great new day, and all these wonderful changes have taken place.We actually have had Democrats and Republicans, Democrats and Republicans, prevented from improving this bill.Now, Mr. Hastings correctly pointed to the fact that the administration has raised a number of concerns, dozens of new programs that are included in this bill.The president wants to work with us to improve this legislation.Doing it under the structure that we have today undermines the potential to see that happen.Reject this rule, and let's come back with at least a modified open rule so that we can proceed with something that in a bipartisan way, we very much want to see happen, I yield back the balance of time.Gentleman's time has expired, gentlewoman from Ohio?I reserve my time.Gentlewoman from Ohio continues to reserve her time.Gentleman from Washington?Mr. Speaker, how much time on both sides?Gentleman from Washington has 13 minutes remaining.Gentlewoman from Ohio with 15 1/2 minutes remaining.Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to you three minutes to the gentleman from Minnesota, also a member of the Educational Workforce Committee.Gentleman from Minnesota is recognized for three minutes.Thank you, Mr. Speaker.I thank the gentleman for yielding.Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong opposition to this rule.The bill under consideration today is a product of a multi-year bipartisan effort by the Education and Labor Committee.Democrats and Republicans worked together to craft this legislation.Now the Rules Committee has thrown this bipartisan effort to the wind and revealed the true partisan colors that are flying there.By allowing 20 Democrat amendments and only 4 Republican amendments, the Rules Committee has effectively announced that the minority party is not to be a player.Folks, it isn't fair.It's not a democracy.I submitted an amendment to the Rules Committee early this week, but my colleagues will not even have the chance to consider its merits because it was not made an order by the Rules Committee.It is a particularly sad statement given the nature of my amendment.On January 29th, the city of Berkeley passed resolutions, that among other things, state that the United States Marine Corps recruiting office is not welcome in their city.And if recruiters choose to stay, they do so as uninvited and unwelcome intruders.I'm appalled.My amendment addresses this action by denying federal funding to colleges that contract with an entity that takes action to discriminate or condones discrimination against the military by denying equal public access.The amendment essentially holds colleges and universities accountable for maintaining agreements or contracts with entities that allow this open discrimination.Mr. Speaker, during the Vietnam era, and I'm old enough to have not only remember it, but to have experienced it, many of our service members and veterans received shameful treatment at the hands of those who opposed our nation's foreign policy.We must protect our current service members from the same treatment by showing that the Berkeley city council's appalling behavior is unacceptable in this great nation.Demonizing the men and women serving our country in the military as demonstrated by the Berkeley city council has no place in our nation's political discourse.As a graduate of the ROTC program and a 25-year veteran of the Marine Corps, I am profoundly disappointed with the appalling actions of the Berkeley city council.Institutions that continue to maintain contracts and agreements with this city are in effect condoning this discriminatory and unjust treatment of our service members.They deserve better from us, Mr. Speaker.This structured rule excluding my amendment denies this body the opportunity to reaffirm our strong support for the men and women who so honorably and bravely defend our nation.Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to vote against this restrictive rule, and I yield back the balance of my time.Gentleman yields back the balance of his time, does the gentlewoman from Ohio continue to reserve her time?I continue to reserve.Gentleman from Washington.Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield three minutes to the gentleman from Georgia, a former member of the Rules Committee, Mr. Gingrey.Gentleman from George is recognized for three minutes.Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.And Mr. Speaker, I rise not in opposition to the bill.I think there's some good things in the bill.I was a former member of the Education and Workforce Committee.I know our ranking member, Mr. McKeon, is a supporter of the bill.I rise in strong opposition to this rule, Mr. Speaker, the gentlelady on the Rules Committee of the majority side, the gentlelady from Ohio has mentioned a couple of things in her remarks talking about what we did, we Republicans did when we controlled this body, and indeed the Rules Committee, and how restrictive we may have been.But what I want to remind her is that I sat on that Rules Committee during that time, and I can remember the comments that were made from the minority, the then Democratic minority of if they had an opportunity to control this place, then rules would be open and fair, and people would be treated fair, so that each member would have an opportunity.They didn't say, \"Well, when we get the majority, we're gonna stick it to you just like you've stuck it to us\".So I think they should live by what they said they would do.And the other thing I want to point out to the gentlelady from Ohio, she talked about the bipartisanship of this bill on a 45-0 vote.Well, 45 members of this body is 10%.90% of us don't get an opportunity to speak on the bill and to offer what I think are very good amendments.Now, 47 were submitted, 27 were made in order.But how many Republican amendments?4 out of 27.It wasn't one of mine, and I had a very good amendment, Mr. Speaker.This is the only opportunity I get to talk about it.It's bi-partisan.Basically, Mr. Speaker, this amendment deals with FERPA, the Family Education Privacy Rights Act of 1974.The tragedy at Virginia Tech where we lost so many lives was because I think, because colleges and universities misinterpret that law, and my amendment would simply say that if a parent lists a child, a student on their tax return as a dependent, even though they might be over age 18, maybe they're a junior and age 20, but they are dependent as verified by the tax return, then those parents should have access to academic records, disciplinary records, drinking on campus, whatever.And many of us I'm sure have had college students where because of FERPA, we never could find out how our youngsters were doing until they were in dire trouble of maybe flunking out of school, or having a substance abuse problem.I commend Representative Tim Murphy for his work in regard to mental health issues along this same line.But this was a very good amendment, Mr. Speaker, and one that I would think that the Democrats would want to join Republicans and vice versa and have unanimous support of that.So I'm very disappointed, I'm very disappointed not only for myself, but for the American people, my constituents, students and parents all across this country.So again, it's not the bill that I'm opposed to.I'm opposed to this restrictive rule.And I yield back the balance of my time.Gentleman's time has expired.Gentlewoman continues to reserve her time?Yes, Speaker.Gentleman from Washington.Thank you, Mr. Speaker.Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield two minutes to the gentleman from Georgia, Mr. Kingston.Gentleman from Georgia is recognized for two minutes.Yes, Jim, thank you very much.And I've urged my colleagues to vote no on this rule so that we can amend it, or offer an amendment on earmark reform.And as we heard the president last week speak about earmarks in the State of the Union, to my knowledge, no president has ever talked about something that's ordinarily a House and Senate procedure in his State of the Union comments.But in it he declared war, you may say, on earmarks.Now, we believe in the prerogative of the legislative branch to put things in the budget and take things out of the budget.Indeed, the White House earmarks all the time.But the reality is, Mr. Speaker, we need to have a discussion on earmarks.We do need to stop the practice of airdropping earmarks into conference committees, earmarks that haven't been debated, discussed, or had hearings held on them on the House or the Senate level.I think that's the first step, but I think there's a whole lot of other things that we should do.For example, there are earmarks routinely in the Transportation bill.There are earmarks in trade bills, earmarks all over the place in any tax bills.We believe that earmarking should be reformed on all committee levels.We always talk about appropriations, but there's lots of committees that do it.If we allow this amendment to come to the floor, we will set up a joint bicameral, bipartisan select committee on earmarks that will come up with recommendations on how to do a better job with them.This would require, or we would urge a moratorium on earmarks until the select committee comes back to Congress with recommendations.But there's so many things that we could do that would improve this process.For example, financial disclosure on earmarks.Does the member have anything at stake to personally gain?Transparency, so that when an earmark is added on a subcommittee or a full committee or a floor level...Will the gentleman- - Yield the gentleman additional one minute.Gentleman's recognized for an additional minute.Transparency, so that the earmark's put in, and members have an opportunity to ask why is that in there?Who put it in there?What does it do?And why should the people of Idaho have their tax dollars go to something that happens in Florida?We want to be able to have that debate.I think that that is so important.And again, there are tax loopholes that are basically industry-specific earmarks.Who puts them in?At least with appropriations right now, you know who puts them in.But on tax earmarks, you do not.The White House, the White House does all kinds of earmarking, and we, and certainly the press lets them get away with it because for some reason they're the White House.But under the constitutional concept of equal branches of government, particularly when spending bills originate in the House, we have the right to earmark, but we should all be measured by the same yardstick.The other thing that is important is what is the impact of earmarks on the budget?When you take an earmark out of a bill, it does not reduce the bill.Is that something that we should look at?There are all types of things that a bipartisan, bicameral committee could look at that would improve this process.So I'd urge a no vote on the rule so that we can come back and have this opportunity to vote on this amendment.Gentleman's time has expired.Gentlewoman from Ohio?Mr. Speaker, I have only one remaining speaker who will close debate for this side.Because we have the right to close, I'll reserve the time until the gentleman has closed and yielded back his time.Mr. Speaker, I understand the gentlelady, that she's prepared to close if I finish mine.Is that correct?Yeah?Gentlelady has just one- - I have a speaker who will close.Who will close for you.Yes.Gentleman from Washington.Mr. Speaker, I just want to acquire again.There's only one speaker on that side, is that correct?That's correct.Mr. Speaker, how much time do I have?Gentleman from Washington has 4 1/2 minutes remaining.Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of the time.Gentleman is recognized.Mr. Speaker, much has been talked about, about this unfair closed rule dealing with the underlying issue.And that seems to be a recurring pattern, and I wish that it would change, but I don't hold out any hope that that will happen.But Mr. Speaker, since House earmark rules were changed just last year, loopholes and concerns have been raised.Questions remain such as what and what is not an earmark?When do earmark rules apply, and how are earmark rules enforced?We have seen examples of member trying to challenge earmarks and enforce the earmark rules only to be told they can't because the rules don't apply.And we have seen earmarks repeatedly airdropped into bills at the last minute that were not subject to transparency or scrutiny.Time and time again, Republicans have come to the floor advocating for additional earmark reform, including stronger transparency and enforceability.Taxpayers also recognize the earmark process is broken and are outraged with wasteful spending.This has led to an erosion of public confidence in Congress and could explain part of the reason why Congress's approval ratings are so low.It is clear Americans want Congress to act now and fix the broken earmark process.An earmark timeout is needed in order to get our fiscal House in order and restore public confidence.In January, House Republicans united together and called on House Democrats to join us in an immediate moratorium on earmarks and the appointment of a bipartisan, bicameral joint committee to reform the earmark process and eliminate wasteful spending.House Democrat leaders were invited to join with Republicans and take the sensible bipartisan course of action to reform the broken earmark process.But the Democrats have remained silent and chosen to continue the broken status quo.So today I'm going to give all members of the House an opportunity to show their support for a bipartisan solution.Mr. Speaker, I'm asking my colleagues to vote against the previous question so that I can amend the rule to allow the House to immediately consider House Concurrent Resolution 263, which would establish a joint select committee on earmark reform.The joint select committee on earmark reform would hold hearings and make recommendations for the comprehensive reform of the earmark process.Their resolution would also prohibit bills, resolutions, and conference reports containing earmarks requested by members or the administration to be considered until the joint select committee has filed its report.Considering and adopting House Concurrent Resolution today is a sensible bipartisan solution that will bring genuine accountability and transparency to the spending process and will restore taxpayer trust and integrity in Congress.Let me be clear, with my motion, every member of this House will have a chance to publicly vote and take a stand on earmark abuse and earmark secrecy.Every member will vote on whether they believe the earmark process must be reformed.So Mr. Speaker, we will do all that we can on our side to challenge the leaders to adopt this resolution until a moratorium or bipartisan committee is in place.House Republicans have adopted already a series of earmark reforms that we will adhere to, including barring members from using taxpayer money to fund projects named after themselves and prohibiting earmarks from being airdropped into bills at the last minute to avoid transparency.So Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to insert the text of the amendment, the letter sent from the Republican leaders to Speaker Pelosi on January 25th, 2008, and extraneous materials immediately prior to the vote on the previous question.Without objection.Mr. Speaker, I urge all of my colleagues to join me today in acting to permanently change the way in which Washington spends taxpayer's money.Vote no on the previous question so we can address this very important House Concurrent Resolution.Mr. Speaker, with that, I yield back the balance of my time.Gentleman from Washington yields back the balance of his time, gentlewoman from Ohio.Mr. Speaker, it's my honor to yield the balance of time, of my time to the gentleman from Wisconsin, the distinguished chairman of the Committee on Appropriations, Mr. Obey, who will close for our side.Gentleman from Wisconsin is recognized.Mr. Speaker, to listen to the last two speakers, one would think that they had Rip Van Winkled their way through the last year in this House.For the Republican party leadership to belatedly give us lectures on earmarks is in my view akin to reformed alcoholics giving lectures on temperance.The Higher Education bill being debated today is funded through the Labor H Appropriation bill.In fiscal 1995, the last year I chaired that subcommittee, that bill contained virtually no earmarks.By the year 2000, that same bill contained 491 earmarks.And by 2006, that bill had 3,031 earmarks, totalling $1.2 billion.The previous Republican leadership was notorious for using earmarks as enticements in order to get their membership to vote for bills that individuals would otherwise not be inclined to vote for.For example, newspapers at the time reported that the previous Republican leadership used earmarks in the Transportation Authorization bill as rewards for several Republican members who switched their votes and agreed to support the Medicare Part D provision that forbade the federal government from negotiating with the drug industry to provide lower costs for seniors under Medicare.Under the Republican leadership the cost of earmarks quadrupled, and we were treated to stories about Mr. Cunningham, Mr. Ney, Mr. Abramoff abusing the process, as well as several others.When Democrats took over the House, until we could reform the process, we suspended earmarks for a year over the fierce objections of as many members of the Republican party as we saw in my own party.In response to demands from both parties, after we reformed the process, we then resumed the earmarking process with the expressed intention of cutting in half the cost of earmarks in non-project accounts.We made no such commitments for accounts that are by their nature project-based because to do so would gut the very purpose under the bills or of the bills under consideration.Example, the Army Corps budget is by its nature project-based.In fiscal 2006, the administration sent up a budget request for the Army Corps containing 984 projects.Of the final amount provided for the Corps, 86% of the projects where administration-requested earmarks.The Corps is an interesting example.The administration argues that they have a system for selecting projects, and that they only select projects that score a three or better on their scale.However, in 2006, there were 16 projects requested by the administration that did not even qualify for funding based on the administration's own criteria.After all the shouting was over last year, we essentially met our promise, cutting non-project earmarks by 43% after negotiations with the Senate, cutting it from $16 billion down to $9 billion.So we came pretty doggone close to our goal.I would've preferred a larger reduction to 50%, but 43% reduction is a 43% larger reduction than any Republican Congress ever produced.And we did it under a reform process.At the beginning of the 110th Congress, the new Democratic majority passed unprecedented new rules that require the listing of the sponsors of every earmark, that require that any member of Congress requesting an earmark disclose in writing the name and address of the intended recipient, the purpose of the earmark, and require that members certify that he or she had no financial interest in the project.We also require that all matters before a conference committee, including earmarks, must be subjected to full and open debate, and that no item might be added to the conference report after the conference committee had adjourned, as has happened many times in the past.As we moved forward with the earmarks last year, I brought a motion to the floor to see if members wanted to eliminate all earmarks.That motion failed by a vote of 53 to 369, with the majority of both parties voting against it.I'm assuming they did that because an overwhelming member of honorable members on both sides of the aisle believe that members should not lose the ability to fund priority items for their districts because of the scurrilous behavior of a handful of renegade members.During House consideration of fiscal '08 appropriation bills, 71 earmark-related amendments were debated and voted on on the floor, including three amendments to eliminate all earmarks in the bill under consideration, and 68 amendments to eliminate particular earmarks.Of the 48 amendments on which recorded votes were taken, only 13 received the support of more than half the Republicans who voted.On those 13, the percentage of Republicans who voted yes never exceeded 57%.Every member knows that even if the House unilaterally suspends earmarks, the Senate will not follow suit.A firm majority on both sides will see to that.I have learned that lesson the hard way.One last point, the resolution introduced by our friends on the other side calls for the suspension of earmarks for six months, until yet another group offers their suggestions for change.It is ironic indeed that that delay would force us to do the same thing that the Republican leadership so roundly criticized me for last year when I proposed to delay earmarks one month until we had time, until we had more time to review them.The practical effect of the resolution which our Republican friends want to bring up today, even though it is non-germane to this bill, would be to require the airdropping of every single earmark in the entire federal budget.It would guarantee that no earmarks could be discussed or debated while the bill was on the floor of the House of Representatives.It would then give you in spades what our friends on the Republican side said last year they wanted to avoid.I fail to see how requiring every single earmark in appropriation bills this year, I fail to see how requiring all of those earmarks to be airdropped rather than debated when we consider the bills is reform.It moves exactly in the opposite direction of that which our Republican friends said we should move last year.So as far as I'm concerned, the truth is, this is not serious reform at all.It is a grandstanding attempt to escape the reputation of previous Congresses.If I had presided over those previous Congresses, I would be running away from their reputation just as fast as the minority appears to be today.And with that, I yield back the balance of my time.Gentlewoman from Ohio?I move the previous question on the resolution.The question is on ordering the previous question.Those in favor, say aye.Aye.Those opposed, no.No!In the opinion of the chair, the no's have it.Mr. Speaker, I demand the yeas and nays.The yeas and nays are requested.Those favoring a vote by the yeas and nays will rise.A sufficient number having risen, the yeas and nays are ordered.Members will record their votes by electronic device.Pursuant to clause 8 and clause 9 of rule 20, this 15-minute vote on ordering the previous question will be followed by five minute votes on adopting House Resolution 956, suspending the rules of adopting House Concurrent Resolution 283, suspending the rules of passing House Resolution 4848.This is a 15-minute vote.The House.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/house_proceeding_02-07-08.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/house_proceeding_02-07-08.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/house_proceeding_02-07-08.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/mv_house_proceeding_04-10-08_00/house_proceeding_04-10-08_00.mp3", "text": "Six, the nays are three, two thirds being the affirmative.The rules are suspended.The resolution is agreed to.And without objection, the motion has reconsidered is laid on the table.The House's in order.Members, if you can kindly clear the way.The Houses is in order.All members are asked to take their conversation off the House Floor and those members remaining on the floor are encouraged to take a seat.All members and staff are encouraged to take their conversations off the House Floor.Those members of staff who wish to remain on the House Floor are encouraged to take a seat.Or we can stay here all day.If the gentlewoman would suspend until we have order in the House.All members and staff are encouraged to take their conversations off the House Floor.Those members desiring to stay on the House Floor are encouraged to take a seat.This includes staff as well.For what purpose does the gentlewoman from New York, rise.Mr. speaker by direction of the committee on Rules I call up house resolution 1092 and ask for its immediate consideration.The clerk will report the resolution.House calendar number 202 house resolution 1092, resolve.That section 151 E1 and section 151 F1 of the trade act of 1974 shall not apply in the case of the bill, HR 5724 to implement the United States Columbia Trade Promotion Agreement.Gentlewoman from New York is recognized for one hour.Thank you, Mr. Speaker.And for the purpose of debate only I yield the customery 30 minutes to the gentleman from California, Mr. Dryer, all time yielded during consideration of the rules for debate only.I ask unanimous consent that all members have five legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks and insert extraneous materials into the record.Without objection.So order.I yield myself such time as I may consider.The gentlewoman from New York's recognize.Thank you, Mr. Speaker.HR 1092 relates to the consideration of HR5724, the United States Columbia Trade Promotion Agreement.The rules suspends the timeline per house consideration that are fast-track law with respect to consideration of this specific trade agreement.Mr. Speaker, we in Congress have a fiduciary obligation to ensure that the legislation pass through this chamber represents the best interest of those that sent us here: the American people.To outsource that very basic legislative responsibility is to abdicate the duties constitutionally prescribed to our branch and raises questions as to why we are here in the first place.Situation we find ourselves in today, deals directly with that issue.The president has attempted to dictate the legislative schedule of the Congress, according to his political calendar, over the objections of congressional leadership.he sent Congress the Columbia Free Trade Agreement in an attempt to force consideration of the measure within 60 days, by using a provision known as Trade Promotion Authority or Fast-track.Mr. Speaker, I think it's important to dispel a few myths about the action that we take today.The role we're taking up today does not in any way affect the Columbia Free Trade Agreement.It simply removes the timeline for considering it.It gives the House of representatives, the right to schedule, when the agreement is undertaken.There are some who've called into question whether Congress has the right to suspend fast-track procedures for trade agreements.One need look no further than the trade act of 1974.The legislation that establishes fast-track to see that the very statute itself allows that like any rule of the House, fast-track procedures can be suspended.We've also heard some raise questions about what consequences our actually here today will have on the Senate's consideration of the Columbia Free Trade Agreement.The answer is, it will have no effect.The rule today was necessitated by the partisan and irresponsible actions of the president.Instead of working with Congress to reach agreements on this accord, he instead took the unprecedented step of sending the Columbia Trade Deal to Congress over the objection of congressional leaders.Mr. Speaker, the American people have been promised a lot when it comes to trade.However, the country whose economy has been devastated by ill-conceived trade deals, it can only be expected that the American people will remain wary.The promise of good paying work on the horizon has consistently been bashed by the reality of job loss.Last year's unemployment rate was 5.1% and more jobs over 80,000 were lost last month alone.Is yet another indicator or the worsening economic situation facing millions of America's families.Each day it becomes clearer that our country is teetering on the edge of economic disaster.And for millions financial ruin is just around the corner.It is simply not the right time to move forward with this trade agreement.The American people deserve an agreement that actually responds to the needs of the American worker.Not makes promises that will not be met.By passing the rule today, we will no longer be bound by arbitrary deadlines and the House can bring up the agreement at the appropriate time and under the appropriate conditions.Mr. Speaker, there's yet another reason why this Free Trade Agreement is untimely and requires additional consideration moving toward passage.We've been promised time after time and trade legislation that there would be the side agreements protecting the life and the work of labor, that there would be an environmental safeguards, that there were no longer be child labor.None of that has come true.And that certainly makes one suspicious on this trade bill.And also, because of the number of trade unionists who have been murdered.This makes the Columbia Free Trade Agreement hard to justify giving the continued violence against the union leaders, subsistence farmers, indigenous peoples, and Afro Colombians.While President Uribe has made some progress, systematic killings are still far too prevalent to warrant the passage of this bill.The persecution of trade unionists is well-known because since the beginning of this year, 12 have already been murdered.Rewarding the Colombian government with this bill under those conditions eliminates any leverage US government has to improve the respect for human rights and the rule of law in the future.To push forward in a time of economic insecurity is simply a responsible for working families at home.To push forward in the midst of gross violations of human rights in Columbia is simply wrong.It is the prerogative of Congress, to suspend fast-track if the timing necessitates it, and only when it is in the best interest of the American people.By passing the rule today, we are reestablishing the House of representatives as co-equal to the president and in doing so, we're standing up for America's working families.And I reserve the balance of my time.Gentlemen from California is recognized for 30 minutes.I want to begin with my appreciation of my very good friend, the distinguished chair of the committee on rules for yielding me the customary 30 minutes.Mr. Speaker, I've seen many, many unexpected political alliances that have been formed over the past years that I've been privileged to serve here, but I've never expected to be taking up a rule that aligns with the goals of Hugo Chavez and South American narco terrorists.The US Columbia Free Trade Agreement would deliver a significant blow to Chavez's authoritarian designs for the region and the FARCs terrorist agenda.No one was quicker.No one was quicker to condemn the president's decision to send this FTA implementing legislation to Congress than Hugo Chavez himself.And so that's why Mr. Speaker, what we're considering today is nothing more than the Hugo Chavez rule.The agreement, that we hope very much we could see this institution pass would help to strengthen democratic institutions, provide real economic opportunity for the Colombian people and solidify the rule of law.So naturally it is vehemently opposed to someone who is systematically dismantling representative democracy and free markets and resorting to corruption and crony capitalism to enrich government coffers at the expense of the working poor.That is the legacy of Hugo Chavez.And naturally, Mr. Speaker, this agreement is also vehemently opposed by a terrorist organization that simply cannot continue to survive in a thriving, stable, and transparent democracy with strong institutions and an increasingly prosperous population.The government of Columbia, its business leaders and its private sector unions all strongly support this agreement for the very reasons that it's opposed by the region's most nefarious forces.It would be a giant leap forward in solidifying their attempts to take back their country from the violent and lawless groups that tore it apart for decades.And yet here we are today, considering a rule that blocks consideration of the agreement under the rules of the Trade Promotion Authority, which were established over 30 years ago.Many supporters of this Hugo Chavez rule, like to argue that this rule is as much about process as it is substance.I regularly make the argument that process is substance.So let's examine these claims, Mr. Speaker.The argument has been made by the sending up the implementing legislation without an invitation, the president has violated the rules set forth by the trade act of 1974.And Congress must take special action to assert its role.Mr. Speaker, over the last few years, we witnessed a number of struggles between the first two branches of government.So Congressional Prerogative is a familiar theme these days, and I'm a strong supporter of Congressional Prerogative.As a result the argument in this case has found an overly credulous audience in this body and proven persuasive to the uninformed.So I'll do my democratic colleagues the favor of reviewing the details of trade promotion authority.The statute outlines very clearly the responsibilities of the administration.It sets forth a number of negotiating principles.It demands that the administration closely consult with Congress prior to, during and after the negotiating process.It requires notification 90 days before entering into negotiations.Prior to signing, it requires notice of potential changes to Trade Remedy laws, a 180 days in advance.Notification of intent to sign 90 days in advanced followed by advisory committee reports within 30 days.60 days after signing a list of laws changes is due.90 days after signing an International Trade Commission report is due.All of this is designed to ensure that the concerns and prerogatives of the United States Congress are met.The administration, Mr. Speaker upheld both the letter and the spirit of the law at every single step.High ranking officials met with Congress a 160 times prior to, and during the negotiations.They've held nearly 450 meetings since August of 2007 and taken 55 members of Congress to Columbia to see the situation there for themselves.To say that the administration has not upheld their end of the bargain is outright laughable.Now, what is Congress is end of the bargain under TPA, to hold an up or down vote within 60 days in the House and 90 days in the Senate.That's the deal, close consultation followed by a timely vote.Congress gets the final say, but it has the responsibility to not let a complicated and time-consuming negotiation to go to waste or languish indefinitely.We have a negotiation that was launched four years ago, concluded two years ago and signed a year and a half ago.And now after all of this, all of this consultation, all this time, Democratic leadership wants to make an unprecedented never before this is done, an unprecedented rule change to allow them to abrogate their role under TPA all the time, while blaming the administration and claiming, it's to blame the administration, somehow to blame for a broken process.They are just making up this nonsense as they go along.Mr. Speaker, ironically on Wednesday morning, when the Democratic leadership was announcing their intention to take this highly divisive, partisan and unprecedented action, I was sending a letter to several of my Democratic colleagues.I was reaching out to them in hopes that they would join me in a special order next week, to talk about Columbia.As colleagues who have gone to the country for ourselves, I was hoping that we could come together to simply share what we had seen firsthand in Columbia.Under TPA, the House has, as I said, 60 days to debate and work together to reach consensus.60 days to work in a bipartisan way.I thought that our special order describing our experiences would be a constructive and congenial way to begin.Unfortunately, the Democratic leadership has cut off this substinate process before it could even begin.Killing any hope of bipartisanship on this issue.Mr. Speaker, their actions are causing even more damage abroad.They're sabotaging our relationship with our best and closest ally in South America.This is an ally that faces a hostile neighbor on its border, which threatens not just Colombia, but the very ideals of democracy and free markets.This ally faces and even graver daily threat within its borders.A threat that has been weakened by President Uribe brave efforts, but one that still exists.I've gone to Columbia twice in the past few months, once with Congress secretary Gutierrez, and once with a speaker's house Democracy Assistance Commission.I've seen for myself, the transformation that has taken place, I've seen the safe and orderly streets of Bogota, and Medellin.I've seen the new opportunities and economic growth.I've met with the attorney general and discussed extensively, his efforts to prosecute violent offenders and end the days of impunity for murders.I have sat down with former members of the paramilitaries whose leaders have gone to jail and who are now struggling to reintegrate into society with the help of government funded social programs.This is a country that has come miraculously far in just a few short years and has so far to go.I find it shocking that the Democratic leadership would turn their backs on our friend and ally.Who's accomplished so much.And who asked for our continued help in accomplishing even more.This week we've all heard the lengthy testimony of General Patraeus and ambassador Crocker.A very common theme I've heard from my democratic colleagues throughout this testimony is concerned for America's lost prestige abroad.They decry what they call our unilateralism and our disregard for the concerns for our allies.And yet today they propose to flagrantly commit what the Colombian vice-president, the Colombian vice-president has called a slap in the face editorial boards across this country have similarly slammed this action.The Washington Post comparative to telling Columbia to drop dead.The Las Vegas review journal says that what we're doing is stabbing our trading partners in the back.Mr. Speaker, the Democratic leadership is determined to isolate our greatest ally in South America and weaken the region's strongest advocate for democracy, flouting national security and our international credibility.The damage to our interests and our leadership will be significant and lasting.Our friends and allies will realize that our word at the negotiating table cannot be trusted and the rules can be changed in the middle of the game, according to the whims of electoral politics.Mr. Speaker, this rule must be defeated for the sake of our national security interests, our leadership in the international community, and our responsibilities as an institution.I urge my colleagues to vote no, and with that, I reserved the balance of my time.Gentlewoman from New York.Mr. speaker I'm pleased to hear three minutes to the gentleman from New York, the chairman of the committee on Ways and Means, Mr. Rangel.The gentlemen from New York is recognized for three minutes, without objection.Thank you.And thank you so much, Madam Chair, for giving me this opportunity.I could not disagree with my friend from California more.And there's no one in this house that I believe that the administration has not spoken to more in concerns of four pieces of trade legislation.And I doubt whether there's anyone that has the compassionate concern more than I, about the people of Columbia, who I've learned to admire, respect and work with over the years, not only with their political problems, but certainly their fight with narcotics and trying to preserve democracy in that country.The president has violated protocol in terms of not fulfilling the outlines that we've been using historically.So what I have to say applies, whether you're Democrat or Republican.If in the rules that the distinguished chairman of the Rules Committee has outlined to us, there's an area of consultation before the president actually sends a complex piece of legislation to the House, which is more conducive of bringing us together.Saying to the House that you have 90 days.And if you don't do anything in 90 days, and it's the House of representative that killed a bill designed to help our friends of this area, or to say, Mr. President, you forgot to consult with us.You forgot to consult with the Ways and Means committee.You did not deal with some of the issues we have.And so as you've changed the rule and just sending it over saying, it's your responsibility in the House.What we're saying is that let's give the House more time and not a timetable to see what can we do to facilitate an atmosphere that would allow the members at least to know, what's in the bill.It is really strange, that the ranking member of the Rules Committee has presented us the speech this morning, that is so similar that I don't remember the last time anyone in the administration is talking about the bill.oh, Hugo Chavez goes to sleep every night, wondering what he's going to do and cash, oh, my God, when we should vote for the People of Columbia and make him against them and make him a big threat in the community.I'm not saying these things shouldn't be consented, but how many people Republican or Democrat has the slightest idea, what's in the trade bill?Why not give them an opportunity to make this decision?Not based on 40 days, 50 days or 90 days, but for us to bring up these things.And when has anyone ever heard that they didn't have a crisis in times of peace and tranquility against terrorism and assassination.And Colombia, the question we may ask is, you really doing a man that I respect as much as he should.Should he be doing more?But the real question, could I..Your time is expired.I yield gentleman one more minute.Thank you.Gentleman from New York is recognized for one minute.The real question I think we should ask our friend is that we know you have a problem.We have problems in every major city.Why don't you allow us to share with you some of the techniques we have, some of the technology, work with your law enforcement, so at the end of the day, those who claim that it's murder that stops us from voting on a trade bill, that we will be able to say that we working with them.So I hope that you rethink the vote.This vote is going to apply to every president, every speak of the House that deals with us.Do you believe they can change the rules?And then we say that they dictate the legislative calendar of the House of representatives?I think not.You change the procedure.We defend the rules of the House and what are we giving up?We are giving us an opportunity, one to find out what's in the trade bill and three, which is most important.What can we do to resolve the issues that forced members to be against it?So I appreciate the words of my friends from California, but you have to do that.You're a ranking member.I remember when I had to say things that I had to say, let's work together on this.Gentleman's time has expired..Gentlemen from California.Speaker this time, I'm very happy to yield two minutes to a hardworking fighter for freedom, member of the rules committee, Mr. Diaz-Balart.Gentleman from Florida is recognized for two minutes.Mr. speaker, what the majority leadership of this Congress, what this rule is saying to Columbia today is you voted to tie your economy to the United States, but sorry we don't care.You're at war with narco terrorists, armed to the teeth by drug money and given sanctuary by neighboring governments.Sorry, we don't care.You've voted not once, twice overwhelmingly to support your brave president and his government and the Colombian armed forces as they fight the narco terrorists and defend your rule of law.Sorry, we don't care.Well, I say to the people of Columbia, Mr. Speaker, like the president of the United States, many of us here in Congress are with you and you are not alone.Despite this day of legislative action that will live in infamy.Gentlemen yields back the balance of his time, gentlewoman from New York.I'm pleased to yield four minutes to the gentleman from Massachusetts, an expert in this issue and a member of the committee on rules, Mr. McGovern.The gentleman from Massachusetts is recognized for four minutes.I thank the gentle lady for her leadership on this important debate.And I rise in strong support of this rule.Mr. Speaker, the policies of the Bush administration have produced an American economy in crisis.People are losing their jobs, fuel prices are at a record high, food prices have dramatically increased, confidence in the economy is at an all time low.Now, maybe this is a radical idea, Mr. Speaker, but shouldn't the energy, passion and focus of the administration be on fixing these problems.This administration has turned a cold shoulder to the plight of American workers.They have opposed efforts to extend unemployment benefits.They have no plan to help 45 million Americans get health insurance.They have even opposed expanding health benefits to children.Their absolute indifference towards our fellow citizens is stunning.It takes my breath away.Well, that must change.The speaker of the House has the right to prioritize legislation.She has stated quite clearly that we want to continue to work with President Uribe.to make progress on improving human rights, the rule of law, ending impunity, breaking Columbia's political and military ties to drug lords and paramilitary groups, and protecting and promoting basic labor rights.Mr. Speaker, if the Colombian FTA came up today for a vote, I would strongly oppose it.I have repeatedly told the Colombian government that I am always willing to reassess my position, but when it comes to issues like human rights, I refuse to be a cheap date.The UN, the Red Cross, and US and Columbia and human rights groups all describe a worsening humanitarian crisis in Colombia.The number of internally displaced grew by 27% over the past year due to increasing violence throughout the country.And over each of the past three years, murders of civilians by the Colombian army have been increasing.Violence against trade unions continues in an extremely high level.And the vast majority of cases of murders of labor leaders remain unsolved.It is true Mr. Speaker, that murderers of trade unionists in 2007 were about half of what they were in 2006.Even then Columbia had the highest rate of trade union murders in the world, but death threats, attacks and disappearances skyrocketed, but this one year hiatus in the murder rate may be over.In just the first 12 weeks of 2008, 17 trade unionists have already been assassinated.Mr. Speaker, like many of my house colleagues, I have traveled to Columbia several times over the past seven years.I have gone to Putumayo, not just to fly over fumigated territory, but to meet with hundreds of human rights victims and campesino on the ground.I've been to Barranca Bermejo, Sincelejo and Popayan.I've traveled to San Jose, to Apartado and to Arauca.where violence from all armed actors, reign Supreme and community leaders are murdered like flies.I visited the slums of Bogota where the poor and the internally displaced, struggled to survive.I spent hours in meetings with human rights groups, with families whose loved ones are held in brutal captivity by the FARC and with victims of violence by the paramilitaries and the Colombian army.I've met with the constitutional court religious and labor leaders with indigenous peoples and Afro Colombians and dozens of government and military officials.There is so much more to Columbia than the administrations day and a half excursion tours to Medellin and Cartagena.Mr. Speaker, Congress must insist upon improvements in human rights in Columbia and not paint a rosy picture simply to secure a trade agreement.US policy must take responsibility for their behavior of Colombian security forces trained with US tax dollars, take into account the continued suffering of the civilian population in the midst of an ongoing conflict and support the rights of victims after a decade of atrocities.I remained dedicated to the Columbia people.I will never advocate walking away from Columbia.I also strongly support the right of the speaker of the House to take up trade agreements when it makes the most sense to do so.I urge my colleagues to adopt this rule and to remain engaged with Columbia on these points.Gentleman from California.Speaker for unanimous consent request, an opposition to Hugo Chavez rule, I yield to my friend from Michigan, Mr. Kamp - Thank you, Gentlemen.Gentlemen from Michigan's recognized for how long?Asking consent to revise and extend my remarks.I'm sorry, the gentleman's recognized for how long?No period of time at all.Oh, okay, gentleman's recognized.Thank you, Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to revise and extend my remarks.Without objection, so ordered.Speaker, I yield a three minutes to the distinguished ranking member of the committee on Ways and Means who's a strong opponent of the Hugo Chavez rule.The gentlemen from Shreveport, Mr. McCrary.Gentlemen from Louisiana is recognized for three minutes.Thank you, Mr. Speaker.I strongly oppose this extraordinary unprecedented and I believe dangerous change to the House rules.Congress first gave trade promotion authority to the president in 1974, in order to allow him to engage directly with our competitors around the world to level the playing field.Eliminate barriers to American exports and create jobs for American workers.Passing this rule would undermine that authority and damage the United States credibility abroad because our trading partners could rightfully question the commitments of our government in negotiating trade agreements.I've heard it said that this rule will allow us to consider this agreement this year after the election.But what this rule would do is to eliminate the certainty under TPA, that Congress will vote on this agreement.It doesn't guarantee a vote, but anytime certain it doesn't push the vote off until after the election.It simply turns off the clock entirely.Even postponing congressional consideration of this agreement does tremendous damage to America's competitiveness.Right now, Canada, the European Union are completing trade agreements with Columbia.So as a result, they will gain a competitive advantage over American products.Columbia will buy tractors, mining equipment and fertilizer from Canada, France, and Germany, instead of from Illinois, Georgia, and Texas.Chairman Rangel, my good friend said, well, nobody's talking about the economic benefits.They're all talking about Hugo Chavez.Well, my good friend knows that that's not the case.And besides the reason we're not talking about it all that much is because it's a no brainer from an economic standpoint.I'm mystified as to why any member would oppose this agreement, when all it does is level the playing field for American workers.Today, American workers compete against imports from Columbia that enter our country virtually duty free.While our exports going to Columbia face high tariffs.This agreement eliminates those obstacles to our goods and services and supports American jobs.I agree with Chairman Rangel's assessment last month at denying a vote on this agreement, wouldn't help address the concerns about labor violence in Colombia.In fact, this agreement would help Colombian labor unions.The agreement includes robust and forcible international labor organization core labor standards.Standards included with the strong support of the Democratic leadership to require Columbia to continue the tremendous progress it has made to improve labor rights.I plead with my colleagues today, do not make a vote which will undermine the credibility of the United States, making it more difficult for any future administration to eliminate barriers to the sale of products made by us.Vote no on this rule.Gentlemen yields back the balance of his time.Gentlewoman from New York.Mr. Speaker, I'm pleased to yield one minute to gentleman from Texas and member of the committee on Ways and Means, Mr. Doggett.Gentleman from Texas is recognized for one minute.Thank you.We certainly do need a balanced, enlightened trade policy, but this debate is not about trade.It's about the guiding principle of the Bush administration, arrogance.Arrogance that has served our country so poorly.This president personally proclaiming himself to be a uniter, not a divider at the beginning, quickly transformed himself into the decider.And that lone decider has unleashed one divisive disastrous decision after another, on our land.Mr. Chenay's current chief of staff, he summed up the situation very directly.We're going to push and push and push until some larger force makes us stop, he said.Well today, our speaker backed up by this house says, stop.The go it alone disdain for allies, dismissal of anyone who has a different point of view has left this white house isolated.It's left us with a disastrous war.And now Mr. Bush's recession.We'll secure a more responsible enlightened trade policy, but we won't secure it until we traded it for a new president.Gentleman's time has expired.Gentleman from California.I'm happy to yield one and a half minutes to my Rules committee colleague, gentleman from Pasco, Washington, who's vigorously opposed to the Hugo Chavez rule.Gentlemen from Washington state is recognized for one and a half minutes.Thank you Mr. Speaker, and I thank my friend from California for yielding.Mr. Speaker, we need to stop this unprecedented attempt to rewrite trade laws and jeopardize fair trade for our America's farmers.Washington state is the most trade dependent state in the nation.One in three Washington jobs is tied to international trade.Since 1991, Columbia has had open free entry into the US for many of their products while steep tariffs block our farmers access into Columbia.This agreement would immediately, immediately, Mr. Speaker eliminate tariffs for Washington state apples, cherries, pears, potatoes, wheat, beef, and more.If the issue is a better way, if the issue is the economy, what better way to stimulate our nation's economy than to level the playing field and wipe out unfair trade barriers for our farmers.Mr. Speaker representatives and senators are elected to vote.So let's do our job in vote on the Columbia agreement.What the House is now considering is an effort to delay, to hide, to slam the door and shut the door on free and fair trade that millions of Americans jobs depend on.I urge my colleagues to vote no on the Hugo Chavez rule.And I yield back my time.Gentlemen yields back the balance of his time.The Gentlewoman from New York.Thank you Mr. Speaker.I'm happy to yiled two minutes to the gentlemen from Vermont, a valued member of the Rules Committee, Mr. Welts.Gentlemen from Vermont recognized for two minutes.Mr. Speaker, I thank our distinguished chair.There's a fundamental issue that we face in this role.And it's this.Does Congress seed its authority under the constitution to the executive, Or does it exercise it?Mr. Speaker from a distance, I have only been here a little over a year.I watched with dismay as a citizen, seeing Congress year after year, relinquish its authority, turn that over to the executive, not do its job of accountability and oversight, not do its job on trade.Essentially not exercise the constitutional authority that we are custodians of each and every one of the 435 members who have been elected.The president exercise his prerogative under a rule that was enacted by this house in 1974.But against the advice of the speaker, against the advice of the Senate majority leader, the president did what he could do and that is send over on his own timetable a trade agreement when it wasn't ready to be considered.And the speaker in her judgment, and I support this, stood up for the prerogatives of this legislative branch, where we have the responsibility to be the final voice of the people who sent us here.Bottom line question is will Congress assert the authority that it has under the constitution?We can exercise it best circumstances, we do it in cooperation and in consultation with the executive.But if it's a unilateral my way or the highway approach that has been so often employed by this chief executive, then it's incumbent on us to stand up and assert the constitutional responsibility we have.I yield the balance of my time.Gentleman yields back the balance of his time.The gentleman from California.Speakers, to speak in opposition of the Hugo Chavez rule I'm happy to yield two minutes to my good friend from Roseville, California, the ranking member of the Trade subcommittee to Mr. Herder.Gentleman from California is recognized two minutes.Thank you.Mr. Speaker, this procedural vote, if it's successful, Congress would be rebuffing the Columbia agreement through technical gimmicks and rejecting a level playing field for American workers.Colombian workers and producers already have free access to the US market, but we don't have reciprocity.Our manufacturers and farmers need this agreement to sell their products, create jobs and compete against foreign producers.A vote for this rule is a vote against American workers.Period.Since the agreement was signed nearly 500 days ago, Congressional Republicans in the white house have tried to work with the democratic majority to approve this agreement.We reached a bi-partisan consensus nearly a year ago to ensure congressional consideration of this agreement.In sending up the agreement, the president said that he was open to continuing discussions with the Democrats.The Democratic leadership through this rule has firmly shut the door to any discussions.Members should be keenly aware of the very negative foreign policy ramifications of this vote.This rule would be cheered by belligerent leftist guerrillas, abetted by Venezuelan strongman, Hugo Chavez, who seek to undermine the democratically elected Colombian government with menacing ramifications.This rule is a public slap in the face to a loyal ally at the epicenter of a philosophical war between democracy and totalitarianism, capitalism and socialism.President Uribe made it very clear that the best way to support Columbia struggle for economic and political security is to pass this agreement.Today's action with- - Gentleman's time has expired.Gentlewoman from California.I urge a no vote.Gentlewoman from California.Mr. speaker I'm pleased to yield two minutes to the gentleman from Michigan, chairman of the Waste subcommittee on Trade, Mr. Levin.Gentlemen for Michigan's recognized for two minutes.Without objection.Trade policy under the Bush administration has been badly off track.The approach of the administration and the then Republican majority in Congress was to go their own and dismissed by partisan effort, starting with a side letter to the Jordan FDA, thwarting enforcement of worker rights provisions negotiated by the Clinton administration in the cases of Morocco, Bahrain and Oman FTA. It was left to Democrats to negotiate with governments of those countries to bring their laws into compliance with international labor standards before congressional vote with no help from the administration.And we all remember CAFTA where the administration's approach was go it alone from the beginning through the end with false claims that the other nations were already in compliance with international standards.In last year with the loss of a congressional majority, the Bush administration was forced to include fully enforceable labor and environmental standards in the Peru FTA. And when Democrats press for Peru to bring into compliance with the language of the agreement, the administration attacked Democrats and refuse to even participate in the changes that Peru made in its legal structure.At that time, Democrats made clear that Columbia was different from Peru, with the level of violence against workers, impunity from prosecution and laws that did not meet international standards.And the sustainable progress was required before consideration.The administration kept on insisting that the status quo was good enough and has done nothing to address these concerns.Urged by both the House and Senate Democratic leadership, not to proceed with the Columbia FTA under present circumstances.The administration decided once again to go its own way.This rule reflects the speaker's response to assert a congressional role on international trade under the constitution of the United States of America.Gentleman's time has expired.The gentleman from California.Share how much time is remaining on each side.Gentleman from California has 13 minutes remaining.And the gentlewoman from New York has 11 and a half minutes remaining.Gentlemen from California.Mr. Speaker I'm happy to hold 30 seconds to my very good friend, my California colleague, the ranking member of the Trade subcommittee, the Foreign Affairs committee, Mr. Royce.Gentleman from California is recognized for 30 seconds.Thank you Mr. Speaker.There are many reasons why what the majority is doing today is gratefully harmful to our security.Columbia is a close ally under siege, and as the Washington post points out today, score this action as a boost to Venezuela's agenda of de-stabilizing democracy in Columbia.By all accounts the Colombian agreement is a big plus for American exports and American employment with a majority is doing is giving near complete free market access to Columbia and taking nothing for our workers.This agreement would cut tariffs 80% on USB, 15% on US built tractors- - your time has expired.Gentlewoman from New York.Thank you Mr. Speaker.I'm delighted to yield one minute to the gentlewoman from California, the distinguished speaker of the House of representatives, Miss.Pelosi.Gentlewoman from California the speaker of the House is recognized for one minute.Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman lady for yielding.I commend her for a very distinguished leadership of the Rules committee and for bringing this very important rule to the floor today.Mr. Speaker, the reason that we are here today is one that I wish could have been avoided.And I think it's important to put it in context because I've heard our colleagues talk about the merits of the bill or talk about any precedent on rules.And I've heard them talk about different things, but I think it's important to know what brought us here today.On Monday, I received a call from the president of the United States.Always an honor to receive a call from the president.This is after months of our going back and forth with members of the cabinet and the rest about if they would send up for the Columbia Free Trade Agreement.The president informed me that he would be sending the bill over the next day.I recommended against it.I said, Mr. President, you shouldn't send it for two reasons.If you send it and we take it up, it will lose.Now you think it's very important to pass the Columbia Free Trade Agreement.And in the Congress, we have people who share your view or others who share your view, that we should pass it.As soon as we address the concerns of America's working people and others who will never before it.But let's just talk about where the possibilities are for passing it.And those possibilities are greatly diminished.If you send that bill to the Congress under these circumstances.Apart from the fact that it would be a breach of protocol, let's just talk about that.A successful trade agenda depends on joint partnership between the Congress and the administration, as was the case recently in the Peru Free Trade Agreement.Had the administration followed the established protocol of congressional consultation relating to the submission of any Free Trade Agreement, we would not have to take this action today.By his actions on Tuesday, the president abandoned the traditions of consultation that have governed past agreements.In fact, the action the House takes today is more in keeping with the spirit of the rules than the white house is move to force a vote.But as I said, just from a practical standpoint, Mr. President, you simply don't have the votes.And if we are to try to arrive at a place where the concerns of the American people are addressed, we need more time to do that.I also said what I've said many times to the president.If we are going to be successful in passing a trade agreement, we have to first tell the American people that we have an economic positive economic agenda that addresses their aspirations, addresses their concerns about their economic security.This bill has been around for a while and matters have only gotten worse in our economy.The former chair of the Fed has said we're in the throws of a recession.The current chair of the Federal Reserve last week, the end of last week, testified to Congress that there's a possible recession.Many people...I mean the joblessness numbers of last week, again, pointed to a steeper downturn in our economy.Now you control your time with all due respect to the gentlemen.I'll use mine.The fact is, as I said to the president, many people in America now are concerned about losing their jobs.They're concerned about losing their homes.Most people won't.But most people are concerned about losing their living standard when the cost of groceries and gasoline and the cost of healthcare and education and other staples continues to go up.And the purchasing power of the income that people have is either stagnant or going down.They have concerns about their economic security.So let's have a timetable for the American people.Let's have a timetable on our consideration of a trade bill that addresses the concerns and is it compatible with the needs of America's working families.That is I think the only fair thing to do.President ignored those concerns and sent the bill over.I pledged to this body as speaker of the House that at the appropriate time, if many of these concerns are addressed in terms of America's working families, that we can take up legislation for such a trade agreement.Some have concerns about the content of the agreement.Others have concerns about the treatment of labor organizers in Colombia, and it's a real concern.And one admitted to by the administration and the Colombian government, their differences of opinion as to how this is changing.But let's see how we can work together to make that change.Distinguish California colleague would yield.Having control of the time, I will retain the control of the time.The important point here is whether it's the substance of the bill, whether it's the conditions in Columbia, they are to be obviously major considerations.But what we're saying to the president, we can't do everything much about some of these things.We certainly can address the provisions in the bill, but I'm not here to talk about that now.What we can do something about what we haven't done enough about is to send a positive economic agenda forth.And these are not difficult.Most of what we're talking to the president about are part of what has passed this Congress and mostly an overwhelming bipartisan way.Whether we're talking about rebuilding the infrastructure of America, whether we're talking about investments in an innovation agenda, our commitment to competitiveness to keep America number one, and that innovation begins in the classroom.And we have to have a strong commitment to the education of our people, whether we're talking about tax credits for our energy bill, which we passed here, which would immediately create jobs.Now if we don't do it we will lose jobs that exist now.Same thing with infrastructure.If we don't make those investments of projects we'll have to discontinue.But many more are ready.Dirt is ready to fly.The projects are in the pipeline.There is a way to create good paying jobs right here in America.We've passed the legislation.The vehicles are there for us to do it.And at the same time, we have to address the concerns of those who have lost their jobs.Whether it's unemployment insurance or summer jobs program for their children or other initiatives.So this is nothing new.And in fact the whole idea that we were going into recession is nothing new to most families across America.It took a while for the president and his administration to accept that fact.And when they did, we could talk.And when they did, we could talk.We could work together as Mr. Baner and I did with the secretary of the treasury to put together a stimulus package that had strong bipartisan support.And as the President has said, has not gone into effect yet.And when it does I know it will have inject demand into the economy, create jobs and I think stimulate the economy.But since we did that matters have only become worse, necessitating for us to do more.And we certainly should do more for our economy.And we certainly should do more for our economy before we pass another trade agreement.It's all possible in the days that are before us.But instead of having the president's timetable, we have the timetable of the House of Representatives.We have a timetable for America's working families and nothing that we are doing here now should be misconstrued in terms of our attitude toward Bolivia, excuse me, Columbia.Bolivia too, but Columbia.Columbia is our friend, is a neighbor in the hemisphere.The relationship between Colombia and the United States is an important one.We have concerns about workers in Columbia and we respect the leadership of President Uribe.And as I said to the ambassador yesterday, I hope you will convey that message to the president.And when you do, I hope you will also tell him we congratulate him on his excellent representation in the United States and ambassador service here.So this isn't about ending anything.It's about having a timetable that respects the concerns, the aspirations, the challenges faced by the American people.We are the people's house.Their timetable should be our timetable.I urge our colleagues to support the rule.Thank you, Mr. Speaker.Gentlewoman yields back the balance of her time.The gentlemen from California.Mr. speaker, I yield myself 10 seconds before I yield to the leader to say that I had hoped to ask the speaker if in fact the votes are not there, why it is that we had to do this the day after the present set this message up?Why we could not have waited 45 days?Was my hope that the speaker could answer that question for us, unfortunately she did not.With that I yield one minute to the distinguished Republican leader, our friend from Westchester, Mr. Baner.Gentlemen from Ohio, the minority leader is recognized for one minute.Let me thank my colleague from California for yielding and say Mr. Speaker and to my colleagues that our economy is struggling.Families and businesses are dealing with the rising cost of living.And certainly the job market has slowed.And in on a time like this, we should be working together.And as the speaker said, she and I came together and our members came together on both sides of the aisle earlier this year to pass an economic growth package.And those checks will be going out to Americans here, beginning in the middle of May and will continue to go on through the end of July.These checks again are not out in the marketplace.We hope there'll be out there soon.And we hope that will help revive our struggling economy.But the action that's being taken here today is going to do nothing more than to hurt American businesses and American workers.Speaker earlier went on about the fact that the typical protocol here was not followed, that the president sent this bill to the Congress without the approval of the speaker of the House.Now, I think it's time to set the record straight on exactly what has occurred.There have been hundreds and hundreds of meetings over the last 15 months, trying to come to an agreement on how this bill shall be considered.There've been changes made, there have been side agreements that have come forth as a result of this.And over the course of the last six or eight weeks, there have been serious conversations between the administration and the speaker of the House about the consideration of the Columbia Free Trade Agreement.And the reason this bill was sent up here this week was because not one time over these six weeks, has the speaker agreed or made a commitment to the administration that this bill will be considered this year.President's been willing to work with the Congress.The conversations again have been going on for 15 months, but not one time during that 15 months, was there ever a commitment by the Democrat majority to bring this bill to the floor for a vote in the House.I don't think the president had any choice, but to bring, to send that Free Trade Agreement to the Congress and force Congress to act.And so what do we do?We don't go try to work to see if we can get the votes.We don't try in a bipartisan way to move this agreement.No, we're going to go in and cheat.We're going to change the rules under which the consideration of this Free Trade Agreement should operate between the House and the Senate.We're not even been given a chance and anybody that thinks that while we're just going to push this off for a couple of months, that is nonsense.This vote today is a vote to kill the Columbia Free Trade Agreement.Nothing more and nothing less.The speaker points out well, this president did this and frankly, there were other priorities in the House.Let me tell you what, when we passed the Andean Trade Preferences act earlier this year, virtually everything that comes from Columbia to the United States, comes here duty free.The Colombian Free Trade Agreement will allow US manufacturers and US workers who produce these goods to send our goods to Columbia, virtually tariff free.We're doing nothing here but hurting American workers and American businesses.Why?I think the speaker made it very clear.This action today is nothing short than of political blackmail.The speaker made it clear that she has her agenda.She wants the president to deal with her on her agenda.And we're not going to move this bill until the president deals with her agenda.That is not the way to deal with our trading partners around the world.I've listened to candidates that are running for president, especially candidates on the Democrat side.Who have talked about the fact, the United States needs to be more willing to engage the rest of the world.The we need to listen to, we need to reach out to countries around the world.There's probably no place that's more important for us to reach out than South America.Here we have a country in South America who is doing their best to fight off a terrorist in their own country.A message that we can send, not only to Columbia, but to the rest of South America, that we want to engage in them.Exactly as many of these contenders for the Democrat nomination points of the day have made.What does this say to Columbia?What does it say that to South America?And what does it say about free and fair trade around the world?This is a precipitous step in the wrong direction.We're sending a very bad message for our partners around the world, all in the name of election year politics.I think that it's regrettable.It's despicable.If we're going to have a vote here, why don't we put the Columbia Free Trade bill up for a vote?Let the House work its will on that bill because the fact is I think it would pass.Gentlemen yields back the balance of his time.The gentlewoman from New York.Mr. Speaker I'm pleased to yield one and a half minutes to the gentleman from Oregon, Mr. DeFazio.Gentleman from Oregon is recognized for one and a half minutes.For a Republican minority and particularly the gentlemen from California, who whine day in and day out about their inability to offer amendments even the most minor of bills, I've never seen a group so eager to give up their right.In fact, the right of every member of this house to offer an amendment to this trade agreement in a rush to rubber stamp yet another failed so-called Free Trade Agreement.As one Republican pointed out, yeah, it's been the policy since 1974.Guess what, 1974, we were the manufacturing Colossus of the world.We ran trade surpluses.We had a robust middle class in America.It was bad policy then, but after 24 years of that bad trade policy, our manufacturing's cut in half the middle-class is losing ground.They're unemployed.We're borrowing $2 billion a day from the rest of the world, including communist China, to buy things that we used to make here in America.And they think we should do more of the same.I've heard this and played this game before.I've never voted for one, but every president since I've been here, Republican and Democrat says, \"Hey, we negotiated this deal in secret.You can't fail us now\".Yeah, it's got big problems, but we'll fix them later.Guess what?Later never comes.Because this Congress until today has never had a spine to stand up to the special interests that are pushing failed trade policies, policies that failed the American people.The benefit a few on Wall Street.This is about main street.The Houses growing as fine today.This is a great day and the beginning of a new trade policy for the American people.Gentleman from California.Speaker, to speak in opposition to the Hugo Chavez rule, I'm happy to yield a minute and a half to my very good friend from Morris, Illinois.Gentleman's recognized for one and a half minutes.Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to this rule.Why is Latin America all today watching this debate in this house?Because today the House representatives is going to tell the world how we treat our best friends.How we treat our best friend and Latin American, who is our best friend in Latin America?The democracy of Columbia.Who was America's most reliable partner in counter-narcotics and counter-terrorism in Latin America?The Democracy of Colombia, which elected national leaders the most popular elected official in all of this hemisphere, the president of Columbia President Uribe.Why?Because he succeeded in reducing violence.Today, 73% of Colombian say they feel more secure and more safe than they did prior to President Uribe six years ago.In fact, Columbia today is safer than Washington DC. Today this house will vote to set Columbia aside.And we'll turn our back on our best friend in Latin America.Why again is Latin America watching?Because leftist us Hugo Chavez and his proxies, the narco trafficking FARC had declared they want to defeat the US Columbia trade promotion agreement.They can't defeat President Uribe the ballot box, but they want to in this Congress.Prime Minister of Canada said it best, \"If United States turns its back on its friends in Colombia, this will set back our cause far more than any Latin American dictator could hope to achieve\".Our friends in Democratic majority say this is all about election year politics, but we must understand that turning our back on Colombians- - Gentleman's time has expired.Has long-term consequences throughout Latin America.Gentlewoman from New York.Thank you.Mr. Speaker I'm pleased to yield two minutes to the gentleman from Illinois, member the Ways and Means committee and chair of the Democratic Caucus, Mr. Emmanuelle.Gentleman from Illinois is recognized two minutes.Thank you Mr. Speaker.I'll thank my colleagues for lending the time.We're having a conversation here about trade and globalization and about how to make sure that in fact, globalization is a win-win strategy for the American people.And we're talking about Columbia, but what we really are talking about is the effects of globalization on the American economy.And in fact, today, if you a look at the Washington Post business page, it's a new survey out showing the middle-class feeling worse in this period of time than ever before.More squeezed by rising costs.Energy is up nearly two bucks a gallon since 2001, Nearly $2 up, healthcare costs have doubled, college costs are up 64%.And yet the median household income in this country shrunk $1,100.The middle-class are feeling squeezed.Globalization can be a good thing.Trade can be a good thing.But if you don't have an agenda to make sure Americans win in that globalization, you're going to get a squeeze on the middle class where they resist the attempts to open up markets to American made products.What we need here and what we are seeking here is a new deal for the new economy for the American workers.And that means when healthcare costs are up like that, we make sure there's healthcare security for the American people.Which is why it was wrong to veto Andean health care bill for Americans children to give 10 million children's parents who work full time healthcare.It is why it is wrong that when we have an extension of the hope and lifetime college credit, so Americans can get to community colleges can get to chances for their kids to go to college.It is wrong to allow that tax credit to end.Is why we are trying to make sure, that in fact, American people have a retirement security and a universal 401 .So those who work time, 75 million Americans who do not have a savings plan outside of social security have in fact a 401k like the rest of us.It's an agenda to make sure there's an economic security plan for the American.Can I have an additional 30 seconds?Your time has expired.I will yield gentlemen an additional 30 seconds.Gentleman from Illinois recognized for 30 seconds.Thank you.So what we're talking about, because no conversation about trade is ever about trade.It's about the standard of living on the middle class in this country.Globalization can be a good thing.If you have an agenda and just trade alone is not an agenda to make sure that the middle class of this country that built this country since World War II are strengthened to compete and win in this globalized economy.And what we're insuring today is that when we have a fact, a trade deal that is not seen as a cost to the American people, but seen as an opportunity to succeed in that world.And we today are making sure that there's a win-win strategy to that globalization.Gentleman from California.Speakers, I prepare it to yield to the Republican whip.I'd like to yield for unanimous consent to my good friend from Connecticut, Mr. Chase.Gentlemen from Connecticut- - Thank you.I'm asking for concent to revise and extend my remarks in opposition to this resolution.Without objections.Speaker with that, I'd like to yield three minutes to my good friend from Springfield, Missouri, who will vigorously oppose this Hugo Chavez rule.Gentleman from Missouri is recognized- - I thank the speaker and I thank the gentleman, I too vigorously opposed this rule.It seems to me the House today is doing two things that this Congress has done too often.One is if you don't like the rules, you change the rules.And two is we continue to take actions that reduce confidence in dealing with the United States.When you change the rules, other countries just simply don't want to deal with you.500 days since this treaty, this agreement was negotiated in good faith, changes made sense then, and elements that dealt with the environment and labor that the Colombians went back at our request and made 16 months of talking to the leaders on the majority about what was the best day to bring this agreement.Now, 500 days old to the floor of the House, and it's not going to happen today, or it's apparently not going to happen anytime in the near future.We had no trade agreements before we went to the process of Trade Promotion Authority, because nobody wants to trade with you if they don't think you're dealing in good faith.Nobody wants to deal with you, if they don't think you're dealing in good faith.This is about jobs.It's about middle-class jobs that my good friend from Illinois just talked about.I mean, how much more middle-class jobs could you try to provide, when we open their market to us.17 years ago, we opened our market to them.This is not a debate about whether we can compete with Colombian products or whether their workers are being treated fair.Their workers already make products that come in here every day with virtually no tariff.This agreement would let our workers send products there with no tariff.80% immediately would have no tariff.Very quickly 100% would have no tariff.The 8,600 caterpillar jobs in Illinois would be sending their products to Columbia without the 15% tariff.Why wouldn't we want to give those 8,600 labor union workers, a 15% advantage that they don't have today?And when you change the rules, bad things can happen.This is about manufacturing jobs.It's about union jobs.It's about middle-class jobs.And of course it's about our closest ally in South America.The second biggest country in South America, a country that for 17 years has had access for our markets.And in the last decade has worked closely with us to try to solve their problems and the problems of this hemisphere.This is a huge mistake today.It is the wrong signal to send, not just to Columbia, but anybody who's thinking about working with the United States of America.You've got to deal with countries in good faith.We are not doing that.We're not dealing with our own workers in good faith.I hope we do everything we can to defeat this rule.I yield back.Gentleman's time has expired.Gentlewoman from New York.Speaker, I'm delighted to yield one and a half minutes to the gentlewoman from California, Ms. Cabs - Gentlewoman from California is recognized for one and one half minutes.I thank my colleague.Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of house resolution, 1092.Columbia is an ally and a friend and I commend President Uribe for reducing violence and unrest in Columbia.However, Columbia still leads the world in trade unionists murders.According to Human Rights Watch, 17 have been killed this year alone.And more than 400 over the last six years.Hardly any of these murders have been investigated or prosecuted.This is not only about human rights, this is about domestic responsibility.How can we try to create jobs when unemployment is climbing and our economy is in recession?We need to expand and strengthen trade adjustment existence.We must educate and train American workers to better compete in the global economy.The president had a choice.He chose to force a vote.And today he is getting that vote.A vote declaring that strong arming Congress will not work.A vote for American workers and their families, a vote for human rights.I urge my colleagues to vote, yes and stand up for working families, both here at home and in Columbia.I yield back.Gentlewoman yields back the balance of her time.The gentleman from California.The speaker, at this time I'm happy to yield a minute to the greatest proponents of free trade, the a member of the Ways and Means committee, gentleman from Woodlands, Texas, Mr. Brady.Gentleman from Texas is recognized for one minute.Thank you, Mr Chair.America's status in the world that has never been smaller than this day.Who could imagine the world's largest economy cowering from Colombia behind the walls of protectionism?Who could imagine the world's greatest democracy too frightened to even debate, even consider this agreement?Who could imagine that this Congress would send a signal to the world that we are not just an unreliable leader in trade, we are an unreliable negotiator in trade?It is embarrassing and it is dangerous and it will cost America jobs.Today Columbia can sell their products into America with no tariffs, no restrictions, but when we try to sell our products, we find barriers and costs.My workers in Texas want to know why can they buy products in Columbia at the local mob?But we can't sell our products around this world.Columbia is a strong trading partner.They reduced violence.They've been embraced rule of law.They are a strong ally.They deserve an up or down vote.Expired.Gentlewoman from New York.Speaker, I yield one and a half minutes to the gentlewoman from Texas, Ms. Jackson Lee.Gentlewoman from Texas is recognized for one and a half minutes.Revise and extend.Without objection.I thank the gentle lady from New York, and I am so much in favor of this process that I had to bring two constitutional books to the floor and to be seen by my colleagues.I support this initiative because it restores the constitutional authority to this floor and to the speaker of the House.And for someone who has voted for trade bills, that are fair.I asked my colleagues to recognize that we have an obligation to the American people.For, if we look at the month of March, the third month of declining numbers of US jobs with losses widespread across all sectors.And the biggest loss is coming in construction and manufacturing.The experts, including federal chairman, Ben Bernanki and former Fed chairman, Alan Greenspan have confirmed the serious challenges to the United States economy.One former labor secretary has also uttered the word 'depression'.This is an opportunity for us to be able to establish our authority on the floor, to work through legislation and to ask the question of my friends on the other side of the aisle, if trade bills are so effective, why are we losing jobs?Why are people without employment?Why are we in this economic crisis?And so we're standing up for American workers.We're standing up for the workers in Columbia.I have the greatest respect for President Uribe.I look forward to working on legislation that addresses the labor concerns, working class, indigenous Colombians, and that this is a two-way street.My friends on the other side of the aisle can not prove that ignoring the constitution will get us jobs, vote for I yield back.Gentleman from California.Speaker, as I yield a minute to my friend from Washington, I'd say to my friend from Texas, that if she turns to page 1136 of the book that she held up she would see that that has the rule that we were aggregating with this vote that we're about to take.With that I yield a minute to my good friend from Auburn, Washington.Gentleman from Washington State is recognized for one minute.Thank you Gentleman for yielding.And thank you, Mr. Speaker.As a representative from the State of Washington, the most dependent state on trade in the nation, I strongly urge my colleagues to reject this unprecedent rule and allow the Colombian Free Trade Agreement to come to the floor to a vote.I traveled to Columbia last weekend to see firsthand the progress that the country is making.I met with union members who support this agreement.I met with union members who oppose this agreement.I met with President Uribe.I met with the labor minister.I met with the attorney general there.I met with the people who have been disarmed and have left the paramilitary organizations I've met with shantytown residents.You want to talk about human rights.Those people are the poorest people in the world.Those are the people that we can help with this agreement.Not only can we help poor people here in the United States of America, but this is designed to help poor people, struggling people in Columbia.Human rights, ladies and gentlemen is worldwide and we give them jobs, we give them hope.Thank you Mr. Speaker, I yield.Gentleman's time has expired.Gentlewoman from New York.Mr. Speaker, may I inquire from my colleague how many requests for time he has remaining.We have...let's see.I have a long list of people here, Mr. Speaker, I would say to my friend, the distinguished chair of the committee on Rules and, may I Inquire how much time we have remaining Mr. Speaker?Gentleman from California has four and three quarters minutes remaining.And the gentlewoman from New York as five minutes.But may I inquire my friend how many speakers she has remaining?I have one more who is not presently on the floor.So I reserve my time.I'd be happy to use the five minutes if the gentlewoman would like to yield me the five minutes.'Cause we got lots of people who feel strongly about that.And I know we can expand our thoughts on this with your five minutes.I think I'll reserve it.Thank you very much for the offer.Gentlewoman has reserved the balance of her time.The gentleman of California.consideration.Why don't I, Mr. Speaker yield one minute to my very good friend from Miami, who is the distinguished ranking member of the committee on foreign affairs, Ms. Ross Layton.Gentlewoman from Florida is recognized for one minute.Thank you so much.I thank you gentlemen for the time.And Mr. Speaker, I deeply regret the effort today to postpone timely action on the US Columbia Free Trade Agreement.For over a year advocates of this agreement have worked tirelessly with our counterparts to bring it to the floor for an up and down vote.We have the power to make a difference.We can make a difference, not only here at home, but in Columbia and throughout the hemisphere as well.Columbia is a close ally, fighting our common enemy of drugs and anti-democratic regimes in the region.We must take a stand for our national security and against the growing influence of Iran and other rogue states in the hemisphere.The choice is clear.This rule change is nothing but an abdication of responsibility and a decision to leave the hard decisions for another day.With the Colombian FTA American businesses will benefit greatly, our ally will be strengthened and our interest in the hemisphere will be secured.I urge my colleagues to join me in vote no.Gentlewoman's time has expired.Gentlewoman from New York.To reserve.Gentlewoman from New York continues to reserve her time.The gentleman from California.Speaker at this time, I happy to yield a minute to my very good friend and a passionate free trader, the gentleman from Texas, Mr. Hensarling.Gentleman from Texas is recognized for one minute.I thank the gentlemen for yielding.Mr. Speaker, I find it fascinating that the Democrat majority this week can find time to rename post offices, but somehow cannot find the time to vote on a trade agreement to help create more American jobs.We're talking about a trade agreement to where over 90% of Colombian goods come into our country duty free.Yet only 3% of our goods go into their country duty free.We're trying to level the playing field here, Mr. Speaker, we're trying to create more American jobs.What could be more fair?And Mr. Speaker, I had an opportunity to sit down with the Fed chairman, this week.And as we talk about tough economic times, we ought to learn the lessons of history.And one of the lessons of history is that starting a trade war can bring about a recession.And that's what we see the Democrats doing.People are struggling to make their paycheck stretch.Why don't we create more jobs?Why don't we level this playing field?And when it comes to our friend, Columbia, Hugo Chavez wants this trade agreement to never see the light of day.The gentleman's time has expired.I yield for additional 15 seconds.Gentlemen from Texas is recognized for 15 seconds.And again, Mr. Speaker, when we're talking about our ally Columbia, Hugo Chavez, wants this trade agreement to never see the light of day and our Democrat colleagues agree.With that, I yield back the balance of my time.The gentleman yields back the balance of his time.Who seeks recognition?I will continue to reserve.So may I inquire of my friends, so I assume there are no further speakers then on- - My last speaker has not yet shown up.So I guess I should refer from that, that there won't be any more speakers other than your close I presume.I think that's- - Let me, Mr. Speaker, if I may yield one minute to my very good friend from Fairfax, distinguished a former chairman and ranking member of the committee on Government, what's it called now?Government oversight and Reform.I can't keep up with it, but- - Gentleman from Virginia is recognized for one minute.Well, thank you.I oppose this resolution strongly Ms. Speaker, we call us fast-track authority for a reason.No argument about process niceties can change the meaning of those words.This is supposed to be a deadline for a vote in the House.The administration has been talking and talking, and we think that if we didn't bring this forward, it would never come up for a vote at all.This is the vote.That's the very point of the requirement we're being asked to waive today.Look, the supposed failure to consult is just the latest pretext for the shameless politicization of free trade policy and the abandonment of a key ally.The perverse truth underlying the political battle lines over trade that this action would harm American interests at home and abroad.In fact, American workers would benefit from the provisions in this agreement, much more than their Colombian brothers and sisters.Columbia already has access to US market under the Andian Free Trade Agreement.This opens 80% of Colombian markets that currently are closed, have high tariffs to American farmers and American manufacturers.Legislating like elections is about choices and changing the rules- - Gentleman's time has expired.is the wrong choice.Gentleman's time has expired.Who seeks recognition?Gentlemen from California.Mr. Speaker, I'd gain inquire the distinguished chair of the committee on Rules if in fact, they're going to be any other speakers on the other side of the aisle.There are not.There are not.Okay.So Mr. Speaker, let me feel myself balanced at the time to simply say that this has been a very interesting debate.Unfortunately our colleagues on the other side have put forward some...well, let's say some inaccuracies.The fact of the matter is over the last four years, when this process began, the administration has been working very closely with hundreds and hundreds of meetings in a bipartisan way to come together so that we can do what both Democrats and Republicans alike have said that they want to do, strengthen our ties within this hemisphere and do what we can to ensure that we bring about an agreement which will work to create jobs right here in the United States.That as sandwich ranking member of the ways and Means committee has just reminded me of the fact that every country with which we have a Free Trade Agreement, every single country, we enjoy a surplus of trade, a trade surplus.So the notion that pursuing these FTA somehow costs us jobs is preposterous and the facts don't hold it up.One of our friends on the other side of the aisle, gentleman from Oregon, Mr. DeFazio talked about the fact that we were the manufacturing giant in 1974, 34 years ago, when fast-track authority was putting in to put into place.And I will tell him today, we are still the world's manufacturing giant.In 1974, we had a one and a half trillion dollar economy.Today we have a $14.1 trillion economy.So as was said by the Republican leader, Mr. Baner, this is a no brainer as Mr. McCrary said, this is a no brainer economically.We need to recognize that if we as a nation are going to maintain our leadership role, we have to shape it.Gentleman's time has expired.Vote no on this horrible Hugo Chavez rule, Mr. Speaker.And with that, I yield back the balance of my time.Gentlewoman of New York.Mr. Speaker, I need to put on the record, the fact that America is not the manufacturing giant, China is the manufacturing giant followed by India.Yield?No, thank you.I like to have my time to close.The people who talk all again today who talk about free trade, never mention fair trade.It's been a problem for me for a long time.If it has not affected their economies, they're very lucky.I happen to represent an economy that has been greatly affected by trade policies that did nothing for the American workers, they did nothing to produce more jobs.The idea that we would, again, continue to follow that failed policy surprise me, but the most important thing today, we are not debating the Columbia US Free Trade Committee.What we are debating today is whether or not the House of representatives is going to take back what it is entitled to take back.And that is responsibility for scheduling matters that come to the floor for consideration.It is a very important point.We're perfectly entitled to do it under the law.It affects the Senate, not a bit.And I am proud, frankly, to say again, that we are prerogatives, which have been slipping away from us for the past 12 years.All the Congress's prerogative going through the executive department, that has to stop.I not only wanted to stop this one, I would like to regain some of the abilities that we have lost already to represent the people who send us here.I urge everyone to vote yes on this rules changed today.And I move the previous question.Without objection, the previous question is order.The question is on adoption of the resolution.All those in favor, say, aye.All those opposed say no.The nos have it.The speaker on that- - Gentlewoman from New York.I request the yays and nays.Yays and nays are requested.Those favoring a vote with the yays and nays will rise.A sufficient number having risen.The yays and nays are ordered.Members will record their votes by electronic device.This will be a 15 minute vote.15 Minute vote on the House Floor and changing the rules for debating the Columbia Free Trade Agreement.It's a second in a series of votes on the House Floor today.And for about an hour of debate between the members of the House over this change in the rules, congressional quarterly reported the debate like this late yesterday.The House is expected to adopt the-", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/house_proceeding_04-10-08_00.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/house_proceeding_04-10-08_00.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/house_proceeding_04-10-08_00.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/Living_in_Harmony_with_Streams_-_Science_to_Action/Living_in_Harmony_with_Streams_-_Science_to_Action.mp3", "text": "I'd like to introduce Ann Smith, who is the Executive Director of the Friends of the Winooski, which is a nonprofit group, which is focused on education, conservation and, and all things targeted towards the Winooski river basin.And she is going to be speaking about her brand new publication, \"Living in Harmony with Streams\", which is a collaboration between her and other folks throughout the State and particularly, the State of Vermont.So let's give her your full attention.Thank you.Thanks Rebecca.Well, I appreciate everybody coming out tonight.I've been going around giving this talk.This may be my eighth or ninth one, that I've given.And a lot of them, I very intentionally targeted going to civic organizations like particularly a lot of rotary clubs because they have established meetings and they're looking for speakers and it's really easy for me to get there.The downside, the other thing with going to like the civic clubs is all of you self-selected to come out on a chilly December evening to hear a talk about rivers.By going to the civic clubs, I'm talking to folks who probably wouldn't do that.The downside is, I usually have no more than a half an hour and sometimes less than that.So I've gotten very efficient at giving this talk.And, when Rebecca said it was going to be scheduled from six to 7:30, I'm like, I don't know what I'm going to talk about for an hour.So I think we can take this at a leisurely pace.And I also think I went and put a few slides back in today knowing I had the luxury of time.But I think I can take questions as we go.And the other opportunity that I have is to tell you a little bit more about what the Friends does, which I usually sort of skip and jump into the meat of things.So the Friends are dedicated to the restoration and the protection of the Winooski river watershed.One question I always like to ask is, does anybody know where the Winooski river starts?In Cabot.The headwaters go like north, north of, loop around, north of Montpelier, into a very rural area?I don't know exactly.Yeah, it is in Cabot.Does anybody know the body of water that it comes out of?Oh no.I was just going to say it starts on the other side.It starts at Coits pond, which is a beautiful little spot and- - - Coits pond, which is one of those, \"I can get there, but I can't tell you how you do it\".You go to Kevin village and then you sort of go off 'that' direction, but it's a beautiful little spot.And when it leaves Coits pond, it's, you know, it's about this, this wide.And I think mostly everybody knows where it enters the lake Champlain, which is under the Bike bridge, separating Burlington and Colchester.So the Friends, we really have work in three different areas, education and outreach, restoration and protection and monitoring and assessment.And I'm sorry, I didn't catch your name, who's going to help me with.Josh.Josh is going to help me move this forward, so I'm not walking back and forth.One of the things that we like to do is similar to the project that Rebecca talked about among the 4-Towns is we really work in collaboration.We're a small group.I work out of my house in Waterbury.I'm part time, and we have a part-time Project Director.And then we hire people as we need to.And we don't cover the entire watershed.It is our goal to be a friend to the entire Winooski watershed.We've been most active in the portion of the watershed.I always say, if you put your thumb on Montpelier and sort of drew more than a half circle, but the North Branch, the Kingsbury, the upper Winooski, the Stevens and the Dog river, and we've had a couple of big projects in Essex and Williston.To be honest, standing here in Richmond tonight, it's not one of the areas that we've been most active in.We did do an Outfall Monitoring Project here in Richmond.I think it goes back three or four years now, where we were working with the town to find any pollutant discharges that were going through the stormwater system, that should not have been there.But we do always try to work in partnership at a smaller scale because people relate to the Dog river, the North Branch, they don't necessarily relate to the Winooski as a whole.Josh, could you go ahead and.Education, we do a variety of things from talks like this.We work with schools.We've been doing a lot with stormwater, actually going out and meeting with landowners and talking about issues there.We do on water programs.Marie who's here, her and her crew have made us breakfast when we've come through Richmond on our paddling trip.So we do a lot of, a lot of different types of projects.In the monitoring and assessment area, we do water quality monitoring.We actually have three programs active, one in the Headwaters, one that we call the Four rivers, which is really Barre Montpelier.And then we work with the Chittenden County stream team on some of the small urban streams in the Burlington, south Burlington, Williston, Essex area.We've done stormwater outfall monitoring.As I mentioned, that's the major project we've done here in Richmond.And basically the way that works is, we go out and we look at stormwater outfalls during dry weather.Because any discharge that's coming out of a stormwater outfall in dry weather is automatically suspect.It doesn't necessarily end up being a problem.In fact, most of them don't.A lot of it's groundwater infiltration.But we did do that project here in Richmond.And we've done, over the years, a lot of geomorphic assessments, which is a study of the physical conditions and processes of the river.And that's really the focus of the presentation tonight, is to talk about those physical processes.Restoration and protection, we do a lot of riparian restoration work, tree planting.We've done some fish passage improvements on culverts and bridges, stormwater related projects.We've done a couple of, you know, we've done smaller projects like rain barrels and rain gardens.We've done a couple of larger bioretention areas.The biggest one closest to here is, we did a bioretention area in front of the Essex Elementary school, that was installed earlier this year.And we do river cleanups.So getting to really the, and I have a publication here, I'm just going to hang on to, and I've got some other things over there that people can pick up after the presentation.And the one thing I do want to say to this group here, is, you know, like I said, we haven't been active in this part of the watershed.However, we always want to work in partnership.So if there's a project that you know, any of you, and I don't know what organizations you might represent, or if you thought giving this talk somewhere else would be good, you know, get in contact with me because, you know, where we have a partner and can work with somebody, that's a big boost to us.In fact, one of the places we're really most active now is in Northfield.And it's because everybody from the Select Board to the Conservation Commission to Public works, you know, we've just found this really fertile working relationship there.So we sort of find project after project, to work on in Northfield.So anyway, getting to \"Living in Harmony with Streams\", we really ask a lot of our rivers, you know.From a recreational and aesthetic standpoint, we want to paddle fish, you know, just relax along there.We want them to provide habitat.But we also ask them to work for us.You know, if you think about, where is the flat land in Vermont, it's all in the river valleys.So that's really where we've put a lot of our communities, our industry, our agriculture.So some of these photos here, you may be familiar with, I think this is somewhere in the Lamoille River.I like this picture because, first of all, if you're familiar with it, you know, it's basically taken from my 89 and it's looking back at the railroad and then of course, the Hydro dam, and then that's Montpelier over there, on the far side.So let's talk a little bit about how streams work.Streams are a product of the land, of their watershed.And this diagram is really very very typical of a Vermont stream or watershed.It starts up in the steep areas that are most often still heavily wooded and they come down, and you can see it's coming down very straight.And then when it gets down to the river valleys, the broader valleys, it's going to start to spread out a meander.So some of the things that define a stream is the valley slope and width.If you've got steep, bedrock, narrow, confined valleys, you're going to have a different stream than one down in the Intervale.You know, what kind of soils do you have?Are they permeable?Are they very erodible, so forth?And then two things that we've really greatly impacted are our land use and vegetation.You know, deep or woody, deep rooted vegetation holds and absorbs water.And we're going to talk more about that later, and that reduces erosion.Land use again, where we have put in our towns or villages, where we've cleared land for agriculture, we've changed the way water runs off the land.And this is a really instructive slide, I think.And I usually focus on the lower one, the White River.And you can see, this was the river in 1924.It was pretty straight.And then the next version of it is in 1939.And you can see the river looks dramatically different.I think most people know what happened.The big event that happened between 24 and 39, was the flood of 1927.And then looking forward from 1939, you can see the river is moving and changing, but it's sort of staying in the same pattern.So 1924 really stands out as being very different.And that was because the river was straightened.The river was put there.They said, \"let's put it over to the side\".And then when you get a really big event, like the flood of 27 or Irene, or some of the more localized floods that we've had over the years, the river is going to go back to what it naturally wants to do.And it naturally wants to meander.And in a un-impacted state, meaning, you know, that we're not clearing land or building around it, the stream is moving, but it's gonna move generally in a slow and a pretty predictable manner.And the term that river sciences use is they refer to the river as being in dynamic equilibrium.Let's go ahead to the next slide.Was there a lot of dredge in there, the point of partnership is trying to help it recover, people putting in berms and people dredging out gravel and people.Are you talking about post Irene or just in general?No, I'm talking about the last 40 years or so?That's a good question, Marie.I honestly don't know the history of the White versus other rivers.We've manipulated really a lot of our rivers.You know, I've found as I walk around, I visited a landowner up in Cabot, talking to him about doing riparian restoration in the river behind his house, and the adjacent properties, is really what we call unstable.I mean, you can just see it moving around and what I speculate, just sort of looking at it there and looking at it upstream is it got pushed over, you know.They wanted to put houses in the village, so they pushed it over.So, the White more than others, I don't know, could be.That's an interesting question, I may try to follow up on that.But the image I had there is really true of any river system.So here's another way to look at rivers.In this cross section, look, you know, the low flow channel, that's where, so you'd see your typical sort of July, August flows.Of course our summers have become anything but predictable.So I'll just say July and August, but during the drier period of the year, there's a very distinct low flow channel.And then there's, what's called bank-full, which is a really important term, within the river science.And this is what's called the channel forming flow.And that's the flow that occurs with enough frequency that when you look a river and you think about, well, there's the bed and the banks, that's the flow.And it's typically considered to be about a two year event.And then we get into the flood prone with, and of course, what people associate with floods and FEMA and flood insurance, the flood plain, which is the hundred year flood plain.So let's go ahead.So this may seem like a silly question, but let's talk about how water gets to a stream.And there's really two main pathways.And one is, you know, it rains or the snow melts.And typically one of two things, well, some of it gets used up by vegetation, but as far as reaching the stream, it either runs off over the surface, or it sinks in, to the ground and it gets there slowly via base flow, via groundwater and the advantages of, and we're going to come visit this a little bit later.The advantage of the water sinking into the ground is several fold.One, it decreases localized flooding because it goes into the ground and it's also purified that way.Water that runs over the ground, particularly if it's agricultural or urban or lawn, it's going to pick up a lot of pollutants and a lot of sediments on its way to the streams.So let's talk a little bit more about how we've impacted our streams.And since we were talking about the White, the Tweed is a tributary of the White, and that's the topographical map that you see.I'm just going to reach over here a little bit, but I think most people here probably know how to read topographical maps.So what you know is, this lighter shaded area is the flatter area of the valley.And going back thinking about how the river wants to meander, this is the area that it had to meander in before we began to manipulate it.And now what you see we've done there, and this is pretty typical and you see it on 89 between Burlington and Montpelier.We've put roads in, we've put railroads in.And basically the river has been moved over to one side of it's valley and we're containing it there.And that's something that I really like to point to is, this isn't just about the ecology of the stream.This is also about economics and how much money we're going to continue to spend, to try to lock our rivers in place.And now we've certainly committed ourselves in some ways.I'm not naive enough to think, we're going to take all our infrastructure, all our towns out of our valleys.But where we have opportunities going forward, we need to think about the economics of doing this.Because this is where we really get ourselves in conflict.And, in big events like Irene, the flood of 27 and the smaller localized events, some of which occurred this year, you know, that's where our damage occurs.So you can also look here and, this I believe is in the Lamoille.You can really see how that river is confined in there.We have the roads, we have a railroad going over, and if we want to maintain these roads where they are, you can bet they're going to be armoring and fixing that bank for a long, long time to come.And these are just some closer pictures there, of where we've armored banks, we've dredged, and we've really managed the rivers.Another really chronic problem that we have is we have undersized our stream crossings.So if you look at the photo here, you can really visualize how wide that stream is.And at this low flow condition, it can narrow itself down and make it into that pipe.But this is again, what causes us so many problems in big events is, when the amount of water can't make it into that pipe, what's it going to do?It's going to take out the road, it's going to take out the culvert.And a lot of our, they may be set this way, or they may become this way.These also present significant problems from an aquatic organism, a fish-passage standpoint.If you look at the one on the lower, your right, I mean, if you were a fish and you were trying to move upstream, would you want to encounter that?Have you guys are ever looking for another very good speaker, Rich Kern, who's a fish biologist for Fish and Wildlife.He has this video, that's very hard to watch, of trout trying to get, throwing themselves up against a culvert to get through.So coming back to that diagram we had earlier, this is the same one we were looking at earlier.So you can see there, the relative amount of surface run-off to base flow, and then the one on the right, you can see, we've altered the landscape.So we've put in some hard surfaces, there's lawn, which is typically very compacted.The roots aren't very deep.Water runs off of lawn at a very high rate.So you can see we've really shifted that balance, between what runs off and what makes it into the ground and gets to the river slowly.And a lot of times, when you think about the localized flooding, you know, small urban streams, it's a lot of, because we've changed that balance.That these streams are gonna rise very rapidly.And it's also why we're also going to have potentially more drought and low-flow conditions during dry periods, because water is not making it in to the aquifer and getting to the river slowly.And this is another way to think about- Did I hear someone ask?Okay, I thought I heard that someone asking a question.This is a hydrograph and what this is demonstrating is in a pre-development or an undeveloped natural state, you can see when a storm comes along, you know, the river rises, you know, it still might rise fairly quickly.But it peaks out much, much lower.And then it goes down where, and this is the discharge, so this is your flow over here.In a developed environment, where you've got a lot of hard surfaces, where the water is going to run off very quickly.You can see it rises very quickly and to a much greater level.And again, that's the kind of, you know, when we see damage to our infrastructure.So, if you talk with river scientists, you'll hear them talk a lot about the Channel Evolution model.So, here we have a stable stream and we have this nice flat land next to the stream.It's also really nice to live next to water.So somebody built their house there.And then, they were getting flooded.So they're like, \"Okay, we don't want to get flooded\".So what they did was, they built a berm there.That's what those little black marks are.So now the water can't get out and onto the flood plain, where it slows down, it loses its energy.So it's gonna stay contained in the channel.And the power of water has to go somewhere.So what it's going to do here, since it can't get out and dissipate that energy, it's going to start digging down.And this is where you begin to see those really steep, unstable banks, I'm sure all of you have seen them somewhere.And, eventually you start to get the erosional damage.Most flood damage in Vermont, is erosional damage.It's not the traditional inundation flooding, although that certainly does happen, but it's where infrastructure gets overwhelmed.We can no afford to protect it, or it just happens too quickly.So in this case, the house topples in.Let's say it was bought out and nothing was put in its place.So now what you can see is the river is starting to sort of shift and move again.And when you get back down here, I'd ask you to look at this picture versus this one up here.And basically what you see is the river's back where it wants to be, but it's lowered itself.You know, it's had to work its way down and re-stabilize at a lower level.And I know from doing a lot of the geomorphic assessments in the Winooski, we have a lot of rivers that are in these stages here.They're in sizing and they're widening.There's a couple of sections of the upper Winooski, I've been watching that I think are finally starting to stabilize.But this is something that's going to take a lot of years and limiting impacts to what's happening there.Let's go ahead.So we've sort of got ourselves in this cycle where we've put infrastructure next to our rivers.We need to protect it.So we spend money to protect it.We have floods and we have property damage.So we come back in and we spend more money.We do some dredging, berm-ing.We certainly do armoring of banks where we have infrastructure to protect.And then the cycle starts all over again.What we're hopefully starting to get a little bit better about, is on the encroachment side and just learning that we can save ourselves a lot of trouble, a lot of money and make the rivers a lot happier if we stay out of their way, where there are opportunities to do so.So that we do have opportunities, and one is to, protect corridors where that opportunity still exists.And what this is showing here is the gray line is the river, the dotted area here, it's called the Fluvial Erosion Hazard Zone because I took this out of a State document, but that's that area that the river wants to meander.So you can see what's been calculated is sort of what is that belt with.Where's does the river want to move?And then, the further line out is the toe or the edge of the valley.So if we have opportunities to protect that dotted area and keep infrastructure out of there, that will allow the river to flood without doing much damage.Another is to improve stream crossings.The photo in the upper right is the same one I showed you earlier, which was a round concrete, undersized culvert, a lot of movement towards, I mean, bridges are ideal, but bridges are expensive.There's a lot of these bottomless culvert designs that you can see this as much better sized to the size of the stream that we want to send through it.And the other thing, for this, from a fish's standpoint, that's a natural bottom and that's going to be a natural flow.So it's also better from an ecological standpoint.One more frustrating things I saw post Irene, I was out at a site and a culvert had gotten blown out and the old culvert was laying about 40 feet away.And it had been replaced with exactly the same sized culvert.Part of those problems as I understand, came from the way FEMA reimburses, is they would reimburse what was there.They wouldn't necessarily reimburse the step up.And one thing, you know, with any event like Irene, you know, opportunities come, and I know there's been a lot of movement by VTrans to better size the infrastructure and a lot of towns have, and I have no idea about any of the towns here have begun to adopt, you know, these higher standards for when they do replace the infrastructure that they're going to replace it with something that is better sized to this stream.And based upon the guidance of the River Management folks at the State.Just to stand up for people, they actually can have permissions for right sizing culverts.In many cases, sometimes the towns don't understand that and they think they're just going to replace what's there, but they actually have provisions for right-sizing and there's a lot of details involved, but if the town has adopted the codes and standards so that they would, if they were doing it themselves, they would upgrade it to the right size and FEMA will pay for that up-sizing.And there's a whole, it's called Hazard Mitigation, and there's a formula to that.And they can add on a certain amount of money to those things.So it's just a matter of how fast, and how well-versed the FEMA representative is in those things.And I think initially there was some resistance with FEMA to support paying for some of the upsides culverts.But I think our congressional delegation actually provided some assistance in that area because, it's just so obvious that you do need to have a bigger culvert, and not to upgrade when you need to, and, you know, not back the towns and doing that, and back the State.And FEMA actually produced a little film talking about some of the innovative stuff they did, especially in the Rochester area and working with the forest service and some other things to really improve the fish passage.And you have other states like New Hampshire.Things are also adopting standards, for fish passage and other things.So, yeah.I know in some areas and you spoke of Rochester and I don't know if this was one in particular, but the US Fish and Wildlife Service, put a lot of people in their post-Irene.And I think that's why a lot of things, did get done that way, as well as with the Forest Service.And, yeah, going back to your comment about FEMA- - There were some people in FEMA that were pushing for that, were pushing for it too, but all parts of FEMA, don't always talk to all the others.Well that's what I've heard a lot of, I didn't have a lot of direct contact with FEMA, but when I talked with people in different agencies and representatives in different towns, some of it came down to who they were dealing with in FEMA. And so, but there were a lot of cases.I don't think it was as bad after Irene as it was after previous floods, but there a lot of stuff that got replaced at the same site.Oh yeah, and it always happens.So, but I think, we did learn a great deal.I remember sitting in meetings and we were talking more about fish passage and I was there with, you know, the State Fish and Wildlife Department and VTrans.And, there was sort of this sense of, abyss between the two agencies.And I think in the last two to three years, that that has changed quite a bit.And I think that there is a lot more cooperation between them.So that's very heartening to see.But, I would also say that really there's been a really good working relationship in the past decade with various departments in those agencies.And do you work for one of these agencies?Yeah, I worked for Fish and Wildlife and we've, we've had a great working relationship with Fish and Wildlife working on this passage.There may be certain sectors within VTrans that maybe hadn't completely bought in, but I know Planning had bought in.Yeah - Going back at least almost 10 years ago.And then Brian , environmental planning, and maybe, some of the structural engineers hadn't completely bought in yet.And then Irene, FEMA, the Environmental Section was pushing very hard to get these fish-passages through, and to work with the agencies to get this.But they weren't always successful either within, you know, what, there were people pushing for it.Because it only makes sense that you repair all at once, instead of repair it, multiple times.And ever since James Lee Witt was the Head of FEMA back in the Clinton era, they've been pushing more Hazard Mitigation so that you don't have to repair things over and over and over again.So it's just, you know, it's totally well.It takes a while, but that is, every project has to be reviewed to see if there's a mitigation opportunity.That's good to hear.So let's go ahead and go on.What areas will you spend a lot of time on is improving riparian buffers.A lot of, we work with mostly private landowners on this because the bulk of the land in the Winooski is privately owned.That is, one huge difference between the Winooski and the White, is that there is a lot of State and Federally owned land in the White.So we work a lot with individual landowners.So we're very dependent upon willing land owners who, with or without compensation through a State or Federal program would be willing to give up, some of their property.We work on, and we all need to work on is better managing stormwater.Sorry?In the previous slide, you said, you improved the riparian buffer.What do you do?What is the work you do?Mostly we do planting trees, native trees and shrubs.We've had one project where we did do bank grading.And that gets real expensive, real fast.With this, and this is one of the hardest things in dealing with landowners.You got to look at this at the long haul.You know, when I go out and talk to landowners and they're like, \"Oh yeah, we want to get trees because we're losing land\".We're not going to solve that problem in the next few years.It's got to be looked at over the long haul.Let's go ahead.So managing stormwater is another area.And I think one of the, you know, there's a lot of focus on stormwater in the greater Burlington area, St. Alban's, Rutland, because those are regulated areas.They're under stormwater permits.But stormwater is an issue everywhere.And one of the things that's really been recognized, I think more recently is what I call \"rural stormwater\", which is coming off of, coming out of village centers, coming out of developed land.Dirt roads have been recognized as a significant source of erosion and sedimentation.Let's go ahead.So these are things that we can do to get ourselves out of this cycle, but we do have to ask ourselves, I think some really hard questions.We have to ask, you know, what are we going to require of landowners?Whether they're farmers, developers, smaller landowners, what are we going to pay for, from public funds?Are we going to incentivize people?Are we gonna require farmers to put buffers in or are we going to incentivize them to do that?And where are we going to get that money from?And then what are we going to do voluntarily?You know, is education enough?So we have some things to think about here and- Has anybody ever seen this?I thought that maybe you two had?Yeah, this is a map that someone from the State, from the River Management Section has maintained, going back to 1973.And I think, what it illustrates is sort of how short our memories are.I think, you know, this group here is pretty conscious of things, but the only thing that was unusual about Irene, was how widespread it was.If you look carefully at the dates on that map, you can see that there's a damaging flood event.I don't know what the average works out to be.Maybe every five, seven, eight years, and they seem to come more and more frequently.And if you were to go up to Plainfield or Marshfield or Barre and ask them, you know, what was the worst flood event of 2011?It wasn't Irene.It was the end of May.And so it's something that we really need to think about.And precipitation patterns are changing.And we do have to, sort of going back to the discussion we were just having, a little bit, is we have to get more people within those areas that are making those decisions to understand that we're going to be facing more and more of this.And we need to turn things around pretty quickly.So there's one last slide that I'll just let you read yourselves.That's it.I don't know if there's any questions or.You guys have been doing any work with, with invasive removal such as Japanese knotweed.We do invasive management on sites where we're doing riparian restoration and we don't go in necessarily with the intent that we're going to eradicate something that's there.But what we're trying to do, since we're trying to re-establish native vegetation, is we're trying to keep the invasive-s at bay, until our vegetation can get established.Because if you commit yourself to eradication, it's sort of beyond our means, to be perfectly honest.So we do try to manage it on those sites, so that our, what we've planted, isn't going to get out-competed by what's there.Branching on that question.Is there a difference between the invasive-s and the natural vegetation as far as retention capabilities?Isn't the knotweed better at holding the soil?No, knotweed is terrible at holding soil.It's shallow rooted.It's very shallow rooted.When the bottomless Culper, thinking about the construction of that, is there a footing near the edges of the - My understanding, and I'm sorry, your name?You might know more.Everett - Everett There's a variety of structures, as I understand it.And I've seen the ones like that, that I think they come down and they sort of have a, a concrete pad and then it ties into that.And then that's buried a certain amount below the ground.A lot of that, or some of that, those newer approaches were pioneered by, I believe the Forest Service.We're looking at, for one structure, we are hoping to replace in Marshfield, we're actually looking at a pre-fab bridge.Normally a bridge would just be totally outside the budget, but they- and they can carry a firetruck because they could carry a logging truck.So usually to be honest, where we've done fish passage, well, not usually always, we hire an engineer and I rely on them.And to some extent, the folks that I work with from the US Fish and Wildlife Service to evaluate what's the best option for a given stream.I don't ever- have you had any experience with those?I don't know if I have much to add to that because that's not my area.Oh, okay.Yeah I would point out one thing interesting is that this area, Richmond was actually affected most severely, by the inundation event.So it was in let's see, in 2011.It was- - In the spring?Yeah.But the lake was- - No, but no, it was, no, it wasn't.It was Irene, but the towns, the Hilltop towns were affected mostly by the spring event, where we get the big rains.And that followed up again this past year, with similar events where we were getting.You know, big rain events in our, in our Hilltop towns.So we're getting erosion events.Any other questions?Where does your funding come from?If you're going to a home-owner or landowners to plant native vegetation, where does that money come from?It comes from a variety of sources.Our biggest sources for plant material are in the headwaters.Cabot Creamery has funded a lot of work in the headwaters.We get some funding through the State.If we can get certain agreements from the landowner, we can get money through US Fish and Wildlife.I've also gotten some private foundation funding through Green Mountain Coffee Roasters.But, if anybody's worked for a small non-profit, you know, you're always chasing money.So it's a variety of sources and then broader for the organization.You know, we do fundraising from individuals, from businesses.Well, in that vein, you might point out that tomorrow is Giving Tuesday, which is the new national holiday after Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, Cyber Monday, and now it's Giving Tuesday - Oh, I have heard of this.It's time to give back to, maybe you can let people know where to send their donations.A question in the back there.Oh, That's right.- Yeah, thank you.Yeah.I did work with, well, really through the 4-Towns to put in a grant application to the lake Champlain Basin program to do stormwater education.Again, it's this idea of what I call it, rural stormwater, but the idea that it's not just Burlington and the greater Burlington area, but we need to look at village centers.We need to look at runoff from private properties in more, you know, spread out settings.And so the application went in and I think it's February before we find out.Just make the observation and maybe ask a question.I think our planning commission here in Richmond is working on flood zone regulations, has been for a while.I have a clear account planner up here, but I'm kind of curious to know if any other members of our planning commission are here, to hear this?No - It's a little disappointing to me.Well, in all effect they may have heard this from the Regional Planning Commission.There may have been other sources of this information, I don't know.A couple of years ago, - I'm sorry?Regional Planning Commission came a couple of years ago.But it's always good for few commission members to care and handbooks to be reminded.So I think that will be coming soon, because chapter 117 does require town plans to now have a fluvial erosion planning section.So, it's an important component, and one that I think towns are going to be looking at for no other reason than, it's a requirement in the town plan.And there was some discussion that there would be incentives tied to towns that adopted certain standards.Is that true?Yeah, that's what they said to us, for reimbursement for highway repair related expenses, in the case of flooding events.So the State is creating systems to incentivize municipalities, to adopt more rigorous standards.Yeah, I think, one of the handicaps is the, what they call the Fluvial Erosion Hazard Zones are based upon having done geomorphic studies, which are very, very time intensive.And I know, I've sort of lost track of this.I know the State was looking at a way to do, you know, sort of quicker.I don't want to call them down and dirty, but, you know, once where, I mean, because literally the way geomorphic studies have been done ,is you go walk the stream and I've done it with consultants and you go at the pace of about a mile a day to gather, and that's just a gathering of data.So there needs to be a way.So towns can really adopt it on a stream level.There needs to be a faster way to get to that information.And I don't know if there's been much progress on that.Huntington has done a study environmental, did a study a few years back.It was pre Irene and Irene, both fortunately and unfortunately was a great seller of the importance of protecting fluvial erosion hazard zone.Well, they probably did it under the existing geomorphic program, if they did it.Yes, they did - Three, four years ago.And Richmond also had maps done, fluvial erosion maps done at that time.Yeah, I know that was one of the concerns.A lot of the Manooski's been done.We were involved with a lot of that, not either of those, but more in the upper part of Winooski, but I know there were concerns in the Southern part of the State that they didn't have as much data captured.So even if towns wanted to create these zones, they didn't necessarily have, I mean, they could still create an exclusion zone, but whether or not it was sort of based on the science of understanding what the river was going to do.They didn't necessarily have that data at hand.Well, thank you all for coming.I do have some publications.I do have a copy of, this is the publication that this is based on.And this is just a little bit about the Friends and then a couple other things here, and you can just take them.This is a publication by the State, it doesn't, it has, I think a horrible name.It's called Vermont Low Impact Development guide for residential and small sites.Basically what it is, is his techniques that you can use around your home, or another smaller property to manage stormwater.Talks about everything, from rain barrels and cisterns, to rain gardens and vegetated swales.I know they're looking to reprint this once we can give these all away and I told them, you've gotta have a catchier title than that.And then, this is something that was just produced by the Vermont River Conservancy, which is really a series of essays on different aspects of rivers management and understanding rivers.So feel free.Vermont River Conservancy or- - I'm sorry, Vermont Natural Resources Council.I worked with both of them.Sorry I got interchangeable there.- Yeah, it is.Well, thank you so much Ann.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Living_in_Harmony_with_Streams_-_Science_to_Action.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Living_in_Harmony_with_Streams_-_Science_to_Action.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Living_in_Harmony_with_Streams_-_Science_to_Action.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/MMU_Board_Mtg._5-9-13/MMU_Board_Mtg._5-9-13.mp3", "text": "Comments from community members?Yes.So- - You want to tell us who you are?Tell us your name.My name is Peter Duval.My daughter, Laura, is a fifth grader at Browns River.Mm-hmm.And my concern is about water.At the beginning of the year, She started buying her lunch.Mm-hmm.And the choice is milk, or a dinky little bottle of water, for beverage.Recently, I learned that the dinky little bottle of water, will no longer be available.And so now, only milk is offered at lunch, even though the price has stayed the same.Kids that don't drink the milk, they have nothing to drink, and they have to wait until, you know, they go to the water fountain.I know.Or maybe they have juice or stop on the way in.It's more likely that they go out of the room, and then come back- - Yeah.After drinking water.I've already gone through the proper channels in the school here, and I haven't really gotten a satisfactory answer, about why the school can't provide water to all kids at lunch time?Mm-hmm.You know, it would be a simple matter of providing enough water in bottles.Perhaps a survey on why there's no explanation given, on the essential need for water?Or do like the other schools that I've seen, in terms of water and cups.Mm-hmm.And if you're thirsty, you go to the table and you pour yourself a cup of water, and you have it with your meal.So my question is, why can't that happen at Browns River Middle School?Saves money, cuts waste- - Reasonable.Gets water to all the kids who are thirsty, including the kids who are bringing lunch from home.Mm-hmm.Okay, since I'm here, I can follow up with it.Okay.It certainly seems like a- - Mm-hmm.not an unusual or unreasonable request.Hmm.Perhaps I'll follow up with Kevin, see if I can get to the bottom of that.Okay.Thank you, Henry.Then will you get back to Mr. Vale?Duval, yeah, I'm Peter.Duval, I'm sorry.Okay, yeah.I can get back to him.Okay, so John will check that out for you, and you'll hear from him.Great, I hope that can happen quickly because- - Mm-hmm.Of course- - The summer's coming.Water is an essential thing for the human body, but also it's getting warmer- - Mm-hmm.Since they're outside more, they're gonna need to drink more water.Can I ask a question?Yes.So if there were a bunch of cups available in the cafeteria, that would be okay?Just drinking cups?Well, they would need cups, and they need pitchers full of water or, you know, maybe a cooler, because there's no tap or water fountain in the dining room.Okay, so John will get back.We'll get back in touch with you.Thanks.Sorry, one more thing.Could they refill their own water bottles from those pitchers, would that be all right too?I'd be fine with that, but they need to have the- - They need the water- - Access to the water.Right, okay.There to do it, yeah.But they do need to have the cups because not everybody has water bottles.Other comments from community members?Yes?Just wondering what that configuration difference would be then, between Camel's Hump and Browns River?Because last time I was at Camel's Hump, in the cafeteria, there's a water fountain, literally with the, you know, shape of the water bottle and you can fill a water bottle at the water fountain.Mm-hmm.So I'm just wondering if the configuration is different?I don't know how it actually- - I don't know if they have one of those automatic water dispensers.They're trying to raise money.Come to the classes here, to purchase one of those- - It's already been purchased- - For here.just hasn't been installed yet- - Okay.For the cafeteria?Yeah.For here.So I'm sure, probably- - But it will be installed in the cafeteria?There's one that's gonna go near the cafeteria, yeah.Near, or?Yeah.I don't have the exact spot.The only thing is, yeah, if the kids are not allowed to leave the cafeteria- - Right.and it's not in the cafeteria, it becomes a catch 22.Well, the one in at Camel's Hump is- - Opposite- - It's in the cafeteria.from the lunch line, so it's in the cafeteria.I'll follow up, okay.That's why I asked on the configuration, there's waterline there.It allows that installation, so I was just wondering if that was the case at Browns River?I believe there is a water fountain in there, that's what they hooked them up to.Hello.We were just discussing water availability for students in the cafeteria at Browns River.If you have something that you'd like to discuss, we'd be happy to hear it?And we're hear to listen.Yeah, you are.Okay.We're going to change the agenda a little bit because Linda has graciously offered to house some of the music students, and has to go and pick them up.So we're going to move to item three of the discussion, on the inside security cameras installation at Mount Mansfield.Mike, do you have information or do you- - This actually comes as a seconded motion from the facilities committee.After discussing at our committee meeting, getting the feedback that we had asked for and that we are, as a seconded motion, bringing forward the ability of the high school to re-install the cameras that they have.There would be eight cameras placed in the common hallways.And there's no additional costs except for installation because the machinery and the equipment is already paid for.Okay.Questions for the facilities committee?What were the cameras used for before?They were installed, then there was- - Objections.Enough people objecting to it at the time that they were removed from the interior areas but they were still kept in the exterior to help cut down on vandalism with the buses.And what's changed, and when were they removed?About two months after they were installed.Just removed?A year ago, two years?Seven years ago.Seven years ago?Seven years old.So we're gonna put in seven year old cameras, that still work.Mm-hmm.That's the plan?Mm-hmm, yep.Okay.Could we have a motion as this comes as a seconded- - Yeah, this comes seconded- - This is a seconded motion.But we need a motion to vote on.Okay.If it comes as a seconded emotion, I don't think we need- - We don't have to have any approval?No, we can just discuss and then vote on it.Yes, we have to vote on it.Oh, I just asked if there was more discussion and no one said anything.Oh okay, sorry.Cliff?Yeah, it's been seven years.In that seven years, how many occasions have there been when having those security cameras there, might have been useful?I'm not sure, you know, because without them, we have to use other methods to try to figure things out.You know, we've talked to kids.There certainly would be some, you know, with some of the vandalism.A handful.Mm-hmm?I've got more.Thank you.These would be installed only in the main corridor?Yes, main corridors and lobbies.So the notion that first responders can see whether some distant wing is clear or not, doesn't apply?Yes, it does.It does?Because every main- - So it- - every main- - They would point down- - It would be pointed- - Down the wings, okay.Right.So you know, each wing would be- - Yeah.sort of covered by a camera.We have some small lobbies in different parts of the building.Yeah.According to the free press...That's a footnote.According to the free press this morning, CVU doesn't have any of these, and they seem to have survived.What's different about MMU?This was something that came out of the, you know, the January 3rd facilities committee.We talked about it at that facilities committee meeting.This is a tool that...For me, if the worst thing possible happened, this is something that allows us to deal with that situation better.Day-to-day stuff, I mean, I'm gonna knock on wood, we have great kids.I don't have, you know, many times to go back to the tape to see who started the fight cause we don't have many fights.But for me, if that worst thing happened?This helps.Well, in law enforcement as well.Sarah, you've talked to the state police and it could be a local police, that it could be a useful tool.You know, Richmond Elementary has the capacity now.It's in common areas where, because it's web-based, the police can see certain spots of the building.So if there was a threat and they knew where it was, then they can go directly to try to eliminate the threat.Yeah, which goes to my question.We only had cameras in for two months in the history of the school.As to what, you know, how many instances have there been when you would have needed things?You know, I can think of one that was.It was a harassment case where there were two very different stories.It was in one of the corridors.And I think it probably would have helped us find the truth in that particular situation.Mm-hmm.I mean, that's just one that I know of.And I'm, you know, working at a central office cause we did do a pretty in-depth investigation of it.Dave?Yeah, John and I had a discussion about this and in one case, where the cameras were installed in the buses.And there was an allegation made- - Mm-hmm.that students had been, you know, shaken or touched on a bus.With the camera, it was shown that the bus driver went back and talked to the students.At no point, did he touch either student.And so, you know, it helped to find the facts.I mean, I don't have any objection to these cameras being turned on.As long as the review of what they're recording, only occurs in an emergency or for using to then ferret out what the truth of the matter is.I don't want it to be surveillance but I don't have an issue with it as being an arbiter as to, you know, what really happened.Yes?Would these be on, when school is out of session?I'm thinking of the hardware, fixing it?My only experience with cameras is really what happened seven years ago.I became a little bit of an expert for that there.The experts with cameras say that once they're on, they're always on.Oh. - So you never turn them off.They're sort of self-taping over, so.That's a good example, Chip.What came to mind, we didn't even really know about that was the incident that happened at Harwood Union.I've gotta think that if there were cameras that would've help in finding out exactly what happened.There's extensive amount of damage, not to mention the impact on the educational program.Yes?I have a few questions.I don't know who it's directed to but, who has access to the video?How long is the video stored?And is it streamed online?Access to the video is principal in designate.Stored?It's just an estimate.It's around 20 days.And it automatically deletes?It automatically tapes, sort of.It's digital, but it deletes or records over itself.It's not streamed online but it can be accessed through the internet.By you or your designate?Correct.By anyone who's got- - Anyone with the password- - The password could- - essentially would- - break into it?would live with the two of us, and I assume the state police.We would give, you know, the state police that as well.Yes, go ahead.And I can speak from the student perspective.We've given the student body multiple opportunities to voice their opinions on the installation of cameras.And there has not been any organized opposal.And the reason was it was presented, somewhat shortly after New Town.And they understood that there, unfortunately, there might be a need and then, kind of, the consensus was we don't have an issue with it and let's put them in and hope we never have to use them.And there hasn't been any from either Cougar House.And maybe Mr. Weston can say that through lunch with the administrators, The only thing is there's been questions about where would they go?When would they be used, how long?Just similar questions that the board has been asked.Thank you.Further questions?Comments?If not, we have the motion but we need to vote?So those in favor of the motion presented by the facilities committee indicate by saying, aye?Aye.Those opposed?Abstained?Thank you very much.So we will go back to item number two, graduation credits in computer applications.Can I just?And on the agenda, it says graduation credits.It's really graduation requirement.We're not looking at adjusting the credits.We're looking at the requirements.So we're not saying we want one less credit, or two less credits, it's just...Right now, it is a requirement of graduation.Thank you.Okay.The curriculum committee discussed it.Looked at it, and may have a position on that?We have a position.We have a seconded motion, also.We had a presentation a week ago from Eric Hall, who is a technology integration specialist, at MMU. And he basically walked us through the educational process for technology, basically K through 12.Mike Weston, Eric, and Jen Ba-Sojourns, brought to our attention that this requirement is really no longer relevant.The middle schools no longer tests for these skills, and the elements of this requirement are embedded all throughout the elementary and middle school academics.So as we move toward each student having their own computer, the technology skills are gonna be used throughout the entire curriculum.So do you want me to read the seconded motion that we came up with?Yes please.Yes please.Okay.The information technology graduation requirement will be sunsetted, effective 2017.The skills in this class are currently being embedded in the K through 8 curriculum.That's fine.Does that sound right?Yeah.Mm-hmm.Diane?Why 2017, why not earlier?Because those kids have already met the requirement.Those student have showed- - Yeah.Whenever the students came into the high school, they're given their- - They tested out of it?A piece of paper they're given, this is what you got for the path to graduate.Uh-huh.To adjust that on them one way or the other, does not seem like the right thing to.There are very few students we're talking about.We're gonna offer the course one more time and we won't have to offer it again.Oh, so my follow up question is, because many of the students sort of tested out of it, and did not require it?Yes.Perfect, thank you.Cliff?I have the same question.Why 2017, why not next week?It'll free up some students calendars, so they could do physics, instead of- - Which is a great class, by the way.Sorry?It's a great class, by the way.Right, yeah.Well, as opposed to Angry Birds, I'm not sharp.Students who already have a pass on the transcript cause they have missed- - They don't have to take it.school or whatever.But isn't there's just some way we can get rid of this requirement and grandfather them in?They still get credit for it- - Yeah.It's not taken away.There are roughly 15 students, 15 to 18 students, who did not pass it when the middle school was assessing, and are with us now.Mm-hmm.And if you all wanna change this, I'm fine with that.But going by the spirit of the graduation requirements put forth in policy was that students need to demonstrate.So these students are not...These are students who don't have...Aren't part of the one-to-one initiative.They're students who...The presentation that was given to the curriculum committee dealt with that group of students who have, you know, who were getting the one-to-one, having a different education in middle school than some of these other students.That's why we didn't push for it to be immediately, but if that's what folks wanna do?I'm sure those 15 kids would- - Mm. - gladly take another course.Yeah.Or take computer apps as an elective?Right.Conner?Now I understand why the current freshmen grid would have to keep that requirement but why couldn't we introduce the new policy to the upcoming freshmen grade?Yes, that's what we're talking about.We are, yeah.Okay.By 2017 the graduation year.Sunsetted in.Oh, okay I thought you meant that was- - Starting next year- - the start of like- - They won't need to do it.Okay, thank you.It's a requirement, yeah.Michael?Mm-hmm.Is this currently embedded in all of our standing elementary schools' curriculum?As it is now, yes.That what we've been doing.Whoever's there now, yes.So each one of those are embedded- - Yeah.In the curriculum?Thank you.In the school.All clear?I've forgotten the parliamentary procedure for offering a friendly amendment.Just say, I want to offer a friendly amendment.That's all you gotta do.If that's all you gotta do then that- - He's done that a lot.motion takes precedence- - over the other motions.I'm guessing that will be yes.Well, until the pending motion gets decided.I'm not quite sure how I wanna word this, but I would like to see this requirement removed as a graduation requirement effective at the close of the 2012/2013 year, but that the course be offered as an elective in the 2013/14 year.Yeah.And I think that- - I don't know if it's gonna disappear as an elective or not.We haven't discussed that.Or offer it as an elective, starting in that year, I don't care when it turns- - Well, it can always be an elective.Yeah, right.Yeah.That's really a substitute motion, but you know, just do what you want with it.There are two issues there.It's your prerogative.You raised two issues.One is the sunset date and the other was- - Yeah.an elective issue.Yeah, the elective issue- - So maybe we should focus- - that can be followed.just on the date.Sorry?Maybe we should focus, just on the date.Yeah, let's.Forget what I said about the elective.Does that fall away?So now it is a friendly amendment, because it's gonna be eased- - Yes.So we're no longer assessing these skills, right?We're no longer assessing to ensure that our students are meeting these requirements?We are.Yeah, we just- - We are assessing?So, the way it is.The way it has been, sort of prior to the one-to-one was- - Mm-hmm.Students were taking a course in middle school that focused on these information technology skills.If they didn't pass this course or they weren't part of our middle schools.They had to take the basic computer applications course with us that focused on these skills.With the one-to-one rollout this year, to make sure the students knew the skills when they needed them, we didn't have to wait.We put it into teaching, you know, in English class they talk about folders.In History, maybe they would look at PowerPoint presentations.In Science, they would look at spreadsheets.It became part of the instruction of the material.So it's not being directly assessed as sort of a hang-alone grade, but you can't complete the assignment unless you can do it.And it's part of the rubrics- - Right, exactly.And we're doing that, really Grade 2 through Grade 12, because it seems that kids apply the skills better when they're in context.And we've already made the port where that's gonna continue next year.You know, we're having some in-service time in June for all 9th and 10th grade teachers to continue this.And we'll continue to roll it out as the one-to-one marches its way forward.So not assessing by that- - Yeah.It means we're not having a letter grade on the report card to speak directly to the course.Any questions?Yeah.Go ahead.I'm just confused about procedure.Someone who at Browns River learnt about SketchUp and Photoshop and all that good stuff- - Yeah.has been keyboarding since 1st grade, or something or other.Does that actually show up on the transcript?Cause I know if you'd take French I in 8th grade, that shows up on the transcript, so- - It doesn't show up into your grade.It shows up as requirement met.Well, just as a P- - Yeah.or something, yeah?Yeah.Mm-hmm.Requirement met- - Right.in middle school or something.I'm not sure that's happened.At least, it does on the computer system.So we know they've met it.It's there cause- - Yeah.we review, you know- - They have met it.Yeah, okay.No, as long as the committee- - Other discussions?Does not object.Okay.If not, we- - Did no one mandate?Do we have to second this friendly amendment?We do have to have a second on the friendly amendment.And what year are we changing it to, 2013?Yeah.Yes.The 2012/13 school year.Well, is there a second?I'll second.We're looking for a second.He said it.Is that an issue- - John, we have two.So it kind of is, right?It's seconded.So if it's seconded, then I would wanna say something- - Can I?Yeah.Go ahead.End this discussion now.Yeah, exactly.Can we end it.Can I?My one concern with this, is once it's no longer required, some students who may benefit from taking that course will choose not to take it.I have 15 students, I'm pretty sure would really benefit from this course next year.I am worried probably, not losing all of them, but losing five of them because when they find out that they don't have to take it- - They won't.They won't.So I understand the point, I get it.But sometimes with 15, 16, 17 year old students, it's written down, you have to do it, works better than it's good for you.But- - Yeah.Diane?Whatever y'all wanna do.Yeah, my observation after we discussed the 2017, and then I was listening to what Mike was saying.I understand completely- - Mm-hmm.And I quite agree with that, that you know, we could be losing some students who really didn't get what they were supposed to in middle school.And that would be important, and I'm glad to see that it's only about 15 students.Having had a student that was in AP classes and was told in senior year, never passed the keyboarding exam and had to take that.I'm glad that it's going away for the kids who really need it to go away, but there are plenty of kids probably, you're absolutely right.So, supporting that.Dave?Yeah, I would speak against the amendment, for the reasons that Mike has made.Sometimes called Mark.Old what's his name.Yes, Tyrone?Is there something- - Is there something that's changing like next year in the integration with the middle schools?So next year we won't have 15 students that would benefit from this course?Yes, what the middle school is doing is changing it.Okay.The middle and elementary has changed over the last couple years- - Okay, mm-hmm.To address this.Cliff?That's a good point.These 15 or 16 students, are they all seniors?In which case- - There's a lot of them.But next year's seniors, I'm already up.I'm already two next year.Okay.We have this year's diplomas.Great.We're due next year's.That's it.Their end credits are weighted, right?Yeah, so the middle schools are moving away from these standalone classes, where they're teaching some of these skills.And what we've done is we've embedded them into rubrics that are actually happening in Math, and Social Studies, and Science, and Language Arts.So, just to go back to the date.2017 is the incoming freshmen, right?Right.So we're including?But you're saying they will have already met this?2017.Yeah, they will have.It would be the first class that it doesn't apply for.That it does not apply to.So it'll end in 2016?Uh-huh.I am happy if you wanna change it just one.Just give me one more year with it.I can get everything I need done, but we did that to be, I thought, consistent to students when they came in.That piece of paper that was given them, that graduation plan they've been working on would be consistent, so.But it's your choice.But what Mike's saying is really, one year.If you wanna change it, you know, you'd wanna sunset it in- - Move it to '14?Like in '15.Yeah.At the end of- - At the end of '13/14.Between '13 and '14, okay.We have the friendly amendment seconded- - Hmp.And we do need to vote on that, unless there's more discussion.So, those in favor of the amendment as read, indicate by saying aye.Can we review the amendment?What, the original one?No, the- - The friendly amendment.Should I amend my friendly amendment?This is just the amendment.Changed the date, Sydney.Unless you wanna- - Unless he wants me to amend the amendment?Do you want me to read it?Go ahead.Please.You want Chris to read it?Yeah, that would help us.If I read it, okay.All right.The information technology graduation requirement will be sunsetted effective 2012/2013 school year.The skills in this class are currently being embedded in the K through 8 curriculum.Okay, amended version.Those in favor?Yes, Cliff?Just one more point of discussion.How do I withdraw a friendly amendment.You just say, I wish to withdraw and the second- - But it's been seconded, I'm not sure.Then the person who seconded it, also has to withdraw their second.Okay, I'm happy to withdraw my friendly amendment.Good.Mike, was it you or?.No, I did not.Okay.I will agree with that withdrawal.Okay.Now we're back to the original seconded amendment which indicates- - 2017, yeah.This will sunset in 2017.Is there more discussion about that?Okay, I see none.Those in favor of the seconded amendment- - Can't wait to get through this item- - Brought to us from the curriculum committee?Please indicate by saying aye.Aye.Those opposed?Those abstaining?Thank you, Sydney.Awesome, thank you everybody.You're next.Okay.Okay and we are eliminating number four.The approval of the interim tax fees as those are still awaiting definition.Yep, I'll bring it in June.Okay.Conner and Hailey, you're up.Do you want me to go?Ladies first.Oh, okay.Ever the gentleman.So we have the All State Music Festival.So we have, like, 400 extra kids in our school, which is cool.And I actually went to MMU first, thinking it was there and there was just, like, so many kids outside.I was like it's probably not here.Then they came here and I was like, oh, look at that.But yeah, we have prom coming up on the 18th.I was looking for a cover, it's pretty sweet.Me and Conner.Uh-huh.Yeah.We have a ton of senior stuff that's coming up, but those don't really apply to everyone.So there's no issue about that.Do you have anything else to add?The senior play production is- - Oh, that's going on.The opening date, I know it's late May, but Mr. Weston, do you know the opening night date?I wanna say it's June- - Uh-huh.But I could be wrong, it's that Friday.I think, it's the 31st and 1st.So 31st and 1st?So it's Friday and Saturday.That's right.What's the name of it?Let's see, I think, - it's just called the Senior Play.No, it's- - Are you sure?No, it's- - It totally has a name.It's- - I don't know.It's something.That's gonna bother me.It's not on the website.Bring out your date?An option.Nobody knows.I'll email you.I don't know what the correct name is.I walk by the sign every darn day.Yeah.That's the way it is.It involves a magnifying glass.Yeah.It's probably a mystery.It is, of some sort.Yeah, uh-huh.I'm on the website too- - There's nothing on the site.And I'm not finding it.Under drama?Stephanie was there last night and she couldn't find it.I thought I had an in with- - And then you could call her.I'll read the sign when I go pick up my students.Conner, you got more than that?Our dance team just had a carwash that was extremely successful.I believe I heard it was- - 210.$210?Yeah.Which I think is pretty good- - Yeah.for a day carwash.Yeah.The spring sports are now in full swing, and now even some sports are looking towards playoffs or state meets or state matches.I'm not sure with Tennis, is it state match?I think so.Uh-huh.And I believe that's it.Great.Judy?Yes.Yeah.I just wanted to say for those of you that weren't aware, last Thursday, John, Mike, myself, and Hailey, and Conner, were speaking with Molly Walsh in regards to the camera issue.But I want everyone to realize, what amazing student reps we have.They were articulate.They were clear.They answered the questions without hemming and hawing.And you both deserve a lot of credit for doing it.So thank you.Yay.Thank you very much.Good job.And this is Haley's last meeting.I'm assuming she's not gonna come on the 13th, since that's senior banquet night- - Yeah.She's been doing this for two years.So thanks a lot, Hailey.You're welcome.Thank you.Yeah, thanks.Thank you, Hailey.I'm not sure if this would be Conner's last or not, but Conner, could you fill them in on- - I was gonna wait for other business, but sure.Last- - This is exciting.Yeah.I was recently just accepted to the United World College Program.The campus that I was offered is in Duino, Italy.It's about 70 miles Northeast of Venice.Nice.In late August, I will be leaving for two years to be getting an IB diploma, which credits can be transferred to colleges.And some cannot, I might just be a very old freshmen.But I think the two years in Italy will be worth it.Yes.But thank you so much for everyone on the board for the experience to help serve with you.It's been really fun.And through the people who I hear, who are applying for my position, I'm leaving you in good hands.Thank you, congratulations.No matter who is selected.It certainly is.That's really cool.Congratulations.That's great.Well done, man.Distinguishing honor.I'm trying to start to learn Italian, that's- - Good.Yeah.Could I just request?Conner, would you tell this board, a little bit about United World College?Sure, it is a program that is trying to...The idea is bring everyone from around the world together that are leaders and give them an academic atmosphere to really further develop.It's very large into diplomacy.A lot of graduates do go to work in UN-type fields.There are programs or campuses from all over the world.The American campus is in New Mexico.We've had two students in the last two or three years- - Two years.Who have been accepted to the New Mexico campus.Mm-hmm.So MMU has a very strong reputation for the program.They accept 50 Americans, 25 of which go to New Mexico, and the other 25 are kind of dispersed around the world.It follows the IB curriculum.The way it works is you hyper-focus in three subjects, and then you kind of like minor in three, and then you have a fun one.I'm thinking about majoring in...And it's kind of like majoring.Advanced Math, Physics and to be determined.Not a hundred percent sure yet.And trying to learn Italian, it's rough.I can't roll r's.It's a challenging exercise.Good kid.The honorary president is...It's just kinda like an honor, but it's Nelson Mandela, and I believe the Prince of Wales.So it's- - That's a good combo.It's a very prestigious institution and program.And I know that I will be coming back on some breaks, and I'm hoping to try to organize a way that I can give kind of a pitch to the student body.I haven't talked to Mr. Weston about that.But it's a great program, and I think that a lot of people should hear about it, because I kind of heard about it through fluke, so.Uh-huh.Thank you.But when you do come back- - That's great.we would like to invite you to come and tell us about it too.Yeah.Your experiences, cause certainly- - I was just about to say- - I would love to.I agree.Thank you.Is it funded?Again, congratulations.Yes, I'm a- - Davis scholarship recipient.That's tough competition.So tuition, room and board, and basic living expenses are paid for.That's great.Wow.That's really cool.That's amazing, wow.Mike, did you have anything else- - No, I- - you needed to bring up?Who here has watched the All State concert?I actually realized, for those who don't know, the All State Festival is at MMU, right now.They started yesterday and they proceed through Saturday.Tonight is a scholarship concert.Tomorrow night, seven o'clock, is the jazz concert.Saturday afternoon, two o'clock, is the orchestra concert.The band and orchestra.And then 4:30 on Saturday is the choral concert.It's outstanding.I spent time walking around, listening.The folks directing are all...I'm not sure about the jazz, the gentleman directing the jazz group, but all the others are from colleges.Delaware.One of the big 10 schools, I've suddenly blanked on it.And then a school in Virginia.It's really, it's quite impressive.So if you get a chance.Even if you get a chance tomorrow, just stop by and I'll walk you around, and you can just sit in, and listen to some- - There's not much on the website about it.It doesn't have times.Yeah, they don't give us much.Oh. - They wanna run it through their website.Oh, okay.Yeah.They're kind of protective.And also Mike, how many MMU students are- - 19.Participating?19?Yeah.And how are they distributed?Two in jazz, and then I think we had- - Now, is that relevant?We had eight.Eight and eight.Or eight and whatever's left.We have eight orchestra.So that would be nine choral.High schools?Thank you so much.John?So I wanted to, I wasn't sure.I was at a special vote in Bolton, at our last meeting.So I wasn't able to attend, but we have the committee assignments.I'm passing those around.There's a conflict with the next one, with strategic planning and finance.There's some members that are on both committees.I'm gonna talk with Chip and see if we can't get the strategic planning meeting moved.The finance committee has been scheduled for that, for you know, almost a year or so.We'll work that out so we don't have any overlap, but I'll pass these out.Question?Yes?We talked about having facilities in May as well.Is that- - That may be.Gonna create more conflicts?Oh, I'm just counting the different- - Well, let's check.It's not on the schedule.Not originally.We may have to do it on a different night.Okay.Hmm.But I'll look.A revision.Oh. - Just looking here.We'll schedule one for May.Okay then.Appreciate it.Yeah, I'll do that.Oh, great.So can I get it from you during the day?So I'm trying to limit the paper.But I do have the- - Well, I'll start with- - Something else here.I don't wanna get ahead of myself.I want everybody to pay close attention.Okay.So. Merger, school district merger options.Sorry, set up isn't ideal but- - Good shot.It's the only game in town.It was about two years ago when we had a vote to ask the electorate whether or not they wanted to form a regional education district, or a RED, that did not pass.Here is what the vote count is.It did pass in four of the six towns.It did not pass in Huntington, and it did not pass in Richmond.And recently, I'd say over the last couple of months, really after the budget process, there's been some interest from our elementary boards in looking at what the options are, and discussing within boards whether or not they want to look at one of those merger options, school district merger options.So we met about a month ago with all of the elementary boards and I showed them most of the slides that I'm gonna be presenting to you tonight.We also brought it to the executive committee and the executive committee really asked boards if they would talk about it in their local boards to see if they were interested in pursuing some sort of a merger.So I haven't tallied where we are with all of the boards.There is at least one board that has a lot questions and there are probably about three others, that I know of, that are interested in looking, at least conceptually, a school district merger.And we had a good discussion.Folks asked a lot of questions.I've had a relay communication with Vaughn Altemas at the Agency of Education and asked some questions about the merger legislation.And tonight the purpose of this is to get some directions from the MMU board.And I think for Judy and Diane as to whether or not the MMU board can support a school district merger.It's obviously a very important component of the SU, and two thirds of the entire SU. I'm not sure exactly what would happen if MMU said, yeah, no.And all the other school districts, or at least the majority of them said, we wanna merge.I think we'd have to cross that bridge when we come to it.But I think we'd like to get some direction or some information from the board, whether or not they could support school district merger of some of our elementary districts.Is that really an option that this board has seen, as we aren't a voting unit, I believe.Technically, I don't believe so.Technically, I think if the majority of the districts wanted an option, especially one of them- - Mm-hmm.That pertains to MMU, that's the one, I think, we'd wanna know, hear what the thoughts are of the board.Technically, I don't believe that they could stop a merger- - If they had more standing.if a majority of the elementary boards wanted to, but we definitely wanna know what folks think.So I just wanna clarify that.I guess I wasn't aware of that.So you mean, you said our board isn't a voting unit?Well, it's not a voting unit in terms of budgets.We're a unified- - You're a union school district?A union school district.You're not a municipality?We aren't a municipality- - Okay.And the voting, it's not like we're voting on a Mount Mansfield or a Chittenden East budget.The voting would be done town by town by town.Okay.Hmm, I guess I never actually gave that any thought.It sounds like it really is the case that, all the elementary school boards would really merge with this board rather than, specifically, rather than just all the boards merging?There some other- - There's options.There some other options in here?So it's almost unidirectional in a way?Yes, but there are some other options in here.Okay.But one of them is the, and this is a mouthful.I've heard somebody call it MUD. It's the modified unified union school district.But that one, it really does and would impact this board, and would impact this union.So I'm gonna share the details as I know them, and as I've learned about them over the last two years.And then hopefully we can have a discussion and see what the thoughts are, of folks on this board.So in the 2012 session, the legislature expanded some of the options and the incentives for voluntary school district mergers.Not necessarily RADs, which is the region educational district, which is what we voted on two years ago.But some other options and some joint agreements or mergers of services.I'm gonna be referring to really Act 156 tonight and it offers some supports for supervisory union mergers, and some joint agreements between two or more school districts.For example, if you had two small districts that were running their own transportation system, they might be able to enter into a joint agreement and run their transportation systems together, or facilities management, or some shared staffing, or actually even enter into an agreement to run a school.Mm. - Interesting.So one of the new options is a union elementary district.This is if a majority of elementary school districts that belong to the same union school district.The term is really high school.Ours is 5-8, so it's middle-high.Our district does pertain to this legislation.I did check that out.If they want to form a union elementary district, they can merge voluntarily.They're eligible for study reimbursements, incentives, and a transitional grant.Each of the school districts that would wanna merge, must vote to approve the union elementary district.If this is something a school district wants to do.For example, if four of our elementary districts wanted to merge, they could, but each one of the districts, the town would have to approve it.So this is one of the options.There's another option as well.This really allows for elementary districts that feed into the same union high school to merge as an elementary district, if they want to, and districts that don't, they don't have to.So I sent all this as a PDF to folks.Mm-hmm.Is it time to ask questions, or do we wait till the end?You can ask as we go along.It probably will be helpful cause the information is- - Dense.It's very dense, you know, - Yeah.there's a lot to it.So if for example, four of our elementary schools wanted to merge, would that be merging into one elementary district?So we would have three elementary and one middle-high, is that how that would work?Well, potentially you could have, say, four elementary districts in Chittenden East that merged.Mm-hmm.That would be one district.Mm-hmm.And then you would have two- - Those are individual?that didn't.They were standalone independent school districts.And then we would have the unions, the Mount Mansfield union school district, which would be 5 to 8.Okay.Mm. - In that situation, would the merged elementary school district be part of this board?No. - No. - They would have their own board.And they would have to follow a lot of the statutory steps or almost all of them, that we did in the RED. So you have to be in articles of agreement.They'd have to decide on what the configuration of the board was like.They'd have to be really based on the electorate portion of the electorate.Then union school district merger.This is any merger of two or more school districts.They're eligible for some of the RED incentives as well.Consultation reimbursement, the transitional grant, or 5% of the base set amount really multiplied by the students in both of the districts up to a max of 150,000.Whichever is last, it can't go over 150,000 but none of the tax incentives.So the declining tax incentives, the union school district merger are not eligible for those.And this merger, again if you had two school districts or three that wanted to pursue this, the towns that wanted to do it, or bringing it to the electorate.It would have to pass in all of those towns for it to happen.So if two voted yes, and one voted, no.It doesn't happen.Hmm.John?Yes?Is this the one where they could combine also with the Mount Mansfield Union high school district?No, that's another one.Okay, great.Next page.Yeah, there are a number of options.What's important to, I think, understand is there are so many different school districts in the state of Vermont.I guess for some, the thinking was a menu might work for more people.So does this mean that all of the people that participate in this.All the districts that participate in this vote would have to say that they wanna be merged, or else it doesn't happen?That's correct.Yeah.Okay.That's what he said.Now for the modified union school district.I've heard it called MUD. - I'm not gonna use that term.In passing?Well somebody called it MUD- - To me, today.This is if all the towns that belong to a union high school district, vote to form a modified unified union school district, and the merger is approved by the majority of the towns, but not all.I'm gonna call it a M-U-S-D, I don't like the M-U-U-S-D. - Hmp.A MUSD is formed.It becomes the pre-K district for the towns that vote to approve it, and it operates the union schools.It can earn voluntary merger reimburse...All the incentives that were a RED, apply to this merger as well.The towns that vote against MSUSD still participate in the union, still have representation on the board, still send their they're either 9-12, or 5-12 students to the union district.However, they maintain their own independent school boards.This allows for the creation of something that would look like a RED, a pre-K to 12th district, but also allows the districts that don't want to participate to hold their independent boards, and still maintain their assets in the union school district and representation on the board.So if this had been available two years ago, the outcome would have been a RED, except for Richmond and Huntington which would have had their own boards in the school.That's correct.Yes?But those towns don't get the tax incentives?They don't, they won't get the tax incentives.They will get some benefit just because, it will influence the tax rate a bit for them.So they will get some benefit even by- - The school tax.even by holding their independent, or maintaining their independent school district.By the reading, it says if all the towns that belong to the district vote.This is gonna maybe sound like a very ignorant question, but what is the mechanism that, that vote to the elementary boards initiate the vote in that town?Yes, yeah.If one elementary school board decided that they did not wanna participate and hold a vote, then this could not even happen.No, I asked- - Okay.that question today to Vaughn- - All right.If you had a majority of the boards of one of them that want to put together a committee- - Mm. - and start the statutory process.The districts that don't want to, they don't have to participate in the committee, but the vote still has to happen in the towns.Okay, which sounds fair.Reading that, it's really not what that says, you know, but I don't know.So it's if all the towns that belong to the district vote?Well, they all have to vote.So that was my question.Couldn't it be that one town just decides not to hold a vote?Nope.Not if a majority of the school districts want to pursue this.The majority.I see.But you just said- - That forces the vote for the other towns, is what you're saying.Yes, that's correct.Huh, okay.Mm-mm.So that would put it back into the other category of the union elementary district?Like maybe I'm not- - Something along those lines?Maybe I'm misunderstanding what you're asking.Okay.If we have four of our elementary boards that wanted to pursue this.Mm-hmm.Two boards can't say, we're not gonna hold the vote in the town.It has to be voted on in every town.So you couldn't have one town that said, no, we're not gonna hold the vote.Okay.Okay, I mean, all right.We can talk about it later.But they can still vote no?Yeah, they can vote no.Which would put them into the category of independent boards.Right.No, no, no, I think it's fair.I'm just wondering, the political process where a bunch of towns can force a vote in another town altogether.That- - That's what happens.That's my understanding.Yeah, okay.I mean, I asked- - No, I believe you.Yeah, mean I asked- - I'm just asking.this specific question today.I asked what if one town says, no?Right.No, we're not doing this.Huh, okay.And they said, the answer I got was they can.Okay.Conversely- - Simple as that.The town that doesn't vote, that decision is made by five people.Well, I mean, I think probably people might- - Just for the vote.still come out and vote.Yeah.No, seriously I mean- - Mm-hmm?If Richmond decides they don't want to participate, that decision is made by five people for the town to not participate in a vote.Hmm.I just kind of find that interesting.Well, that's their job.that we talk about it as- - Yeah.That's the way it works.We do that all the time.expressing the town's wish.I just find it interesting, that's all.But wait a minute I thought- - Yeah.you said they all have to vote?They have to vote.No, no, I meant, in the ones where you had an option- - You're trying to create a majority or a- - Yeah, of not.Right.Right, and- - I just think it's- - They don't have to participate in the committee or they can- - Right.But if a majority of the elementary districts wanted to pursue this, then one town can say, we're not gonna hold a vote.Other questions?Yes?John, has the law including the modified union district, as it was passed by the legislature last Spring, has that undergone any technical correction?I'm not aware of any, no.Well, if that's the case, then people might ought to know that on page 2239 of the Journal of the Senate of May 5th, 2012, it says that establishment of a modified union school district shall, one, dissolve the union high school district and any assets or liabilities held by the union high school districts; shall be transferred to the modified union district, and two, dissolve the elementary school districts that voted in favor of establishing the unified union district and any assets or liabilities they held as individuals; districts shall be transferred to the modified union school district.In other words, if you vote as a town not to participate in this, you'll lose your assets in the high school.We used to call that stealing.No, they're still represented on.That's not what it says here.Well, then there's gonna have to be some guidance, legally, around.When I asked the question, okay, the independent districts that are part of the union, do they hold the assets that they hold, you know, hold in 5-12?They said, yes.Okay, because they're represented.It says it right up there.If you vote no, the towns that vote against the MUSD still participate in the MUSD by sending children to these new schools, and are represented on the school board.So they'll be represented on the board, the new board that holds all the assets.It doesn't say that in the law.No, if the town votes against it, they wanna remain independent, right?Their high school assets get transferred to the union board which they sit on.They would be sitting members on that board as well, which is what it says right here.Then they still hold the assets.In the same way?It's taken them, yeah.Yeah, yeah.That they do- - Right.currently.Right, but they wouldn't.We'd have to separate what those assets are.We do now.And so there would have to be a separation between the 5-12 and the pre-K to 12.John?Yes.Doesn't that create that, that new board an unequal representation because the towns that choose not to join, in actuality, would probably have greater representation?I mean, you take a town that currently has two members on this board.They would still continue to have members- - Mm-hmm.but in the new board, a town may only have one member that may be of equal size.So isn't it possible then that the representation becomes disparate as a result?Mm-hmm.That's up to the committee that's putting it all together to iron that out.How many members and all of that, it's possible.Anything's possible until all that's designated and figured out.Uh-huh.Yeah but I mean, if you're gonna say, they maintain their representation then I'm presuming, they're maintaining their current purpose.Yeah, I think that- - But it's a new board- - Hmm.That's gonna happen.I think the board.This is my understanding, it's different than a RED, that the board would remain as it is.This board potentially would expand its role to pre-K to 12, for some schools.The representation would stay the same.There would have to obviously be some procedural structural requirements around what's voted on and what isn't.I mean, because here's an example.So this is where I think it could get complicated.You could- - Yeah.That's what we think.It has.This is what we've come to.Bye Lindi, here's it now.Say that Underhill Center, hypothetically, we merged into a district and they wanted to start a public preschool.It wouldn't be fair for, necessarily, Huntington to be voting on that.So there would have to be some procedural pieces that are put in place so that, if it was something that pertained solely to pre-K to 4, I don't wanna pick on Huntington, but Bolton- - they couldn't vote on it, if they had their own independent district.Oh, okay.Yeah.I don't wanna divert you but I do wanna comment on your example because, I think, it's something we should all think hard about.Part of the reason that I think, we ought to be thinking very hard about organizing a single school district that is responsible for all our children, and all our tax dollars throughout the communities that are now part of Mount Mansfield school district, is that we all have an equal stake in that education of kids from pre-K through 12 being successful.Now, the way you phrased your examples, you said that town that is out, doesn't really have a stake in that particular decision.The reality is one of the things that frustrates me about current organizational structure is, we in this board are not talking about and never talking about, the pre-K through grade 4 issues that at some point are going to impact- - Mm. - the success of our students.Whether or not my community has voted for some form of unified school district, I still believe that my real community, which is the Mount Mansfield school district, because we really are a community dedicated to educating all of our children together and managing all of our tax dollars together.Has that same stake in that decision because ultimately it doesn't end when the child leaves 4th grade, it continues throughout their educational career.And I think my greatest frustration with our organizational structure, right now, is we don't sit down as a community and talk about these issues with pre-K to 12.And that's really what would be my goal if we pursue this because I think that we're missing a lot of opportunities to improve how we think about educating our students and also to be efficient at it as well.Yes?You're looking to me?Yes.To your point.One of the issues I see is the fact that unless you have all the elementary school boards involved in the district.All the towns belong to one district or RED, whatever you wanna call it, MUSD. Then you lose the ability, which I think is one of the big points about this, as having a consistent curriculum through all of the elementary schools.So that when they enter the middle schools, each of the, you know, kids has had this equal education opportunities up to that point because they're fairly disparate now.Mm-hmm.Unless you have everyone on it involved, if you still continue to have some elementary schools that are not part of it, then you don't have the ability to create a curriculum, you know, throughout the entire Chittenden East district, that would give you a consistent education, and a uniform education.And then also you'd lose the ability, you know, from the aspect of, you know like, sometimes you have to reduce staff in one school.And that was pointed out as one of the advantages.Well, if you don't have all the schools involved, that gets limited as well, about being able to.You may have to lay someone off, in another school you're hiring someone.You know, you can't move people around, which has advantages and disadvantages to the teaching staff.I mean, those are the things to think about.I understand, you know, this allows people they believe, you know, a voice to do something on their own.You know, without all the towns choosing to participate, but at the same token, you're losing out on some of the things that really would work if all the schools were involved.You know, since I've been on the board which has been since- - Gotters.Dwight Gotters, yeah.The conversation has been about professional development.The conversation about professional development has focused on consistent curriculum from kindergarten, before there were kindergartens, 1st grade through 12th grade across the district and focusing on the transitions.There was a time that it was a very difficult transition for kids going from elementary schools to the middle schools and the middle schools to the high schools.And I think that as we've talked about professional development, you know, the consistent curriculums in Math, the consistent curriculums in Language Arts are being built in to our curriculum, and there's a lot of focus on that.So I think you're sort of shortchanging the district, David, when you- - Might be bad, for calling me David- - I know, that just slipped out.But I think you're short changing the district when you talk about the district curriculums.If you have a central school district, like Burlington, where you have a number of elementary schools.Every 5th grader in Burlington does not have the same agenda.I mean, the same overall agenda, but not the same lesson plan every day.You're dealing with individuals.You're dealing with individual teachers.And I think that the standards, and I think the core curriculum will address some of that as well.Well and I think, it's more resources than curriculum.I'd say it's the resources that are different.The curriculum is common and pretty solid, and it has been for the last several years.It's really about the resources and implementation, and the differences in the amount of money that can go to professional development, and embedded professional development, and technology.It's different across the board.So there are differences and that does affect student learning.And in fact, students' success over the long run.I mean, when you have one district that may have a surplus and it could have been used in some different ways to help offset a deficit in another place, there's some real benefits to that, to the taxpayer, and those are some of the hidden, I think.And that is acknowledging that I respect everybody's opinion too.You know, I understand that this is a very, important discussion and that there are people that are very passionate about it.But here's a couple of the realities that are setting in, right now, that I think it's important for me to share with you.We have some of our small school districts, they're in a really tough position, and they're gonna be forced to either do some sort of merger or you know, God forbid in my opinion, you know, tuitioning of students or something, because their budgets will be dismantled over the long-term because of our ed-funding structure, and some of the legislation that's in place right now.Excess spending threshold, it is punitive.And they're talking about lowering that, and it's gonna catch up to every one of our small school districts, very soon.They're talking about getting rid of the small schools grant.They're talking about getting super majorities, if budgets exceed inflation +1%.And you understand that when you have a small budget, there's volatility and there's volatility based on a few kids that move in and out because of ed-spending for equalized pupil.So they're in a really tough spot.Really, right now, it's Bolton and Underhill ID, which you know, you had Act 82 that applied to ID. And then Bolton, you know, they had a budget that failed, which is the first time, I think, anybody can remember.And I think right behind them is going to be Underhill Center, and Huntington, and Jericho, and then Richmond.Richmond is probably in the best position right now.So there are things that are happening that are beyond the control of boards that are really pushing this conversation.Yes?In your opinion, what is the benefit the state is seeing to push these things?I mean, it sounds like money-wise, right, they are looking to save themselves money and not spend it.Mm-hmm.Why are we going here?What's going on?Well, I think they're really low.There's a big movement in.And again I mean, please talk to your legislators.I'm getting this from people I talked to, and what I read, and the interactions that I have.But people are looking at an economy of scale and it's not just Vermont.It's states across the country, and some internationally, they're really struggling to fund some of the small schools because they are expensive.Right, but they're still gonna have a small school, right, in a RED?Yes, potentially.Potentially, and so where- - Yeah.Where do we shift resources?We just take them out of high school to keep those little ones afloat, or we close them, right?I mean, those are the options.I mean, we're not talking about saving a tremendous amount of money.We're talking about economies of scale, but that's certainly not on the order- - Based on our ed, you're right.I mean, we looked at it, there isn't gonna be a windfall of money by merging, in the structure that we have right now.Yeah.There are some efficiencies- - So?and there are some structural pieces that over time might save money- - Mm-hmm.but it's hard to define what those are.Mm-hmm.But really the way that I have the funding system, is set up as sort of what, and some of the incentives, I think, are part of it that are influencing and impacting communities.If we kept the structure just like we have it now, there isn't a ton of money to be saved.Sorry, I'm just gonna follow up on the question.I'm still not clear about really what the formation of the district would serve in that case, of the modified union school district?So we're not gonna save a lot of money, but you're saying that the reason to do this is because of these sort of impending financial dilemmas.Well, some of the legislature is perpetuating it for sure.Right, no, but if we formed, you know, a RED or an MUSD- - Mm-hmm.I'm still not clear on how that would solve the problem that you're describing for the elementary schools?Well, their equalized pupil would go up immediately.Yeah.Like Bolton.And with the incentives- - I could answer that.And I have a slide in here I'll get to, that shows what some of the savings would have looked like for some of the smaller school districts.Yeah, maybe.I mean right now, Bolton is the number one school in the state for excess spending.Okay.There's no school in the state that spends more over the base amount than Bolton is.And our taxes on the slide John will show you- - Right.instead of going up $236, would have gone down 77 because when you've got a pupil count of 68, it's hard to lower your pupil spending.It's really tough, and there's some other things.I wouldn't say defend, but really outline some of the things that Bolton can't control.They are in Chittenden county.They're tied to a contract that is much different than you would see in Washington West, which is right across the, you know, right across the line, or in Addison, or in Franklin.They have a demographic in their staffing that is at a place in their career, that their salaries are higher on average than, you know, other districts.And so those are some of the things that they're influenced by, that they don't, really, have any control over.But merging would really have a big impact on their equalized pupil spending, pretty quick, if not immediately.And ID as well.Which would, I'm just trying to clarify, then that would essentially just address the tax issue?Mm, yeah.Okay, all right.We wouldn't see a huge savings, you know, in the overall budgets.Right, okay, all right.I mean, I think, of all people.Well, I've said that over and over again, that we wouldn't see a huge savings and there are some savings that we could not define, And the committee was real clear about that, as well.What I see as the benefit is, expanding some student opportunities for students, flexibility in the way we use our building.Those are the things that I think are the big benefits from a merger, and looking at sharing more resources.You know, those are the things that I see as benefits.John, when you say sharing resources, that means we're also sharing staff?Yes.Right.That's a big deal that would help a lot of our students.Yeah.Yeah, I mean every year, and this is an example.Every year or not every year but often, we'll have a school system in one of our districts that, they're on the edge of whether they want or they need a RIF teacher or not, and they're looking at the next year.And then the next year it looks like, they're gonna have, you know, an uptick in their population.And then you have another school district down the road that is debating, oh my gosh, you know, we need to hire another teacher.And yes, it would have to be some reconfiguration, and this is just me saying this, and this is from my perspective.As somebody that has followed and been involved in school district budgets for the last 15 years with boards.I think sustaining 10 kids in a classroom is not possible anymore.We have done it and school districts have done it, in our system and across the state, and I just don't think that's possible anymore.So we're gonna have to really be looking at resource allocation.So do you wanna go to 26 students, or 30 students, or do you wanna have class sizes of 15?I mean, those are some of the questions, or 14 or 13, that we're gonna be grappling with over the long haul.Yes?If we went to an MMU-USSD opportunity, would that also allow us to determine the placement- - Mm-hmm.of 5th graders easily?Could we say that the 5th graders belong.If we decide they belong better in the- - Yes, if every - elementary school?If every school district that we have now was part of the unified union, yes.What if four of the six would?Then, no.No. - Oh, okay.That's different.Yes?The one thing that, you know the legislation.To me, it's unfortunate in one aspect because the legislation is looking more of dollars and cents than it is looking at the quality of education, cause the quality of education in the state of Vermont is very good.You know, to compare us to other states is unfair because we do a much better job, and yes, it does cost more money.You know, and it's dismaying to me, and it shows a lack of...An expression my father used to use, a lack of intensive fortitude that the legislators in Vermont are not grappling with the essential question, which is funding of education.They run away from it consistently instead of looking at, you know, some sort of broad-based, you know, income tax.And instead of sticking with something that was created in the middle ages, you know, in terms of how we fund education.And I understand that that's not gonna be changed in the next two years, but that's the question.I mean, that's the question that needs to be addressed in that.And it really bothers me that they just don't seem to have the political courage or the educational vision to deal with it that way because what they're talking about, they're just talking about dollars and they're trying to move that off their plate.They don't wanna deal with it anymore.You know, they're saying, well, this is gonna be forced out to the districts.We're gonna make you do this in some fashion, if you don't do it voluntarily.And that's not a way to affect change in education.Well, it feels like the legislation, and again, this is me talking.It's pushing some of this because, you know, what isn't healthy is when you have budgets that don't pass.Mm-hmm.You know, year after year, that's not healthy for a school community, that's not good for your property values.It's not good for anybody.You know, you've got communities and you've got boards and you've got systems that are really trying to look for ways that they can preserve what they have.I just wanted to point out, we're talking a lot of dollars here too.And if we merged the districts, it would help the students.We wouldn't have students coming from struggling districts who are having trouble getting their teachers, merging in with students where there's schools that have you know, enrichment programs, and math specialists and all of that, and all the kids come together.It's harder to teach that classroom when you have kids that have had all the extras, and kids that have not.So I think that we're looking at dollars too, but we need to back the kids as well.I'll give you another example.Real example, sequestration.So we've got these qualified school construction loans.It doesn't affect them at Mount Mansfield, but it does affect Jericho and Richmond, that they were supposed to get a zero or really low interest loan on their qualified school construction loans.Well, they're not funding those qualified school construction bonds.So they're gonna have interest that they have to pay that they didn't know about.Mm. - And while, you know, I haven't seen the final end of year estimate, but MMU is probably gonna have a surplus.And so you've got these districts that are running these deficits.Some of them, they have no control over it.Who could have predicted that?Nobody.Hmm.And then you have another district in the same SU that is gonna be running a surplus.And so you have this district that right off the bat, they've got to raise the percentage of their budget and their tax rate.Right off the bat, without doing anything.And it could be things that they have no control over.And then you'll have another district that will maybe be able to reduce the impact of the tax rate.So maybe it comes out in the wash but it really, it's getting more and more difficult for our small school districts to present budgets that don't look like there's a huge increase in the tax rate increase from year to year.Allison?I don't who is Allison?Yeah, and unfortunately, John.Unfortunately I think for some people that, that is like the whole point.I was in Montpelier today and I had a discussion with a few Senators about exactly the thing that, I think, Clark was talking about.The fact that our central problem really is the way education is funded in Vermont with a regressive tax structure, and many of these people are actually aware of that.I don't know just what will be done to try to change that.It's really important, I think, to separate the issues of what can we do as a community.How can we work together to provide the best education, how can we utilize our resources in the most efficient way, so that everybody can benefit to the maximum amount that's possible.How can we do that?And then the other side of that is the law that was passed, supposedly, to permit this or to encourage it has some very serious legal flaws in it.Some real snags which actually, I think, are constitutionally threatened.I have written a little piece on it, a one page piece on it that I wrote a little while ago, but I'd like to point out a few things about this law.There is an accumulation of $550,000 in rewards for research, which favors redistricting, which is also paid for by public funds.A financial reward for a predetermined result of research renders the research invalid.If research obtained in this manner is used to persuade voters and administrators, then it's frightening to think of the implications this could have on the merits of the issue.Now, I don't know what research is available that we can find but I'm working on it, to find what has happened to the quality of education in some of the states that have already done redistricting like Maine and Massachusetts.I'm familiar with some people from those states, who think that it was a paramount mistake.Some of the technical problems regarding this newly modified RED, which is the Section 17 on this law that we're talking about.The way the law reads, if the majority of towns vote for the RED and a minority vote against it.Those who voted for it will by default, wind up in a modified RED. Some citizens might favor a RED, while not favoring a modified RED. This is very confusing to the voter and creates an ethical dilemma because of the unfair division of assets.Either in losing whole account assets which, I think, you're not interpreting the law in the way it says or in taking assets from the neighboring town.Because it looks to me and Anne O'Brien, the Richmond representative, when she read this, she was absolutely horrified.She went running to Montpelier and found out that it couldn't be corrected until the next session, which is, like, taking place now.The constitution says that election shall be free from corruption.When you use public funds to reward people who vote for a certain agenda, that's bribing votes essentially.I think that's a form of corruption.And I think that when you have a law that is supposed to further education, it sounds like it's about education but it has these kinds of problems and implications in it.I think this is a danger to our democracy, and I think we need to ask the legislature for a better law.And for that reason, I think it's unethical to try to bring this matter to a vote in this community at this time.First, thank you, Allison.What some of our board members are also saying is this, that their community voted for it and they have a duty to bring it back to their electorate.So that's the position of some board members in our elementary districts.Yes?All of that aside, cause there's a whole lot of emotion and a lot of concern about, sort of everyone's private town, and private school and everything.And I really go along with what Michael had said earlier.This always, for me, was about how we can expand the opportunities for our kids, with these small schools set in separate spots.Whether we save money along the way, you know, whatever the laws were, were really not in the forefront, certainly, of my mind when I saw, you know, what we could do.And I keep thinking about the successful, from what I hear, experiments that have been done.They're not experiments.What they've done in Burlington with having unique, you know, academies.Kind of the magnet schools that could teach in a different way, that could meet different needs.And so that we could have options for our kids that maybe don't do as well in a traditional setting, or would like to be in the arts academy or like to be in more of a sustainability or science academy.It just looked like we had so many more options if we could form a group together.And the other piece of it is, regardless of how much we've done with the curriculum.I think I had read that, sorry, that some of the Bolton kids were coming in to the middle school, less prepared.I mean, we still have disparities on how we reach our kids.So I still think it's all about what we can do for the kids and how we can be creative and be ahead of the game.Whether or not they're gonna throw incentives at us, to me, is not the point.Well, that was the point of the committee.And that's where we tried to focus as best we could on.You know, and I share some, not all, but some of Allison's instincts about this.There is reason to be wary when state government says, here's the money, this is what we want you to do.There's reasons to be wary.But focusing on that, for me, is just looking at the wrong question.For over 40 years, all of our communities have formed one community for the purpose of educating our children between grades 5 and 12.We're one community for them, and we're one community for managing tax dollars.We care as much about the kids.Even though we're representatives of Richmond.I know from just listening to you on the board, you care as much about the kids from Underhill, and Huntington, and Bolton.And I think that's true for everybody on this board.That was, I think at the time that it happened, there's probably no institutional memory.That was probably a bold experiment for those people because they were getting together outside their towns to form this district, to make this work.And I think the reason I can say it's worked, is I think all of us, now we're not perfect, but that this school district does a good job educating students, and it does a good job managing tax dollars.Sure, we can do better, and that's our aspiration, but we're a community that works.You know, why?Given that we know this community works for our students, grades 5 through 12.Given that we know it's an efficient organization, why would we say, okay, here's gonna be our system?We have one community, great enough, to handle everybody grades 5 through 12.And we're gonna have six other communities with disparate resources, different abilities to deal with circumstances and relatively small amounts of dollars.So that if something happens, they really don't have wiggle room in their budget.We're gonna make you responsible for everybody who is pre-K through 4, because we think that serves the local control or it's the way we've done it.I just don't think that argument resonates.I think what makes sense for us is to think hard about, we really ought to be one community for all of those students whether it's pre-K through 12.And we really ought to have the ability to provide all of them with the opportunities to provide all of the efficiencies that I think are in that model, and that's really what drives me on this.It would be nice for somebody who is pressed on property taxes to see us some savings for a couple of years.But that, to me, is not a decision because it only is for a couple of years.To me, the real question is, does it make sense to have this Mount Mansfield community really assume responsibility for all our students, so that we really are not divided in that anymore?So that's the way I look at it.I feel like, in a way that's kind of arbitrary because if we follow that train, that argument to its final conclusion.Then why don't we have one board for the whole state?Like- - All the boards, right, all care about all their kids as equally as we care about ours.Are interested in, you know, the taxpayers' money and their education.But the point is, there is a value of having a small unit access for your town to access government, be involved in that tight, local, you know, granular way.And there's also a benefit to what you're saying, where we come together as a high school, and we share things, and we go back and forth to our towns.Having both, I believe, provides a synergy.Taking away that smaller step, I think, there are things that would be lost as well.May I respond just briefly and then you'll knock on with it.I don't think anybody's in charge.We're free flowing.Yeah, again, I think that's a valid point to think about.I really, I don't think that that's something that anybody, even me, I wouldn't dismiss it.What drives me though, to reach the conclusion I have, is that I kind of think this Mount Mansfield union school district is in some respects, the just right stance.All of our political towns have already formed that one community where we work together.I think it's a model that we know can work among all of our political tenants.And if somebody were coming to me and saying, the suggestion is that all of our schools be merged into a Chittenden county school district or that the Chittenden county school district supervisor unions be arbitrarily reduced by half, and that you have to join one of those bigger supervisory unions.I'd be much more resistant.I just think that we in our communities together have that track record of working together and forming that community that really can provide that level of local control.But having said that, I think, it's a valid point for us to think on.Mm-hmm.Cliffe was?No, Conner was ahead of me.Oh, okay.I understand I'm 60 and not taxpayer, so you can kind of take it with a grain of salt.Like to your point about, if you take the same logic and apply it to the state, I think the education that happens in Rutland doesn't directly affect Mount Mansfield.But because all of these elementary schools do eventually funnel into this one board, the decisions that are made on these local towns do eventually impact- - Mm-hmm.The school, the Mount Mansfield.And it is true that the curriculums of elementary schools have been much more standardized, so that there's less challenge from school to school.But to the point of the student that's elementary school was every single year, not sure if their teachers would have a job, I think, that would have an implication.And because we're the size that we could have all the students that would become part of this one group come together realistically.And we can still make decisions on towns that eventually will impact the board that already is in the state.Yeah, I appreciate the point about local, and you can understand the historical way this developed.You know, there's no longer an elementary school on Upper English Settlement Road, or an Irish Settlement, Gabriela, and so on.The populations change, transportation corridors change.In fact, we've got one that runs North to South through the whole district.I'm a big city kid, but I have some small town experience, and I think the population of our five towns is on the order of what 17 or 18,000?Right around there, yep.Okay.About the size of my father's hometown of Hannibal, Missouri which has one high school, one middle school.It's inconceivable to me that the town of Hannibal would have eight separate school districts with eight separate funding mechanisms, eight separate tax calculations.It's separate staffing arrangements, and so on, it doesn't work that way.My cousins tell me, it work just fine the way it is with one school board, you know, for 18,000 people.It just seems to me that although, I would not want a statewide school board, that in this situation, the efficiencies, the relief of pressure on small schools, which are scarcity viable to 68 students, vastly outweigh considerations of locality for the pre-K to 4.Since as Michael points out, were already consolidated after that.Just seems like an odd camel that's been constructed here.Jeff?I think, and just an observation.I think Ken and Michael are talking about two sides of the same coin.That being of trust, in terms of a four year relationship with five towns that we trust each other to act in each other's interests.Whereas, correct me if I'm wrong.The voice of Ken and Allison voicing some skepticism as to taking that to the next level.But that we're not able to go the full measure because we're not sure whether that trust is going to extend to the full thing.We can say, well, we've got K through 4 under our control.You know, that's really the important developmental age, and then we'll allow it to go to the greater common good, if you will.I'm not saying I have an answer.I'm just saying, what was more arbitrary was the Brigham decision, because that came down from the Supreme Court and that was about, you know, equal access to education.And so you had Stratton paying 19,000 a kid, or Whiting having 3000.That was arbitrary.You know, the gold towns, all got multiple formulas, and over time it's changed.Vermont was the community.The statewide community that wouldn't work in...I grew up in New York.There's no way that would work in New York, at any level at any subset.So the question is, where do we extend the trust?Are we going to trust that this board or any board is gonna work in the interest of all the kids based on an existing bond?If we didn't have that, I think, this would be a massive leap but we're in that.We're in that no man's land right now.We do have a choice.We could still choose not to do it, but we do have a choice.And I think that puts us in a unique position to weigh all these factors.It doesn't make it any easier.I come down on the trust issue, and that's where we need to work because that's what's gonna happen going forward.We're gonna need to trust each other.To be clear, for me, it's not about trust.I think that this school and the system can run perfectly well without any of us here.And probably, you know, that would be fairly freeing.I mean.However it shakes out, I think we will continue to have a successful school.However, I think part of the reason that we can have that kind of trust is because we do that work thoroughly throughout our communities.And I feel like having that smaller step is part of what makes you trustworthy for the rest of the towns.Because, I don't know.There's something to be said about, I don't know, having your elementary school.That might be the focus or, you know, I might be wrong, but it seems like in Bolton, that elementary school is central, right, to their community there.And in a way that if it was removed, it's gonna be very detrimental to them.That doesn't mean that that's not what should happen.That doesn't mean that's not what's best for the kids.That doesn't mean, I'm just saying, they should be the ones to decide what's right for that.As opposed to the rest of us, that's all.I guess I have to disagree, okay.I spent 25 years working in small schools and I've heard this argument over and over and over that the school is the center of town.We can't exist without it.25 years in a small school, the only people that came through that school during the school day were parents which was, sometimes, 18% of the population.The rest of the town did not come through that school when the school was in session.Yeah, it's a nice building to use for the rec league at night, and for your meetings, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.That doesn't change whether it's one board for the school or one board for the district.The building's still there for the use by the community.But I just don't see this, the town lives for the school.The parents who have kids in the school, when the kids are in the school, it's the center of their life.When the kids come to the 5th grade, the middle school becomes the center of their life.When they come to the high school, the high school becomes the center of their life.The building's still there for the use by the community.The other thing that struck me as we were talking about this is I, like probably many of you, did not grow up in a state that had any kind of system like this, where there was a single board.It was a county system.I feel like my education, where it got me, how involved my parents were in the community, how involved we were with the school was the same.The same PTO, the same you know, complaining about things, the same involvement in cleaning up and caring about coming to field days and participating.So the community is not, we tend to think because this is what we know that it's linked to the size that we have existing, and that's a state of mind.It's a bit of physicality, but it's also a state of mind and it can be expanded, so.I think, something that was missing from the previous discussions of the RED, were the comments from the principals.I didn't hear the principals step up and say, this is how it will affect our school.I wonder why we didn't hear from the principals?And during this discussion, what benefit that might have to community members to hear what the principals feel about how we would- - There were some that had spoke.I was gonna say- - Yeah, I mean we had some- - I was a member- - Yeah?Of the red group last time.Mm-hmm.And I actually went and talked to principals at the schools and brought their opinions, too.If they weren't coming, we did that.We went to the schools, I think, right Dave?Everybody talked to the principals.I think the public needs to hear that.They should have an- - They had the opportunity.They just didn't come to the meetings.Right but how many meetings- - They didn't speak up.do you want them to go?Cause they had a lot.They have a lot, yeah.I didn't hear any of the principals, I think.None of them said that they were against some merger.In some ways it would make their life more efficient and help them to focus more on what's going on in their school instead of what's going on at the board level.You know, I asked Cindy Mac at the time to speak up, and she said that she's not been asked to, so she won't.But I think that we should ask the principals to go public about their views on how it will affect their schools, because that would sway the popular opinion on the benefits of this or not.Make it more public.David?Dave, sorry, Dave.Were you referring to me?No they're not.That's not even my real name.Whatever, John-Boy.Yeah.Yes, the guards are coming.I know that this discussion is sort of free flowing.I guess, where are we going?And I mean, this could go on for a long time and you know, I'm not as young as it used to be.And I'd just like to put a little structure into this, so that we can see a conclusion to this discussion.So I have a couple more slides.Okay.Let's do them.Yeah.And we'll go to it.I'm just gonna keep going, here is a advantage.Four years of decreasing tax incentives.You folks know that for some of the merger options, the union merger districts can receive a transitional facilitation grant of up to 150,000 or 5% of the base set amount multiplied by the combined enrollment of the merging districts.There's 150,000 transitional grant for some other merger options and $5,000 for early exploration or feasibility studies for two districts that might wanna merge, but don't know if it's viable.So here's a chart trying to help you just see what the summary of what the reimbursements and the incentives looks like in the merger type.The RED is on the top.The union elementary, it's not really a RED. You can see what the incentives are.Good?Mm-hmm.And I included this slide just as an example of what it might've looked like with an 8-cent tax incentive.The most important part, I would say, is really focused on what would probably make the most sense, would be here and here with non-RED. This is based on $100,000 house and then with the RED. - John?Yes.Whenever I see this, I always wonder, these tax incentives go away in a few years.Right, they do.So for me, the real question is four years, what would the tax savings be?You know, when the incentives are gone, are there any tax savings?Hard to say.I mean, I would just request when we talk about this and present it to the public, or whoever does, that's a really important issue.And it goes to what Alison was saying.I wouldn't want the public to, be miss, or misunderstand that those tax incentives are only lasting just for a short amount of time.When they decline too.Yes, right.And they're public funds.So I think it's just an important thing that the public knows when we discuss it, that's the only thing.If, especially, you say that we don't even know if there'll be lower once the incentives go away, right?Right, we've been- - Right, okay.We'd have to see what the budgets are.Right, okay.There's so many unknowns.You know, based on what will happen at the legislature.Good point then.Here's a link.We've had a lot of questions.Refer to that.You know, it is an important topic to several school districts in our community.I'm not sure, you have a real direction or- - Certainly, we can take a position, as it were.You know, I think.If it's possible, I think, that might be useful information to the executive committee.Even a straw poll to say that, if the majority of the school districts or elementary districts want to pursue a modified unified union school district, that the board would not be lobbying against that, or that they could live with that.Can I ask just, I guess it's a point of order.If we take a poll or a vote, is it binding?Well, I would say we- - No. - The people aren't going to lobby against it.No, but it would be good to get in the minutes- - Right, okay.I'd hope what to say, what the position of the board is.Not that it's binding but it gives- - Like a highlight?It gives some historical information for the public, and it gives Judy, some feedback that she can bring to the executive committee.I have a clarification question.If we're voting, are we voting to endorse the reactivation of the study committees?Or are we voting to endorse creation of the- - I think, my recommendation would be voting to support a merger and a merger study if the majority of the elementary boards vote to do so.Okay.Somebody would like make a motion to that effect?Somebody along here could.Well, why couldn't you?Yeah, well that's- - Yeah, what he said.What he said.Is that what, let me see...A motion- - To support?Huh-uh, huh-uh.To support, not even.I mean, there's some semantics here, but support the formation of a merger committee, a merger study if a majority of the elementary school boards want to move forward in such a manner.She said so be it, so I'll second.Is that what you said to me?Yeah, I think he did a good job of repeating it.I thought it was fine.A good lane.As we are.That's okay.Okay.Okay, discussion?Diane.I just wanna say that this is just a really, really important discussion and that if we do nothing else, and if we have to schedule another hour so that everyone can really delve into this and express their opinions, express their concerns.I think that, that would be so important, and the only thing I fear, sort of, if we go right to a study is that we lose these bigger voices because we consolidate down to a smaller group.But I think that this discussion has been very, very helpful.And I think we're getting to a point where we're kind of tired of the financial part, and we're really looking at how this is gonna benefit our community and our kids.So I'm not sure.I don't know about the study, but.Even if they do.Well, they have to do.They would have to do a- - They have to do a study.A articles of agreement.They'd have to look at what the formation would look like.They have to follow the statutory steps.It wouldn't have to be a full blown governance study because we've already done that.If we hadn't done that, we couldn't even bring it to the statutory steps but forming a committee and talking about what this would mean for the districts that merge, and what the articles of agreement might look like, and what the structure of the district would look like, stipulating that.Dave?I really agree with Diane's answers, and I would like to expand on that.I think we need another discussion about this.And the reason I think we need another discussion is, A, so that we can get the public involved.I mean, tell people this is going to be the main article for discussion for this meeting, and we really want you to come and listen and participate.So that we can get some public feedback on this because it's gonna be a contentious issue.You know, if we go back out and do another study, people are gonna say, why are we doing this?And you know just, also that people can come in better informed about what all this means, because it is complicated.Mm-hmm.You know, I mean, what the various options are.Les?It seems like we're jumping a little too quickly here.Wouldn't it be that the elementary schools are the ones, they have to decide if they wanna go ahead.It's their school districts that are voting on it and paying for it.Are you asking us to tell the elementary school districts- Well.that yeah, we think it's a good idea, you go ahead?Well, no.As opposed to, letting the public know, each school board talk to their members.You are- - And say what do you think?You're a standing board.So it's pretty important that if you say, we cannot live with a modified unified union school district that Judy brings that back to the other elementary boards, because potentially what could happen is that this board could take on some pre-K to 4 school districts.Okay.So you know, I think, it's important for you folks.Not say, necessarily endorse it, but you wouldn't stand in the way.You could support it and support bringing it to the electorate, if a majority of the elementary districts want to pursue this.Do we actually have the opportunity to say, we would not participate?Being the local high school and middle schools, as it were.Can we say if the communities voted for this, we can't opt out, can we?You can opt out.But I think, I'm pretty sure, almost positive that the elementary districts would wanna know, well, what does the MMU board think?This could have a big impact on them.And then they could pursue a modified elementary district possibly, okay.They could, yeah.But we have the right, we should be attending those elementary school board meetings cause we are town taxpayers and we- - Taxpayers.can bring that perspective.And they should be coming here and then we can have that little talk that we've been missing.But in terms of moving forward, I would wanna know that that was up for the discussion and be present, you know, in my town.While they are having those discussions.I mean, I'm really sure that they're gonna wanna know, does the MMU board think this is a bad idea?We should not be doing this, and that they don't wanna change the structure.I think that that would be important information for our local school boards.Cliff?I see this as a sort of a sense of the meeting vote, here.It doesn't bind anybody- - Right, no.To anything.Exactly.It just says, smile- - I think that's better.Go ahead and do it, and if you like the idea, you know, or you don't like the idea.And it also doesn't conflict or preempt getting the public involved, getting the other boards here.I was even thinking in my mind, a massive meeting of all eight boards.But we'd need to schedule for that, I think.Sorry?Did that on Monday.That's okay, only certain delegates.So I have no trouble with the motion.It's just a smile, directed at the elementary boards.Yeah.Cindy?Yeah, I agree with you.If this is just the way we feel at this point in time, with this information after this discussion tonight.Yeah.Yes?Does anybody remember the content of the resolute update of the resolution we passed, that instructed our executive committee members on the positions they could take on this issue?Because we did pass a resolution- - Mm-hmm.Yup.And it did bind them to specifically limit them, I believe, but I'm working from a faulty memory.That there were limits on what they could bring up or support.Mm-hmm.And I do think, if my memory's even in the ballpark, we need to pass something.Otherwise they continue to be bound by that resolution.Right, cause that was that resolution that we dissolve the RED. - Mm?The committee.The committee, itself.Cause there was a motion.We had to take that to the executive committee- - Right?from this board- - Right, sure.and say that.Yeah, but if it's dissolved and this is it's new start, then we can start it.No, not this.It was the process of being directed.But that's what you're talking about, right?Yeah, I just think- - That- - I don't have it in front of me.I just wanna be sure that we don't create that disconnect.Well, and I think that'll come from the executive committee, but I know.I mean, you can table this for another time, but I think that the elementary boards would wanna know, could the MMU board, a majority at least, support this or support the electorate voting on a modified unified union school district.I'm not saying you support the concept.I'm saying that you could support the electorate, if a majority of the school boards want to move forward with this merger option.That's all I'm saying.Allison?Yeah, Allison.I agree with Diane.I think that's premature.And I think that, as much as I appreciate, what your sentiment is Cliff.I think that a vote about this might be misunderstood by the public.Mm-hmm.I would not like to see us get in the situation of the classic, \"Mommy, can I go to the store?Ask your father.Daddy, mommy said I could go to the store, is it okay\"?You know, I think we should stay out of it, and let them decide- - Yeah.And then we'll continue to talk about what children need and what is appropriate for education.My main concern, I know I come off as being very emotional about this, which I guess is true.I think that I agree with Michael and all these concerns that you folks all have.Very, very passionately, I agree with you.I think we have the wrong legislative structure in which to work.Not gonna change in time.That's my concern.Or that you don't have a position.You do not have a position at this time.I think that should be stated in the minutes.We do have a motion- - So you don't- - On the floor.We do have a motion, right?A seconded emotion.Uh-huh, uh-huh.Yup we have seconded motion.Yeah.We have a seconded motion.We can move to table it.There we go.You got it.Excuse me?I'd like to move to table it.Second.Oh dear.Is that it, to be voted on?No, it's non-debatable though, right?It's voted on- - It's non-debatable.But it's not debatable.Right.And that takes precedence.Yeah.So those in favor of tabling the motion as presented, indicate by saying aye.Aye.And those opposed?No. - We'll do a show of hands.Those in favor indicate by raising your hand, please.Of tabling it?Of tabling.1, 2, 3, 4, 5.1, 2, 3, 4, 5, okay.And those in favor of pursuing the motion indicate by raising your hands, please.1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6.We're back to the motion, as it was originally presented.Is there more discussion to that?We just have the motion remaining, I'm sorry.Yes, that would be great.Yeah, Chris?It's going in the minutes, you gotta have it.To support the formation of a merger committee and study if the majority of elementary boards vote to do so.Okay.Mm-hmm.So that's the way the motion is.Yes.Okay, more discussion?Not hearing any, those in favor indicate by saying aye.Aye.Those opposed?Nay.Okay, I think, the ayes have it, clearly.Yes, go ahead.But you didn't ask for the abstains.And abstentions.I mean, abstentions.And one abstention, okay.We will go- - The ayes still have it.with that message to the executive committee.That's fairly clear.Thank you for the discussion.Okay.I'm gonna make a suggestion that we table, the vision 2.0 calendar- - Okay.for our next June meeting.We're in a informational gathering engagement part of this.So you can take a look at what I provided you.And then we can, that will be an agenda item for our next June meeting.Are people okay with that?Mm-hmm, yeah.Cause it'll be a meaty topic.I don't think we can dive into that, today.I can attest to that.Okay.Yes I can.Are there committee reports?AP language classes- - Other than those that were- - I gave you our recent ones.It's not Italian- - The written reports- - We're okay, right?I received?The only thing that policy did was that we rescinded.Not rescinded, we sunsetted a lot of smaller policies that are really subsumed into the contracts.Are there additions or corrections to the minutes of the previous meeting?I have none.Hearing none, we will approve them as written.And the words?They are, ooh I gotta pass those around.Sorry, oh God.$2,141,517.91.Okay.Any questions or objections to the words as presented?We will approve those.Are there announcements or other business?Ken?John, I just have a question for you.In light of all the news that Burlington is in the news forum last week.Act 1 went into effect in 2011, and it very clearly says that the school board of a school district shall ensure that all adults have been trained.That's bus drivers, cafeteria workers, everybody in the district.Have we done that?Yes.Yes.So there may be some employees that were hired during the school year that haven't had that training, but folks that when we started the school year have been trained and we'll be doing it again.Thanks.Other announcements?We don't need an executive session?We do.We do?It should be pretty brief.Okay.It's a student issue.Okay.I move that we go into executive session for the purpose of dealing with a student issue.Second.As soon as the room is cleared, we will enter into an executive session.Pardon me?Could we have a vote on it- - All right.because the public meeting, requires us to vote on that.We can have a vote.Those in favor of going into executive session for the purpose of discussing a- - Student issue.Student issue, indicate by saying aye.Aye.Thank you.You need a ride?Oh, I will.Hailey and Conner- - It's okay.Thank you very much.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/MMU_Board_Mtg._5-9-13.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/MMU_Board_Mtg._5-9-13.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/MMU_Board_Mtg._5-9-13.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/gov.uscourts.ca7.19-2615/gov.uscourts.ca7.19-2615.2020-10-26.mp3", "text": "Next in the case of United States against Beltran-Leon.Mr. Blacken.Morning, Your Honors, Council.May it please the court.The sentencing hearing in this case was not a typical sentencing hearing, and this is not a typical appeal on a sentencing.This is a sentencing that, I don't think there's any better term for it than it went off the rails, so much so that as part of the sentencing hearing, the district court considered inappropriate and irrelevant information as part of the sentencing.For example, the district court considered the number of people that it stated, 30,000 people in Mexico killed during, related to drug violence in general, speculated about the murders of members of the media by cartels, although not specifically identified in the cartel that the defendant was associated with.The court -- - So Mr. Blacken, can I ask you a question though?What really bothers me about this?There's some very troubling things.I agree with you in that respect, in the sentencing transcript, but when all was said and done, the district court gave Mr. Beltran Leon a sentence of, if I'm remembering, 300 months.And I wonder if you have alerted your client to the fact that if he wins, as it were resentencing, he might be worse off.Judge, we have discussed that with Mr. Beltran.And particularly in the sense of one of the issues here is there are, of course, all of these troubling comments, and we don't know the, the defense takes a position that, while it's clear from the record that these troubling comments impacted the sentence, we don't know the extent to which they did, or the extent to which the judge either accepted or rejected the allegations of torture.I think it's pretty easy to figure that one out, to be honest.The government asked for 35 years on a guideline sentence of life, and the court then sentenced Beltran-Leon to 28 years.If a court wasn't crediting him based on his torture argument, there's nothing else here that would account for that seven-year break.Judge, that -- - It seems fairly clear that the court was willing to give him some break, even though it found the claim not entirely credible.What more do you think the court was required to say?And I really want to second Judge Wood's first question to you because it is very possible that this could go back and, of course, it will go back to a different judge because Judge Castillo isn't there any longer.And one of those judges could give him life.Judge, let me respond to your first point.And of course we can, if the court would like us, to be doubly sure, speak to Mr. Beltran about that issue again.But the other reason that our position was he should've gotten less than the 28 years that he got was because of relative comparative sentencing for defendants and the need to avoid unwarranted sentencing disparities.One of the individuals who testified at Mr. Beltran's sentencing was Manuel Valencia.That gentlemen received a sentence of less than Mr. Beltran, even though, and had not cooperated at that time, he ended up blind plea without a cooperation plea.And he, on the witness stand, before Judge Castillo, admitted to thousands and thousands, more kilograms of drugs, of all kinds than Mr. Beltran.He was a much higher member of the cartel.He was considered partners with Chapo.He was so influential and wealthy that he loaned $3 million to Chapo.And when we argued to the district court, that of course, Mr. Beltran's sentence should start lower than his, based solely on unwarranted sentencing disparities and comparative sentencing.What Judge Castillo says is, well, I can't get into the mind of Judge Bousman.That would completely rule out the requirement of avoiding unwarranted sentencing disparities.And, it also brings up a salient point here, which is we cannot get into the mind of Judge Castillo.I think the primary difference between our brief and the government's brief is the government suggests that it knows the reasons or the basis for the sentencing and believes that the ones that we're complaining about were not bases for the sentencing.I frankly don't know how they know that.We haven't taken the position that we know definitively.Our position is that you cannot tell it from all appearances from the transcript.And frankly, from being there in person, it did appear that all of these troubling comments related to the sentencing.Why do I say that?They were all part of the same statement about sentencing.The judge listed several things and its head, in whatever three pages it is, that he announces the sentence, such as Mr. Beltran did not cooperate.Mr. Beltran's acceptance of responsibility, maybe wasn't as good as the judge had hoped for.Mr. Beltran was convicted and found to have distributed a large quantity of drugs.All of those things, the government says, of course, that was the basis for the sentencing.And that's what the judge relied on.But things like the personal hurt that the judge feels every day based on his ethnicity, which is in the same section.It's one of the thoughts he expresses right before sentencing.The judge says, well, disregard that as a side comment about that.They say that disregard the issues about the Mexican media, members who may have been killed and all of those sorts of things or holding Mr. Beltran accountable for all drug violence in Mexico for some unknown period of time.I think we're right here.And frankly, I think, my personal view is that a judge who accepts the allegations of the serious psychological and physical, terrible torture here, and also engages in comparative sentencing, particularly with regard to Mr. Valencia, could very well come to a lower sentence.Mr. Beltran was not a very high ranking member of the cartel.He was found to have engaged in suggestion that he was the kind of person who could have ordered cartels or cartel people who engage in violence against the government.All of these were extraneous issues.You know, I been doing this for awhile now.I've never been involved in a case where a judge waved around some unknown piece of paper that he was relying on her sentencing.And I've certainly never been involved in a case where a judge referenced its own ethnicity, and the personal hurt that it held as a result of cartel violence.So I understand the court's concerns.And like I said, we can discuss that with Mr. Beltran again, but this is a case that cries out for a resentencing.And I think that's what should happen here.I see that I'm running into my rebuttal time, so I'll save the rest.Certainly Mr. Blacken.Miss Alex Hankes.Yes, Judge.May it please the court.My name is Georgia Alex Hankes, and I represent the United States.This court should affirm the defendant's below guidelines sentence.It was well justified in light of the section 35, 53, 8 factors expressly considered by the district court.This was not a sentencing hearing that went off the rails, and we can tell what the district court considered when he sentenced Mr. Beltran, looking at the express language that the court used.But Miss I have to say, going over the line to say in effect, I'm of Mexican descent.I feel personal hurt when I see this, number one.And when literally, as the record reflects, waving around undisclosed statistics about the severity of the drug cartel behavior in Mexico, implying that the reason that the torture took place was revenge, not just to get information.These are not your daily fare for sentencing review.I find them all terribly troubling.Judge, if I could address each of those concerns in turn.First, with respect to the comment that the judge made the reference to his own heritage and the personal hurt that he felt.From the government's perspective, the court was bringing in his personal experience as a way to highlight the severity of the offense.But why is that -- - And in particular -- - Okay?Exactly what we're not allowed to do, exactly what we're not allowed to do.I think I would disagree -- - Why is it any different from the judge who said, you know, you've been dealing drugs in my neighborhood and I used to walk down the street and people like you have ruined it, you know, that was bringing personal experience.And we said, that's out of the record.That's not the way we try to achieve, the best we can, impartial justice in this country.And judge, I believe what you're referring to are a line of cases, Figaroa, Smith, there's a Wilson case as well.And I understand again, the court's concern, but that sentencing hearing here differed from those cases and in particular, it's because of the nature of the offense, the defendant here committed.I don't agree with you at all.I think if you were going to get anywhere with this, you have to admit that that remark was out of line, that you can't be, let's take today's world, you know, where there are occasionally riots that get out of hand when certain incidents happen, the murder of George Floyd or whatever you want to say.You wouldn't want a judge of a particular ethnicity saying I'm going to impose a sentence because you know, I'm one of that group.That's not the way we do it.I don't disagree with that judge.But I think here, what Judge Castillo was trying to do is draw attention to the number of Mexicans who have died as a result of cartel-related violence.So are we supposed to take judicial notice of that?Is that something that's so far beyond dispute that he can wave an article around that he never shows anybody?I think, Your Honor, here, defense counsel agreed with the courts proposition.Under duress.I mean, if you read part of the transcript, the judge is hammering and defense counsel was trying to placate him saying, yeah, you know, there's a big problem.But he's certainly not saying, you know, I waived the right to see whatever it is you're relying on.Judge, I think if it was one offhand comment by one defense lawyer, I might be inclined to agree.But here, Mr. Beltran is represented by at least two different lawyers at the sentencing hearing.Both of whom have agreed -- - I know what you're talking about, but I just, I don't read it that way.I mean, the judge is really hammering him when defense counsel tries to say, for instance, when he says, why do you think the torture happened?The defense counsel says to get information.He says, no, you know, blah, blah, blah.You know, it's because so many members of the Semar group have been killed.And defense counsel responds, the first defense lawyer responds by agreeing with that proposition.The second defense lawyer responds by agreeing with that proposition, again.There was evidence that was presented at the sentencing hearing regarding the violent nature of the cartel.And I think the reason why there isn't a significant dispute as to whether 30,000 Mexicans have died as a result of cartel-related violence or whether Mexican military personnel have died as a result of cartel related violence is because those inferences were supported by the evidence that were presented at the sentencing hearing.And I think that is why to date the defense counsel has yet to -- - What evidence has supported those statements of the district court judge?I'm sorry, Judge, I didn't hear you.What evidence supported those estimates of the situation Mexico, assuming for the sake of argument right now that the situation in Mexico was relevant to Mr. Beltran-Leon's sentencing.There was no evidence that those particular numbers were supported by it.There was evidence, though, that the cartel was engaged in violent operations, but district court credited testimony that armed bodyguards appeared at business meetings, that sicarios were employed, hitmen were employed by the cartel, that one of Mr. Beltran's co-conspirators ordered the murder of 13 to 15 individuals as a result of his drug trafficking operations.But the district court chose not to credit some of that.And despite the fact that the district court didn't rely on the alleged murder in, I forget which city, you know, your brief keeps mentioning it as though it was a fact that district court found.Judge, I apologize if that was the impression that the government's brief left.I believe the government's position is that there was evidence that indicated that Mr. Beltran was involved in a murder that took place in Quiacon.I agree that the district court did not actually find that he committed that murder.The district court did make findings that the cartel of which the defendant he also found was a high ranking leader.I'm not sure why defense counsel disputes that.The district court did find that Mr. Beltran was a high ranking leader of the cartel, that this was a sophisticated, those were the district court's words, a sophisticated drug trafficking, transnational operation.And the district court found that the use of firearms was used by the cartel for 'safety and protection'.And so from there, I think it's a fair inference that the district court drew to conclude from those findings, that the cartel of which, again, the defendant was a high ranking member, was responsible for violence in Mexico.And the district court referenced that violence in Mexico in the course of referencing his own personal background and experience.But this -- - Judge Rovner, I think, has a question.The court clearly implied that Beltran did not testify about the torture because counsel was unwilling to put him on the stand where he might lie or hide the truth.Where did the court correct it's improper inference that Beltran did not testify for reasons, quote, known to any lawyer in the business.I'm a lawyer in the business, and I don't know what he's talking about.And I agree, Judge, that the district court wasn't clear, did not clarify that comment in that instance.Later on, however, in the transcript and it's in particular on page 293 of the transcript, the district court expressly says that he did not hold the defendant's decision to testify against him.And he says that he understands that he has a right not to testify.And I think that -- - as I recall - That is true, Judge.But I think that this court can still credit that explanation that, because in particular, because the district court acted consistent with this explanation.It credited the defendant's allegations of torture, it treated it as mitigation, despite the lack of testimony and the holes in the affidavit, and it then awarded him a downward departure as a result of that mitigation.And so when the explanation is consistent -- - Did Judge Castillo ask defense counsel whether the principle arguments in mitigation had been addressed?We've warned courts repeatedly to do so.I just didn't see that inquiry in the record.I don't believe it is in the record either, Judge Rovner.I do believe though, that Judge Castillo did address the principal argument in mitigation, which was the defendant's experience or allegations, excuse me, the defendant's allegations of torture.I think that the district court in particular, in his colloquy with the second defense lawyer understood, expressed agreement, understanding that the argument that defendant was advancing was that the torture he experienced should be analogized to an argument that a mitigating factor could be the conditions of confinement.And so I think the record is clear that the district court did consider that argument and mitigation.And unless there are any further questions at this time, the government would ask that the defendant's sentence be affirmed.All right, thank you, Miss Anything further, Mr. Blacken?Yes.Briefly, Your Honor.So the court is correct.There was no concession by the defense that a specific number is being quoted by Judge Castillo were correct.It was an effort to steer the discussion back to, you know, the issue regarding the torture, and so there was some general agreement, but yes, Mexican military people have been killed and so have people in Mexico, but the numbers were never routine.But, notably, the effort was to steer the court back to somewhat more reasonable thought about why Mexican officials might use a lot of force when arresting someone.The court, the district court never concluded whether or not Mr. Beltran was tortured.You can read it in the judge's conclusion.He says something along the lines of, I, you know, he's presented some evidence of that, but it'll take a greater power than me to decide if it happened or not.And then also says, I'm going to give a modest, downward adjustment or modest modification of the sentence for what may have happened, the judge never decided whether it happened or not.And that's one of the ways that we, it's of course impossible to tell whether all these extraneous comments affected it.The fifth amendment issue was frankly, stunning.I was going to say what Judge Rovner has already said, which is there is no consensus in the defense bar as to why you don't call your client, as, in a case, in every instance There is no one thing that all lawyers know.I will tell you, the primary reason is, at least in trial, is because you think your argument is better, that the government didn't prove the case.There is no consensus among the bar that, oh, I know my client is lying, or he's going to lie.That's why he won't call him.And the judge never retracted that adverse inference.Of course it was, he did make the comment about the fifth amendment, saying I didn't hold that against him.That was after the sentencing, I think post all of their supervisor.These conditions And of course the government's prompt These facts that the judge was relying on and waving around these numbers.We don't know if some of them were before Mr. Beltran was born.We don't know if some of them were when he was 10 years old.We know nothing about that.The government complaints that we haven't it.How would we go about doing that?We don't know the source of it.And, I would point out that the judge did attach some articles to his ruling that the case could not be dismissed as a result.The one article for Amnesty International presented reasons for why torture occurs and reasons were to get information from people and for public conflicts.There was no, so the idea of it's done as revenge for Mexican killed is not even in the one article that the judge cited in something that he published.I see that my time is up and I thank the court for its attention.Thank you, Mr. Blacken.The case is taken under advisement.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/gov.uscourts.ca7.19-2615.2020-10-26.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/gov.uscourts.ca7.19-2615.2020-10-26.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/gov.uscourts.ca7.19-2615.2020-10-26.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/gov.uscourts.ca9.02-17057/gov.uscourts.ca9.02-17057.2004-02-10.mp3", "text": "Good morning, your honors, may I please the court.My name is Richard Faber.I represent plaintiff Jim Cherry individually on behalf of a similarly situated class of persons identified in our complaint.I'm here with Joseph Dolan and we also represented Mr. Cherry in the trial court.We submit that the district court erred in granting the motion to dismiss for five primary reasons.First, that the court resolved disputed reasonable inferences in defendant's favor, instead of plaintiff's favor.Second, that the contract is reasonably susceptible to the interpretation proffered by plaintiff.Third, that the court erred in declining to consider how the parties, America West and Bank of America, interpreted 10 years of prior affinity marketing agreements.Fourth, that the court erred in deciding the plaintiff did not occupy third party beneficiary status.And fifth, the court erred in deciding that the plaintiff did not occupy third party beneficiary status to assert a claim in that status.He was precluded from asserting his statutory claims for relief and the portion of the breach of contract claim for good faith and fair dealing as a cardholder.Mr. Farber, can you help me with regard to the third party beneficiary issue.As I understand it, your client is claiming rights under the agreement between Bank of America and America West.Yes, Your Honor.And, I looked at, I guess, the relevant portion of that contract, and it seemed to me that all it does is talk about the rates at which Bank of America would offer the credit card program through America West.And, I'm wondering why did Judge Tilbert err in finding that because that is a contract that's between those two parties, it doesn't erner to the benefit of any of the subsequent card holders.Yes, before I answer that, let me back up a second.I'd like to allot nine minutes for the four claims for relief, six minutes for attorney's fees.You're going to have to keep track of your own time.All right, five minutes for rebuttal.Primarily because the contract specifies that the rates, precise numerical rates, that are indicated on exhibit B to the exhibit, cannot be changed unless 90 days prior written notice is provided to America West.Now, that's not a change of a rate that America West is paying.That's a change of a rate that the cardholder is paying.And, we point out to the court that nowhere below in either the motion to dismiss, responses and replies.Yeah but, America West, I mean I fly America West frequently.They sell t-shirts.They sell these credit cards at the airport.They wanna know when would the rate changes.This is a very competitive thing for.Absolutely.We are not denying that America West is a beneficiary of the agreement, for reasons that Judge Tilburg said.You know, he pointed out that America West has an interest and a competitive and commercially reasonable rate being charged, as is required by the agreement as well.But, the agreement also says that the rates attached on exhibit B, cannot be changed without prior 90 day written notice.Now, their position is well, but it only says intends to offer.So, if it says intends to offer, then that's sort of an aspirational goal.And, there's nothing mandatory about that.We would respond with three points.First, the 90 day notice provision becomes meaningless an illusory, if the intent offer provision is only interpreted as an aspirational goal.To what rate would the first 90 day notice provision to America West apply, if not to the rates specified on exhibit B in the January, 2001 agreement?Was there any evidence in the record that at the time that the card was issued to Mr. Cherry and to the other putative members of the class, that they were given the usual insert that comes with my credit cards that I never read, that tells me all the terms and conditions, including the rate that's gonna be charged?And, it also warns me that if there are changes in any of the terms and conditions that by my subsequent use of that card, I am by that act agreeing to the changes in the term.Absolutely.And, there was evidence that that was the way that the rates were communicated - Yes.to the card holder?And, we also alleged that the rates that were communicated to cardholders during the approximately 10 years of that relationship, were the rates that were specified in the agreements between Bank of America and America West.They weren't pulled out of the air.They weren't made up pursuant to some claim of sole discretion.They were the rates contained in the contracts.But as I understand your argument, the argument is that under the third party beneficiary theory, that if those rates became more favorable, as between Bank of America and America West, that your client was entitled to the lower interest rate, even though he was operating under, what I guess is a direct contract, between the card holder and the credit card issuer, which states what the interest rate will be.So, - Yes.long as he continues to use the card.Yes, and our contention in that regard with all inferences being resolved in plaintiff's favor, is that the parties understood that that rate lower or higher, was governed by the terms of the agreement.And again, back to the 90 day notice period.Of which agreements?Which agreement though?That's what I'm trying to get at.Well, in this case, we're alleging they didn't comply with the terms of the 2001 agreement.You're conceding that they complied with the terms of the direct agreement between the credit card holder and the issuer.Yes.Okay.Yes, but that they had no authority to charge any rate other than the rate specified in the agreement with America West, pursuant to the 90 day notice provision.We would agree with defendant entirely if the contract did not have a requirement that before changing the rates in the agreements between America West and Bank of America, that Bank of America provide America West 90 days written notice of that change.Because then they would, in fact, their reading of the agreement is fine.But, under the rules of construction that say, when interpreting an agreement, all provisions should be interpreted in a manner that give meaning to all provisions.If, we simply stick with the cardholder agreement itself, then the 90 day notice provision has no meaning because Bank of America has sole discretion to do whatever it wants.But, the 90 day notice provision benefits America West.I mean, unless we buy your third-party beneficiary theory, it doesn't matter.Vis-a-vis the card holder, unless he is truly a third party beneficiary.And I, guess I'm trying to, if we rule in your favor, what will that do to the practice of car dealerships that sell cars where the financing rate today is 0.9%.But two months from now, you know, it's lower, let's say it's 0.5%.Does that mean that somebody who bought the car at 0.9% is now entitled to have the interest rate lowered on the car because GMAC is offering better interest rates down the road?No, if that car dealership had a marketing relationship, for instance, with the Phoenix Suns.And, the Phoenix Suns sent business to that car dealership pursuant to an agreement between the Phoenix Suns and the car dealership.And, within that agreement, it said, here are the interest rates that you will charge these customers in financing.And, you may not change those interest rates until you provide us, Phoenix Suns, 90 days notice of any change.That those are the rates and that are applicable absent that notice which we've alleged didn't occur.Now, as to the broader.Negotiations for the car, two months down the road, the dealer says, I will sell you this car, but the interest rate is going to be at, you know, 1.5%.And then, I either buy the car or I don't.I use the card, or I don't.Understanding with the warning in my contract that the interest rate that applies, is gonna be a higher interest rate.Well, again, all of that is fine, except there's no authority in this case for Bank of America to issue cards to any America West customers, absent this affinity marketing relationship.Here's another...What is this?Are we talking about Arizona law here?Yes.Ma'am.Okay.What is the strongest case under Arizona law that involves a situation remotely like this?Well, there's a three-part test to determine whether a party is a third party beneficiary.We would throw out this argument to the court with respect to the cardholders.Yeah, but what is the strongest case in Arizona?That recognizes a third party beneficiary relationship in a situation remotely like this.I would suggest to date it's the NAMM case, which we cite, which is very similar in this respect.You've got an agreement between a hospital and Blue Cross, that has nothing to do directly with the actual patient subscribers.Within that agreement, pricing terms were set.And, what the court held was in mayhem, that the actual insureds were third party beneficiaries for two reasons.One, they said they were named numerous times throughout the agreement.Two, they said the effect of the agreement was to preclude the hospital, from charging more, - Right.than what's specified in the agreement.Here, the effect of the agreement, is to preclude Bank of America from charging more than the specified in those pricing terms, absent 90 days written notice to America West.And, we would just throw out this general point.But isn't there a difference in NAMM because in NAMM I am a patient or an enrollee of the Blue Cross medical program.And, I am promised that if I check into the hospital, that whatever the rates are that are being reimbursed by Blue Cross for the services provided to me, I'm not gonna have to pay any more than what my insurer pays for the covered services.And, that promise was not made, as I understand this record to the credit card holder.But the rates being charged, are rates set in a contract between Blue Cross and the hospital.But, its a different contract Mr. Farber.And, I mean, blue cow, brown cow, you know?If the terms of the contract are different, I'm not sure how you are supported by that?Well, here's what we would say, just concerning that the contract generally.There is no provision.Any provision, in the contract between America West and Bank of America, that can be meaningfully implemented, without the participation of the cardholders.That goes to marketing and retention.It goes to issuing applications.It goes to Bank of America and America West paying each other without the direct, intentional, and primary participation of the card holders, which is the standard of the three-part test.That agreement means nothing.The cardholders have to be involved.In that sense, we think they are primary...If you're involved by continuing to use the credit card?But, in not continuing, - Is there any reason?by simply being an active card holder.Is there any reason why you couldn't have canceled the card and gotten a new one?Or the new rate?No, and- - My brother who's an economist, he does that all the time.Well, and that was our point below.That what they argued below was that their intention in this contract and that they complied with it, was- - Who's they?Bank of America.That what the parties intended was that this 8.49% was available.And, that what the card holders should have done all existing cardholders, like Mr. Cherry, should have called the Bank of America, canceled their card, filled out the new application, with all of the downside to all of that process.That we set forth in our brief.And, we don't think that was their commercially reasonable intent.We think their- - But isn't that why my mailbox is full of credit card?I mean, I get these things all the time.Ya know, if you sign up with the First National Bank of South Carolina, you get a better rate than them?There balances.Yeah.Absolutely.Except in this case, there would be no reason for Bank of America and America West to negotiate a contract, where they decided that, okay, how should we handle this?Let's set an interest rate where we're deliberately going to encourage thousands of our customers to cancel their cards, forfeit their fees.Will lose revenue, mileage won't be posted.Because people don't do it.Right, exactly.But, they could.If it were that important to get the rate.All they have to do is ask, right?Well, one of our points is that we think it's relevant and important that an examination be permitted of how America Western and Bank of America in appropriated their contracts during the previous nine years.Now, what the district court said was that it would not consider that issue.And, it said two reasons for that.One of which was contradictory.On page 65, 66 of ER, it says in its order, we will not consider, I will not consider how the parties implemented their previous contracts.Because in their previous contracts, they used the term , may be effective, as against intents to offer.And therefore, I'm not gonna consider those contracts.So, he used a term from the contracts to support his decision that he wouldn't consider the contract.Okay.You've got a little over five minutes left.Do you want to talk about the fees briefly?Yes, thank you.We have just a...I have a question about that.It's not a certified class, correct?That's correct.How did the fact that the class is essentially still putative rather than certified strengthen or weaken your argument?That attorney's fees should be awarded on a pro-rata basis across the entire class.Well, we think it does neither.Because a class representative owes duties to the class, as we've set out just as a certified representative, owes duties to the class, that it will have the same negative impact on, and the same crippling impact on contract class actions being brought at all.If a class representative can be held personally liable for 8,000 and should it go through trial 80,000 times.There's no question the fees were incurred.Absolutely, but they were not incurred defending the individual's claim.They were encouraged defending the perceived exposure to the putative class.And, while we agree that that's essentially an unfair result in terms of a defendant being able to recover its fees.As we point out under Arizona law, the right to recover fees is not, and has been expressly rejected by the Arizona Supreme Court, is not an ordinary- - How does this work?If I, suppose I'm out there and I hold one of these cards, just like your client.So, I'm a member of the putative class?Yes.Now, does the bank get to recover fees from me?No, and that law is well settled.And, we agree with defendant.A prorated apportionment results in the same results of the defendant, as a successful defendant, as successful defendants recovery of costs.So, I don't have to pay them, but you pay only as if I did pay?That's correct.And, that's what those cases have said with respect to mandatory statutory costs, after certification.And, the grounds for that reasoning was, that to do otherwise, would fatally cripple the class action device.Because no.Only lunatics and madmen will ever step forward to be a representative of a class, if they think they can be personally exposed for thousands of times their individual claim.In that circumstance, the result is that the defendant simply does not recover those mandatory statutory costs.But, that's after the class is certified?Well, or at the certification process.But, because the case can be lost at either stage.I don't see what they argue.I just don't understand the argument that, that you can bring, that a person can bring an utterly frivolous class action suit 'cause a defendant to incur thousands, and thousands, and thousands of dollars of fees in order to defend it, and then not have any responsibility.Absolutely, and we agree with you.When a defendant brings an utterly frivolous case, or even if there's a rule 11 finding, or a 3-41-OC filing of bad faith, then that's absolutely right.That individual should be charged.But, not if you just failed to state a claim.That's exactly right.Because you can be dismissed for failure to state a claim.And, authority for that?But, if you don't stay to claim you're not liable for the fees incurred?No. - But, if there's a rule 11 finding you are, is there any authority?Well, no.In that sense, all of our questions are, that's a first impression question.And, in that sense, it's a first impression question.But, does the District Court have a lot of discretion in this?We think it has discretion to award reasonable attorney's fees in a manner which will not cripple the rule 68 class action litigation device.There's risk inherent in all class action.And, presumably there are pooling arrangements that are made by class counsel with regard to figuring out how to share expert witness fees, and other costs of discovery, that may be lost if the litigation is unsuccessful.Yes.Why should it be any different with regard to attorney's fees, where the claim is determined to be completely un-Americanized?Well, because cost can be shared and cost can be advanced.Defense counsel has informed- - Why can't fees be?Because defense counsel informed us that should we try to pay these fees and assume these fees on behalf of Mr. Cherry, we would be in violation of two state bar rules, 1.8 E and 1.8 J, and that we would be subject to disbarment.So ,they asked us to actually to confirm in writing, that although we would obviously think that's the fair result, and that can be a fair result in terms of costs as the Rand case stated.That she may be counseled, pick up these costs.Counsel has informed us, that in fact, they want confirmation that we will not personally pick up these costs and that Mr. Cherry will personally pay these costs.Okay, you have about a minute left.All right, thank you very much.I think we should hear from you.You can stay here.Please stay up.Stay in front of the bar, so that you can present your rebuttal.And, may it please the court counsel.My name is Jennifer Hadley at Dioguardi.I'm from the Phoenix office of Snell and Wilmer.And, I'm here on behalf of the defendant, Appellee, Bank of America.The core of operative facts that I think everyone agrees on here is, is we've got two issues with respect to this third party beneficiary claim.One, does this card, I'm sorry, not the card member agreement, but, what we've been calling the affinity agreement.The agreement between the bank and the airline.Does that agreement indicate an express intent on the face of the agreement to create a third party beneficiary right, in the plaintiff and other similar situated card members?And then, if you do find that that agreement does create a third party beneficiary right, what is the impact of the plaintiff cardholders direct contract with the bank on that right?Plaintiff has a direct card holder agreement with the bank providing for a 9.99% interest rate.That agreement also reserves discretion in the bank to set the terms for that card and to change those terms for that card.That direct card holder agreement with the bank does not state that if the bank enters into an agreement with a third party, we're then going to change your rate as well.We've got a one-on-one relationship with that card holder.And, that's really an accord with some of the principles behind the truth in lending act and whatnot.You need to disclose to this person what you're going to charge to them, and on what terms that rate is going to be changed.On the second hand here, we've got this card, I'm sorry, the affinity agreement, I keep getting the names of these two agreements mixed up, the agreement with the airline.This agreement is 40 something pages.Plaintiff keeps maintaining that the bank has no authority to extend credit to card holders, but for this agreement.And, I disagree with that position.How does the plaintiff says that, how does the plaintiff reference, say that he's referenced in the affinity agreement?The affinity agreement refers to an intent to offer to flight fund participants.So, it's FF participants?Participants.Is, what he's saying he put...Right.That's got his name on it.And, if you look in the terms and conditions of that affinity agreement, it defines FF participant as someone who is either I'm an America West customer, or already enrolled in the flight fund program.That definition does not necessarily include flight fund members who already hold a card.And, I think that comes into play.When you look at section seven of the affinity agreement, plaintiff has demanded that he's entitled to enforce an obligation upon the bank to communicate to him.Not only to give him the 8.49% margin rate, but to do so in a very specific fashion.He's claiming that the bank is obligated to send directly to him, not through a mailer provided to America West, to send to flight fund participants, but obligated to communicate directly to him through a change in terms notice, this 8.49% margin rate.And, if you examine the entirety of section seven of the affinity agreement, which lays out in detail, the banks obligations with respect to communicating with existing card holders, for purposes of putting into play and expressly designed retention program directed at existing card holders.As well as, communicating with new card holders, or potentially new card holders.Doesn't he say he's entitled to the adjustment without applying for a card?In essence.And, this is something, which actually brings up a good point, which I would like to raise with you all to clarify.It's a bit confusing because when you looked at the arguments that were addressed on the bank's motion to dismiss, the plaintiff's position at that point was really that the bank was obligated to just charge me this.Apparently unilaterally immediately change his interest rate to 8.49%.I think after the oral arguments and reading Judge Tilburg's opinion, with respect to looking at the limitations in his card member agreement, for how the bank can change his rate.And then also, the language in the affinity agreement with respect to the term offer.As opposed to immediately charged.Plaintiff then came back on the motion for reconsideration and said, no.What I really meant to say, and give me a chance to amend my complaint to say, is what the bank was obligated to do was to send me directly, not through a mailer provided from America West, but to send me directly this change in terms notice.And so, when you're looking at references in the plaintiffs appellate level briefs, he sometimes make references to Judge Tilburg saying, well, you were really saying X, when what you meant to say was Y. Well, at one point he was saying X not Y, on the motion to dismiss.And then, it was not until the motion for reconsideration that the argument shifted to this offer and the way in which the offer needed to be conveyed.And, I think that sometimes creates some confusing issues in reading the appellate briefs.You need to look at which order the plaintiff is citing to and consider which type of obligation he was advancing at that point in time.Let me ask you a question.The affinity agreement I take it, establishes the terms that Bank of America is willing to offer to America West frequent flyer card holders who apply through America West for the Bank of America credit card.Is that right?That's correct.And, presumably there is an interest rate that is quoted, which is in essence what the bank is willing to offer that particular program for America West.Then I guess, pays Bank of America or gets paid by Bank of America separately for participating in the program.Is that how it works?It's actually, and those are the portions, and I can understand your confusion.Those are the portions of the affinity agreement that we had to redact for confidentiality.Yeah, I figured this much.It has to do with, apparently this was a very competitive industry, these banks and these airlines negotiating these agreements.And, basically what the bank does is they buy the miles from the airline at a specifically negotiated rate.So, the airline does not benefit from the specific interest rate in the sense that they get money directly in their pocket from it, however.Not tied to the interest rate.Right.Although it is tied somewhat, I suppose, to the success.Exactly, and that's why - of the programming - the interest rate - issuing this many - is of interest - credit card, that's all.and of benefit to the airline.That's helpful.I figured that's why you kept it out, but I really did need to have some understanding of how that works.Right, and those provisions, all that were redacted had to do with the compensation that flow directly from the bank to the airline and how that was reported.You don't want Southwest to know that?No. Because if the bank tried to enter an agreement with them, they'd hold those terms over our heads.So, let me get back to the argument again.And, I think another important point to make is, as plaintiff has talked at length below in the appellate briefs, and then here today, about terms such as reasonably disputed inferences, the contract is reasonably susceptible.I'm encouraging Judge Tilburg and this court to look at the prior agreements between the bank and the airline.What plaintiff is really asking this court to do is to put Arizona back in the camp of the restatement, with respect to how third party beneficiary rights are created.The first, and now currently the second restatement, talk about examining the surrounding circumstances of the agreement and the subjective intent of the parties.Arizona specifically rejected that approach nearly 50 years ago in Irwin, and has consistently sided Irwin with approval.When they expressly rejected the approach of the restatement and said, you know what, with respect to this intent, we don't like this gray area,.Especially with respect of people that aren't parties to this agreement.We want people who enter agreements with each other to be certain as to when they're going to owe something to somebody else.And for that reason, we're gonna require this contract on its face, to express a clear and direct intent to convey a specific benefit to that third party.Now, examples of when the Arizona courts have interpreted contracts to find a third party beneficiary, argument are, I think it was US Fidelity and Guaranty versus Farrago's Plumbing.It had to do with an owner of a construction project, and a contractor entered into an agreement together with respect to the construction.And, in that agreement, the owner specifically agreed to purchase insurance.And, the point of the owners purchasing the insurance was to protect the interests of the contractor, third party subcontractors, as well as sub-sub contractors.That agreement also stated, that if there was some sort of damage or a loss to the property, as a result of the conduct of one of these subcontractors, the owner's right to recover was going to be limited to that insurance.And, in that context, the court looked at that and said, well, these parties clearly intended this owner to purchase this insurance, to insulate this third party, like this third party subcontractor from liability.And, they also specifically agreed not to go after that third-party subcontractor.That's an example of when the courts have found an expressed intent in the agreement to convey something directly and intentionally to that person, upon which they can recover.An example similar to this one, when the courts have not found a third party beneficiary right, I would refer the court to the de Certeau case, in which a party who was injured on a mining construction type site, tried to sue based on a contract between, again, a similar owner contractor situation, in which one of the contractors on the job specifically agreed to take safety majors, to protect the employees, the public persons on the job site.They agreed to implement those safety majors, which frankly conveyed an absolute benefit to those people working on the job site.But, did that agreement specifically communicate an intent to create an actionable obligation on the part of people on the job site?No. The purpose of that agreement was to convey the obligations of the contractor and the project owner with respect to running the site.That's similar to the situation we have here.I submit to the court that Judge Tilbert correctly applied the Irwin standard, regardless of whether the plaintiff is advancing a theory of, which he originally advanced on the motion to dismiss, that the bank was obligated to unilaterally charge him a particular interest rate.Or, whether it's the second theory, that the bank was obligated to directly send him some sort of change in terms notice.You cannot find anywhere in that credit card, or the affinity agreement, a direct and clear expression of intent to benefit the card holder.As opposed to the bank and the airline trying to define their relationship with respect to each other.And, that is why Judge Tilbert disposed of the third party beneficiary claim.Now, moving on to the claim for breach of the covenant of good faith and fair dealing.Plaintiff brought that basically based on two separate agreements.He sued for the covenant of good faith and fair dealing in the affinity agreement in a third party beneficiary basis.Now, if the court does not find that he's a third party beneficiary, he obviously does not have a right to sue to enforce a covenant on a third party beneficiary basis.He also sued based on the covenant contained in his card member agreement.Essentially stating, that the bank breached some sort of duty of good faith in leaving the agreement exactly the way he agreed to pay the interest.The bank supposedly breached some sort of duty of good faith by continuing to charge him the exact interest rate he agreed to pay.There's no, and plaintiff is trying to incorporate some sort of a term from this other, this affinity agreement into his card member agreement, as the source of the duty.The bank concedes that there are cases in which this covenant can be formed or based upon something outside of your contract.However, there is no case that plaintiff can cite to and bank could find none, in which the source of that duty was a lesser third-party beneficiary right.And I think Judge Tilburg, you kind of hit the nail on the head and in the impact that such a holding what have on the certainty, when people in lending situations enter into an agreement with their customer, if they enter into some sort of, you know, again, global agreements say with those senior financer to, you know, extend, you pointed out car loans in the future at a certain rate, what happened to the certainty and the terms I've entered into with you?And, if you can import some sort of nebulous, good faith standard into an agreement that requires you, and someway to distinguish some of the cases plaintiff's cited is there was one or two, the Beatty case in particular, where my client Bank of America, was prohibited from adding an alternative dispute resolution term to an agreement, despite retaining express discretion to change the terms of the agreement.Now, the court in that case was looking at, when you retained discretion to change the terms, it's reasonable for the parties to think you're just gonna change the existing terms.You're not gonna add completely new ones that we never thought about when we entered this agreement to begin with.And, there was no provision for ADR to begin with in the card member agreement.And, for that reason, despite the express retained discretion in the bank to add terms, the court said, not that kind of term.It's we need an express waiver of a right to a jury trial here.That's not the kind of term the party was anticipating.Conversely, if you apply that to this situation, the plaintiff is saying that we cannot exercise that grant of discretion to change an interest rate, which was a term that was already in the agreement and is saying, not only can we not exercise, we can't exercise that discretion to leave it the same.Which is different than Beatty, where the court was exercising the discretion to import a different term.I'd like to turn my attention for the last few minutes here to the attorney fee issue.The standard on that is an abuse of discretion standard.Plaintiff in essence, is asking this court to create new law in Arizona.And, as much as he is basically asking for a blanket exemption, to the application of 12 dash 3-41-01, when you are a plaintiff who has brought an action on behalf of a class, and you've got a relatively small individual claim.There's not a case in Arizona that says you cannot apply that statute to a particular group of plaintiffs.It's to be applied evenly to plaintiffs and defendants.And, I don't believe that the apocalyptic result of no more contract class actions, is going to result from this.And, I don't believe that for a couple of reasons.One, is plaintiff has pointed out in his briefs, it is not necessarily a done deal.That if you lose an action, you're going to get hit with fees.There is a sixth step inquiry that the court must undertake.It's fact specific.It's tailored towards the circumstances of the case.It involves the party's conduct in the case.It involves whether the case could have been resolved.It involves the strength of the theories and the person that's best in the position to judge whether this is the type of case that's going to suffer from people bringing valid claims in the future.It's that sixth factor there is the trial judge.Yeah.And, I assume that your client would argue that we don't want to encourage people to file meritless class actions.I agree with that.That's exactly what my client would argue.And here, I think something that the judge, although he didn't say so in his order, I think it's something that influenced the opinion is, this was a situation where the plaintiff amended the complaint, not once, but twice.Didn't survive a motion to dismiss and then chose to bring a motion for reconsideration.You know, it's the conduct that goes on in the case, the opportunities to present the theories, the strength of the theories.It does not have to be a frivolous case.We've got rule 11 for that.And in Arizona, we've also got a 12 dash 349, as well as sub-C of the statute that's an issue here.That's for frivolous cases.Sub-A is for something less than a frivolous case, but one that you still want to encourage a party to think twice about bringing.And, I submit to the court that this is just such a case.Now, with respect to the prorata share argument.Plaintiff has cited cases that have to do with whether or not you can examine the financial background of a plaintiff.And, that a plaintiff has to say at deposition, that he will agree to pay a hundred percent of the costs as a precondition to finding that person an adequate class representative.I think that's a different inquiry than where we are on the backend.Where not only are we not even addressing whether this person is an adequate class representative.We found that the claims cannot go forward..I think the Right v Shaw cases is directly on point on this issue.And, I believe it was either the ninth circuit or the district of Arizona.I forget which.I think it was the ninth circuit in which they awarded $60,000 in costs against the named plaintiff of a putative class action, when his claims were dismissed prior to class certification.That person, because there was no class to be certified to share those costs, that person had to pay all $60,000 of those costs.I think putting this prorata share argument also into practice, it really baffles me as to how that would be done in a way that that would be fair to a party who successfully defended the claim on the merits.Is the bank then to go through and disclose all of the existing card holders who had a card at a different interest rate as of January, 2001, add that up, and then figure out what fractional share plaintiff should be.It seems to me that that's a rather large burden.I think you have this all briefed.All right.Thank you.Thank you.Thank you.As fast as I can speak here.You have about a minute left.Judge Callahan, yes, plaintiff is in the category of FF participants.Defendant did not dispute that below.And, Judge Tilburg specifically found that.Second, to defend to not discuss it all the Beaudry case on plaintiff's claims of breach of covenant of good faith and fair dealing in the cardholder agreement.The facts there are virtually analogous to these facts in terms of what they're suggesting about retained rights, sole discretion, and course of conduct.In that regard, we continue to maintain that because Mr. Cherry, over a 10 year period, was charged the rates specified in that agreement, that that course of conduct under Beaudry supports that we've stated a claim.Stating a claim doesn't mean we're gonna win the claim.It means we've stated a claim.Third, the Right versus Shaw case.It was $113,000 claim, was a $60,000 cost award.There was no argument made before this court, and it was a ninth circuit case, that that would negatively impact the class action device, fatally crippling.Fourth, defendant has agreed that with respect to costs, that costs that are grossly disproportionate will result in that sort of crippling, that only lunatics and madman would ever file a case like that in the first instance.The only disagreement in that regard, is the timing.And, because every class action must be filed initially by an individual plaintiff.And, every class action can be lost at any stage of the proceedings.Hindsight, is not as the Supreme Court said in Christianburg- - There shouldn't be any risk involved in filing one that has no merit.Well, yes ma'am but- - To argument.We understand, your honor.Yeah, okay.But, just as in Christianburg, where the Supreme Court held with respect to title seven that are prevailing, only prevailing plaintiffs, only prevailing plaintiffs should recover attorney's fees with a neutrally facial statute?We're not advocating that stringent a standard here.Because otherwise, the policies underlying class actions will be crippled.Thank you very much.Thank you.The case just argued is submitted for decision.Now, that concludes the courts calendar for this morning.This the last case has been settled.And, the court stands adjourned.All rise.And, the courts of this session stand adjourned.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/gov.uscourts.ca9.02-17057.2004-02-10.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/gov.uscourts.ca9.02-17057.2004-02-10.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/gov.uscourts.ca9.02-17057.2004-02-10.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/gov.uscourts.ca9.04-15531/gov.uscourts.ca9.04-15531.2005-11-18.mp3", "text": "Councilman.Thank you, Judge Chamberlain.And may it please, I'm David Frederick for Fidelity.This case raises important issues concerning the rights -- - Mr, Mr...Frederick, before we get started.How are we going to allocate time on both sides here?Well, we assume we have 20 minutes, because we're -- - All right, and then the other side has a total of 20.That's correct.All right, great then.And I would like to reserve some time for .Fidelity is a non party to this action, and seeks to protect the confidentiality of its business secrets.Even though the trial ended last year, Fidelity is here today because it is a repeat player.It routinely received civil investigative demands from the government.It has received six in the last year, with one more believed to be eminent.As a result the issues that are positive here today, are capable of repetition, yet evading review.The fact that we've waited a year now since the end of the briefing to get an oral argument date.And the trial has ended suggests that this kind of issue is difficult to get through the normal appellate process.We did everything we could to get before this court, we brought a petition for mandamus and emergency appeal.All of those efforts were set back.But isn't this case moot at this point?No, it is not for three reasons.First, the doctrine of capable of repetition yet evading review falls squarely within this type of circumstance.Where the normal means of obtaining appellate review would simply be too slow for the pace of the litigation as it is arisen.All right, is there any showing that there's something out there right now that would be effected by our interpreting this as not moot.That was going to be my second point.That is that these documents are still in Oracle's possession.They have not been destroyed or turned back, to our knowledge.Pending the resolution of this appeal, wherever this appeal may go.Those documents are still operating under the protective order that the judge entered in this case.That permits Oracle's in-house counsel to have access to them.If the documents have in fact been returned...And are no longer in the possession of the counsel...Then it would be moot, wouldn't it?No, my third argument Judge Goodwin is that the information that was permitted to be disclosed is still subject to disclosure standards.That would give Fidelity an opportunity to bring an action under the California Uniform Trade Secrets Act.So if there was a declaration by this court that the blanket disclosure allowed by the judge and the access to in-house counsel somehow did create an inadvertent disclosure.We would have an opportunity under that statute to bring an action for wrongful abuse of this information.The documents are disclosed to counsel under seal, and are later returned to the custodian of the files, wherever they came from.Then there's no case or controversy, it's still alive, and you get one of these...We call them.And wouldn't this be eligible for a , if the documents or counsel had a peek-a-boo look at them.But they they're still under seal, they would be in contempt of court if they released them.It certainly would be appropriate to issue a order in this circumstance.And we would urge the court to do so for reasons of judicial administration.We've cited a case in our reply brief, a fourth circuit case called NRA Pruitt, which is on page 14.The citation of that case is on page 14 of our reply brief.And that case raised a very similar type of problem.A discovery order had been issued by the district judge, and when the government petition for a mandamus, to have that order withdrawn, the discovery demand was withdrawn.A voluntary action if you will, to try to moot the government's appeal.And what the fourth circuit said, and citing a number of cases from other circuits, but no cases from this circuit.Said that, \"When there are issues of judicial administration, the reasons animating them, the capable of repetition yet evading review doctrine.Should be dealt with in an appropriate manner, so that the course of appeals have an opportunity to render decisions that would guide the conduct of the district courts.There is no decision in any court of appeals under the Anti-Trust Civil Process Act, the ACPA. And the reason we submit is because when parties like, or non-parties like Fidelity, get wrapped up in the kinds of actions that the government brought here.There's simply no time to be able to assert their rights, and vindicate them on appeal.What the district court did here, was it sanctioned an expedient action on the part of the parties.To turn over the entire civil investigative demand file that the government had accumulated in its month's long investigation.Without giving them the confidentiality protections that 1313 C demands of the government.It didn't even follow the rule 26a1 initial disclosure standards.Which would allow for initial disclosure only if the documents are to advance a claim, or a defense of the disclosing parties.Were most of the key documents actually used in the prosecution of the trial?To the contrary, most of the documents that Fidelity turned over, there's no claim that there was any use at all.Wait, wait.I can understand if you're talking about the mass of documents.But I thought there were seven particularly sensitive documents that you were most exercised about.That's right, and to clarify -- - My question goes to those seven documents, weren't they used to prepare witnesses for depositions, given to expert witnesses as part of their work and used at the trial?They were not used, at the time the government launched its complaint, there was no contemplation of use as to those documents.My question.This goes really to the mootness issue, weren't those documents actually used?Not all of them.All right, how many of them?We know that at least four were used by -- - Four out of the seven?Four out of the seven were used.You're complaining about the three?Well, no, even as to those four Judge Tolman, we have a claim under the AT&T case.Which the government has set forth in its policy manual as guiding the definition of use.And the AT&T case set a standard that was not met here.That is that the government determines before it intends to use them that there will be a use.And that was not satisfied at the time the disclosure was made.The fact that we had to turn over all these documents, and provided a roadmap, if you will, for Oracle doesn't a satisfy mootness concern.Because the cat had already been out of the bag at that time.Well, it is a chicken and egg problem.In order to conduct reasonable discovery, the Justice Department issues it's civil investigative demands.And it can't know at the beginning of the investigation where the documents are going to lead it.I'm not sure what you're asking us to do in terms of guiding the district courts.A protective order is the classic way that we ensure that no harm will befall the owner of the document from release of.And it looked to me like Judge Walker entered a pretty comprehensive protective order.We're asking for two things, Judge Tolman.Number one, we're asking this court to say that before CID materials can be disclosed by the government in an anti-trust action.It has to make a determination with particularity that it will use those documents, that was not done here.Secondly, if that use determination is made.You say use those documents, would it be sufficient under the test that you're trying to get us to adopt?If...In response to the rule 16 pretrial order, that the documents were listed as potential exhibits, that might be used either on direct or cross examination of witnesses, or would you require more?Well, the AT&T court went through this, and I would direct the court's attention to that, We cited it in both of our briefs.But that's a comprehensive opinion in which it explains that uses are for things like pre-trial exhibits.For uses in depositions of witnesses, for propounding interrogatories and discovery requests.For backup to the complaint.Here none of that was done.It was simply a blanket disclosure that went beyond even the normal initial discovery process of rule 26a.And we object to that.But secondly, as to your point about the documents actually used in the litigation, we would ask this court to follow the decision in the Dentsply case.Or not to follow it, but to make it the law of the ninth circuit.And to opine that only in extraordinary circumstances, if that dissemination of documents is going to be made, would it be allowed to go to in-house counsel?Here -- - Well, but wasn't Dentsply the case where there was only one general counsel.Here we've got 55, we've got them divided up like a law firm with different departments.And judge Walker essentially approved, you didn't use the term.But he essentially approved a Chinese wall between the two Oracle in-house lawyers, and the rest of the general counsel.Judge Tolman the problem here is that the people that were approved by Judge Walker were the very people who had approved and been working with Oracle in the Hart-Scott-Rodino pre-merger clearance process.The judge said they aren't involved in competitive decision-making, because they don't do the licensing for Oracle, or its software.But these are the very people who are advising the executives in the company on what would be the relevant market, how the department of -- - What about the fact that Judge Walker found that there had recently been a change of counsel, of outside counsel.And that these two in-house lawyers were needed in order to, in essence, represent the client's interests in getting the new outside counsel up to speed.I think if you look at the documents themselves, and we filed them under seal as volume three of the excerpts of record.It will be clear to you why Fidelity care so much about these documents.And why the access to in-house counsel is so sensitive.Those documents are forward-looking business plans that contain the most sensitive kind of economic and commercial information.The outside counsel, Judge Tolman, had absolutely no problem understanding the significance of those documents, and why they were important to Fidelity.And in fact they will tell you now that throughout this process they kept their promise not to show it to in-house counsel.But they did that at a very high cost.And that cost was the use of the access and the potential access, to coerce further discovery from Fidelity that it otherwise would not have been able to do.And it knew what the documents were, so under the threat that they would be turned over to in-house counsel, Oracle repeatedly extracted discovery concessions.You're not arguing, are you counsel?That the information cannot be compelled at all?You're arguing that it must be, if it has to be compelled, because it's relevant to the subjects of the antitrust investigation.It just needs to be better protected than it was.We're saying two things, it does need to be better protected.But there also needs to be an extraordinary showing of need.And what the Dentsply court did was apply a three-part test.Which we think properly vindicates the interests of non-parties in these CID situations.Number one, it said the court should make an extraordinary showing that these documents have to be disclosed to in-house counsel.Number two, that the filtering mechanisms between outside counsel and in-house counsel have to be shown to be inadequate.And number three, that the representations made by outside counsel have to be shown to be insufficient to advance the interests of the client.Here none of those had been shown, in fact, what the court did was to apply the brown bag test.Which we think is perfectly appropriate when there's private litigation between two parties.But doesn't take into account the interests of a non party that has provided sensitive information to facilitate the government's investigation.Why would it be any different?Why wouldn't brown bag cover the situation?Why would it be any different if we're talking about ?Well, brown bag concerned very sensitive information, in which two litigants were fighting with each other.And the question is, \"How do you vindicate the interest of the litigants to advance their claims against the claim that there might be an inadvertent disclosure\"?Here Fidelity is a complete innocent bystander to this.We provided this -- - Yeah, but Fidelity has very articulately identified its concerns, and that is in front of the George Walker.And Judge Walker aired by not taking into account the very high risk of inadvertent disclosure.And not requiring Oracle to make the extraordinary showing that would vindicate the confidentiality policies that Congress enacted when it provided this mechanism for DOJ to get information.Didn't he include provisions in the protective order that say you can't even transmit these documents through an Oracle server.It has to be a completely separate, dedicated mechanism.That looked to me to be pretty extraordinary, based on my experience with protected.It certainly was an extraordinary measure, but your honor, when an in-house counsel has the capacity to see the information which is in volume three.And now we know through public sources that Oracle is in fact seeking to acquire an entity that was a CID recipient in this very investigation.It's pretty clear, I think, that you could be as well-meaning and as ethical a lawyer as possible.But still be affected by the information that you might glean, that would be highly sensitive.But the logical extension of your argument is to, in essence, impose a blanket rule that in-house counsel must never be allowed to see this type of thing.No, what the Dentsply court said is that there has to be an extraordinary showing.And we think that there ought to be a presumption when you provide government compelled process to obtain information from non-parties who are facilitating the government's investigation.So that those confidentiality interests can be vindicated.Because if you don't, here's the consequence, that as a recipient of a CID will think at the very beginning, \"The government's promise of confidentiality is not worth the paper that it's written on.I'm going to fight it from the get-go\".And that would have terrible policy consequences, because the government issues about 700 of these CIDs per year.And if you have district courts all around the country taking claims by CID recipients that are attempting to seek further protection.Or, to narrow the scope of the CID. Then you're going to bring a very significant halt to the government's investigative efforts.If I could reserve -- - What is the standard of review with respect to what Judge Walker did under brown bag?Well, the application of what we have our third issue would be abusive discretion.Whether or not he should have considered the policies of the ACPA is a error of law that is subject to De Nova review.And our first issue is also De Nova.Thank you.Thank you.Good morning.Good morning your honors.My name is John Fante, I'm from the US Department of Justice representing the United States.Your honors, the government believes that this -- - Mr Fante, before you get started.How do you and Mr Yates propose to allocate the 20 minutes?Yes, your honor.This morning I will be using appellate's first ten minutes to address the ACPA issue that Fidelity has raised.And Mr Yates, who represents Oracle, will address the seven highly sensitive documents issue.Thank you.The government believes that this case should be dismissed, because Fidelity waved its claim under the Antitrust Civil Process Act or the ACPA. And because Fidelity's claim regarding its seven highly confidential documents is moot.Not only did Fidelity fail to raise the ACPA issue below, but it repeatedly told both this court and the district court that it had no issue with production of its documents to outside counsel.At the hearing Fidelity expressly told the court that it was content, it said, with the protections that were in place with respect to outside counsel.And then their mandamus reply in this court, which was quoted on page 15 of the United States' brief.Fidelity explained why it was content with disclosure to the outside counsel.It stated that most of the documents produced were contracts between Fidelity and Oracle.And that because there was not going to be public disclosure of those documents under the protective order, the documents themselves presented no concerns if disclosed to Oracle's counsel.Including the internal counsel, and they are adequately protected by the district court's order.Also, in the district court Fidelity suggested to the court that it employed the brown bag approach.Or have Fidelity utilize the brown bag approach of having outside counsel review the seven highly sensitive documents to see if disclosure to inside counsel was essential.Under these circumstances Fidelity's complete acquiescence in allowing outside counsel to review its entire CID production without any complaint whatsoever constitutes a total waiver of FESCO's ASPA claim.But even if it is not waived, Fidelity is wrong with its ACPA argument.Both the language of the statute and its legislative history confirm that although CID material is afforded complete confidentiality during the investigative phase.Excuse me.When an investigation leads to a civil action, the defendant is allowed full discovery of CID materials under the federal rules.Now, this morning...Fidelity quoted 15 USC 1313 C. And that does in fact apply to the document custodian during the investigation.And that expressly states that while the documents are in the possession of the custodian, no CID material shall be available for examination by any individual other than a duly authorized DOJ employee.However, 15 USC 1313 D. Which discusses and rules utilization of investigative material, it states that the custodian may give a division attorney appearing in a litigation CID material for official use as that attorney determines to be required.The statute therefore gives the attorney appearing in the case broad discretion on how to use CID material.And certainly complying with valid CID requests.I'm sorry.Valid discovery requests, is official use within that discretion.In fact, nothing in the statute suggests that it alters in any way the government's discovery obligations under the federal rules.In fact, the legislative history confirms that this interpretation is correct by drawing an unequivocal distinction between the investigation and any resulting litigation.But would it be fair to say that that the ACPA is essentially a mirror of the rule 60 grand jury material protection under criminal investigation?That once the indictment, or in this case the civil complaint, is filed then to some extent the...Trout of secrecy has to be lifted because of the interests of the parties in having access to the information for trial.Yes, your honor.I think in the legislative history, Congress said that it is similar to that to the extent that once the civil action is commenced.the defendant has to have access through the discovery process to relevant material in the possession of the United States.That is relevant or likely to lead to relevant evidence to its defense.And the committee stressed that nothing in the bill in any way altered the federal rules.Your honors, Congress enacted the ACPA to assist in accomplishing its antitrust enforcement effort.The division has a very strong incentive to encourage voluntary cooperation with our CID requests.And while I do not want to dwell on the argument regarding the seven documents.In terms of...The voluntary cooperation and the brown bag test that the district court applied.We agree with Fidelity on that point, as we stated in our brief.That encouraging voluntary cooperation with the CID requests is very, very important to the department's enforcement effort.Congress passed this act.If you read the first few pages of the house report, it explains that Congress passed this act recognizing that the Clayton Antitrust Act, for example, is an incipiencies statute.And the department has to work very quickly on their Hart-Scott-Rodino timeframes, in order to decide whether or not to bring a pre merger enforcement action.This case demonstrates that CID recipients are concerned about their competitor's lawyers seeing their confidential business information.Ten of those CID recipients filed objections to the district court's intention to allow in-house counsel access to the most highly sensitive documents.And five took the trouble to show up in the district court.Yet the district court, we believe as does Fidelity, failed to take into consideration that it's just broad disclosure.Which at least with respect to the seven documents at issue here, resulted that that the court's decision was wrong.Because it had a broad blanket decision that all of these materials have to be accessed by Fidelity's inside counsel.And yet, we know now that they did not have to be.And so in terms of reaching the brown bag decision, if this court decides to do so, we would urge the court to put a gloss.As the Dentsply case did, on that brown bag standard.So that it takes into consideration the importance of encouraging CID voluntary performance.Well, are you suggesting that if we get to the merits and it's not moot, that we would affirm on the basis of Dentsply?Affirm the district court?Right.No, your honor.We would ask you to say that the district court erred, because it applied the wrong standard in, excuse me, in applying -- - What would the practical result be of that?If we were to follow your analysis and the analysis of Mr Frederick?Well, I think that's a problem with this case, your honor, like I said earlier, we do believe that that issue is moot.The practical result in terms of Fidelity here would be nothing, I believe.Mr Frederick said that there would be some possibility if they discover ultimately that there was some type of disclosure that resulted in harm.But, excuse me, the district court, not the district court, but Fidelity.Fidelity, I'm sorry.Oracle has, in fact, given Fidelity all the relief that they can possibly get, I believe.With respect to the seven documents.Thank you, counsel.That's all I have.All right.We'll hear from Mr Yates, I believe.May it please the court, I'm Christopher Yates and I represent Oracle Corporation.In my time I'd like to address three issues, the first is the fact that this appeal is moot.The second is the inequities of Fidelity's construction of the ACPA to an antitrust defendant in this case, Oracle.The third is challenge to Judge Walker's brown-bag balancing.Throughout though, I think it's important, as this court has recognized, to keep in mind what is really at issue here.We're talking not about unfettered disclosure of documents to a competitor, or to the Wall Street Journal.What we're talking about here is disclosure of documents to outside counsel and some documents to in-house counsel, to two specified in-house counsel who are litigators.Subject to the protections of a very strict protective order.On the mootness point, mootness is always a threshold issue, of course.The underlying case here has been over for more than a year, no appeal was taken.And Oracle, contrary to what Mr Frederick said, has complied with the protective order by shredding FESCO's documents and certifying destruction.What that means is that under the protective order, under paragraph 22 of the protective order, which is at ER 295.That Latham and Watkins is permitted to retain copies of certain documents in its files.For instance, our file for this appeal has the document that was filed under seal.However Latham and Watkins is under court order not to disclose such files to any person, except pursuant to court order or agreement of Fidelity.There's nothing more for this court to do, there's no order, there's no relief that Fidelity -- - Well now, what about the argument Mr Frederick makes about capable of repetition but evading review.Your honor, I don't think this is such a circumstance.Most cases involving CIDs last far longer than this case.This case went from the complaint being filed to final judgment in a mere seven months.Most cases involving CIDs, or price fixing in other cases that last for years.I think, more importantly, there's nothing in the record that suggests that Fidelity has been subject to other CIDs that have resulted in litigation.Most CIDs, most investigations never result in litigation.So there's nothing in the record that suggests that Fidelity, there's a reasonable expectation, which I believe is the standard that Fidelity will confront this issue again.Now turning to the ACPA, I'd like to provide the court with a defendant's perspective on the ACPA. - Sir, i there anything imminent?You heard my exchange with Mr Frederick, is there something pending or about to happen that might give them some cause to be concerned?There's nothing that I can imagine that would give them cause for concern.Especially when you have the protective order that was entered by Judge Walker, which provides all the relief that they're entitled to.It orders Latham and Watkins not to disclose the documents to any person.Turning to the ACPA. And briefly, I'd like to discuss Fidelity's construction of the ACPA in the inequities.That Fidelity's construction would result for an antitrust defendant.In this case, the complaint was filed in February of 2004, the Department of Justice by that time had the CID power for over eight months.And it used that CID power to amass a great volume of material, to take dozens upon dozens of CID depositions.And it used that it used that CID power to attempt to understand the market that was allegedly impacted by this proposed acquisition.To formulate its theory of the case, and ultimately to craft the complaint that it filed Oracle in contrast when this complaint was filed, had a mere four months to prepare for a month long bench trial.But under Fidelity's construction of the stature, Oracle was not entitled to one page of CID material until it was, they say, directly used at either a deposition or a trial.That would permit the Department of Justice to cherry pick the helpful information, and exclude the exculpatory information.It's counter to all known principles of civil discovery and due process.It just cannot be right.It's not countered to the experience of practitioners in grand jury investigations.Who sit by helplessly while the government does what it's going to do, and the grand jury's waiting for the hammer to fall.And see what you get indicted or not.But your honor, once litigation, I think as your honor pointed out, once litigation commences I believe even under 16 -- - Documents.Exactly.As Mr Fante pointed out, \"There's no support for the Fidelity's position in either the statute or in the legislative history\".On the brown-bag point I think what Fidelity is asking this court to do is to second guess the issues that are fundamentally entrusted to the trial court.And to second guess Judge Walker's management of a highly complex case and his findings.You recall, I asked Mr Frederick about our standard or review, what's your analysis of that?Your honor, I believe on the standard of review that this court looks at Judge Walker's factual findings for clear error.And then when this court is reviewing Judge Walker's balancing under the brown bag test, you look at that under an abusive discretion standard.Well, what about the legal argument suggestion?I think, on the legal argument, if there truly is a legal argument, I'll get to that one second.I believe you would review that under De Novo review.However, I don't think there's a legal argument here, I don't think this court needs to construct a new standard as Fidelity suggests.First of all, I think it's important to note that Fidelity told Judge Walker to apply brown bag below.More importantly, brown bag is a flexible standard, it's an inherently flexible standard.That's sufficient to account for any of the myriad of confidentiality concerns that can arise.And here what we're talking about, and the confidentiality policies that animate the ACPA, are simply that the Department of Justice does not want to permit confidential documents to be turned over to a competitor.That's the same standard that this court applies when applying rule 26.That competitors should not have access to highly confidential documents of another company.Now, and this court should not start down the slippery slope of constructing modified brown-bag tests for each new set of facts that arises.That's just going to lead to error below in the district courts and utter confusion.Now, Fidelity then says that Judge Walker did not appropriately balance the competing interest under brown bag.But I think it's important for this court to review what Judge Walker actually did in this case.He required Oracle to provide evidence substantiating its assertions that the two in-house lawyers, the two in-house litigators at issue were not involved in competitive decision making.He asked the parties to provide answers, and Oracle to provide answers to a variety of questions.Based upon this court's a brown-bag opinion.and also the U.S. Steel opinion, which is the other leading opinion in this area out of the federal circuit.In a response Oracle provided detailed declarations from the two in-house counsel, and also from its lead trial counsel, Mr Wall.That evidence which was un-rebutted, established that the in-house lawyers were not involved in competitive decision making.And I submit that competitive decision-making is really the key thing in this balancing test.And they also established why the involvement of the in-house counsel was crucial to Oracle's defense.Because as Judge Tolman recognized, Latham and Watkins had only been recently engaged.And the in-house lawyers had been involved in the Hart-Scott-Rodino process.Now Judge Walker then heard argument.He actually reviewed one of the Fidelity documents that's an issue in this appeal.That's in ER 263, where Judge Walker mentions that, and then he made findings applying brown-bag.Fidelity clearly disagrees with the findings that Judge Walker made.But there's no abuse of discretion, there's no clear error here.There's no support for Fidelity's suggestion that Judge Walker was required to conduct some kind of document by document review...Before he applied his brown bag balancing.In practical terms that would have brought this case to a grinding halt, and would essentially be a presumption in any case with any substantial number of documents that in-house counsel are not going to be given access to any highly confidential documents.Now, Judge Walker recognized, and I think this court's brown bag opinion, the U.S. Steel Court recognized that in-house counsel are not to be treated as secondhand citizens.The Dentsply case that Mr Frederick referred to is a completely different circumstance.There you had a general counsel who was involved in merger and acquisition activity, who was involved in contract negotiations.Obtaining access to competitor's information about marginal costs.And the like would be highly relevant to his performance of his duties.And the un-rebutted evidence here is the in-house counsel had no involvement whatsoever in competitive decision-making.They're litigators, they were members of the trial team, and there was no abuse of discretion.Thank you.Thank you counsel.Mr Frederick, you have some reserve time.Thank you.I'll start with the waiver.At the hearing on March the 19th, counsel for Fidelity stated, and this is on excerpts of record page 209.Quote, \"It was Fidelity's express expectation that that information, the CID, would be afforded all of the protections available in the statute, the ACPA\".As Judge Green said in the AT&T case, to which I draw the court's attention, \"The information that's supplied by third parties under CID is not to be produced wholesale as part of an investigation, or ensuing litigation.It requires much more careful consideration with respect to who gets what\".We weren't a party when the initial disclosure order was issued.We were invited for the limited purpose of saying now that the disclosure has been made, is there some further protection that you can get?For that reason, this court's decision in the United States versus Carlson, which says that there are exceptional circumstances, an issue that wasn't expressly pressed below will be acceptable for review here.We didn't have an opportunity to contest the blanket disclosure until all of the documents had already been turned over.With respect to mootness, Mr Yates himself in writing, promised that he would not argue mootness the day before our appellate brief in this court was filed.I direct the court to reply brief footnote six, which explains exactly the kinds of discovery concessions Mr Yates himself was attempting to extract from Fidelity.And they strung out this process in a way that has made the mootness problem.For that reason, I think the court ought to take into account the fact that this issue is capable of repetition yet evading review.Fidelity now has a civil investigative demand, and a merger case that it is considering how to respond to the government.Well, what's your response to the claim that none of these other CIDs are on a fast track, like this one was.This is an unusual case in our experience.We've cited the statistics that in these merger cases, they tend to go much faster than the appellate process.And I would simply note for the court, that not withstanding the fact that there are these schisms between non parties in the department.There's not a single report at appellate decision.and that ought to speak for itself.Fidelity is here because -- - The other courts found mootness.Well, because, no, people haven't taken appeals because it is thought that is going to be difficult to do.But because Fidelity is a repeat player, that's why we're here.In the number of contexts in abortion, in free speech, in the education act, this court has said that if capable of repetition yet evading review.Our addressability problem is not going to be an impediment to the court deciding the issue.I direct the court to the Board of Education versus Raleigh case, which we've cited in our briefs.There the school year had ended before the court of appeals had an opportunity to determine whether or not the person's rights over the handicapped act had been satisfied.Finally, Judge Tolman, with respect to your point about the grand jury information.The Cuisinart case, which we cited in our brief, directly addresses this.And in footnote 13 of that opinion, judge Cabranes, who's a very respected judge, explains why this CID information should be given the exact same kind of confidentiality concerns that grand jury material is.I have more to say, but my time has expired.Thank you counsel, your time indeed has expired.The case just argued will be submitted for a decision.And we thank counsel for excellent argument in that case.Yeah, thank you all, that was very helpful.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/gov.uscourts.ca9.04-15531.2005-11-18.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/gov.uscourts.ca9.04-15531.2005-11-18.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/gov.uscourts.ca9.04-15531.2005-11-18.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/gov.uscourts.ca9.04-35246/gov.uscourts.ca9.04-35246.2005-09-12.mp3", "text": "Good morning, your honor, your honor.May it please the panel, my name is William Gantz, and I'm here today on behalf of Rapid Displays.We're here today because, although the trial court got some of the things right, particularly the decision as to breach fiduciary duty, the result in the end was unjust and inequitable.Rapid did everything right.They had a claim, they brought a suit, and they were confronted with what can only be deemed, is the classic shell game, which the courts have seen in many, many instances, in which many cases and incited to the court.Mr. Gorder was a fiduciary.He breached his duty.He admitted that he breached his duty, and he has not appealed that finding.He also admitted in the trial court.What fiduciary duty does he admit he breached?Well, the trial court's finding, your honor, was that Mr. Gorder breached his fiduciary duty for failing to properly liquidate his corporation, which was insolvent.And what was improper about his liquidation?Well, as we pointed out in the trial court and thoroughly in our briefs, we identify hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of assets, belonging to his first company, which we've called Old Core, that were either transferred to himself or transferred to his new company.When we sued him, he started up a new company and shut down the old one, New Corp.Essentially our suit was to set aside these transfers, and to get back the money that Old Corp should have had in its coffers to pay us.In addition, your honor, as, as we've cited- - I may have not phrased my question very well.Yes, sir.I'm not concerned with the ways in which he breached his duty.I'd like you to state what the duty was.Was it a fiduciary duty owed by him to the creditors, to marshal the assets upon his recognition that the company was insolvent?Is that the same duty as the directors owed under Oregon state law?That's what I'm getting at.Yes, I do actually believe it is the same duty, because as the court will see, and in the Gantenbein case, it's cited to the precursor of a 60.6.37, which is the improper distributions to shareholders case.So whether you term it, the breach of fiduciary duty, or you call it an improper dissolution of the assets when you're dissolving a corporation, those duties are the same.And I think that's a good point.The Gantenbein case also specifies that when you were operating the company in an insolvent state, although it's a going concern, the sole director, shareholder or officer is still going to be required to properly account for and establish the good faith of his dealings with the company.That part of Gantenbein, correlates to the rules that are set forth in the Uniform Fraudulent Transfer Act, which Oregon's adopted.As set forth in 95.230 and 95.240.The fundamental error that the trial court made was limiting Rapid to what it deemed to be transfers taking place after July of 2001.In a sense, we know that the district court attempted to do some sort of bankruptcy analysis as of July 2001, because that's what the district court has said.As we pointed out in our brief, the four or five things that the court agreed with us on, on transfers were all transfers taking place after Mr. Gorder got our suits, started up New Corp, and transferred assets.What was ignored in the trial court was the way in which the company was run while it was insolvent.And that dates back all the way to 1997.And certainly by the admission of Mr. Gorder in this case, on May 4th, 2000, the day that we contracted with Mr Gordon's company, they were also insolvent.They had lost money, hundreds of thousands of dollars, in every year prior to that.If on May 4th, 2001, at the time you contracted with, as you call it Old Corp and Gorder, you have the financial statements of Old Corp, which showed losses and operating as a loss.And you had Gorder's personal financial statements.Why didn't you realize the company was insolvent?Well, your honor, as the court in Gantenbein and numerous other, in fact, the fraudulent transfer statute contemplates there are many corporations which have a balance sheet insolvency, but are going concerns.Here, Mr. Gorder gave us an indication of his net worth.He had a vested interest in keeping this company going, and there are many companies that people do business with, who are in precisely that state.So he gave us also, we also required that we got a third down before we started the job.So we did take certain precautions, but essentially Mr. Gorder displayed that he had a net worth of $3.6 or $3.9 million.The company had significant assets.There was not an overwhelming amount of secure debt.In essence, we knew what the condition were, of course, because he gave us the information.And that's why we asked for certain precautions, but that doesn't go back to excuse him for the manner in which he actually ran his corporation.If I understand you correctly, at that point, he should have, if he realized he was insolvent, he should have stopped operations, marshalled the assets, and distributed them on an adequate program to share.So therefore, your contract would never have become a contract.Well, I guess looking retrospectively that's possible, but he did enter into the contract with us, and he did give us the down payment.And, your honor, I think that there's a distinction to be made here between operating a company and the time when it becomes so bad that you must shut down the company.And I think that's a distinction that the district court confused.Mr. Gorder, because his company was insolvent when he contracted with us, he had the particular responsibility to deal with this company in good faith.And one of the recent decisions that the panels asked us for a supplemental brief on, the Houston's case- - I don't have a copy of- I don't know, I don't know if my colleagues do.Did you file one?We did file a supplemental brief with the court, your honor.I'll be happy to provide- - I have a 28 J letter where you raised Hamilton, that was- - Yes, that was today, your honor, we discovered Judge Gould's opinion in this regard.I neglected to mention, I would like to reserve, I would like to reserve three minutes.Just tell me whether you think the Houston case, 'cause I don't have your brief.Yes, sir.The opponent says it doesn't apply because they were not under-capitalized from inception.The second prong about a disinterested lender.If you think, is your position that that case does or doesn't apply?I think it certainly applies because the plaintiff in that case brought some of the same claims that we dealt with.And the analysis here is the, the defendants in that case are the parent company, and the officers had given advances in the form of inventory and goods.Here, Mr. Gorder gave certain advances to keep the company afloat and keep it a going concern.That's precisely what the district court, in this case, actually made one correct finding, a fact that I agree with, when he found that Mr. Gorder's money kept the company afloat.The decision in Houston's is actually right on point here, because where you are putting in money to keep it afloat, you are actually gambling on the outcome.And if the company does well, you'll take a reward in its operations.So you don't read the statement from that case, that Gorder relies upon that it only applies in the case of an under-capitalized company, that's under-capitalized from the get go?No, and that's the point of the Gantenbein case.It's the point of the Fraudulent Transfer Act, at any point that you're running a company that's insolvent, you have these duties to act properly.And in fact, the Houston's case was interesting because it didn't specify that the shareholder had to feel in good faith and establish that , based upon a breach of fiduciary duty.That wasn't even raised by the plaintiff in that case.The Houston's case has a two-pronged test.One can be quote, \"a shareholder loan as a capital contribution if it is made to an initially capitalized corporation..or when no descend arrested lender would have extended credit\".Correct?That's correct.So you say that the second prong applies here?Yes, sir.Now, is there any evidence in this record, and if so, please point out to me, that the corporation, IE, what you call Old Corporation, was under-capitalized, and if so, when?Okay, again, your honor, based upon the admissions and the balance sheets and the financial statements and a long history- - That's not what I meant.That's circumstantial evidence.I suppose, what I should've said more precisely was, did you have an expert witness, an economist or an accountant testify that, on a date certain, based on the financial statements, a business of this volume was under-capitalized for the purposes under which it was incorporated?No, your honor, Mr. Gorder admitted as of May 4th that his company was insolvent.That's not the same as being an under-capitalized.You can be under-capitalized from the get-gos.As Judge Fisher says, that's one issue, but you can still be solid.Okay, I think if you read the Houston's case with the Gantenbein case, and the fraudulent transfer statutes, whether the company's insolvent or under-capitalized at a particular moment means that it's unable to pay its debts.It has a balance sheet insolvency.And I think that's, I think that's- - You equate the under-capitalized and insolvent- - Well, in terms of under, the term under-capitalization implies that from the beginning of time, when the company is formed, it was under capitalized.We don't have that information for Mr. Gorder's company, because it had been in existence for 20 plus years.What we do know is that it was insolvent at all times that he was dealing with us.Was this Oregon Case law provided to the district coordinator?The Houston case regrettably was not, your honor.We certainly did argue that the loans were not properly documented, that they could not be called loans, that he was simply advancing money to keep the company alive.We made all of the arguments, but we did not cite that specific case.How about the Gantenbein case?Gantenbein was front and center in the district court.How about Hardman, was that also- - Hardman I do not believe was presented to the district court.Now.But Gantenbein and the Fraudulent Transfer Acts and everything else tells us, is that when we proved our case, Mr. Gorder had a burden to come in and establish the good faith of his transactions, because he was a sole shareholder, director, and officer of the company, both during times it was being dissolved and while it was being operated as an insolvent company, nonetheless.Now, we, I want to just, we have lots of exhibits and I know we've probably overloaded this matter with facts and documents, but there's some important ones.What did we do?We got a bunch of documents, and we went through all the documents and ledgers, and we tried to guess and come about transactions and transfers.We were the bloodhounds in this.Mr. Gorder dumped his documents on us and discovery.We went through them and we provided affidavits.And the result of it, your honor was tabs 105, and that was the basic list of all the things that we found that were transferred in properly.Now, the amounts of these transfers, and these are things that were really never accounted for, the accounting, this to the entire accounting that we got in the district court is a document which was produced at trial, not in discovery, by Mr. Toby, who is the controller of both Old Corp and New Corp, and that's a tab 116.There was never any explanation or accounting for any of the plain loans.We never got information about when, where, how, who, for what reason, any of that basic information.There was a rey loan file that Penny Kelly said she maintained but she never produced.One amazing example is that there was never any accounting for over $500,000 of personal expenses where we found things just in the three-year period of time that we had records, that that had been milked out of Old Corp because Mr. Gorder was paying his personal bills or non Old Corp business bills through the company.Those amounts exceeded, those amounts exceeded the amount that the district court ultimately even found as loans.And that was Mr. Gorder's justification for taking the money and doing all these things that he did, and co-mingling.What would you have us do?Your honor, we would have you on multiple theories because we produced hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars of transfers in excess of what we were owed, in excess of what the other creditors were owed, and in fact, in excess of what Mr. Gorder, the district court found he was owed.All of that adds up to about $890,000.We had transferred well above that that Mr. Gorder didn't account for.That means this court, as a matter of law, because there was no accounting for these transfers, can enter the judgment in full for us.This is what happened in the multiple cases, such as Houstons.The defrauded and the disappointed judgment creditor proves that there are assets that were transferred vastly in excess of what they were owed.And they recovered in full.And one of the interesting things that, I hope that the panel found it interesting, but on page 32 of our brief, we took the trouble to actually do a pro-rata distribution that had the court.I just wanted to see if we used the district court's actual factual findings, We used Mr. Gorder's actual findings for what he paid his creditors over time.You may remember, and I'll give you the tab number, but Mr. Toby set out to determine that, and prove, on behalf of Mr. Gorder, that from May 1st, 2000, just three days before we contracted, they actually paid all of their other creditors 95% plus on the dollar.That's tab 112.We did, we added our receivable backend, We used the actual findings of fact for the 300, approximately $300,000 that the district court did find was improperly transferred.And, we actually used Mr. Gorder's numbers for all of his receivables and what he paid, and when we added all together, we would have been paid 97.1%.So if the court here is looking for an alternative, it should find that the district court, if it wanted to do a pro-rata distribution, should have done it as a May 4th, 2000.And the evidence provided by Mr. Gorder, and using the trial court's findings of fact would have put us in a situation where, just under the breach of fiduciary duty claim, we would have gotten 97.1%.And we probably wouldn't have been here, except for the issues that we have raised on our attorney's fees.You want us to do a pro rata distribution a year before your contract was entered into?No, our contract was entered on May 4th, 2000.Oh, I thought it was 2001.No, I'm sorry, your honor, if I misspoke.May 4th, 2000 was our date of contract.They provided the evidence that showed that they paid 95% on the dollar from May 1st, 2000 'til the end of time.And we don't ever really know what time the end of time is, because there was no real liquidation, and the district court actually didn't find when he specifically turned it down.You know, I don't know what the views of the panel being, and I haven't decided the principles yet myself, but normally even if we agreed with you on the law, we would not get into, kind of, a fact intensive calculation as an appellate court.All we would do is to declare the law, and remand it to the district court for further proceedings consistent with our opinions.I'm running short on time, but I'd like to respond.I agree that the findings of fact are subject to the clear air standard, and there must be a fundamental mistake.But here we have a trial court who misinterpreted the law on how to do the pro-rata distribution, misinterpreted the law on what the fiduciary duty meant, and misinterpreted the law on how Mr. Gorder was required to account- - If we said what the law was, is there any reason to think that district court couldn't follow the law as we stated it?Well, that's why we've also maintained that there are clear errors of fact, and there are a lot of non findings, but the fundamental error here is calling it a day on July 31st, 2001, and not well into the future.That's what the court fundamentally got wrong.So that was clear error.And it was also a misunderstanding of the law to try to do a faux bankruptcy.That was the, that's a misunderstanding of the law.And it's a mistake of law, and this court can reverse that de novo.I've suggested ways that this court can- - Why don't you save your time?Yes, sir.Thank you.May it please the court.Dave Sweeney, for responding cross opponent, Ray Gorder.This was a fact intensive case, trade by US magistrate.I note that my colleague states that the fundamental error was that the trial court held that the timing in this matter was July 31st, 2001.In fact, the trial court held that Mr. Gorder knew that the company was insolvent on May 10th, 2001, not late July.There were two pivotal factual findings that occurred in this case.This case involved interesting exhibits of Mr. Gorder, who was the president shareholder of interesting exhibits, a company that lasted over 20 years, had excellent clients.And when they entered into the contract with Rapid Display, gave them a balance sheet, which displayed accurately what their financial situation was, including a reference to a note payable shareholder of over $495,000.Now the trial court here made two pivotal factual findings, one, were these infusions of, and by Mr. Gorder, were they loans or were they capital contributions, that's a fact issue.And the trial court heard testimony from Mr. Gorder, they heard testimony from the Chief Financial Officer of the company, they heard testimony from the outside accountant of the company, they heard testimony from the Chief corporate counsel for the company, they had documentary evidence showing that the loans were, in fact, evidence on the books of the corporation- - Did anybody argue to the judge that these were capital contributions?Oh, absolutely.Okay.And, but we've heard that at least one of the relevant Oregon cases and the federal cases, neither of were cited.It's all under Gantenbein.Is that it?The Gantenbein doesn't deal with the issue of loans versus capital contributions.Gantenbein deals with the issue of whether, at what point does your obligation as a fiduciary kick in?When does that occur?And the issue of loans versus capital contribution, which was front and center in front of the trial judge, that was an issue that he had to determine that was critical, because if in fact these were not loans, then Mr. Gorder would not be repaid any of the amounts.That those would not have been appropriate.Mr. Gorder loaned this company over $1.3 million over the course of its activities.And as I was trying the case, and is reflected in the record, the trial judge looked out and he smiled.And in the record, it says, you may wonder why I'm smiling, because this is an unusual case.Most of the time, I'm dealing with cases where people are trying to save their own skin But here, Mr. Gorder was continuing to place money into the corporation.In fact, he placed over $200,000 into the corporation in the year 2001 alone.Judge Jelderks the trial judge, held that on early May, May 10th, 2001, Mr. Gorder knew that the company was insolvent.So that's when the trust fund theory kicks in at that point.That's the purpose of Gantenbein.Gantenbein says the test is, the fact test is, that the company must discontinue business by reason of its insolvency.And what happened in May 2001 that the trial judge was looking at to make this determination?What happened was that there was, in fact, outside financing of this company, unlike the Houston case, and it was from Key Bank.There was approximately $50,000 worth of equity on that line of credit.But in May 2001, Key Bank decided that they gave the note over to special assets.That meant collect the note.It was a demand note.And at that point, a meeting was held with the outside accountant, Mr. Mack, who testified, with the corporate counsel, Mr. DeSylvia.And at that point, Mr. Gorder was told, in essence, this company can no longer survive.It was that May period of time that Judge Jelderks determined that Mr. Gorder then knew that the company was insolvent.Judge Jelderks saw Mr. Gordon.He acknowledged in his findings of fact that Mr. Gorder was unschooled in accounting and law, but he relied on his professionals, and that without his loans, this company would not have survived.So, and, in fact, when Mr. DeSylvia and the outside counsel was testifying, the trial judge says, now this time period may be important to me.I want to make sure I understand the sequence in May.And then in his decision, it was that sequence in May that triggered that finding that Mr. Gorder knew insolvency of his company occurred in May 10th.That's the findings of fact.And from that point forward then, his fiduciary duty occurred.Now, it's, it's also the trial judge puts assets back into the pot, so that the- - Before you go to that- - Sure.As of the time when Gorder knew that his company was insolvent, any loans that he made after that time should be treated as capital importations, correct?Well, there's certainly- - What, you don't agree with that?I think as a strict construct of law, perhaps, that's, that's correct.You want us to apply a loose construct?No, I guess my counsel's arguing equity, and here's a, here's a fellow.If you, if you could imagine that, that his company of 20 years is now going down the drain and he's still trying to put money into it to save it, and Judge Jelderks found, the trial court found that- - But under the instance of rule, the second rule, if he has reason to believe that the company is insolvent, at that point, you don't consider, I mean, he's got a duty to marshal up the assets as of that point.And any further money he's giving is to an insolvent corporation.So he may be trying to save his name, but he shouldn't be expecting to see to that.I think in this situation, I believe Judge Jelderks would have applied that rubric.And I believe that that's from- - I didn't mean to stop you on the other one.You don't have any problem with the disgorgement of $188,000 for the boat and a beach house, do you?No. And what happened there was that it was improperly on the balance sheet in the first place.It was taken off after that balance sheet had been given to Rapid Display.The trial court said, hey, Rapid Display saw this on there.So you're a stock from saying it wasn't there.Not that it was a fraudulent misrepresentation.In fact, the trial court said it was, it was clearly not.And our only point in cross appeal is that if you're going to put that back in, you need to correspondingly put the debt back into Gorder as well.That's the only- - Issued after May 1st, 2001?Pardon me?You mean the debt issued after 2001?That if the trial judge in our point on cross appeal is if you stick that beach house and the boat back in the pot for creditors, then those that has a corresponding debt at the same time to Mr. Gorder, that should go on his side of the debt column.Unless the debt given by Mr. Gorder was when he knew the company was insolvent.Right.And we don't believe that occurred.We believe that the, that those, the beach house and the, the boat, were taken off prior to May 1st, 2001 in the books.Well, he, he made two loans after, oh, pardon me now.Didn't he make a loan of $229,000 between 12/31/2000 to 5/10/01?I'm going to have to rely on the record, your honor, I don't have it in front of me.I'm going to avoid, at the suggestion of Judge Gould, getting into details, like leave that to the trial judge.But it's our principal position on this appeal, that it was a fact bound case that had two critical factual underpinnings to it.One, that these were loans rather than the capital contributions.Two, that, in fact, the, under Gantenbein, and under common law principles, the trial judge made a very clear analysis of when that fiduciary responsibility occurred.And it was early May 2001.The trial judge had an analysis by the Chief Financial Officer that he used, trial judge- - I'm still trying then to understand how you want us to end run Houston and that principle, and say that anything, any capital contribution made after he was aware should not be treated as, excuse me, any advancement as much loan, whatever, should be treated as other than as a capital contribution.What's your theory again?Why, given your acknowledgement that as of May 10th, 2000- - No, no.May 10th, 2001, your honor.But the trial judge- - Yes, May 10th, 2001.But any monies after that date that Mr. Gorder loaned to the corporation, which I understood to be about a hundred some odd thousand, would be treated as a capital contribution, contrary to what Judge Jelderks found.I don't recall how Judge Jelderks treated those monies post May 2001.But in light of, in light of the law, that would seem to be pretty much have to be, given what you acknowledged, that the trust fund, the duty applied at that point.Absolutely, your honor.All right.I think we have your point.The trial judge had counted by the Chief Financial Officer and the trial judge spent a significant period of time, it's cited in our supplemental record, examining directly, as is his power to do so.The Chief Financial Officer, asked to how the accounting records work, how did the, the loans were booked to Mr. Gorder, and the trial judge was entitled to rely on that testimony.The countervailing evidence was prepared by a paralegal, that was admitted, simply, that was judged, as the trial judge says to try to make the record make sense, but not for, as I understand it, the proof of the underlying calculations or the information.This is not a fraudulent transfer under Oregon state statutes, because there was contemporaneous value, given the loans that occurred.This was not an asset because the, the materials and assets of the company were encumbered by the Key Bank's loans.So it turns to the statute, it doesn't apply.This was not an improper shareholder distribution because it wasn't a distribution.It wasn't in, wasn't in regards to a shareholder.These, in fact, were loans.The equitable subordination argument, I've only seen advanced ever in an Admiralty case.And that's the only time we've ever seen it occur.It requires an equitable conduct and that inequitable conduct did not occur.Judge Jelderks I think went out of his way to indicate that this conduct was not inequitable.And in fact, the, the fiduciary duty, Judge Jelderks found that Mr. Gorder was not told of his obligations, under to martial assets and to do an orderly liquidation.Now this doesn't excuse a shareholder from doing that once that point in time is achieved, but nonetheless, in terms of, in terms of culpability, in terms of that analysis- - Does that go to the issue of punitive damages and attorney's fees?The issue of punitive damage and attorney's fees, there was flat note, no substantive basis for attorney fees in this case, it doesn't exist.It's not an Oregon Common Law, nor in the statutes.In terms of punitive damages, punitive damages were never pled in this case.In fact, when the trial counsel said, let's bifurcate this, I told her, I said to the trial judge, punitive damages aren't at play in this case.So they're simply not there.So the record in terms of Mr. Gorder's culpability is closed, punitive damages were never played, there's no substitute basis for an award of attorney fees here.There's no vindication of a constitutional right, the creation of a pool of assets for others to share in, the right to attorney fees, or may in some instances, if you're shaking the attorney fees you spent in the prior litigation, but the prior litigation was against the corporation, not against Mr. Gorder.I have a question on one of your earlier points.Were there improper shareholder distributions, if loans will be paid after, that were made after the date when Mr. Gorder knew of insolvency?Because I believe in that instance the distributions have to be because of Mr. Gorder's shareholder status.You're a shareholder, therefore I'm going to distribute X dollars to you, given your status.The, that simply did not occur.These were, these were loans that were paid.And in fact the loans, the loans are the monies that went in late 2001.Certainly if you're talking about a first in, first out analysis, we're never repaying, because a judge, the trial judge found that that Mr. Gorder was still owed over $395,000 at the end of the day.And then, so Judge Gould's question, you mean, unless the repayment where stamp dividend, then it's not an improper distribution to shareholders?If he's the sole shareholder?I don't think that this were, these were shareholder distributions in the, in the sense of, in the sense of the definition.No, I don't.It was a distribution to the only shareholder.That's correct.You said that the punitive damages wasn't flooding yet.I'm looking at the transcript of the free trial fashion for bifurcated the trial and Mr. Gas is saying, we pleaded the right to recover attorney's fees, as well as punitive damages.And the court says, okay, without prejudice, either attorney fees, or punitive damages, I'll allow you to reserve putting on any testimony or making any argument on those two issues until the underlying little liability issues have been resolved.Let's take a look at the first amended complaint.It's not there.Okay.The pretrial conference seemed to think it was.I was, if that was the conference immediately before trial, I believe I stated, and I was inserted in this case late.I think I told the judge that I said, your honor, there were no punitive damages that I'm aware of that have been pled in the case.Okay.You did raise that.I don't recall specifically, when you said there was no organic basis for an attorney fees claim.Okay.Well, we'll see what the- There was a bifurcation order issued, right?The order that you, that's, what I recall the court doing, what the transcript said.There's no formal pretrial order.Apart from that trans- - That I wondered is, is there a formal pretrial?And it's a good question.If there is law, I think, or at least there used to be when I did litigation a number of years back that a pretrial order supersedes the pleading.Sure.So that if a pretrial order said punitive damages, once that happened, even if they weren't in the complaint- - Pardon me, I don't believe there was a pretrial order here.I got involved just before the trial.I should know the answer, but I don't, I don't think that there was.So for those reasons, your honor, we believe that with the exception of our issuing cross appeal, judgment of the trial court should be sustained.And what relief you wish on your cross appeal?Cross appeal?The judgment against Mr. Gorder personally should be reduced by slightly over $4,000.I just have a couple of minutes, so I'm going to go as quickly as I can.The definition of distribution under the Transfer to Distribution Act is 60.017.It means a direct or indirect transfer of money or other property.That's a broad definition and covers any type of distribution.The idea that my clients have waived the protections of the Fraudulent Transfer Act or the breach of fiduciary duties, because we knew that the company had a negative balance sheet isn't square with the law.Otherwise no one would do any business with a going concern that it's operating as an insolvent.The trial court made numerous errors of fact and clear errors.One is on page, if you look at page 12 of the conclusions of law and findings of fact that the court finds that there were overpayments on leases, that Old Corp didn't receive revenues, and it paid for repairs for properties that Gorder owned.We identified $488,000 worth of that, and added up to 488,000.My reference for that is tab 1069 and Duncan's testimony.Mr. Toby came back and said the entire amount of rent's due, they try to offset that claim with rent.By his testimony, it was 96,000.There was no finding in our favor as to the differential.That's $300,000 plus that would have been available to us.The issue here is not what came in and out.It's globally what happened, and we were entitled to have a pro-rata distribution.There was $568,000 in accounts receivable, not accounted for.There was a receivable for $43,000 that his, Mr. Gorder, Judy Walsh, acknowledged was received, but it vanished into thin air.The trial court's problem is that it didn't make proper findings of fact, and it missed, it missed the boat.It didn't even roll up.All right, we've got that point.Now, in terms of punitive damages and attorney fees, was there, because it's not in the, punitives are not in the first amend of complaint, not specifically anyway.And, but you do ask for attorney fees.So what's the status of the record on first punitive damage?There was no pretrial order.We filed an amended complaint.We felt at the pre-trial that our claims and the evidence that we are going to see would sustain our action or our claim for punitive damages.And in fact, reaching- - That's all you've got, it's just what you said, that you thought you had a punitive damage claim.And when challenged, you said, you'd have to go back and take a look.That's the state of the record.That's correct, your honor.And there was never any- - And as far as attorney fees, what's your basis for attorney fees?The attorney's fees, your honor, in a couple cases I'd like to cite to.Are these also new cases that haven't been cited previously?These are cases that we cited in our, we never got an opportunity to brief the issue in the trial court.So what, you decided that these- - Are in our brief, your honor.Give me the name.Osborn versus Hay- - That's fine.Which adopted the restatement of toward five ninety one.You don't have to, just cite.Okay.Osborn versus Hay.Okay, got that.And for these single cases I want to save my quotes and time by having to track them down.Oskenholt versus Lederle.Thank you.One last question.I'm sorry, there were a couple more.Dizick versus Umpqua, and Medford Irrigation.And also I'd like to point out that ORS 95.261C allows for any other relief the circumstances require.We've got no equity here, unless we get our expenses from this case.One last question, counsel.As to the punitive damages, at the end of the evidence, did you make a motion to amend your complaint to include a punitive damage based on the proof?No, I did not, your honor, it was never, it was never challenged after we started the trial.And Oregon law, well, it was challenged at pretrial conference, but does Oregon law require specific fleeting of punitive damages?In other words, you have to specifically request that you can't, it doesn't come under the such other relief as maybe just the proper.You know, I don't know the answer to that question, and I'd be happy to look into it and provide the court with a short brief on that.If necessary, we'll ask.All right.The case just argue will be submitted.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/gov.uscourts.ca9.04-35246.2005-09-12.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/gov.uscourts.ca9.04-35246.2005-09-12.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/gov.uscourts.ca9.04-35246.2005-09-12.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/LaPaz1943/LaPaz1943.mp3", "text": "The traveler who crosses Bolivia's high plateau toward its chief city, La Paz, comes upon it suddenly.Picturesque, Bright colored, a city in miniature.Here, a quarter of a million people live in a modern community, two and a half miles above sea level.La Paz is the highest big city in the world, higher even than LASA in Tibet.Thin cold air, the people of La Paz are well adjusted, although living so high does make a difference.Even in people who were born to it, the Pase\u00f1os, as residents of La Paz call themselves, are likely to alternate between periods of nervousness and apathy and the foreigners who come from such sea level points as Lima or New York or Buenos Aires, find that the scarcity of oxygen converts climbing a flight of stairs into a major physical effort and walking up one of the steep streets becomes a Herculean task.No matter where one wants to go in La Paz, it always seems to be uphill going and uphill coming back.There are many strange phenomena in life at this altitude.There's so little oxygen that fires are difficult to start.So, no one carries fire insurance.An automobile loses 40% of its power and it takes six minutes to boil a three minute egg.The heart of ol' La Paz is in the Plaza, Maurilio, where it is said that the first cry of rebellion against Spanish rule, arose in 1809.On the great squares, the handsome cathedral, one of the largest in the world where 12,000 people may worship together.Around this Plaza are the principle government buildings where in LA Paz are the executive and legislative branches of the government.The Supreme court, however, meets in Sucra.The Indians of this region, from the high plateau above the city and the luxuriant yungas valleys beyond the mountains to the east, are notoriously bad city dwellers.They do however, come into market on weekends.Then the city is alive with these strange and quiet people.They are for the most part of the ancient Aymara tribe.Long before the Incas, they were a powerful race.They make their headquarters in the old Ins whose courtyards become warehouses for their goods.In the market, they eat the hot and high smelling picante.This may be a stew with meat, potatoes, and corn or roast meat served alone flavored with pepper and garlic.Here, they bargain for little piles of pale green leaves called coca, from which the drug cocaine is derived.To these people who chew it like tobacco, it is an opiate to help them to endure the bitter cold and the hard labor, but the habitual use of Coca dulls the intellect.So that enlightened Bolivians are now trying to stamp out the practice.But even more characteristic of the La Paz scene than the Indians, are the Cholos, people of mixed Spanish and Indian blood.They comprise about 25% of Bolivia's population.Adaptable, colorful, and intelligent, they grow daily more important in Bolivian national rights.Sometimes parading on a Saint's day on a cloud of confetti and incense, more often gliding along under loads that would stagger a Husky North American at this altitude, they are as omnipresent as the cobblestones of the street.Their great festival of the year is A La Cetus modernized remnant of an ancient Indian custom.Here the Cholos and Indians come from many parts of Bolivia, bringing their own handicrafts to sell the real star of the festival is the Akeko, a tiny plaster mannequin, a good fairy of prosperity, an ancient legend, or the people believe that if they purchased at the fair miniature reproductions of things they want during the year.And if they hang them around the Akeko, their wishes will be granted.Tiny bags of rice and Coca, new shoes, wedding rings, toy horses, trucks, and gaudy new apartment houses, all surround the Akeko and the jolly little God and all his fine wares will stand guard in the household of his purchaser until he makes all the dreams come true.Or at least until the fair of A La Cetus returns next year.A La Cetus brings out the Chola of La Pies in her full glory.They never costume in person.She may spend a month income on a pair of earrings.She is still a practical business woman, a hard-headed shopkeeper.She is an extravagantly loving mother a Chola without a baby on her back is hardly a complete Chola.Humorous quixotic, sharp tongue.The Chola is unique and knows it During the three days of A La Cetus, troops of dancers and musicians, dance down the narrow cobbled ways into the patios to play their strange toons and to perform their gay dance.Whirling in her bright shawl and dozen petticoats.The inevitable Derby set at a jaunty angle.The Chola is a gay and provocative figure, unlike any other in the world.But all of La Paz is not markets and fairs and dancing for the city of peace is full of colonial tradition founded in 1548 by a Lieutenant of Pedro Dayla Gasca.It is Laden with all the architectural glories, which grace the early capital Spanish stonework by Indian artists, tends to perpetuate Indian forms and the heads of ancient Gods looms strangely on these Christian columns, Even here, the Chola reappears, this time in another guy as a nurse to a newly christened child, the chola nurses to many La Paz families, what the Negro mammy was in the Southern homes of the United States, and many a child of Spanish speaking parents grows up speaking fluent Aymara.Also belonging to antiquity is this strangely beautiful cemetery where the dead are placed in tombs high above the ground.In a new part of the city is the national stadium seating 60,000 people.Bolivians, in common with virtually all other south Americans, are lovers of soccer, which they play far harder and better than would seem possible at this altitude.Imagine yourself doing this.For example, on top of Pike's peak, Smart La Paz loves the movies.This is one city in which Argentine and Mexican made films are almost as frequent as those from north America.Most fashionable is the Vermouth or six o'clock show on Sunday evening.This is one hour in the week when you can be fairly sure of seeing La Paz out in its best bib and Tucker.There is still another La Paz, not picturesque, but important for the city's future.The Bolivians have great ambition for the industrialization of their country and factories.Like this are becoming focal point in economic expansion.They have an almost childlike love of intricate machinery, and they also have sufficient good and inexpensive manpower to run it.But there are obstacles to industrial expansion here.There's little fuel for plant operation.Most serious of all, every piece of machinery in this wool factory had to make the long sea trip from Europe or north America and the expensive rail trip up from the Pacific coast.In spite of these obstacles, industrialization and construction are going ahead in this new realistic La Paz.This fantasy tins project, of tearing down a hill as the purely practical end in view of constructing a highway to link La Paz with its Eastern suburb of Mira Flores.In these projects, Cholos are the chief workman.Indians will occasionally join them for a few days, but they are farmers at heart and prefer to work the soil.In Mira Flores, construction is in progress on a new workers housing project to replace the ancient Adobe huts, which it is the wish of every citizen of LA Paz to destroy.And all over the city, the Adobes are coming down and new starkly modern buildings of reinforced concrete and brick are going up.The silhouette of La Paz is changing more rapidly than that of any other American capital today.This reconstruction is a hard job.There is no easy access to building material there's little wood and all iron and steel must be imported.This adds to the cost and increases the difficulties of all construction.But still they build.Bolivia looks to a time when a greater part of her national territory will become economically effective producing not only tin and other ore for which she is already famous, but food, clothing, and building materials sufficient for her own needs.La Paz, the center of modern Bolivia is already the highest big city in the world.It is growing in the face of tremendous odds.And so there was some special virtue in this height.As though it literally increased the stature of the city.La Paz has set it's heart on the idea and it's back to the job of living at least half a dozen stories higher.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/LaPaz1943.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/LaPaz1943.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/LaPaz1943.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/Let_s_Talk_Healthy_Pets_-_Rose_Tennent_interviews_Edmund_Sulkowski/Let_s_Talk_Healthy_Pets_-_Rose_Tennent_interviews_Edmund_Sulkowski.mp3", "text": "Welcome.I'm Dr. Edmond Sakowski and this is Let's Talk Healthy Pets.We're gonna do a kind of a different show today.It's kind of one of the favorite shows, type of shows I like to do.I'm gonna be the guest actually.And I'm going to turn the show over to a very special guest host and my close friend, Rose Tenet.And I do want to, we're going to have some interesting topics that we're going to be discussing in this show.And I do want to give a little bit of a disclaimer information.There are all the things I'm gonna be talking about that are outside of what we call traditional allopathic medicine.And I'm not speaking as a medical professional.I'm giving totally my opinion.I'm saying to you, the audience that you're welcome to investigate what I talk about to run with it, to ignore it, to talk to the, your medical professionals about it.Basically what I'm doing is giving my opinion, not advice.I'm not diagnosing.I'm not telling you to do what I say to do.I'm just kind of giving this as information to make you more aware or to enlighten you.And hopefully you will look into some of the things that we're talking about today.So with great pleasure.I turn, Let's Talk Healthy Pets over to my friend, Rose.Thank you.Ed it's so nice to see you again.I love doing this with you.You know, one of the things that's so important is good health, and whether we're talking about our good health or our pet's good health, it's all relatable.I mean, as far as I'm concerned, my pet is a part of my family.So I want us all to be healthy and doing well.One of the things a lot of people are anticipating right now is some changes, some very strong, big changes in healthcare and the providing of healthcare in this country.Now, I know I had talked to you not too long ago in the summer I was in Hawaii and I had to experience firsthand a different kind of government run healthcare system.And it shocked me because it was difficult to get.I mean, I had someone who told me that I was going in for an x-ray and they said, can you wait, we have to plug the x-ray machine in and wait for it to heat up.But it's very frightening when it's people that you care about and you're trying to get them good health care, and you're having a difficult time finding it.I remember calling you afterwards and saying, \"Oh my gosh, the only way I can be sure of, of being in good hands is to put myself and my family in my hands and take care of ourselves to make sure we're healthy.And that's the key.That is - The key is taking charge of your own health.Yes - There are a lot of knowledgeable people out there.I have the utmost respect for anybody in the medical field.When you received your training and your education, you, you it's really intense.And it takes a lot from you and a lot out of you, a great expense on top of that.And you, you learn the systems of the body, but then somehow things went to file and you should be in charge of your, - Right.Arm yourself and be in charge of your health.Why would you turn something over to somebody else and say, \"Take care of me\".It makes no sense to me whatsoever.You know?So how do you take charge of yourself?You educate yourself.And if you look at this new system, that's being thrust upon us, whether we want it or not, - Right.Which, which that alone is an issue.Exactly.We're giving more control of ourselves and our health and our wellness and our life into the hands of perfect strangers.They are - In the old days, your physician knew you.And you're young enough to remember that they knew who you were.Thank you for saying that.Okay, Yes.I'll take that.People today.Your, your physician doesn't know you, they see you for three minutes.A lot of times a physician's assistant sees you in longer.You know, so you don't know the person that's suddenly saying, \"Well, you need this surgery.You need this prescription.You need this medication you need, you know, whatever, - Right - You know, and they're basing everything on a test.Well, tests aren't always accurate.And some of them, some of them, even though we think they're accurate, they're not, you look at a person and you ask questions.What are you eating?How are you living?What are you doing?You know, sometimes we do things that abuse ourselves.You know, sometimes we're not eating properly and we're listening to what other people are telling us to eat and what I've come to learn in the years of researching this, my approach to all of this Rose is I don't, well, maybe I should tell my story a little bit first.Maybe you should, yeah, it's a fascinating story.Having a medical degree that I worked hard for and gave up a lot for it.I bought in into that, you know, there's, I call it now Frankenstein medicine, and I'm not knocking it.There are times you need surgery, - Right.If you have an accident, please take me to a trauma hospital.You know what I mean?They can save your life.Even medications on short term use can save your life.And, I'm certainly not saying don't go to these facilities.Right - But what I've come to learn by my own personal experience was that the medical field knows nothing about keeping you alive or keeping you well and making you healthy.So what happened with me when I had the trauma that I lost my small intestine and so forth, they saved my life, but had no idea how to keep me alive and basically sent me home to die.And they said, they sent me home and said, \"Get your affairs in order, you need to- - Wow.Five years over a five-year period.I was seeing three physicians twice a month.So think about that.That's every six days, every five days I was going to a physician.And five years later, I walk in into my primary care physician and internist.And he says to me, \"I can finally tell you every time you came in, I thought that was the last time I was going to see you\".Wow.And that, that hit me, like running into a wall because here, I think I'm doing well.And according to the standard, I wasn't.He was just waiting for you for me to die, basically.Yeah.Yeah.And you know, and the whole time though, what I did was I went outside of what I've been trained to do, you know what I call now Frankenstein medicine.We cut it away, we sell it back on.We suppress it, you know?So, it's basically just what they did to create the monster.So in, in television or movies, so I took charge of myself and I started, started investigating what my body needed to survive.And at the time I was living off of fluids.Wow.You know, and not eating solid food and for years, but I started to investigate supplements and what they did.So, I basically like Abraham Lincoln learned, I learned natural pathic healthcare, right on my own by constantly studying.Of course, I couldn't do much of anything else.I had the time to study and I wanted to save my life.Allopathic traditional medicine was not saving it for me.Right.You know, they saved it, but they weren't able to make me prosper and develop and be the healthy human being I am now, I have restrictions caused by the trauma of the surgery.And I have a ton of restrictions because my immune system is destroyed.70% of your immune system is your intestinal track, a healthy intestinal track.I'm missing half of my small intestine.I'm missing my tonsils, adenoids, my appendix, all part of your immune system.I'm missing my gal- that's not like, this is like a soap opera.I'm missing my gallbladder.Yeah, you starting to sound like a country music song.I love my wife, my dog - If I could sing maybe I could And my gallbladder and the gallbladder is important because you can't digest fats without a gallbladder.Right - Now that you'd take your gallbladder, eat what you want.No, you can not eat what you want.That's right, that's totally right.So, so about 85% of my immune system is gone - Well.But do you know me to be sick?Never.Never.You know, because these, these things that I'm doing that I've learned to do, basically on my own and studying studies after study and listening to people talk and taking these bits of pieces and adding them all up together, I'm healthier than any physician I know.And I have all these restrictions and limitations because I support my body.And certainly this was not a show of faith, religion, or anything like that.I firmly believe we have a creative creator and I believe we were created in a certain way when we support that way we prosper.Right.And I'm living evidence of it.Yeah, you really are, and as you said, you saved your own life.And I was thinking about how that all relates to do to even animals, I mean, we're talking about the, did we talk enough about the politics of all of this and the money that's involved when you consider the healthcare system as a whole and maybe where it's headed and what we can do ourselves.Well, all per surely not going to go into the politics of all.That's, that's probably a years worth of shows.Right.But the, and this is a health show.So my issue with, with what they're doing is first of all, you know, I wear my seatbelt every day.I won't get in a car without a seatbelt.I resent being forced to say that I have to wear my seatbelt.All right.Same thing with healthcare, I'm forced to buy healthcare insurance.The model was incorrect.Healthcare insurance is not healthcare insurance.It should be for the case of trauma or, or for, for diseases that get out of control.Healthcare is the prevention of disease and there, and nowhere in this healthcare format that they have is prevention addressed.All right.And you make a good point.I can actually relate this.Now, what you just talked about in terms of seeking out healthcare, and you said, if it's an, if it's an accident or a, it's a life threatening event, then naturally you've got to get yourself to a hospital.Case in point I, our dog was very sick.She was motionless, she was not responding.She couldn't get up and walk.We had no idea what was wrong with her.So naturally we took her because it's a Sunday night, we took her to a facility to have her looked at.Now, in my opinion, they did save her life.Because at that point she was, she was exhibiting, you know, - She was septic.Yeah, she was septic, you know?So, but the thing is they did help her, but it was a very large bill and as you said earlier, suppressing, so there was medication to suppress it.We weren't even quite sure what was wrong with this dog.All we know is that we were given medication and that was it.And sent home with a very large bill and still a dog that I needed to know, because I love this dog, part of our family, what was wrong with her?What caused this to happen?And how do I prevent it from happening again?So what did I do?I called you and we started a whole routine for her and she's become healthier.She's doing much, she's a hundred percent better right now.Again, I didn't tell you what to do.I told you my opinion on what I would do if this was my dog.Well, Of Course, but it all made sense.But it was up to you to take charge or not take that.That's right and I had to take charge because no one else was doing it for me.And you shouldn't have to go to somebody else to take charge, you know, the problem here is medicine has become where, where we diagnose a test, you know, I could give you a bunch of detox supplements.And while you're detoxing, you can go take liver enzyme tests, kidney enzyme tests, and they'll all be elevated.Well, suddenly your mask as a problem with liver and kidney.But in fact your body is clearing itself.Right.You know?So it's a photograph, a picture in time.Just a moment, yes, yes.In that moment When you have added up, when you add it up, let's say you did five blood tests and over a period of two years, and you see this constant marker, then you start to suspect, okay.Yeah, there's kidney damage.But, and this society, we don't look at the cause.There's a root cause of it all.You need to know 'cause I don't wanna repeat any behavior that may have caused my dog a problem in the first place.Exactly or you for that matter.Or me, that's right.You know, because what we say about the dogs, we pretty much say about the humans.What we say about the humans in this, we're talking about the animals as well.So if you don't look at the source, you're never going to resolve the problem.Same thing with, with the money in the medical system.If you don't follow the money, then you don't know why the medication is what it is.You don't know why everything is set up the way it is, when you follow the money.You know, there's these, these races for the cure of this and the races and the walk for this and that, it's a cash cow.Like for example, cancer, a billion dollars a year in I'm sorry, $80 million a year in treatment, $60 million a year in diagnose, you want to cure cancer.Would you want to cure cancer if you're sucking in that much money?Well, I understand where's the incentive.Where's the incentive.Okay.And if you start to even investigate things online and you know, of course online, you have the things you have to discern.What's right.What's bogus.You know, all of that stuff.When you, when you follow the deniers, you find that the money they're selling a product or selling a drug or something like that to counter react, what the good stuff does.And there's a push to get supplements off the market and therapy together.And they're selling a drug, as you said to suppress rather than to exp, I mean, they're not solving the problem, you know, they haven't even found that, they don't even know if the solution to the problem is, but they are suppressing it so that it doesn't appear to you to be inituating.Well, I would tell you that the disease and sickness, everybody knows, they know.it's not rocket science.We know the causes of the disease, but we set out all these things out here to distract it, because there's no money in the wellness.There's money in illness, follow the track of money.You can follow all the way back to the drug companies, to the food manufacturers, to the water suppliers.All of it.Let's see.That was very sad.Well, it, it could be.And, but to me, it's very, very sad because we're talking about life here.We're talking about life.And I don't like the idea of fooling around with wife.And then that brings us all the way back to what we started this conversation with.And that is that if you care about someone, whether it's your pet and it's a child or a spouse, you care about that person.Then you want to make sure that they are getting the best possible opinions and attention, really, it's attention.Exactly.And who pays attention more to you than someone that loves you or yourself.Exactly.So you sit here and you look and you, you wonder like these physicians come in and sometimes they're almost stoic.You know what I mean?It's, it's bam, bam, bam.See a man, you know, so I think most, I know a lot of physicians, a lot of people in the medical field, being in the medical field, they come in initially with the idea to help.But somehow the track changes because they're mandated by licensing laws, the ADA, the medical societies, they all put these guidelines forced on you.So for example, I'm gonna talk about myself.I'm not speaking as somebody with a doctor, medical dentistry, okay.I go to school and I get this dog mode it says, \"Fluoride\" Tucker's saying hi to the camera crew, fluoride prevents cavities.I don't read a study.I don't read any documentation on literature wise at all.It's done, but it's passed down to me.I'm a doctor now, fluoride treatments, toothpaste with fluoride, Bubba, you know, drink fluoride in your water because it makes your teeth stronger it prevents cavities.in my research, no studies say that there is not a study that says fluoride prevents cavities.In fact, Europe doesn't use fluoride in the drinking water, and there's no difference whatsoever in the amount of cavities in the United States and in Europe.In fact, I would say United States has more because we have a sugar based diet, a carbohydrate based diet.Which you don't find it in Europe, I can tell you that.Which you don't find in Europe.You see people walking around with candy bars and and all of that stuff.and all of that, right.You know, so persons in the medical profession, such as myself, that has this degree in this licensor ship, and I'm gonna just put this out.I have not been in practice for a while.I am licensed.I do not.I am not talking here as a dentist or as a dental physician.I don't use fluoride.I avoid it like the plague, but as a dentist, if you came into my practice and I said, don't do fluoride treatments, or don't use for I'm suddenly in hot water with the powers that be, yet, there's no basis for the use of fluoride.It's, it's basically a lie.So why?Well follow the money.Fluoride.What we call fluoride is a toxic waste product from the aluminum industry.Great.And when they processed the production of aluminum, it goes up to the smokestacks and they scrape it 'cause they have to clean the smokestacks.And they, it's a toxic waste thing that when you're tall down the road, it says toxic.Yet they throw it in our drinking water.If they put it in our, in our toothpaste, it put it in a lot of medicines.They put it in a lot of food, but here's the weird thing in the research that I've been doing for quite a long time.During world war II, when the Nazis were in control of everything, they were adding fluoride for mind control.And you say, that sounds pretty wacko.Yeah, it does.But the documentation is there, but let me tell you, Prozac, based on fluoride, there's fluoride in Prozac, why does there need to be fluoride in pro Prozac?Because they know the fluoride does something with your, your mental capacity.Yeah, and I want to say something too about the doctors, we were talking about doctors.We're very fortunate here, especially in Pittsburgh to have some of the, I think greatest doctors in the country.And I particularly like my doctors, but here's why, why I like them because I tell them how I approach things.And they support me in that.And I think that a good doctor, you know, good doctors appreciate that.They want you to maintain a healthy lifestyle outside of their office.They don't want to see you in there all the time.Even though a lot of them, the domain, tend to their own lifestyles, because they're not really, we're not told, I was told, I got a week on nutrition by a lady that was 150 pounds overweight who taught me the pyramid.That really doesn't make sense.And then when we looked at her and said, \"How can you be an nutritionist?Basically our eyes were balls out to be 150 pounds overweight and you're telling me how to eat\".And she said, \"Don't do what I do, do what I say\".Oh, well, that's a bad picture there, you know, but we are in a center of good healthcare.But then again, it's all based on chasing the dollar, you know.The interesting thing, what I found, any physician, any medical person that is into the holistic or the more natural side of it has had trauma themselves in one way or another, that didn't get addressed - Or someone they care about.And now allopathic medicine.Right.You know, which was the case for me as well.So once that happens, they kind of changed their views a little bit, although they are so cautious because they can be reprimanded and hand slap them.Well they are and that stuff that they do, their hands are tied.So, so let me tell you a couple of stories.My physician's wonderful guy.I found him because I asked the nurses at Allegheny general hospital, who did the doctors go to, right away, made the appointment and I'm not here, I was in my dying state.So I told them what I was doing and his comment to me.\"Well, I don't think it could hurt you, you know, do what you want to do.Of course, at the time I was on some medications, I got myself off the medications.I started the prosper.He said, \"I don't know what you're doing, but it's working for you\".Well, he can't know what I'm doing because he'd be in trouble if he said, \"Hey, you go take vitamins to you.Go take no.In fact, I was taking tons of vitamin C. And the reason I was taking tons of vitamin C is it's an oxygenator, it's an alkalizer, it produces nitric acid, boost your immune system, dilate your blood vessels.You get oxygen to your organs and your tissues and so forth.And so I was doing all this stuff and he tells me, \"Well, if you take too much of vitamin C you'll get kidney stones\".Well, so somebody along the line had mentioned that to him.So not the case.If you take too much calcium, you can, if the ratio of magnesium to dissolve it up there, it does and you can end up having, having diarrhea or you know, or loose bowels.So that's the worst thing you can get from it.And you should always take it to bowel tolerance anyway.So the knowledge isn't there because in the medical schools, there's, there's no natural.They probably don't even get a day of nutritional training.You know - That's unfortunate - It's reactive, not proactive and we need to be proactive.I think.So it comes back to us.The onus, the burden of it all is on us, really it is.I mean, if you want to be a responsible person, you can't look to blame a doctor or a facility.I mean, really it starts with you.Yes.Mandated healthcare is not, and what they're mandating is not healthcare.It's reactive care, get sick, eat junk, do whatever you want.Come to us when you're sick and we'll make your miserable until you die.Or make you comfortable until you die.I don't know if.In some cases if that possible, but, so in the end and that's, and it goes back to what I had called you about, you know, I was so, I wanted so much.When did you to get that book done?Because I realized it's like, I had this great awakening and then realized that, \"Oh my gosh, I'm the one who's going to keep myself out of the hospital\".Wow.And you're right.Now, you bring up the book.I in conversation told Rose I was writing a book and I wasn't necessarily writing a book to be published.I was writing a book maybe to clear out my mind.So I was journaling and documenting all of this, my collection of knowledge that I'd gained over 20 years of being well, you know, going from being close to death, to actually being well healthy, not on one medication, not on anything, you know, and I was journaling and I thought, you know, would make an interesting book on and I started telling Rose, \"Well, you're gonna publish that book.So I don't know if it's really going to be published, but it may be there.And it's going to be a book just to make you think, you know, a book of my experience basically.Yeah - But yeah.Anyway.You know, I have to just throw something in here.I like to have a little bit of fun when I go to the doctor's office, because I mean, they do, they have these files on you and they can't possibly get to all of that.And, and even when, before they walk in the door to talk to you, so every time they ask you, you know, to, to mark off, you know, what's wrong with you?Or do you have any hearing loss?I always write \"What\"?with a question mark.No one has ever said anything or notice that I do that.I'm waiting for the guy that notices or the woman that notices that that's what I'm waiting for.But I'd love to have fun in those forums.And they don't because they don't see them.So I figure I can have as much fun as I want.Well, this is an example.My cousin called me who lives in California, her mother and dad live in Pittsburgh.And she said, \"Dad's in the hospital.He's had some heart issues, they put them on LASIK. It's damaging his kidneys a little bit.His enzymes are up.He's, he's gone to the bathroom all the time.So they're putting him, they're not prescribing a pill to stop him from going to the bathroom.Okay.Excuse me.We put you on a pill called Lasix that makes you go to the bathroom.And then we put you on a pill to stop you from going to the bathroom, but we're not stopping the Lasix.I mean, that's just an example of what happens.I had an uncle, my aunt calls me and says, \"Uncle max in the hospital, he's dying\".\"What's a matter\"?\"They don't know\".\"What's his medication\".\"Excuse me, the medication\"?, I said, \"And Jane, you cannot prescribe this medication with this, the Contra indicated\".She says, \"Well, that he's taken them\".And I said, \"By two different doctors\"?Because sometimes we're so carp, carp, compartmented specialized in everything.One doesn't know what the other one's doing.And we forget I've had patients come in and I say, \"Are you on medication\"?\"No\".\"What?Do you have any heart problems\"?\"Yes\".\"What are you taking medication for your heart\"?\"Oh yeah.I take this, this and this\".And that's an exact scenario.That's right.Okay.So I say, \"From two different doctors\"?She says, \"No, from the same doctor\".\"You can't take them together.Tell the emergency room doctor that he's on these two medications\".The guy says, \"You can't take those two medications, takes them off of it\".Wow.He walks home.Wow, wow.All right.So these things happen.So I always tell people, you need an advocate.You need an advocate for your little dog.That's right You need an advocate for yourself.So if you're in trouble, have somebody around that can speak for you.Sometimes you can't speak.When I went to the hospital, I couldn't speak - Wow - You know?So you need that.Yeah.You do.What this new healthcare system that's coming up.I think you need it even more.Right, yeah.So - You need an advocate.Absolutely.Definitely need an advocate.Yeah.And so, and it looks a little Tucker though.I mean, this is the sweetest little dog and Tucker has been very, very sick.I mean, it's almost like.And people know the story of Tucker a vet made him paralyzed.And, you know, I was told to put him down and he's almost walking now.Of course, I'm giving great effort.And what got me into the pet field was I had two dogs that were aging and I kept going to the veterinarians and their model is the same as our model.Right.You know, and I was getting, \"Take this medication, all the dogs thrown up in the medication, while we'll change this medication\" Not seeing any improvement.And I thought, their really not that different.So I started giving them the approach that I gave me.Wow.You know And the change, even the veterinarian, \"What are you doing\"?You know?And when you support your body on how it's meant to eat and sleep and drink and everything, you have a wellness.These bugs don't come out of the, and we catch viruses in the air and in the drinking water, in food and bacteria.But it's not like you're under attack all the time.You're only get sick when you're off center.That's right.You know?Right.And you wanna maintain.And that's one of the things.And in the end, my dog is doing really, really well because I took her health care into my own hands.Well, I'm going to cite an example if we could bring that graphic up, I got, this was five years ago, I believe.And I've got to read this as this was an email sent to me.I got a call from a lady in California.Okay.Someone that I knew and she had rescued a new dog, took them home and the dog got real sick, took it to the vet.The vet said, \"He had distemper.Really nothing you can do\".Wow.\"We'll keep him comfortable\".And I'll read what she said.Okay.And I think Yeager's picture is probably up right now.\"Hi Ed. Here's a little story about Yeager.We've got him on a Saturday from a pile.And he was about 10 months a German Shorthaired pointer mix.Two days later, he got sick and we took him to the vet.He got I'm reading this as it was sent to me, he got prescribed meds, but just thought he was sick days later, he was worse.Took him in again.Vet said distemper, nothing we could do.Vet said, we would know when we bring them home.When it was time to put him down, we called you and you told us\" Again, I gave my opinion of oregano oil, colloidal silver, colostrum, and other stuff.\"And you told us how much and how often.And we did exactly as you said.Yeager beat this in two weeks.The vet was certain Jaeger would not make it.We firmly believe the dog would have been dead.If we hadn't called you.Yeager is a great dog today.Call me crazy.But somewhere in that canine brain, he knows that we saved him.He's a loyal, wonderful dog.Okay.Now I'm not saying this because it's something that I did.I made suggestions, in my opinion, whether they took charge or not and did it was totally up to them.Right.But see, there is something that the allopathic medical field said, \"Nothing we can do go home and die\".They said, \"I want to try to do something.And they looked to another angle\".See, personally, and it worked.Personally, I say allopathic and traditional.What we call traditional medicine is the alternative medicine.The real medicine is all this other stuff.Chiropractic care, nutuition, supplementation.Right - Reiki, I'm at a loss right now, acupuncture.And exercise.And all of those things that really, you know, continue to build up the immune system to make you stronger.You know?And the thing is when it's somebody that you care about, again, Most people wanna fight.I want to fight for life.I did.I want to fight for it.I want to make sure you know, that nothing takes that dog down, or it takes my child down or my husband down.I want to fight for them.And that's exactly what this person, you know, she was given a death sentence and she said, \"No, I don't accept it\".\"I don't accept\".And that's the, you bring up this grade point, Rose.The medical profession labels you, they label you as a cancer victim, they label you as a diabetic.Wow.They label you.And that's what they see you as.And you accept that, you are what you accept.There's a saying, that's absolutely true.\"You are what you eat\".You are what you accept.If you accept the label, somebody puts you under, you are that and you're not a diabetic.You're not a cancer victim, you're not, you're not those people.Okay.You know?And the minute that gets into your head - It stays there.It stays there.It stays there.And then you start defining yourself as such and then, you know, that's almost the defeat of attitude.It is the defeat of, Yeah.Yeah.And it creates this cognitive dissonance where you start to own up to it and you believe it.And you live in- - And then you start living that way.Exactly.As that victim.One of the walls that I hit was I have three weeks of memory loss.I have like maybe a total of five minutes of memory that are, that are bits and pieces.My first memory is my, the surgeon that saved my life and doing the surgery that he did with my situation, my intestines, he came in and I said, \"When I'm able\" And mind you, I was in no condition at the time.I said, \"I want to give you a hug for saving my life\".And he looked at me.He said, \"We're not there yet\".Just like that.Wow.As sick as I was, I went, \"What\"?Now here's me that you took out the diseased area and the trauma area, and I'm, I'm fine.And we're not here.He said, \"We're not there yet\".I was like, \"Oh my\" - Devastated.But at that time, I then realized I had to get me where I needed to be.Yeah.You were putting your hands into someone else but, and that's okay.Like you said earlier, but you need to take some responsibility yourself.I will tell you that I own my illness to a certain degree because my lifestyle was not great.I ate M and M's and potato chips and drink a Coke from many, a lunch.See I don't see anything wrong with that - We're gonna talk- - My favorite foods.It just so happened.We gonna talk about why that's wrong.But I did things like that, you know, I was hard.I did, you know, things, sports wise, they were hard on my body, you know, tearing cartilages, breaking knees, doing things like that.So we bring a lot of that stuff on.So I will own a little bit, but most of my condition was misdiagnosis and bad surgeries - Right.That brought the final thing on.So, you know, we share this responsibility, - Yes, we do.But you own your health.That's right.No one else does.No else does.No one else even wants it.You know what happens - Right?I mean, who needs that on top of everything else, it's yours and yours alone.You get it.You have a disease that you're diagnosed with, and you're doing these conventional treatments, whatever, whether they work or not.But at the end, if you were to pass and crossover, your physician goes on, feels bad and goes on.You don't, well, you go on, but you don't go on they way you are now.Yeah, exactly.So why do you hand that over?Why do you know?It's like, you want to hold on to that and never let go really think about it.It's that important?Exactly.It's something that you need to embrace and to not let go of.We haven't answered how you do that.It's education, you have to educate yourself and you have to not take things as dogma.When somebody, when somebody tells me, well, my physician says, \"I have to do this\".I say, \"Go, go talk to another physician, go get a third opinion\".They all may be different.And then you add up and say, \"You do the pros and cons\".well, \"This may work, this sounds better.This looks, I did the research.This has more probability of greater success\".Right.You know, whatever.We're all human beings.We're all taught different ways.And we all learn things differently.So 1, 2, 3 opinions go for it, you know, and try to seek, I don't say you look at a yellow pages to find someone who talked to someone who is going to these people and ask what their experiences has been and how things turned out.It's proactive.It's proactive.Yeah.Yeah.I mean, it takes a lot of work and it's a big deal, but it is your life after all.I mean, you know, when you think about it, we have time for our emails and the texting and the television show that we can't miss every week.And if you have time for all of that, you certainly need to make time for your good health.And that's what this has been about on this program is our good health and how to maintain it, how to anticipate what might be coming down the road and to prepare for it.Yeah.Same as with an animal.If your animal is not eating properly, they're not gonna be healthy.Right.You know, so.Yeah.So, I mean, it's always just, you have so much information and just, I have learned from you too firsthand.So, anything that we're talking about right now is something that I have also experienced.And I just know that I don't want to ever have to worry again, like I did this summer, I want to take control.I don't want to label myself and I'm not gonna allow someone else to label me either.Exactly.And, and that's kind of what, you know, that's what we talked about this entire segment on this program is just taking control and recognizing that you and you alone are responsible for your good health and you and you alone are responsible for your child's good health, your pet's good health.And we have certainly a lot more information to bring to you, we are going to take a break.And when we come back from that break, there's plenty more to discuss, there always is with you.My goodness.I could spend hours on the phone with you talking about these kinds of things 'cause they're, they're important.I mean, they should be number one in your life.And that's why we bring you this program.And some of the information that we are bringing you.So we're going to go ahead and go to break.And when we come back, we'll have a lot more too.Wonderful, look forward to it.If you are looking for a vacation escape from the pressures of modern life, Iceland has much to offer.Reykjavik is a charming and safe city to walk with a small town flavor and warmth and cultural richness.The country uses geothermal steam to heat homes and outdoor swimming pools, which leaves the air clean and clear.Unspoiled nature is nearby, abundant and breathtaking.This is Iceland, pure natural unspoiled.Come see for yourself.Some people might think Adrian would be totally dependent on his parents the rest of his life, that he'd never be able to go to college like his brother, that he'd never be able to achieve his dream of being an actor, we couldn't disagree more where they are.And we believe everyone should have the opportunity to realize their full potential.I am proud to Lord to have poor Ed. - For over over 60 years.The arc has been advocating for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities, standing up for those in need, connecting people, just like Adrian with the services and support, they deserve.I wanna be a professional actor in movies and in place.So they can be anything they want to be.I'm Potter and give public no me aspect or ugly.I achieved my theme of bead our threads.The arc helps make dreams come true.If you need help, or if you want to help visit us at www.darc.org.I've got my own problems to worry about those people in Africa don't want to help themselves.What's the point?Where's the proof?Actually smart programs are saving lives.In just 10 years, Over 15 million, more kids are alive - All less than 1%.Totally worth budget.How is that approved?And today there are new vaccines that could save millions of more kids.Go to one.org and join the movement.We're not asking for your money.We're asking for your voice.Welcome back to Let's Talk Healthy Pets.I am serving as a guest host today.My name is Rose and I'm with my long time friend, I used to say my old friend, but I'm just not digging that anymore.We're not that old, my friend Ed Sakowski.And you know, I just want to point something out that we're doing something a little different today.What we're doing is like a crossover program where we talk about the good health of your pet, but not just your pet as a person too, you need to be in health, good health, always.And if you want to take care of those that you love, whether it's your pet or your children or a spouse, then you need to be healthy as well.So we're kind of going back and forth between good health for people, good health for pets.So we're back and let's talk about food because this is Ed yelled at me recently.He did in a very nice way, but he did have to take me to task because I was feeding my dog, a brand name, dog food, and we were having a lot of issues with our dog.And once I stopped doing that, things began to change.And you can't just change overnight, can you?You can't just suddenly say, okay, you're not going to get that brand name food anymore.We're going to give you this new food.You can't, you have to gradually introduce them.Well, that's a good suggestion.I do want to comment first that it's kind of fun and strange being in the hot seat for a change.It's all I recommend all the time that when you make changes, you do them gradually.Okay?So, you know, you take the old food and you integrate the new food in small amounts and then over a few days, five, seven days, you start increasing the new food.Just not to create a shock because the body does adjust to the junk that you eat.And then when you start to get the better quality of food, it has to make another adjustment.Now, when I rescued my dogs, the change was like turning on a light switch, never had an issue, but I'm well versed on how to do it as someone that may be new to making these changes, it's always best to do slowly.Whether you're adding a supplement, whether you're changing the food, you know, all of that.So. - Because sometimes it upsets their stomach and I was wondering, and that's what stopped me.Actually, I started to introduce a new food early on years ago and I saw that it upset her stomach.So I thought, you know what, that's it?I thought it was something wrong with the food, the new food, the better food.When in fact it was just an adjustment.I think people need to know that, that there is an adjustment period, sometimes - It's kinda hard, this story kinda have a look at it.We have a disease, let's say you're in a disease state.What does that mean?It means this ease.Okay.Not, you know, it's, it's, it's a body out of whack.That's my favorite term out of whack or out of whack, get it back in whack whack.So when the body adjusts to what it's consuming, even though that's, that stuff may be not so good for you.Right - And then all of a sudden, you know, you have receptor cells, you have, you know, different enzymes and different bacteria in, within the structure of the intestines.So forth.And suddenly you're making that change.And the body says, \"Oh, what's going on here\"?And then it starts showing some symptoms of what you might think of as being a problem.But it's just an adjustment.Okay.And here, I thought that I was doing okay too, with the name brand dog food that I had, because it said on the bag that there was chicken in the bag.Oh, yeah.They had chicken in there.And then you taught me how to look at the ingredients and just how much chicken was in there or was chicken, even a great idea.I generally grab a bag of, or good Ken or bag dog food and a bad or usual one that everybody buys a store brand.Let's put it that way and, or a big box brand.And I forgot to bring them.But if you look at it, you'd have to really know how, just like for your own food, you have to know how to read the label.And a lot of them are kind of deceptive.Okay.So you look at something, first of all, let me say your animal should not be eating grains of any kind, whether that be corn, wheat, Barley, or just whatever.We are so us as bodies, as humans, them as animals, they are designed so specifically for food source.So if you look at us, for example, we have teeth that tear.We have teeth to chew, we have teeth that grind.We have a testable track, or most of us do that.Then it's a certain length that processes the food, dogs are the same way.Their teeth are tearing teeth.They're only meant to meet, their intestinal track and their stomach is designed a certain length to process that meat.So when you start feeding grains and corns and things that they're not supposed to eat, they can't handle it.Now they can handle a little more than a cat.A cat never have anything but pure meat.If a cat kills an animal, it doesn't need the stomach contents, a dog may.So in that stomach could be grasses and leaves and you know, greens and, you know, whatever.But a cat will not eat the stomach of that animal.Eats the flesh will not touch something.Interesting, I didn't know that.Yeah.So cats are even more particular to the, to the protein source that they're getting.And it has to be a meat product.I think one of the things I found most interesting when I changed the food for my dog was the immediate results I began to see.I don't think I expected to see results or see them that quickly, let's put them out.There is the saying, and it's absolutely true.\"You are what you eat\".So your cells absorb those nutrients.And we're going to talk a little later Rose, if we can, about how that process works, what does protein do and how it works and what we need to make it work.But that change is dramatic and you see it in the coat, you see it in the reduction of hotspots and so forth.So as far as I'm concerned, even a human should eat very small amounts of green.Dogs really shouldn't be getting any.And corn is the worst because a lot of most corn is GMO, genetically modified organism.So they're taking animals, they're taking other plants and they're changing the genetics of that plant.And they're fine.The results are finding that they're toxic.The studies are, we're not told that, we're told genetically modified food is good for you.It is not good for you.Start researching it and you won't touch genetically modified food.Okay.So when you're looking at a bag, let's talk about that and I want to talk about organic versus any other type of food, but when you're looking at a bag, what are they looking for?What should we be looking for?Well, for the dog, you're looking at the first ingredient.What should be meat?Okay - Now it can be deceptive.So, and I mean, meat, you can use chicken, you can use fish, whatever.But what I say, the first ingredient should be meat.It's a little deceptive because meat is weighed wet.So if you have a grain food that they had grain, the grain could be the, you could say corn, the second ingredient, but it actually, there's probably more corn.In fact, there's certainly more corn in that ingredient, in that product than meat 'cause in the cooking process, it dries out and you have less meat in there, but for the most part, and it's not a hundred percent of the case, they're not taking the quality meats that we might eat and putting it in that food.it's the waste products, you know?So you have to, you have to really study the packaging and see what's in there.So you look the first ingredient as a meat product, - okay.Dogs can eat a little bit of vegetables.I would tell you really not a lot of fruit, but they can eat some vegetables.So there can be some vegetables in that mix.It's okay for them.You know, I, when I made my own food, I went there when sometimes carrots sometimes kale every once in a while, a little bit of rice, you know, they can handle it.So you look at the first ingredient being a meat product.Okay.And then let's talk, you'll see a word like meal, MEAL. - Right.Technically speaking, when you see the word meal, that's usually the byproducts or the waste products that are not really fit for human consumption.So it'll say animal byproducts or animal byproduct meal.Okay.All right.So that's putrid stuff that that's rancid and rotted, and then everything that they throw out the floor where they're cutting meats, and then they put in into your, at your pet food.If you see the word meal, like chicken meal, it's usually not the best quality.Okay.Now, there are a few products where they use more choice meats and they freeze dry.And grind it up into a meal.And then they have to say the word meal.In all dry food and the process of making dry food.You have to use some form of meals.So it has to be either meat meal, you know, chicken meal, fish meal, whatever.In canned food doesn't have to be.Okay.All right.So I tend to stay away from products that say the word meal.My dogs personally get a product called original dog food company and its organic, free range, grass fed, beef from Argentina.Wow.You know, so they're getting, and you don't have to feed very much.It's a little more expensive, but you don't have to feed very much.'Cause they're getting the pure protein.They're not getting these fillers that are in there.And when they add corn and wheat and stuff, your animals can even process.In fact, they feed vegetables, corn to cows, cows cannot process it.What they make from it, it starts to goes into the meat.So when we eat cows fed by corn, besides it being GMO corn, we're eating starch in the meat because the cows can digest it.So, that's not the best meat for us either too.No, we should be, see organic food doesn't necessarily give you more nutrition.But what it gives you is the lack of pesticides and pesticides are killer.And these GMO foods are actually being designed and engineered to have pesticides, natural pesticides in them.Wow - And we're consuming it.But it also, when you eat organic, it gives you the food that you were meant to eat.The food that you were meant to eat and it's important, like eggs are extremely important for you to consume.You know, all of our cells in our body have a substance in them called the rocket Danek acid.You never hear anybody talk about it.And the rocket identic acid only has.And it's 11 to 19%, depending on what study you read, you can't get it from a vegetable source.So if you're eating, not eating animal products and quality animal products, you're not getting the accurate act.Okay.You're not getting the rocket down the gas, mines mines, mine's going faster than my mouth is moving.So what happens here is you don't have an intact wall and things that should be moving in out, whether they be nutrition, vitamins, minerals, oxygen, fluid, isn't happening because you don't have the right structured cell wall.So as a vegetarian, healthy.I would tell you no, as a vegan healthy.I would tell you really no, you know what I mean?Because you need a rocket danek acid, but you want to get it sourced from grass fed, free range, eggs, raw milk, chicken.So, what's good for our dog is good for us.And the reverse can be said as well.Over the years of lecturing for humans and animals.I always say this about the animals.And it's true for, holds true for humans as well.You're going to pay it one way or another.You're going to pay it with the food and the supplements to keep your dog.Well, are you going to pay it to the veterinarian or are you going to pay it in grief?Yes.You know, so I'd rather pay it upfront and be happy about it.You know, knowing that I'm doing the best thing I can for my dog, my cat, myself, you know.The cost is high.The cost is high, whether it's a veterinary veterans fee, or it is the grief.And, and even just knowing that your, your pet is not well, is, is very difficult.Well, you know, you stay up, you stay up nights, you know, and you could talk about organic food.I think it's critical.I do it as much as I can because you're not meant to consume pesticides.You know?So, we can talk about raw food and cook food.Really, the only difference raw food has digestive enzymes, cook food does not.If you cook a food, cook food in a microwave, it's dead food.You can actually take a volt meter and stick it into it and say, \"Rob potato\" And you get electrical potential that reads out of there.So you get bullet bolts.So there's electrical energy in that potato.If you freeze the potato or you microwave the potato.You lose it.you lose it.So you ever heard this word live food?That's part of what live food is.And part of why raw food is so good for you is because it has that energy and we're nothing but energy.Great.So you, you nuke a potato and you've lost any value.Well, the interesting thing here, here's the interesting, a baked potato is nothing but starch.That's all it is.So you could drink a can of soda pop full of sugar.And it has the same, same thing.All right.The nutrition is actually in, in the skin - Skin.All right.That's where the vitamins and minerals are also a little bit fungus, aflatoxin, beef fungus at the eyes of those potatoes really cuts out.Yeah, but it's interesting.What nature does you need?Vitamins and minerals, - Right.Where there's minerals, they're found in sweet products.So, what nature does is puts these minerals in the outside of the housing of this fruit or vegetable, that's sweet.You eat, you know, you shouldn't tore your potato, you should clean it and eat the skin.Same thing with an apple.That's where that is.The rest of it is the sweeping that attracts you - Oh, really?Yeah.So it's amazing how nature puts, because minerals can be bitter, - Right.It's amazing how they it's combined with the bitter and the sweet so that you go for it and you're getting the minerals that you need.I never knew that, I never do that.That's interesting.I'm gonna talk about something else too, that you had me do for my dog, and, you know, and one of the things I want to stress is that when you're taking care of a pet, I mean, it's just, it's the same as taking care of someone that you love when you're taking care of a pet.Yes.Sometimes it seems like, you know, it's time consuming or there's one more step now to this whole process that you didn't have before.But like Ed said earlier, that saves you the grief or the bill from the veterinarian that can sometimes be really, really high.I just had that experience myself over the summer.But, it's important that, you know, it becomes a routine after a while.Yes, it might seem like you're taking extra steps and you're doing a lot more for your pet than you were before, but in the end it pays off and it just becomes a routine.And it's not something that, that is so overwhelming, you know, as it may seem, when you initially start to do some of these things.One of the things that you had me do was to introduce some oils and we started with a fish oil.If you remember for my dog, for Spike, I would use an eye dropper and put some oil on top of her food before she ate it.And again, I started seeing a difference in her after that, her hair was different.She had those hot spots, a lot of hot spots.They began to disappear.So, I mean, you saw the effects rather quickly.And even if it's not quick, it is taking effect.But what I want to stress is that, yeah, it's one more step it's one more thing.But look, when you care about your family, you care about your pet.It's just something that you do and in the end, it pays off in many, many ways.Absolutely.What's important about fish oil, same thing for us, same thing for them, you have DHA and uh-oh.Don't look for me to give you the answer.Oh boy, it just ran out of my head, but there are two ingredients that you need.One, VHA affects the brain.I want to say EPA, but that sounds like a government agency.So I'm off, but that helps yourselves and your coat and so forth.Okay.So, there's two things that you essentially need, dogs need it as well.Okay?And, but while we're on the subject of fats, you have to get a quality fish oil while you're at it.Because there is mercury that can get into this.And you have to kind of read through the lines on some of these things, but here's two important factors.You should never eat canola oil, consumed canola oil.And that's what most restaurants fry their food or vegetable oil should never be consumed.And you'll say, \"Why\"?Why because it's part of the ingredients and brownies?Well, canola oil, canola oil.There's no such thing as a canola seed.Okay, what is canola Oil?I don't even know.Canola oil is extracted from the seed of a weed called the rape seed.Now, if you were told to consume rape seed, it's not a very nice name and you would probably wouldn't consume it, but they gave it this name canola, it's almost Italian.It's a nice Italian name - Yeah, it's a nice Italian name Let's have some canola.Well, what canola oil is besides being toxic.Right.It actually wraps yourselves and almost like a saran wrap.They make plastics and pesticides out of Canola oil.Okay.So you're, you're preventing, you're actually selling yourselves off from nutrients going in and out, never touch it.What oils and fats should you touch?Well, I would tell you coconut oil.In fact, I have told you coconut oil.Yeah, and they're finding the coconut oil is, is, is quite remarkable, especially for people that are, was beginning stages of dementia.And.Well, I can get into all three, if it's about that and that's true, but what happens with coconut oil and you want extra Virgin, organic coconut oil, and they actually make a sugar from coconut oil.Well, the coconut oil, should it be like the solid or is it.Well, depending on room temperature it'll solidify, or if it's warm, it becomes liquid.So, it's very dependent on room temperature.I make my eggs in it every morning.I make the dog's eggs in it every morning or afternoon, it makes a fluffy flavorful omelet, you know that, but coconut oil does a number of things.And one of the two things that it has in there that are critical are, is LORIC acid and caprylic acid.They're antifungal, they're antiviral, they are non-toxic actually helps with epilepsy because a lot of epilepsies that aren't from trauma or from fungal overgrowth and they're toxins, and this controls the fundus.So, cook in coconut oil, salads, extra Virgin, organic olive oil.Yeah.Eat natural stuff, not the stuff that's synthesized, it's made or made from things that we shouldn't be consuming You know?So, what's the big thing about fats.Well, you have an electric potential.We're going to talk about that hopefully in the next segment, but electrical potential is stored in your fat.So your body should be about 20% fat, but the right kind of fat.All right, 'cause I was going to say, \"Yeah, I think I've got that covered\".Doesn't worry about that, yeah - You know, these partially hydrogenated fats and so forth, like canola oil, you know, bad for you, the good fats, olive oil, coconut oil, Palm oil.Oh, Palm oil too.Yeah.All right, when we talk about pets and their need for fats and oils, is it because they're not out there in the wild and killing and getting those natural fats and oils from.We took their natural diet and totally destroyed it - Okay.That's exactly for our convenience, you know, the food industry didn't start until the early fifties, everybody fed their dogs scraps from what they ate.Oh, really.Yeah.And then suddenly, you know, this market was created and it was products that were being thrown away.That ended up into the pet food industry.I remember as a child feeding my, my, the first dog that I was old enough to remember, we bought these hamburgers that were pink and had yellow cheese lines in there.And, it was wrapped in cellophane and it looked like a human hamburger.Oh. - I forget what they were called, but it was like feeding her clay and garbage.And she had health problems all along as a result of it.You know, so the food industry for pets is improving, but you really got to be the discerning consumer and you have to read it and you have to look things up.And if you don't understand it, look at it.You can take the chemical structure of water and you wouldn't want to eat it, you wouldn't want to drink it because chemically it's names we can't pronounce, but food really, you should be able to pronounce and know what it is.Yeah, it should be pure form, be the purest form.So if you want to begin to introduce fats and oils into your pet's diet.Slowly?What I would suggest you do is, is, you know, if you have coconut oil and it's liquified, 'cause of the room temperature.Take a fork, load the fork up and let a dribble on the food.Okay.Olive oil, you can put a little bit of olive oil 'cause olive oil is omega-6s.All right.And you need a little bit of omega-6, but omega-6 is actually inflammatory and where there's inflammation there eventually is disease.So you don't want to overload it, but you need omega-3s, omega-9s.All right.So, I'm gonna.But then you buy a package, let's say in a healthy store 'cause there's a lot of health food stores that you have come to trust over the years and you buy an omega 3-6-9.They put the right balance.They generally do.Yes.Okay.Yeah, yeah.So anyway, I think I said something wrong.I said, did I say olive oil was omega-6.No, you didn't.Okay.All right.Okay.Anyway, add it slowly.Okay.And if you were to add too much, like, like for example, you have fish oil, I would say a teaspoon every 25 pounds of your animal.Okay.You know, if you were to add too much, what you ended up getting is a little soft stool.Okay.And then you just back off a little bit.Yeah, and I know that you can get some of these things in a dropper and it doesn't, as you said, it doesn't require a lot.It's just a tiny little bit over the top.A larger dog, a little more.Oh, okay.A larger dog requires more.All right.And that makes sense.Now, let's talk about, you and I have talked a lot about good health.and how a lot of it really can have to do your stomach and stomach acids.And that's something that you talk about all the time with me anymore.It's like, this is your new thing.Like, you're really into this.Well, it's not a new thing.It's just in my research.Yeah, in my research that I've been doing extensively.I've come across, what's behind everything.Okay.So, we in America do things to shut down our stomach acid.There's a pill for that.Okay.All right.So listen, what happens when you shut down your stomach acid, you consume protein.So we consume meat or legumes as protein.And we think we're absorbing that protein.That protein is actually a foreign body to us that can offend us and cause symptoms of allergies, can cause symptoms of flu.So what happens is our stomach acid breaks those proteins down into amino acids.Then your body can reconfigure those amino acids in the proportions that you need specifically to you.So you can eat a steak and get something totally different out of it.Than I eat a steak, when I eat a steak, all right, because of our needs and the reconstruction of these amino acids without stomach acid, you do not break those down into amino acids.So, and we're going to talk in the next segment about this electrical potential I keep wanting to talk about, but it's a little premature to talk about it Now.When you don't have stomach acid, you can't have the electrical potential.So, bunch of things go awry as a result of that.So, let's say you don't have a stomach acid and you're taking supplements, calcium, magnesium, zinc, which are all important things that consume.You can't break them down, you can't break them down.You can't absorb it, we just expel them out.Wow.Okay.So should we be shutting down stomach acid?Absolutely not.I take things to make stomach acid.One thing that I always recommend is Bragg's raw apple cider vinegar.It actually alkalizes your body, which is important, but it adds stomach acid.Most stomach acid reflux is not amounts of acid back up in yourself, I guess.It's off gassing, undigested food.Wow.And that's why when you take a teaspoon of bragg's, suddenly your heartburn goes away.Wow.Now you can, you can normally make stomach acid if you're taking the right supplements 'cause I think we're all deficient.Our diet makes us deficient in stomach acid.And then we take things to suppressed on the gasoline.That's why after a very short time on, on things like pro-second sober, you know, these, these antiacid antiacid whatever they are, you don't, you can go into osteoporosis, osteopenia, osteoporosis happened to me and I had to reverse it as a result of it.When they wanted to put me on that, those junk calcium building pills.So, you need stomach acid.So, what makes stomach acid iodine, which we're all deficient in vitamin B1, salt, water, which is incredibly important to be fluid these things.And there's a couple more make stomach acid.So every other day I take those to increase the amount of amount of my stomach acid.So, I'm digesting my foods, making the proper amino acids.So all these supplements that you know, that I take, - Otherwise, it's a waste then.It's a waste and you're not getting the benefit of them.So, stomach and so it's really interesting.This is absolutely amazing.And I want to make sure not to run over, but when you consume something, your stomach acid comes up.It's supposed to, at the time that your stomach acid comes up to two, it sends a buffering agent into your blood.So your blood doesn't become a Siddiq.Oh wow.If you're low on acid, you're not making that buffering component.Then when food moves into your small intestine, the process of reverse, it goes to an eight.So, your pancreas throws in a buffering agent at the same time, it throws a little bit of acid in your blood to balance it out.So, if you mess up at the beginning, you're way messed up at the end.Wow.And I, and I think too, and we can talk about this more after the break, but I think too, that some people will say, \"Well, you know, I'm not eating that well, and I'm not worried about my stomach acid and I seem to be fine\".But what they're doing right now is gonna affect them later.It's affecting them now.They don't even recognize her.Because what happens is we wait till the disease process.Then we react and why do I have stomach acid reflux?Why do I have diabetes?Why do I have cancer?And sometimes it's a little late to counter all of those things.So that's why, and when you talk to teenagers, do you, I mean, we're talking about our pets and how we care for them and our children as well, what we're telling them to put in.But you know, talking about taking your vitamins, taking your supplements, those are all important things that they need because they're in a very crucial time.Growing period, developing period.And growth.So we are talking, Let's Talk Healthy Pets with Ed Sakowski, and I'm a filling as a guest host today.My name is Rose and we will certainly be back with a lot more after this break.International disasters occur frequently compared to donated goods.Financial donations are the best ways to help disaster victims.Even small cash donations can have a far greater impact.Difficulties in shipping and storing donated goods can sometimes interfere with relief efforts, but relief efforts can purchase exactly what is needed with cash donations, cash prevents all types of inappropriate giving.Just remember cash is always best.For more info, go to cidi.org.A clean breath of air shouldn't have a price tag on it.Our river here is already contaminated with mercury.My water was kind of yellow and it has a rusty smell.My lungs are shot, my hands are numb.The incidences of asthma hospitalizations and respiratory problems.All the children that are ending up in the emergency room, not being able to breathe.I'm tired of people in my church, dying from all kinds of cancer.And I just think that every day we're threatened.When listen to your coughing child upstairs.You wonder, should I be living here?You need to make the transition yesterday.I mean, people's lives as a word.I'm sure there's stories just like ours all over this country.What we have to say is important, and our voice does matter.More than 12 million people are at risk of starvation in east Africa due to the worst drought in 60 years.At the Dadaab refugee camp, I met people desperate for food and water, but already over tens of thousands have died.Half of them, children under the age of five, but Oxfam is there in east Africa, saving lives with emergency food and water.And you can help us give $10 by texting Oxfam to 25383.So, we're back with Let's Talk Healthy Pets.My name is Rose.I'm a friend of Ed's.We've been friends for a very long time and I'm guest hosting today.One of the things that we've been talking about, well, we've been talking about a lot of things, but we really, we can just narrow it down to this.It's so important that you stay healthy so that those that you love stay healthy as well, whether they are your spouse, your children, or your pets.So we're kind of crossing over today, talking about staying healthy as a human being, but also keeping our pets as healthy as well.We were talking about stomach acid and how important that is to maintain that balance and how your entire health depends upon it, not just yours, but your pets as well.Exactly, and especially in your pet Rose that actually their stomach produces more acid than we do.One of the things about acid.That's so critical.You know, we ingest pathogens, you know, bad bacteria, viruses, fungus, that stomach acid kills them and actually is part of your protective mechanism.So, when you're low on stomach acid, you're more vulnerable to these pathogens.So they have a higher amount of stomach acid because what do they eat?Roadkill, live animals that may have diseases and so forth.And that's what their, their history is.So, they're stomach acid is higher than even ours.'Cause we go to a point to, they actually go higher than that.But our diet that we've been feeding them has changed a lot of that.So, I will drop a few drops of, let's say Bragg's raw apple cider vinegar into one of their meals a day to help that digestive it, I give them digestive enzymes.So stomach acid is so critical to our overall health.And we're gonna talk about how it even implies the next topic, you know, relates to the next topic.But zinc is extremely, extremely important for all our functions in our body.And 80% of us are zinc deficient.Wow - We will not absorb zinc without stomach acids.Well, there's so much to think about.And yet, as I said before, it may seem overwhelming at first, but once it becomes a routine and once it becomes habit in your life, then it's that much easier.And you really don't even think about it.Exactly.And we were talking about, now these are treats, I didn't bring prep food, and these are treats, I give my dogs.This one, this one is, and I'm not recommending them.I'm just showing you what I use.That what I found to be the best.A healthy, a healthy treat.Yeah.They're raw, they're freeze dried, they're grain-free, which means they're gluten-free, they're potato free.Potatoes are not good for your dogs.So, even though you'll see potatoes in dog food, they have a little bit of added, added vitamins and minerals, but that's really my nude, but I just got blinded by the light.And now, I can't read this, but let's, let's see what's in here a little bit of excellent.I'm so blinded.I can't even see it right now.Let me take a look for you, - My eyes are getting better, but, but what's good about this.And I think that, you know, it could be any of the ingredients are beef with ground bone.So, that's the first ingredient in this product.And that's what you want to look for even in a treat, because, you know, I was talking to him before I had changed my dog's diet, but then I didn't change the treats.Which I used to harp on you all the time.I know, All the time.So, the very first ingredient is beef and it goes on it's more than just that it's the beef liver, beef kidney, then there's apples in here, chickpeas things that a lot of protein.Exactly.And this, this is another product I give and they love it.And it's the same type of thing has a few barriers in it.And it has some, some lettuce in it and things like that.And then here is a salmon bite.It's Alaskan wild salmon.Wow.And really nothing else, a little bit of meat meat in there, and you're getting healthy treats.So, when you give a healthy treat, it's nutrition.And the dogs like them, right?And the dogs like them Yeah.It's not like you're feeding a kid, the dog is going to eat.This is, we're talking about dogs that he did just about anything.Right.Let's see how I, yeah.I would say that the dog likes this one a lot.All right.So, we were talking about stomach acids and we also were talking earlier.We just mentioned this, we only touched on it, electrical energy in the body and how important it is to produce that and maintain that.And now we need to talk about how you do that.This is so critical.You are a battery.Everyone of yourselves has a positive poll and a negative poll.Everyone, yourself is filled with ionic solution, liquid solution.What is a battery positive pole, negative pole, ionic solution sounds a little wacko.Maybe no, it's actually taught to us in medical school.Right?And we defined the Krebs center as a cycle and how ATP works.And that's how we get our energy and everything.It's all part of this electrical energy.You were electrical energy machine.That's why you can do an EKG. That's why you can do an EEG and you'd have magnetic poles.That's why you can do an MRI. The MRI actually, which I don't know if really that's that a healthy reverses those poles temporarily.So, we are electrical energy.Interestingly enough, our cells, a healthy cell runs between a -20 millivolts and a -25 millivolts an injured cell needs to go to a -50, minus is good.It's an iron donator, you know, positive is really bad.That's an iron Stiller.Oh, okay.So the more negative you are, the better you are to regenerate an injured cell.You'd have to be go.Your body has to take that injured area to a -50, to regenerate a malignant cell.It has to go to a -60.So, when you start going up the scale to the positive side, you go from, let's say, -25, and you get to a -5.You start filling not so great.When you get to -10, you start feeling sick.When you get to a -20 you're in a chronic disease state, when you get, I mean, not the -20 or +20.I mean that, I say that and see I'm thinking and talking, and it's hard to do these days.When you go to-10 to -65, to -10, then you go to op to a +30, you have cancer.So, as you go -5, -10, -15, -20, you have chronic disease.Okay?So, so how do we keep this voltage?All right, well, number one, you have to be hydrated and you have to drink quality water.Not all water is quality water.Also the pH that's the hydrogen potential, potential hydrogen pH that's the electricity in that cell.So when you take, I will let me make a statement.No disease lives in an oxygen native environment.When you have an, I don't care if it's cancer, I don't care if it's diabetes, I don't care what it is.Any bacteria, they're all go to sleep in an oxygenated environment.When you get to an acidic environment, they wake up.So you have to keep your body as alkaline, which is a 7.35 to 7.45 pH reading.As much as you can, one of the ways is using pH water, meaning water that's at eight oh and eight five a nine O because- - If you have determined and how do we know?Well, I've actually done self testing on many bottles of water, because I bought an electronic pH meter in my research.I want to double check even the research that I've been reading on, on the water.Well, there's some natural waters that have good pH, like Fiji water tested out to be almost a 9O for me.They advertise it as like a nine, four.There's a water called real water that they infuse with ions that are stabilized.It's an 8.0, that's.It was actually 8.1. When I read it average bottle water, 6362 , IO water, 6160.You know, reverse osmosis, filtered water, low they're acidic.So they take you to this city mode.You want to go to the alkaline mode, chlorophyll green.And you've heard me talk many times about chlorophyll, - But I use that.I put that in a bottle of water.I do the same thing.I do the same thing, eating greens, dark greens, chlorophyll.Okay.Okay.And those things take you.In fact, you can go online and Google alkaline foods and acidic foods, and it'll give you list meat products or acidic, but you need a certain amount, but you do want to have a good vegetarian diet on top of that, of these dark green lady things, and then supplement yourself with most supplements, take you to the alkaline state.So, you know, there's a purpose for those minerals, take you to an outline state, amino acids taking a alkaline state.Alcohol takes you to an acidic state.Yeah.There you go.Why do you seen it like that to me?Coffee.Okay, So, I like a glass of wine.Coffee takes you to an acidic state.No look, I can understand that for, for a human being.Okay.We can figure that out.Now, if we're concerned about the electrical energy of our pet, how, how are we handling that?I mean, are we giving them bottled water?Yeah.I mean their a little more acidic than we are, so they're not as sensitive to it, but I put 8O, 9O water.And there's actually some, there's a wonderful supplement that you can add to any water to take it to an alkaline state.Okay.And it does it dramatically.It's called IONPH , PHION. And you can Google that.It's a company out of Phoenix.And I used- - Is that to your Dog's water.Yeah.You have to, you have to do a measurement.So there's so much of each liquid that you put in two ounces of water.And then I just, I always add that water right to their dog food.So, they need to be hidrate, dehydration is, is one of the worst things we can get into.It makes us acidic.It, it stops digestion.It stops the cell process.It stops regeneration.It is absolutely amazing.And there were actually actually tests done where they took cells, had the voltage between that -20 and -25, raised it up to a +30, their cells went to cancer, raised it down to a -60 and the cancer cells dies and new cells regenerated.When you hit yourself, let's say your finger it with a thumb, you know, your thumb with a hammer.Rather, you get that instant pain.That is your cells going down to a -50.Oh, is that right.Yeah.And that's why it's a throbbing pain.The minute they come up to the normal regeneration after they've regenerated that the throbbing stops.When you have chronic pain, you are at like - That doesn't stop.At this plus side and it doesn't go away until you change it.And you say, what are some of the other things that are really important?Thyroid?Our thyroid is the voltage regulator of every cell in our body.Vitamin D is the, the introductory regulating hormone, because it's not a vitamin, it's mislabeled to every hormone that your body makes when you're not making thyroid, your adrenals take over.And then you stress your adrenals out and you raise your core, It's a vicious cycle.So I would tell you that a majority of people are misdiagnosed as well as to the health of their thyroid, - Right.And you need to really address it.A normal blood test only tells you if you have too much thyroid being produced, or you have not enough being produced, it can give you a most of the times a false reading.And I know it's probably, we don't have enough time to get into it, but that under our test of, of your basal metabolic temperature is, is the best way to do it.And I don't know if you were doing that on.I know we talked about it.A little bit of time.I can't see.I cannot see that mercury.I don't care.I don't, I'm sorry.I've never could my entire life.I can not see the mercury to tell exactly what the temperature is.So. - We can go in an idea.And we can't do it now because we've got like two minutes left.Yeah.So, I would tell you to start investigating it started investigating why we shouldn't consume fluoride, why we shouldn't consume chlorine and then look into supplements, just pick a supplement, start reading about it.When you start reading about it and you learn how they interact and what they do, you'll start taking them because it's, it's, it's a quest for health, - Right.A quest for wellness, you know, you could live to be a hundred and be sick and not be happy, a hundred.You know what I mean?But you could live to be 70 and be healthy and have quality of life.Right.So. - And I think I prefer quality of life, you know, and I have to say too, that I have put a lot of this into practice, things that you and I have talked about over the years, and I can see a difference.And even with the supplements, if I miss a week, or if I was away on vacation and forgot to bring them with me, I can feel the difference.You see the energy go down.You see the change in your hair and your skin, everything.We're actually running out of time, Rosie, I'm going to take the show back from.Is that what you, it it a show.And I thank you so much for giving me an opportunity to talk.And, and it's always a pleasure to see you, of course.But when you come to the set and do this, I do appreciate, I do appreciate it.And thank you so much for watching, Let's Talk Healthy Pets.This show was about inspiring you, inspiring you to take charge and to look at things.Don't, don't take my word for it.Don't take other people's word for it.Start to study it.It's really not that hard.And you'll start to move toward wellness for you, for your family, for your animals.So I thank you so much for watching.Let's Talk Healthy Pets.Remember a healthy pet is a happy place and take care of yourself.Take care of your animals.We'll see you next time.Rose.Thank you so much.Thank you, it's a pleasure.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Let_s_Talk_Healthy_Pets_-_Rose_Tennent_interviews_Edmund_Sulkowski.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Let_s_Talk_Healthy_Pets_-_Rose_Tennent_interviews_Edmund_Sulkowski.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Let_s_Talk_Healthy_Pets_-_Rose_Tennent_interviews_Edmund_Sulkowski.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/Let_s_Talk_Healthy_Pets_-_The_Body_Shape_Diet_-_Part_2/Let_s_Talk_Healthy_Pets_-_The_Body_Shape_Diet_-_Part_2.mp3", "text": "Welcome back, I'm Dr. Edmund Sulkowski, and this is \"Let's Talk Healthy Pets,\" and we're here with our very special guests.And it's an honor for me to have Dr. Cass Ingram here, just extruding with information and energy regarding your wellness, and the wellness of your animals.They're the same.Absolutely.And this man comes from a point of view of being ill at one time, and going outside this allopathic method of treatment and going into what nature has provided, and the change in his life was dramatic.Yeah, yeah, for sure.And he's so for years now, since what, '96?Since about- Well, I got sick in '89, and since about 1994, because of the oregano oil, I got back on planet earth.Yeah, oregano piece of the tree is what I took.And what's amazing, and it happened with myself as well.When you see the turnaround from bad health, or poor health into wellness, you just wanna tell everybody.You become almost an Oracle, if you will, you wanna use that word.You want everybody to experience what you did, and you do a wonderful job of it.And -- - Well, I'll tell you this, that there was no way I could be with you today and be productive without the oregano oil, especially this.This oregano, the material is totally edible.You can take it daily.You can take it aggressively.In my case, I had to take about a hundred drops a day, the juice and the, also the OregaMax.Those, were the three products that put me back on the planet.Well, let me tell you one about- Well, I'm gonna finish up on this with Oregano oil.And this of course is my personal bottle.This is wonderful for skin infections, for hotspots on pets.Orally, you know, dogs have traditionally a poor oral health condition, and a drop of this in the mouth really cuts down on the bacterial effect that's happening, and then -- - You can even put it on a tooth ache.You can put it on a tooth ache.And of course, we're not telling you to do that.These are personal things that we do that we know that we know that work.Right, right.I must say that, whenever I talk about this as my personal view, it's just me exuding my enthusiasm about how great this is and how it can save people.I'm not connected financially, to try and endorse it.Yeah, everybody knows, that's the same with me.I have no stake in North American Spice whatsoever, but it's a product that I firmly believe in.And I wish I invented it.That's how much I believe in it.But here is one of my favorite products, and this is called SinuOrega.And these two products, I never leave home without.I keep them in my center console.I keep them when I travel, I leave the house, and I'm using these things.This is a sinus spray.And you know, most of these airborne products, airborne pathogens, I don't wanna say products come in through our, both our mouth and our nostrils.And the blood supply is so rich there that when they come in, if our immune system is suppressed, for whatever reason, we may talk about that.They take hold and they grow.This eliminates that from happening.And you travel on an airplane, you're in a group of people, you're whatever, spray this before you go.Spray this before you go, no sickness, as far as my opinion is concerned.But I'll tell you, I use this on my dogs in so many different ways.I had a couple of dogs that developed fungal infections, obvious.They were almost like overnight, their ears were great.And then I saw them go like this, and I looked in, I have a scope.I look in, and it's full of fungus.So I happened to have a anal gland appointment at the vet.So I said, you know, \"They have fungal infections\".\"Oh, we'll put some of this solution in there \"and you wash it out\".So I'm doing it for six weeks, and I'm getting worse, all right?And I'm religiously doing it, you know?So I get a little light bulb comes on, SinuOrega.Mucosal on your sinuses, not so different from the mucosal in your ear.It's safe for your sinus, it's gotta be safe for your ear.So I put this in their ear, a few drops several times a day, within one day -- - Finished.Gone.Finished.Clean as a bell.Yeah.You know?And I sit there and go, \"SinuOrega, like, who knew\"?Yeah.You know?I've never heard anybody say, \"Use SinuOrega in somebody's ears\".It's the ideal way to do it.So once a month, as a maintenance, because you know, medicine has become reactive, we need to be proactive.So once a month I drop a drop in their ears.These dogs have the cleanest, healthiest ears.Even when I take them to the vet for a checkup, their ears look wonderful.Even just once a month, that's amazing.Once a month, that's all I do.50th of a scent a month, or something.If I bathe them, and you can always get a little water in there, I put that in, because that stagnant water can -- - Yes, it can cause the fungus to flourish.Cause the fungus- And these infections aren't bacterial, they're fungal.Even sinus infections, fungal, not bacterial.Right.You get a secondary, at some point, bacterial infection possibly, but they're fungal in origin.Well, when the Mayos Looked it in 1999, at 280 people, they found that these were chronic sinusitis.They'd had surgery.They'd had multiple years of antibiotics.They found in like 250 out of 280, 90% of them had fungal infestation.They called it pathogenic.In other words, it's like a disease, the infecting, the nasal cavity, the sinus cavities with fungal tentacles, of penicillium, black mold, all that.Yeah, those tentacles pillow forms, and they actually poke holes in your intestinal tract and cause that dysbiosis or leaking gut.They cause the Crohn's, the irritable bowels, spastic colon, as well as sinusitis -- - You are 100% accurate on that.It is amazing that how much damage fungus does to our body.Bronchitis is 99% fungal.They kept going down with the broncoscopes, you know, in taking cultures.And they were always getting fungi, no bacteria.But what they say is, well, you know, fungus is among us all the time, as Doug Kaufmann says, I love Doug.If anybody doesn't know about Doug kaufmann, take a look at his website, he's a real antifungal guy.He always says \"Fungus among us\".Well, it is among us.We are from the earth, you know?So, you always get fungus, but it's the proliferation of fungus that's the problem, and the mycotoxins that it produces.Right.So, you know, it isn't really the bacteria that hurts us or it's the fungus that so much, it's the byproducts, the waste products.These endotoxins, and thioesters, and all of these mycotoxins that do the damage.It's very damaging.But the fact that almost 100% of sinus is fungal, the fact that chronic earaches in adults is always fungal, and in animal's fungal.And that bronchitis and many cases of pneumonia, even colds, coricic congestion, clear drippy, runny nose, that- and you have something so simple, hay fever as well.This obliterates all of this, but the SinuOrega is great because it's a water soluble saline, isotonic, ideal for the ears.Nobody wants to put anything irritating in the ears, and this is against the ear, it fights the ear tissue.I'm gonna take it a step further and I'm not gonna, I'm not advising anybody to do this, but I'm gonna tell you, this is what I personally do.I will preface this by saying, \"Oregano oil does not belong in the eyes,\" all right?So that's the one place, no matter what form of oregano oil you have, avoid the eyes.But I have a dog, Abby.A little sweetheart, miniature dachshund, audience knows her, who chronically gets anal gland infections.Okay, even though she's monthly squeezed and so forth, but she gets them, and they pop up pretty rapidly.Well, a little light bulb again.I say- well, to me, it's almost irrelevant whether it's fungal or bacterial, all right?Because I have a product here that works.So I say, \"Okay, sinus, SinuOrega, sinuses, ears.Mucus membrane.That's all the rectum is, is a mucus membrane.Same origins.Okay, let's try it.So I take, I get a- Now, usually the oregano oil comes with a pointed dropper, glass dropper, but some of them came for a while with blunted...Blunted ones, so yo got both?So I saved all those blunted ones.And I put the SinuOrega in a empty bottle, oregano bottle.And I use that blunted dropper, and I go half an inch up her rectum.Then your instincts and still -- - And I just drop it in, and you know.And I'm, again, I'm not telling you to do it, you wanna talk about it with your vet, go ahead and do it.But every single time without antibiotic use, which takes days for those to come down, and the protocol, veterinary protocol is, \"We'll try an antibiotic, if it doesn't work, \"it's a very hard area for the antibiotic to get to\".They do surgery and they removed the anal gland, which is traumatic forever after that point, plus expensive.Frying of that whole situation.Exactly, so I dropped this in there, and when I say within a half a-day to a day, gone!And she may get it one or twice a year, you know?So every once in a while, you know what I do?As a preventative, you know?So do I love SinuOrega?You bet I love SinuOrega.Do I advocate it?And again, everybody knows I have nothing to do with North American Herb & Spice.Everybody that I've told about SinuOrega comes back to me, and they tell 10 other people.Wow.It's absolutely amazing.And it's got the Sage and Bay leaf, and along with your Oregano or the oregano.Sage is very soothing to the membrane.Well, I got to tell you, I always advise everybody on that first initial squirt, go gentle, you know?Do a few times because it is a burning sensation, but you know, what's interesting?It burns good.It burns good.There is a pediatrist, Dr. Fish, who has, who I quote.I believe in the cures in the cupboard, if not that, he's in the miracle of wild oregano, but they're both important books.I would recommend them both to study oregano.That it's a escharotic agent, oregano -- - Meaning?The P73.Means that it burns the fungus.You need something for toenail fungus, for athlete's foot, for ringworm, and for the mucus membranes that will root it out.Kind of cook it out, if you will, but no danger to us.I'll tell you what I find, and I've talked to many people about this.If I do this as a preventative, so I'll take it in the morning.I'll take it throughout the day.I'll do a spray off and on using the oregano oil itself, orally.When I'm not...I'm gonna use the word infested.If I'm not infested with either any type of pathogen, it doesn't burn so much.You don't even notice the burn.But when I'm starting to feel a little funny, or...I get a sudden burn that I haven't felt.It's gonna go where it's needed, it's energetic.Exactly.And what I'm thinking here is, you know, bacteria, fungi, viral, they don't have teeth, but they eat off of us.They feed off of us -- - Yes, they do.So they drop enzymes.And those enzymes putrefy our tissues, basically the best way to describe it.And I think, \"While that process is going on, \"that's where that extra burn comes from\".It could be, and there's all that inflammation.And if you have even an inflamed skin, or a burn, or a cut, initially when you put the oregano oil on, you get a little bit of that burn more than you would, if there's no wounds -- Sometimes, or not.But then it goes away.Yeah, sometimes I've noticed that and people say, \"Can I put that on an open wound\"?And I say, \"Well, be gentle\".You know, I say, \"Maybe start off a little -- \" - It's burny, that actually it's less burny than water.Yeah.Water burns and irritates an openness, a scratch, a contusion, or an abrasion more than the oregano.And hydrogen peroxide should never be used -- - No, that's a carcinogen.It's a carcinogen, and it stops the healing process, actually.So this is energy.You know?It grows on the mountains up to 12,000 feet above sea level, above the treeline, on white rockets.The flower is a brilliant white, every bee, every insect, every nut descends on those flowers.It's white lightning, and it has that kind of power in your body.And if there's a little bit of burn to the lightning, okay, but it's not gonna burn your tissues.Just the bad guys.We end up getting sick because we get this abundance of a pathogen, and then they do their damage.They do big damage, inflammation.When this takes care of those, it reduces that load, and then we don't get sick.That's right.So tell us, what is this?Well, I'm gonna take a couple of drops, five or 10 drops right there of the oil.And then I'm gonna take a shot of the juice, which is the hydrosol that comes out of the other spigot when they steam distill it.Mhh, mhm, mhm.Ah!That bite's good.Yeah.That's great stuff for physical stamina and energy -- - So it's delivering oxygen?It is, because the water from the steam binds the oxygenated molecules from the mountain oregano.So let's talk about why that's important, and I'll make mention first.We are 70% water, and we thrive with oxygen.And we have a certain pH that your cells function at normally.And I've talked about this in previous shows.So on that, for that Miller voltage, they function normally at, you need oxygen for that to happen.Disease does not grow, develop, proliferate in an oxygenated environment.I don't care if it's cancer.I don't care if it's anything, when you're acidic, they love it.And we're not meant to be acidic, but our diets, the things we consume, our lifestyles tend to push us- our water even, our drinking water tends to push us through this acidic thing.So something- And this is called oregano, is something that can help balance that in the other direction, and push it in the other -- - Oxygenated and molecular oxygen, herbal oxygen.And the reason that's important is that, the oxygen from the water is bound to the oregano, the oregano chemicals, and then that goes into the fat.So that goes into the brain, it goes into the spinal cord.And you might even notice that after a shot of this, even the doctor got more lively.Because oxygen gives you energy.I take chlorophyll all the time for that reason, it's oxygenated.Exactly.This is big oxygen because this is 12,000 feet above sea level.It's rarefied, it's bound to water, and water is the solvent that delivers our oxygen through the blood.And man, this stuff goes right into the head, and into the nerves, into the internal organs and just oxygenates the whole system.And that's not a medical claim.It's just a chemical fact.Yeah.But I will say that anytime there's something shot with the nervous system, how could you get better than something like this to get that molecular oxygen, or the oregano oxygen, the antiseptic into the brain and into the other tissues?Case history, me, you've got a tick right here behind the ear, and he's on for a few days, you know, hunting around the wilderness for stuff, right?For good things.And the arm on the opposite side, the arm and the leg are paralyzed.I can't move them, I can't walk, right?Tick paralysis.Wow.What do I do?I pound this, I drink a bottle of this a day, for a couple of days.I take a 150 drops of this P73, and Kapoot!It eliminated it.Incredible.So our little dog, we've got to get the juice for the doggy.With, you know, Tucker, and just got to keep going here.Yeah.Get the nerves healed.And we are gonna do that because I've been diligently working for the last four and a half years to get him up and walking again, and undo the damage of a basically, almost incompetent medical person.But anyway, it kind of triggered something in my mind over here.You're promoting this wellness, and you're talking- you've written a number of books, all promoting wellness.Have you had any issues with, I don't wanna say, let's say government authorities or the medical profession, because you're talking outside the dogma that we're trained with.Well, I can say the oregano gives me so much energy.I suppose somebody is gonna probably try to slap me down.It's extremely high in this Hertz energy, this electrical energy -- - So explain to the audience -- - It charges of the body.I was hoping- I thought everybody would get excited.Government, non-government, lay-person, professional, medical, nonmedical.I mean, I'm totally empowered by this.And it changed my life, and saved my life, saved your life, but it didn't happen that way.That energy didn't translate into those who are in power, who have the monopoly.Who have monopoly over coal tar drugs, or petrochemical drugs.They've got a system in place.So yeah, I got run into, and run over a few times.Because you're going outside the paradigm.Apparently so.I mean, it would benefit everybody to use oregano oil, to use the P73, to use the juice, to use this OregaMax, which saved me and continues to keep me going.But no, they fought it, and they keep fighting it.Are you familiar with Dr. Stanislaw Burzynski?Sure.Very quickly, I'll tell a brief story.This man was given authority by the FDA to investigate a non, really non-chemical way using amino acids to fight cancer.He was under the guise of the, and the permission of the FDA. And he opened up a pharmaceutical lab that was producing this, and he was getting dramatic results in curing cancers.And drug companies, pharmaceutical industry, and the political industry, even though they gave him permission, went after him .And over a period, I think it was 10 years.I may be wrong in that, but I think it was 10 years.Our government spent $16 million of your taxpayer dollars to fight this man, put him in bankruptcy, spending $2 million with- even though they said no harm was being done.Even though they were- he was under their auspices?Exactly.And he ended up winning -- - It's so tyrannical.He ended up winning, and the pharmaceutical- couple of pharmaceutical companies were trying to take his process from him illegally.And he's in function today.He's -- - Yeah, I know, he's helped some people I know of, but that's how it was with Hoxie.Morris Fishbein working for the Rockefellers, and there for the Rothschilds, descended on him and said, \"You either give us the formula or we'll kill- \"we'll destroy you\".And they did.Yeah.And they did.drove him down to Mexico, you know?Exactly, yeah.To Texas.And the human kind has lost because of tyranny.If we would just have an openness to allow us to learn about culture civilization, instead of destroying anything that's in our way, you see, then this has cost the human race tremendous.See, when you follow the money, you follow it and find the reasons.And we know how our political system is, and what's happening with it, sadly.It's all money-based, everything -- - That's right.The food industry...GMOs, for example, genetically modified organisms.Proven to be carcinogenic, to be undigestible, to be toxic, yet we're not even allowed to be told anymore whether it's a GMO product or not.I know, I know.You know?Raw milk!Yeah.You can sustain yourself on raw milk and never have to eat, and you would function and be healthy, yet they're going, especially the state of Maryland, going after farmers who are attempting to sell raw milk.Pasteurized milk has more -- - Ugh!Yeah.More pro- It's even, it becomes a protein that's toxic to us.Yes, and then acts as an anti oxidase enzyme, and the skimmed milk, how dangerous that is.And then of course even, there is medical use for marijuana.It was used in ancient Greece, Islamic empire, ancient Rome, to sedate and to- and even they used it to eliminate any consciousness post-surgically, so people could stay like laying there for a week and heal.There should be no prohibition about the strategic use of, if the states allow that.If the state representatives say, \"No, we'd love to have our farmers provide raw milk\".There shouldn't be no federal cops involved.Well, if you read the studies, if you gain access to the studies, and you arm yourself- and I always preach this, we need to take charge of ourselves, not put ourselves in the hands of somebody with a scientific medical degree.Waiting for the government to do something as well.Exactly, you know?And I talk about this.If I was in practice and told, I try to eliminate as much fluoride as I can, okay?Even though I was given the dogma that fluoride does, blah, blah, blah.But I know it doesn't, I've read the studies.I don't know if ever it was given as study in school?No. - Okay.It was just -- - It was dogma.It was just dogma- Give this, it does this.Okay, well, we're soaking in information when we're in school, you know?And we take it as gospel, and it is not.So I avoid it.But if I was in practice and I, you came into my office and I said, you know, \"I don't believe in fluoride.\"Don't use fluoride toothpaste.\"Don't do this or that\".I'm on a chopping block.What if I was a spy for the American Dental Association?They'd go after you.They'd go after me.And if you said, mercury is a toxin, it should never be used.They'd go after you.They'd do something towards you.Exactly.See, that's why I put up also here on this show, this writingrevolution.com.Writingrevolution.com?Right, Which is basically, rightandwrong2012.com, which is great for Pennsylvania, for instance.Why should we select one of these lackadaisical, apathy inducing, same-old same-old, twiddle-dee twiddle-dumb and think we're gonna vote strategically.When we could vote for someone that says, \"We have every right to have raw milk, they should stop the raw milk police, get the feds out of our life, get the feds out of the so-called drug war, the war on tyranny, the war on terror that they claim, which is, they're creating tyranny and terror.The interventions, the bombing and killing, the depleted uranium, put a stop to it all.So you have, you had Ron Paul who said absolutely no to all this stuff, \"Stop this, stop the TSA tyranny\".And the only one, that's actually an honest person.So people are still saying, \"Yeah, he was our focused one, \"telling them, make him your focus, \"and make the future stop the cheating, \"by doing right in votes\".You see, we could slowly, peacefully get the country back by bringing in handfuls of honest people, but the way we couldn't do it, is because they cheat us in the machines or in the caucuses.Like they did with Ron Paul, they cheated him out of Iowa.Cheated him out of Maine.Definitely cheated him.Well, what's interesting is, we should be...like, who gives us this right?We should be able to choose whether we want whole milk, pasteurized milk, raw milk.Whether we wanna go and have a different treatment for, if we, for some reason, developed a malignancy, to go have access to our way of thinking, or our beliefs, but we're denied that.And it's so interesting is, the drug companies have to go through double blind studies to bring a new drug on.So they give a double-blind study as they take a placebo, I'm drawing out here, and their new drug.And they give it for so long to half the population, you know, that they're testing, and then they reverse it.So, they then qualify- quantify and qualify it at the end.With chemicals used for cancer, does not have to be done.You just have to say, \"We have such and such -- \" - New, new, new formula.And then it's hid on you.Yeah, if they even do the studies.As you know, Rozen was prosecuted for faking 20 studies on Vioxx, and Vioxx killed 100, 150,000 people and ruined another half million.And they were fake.Nobody even did this studies!Well, here's -- - They got approved with a fake study.Aspirin kills about 60 people a-year.Yeah, minimum.Yeah.Remember the situation with L-tryptophan?Yes, that was Showa Denko's mistake with the GMOs. - Yeah, okay.With GMOs, which is critical.L-tryptofan wiped off accessibility.You can get it now, but it was wiped off.But right after it was wiped off, Prozac came on.Prozac, the fluorinated...Yeah, fluoride, exactly.So, is that a conspiracy?I don't know.Well, you're just a theorist and so am I, trying to find out who's behind these conspiracies and the fact that they really do exist.It sounds like a conspiracy, but the USDA asked me years ago, can you send some oregano oil and Rosemary oil?We're interested in this.And then they got it- I don't know why I even bothered sending it, because it's that same federal autocracy that we need to eliminate.It's crushing us, and has already crushed us.So they got the stuff and they ended up patenting.They put a patent on an oil of oregano based food processing product.It's a film that you wrap luncheon meats in and it's got oregano oil in it.I gave them the idea, the concept that oregano oil is a germicide, but yet the same federal government has been trying to attach me to oregano oil sales, to making money, and going around saying they wanna crush companies, and destroy me.And both the Canadian government and the US government have directly said to my face, \"We're trying to find you, \"we're watching you.\"We're trying to associate you with oregano oil\".If they're watching you, they're watching me now -- - Making money, and this type of thing.Yeah.So we can destroy you and destroy your efforts.Efforts to make people well...I had one Canadian guy, who was a lobbyist for the military industrial complex, who said, \"We're gonna get rid of you, \"and put you out on the curb with a tin can.\"And that's all you're gonna be, as a beggar.\"And we're gonna take over the oregano oil business\".I mean, I didn't know herbal medicine was gonna be such a dangerous venture -- - Well, they're trying to get you, to stop with that codex, to stop our access to therapeutic doses of natural things.And therefore, the Ron Paul- Let all of Pennsylvania cast a vote of redress for him, for example, as an example, as a fight.Because here's a guy who says, \"Stop the anti dietary supplement.\"Allow people to say what turmeric does, allow -- \" - Wonderful, wonderful spice to learn, yeah.Oregano oil's a germicide.Yeah, exactly.You can't say that now.To end on the oregano oil and so forth, I just have, a thought came in my head.And we're just about to wrap up this segment.I had a dog that was having a tooth issue.So I was giving her oregano oil directly in her mouth, and in her food, and everything.But I hadn't been given it for a while to the other five dogs.And I made a batch of food, had some bad meat in it.Five of the dogs had diarrhea and vomiting.The dog that I was given Oregano oil to, did not.And you triggered that with that wrap of oregano, she did not get sick.She did not vomit, she did not have diarrhea.Went on without skipping a beat.That's the story of life.You know?So do I witness this every single day of my life?It's a life saver.It is saving lives, and it will continue to save lives to the end of time.And you know what?We'll keep the government in check, that's what the voting's about.Let's do it!Doctor, we're gonna go to a break right now.Please stay tuned to, \"Let's Talk Healthy Pets with Dr. Cass Ingram,\" and my little Tucker, and myself.And we'll be back for segment part three.Thanks so much.Yeah, I think you got your voice across there.I think so.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Let_s_Talk_Healthy_Pets_-_The_Body_Shape_Diet_-_Part_2.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Let_s_Talk_Healthy_Pets_-_The_Body_Shape_Diet_-_Part_2.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Let_s_Talk_Healthy_Pets_-_The_Body_Shape_Diet_-_Part_2.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/Marriage_constitutional_amendment_Town_Hall_Mtg/Marriage_constitutional_amendment_Town_Hall_Mtg.mp3", "text": "As we move around, try to see if we can do that.See what its like.Good evening.I'd like to welcome everyone here tonight to the \"Marriage Amendment Forum\".I'm John Brandt chair of the Maplewood Human Rights Commission and moderator of tonight's forum.The forum is jointly sponsored by the Human Rights Commissions of the City of Maplewood and the city of Roseville.In the interest of Minnesota open meeting laws, Human Rights Commissioners from the City of Maplewood are present here this evening, but we will not convene a commission meeting tonight and no business of the commission will be conducted.We have four excellent speakers here this evening.Each are experts in their field.Are here tonight to share information and perspectives that we hope people will find useful in thinking through the pros and cons of the proposed marriage amendment.Before we hear from our first presenter, we want to explain how this forum was developed, provide some background on the marriage amendment and find out a little bit about who is in the audience this evening.Can I ask people to stand up if you are truly politically independent, we're not asking anybody to define themselves as a Republican or Democrat.Yeah, Bob, I think you've been outted.And we're not going to ask anybody what their position is on the amendment or whether you're Democrat or Republican or Conservative or Liberal, just if you are politically independent.Still standing, please remain standing.Okay.We got four people.Now second question among the people standing, if you have pretty much decided how you were going to vote on the marriage amendment, want you to sit back down.Okay.Thank you.Which leaves, maybe two people, maybe.Armando?Alright, good job.We got another recruit.Okay.We'Ve got a little experiment here and we're asking for two volunteers and we happen to have just two.If you would go see Maurice over here, we've got a little experiment and you two folks are going to be part of our integrity response at the end of this presentation, to give a little feedback on how we did with this event.So if you'll see Maurice, you'll get it via a name tag, and Theresa will give you a handout so that you know what the four questions are that we're going to be talking about tonight.And the questions for our integrity review panel, are up on the screen.I'll leave them up there for just a second.So you can see them.Unfortunately, I can't read them from here.So if you can read them, we'll also bring those up at the end of the forum.When voters go to the polls on November 6th, people will simply vote yes or no on the amendment questions.But the commission believes that citizens of Minnesota will vote yes or no for many different reasons.Many in the audience came here tonight with an opinion and not undoubtedly many are here this evening that have already decided how they're going to vote, and many people are perhaps even passionate about the outcome.So let's acknowledge that reasonable people see these issues very differently and that we all have a responsibility to be civil and respectful of our neighbors who have different viewpoints.Please listen and hear- I'm sorry.People listen and hear others better when discussions are more respectful than passionate.To bring everybody up to speed on the current status of gay marriage, I have a few slides and I'm gonna have to move down to the screen.can people still hear me okay?Yes.Gay marriage is recognized in six states and Washington DC states that currently recognize gay marriage include: Vermont New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York and Iowa.Civil unions are recognized in five states: Rhode Island, New Jersey, Delaware, Illinois, and Hawaii.Gay marriage is currently not legal in 39 states.In every state that has gay marriage, it has been the result of a legislative initiative or court action.In the 31 times that it has been put to a popular vote, gay marriage has been defeated, in every state.And incidentally, it has been put to a popular vote or will be put to a popular vote more than once in some states.This is a Gallup poll from 1996 to 2012.And it helps to realize the direction that gay marriage is going in the United States.In 1996, 68% of people polled by Gallup's, said that gay marriage should not be valid.Only 27% thought that they should be.You can see as over the years that these have converged.And for the first time in 2011, the Gallup poll showed that there was a reversal in 2011.And that currently now I think this was in June of 2012, that it's very close, 50% to 48%.in November, 2012, Gay marriage is on the ballot in four states.In Minnesota The ballot issue is to decide whether to ban gay marriage in Minnesota, in Maryland and Washington The ballot issue is a vote to wrap by legislation.And in May, if it passes, it will be a vote to legalize gay marriage.The polls indicate that each one of these ballot measures are very close in four states.If it passes in any of these states, it will be the first time that on ballot referendum supporting gay marriage has passed in the United States.Human rights commission announced over the summer that we would host two educational events on the proposed constitutional amendments, one on voter identification and the other on the marriage amendment.We chose two different formats for the town hall meetings.And here's why, there are basically two ways to provide a public event to learn more about important social issues.One is the traditional debate format to have speakers for and against a proposal, take polarized positions and present adversarial viewpoints.The other is the familiar academic discussion, essentially the traditional classroom that we are all familiar with from high school or college.With the academic format, speakers are invited for their knowledge in a particular area and asked to share information from their respective areas of expertise.The two proposed amendments are both controversial, but beyond that, they are quite dissimilar.The voter ID amendment is inherently political.So we chose a traditional debate format at the town hall meeting that we had at Maplewood city hall, two weeks ago.The marriage amendment is different.It reaches into the hearts minds and souls of many people in Minnesota and politicizes very personal relationships between people.While the voter ID amendment has the potential to change how people vote in Minnesota, the marriage amendment has the potential to change how people live in Minnesota.For those that were expecting to hear a debate tonight between warring factions over gay marriage, that is not the format.The commission shows the less polarizing, more civil and respectful academic format of an educational setting that all here tonight are well familiar with.Who should have the burden of responsibility to make the case for social change?Should it be those that propose a new constitutional amendment to maintain the status of traditional marriage?Or should it be those that are suggesting gay marriage should be recognized as a legitimate matter of civil rights?The truth is, we have difficulty- We had difficulty finding experts to speak on either side of this issue.The reasons actually are fairly obvious.There are a lot of people on both sides of the marriage amendment that are long on opinions, short on facts and loaded for bear.Our objective was to find four experts that have the education, credentials, knowledge and experience to bring highly credible information to the forum.To that end, the commission reached out to organizations on all sides of the marriage amendment and also, to neutral organizations to find expert speakers.We were dismayed that several pro amendment organizations declined our invitations.The commission contacted organizers at Minnesota For Marriage seven times.over the last three months, we reached out to them three times by email and four times by phone.We got no response by email and only one response by phone from a organization leader who told me that Minnesota For Marriage would not participate in our event, if there were people speaking against the amendment.At one point, we had to decide if we were going to cancel the event or hold the event as planned with experts that could speak knowledgeably to the controversies around the marriage amendment.We decided not to cancel the event, incidentally, our efforts to find speakers, to provide a more balanced forum this evening will, be a topic of discussion at the next human rights commission meeting on November 13th at 7:00 PM at city hall.We welcome your participation.So in the interest of integrity, it's important to note that our speakers here this evening are not without bias.All have studied the issues around gay marriage.For many years before this proposed marriage amendment.Each has written or spoken publicly about issues surrounding gay marriage.All four speakers are experts in their respective fields, but in the interest of disclosure, three of the four speakers have spoken or written publicly about why they believe the marriage amendment would not be good public policy.But all our presenters here tonight were invited to speak to not just one side of these complex issues, but rather to all sides of the many competing values, principles and issues related to marriage, families, and children in Minnesota.They are here tonight not to speak to their conclusions, but rather to share some of the facts, research, information, experience, and perspectives that we hope will lead those in the audience to their own conclusions.We are expecting all of our speakers to be long on facts and short on opinions.We hope every member of the audience here this evening will listen critically to the information that speakers will share with you.And you will be the judge as to whether the information presented leads you to vote yes, or vote no on the amendment.At the end of the- At the end of the forum, we will ask our review panel members to indicate whether they think we met our objectives this evening for educational integrity.Let me say briefly why this amendment matters to so many people.If it passes, gay marriage in Minnesota will be unconstitutional.Pass or fail, it will affect a lot of people in Minnesota.And let me tell you why the outcome may not decide the future of marriage in Minnesota.On November 7th, the morning after the election day, the sun will rise as it always has, regardless of the outcome of the marriage amendment gay marriage in Minnesota will still be illegal.And there's another important reason why the outcome might be short-lived.This issue is already in the federal courts and may end up being decided by the Supreme court.Our law professor here this evening, Mark Ostler will speak to these issues in just a minute.So with all this in mind, I'd like to share with you one of my favorite quotes: \"Everything is either going to get better or it's going to get worse.So we are either worrying about nothing or we are worrying too soon\".Here's the format for our speakers tonight.Each speaker will have about 15 minutes to present their information.We will have time for questions after each speaker.And we believe that by allowing questions from the audience to challenge our panel, by respectfully raising good questions, we can maintain both integrity and civility.We will take a break halfway through the forum.After the break, we will hear from our last two speakers, get some feedback from our review panel and we'll leave time at the end for refreshments.I'd like to introduce, excuse me, all of our, our speakers this evening.And I'll ask you to hold your applause until I've introduced all four speakers.Our first speaker will be professor Mark Ostler.Mark Ostler is a professor of law at the university of St. Thomas in Minneapolis, a graduate of the college of William and Mary and Yale law school.His work frequently strikes at the intersection of law and faith.He currently is the head of the association of religiously affiliated law schools.In 2009, Mr. Ostler published a book titled Jesus on death row, challenging the death penalty based on the experience of Christ as a criminal defendant.He writes regularly on religion and law for the Huffington post and has been interviewed as an expert on sentencing and related issues on CNN. NPR is morning edition and ABC's good morning America.He's been sourced in hundreds of newspapers.In 2009 Mr. Ostler was the lead counsel on a case before the U.S Supreme court, on the winning side of a Supreme court decision regarding federal sentencing guidelines.His work on one case is portrayed in the Samuel Goldwyn Film, American Violet.Dr. Laura Boysen is a professor at Augsburg college.She earned her doctorate degree from the university of Minnesota.Since 1996 She has been teaching and doing research at Augsburg college in the department of social work.In the 1990's, she was a researcher in the center for advanced studies in child welfare.She has recently been doing research on the meaning of marriage with gay couples and how children are affected by being raised in gay or lesbian households.Anne-Kaner Roth is the executive director of project 515.She earned an MSW in public policy from Boston University.She's on the national board of directors of the equality Federation.In 2006 and 7, she was the University of Minnesota, Humphrey Institute as a policy fellow.She lives in Minneapolis with her husband Mark and three children.Reverend Grant Stevenson has been a Pastor for 20 years.And besides Minnesota has ministered in Wisconsin, Taiwan and new Guinea.He is currently a Pastor at St. Matthew's Lutheran Church in St. Paul and the faith director for Minnesota United for all families.Reverend Stevenson, and his wife, Karen have five sons.Would you please give a welcome to our panel.And with that, I will turn it over to our first presenter professor, Mark Ostler.Well, it's a pleasure to be here.The first thing I should probably make very clear is that I'm from the university of St. Thomas, but I don't represent the official views of the university of St. Thomas.I really, really don't.If you, if you followed the discussion there.I am really fortunate though, to work in a place where there's a diversity of viewpoints.This is an issue, and I'm going to talk about the legal perspective as well as my own personal perspective.I can't really separate the two since I'm an attorney, but I think there's principal positions on both sides of this debate.About a year ago, I wrote a piece for the Star Tribune about the coming controversy on this.And talk to my- The person in the office next to me is Teresa Colette, who is one of the leading speakers on the other side, who's a friend of mine and a colleague and someone whose opinion I respect.And I talked to her about that I was going to start writing about this.And one of the things that I told her, that I'm going to tell you right now as my starting point, is what I think is the best argument on the other side.And it's not legal at all.It's a simple story of a few moments that some of you have experienced, I think, and it's this: I'm a father.I have three children, my wife and I have put those children at the center of our lives, as some of you have with your own children.When they were babies, there was something that happened with those babies and us.And it was this, that when I was holding one of the boys, all three of them are boys.I was swinging them around and pretending that they were falling and catching them and tossing them up in the air.And then when my wife took them, she didn't do that.She held them close, wrapped her arms around them, kept them still and calm.And there's something very deep in that that men and women are different in certain ways.Now, is it socially constructed?Is it something that is within our nature?I don't know.And I can't say I know exactly what that is, but there is something probably to having one person there who is tossing the baby around and the other person whose instinct is to hold that baby close and still.So why is it that I'm against this amendment?And why am I against it so much that I have been fairly outspoken?It's because there's several parts of me that have overwhelmed that instinct that I can't quite describe fully.One of them is legal.And I'm going to talk about the legal aspect of it in a couple of ways.First of all, the law already prohibits gay marriage in Minnesota.There's a statute that defines marriage as being between one man and one woman.So this isn't going to change the law in any way.What it's going to amend is the constitution and the constitution is fundamentally different than a law, than a statute.A law, and I, you know, I'm a prosecutor at heart.I was a federal prosecutor in Detroit before I started teaching.And you know, if you want to do serious law enforcement, Detroit's the place to go.It was, it was fascinating, but it was all about law.And the thing about law about statute civil or criminal, is it restricts freedom.It tells you what you can't do.You can't go and take that money If it's not yours, you can't hit that guy in the bar.It's a set of rules that restricts freedom.Now, as a society, we think that's an acceptable restriction on freedom.In civil law there are some things that within the law, if somebody does it to you, they can sue you.They can enforce a contract, if you sign that contract.It limits your freedom to walk away from the contract.That's what law and statutes do.But one of the geniuses of the framers of the constitution is that the constitution is different.And what was revolutionary in that time is that it gave freedom to individuals as against their government.You know, there was an idea that that goes deep into British history, but it came to full fruition in the constitution.We talk about what's amazingly new about that document, about why other countries look to it for guidance, is because it does something beyond restrict freedom like laws do.It's not a law, in a way, it's the opposite of a law.It's what stops the government from restricting our freedoms.And it does it in a few ways.Alexander Hamilton wrote very eloquently about this in the Federalist papers.And one of the things that he expresses over and over is that you have to have divided government.But beyond that, Jefferson in particularly, Madison, in writing the bill of rights, the first amendments to the constitution expressly gave individual rights to people, protected them from their government because they didn't trust government to intrude on the most personal aspects of a person's life.It was something new and different and wonderful.And since that time, with one exception in the federal law, as we've amended the constitution, we've been very careful not to use the constitution to restrict freedoms because that's the opposite of its true purpose, which is to protect individual freedoms versus a government whose instinct is to limit them and to take from us, our money and our freedom.That one exception of course, was prohibition.That didn't turn out very well.Now, in the case of Minnesota, Minnesota's constitution, in many ways, replicates the federal constitution.In fact, it includes most of the bill of rights in its text.It does the same thing as the federal constitution, and that was intentional.It protects individual freedoms.It doesn't take them away.In the amendments, and you know, there's a website you can go to and pull up all the amendments to the Minnesota constitution.And I did this and I read them all and there's a lot of them, but what's fascinating about them is they do three things.One of them, one of those things is that it affects the structure of government.You know, that this department's going to report to this person, things like that.The second thing that it does is talk about budgetary issues about the way that money can be raised or spent, how bonds can be passed, how municipalities can raise money.And the third thing, and there's much fewer of these, but there are some, it enlarges individual liberties.It doesn't restrict them, for example, giving women the right to vote and amend the constitution to do that.And so we've got those three things.What we don't have in the Minnesota constitution up to this point is a constitutional amendment that restricts individual liberties.Because if we think an individual liberty should be restricted, we expressed that in a law as Minnesotans already have done.And I think that's very powerful because as much as my friend Theresa believes very strongly and sincerely, not out of bigotry, but out of religious belief, that that principle of marriage being between one man and one woman is important.There's a countervailing also conservative principle at play here.And that's the principle of what a constitution is supposed to do.And I think that's something that's very important as we go forward.I also oppose this amendment as a Christian.I'm not going to speak on that.I'm going to defer for Reverend Stevenson on that.But I will say that I know how controversial that is.I wrote a piece for CNN several months ago, and it was called the Christian Case for gay marriage.And it got over 12,000 comments.And I got a lot of email too, several people thought I should be cast into a lake of sulfur, which fortunately it hasn't happened yet.But the third reason that I am, and this crosses over into my legal views as well.Is that I'm, pro-life, I'm not ashamed to say that.I believe in a constant pro-life ethic.I am against the death penalty as just was mentioned last week, in fact, I was in California talking about that at Fuller seminary.I'm also against abortion.I don't think abortion should be legal.And I write and speak about that.I just finished a piece for Stanford's law review that I'm going to go out and speak on regarding abortion.But one of the reasons that I'm pro-life, and this is linked both to my view of the law and my view of my faith, is because there is an imperative that we value life, that we value the life that God has created within and amongst us.And yes, to me, that means protecting unborn children.It also means not executing people, even those who are guilty, but it means something beyond that.It means also that people who are here, those who are amongst us, everyone has the right to be who they were created to be.I don't think having known a number of gay men and lesbians that they chose that, especially in Texas, where I lived for 10 years, where being a gay man or a lesbian caused you to be cast out of every circle that you were a part of.Who would choose that?And when I was in Texas, I worked at Baylor university.Baylor university has a policy that they do not hire gay men or lesbians as faculty or staff.They do not allow them to enroll as students.And in fact, when I started teaching there, the rule was that it wasn't even that people were sexually active, just the status of same-sex attraction was a bar to admission.And I taught there, unfortunately, without thinking through the implications of that.What we were telling people, those amongst us who were gay and some of them were my students, was that there was no love for you on earth or in heaven.And I feel very deeply that that's not something that we have the right to say to others.And then I think that if there is love for those people on earth and in heaven, it should be within the covenant of marriage.The last thing before I conclude, we lawyers tend to be very much on time because if we're not a judge yells at us, is as a father.I started out talking about fathers and being a father.And the reason it matters to me as a father is that I hear the arguments from the other side, that there's a threat to children posed by gay marriage.And the argument I suppose, is that if there is gay marriage, then children will see that gay men and lesbians are married to one another.It will undermine their belief in heterosexual marriage.And they'll be less likely to get married themselves.Which to me seems like a fairly obtuse set of connections.But as a father, there's something that I know and it's this; there are gay men and lesbians in relationships in this state, in this community, within my own school who have children and they're not hypothetical children.They're real children with names.It's Katie and Bobby.They're kids that go to school with my kids.And they have two parents who care for them.Maybe two women, maybe two men.But for those children, I believe what the other side said says is true.That those parents in marriage are better parents.That marriage provides a stability that's good for children.And if I care about those children, those real actual children with names and birthday parties and graduation dates, I should want their parents to be married and have the ability to do that and have the law reflect that important reality.Thank you.We are going to take questions for Professor Ostler.Who has any questions for Mr. Ostler?I'm Bob Zik and I do public television.And I was hoping- let me just hold this.I was hoping that you would actually touch on the law concerning this issue and not get focused on the emotional feeling of the issue.Now, I mean, you started off by saying that it shouldn't be in the constitution because it's restricted.But maybe it should be in constitution because it's protective.Those are some bad things.And then we get down here, to \"have the right to be who they are\".Nobody takes that right away.Nobody takes the right from a gay person to love who they want to love.So, I don't think you need to go there.I'm not threatened by gay, lesbian, transgender, not at all.As a Christian we're taught to love everyone because we all share the same father, God.Now let's- I want to touch a little bit- - Is there a question coming here Bob?There is a question, I'm gonna ask him a question.Because the normal argument I guess is the 14th amendment.No one shall deny the equal protection under the law, The law applies to everybody correct?So let's look at discrimination from a legal perspective what does discrimination mean?My understanding or what has been taught to me it means to make a distinction.That's what discrimination in the law means to make a distinction.Now, when you look at the law concerning this, because when you mentioned that this issue will be taken or is in the courts, there's the rational basic basis test rational basis for the distinction, correct.Different treatment discrimination.The discrimination is a distinction.I'm going to have to ask you to quickly get to your question.Well we'd like to understand the law and I'm asking how to explain this law so I'm gonna make two more points here.Okay so if you could get to you question quickly.The next, next part of that is strict scrutiny test.If the law impact the fundamental right or a suspect classification and what would be, is there a compelling state interest.Now suspect classification- - Now you're giving a lecture to a professor- Just give us another second here.You are not asking a question, you're giving a lecture.If we could get to a question- - Aspect classification, race, religion, gender, national borders, not sexual preference.And your question is?The question is, what is the legal basis for challenging this in courts under the 14th amendment?I have a short answer to that, that is that I didn't address that because it's not an issue here.Of course, there's not a challenge to the Minnesota amendment.It hasn't been enacted.I'm talking to voters.That's how it's being decided.That's where the law rests right now.Next question.Yes, sir.You broached the issue of- right now.We have gay people raising children that raises the issue of adoption.Is it not the case that it is legal for gay people to adopt in the city, and if that is so, do you have an opinion as to why the legislature simply didn't ban adoption by gay people?If the, one of the major objects of this amendment is to protect children?Yeah, I can't, I'm not a family law expert.The constitution is one of my fields, but, but to answer that question and I always try to be generous to the people who made the decision if I wasn't there.If I just remembered that legislature, one reason I might make that distinction from area principle is that with adoption, you have people who are the natural parents of the child, where it then is going to- they're in a new relationship and the original mother or father is now out of the picture.Now there's a same-sex partner.They let that partner adopt the child so that there will be two parents.And I think that was seen as something where that relationship was going to be there anyways.And they couldn't intercede or affirm it or deny it in any way.And, you know, from a point of compassion, the other thing is that I think that social workers who play a key role in adoption, part of their code is that they don't discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation.That because so much of adoption goes through social workers and has social worker involvement that if you mandated that kind of description of who could adopt and who couldn't, you would lose their cooperation in that important process.One of the arguments I hear is that clergy people do not want to be put in the boxes of they must marry gay or lesbian couples, and could you explain if that's a legitimate way to go about this or not?My interpretation of it simply is that it could become something that could be used as a weapon if you go about it like that, so could you explain that?Yeah.That's a question that first of all, it's pretty far away from what we're talking about with the amendment.I mean, with the amendment it's if what's already in the law is going to be put into the constitution.That said, let's say we were talking about one of those other states where what they're voting on is to allow gay marriage directly.In those states, of course you have clergy saying the same thing.Clergy always have had the freedom to not marry people that they don't approve of.If I was to go to the Catholic church and say, I want you to marry me to someone, they would say you're not Catholic and not let me be married there.And that's something that's respected by the state.And so I think that that is something that would be such a radical departure from our current relationship between the state power and religion, that it's pretty unimaginable.Did you have a follow up on that?The reason I bring it up is because it's one of the reasons people are handing out to people.And so the distinction really is that marriage is a civil process and isn't it?The story with the churches, if you will, right or option to marry people and- two separate services, you have the civil ceremony and the religious ceremony.There are always these options that's why we got so far from what this is really about.Well, I'm fortunate to have Reverend Stevenson here because he actually has married people.And so I'll defer to him and he'll probably address it in his part.I'm Tim Finley, I also would like some more on the constitutional issues.One comment you made was, we don't have in our constitution which restricts liberties in Minnesota Constitution, which is different than the federal constitution.17 year old's can't vote.Even in the federal constitution you have to be a certain age, 21, 35 to be able to do things.Judge, to judge, you have to be learned within the law.There's all kinds of restrictions that are in our constitution.What is the constitution about?Because why is the is the relationship between things, and people and the way our corporate government is designed is that people are the final authority.The people determine the relationship, with government that has to follow it.Just briefly on that, the restrictions that you're talking about, a restriction to the relationship in the government, and that's different than what we're talking about here, which is the relationship between people.And so I think that's an important distinction.Okay, last question.Hi. I'm Kenny Noel.I have two moms.and the fact that they know when they married, they talk about the bills and, and how they express the matter of how they want everything because it's separate.Well, if, I, let me just make sure I understand the question correctly, and that is that you've got two moms and right now they have to deal with everything separately as your parents.Instead of being a unit as a whole?And that's part of- you're exactly the person I was talking about.You know that there are things that go with marriage.I was talking about the stability, but there's also that.There's the recognition of the family unit.And you know what, whether your mothers are married to one another or not, you're a family.And, and the society generally accepts that.If marriage is a good thing for a family to have as a part of it, then this is a pro-marriage thing to allow your mothers to get married to one another.Okay thanks for your question.We'll move on to our next speaker, Dr. Laura Boysen.Good evening.I actually worked, not only at Augsburg college, but I'm also doing some adjunct work at the University of Minnesota.And again, these are not any reflection on, I'm not speaking for either of the university or the college.I actually was going to start tonight by saying how glad I was to be here.Because in fact, the project at my house tonight is doing some foundation work on my house, doing some masonry.And of course that's not an area of my expertise.And I was thinking, man, this has gotten me out of something.Good.I do think that DIY network gives you a little false sense of security nowadays.But now I - What I'm hoping is that I can talk a little bit about the family.This is a- for the past two or three decades, I've been working with infants and families and children.And what I'm hoping to do is kind of talk about what we know about what's good for children.What's good for infants.What's good for families.And actually wanted to talk a little bit about how families have changed because they have changed significantly, during my lifetime.We know that families now look a lot different than the mid 1950s, the mid 1960s.Many of us in this crowd probably grew up watching the Cleaver Family, maybe the Brady Bunch and families, really the majority of families in the U.S now most families for parents who have children.Most of those families have children that are over 18 years of age.Most of them, most families, the majority of families now don't have young children.So people are marrying, we know at an older age.We know that the highest number of births to women are to women who are now over age 30.We know that from 1970 to 2000, children in two parent families actually decreased from 85% to below 70%.And currently over 13 million, there are over 13 million single parents.And most of the single parents that have children are women.And although most of these women work, a third of them are living in poverty.And we know that the biggest, the largest variable for poor outcomes for children is if you live in a family or a home where you're low income.And in fact, we know the divorce rate is as high as nearly 60% of new marriages, now end in divorce.We know that approximately 10% of children are now living in homes with their grandparents.And if those children living in their grandparents home, are without a parent in that home, they're more likely to be poor.This is what perhaps is one of the most amazing statistic.When you think about the impact of poverty on poor outcomes for children, is that 50% of all children in the U.S will at some point while they're a child, be on food stamps.And if you're a black child in this country, 90% of black children are at some point going to be on food stamps.So many times as I tell my students, the fastest way into poverty for a woman is divorce.The fastest way out of poverty is marriage.And finally, one other statistic in terms of families and marriage is the drop in the marriage rate in this country.The Annie E. Casey foundation is reporting that over the past 30 years, there's been a 40% drop in the number of U.S citizens who are getting married.And that delay is based on seems to be due to the economy.We are increasingly seeing folks cohabitate that are unmarried.And so from these stats, we know that families are really looking very different than what they used to look like.We also know that children are growing up in gay and lesbian families.When we- the 2010 data, the census data tell us that there are at least 900,000 same-sex couple households.And this is an increase in 52%, from 2000 to 2010.And it's estimated that 22% of partnered lesbians and 5% of gay men have children in their households.So we know that that even though folks can't marry, that, in fact, at least in Minnesota, that in fact, what we're seeing is we're seeing kids live in families with two moms and or two dads.One of the things I would like to say, when you think about poverty and poor outcomes for children, we know that gay men, out gay men earn more money than heterosexual couples.We know that in fact, women earn- Lesbian women, they earn more money than heterosexual women.And so one of the things, if you're thinking about what's good for kids, we know that poverty is not good for kids.And in fact, because lesbian and gay couples are more highly educated, they are more likely to have advanced degrees, college degrees.In fact, they tend to have higher median incomes.There has been a lot of research and here, I want to point out some things about Google, because one of the things that people- in fact, I did this today.I Googled children raised by gay and lesbian couples.And if you do that, what you're going to do is you're going to see a whole page.The first page is going to be a gentleman by the name of Reganour.And he is at the university of Texas at Austin.And he's recently published some research that gives lots of poor outcomes for kids that are in gay and lesbian households.The reason I say that is because I caution you to not always go to the front page.What you might want to do is Google, and then go to the academic site or the scholar site, because that will give you a more balanced view in terms of the literature.And let me just talk about kids that are raised in gay and lesbian homes.The bulk of the literature says that those kids are more empathic.And in fact, the census that they're more empathic because they face more scrutiny and they may face more bias, with the things that are said against- about them and about their families.These kids that are raised in gay and lesbian homes, they are no likely- they are no more likely to be gay, than kids raised in heterosexual homes.They seem to have the same level of self-confidence and ego strength.Unfortunately, they do sometimes suffer because of the bias that they may face because of their parents.And one of the other things, in the comparison is that you'll notice lesbians- Lesbian couples are more often than single heterosexual females, single heterosexual mothers, to include men in their children's lives.They have an appreciation that they need to have- They need- As you were talking about how men are throwing up their children, women are more cuddly.They seem to understand that in fact, they need to have the different sorts of interactions with their kids.The other thing, when you look at the literature is that when you think about are gay and lesbian couples happy?As happy as heterosexuals?In general gay couples report as much satisfaction as heterosexual couples.And when you look at lesbian couples, they actually report more satisfaction in their relationships than heterosexual couples.Finally, I have done some- One of the things that a colleague and I were interested in is why are gay and lesbian people getting married?In particular, we were interested in, we researched older lesbians because the literature is pretty replete in the, back to that older lesbians are sometimes pretty protective about their social identity category, because they don't want to face bias.And so they may be more likely to be closeted.And so one of the questions we had was, why would they go to a county clerk's office and kind of face, what we call in social work, we call it microaggressions.Why would they want to have bias come their way?And so what we did was we, we interviewed some folks in California, some women in California, Washington state, Iowa, and what we found was similar themes that you'll find in the research.And I also want to tell one little story before I get to the themes, there were several couples we interviewed that had gotten married in San Francisco.At the time when the mayor opened up marriage.And I don't know if any of you have seen any of the footage about that particular day in San Francisco, where the mayor opens it up.And what happens is gay and lesbian couples start forming outside of the courthouse waiting to get married.Well, there's a driving rainstorm and they decide that even in the driving rainstorm, they are going to stay outside of that courthouse.Many people don't get in the courthouse that day to get married.And so the police come out about five o'clock and they say to many of these couples, you need to leave.You can't assemble here overnight.And several couples said that they talked about, they talked to the police and they said, well, what are you going to do if we don't leave?Will you arrest us?And the police officer said, well, probably not.So there was like a monsoon rainstorm throughout the night, and the crowd continued to grow.And there are stories about people in San Francisco coming to the courthouse throughout the evening, bringing food, bringing umbrellas, bringing raincoats and bringing chairs for people to sit in and supporting those folks who were waiting in line, who were scared that if they left the line, that they would never be permitted to get back into the line so that they could marry the next day when the courthouse opened.So that's a little bit of, kind of the resolve that many had in California.And when you look at the literature about, and when you talk to the people about - and you talk to these lesbians about why would you go through this?Why would you choose to marry?Many of them talk about wanting the legal and civil rights that come with marriage, that Anne's actually going to be talking about.Many, talked about how they were very surprised.These women that we spoke to had been, who had been together anywhere from 10 to 35 years.And some of them, actually, some of them were very surprised, and they talked about how, when they got married, there was a deepening commitment to their relationship.They talked about how marriage changed their perceptions about how they were as a couple, and that they now felt legally and financially more secure.And in fact, for the folks in California, we talked to several folks that they now had rights to their California pensions.And these were people who were no longer- They didn't have to worry about living in poverty.They also said that they had much more of a feeling of permanence.So when you look at the literature, the literature is pretty, it's pretty clear that gay and lesbian parents, are not - There are no poor outcomes for kids because of gay lesbian parents.And that marriage somehow creates a permanence and more of a financial security.And finally, one other thing I want to say when I had a real job before I started teaching, I actually worked in infant mental health.And one of the things that was very clear when we worked with infants and toddlers, and that we believe very- So any of you that know Selma Fraiberg and the research she has done is that children are mirrors of their, she just said mirrors of their mothers.We like to say mirrors of their primary caretakers.And one of the things that we know is that if in fact, the parents are secure, not living in poverty and not depressed, feeling secure in terms of their family and the commitment that in fact children do much better.And so I would say that one of the things we need to think about is if children are in fact mirrors of their parents, in terms of their mental health, we need to look at that literature very seriously.As we think about what sorts of policies we enact for children, or for children and parents.Thank you.Are there any questions for Dr. Boysen?I want to ask people to identify themselves by first name so we can keep a record.I'm David, I have a question on internationals, people moving in from other cultures, into like these cities.What's that research on them, where their families are.I'm curious to see that maybe you're tapping into some research on people moving in from other cultures into and living in our cities.And this is unrelated to this, to this topic.What would kind of be your research with families in general?Oh, so you're wondering about, yeah, so we are, There are actually, we have four groups of people.We actually are either the first, we are first in the country or second in the country in terms of these populations moving, immigrating here.So for instance, among folks, the car in- Actually I'm trying to pull from my lecture, I just did last week in terms of immigration, we actually are a hotbed in terms of immigration and twin cities.And you're wondering, and besides that, the additional question is- - The views of marriage, family, things you'd have to face with when you immigrate?Okay.So as you know, when people immigrate, they immigrate with the cultures that they had in their home country.And so really the- One of the tasks for families who immigrate is when they get to the first-generation or that second generation, how do they then mold into their family, kind of what happens with the mores, of the United States with what's happening in their home countries.And so what you'll see is that many of the parents who immigrated will stick with traditional values and then their children, and then their grandchildren will start to integrate the values of the United States.And in fact, what you'll find in that generation of young children that have moved here perhaps at a young age, is that many times you'll find that those kids take on the United States persona very strongly.And so there can be a lot of tension.And, in fact, many times the people that are seen for problems or in, within the family are those families where they've been unable to kind of negotiate those inherent intensions of immigrant parents and this first generation.So it is a tension.Other questions?I appreciate you mentioning about the 1950s, and the families back then compared to today.But I think that's a part of the problem is that, the culture has been the needing a father, making a big effort to push the father, now.The statistics for fatherless families, and the kids being deprived of continuity is very high, but, but that is not, I mean, kicking a father out does not help our country.Does not help the tax burden, the taxes, everything.So I don't see that as a positive step of, even for heterosexuals that are families.One of the things I would say about that, Tim is actually a public policy.When you look at the researcher on public policy and what's best for families, one of the things that's not good for families is the inequity between- the inequity that we're seeing in our country right now, in terms of low-income versus high-income.And when you look at those inequities, it is, the inequity in the U.S is as high now as it was in the 1920s.And we know that when there's that kind of inequity and the kind of- We just, we're having- There are books being written right now about what's happening with our males, with our male youth.And terms of that- We don't have strong policy for what to do around our young men, and that we need to have more social policies that actually speak to education, getting them educated, getting them jobs, those sorts of things.And that, in fact, I would agree with you completely.I think that a two parent household maybe where we would disagree was who those two parents are, but certainly two parent households.We know that they are more apt to not live in poverty and they are more sensitive and more responsive and receptive to their children.And so I actually would agree with you completely, that two parent households are in fact much better for children.There are many more resources for those kids and they have much better outcomes.Okay, were going a little bit long.There will be a time again for additional questions for all the panelists.We're just going to take a 10 minute break.We have water and cookies, at the table.If you did see the surveys, when you came in, we'd like to have everybody fill out a survey, we mentioned that the the cable, the broadcast here this evening is being recorded.By Ransom Washington Cable Commission.The recording will be Cablecast by the city of Maple, on channel 16 and will be online at the city of Maplewood.And at RWCable.com.Before I introduce Anne again, I'd like to ask Gary, if he would like to make comments to the audience.Hi my name is Gary Grefenberg.I'm chair of the Roseville Human Rights commission, one of the two co-sponsors of this event.I wanted to welcome you tonight, especially wanted to thank John and the Maplewood human rights commission for their efforts to hold this forum in an unbiased, and fair way.I want to repeat, repeated efforts were made with the Minnesotans For Marriage to send a speaker.They consistently refused.So we tried our best.I also want to add that the Roseville human rights commission, believes that human rights are controversial, but that should not reclude rational and respectful dialogue on these issues.Human rights in this country, have always been controversial.If there had been a referendum in Mississippi and Alabama and Georgia, we never would have seen the civil rights and the rights of black people to exercise their .So from our viewpoint, the Roseville human rights commission believes that marriage is a civil right and civil law, civil law and civil constitutions- should permit all of those.Irrespective their sexual orientation, the ability to exercise that right.So thank you again for coming.If you'd like further information on future human rights events and activities, please sign up by the water on your way out.Oracle, an event next Monday night, on religious perspectives on same-sex marriage.This event will have the Representative Pastors from a variety of religious perspectives, including those of an evangelical persuasion proceeding- Will be speaking from their beliefs.So we invite all of you to come to Roseville Monday night.There's some flyers here.If you'd like to further continue the dialogue on religious perspectives.Thank you.Okay thanks Gary.Anne, we have two different microphones that you can use.You can use the handheld microphone.You can use the one at your desk or the podium.We have one that you can take if you need to walk out, to see your presentation.If you need to be able to see your PowerPoint.Well, thank you very much, John.And thanks so much everybody for being here tonight.I'm really glad to be here this evening.I appreciate both human rights commissions, invitation to speak with you tonight.I'm Anne-Kaner Roth I am the executive director of project 515, and I'm going to talk with you a little bit about project 515 and the work that we do as well as the research that we've done, which really relates to the topic on your agenda, which are the kinds of rights and responsibilities that couples access with legal civil care.So just a little bit about project 515.Project 515's mission is equal rights and considerations under the law for same-sex couples in Minnesota.And just to reiterate what some of the speakers have referenced, currently in Minnesota law, marriage between same-sex couples is not legal.And this came into play in 1997 when the Minnesota legislature hatched its own version of what we've seen at the federal level as the defense of marriage act.And see some of the language here on the slide, in law, which states that lawful marriage is only between persons of the opposite sex and that marriage between the persons of the same-sex is prohibited.So just to clarify, not really have, what the law is in Minnesota currently.So just a little bit of background of how we got to where we are at this point.Looking at this ballot measure, which we will have on the ballot exactly two weeks from today, ballot measures have been passed by the legislature.They bypass the governor and go directly to the electorate to approve or, or deny.And so you see on the slide, what we saw happen at the Minnesota legislature with the constitutional amendment passing in the Senate, as well as in the house on a bipartisan manner, on both sides.In fact, there were Republicans that opposed the amendment there were Democrats that supported it, again legislature bypasses the governor.So although the governor folks may remember, I issued a symbolic veto of the amendment, the ability to approve these kinds of amendments go directly to the electorate.And on the evening of the passage of the bill in the final body of legislature, that campaign, which was called Minnesotans United for all families, was launched to work against this amendment, and to defeat it on the ballot.Language that folks will see on the ballot is important to look at it, see and think.I've been working with this issue and with this campaign now for what's going on almost two years, and what I've seen in the discussions that I have with voters every day is that there is a lot of confusion about what this question is, what language would be on the ballot and what that question actually means.And so I think it's important to take a look at it, in advanced point to the ballot box and the language we'll see is shall the Minnesota constitution be amended to provide that only the union of one man, and one woman shall be valid or recognized as a marriage in Minnesota?Yes or no.As we talk about a little bit marriage for same-sex couples in Minnesota is presently illegal.So a yes vote puts a ban on same-sex marriage in the constitution, which replicates what we already have in statute.A no vote keeps the current, basically the status quo.There's a little bit about Project 515, what we work on as we move into some of the research that we do.Project 515 has four primary strategies.The first is public education.We do quite a lot of public speaking and talking about the research that we do, telling the stories of the families, which I'll be getting to in just a moment.One of the things that we find is that it is illuminating for people to hear about the kind of impact that Minnesota law has on families in Minnesota, presenting on that as well.One of the niches that Project 515 has in the community, is specific outreach in the corporate community, folks may know that Minnesota has a special corporate community, and that is per capita, the largest in the country in terms of fortune 500 companies.And interestingly enough, some 70% of those companies have offered domestic partner benefits to their employees for decades, in fact.And so Minnesota businesses have really stepped out in the past for quite some time in terms of trying to level the playing field for their employees.And finding a legislative advocacy is one of the keystones of Project 515.So as we work towards eliminating the 515 laws that discriminate against same-sex couples who work at the state Capitol, to change those thoughts.Some of the research that we have done works on surveying Minnesotans.In fact, Project 515, did the very first survey of Minnesotans to start to understand how Minnesotans felt about issues related to equality for same-sex couples in Minnesota.And one of the things that we found was that eight out of ten of the respondents said that government shouldn't treat people differently because of their sexual orientation.And that 70% Minnesotans said that gays and lesbians have the same rights and responsibilities as everybody else.And this is the same data really that we have gathered year after year asking questions in many different ways.But what we found is that in Minnesota, Minnesotans really do support equality.The primary research however, that Project 515 is really known for came originally out of William Mitchell school of law, where we worked with law professors there and students to essentially gather data on Minnesota statutes by calling through every statute in Minnesota, to find out how many statutes afforded rights or benefits or responsibilities to people by the ability to access marriage.And so what we used were keywords like spouse and marriage to see what would that trigger for families in Minnesota.And what we found is that there were, as you've probably gathered by now, at least 515 laws in Minnesota, that discriminate against same-sex couples and their families by not allowing marriage for those families.And what we see in that research really is laws that impact families, really in the full spectrum of life.Everywhere from, from birth to death, you see differences in the way that same-sex couples are treated to married couples, in so many different ways in healthcare, in social services, in politics, in providing for your family.And also at the time of death and beyond.We know that these are things that hurt families deeply as the speaker before me referenced.There are many, many same-sex couples in Minnesota that are raising children.So just to kind of dig into it a little bit more, if you can see this slide, we can see really the range of laws that we're talking about.91 Laws that relate to death, estates and trusts.28 Laws that relate to courts and criminal law.37 Laws that relate to tax and property.So you start to see that we really are talking about every way in which the law impacts people's lives, whether that's your day to day life or a certain events over the course of your lifetime, these statutes really do impact families all the way through.So I want to tell a little bit about some of these various specific statutes.I find that it's usually interesting for people who can't wrap their head around, what could these 515 statutes really be.And how is that meaningful to people in Minnesota.So the first one that I have up here says the spouse of a patient is the first person a treating physician must consult, if a patient can't consent to treatment.And this might be something that folks who are married in the room would just sort of assume, this is kind of social convention, right?So you're in the hospital and your spouse is unconscious, not able to make decisions for themselves.And you're there, you're the spouse or the partner who should be the person that helps to make those decisions.In fact, this is something that is directed by statute in Minnesota, specifically to the legal next of kin.And for a same-sex couple a legal next of kin is never going to be the same-sex partner because they are not legally married.So they are not legally related in the eyes of the law.So here's a story that was told to us that highlights what this could look like for real families.This is the story of Earl and Chuck.And Earl and Chuck had been together for several years at the time of this story, when Chuck experienced a medical emergency, while he was out of running, he was taken to the hospital.Fortunately, although he did not have any identification on him, a friend of the couple was on duty at the hospital and called the partner, Earl, to come to the hospital.But when Earl arrived at the hospital, he was not allowed to be in the emergency room with Chuck.He was not allowed to make medical decisions on his behalf, and Chuck was unconscious and so could not consent to the treatment that he needed.And so it fell to Earl to spend two hours of precious time to track down Chuck's parents, to be able to consent to the treatment that their son needed and lost valuable hours in which the treatment could have been delivered.So second statute that I wanted to talk with you about.And this is sadly, one story that we hear over and over, married couples have the right to control the disposition of their spouse's remains.So this is that what could perhaps be the most tragic point in someone's life.Where your spouse or partner has passed away, you know what their final wishes were.And instead of the coroner's office being able to talk with you about what those final wishes would be, the coroner is required to speak to the next of kin.So like in this story, Bob and his partner Richard, who've been together for 18 years had each other's contact information in their wallets in case of emergencies.But when Richard died unexpectedly from a heart attack at a grocery store, Bob was not contacted by the medical examiner's office.They initially called Bob's phone, but they couldn't share any information with him.And instead they needed to look for the next of kin.Next of kin ended up being Richard's sister Marge, who lived out of town.It took quite some time to track her down.We actually heard this story from the sister.She was quite irritated actually that the partner of 18 years was not the one that was allowed to take this final responsibility of caring for his partner at this final stage.And that in fact, she was the one that needed to take responsibility for that, even though it was Richard, or that was Bob that knew about Richard's wishes.So now we're going to try a little bit of technology.I want to show you a video of another story of Carrie, Rebecca and Ruby.So, hold tight lets see if we can get this technology to work.Oh that Pregnancy was awesome.She was picture perfect.We had a beautiful pregnancy and, and then one night I woke up in a crisis, I guess you can say, I woke up, I was losing Ruby, feeling pain and then ripping around at me and, and, and fainting, I guess, or I dunno if they even got the anesthesia in and then Ruby was born, they had to resuscitate her a few times.They did everything life-saving that they could, but as far as this elective treatment, which saved her brain, saved her from having a life of, of severe brain damage.And allows her to live a normal life and- - Allow her to live.Yeah, it was an elective treatment because it was very experimental and just a clinical trials.And it's not an automatic, it's something you have to consent to.We had started talking to our lawyer about adopting Ruby, since before she was born, but you can't adopt an unborn child.So I had no legal rights to Ruby's medical care.And so they were communicating back and forth with Rebecca's doctor at the hospital and she hadn't woken up yet.And her doctor knew the severity of it.And her doctor literally ran her over to children's to sign the papers as soon as she woke up.And it was within minutes.If she'd been a few minutes later, we would not have been able to get her this treatment because there's a small window of opportunity- - If I hadn't woken up in time.You know, she wouldn't have gotten this therapy and that means she probably could have died - because the seizures- - or she probably would've been severely brain damaged.Are you going to do some of the puzzle with me?We love our daughter and we love each other.And we've been together for almost 10 years now.And it's now we're, we're a family.We're not any different.Project 515 started with really a broad base- Give you a break from the promotional piece there.Thank you for that.So that, that's another type of story.Folks may have actually seen Carrie and Rebecca on the Ellen show.They were on that show a few months ago.They actually are a Minnesota couple and after that story became public.I think it's sort of, a story that really shows how in the moment and quickly these kinds of laws can impact a family where you see an instance where the child is at risk of dying, the birth mother is unconscious and the Partner who is intended to be the mother is not able to make decisions for that child and places that child's life at risk.These are the kinds of stories that we see in Minnesota really, every day.So I'm actually going to wrap up here, but I think you get a feel at this point for the kinds of laws that we have in Minnesota right now that impact married couples in a very, very different way than they impact same-sex couples.515 Of those laws in Minnesota right now.This amendment is something that doesn't change those 515 laws, but that's creating a premise for those families to never be able to achieve the full equality through being able to achieve those same rights, responsibilities, and obligations.So if it's not fair, there's provision up here for you and I'd be glad to take some questions.Does anyone have questions?They've been together for over 30 years and Tom died last year.And they thought that they had everything covered.They had gone to a lawyer and gotten all kinds of powers of attorney contracts, and all kinds of things set up that they thought would cover them because they knew Tom was ill and they knew his time was short, but Scott was left with nothing.He had no rights, as it turned out, after Tom died.And the issues of property issues of like even the car that was in Tom's name, Scott couldn't sell it because he couldn't sign the title.So I'm wondering if in reality, is there anything short of changing the statutes that gay couples can do, same-sex couples can do to address these inequalities, if they have a sense that they may be in a situation like that?Great, thanks for that question.This is something actually that comes up quite a lot is can't we just impact these kinds of inequities through some kind of legal contract that you could go to a lawyer and draft up and therefore protect your family.And the reality is that, there are some things that you can affect in that way.And many, many more things that you can't.The reality also is that some families can afford to go to a lawyer and spend thousands of dollars to draft up that kind of legal paperwork.And a lot of families aren't able to even afford that even if it were available.So the reality is that there are, there are some things that can be impacted that way, and it just depends.Some of those things end up helping out those families.And then sometimes there are families that experience a devastating loss, where that wasn't able to be impacted.Other questions?- Is there, more about the question?- I think it is.It's an interesting question.I think there have been these progressions throughout history where you see some differentiation made between certain kinds of families and other kinds of families, certain kinds of people, and other kinds of people.This movement towards equality for, for LGBT people, and same-sex couples is frankly, a fairly new movement.But I think that it is a reference that is sometimes made is that this was a learning that our country went through at one point where we felt that it was appropriate to treat Caucasians differently than we treated people of color and had laws that reflected that.And ultimately those laws were changed.And so I think that that is the direction that organizations like mine expect the state to have moved towards.One more question, identify yourself by your first name.Hi I'm Tyler, I was wondering is there a progression in how, not only in high school but they're over in district 11 a couple of years ago, there's a bunch of kids committing suicide because of bullying.Is there a progression in how much understanding of the LGBT there is?I think.So, I think what Tyler's reflecting on is, is really a devastating impact of discrimination and bullying that, that we saw very, very clearly in the Inoca Hennepin school district, to much national and of course, local attention as well.The direction that the state has started to move in, is reflecting on how to impact that level of bullying at the state level through legislation.The governor had appointed a task force to really study the issue of bullying in Minnesota.I believe that taskforce just ended in the summer and had recommendations that were issued.There has been legislation that has been introduced several years in a row, I believe, that would really create some stronger guidelines for schools around what is allowed and what's not.We do, obviously in Minnesota have laws that should protect youth from bullying.Those laws are not what's called enumerated, which means that it's sort of a blanket law, but it doesn't specify certain kinds of populations that research really shows, could use some extra protection.And that that enumeration does help to protect children in that way.So that is something that frankly I would expect to see at the legislature.I know that that has been an active coalition, that safe schools for all coalition has been an active coalition for a number of years.And the goal is to pass legislation that will protect kids in a stronger way.We'll take one more question, and then others that have questions, please save it for the end of this evening.Hello, my name is Shaun.I have a question, so, well, first of all if you could define this a little bit more, So we could understand what this means as a change, in terms of the marriage act.Well, first of all in terms of a definition, I'm not sure that I can give you a definition.There are, I think, as John reflected on a number of states in the country that have enacted civil union legislation, it looks different in different states.States also have different kinds of domestic partner benefits that are in place.Two states in the country has something called reciprocal beneficiaries, which is a different kind of policy that impacts same-sex couples as well as a broader relationships.It really, so really depends, what a state has decided to put forward.What we have seen in states is that there are protections that can be provided through these kinds of domestic partner benefits.And, you know, some states have broader protection, some have more narrow protections.They could all be called civil unions, but it really depends what the legislature has put inside of that legislation.What we've seen in states that have had civil unions or domestic partner type legislation enacted is that over time they find that frankly, it just doesn't work very well because in our society, the way that we identify family structures and legal family units is through marriage.And so in these examples for that, you saw on the slides, if you were to go to a hospital and say, I need to see Bob.And they were to say, well, who are you?And you would say, well, I'm the civil union-er, they might not really know what that means.If you were to say, I'm the husband, everybody knows what that means.And so some of what we find in states is that even though there is protections that are put in place through these kinds of mechanisms and they are important without question, because in Minnesota same-sex couples have absolutely no protections at all, not one.So not to deny at all that these kinds of protections can be put in place in some ways, but it does seem that the experience in states has been that that has not worked quite well enough and that most of those states start to move towards enacting a broader definition through marriage.Our last speaker is Pastor Grant Stevenson.Good evening.I really am grateful for your persistence and staying until the last speaker gets up and talks.And I have some, I have some good news.I think I have a theory as to why I might be able to be brief or at least try.We have heard speakers tonight from various, from various fields.And as they have been speaking- I'm a Pastor.I'm a Lutheran Pastor, I would guess because we're in Roseville and Maplewood that there are other Lutherans in the room.But I think I could take a pretty good guess that that's not true for everybody.I think I could take a pretty good guess that there may be Catholics in the room.I think I could take a pretty good guess that there may be people who don't identify with a religious faith in the room.I think, I'm pretty well, maybe right.About all of those things.And we've been listening to other speakers and what, here's what I've noticed, although a professor also might disagree with this, but bear with me for a minute.In the area of law, everyone knows that there are disagreements, right?That's why we have courts.There are disagreements, but there is something of a consensus as to how to approach a problem.There's something of a consensus as to what makes a good argument or a bad argument.And when that consensus breaks down, I guess we have juries.I'm sure that I'm just being horrifically simplistic in my explanation.In science, and Dr. Boysen and I'm going to- you may have the agreement or disagree- in science hard sci- what they refer to as hard science sciences, or also social sciences.We have clearly many, many disagreements, but we have something of a consensus, in the modern world about methodology and where we have breakdowns in our understanding of methodology, we have at least peer reviews, the review of our work and the review of our outcomes and the review of our conclusions by peers.That's how?am I right?That's how it works.In my field, in the field of religion.I think it is crystal clear we have disagreements.But in 2012, we have no semblance of a consensus on methodologies, or peer reviews, or even how to read the basic book that many of us claim holds truth.Zero consensus, fail- zero's two strong.Very, very little consensus.So part of what makes me sympathetic to those who are having- I told you, John, I would try to present as much of both sides as I could.Part of what makes me sympathetic to those who are having a strong religious reaction to the idea of gay and lesbian people being married.Part of what makes me sympathetic is that I am aware that it's just true.It's true in my own family.It's just true that when we stand and speak of religious truth, we just don't all stand in the same place.Now you might be true.A really good historian could tell you that there were times- That there's never been a time when we all stood in the same place, but it is- There have at least been times when there were people who could impose a unification of truth.I think the middle-ages or something like that, that's just not true in America.And so we are left.We are left in America, to probably live out the words of the apostle Paul, more deeply and more profoundly than any generation in the history- in any generation that has lived since he spoke them, work out your salvation, by the way, that's a nice Greek word that really means healing.Work out your salvation or work out your healing with fear and trembling.We're not exactly on our own, but there is no dominant force.There is no standard bearer in the area of religion.And so you'll see religions flourishing and we indeed have to grasp at what we find is most basic and most true for us.For me, I would name as one of those things.What we often refer to as the golden rule that we treat our neighbors as we ourselves would wish to be treated.It seems to be a very standard thing that runs true across so many different religions.The problem with the religious discussion, is when one group of people want to claim a kind of unified authority that just doesn't exist in modern America.And I, for one, am not unhappy about that, that it doesn't exist.I think we're doing quite well, exploring our spirituality, exploring our faith, exploring our religion.It does seem to me though, that this debate we're having in the state of Minnesota is steeped in religious disagreement.As much as any other kind.Steeped in religious disagreement, as much as any, as much as any other kind of disagreement.I have been working, myself, these last months as I work on the campaign.John mentioned, I'm not an unbiased person in the room.I am the faith director for Minnesotans United.That's the campaign urging Minnesotans to vote no on this.And I have been working myself with, two concepts that I find personally very compelling.And one is personal.The concept of personal freedom.If any generation has been aware of the obligations and the responsibilities that come, that are ours in 2012, it is in the area of personal freedom.We have an enormous amount of freedom to decide how we will spend our lives and how we will live them and who we will live them with.And I think as Americans, we celebrate that.I think, I think as Americans, we yearn for that and we desire more of that.And we don't like it when someone else tells us how we should or shouldn't live.But then the question that grabs my attention even more than that is the question of religious freedom.How is it in 2012 that we could still be having a conversation about which theology will carry the day in the state of Minnesota.I saw on the agenda, the question that I was supposed to answer was can the church reconcile gay marriage?Yes, it already has, right?There are all kinds of churches.There are all kinds of churches.There are all kinds of synagogues that right now bless and celebrate the unions of same-sex couples.It already has.We can't talk about it as if it's a hypothetical thing that someday might happen.It's true now, so the question is, will this, in my mind, will the state of Minnesota endorse all of the unions that are churches and synagogues and places of worship, bless and celebrate, or will it pick and choose?I think that's why we're having this debate in the state of Minnesota.And I think it's what this amendment is really about.I work with a couple and I'm just going to close- I'm going to close with this 'cause I'd really like to deal with questions.But before I do that, let me just do something that I forgot when I said, yes, we do.It's not a few religious traditions that bless and affirm and celebrate the unions of same-sex couples.My own church, the ELCA Evangelical Lutheran church in America, we're divided up into what they call synods.There are six of them synods.It means a gathering.I don't know why we can't use regular English.There are six of them in the state of Minnesota, five of the six voted this year, either in- either at the end of may or in the beginning of June as synods to encourage the people in their church, Minnesotans, to vote against this amendment.There was one Senate in Southwest Minnesota that voted to not take a vote on, on the issue.The Episcopalian church, the Presbyterian church, the United church of Christ, Universalist church, Unitarian church, the Methodist church and the rabbinical association, all of the rabbis in the rabbinical association of Minnesota all have been asking their congregants to vote against the amendment.So I say that not to convince you that you should vote against it, but to lift up the obvious that the faith community is at least very divided on this.So the division already exists.Each day when I go to work at Minnesotans United, I sit next to Olbie, Obadiah.But we call him Olbie and Javin, who is his husband.They were married while they were both attending seminary at Yale, which I think is a little uppity, but these are really good people.They were married at the chapel in Yale, it was a legal.It was a legal marriage.They now live and work here.Javin works for Outfront, Minnesota, and is hoping soon to have a call into the Lutheran ministry.And Olbie is a Pastor as we speak in the United church of Christ.So it's a mixed marriage, but sitting next to them every day at work is such a dissonance to me, that the two of them, I've seen their wedding pictures, that the two of them are considered married in one part of this country and not married here.What does that say about our laws in Minnesota?What does it say about where we've come?Well, we're in conversation, we're in conversation and we're not done.We're not done yet.Sometimes I encourage people to vote no, just because we're not done.There's just lots of conversation to be had.I'd like to stop there because to go on, would lead me down the path of doing a Bible study.And I've already, I hope I convinced you that if I were to do that, I would do it from my perspective, a Lutheran trained Pastor, probably a bit on the progressive end of things.And it may not be yours.So we have to be in conversation with one another about how we read these books and how we understand these and how we understand these truths.Thank you.Questions for Pastor Stevenson?Okay Bob.Several questions Pastor, first of all, do you believe the Bible is the revealed word of God?I believe- this is the kind of conversation that will get tricky.But yes, I do.I believe that that, I mean, for me, that's just true.I believe that the Bible is the revealed word of God.And I believe I was speaking for myself.And I believe that the narrative and the Bible is a narrative of freedom and liberation.And that includes me.And I think, and I believe that it includes you.I'd like to say on behalf of my friend Bob here, that's the first time I've heard an answer that was longer than Bob's question.The next question is, do you believe words have meanings?Clearly they do.I'm answering your question.So the question becomes, how do you negate all the scriptures in the Bible, that absolutely say two things.One that homosexuality is an upfront, I'll say it nicely upfront to God.Why say it nicely, say it how the Bible says it.Abomination, and then the thing, how do you justify and debate scriptures, but one that immediately comes to mind is the one that's usually used at most by everybody, a man shall leave his mother and father, mother and father, not two mothers, not two fathers and marry his wife and become one.When you have those kinds of direct usages of words in a revealed word of God, how do you see a Pastor and Pastor's interpretation by humans?How do you justify saying that it's open for interpretation?Clearly it is open for interpretation.I mean, you've made an, you've made an interpretation just now you quoted a passage.For example, from the book of Genesis that I would read as a passage of hope and a passage of promise and, and a passage of love.A man shall leave his mother and father and cling to his wife.I myself have done exactly that.I don't know if you're married, but perhaps, perhaps you have done it as well.And I believe that passage reflects one of the deepest truths that I hold about my faith, which is that God created us for relationship.And God created us for community.The truth is God created some of us gay, so should relationship and that kind of community and that kind of intimacy be denied?Someone who's gay or not.And I would say that has, I don't understand how that could be from a perspective of a loving God.Could I take, just give a different perspective and answer to Bob's question.And that is that this is a question I struggle with a lot.I do take the Bible to be the authoritative word of God.And I agree that homosexuality is described as a sin in places in the Bible, but here's where I come down on that.What I am is a relatively affluent straight white guy from Adina.I have my sins.That's not my sin.If I were gay, I would struggle with that, but I'm not.And I go to church all the time, surrounded by people who have sins that are very different than mine.I sit in church next to someone who is divorced and remarried.Now that's something that Christ spoke directly about in a way he didn't speak directly about homosexuality, but that person was married in my church.And I've come to accept that.And I have a problem with differentiating the way I treat that person from the way I different- I treat a gay couple because if I was to treat the gay couple differently than that remarried person, I think at some level, I'd have to admit it was bigotry within me that was coming out.Because Christ was very clear about the remarried person.And in the same way that you're saying that the Bible has words, those words have meaning.I think those words have meaning coming from Christ as well.In a word that, something I was facing, I was struggled mightily with that, the same way I struggle with the sins that Christ has named in my own book.But I think if I could just add to that, one of the things I have heard since, since this amendment has been put on the ballot, that I didn't hear so much before, people are talking so often about a biblical marriage, that's a phrase I've heard recently.A biblical marriage and I've started to ask them, which one are you talking about?Which one?Adam and Eve might be the best, but they didn't do so well in their children were homicidal.We can't be talking about Abraham, whose wife gave her slave- because she was, Sarah initially barren.So gave her slave to Abraham so that their first child could be born, not from Sarah, but from her slave.And I think a real, a real grownup conversation that we have to have in the faith community is to realize that there's there, there has been a pretty big shift, mostly over the last 200 years in marriage.And it has not come about because of gay and lesbian people.It has come about because of straight people who have said more and more, that a marriage is no longer a contract between a man and his future Son-in-law, about a piece of property.But is a contract between a man and a woman- - And God.And God, but that's, but that's an enormous change.So to talk about biblical marriage, without addressing the ownership of women and what it means for another person to be property is to miss the mother load of what's going on.And so what we ended up doing is pulling out of the scriptures.What are for us fundamental bottom line values do unto others, love, mutuality, hope.These are the themes that we've- and commitment.It's also edified and .Don't leave that one out.Yeah, thank you.A question I have had throughout this entire debate, and how we go about this reform, is how we do have separation through the state.And this has always been framed around religious issues and the whole reason that this needs to be on the ballot is a lot of people's religion of what's their opinions.And some people choose other things and may have other rights.So how is it- Is this something that then will then be challenged in the courts that this constitutional amendment is unconstitutional?Yeah.Well, that may happen.And there's a- I was supposed to address a question that came up earlier, I was asked back here about clergy, functioning as agents of the state.That's actually, that's actually true.There's only one place in my work where I function as an agent of the state, I'm registered in the county of Ramsey.And that is to do marriages.I have no idea why that came about, but I have a theory.My theory is that as the population in this country expanded westward, there were more clergy than there were government bureaucrats.And so we were deputized by the government to do a civil marriage along with the religious right of marriage.So if you're, if you're a Catholic, you use the word sacrament for marriage.A sacrament is a religious right.We have other ways of talking about it, If you're a Protestant.But that civil right is separate.I mean that sacrament is separate from the civil marriage, the civil marriage that is recognized by the state.And that's why, by the way, religious leaders will never be forced to marry people that they, that they wouldn't want to marry.It's true now it's always been true and it would be true in the future.Okay, got a question here.Hi my name is Eric.I just can't agree more on using a more constructive dialogue on this issue.I just feel that there is that need to go beyond the shallowness of describing some individuals, by our sexual orientation.So much more makes up a person.And I think everybody should receive equal dignity and respect going forward.My only issue going into this, instead of avoiding it.It is my understanding of the amendment.And this is where I like you to do a fact check on me, is that this is not a ban on gay marriage.And that it's strictly is prohibiting the government or judge, or a lawyer or a politician to pass it as a law, without voting people.And for me, I want a vote as, regardless of the topic, it could be a hundred different topics.It just happens to be marriage right now that the people have a say, have a vote to determine law, rather than the judge or lawyer or politician.I just think that there's a lot of misdirections and misinformation pertaining that.And please correct me wrong, but I think all of this energy needs to be directed towards putting gay marriage on the ballot itself and let the people speak rather than a judge in a year or two determining on their own, like had happen in New York or Massachusetts.And that's where I'm- - Okay, so I'll tell you what, I'm going to join my colleagues on the panel and let somebody who works with the law, answer that question.All right.Well, first of all, it is a ban on gay marriage.And of course there's already a ban on gay marriage and it was passed in 1997, as we've already heard described.So it does, it reinforces that, you know, in terms of, you know, could in terms of what you're saying, could a judge overrule that law, the legislature go back and change it.Sure.That's how our democracy works.I mean, one thing is that what you're talking about in terms of direct democracy, where you have a referendum on things, that's not our system of government for the most part.I mean, we're a representative democracy.We do elect politicians and man that's messy and unfortunate, but that is the way the American system works is that we don't vote individually on everything.There's some places that come closer to that.Vermont's one of them where they have town meetings and they send a representative from every Hamlet, but it's a small state with a tiny population relative to Minnesota.So in terms of, you know, something like this referendum it's pretty rare that we do this, that we vote on something.So in terms of the legislature making a choice like that, that's kind of in our system.Now, in terms of judges making those choices, I think that's a legitimate concern.That judges, I mean.The nature of judges that can overrule a statute, you know, in law, we say it's counter of majoritarian, that the majority of the people consistent- think something, and then judges overrule it.Luckily they do it pretty rarely.Now this is an area in which you're right.In some states they have done that.But here's something to think about, is that maybe that's where the people's vote comes in.In Massachusetts the people didn't rise up and say, you know, you're wrong judges, in Iowa, you know, it's a different situation.In California they did.In California, there was a judicial decision that allowed gay marriage that allowed that incredible moment in San Francisco.But then they passed proposition eight, that there was a referendum that came after that, and that kind of dialogue back and forth between the branches of government and the people, actually works pretty well in the end.You know, maybe California will come back again in a couple of years and they have a referendum again.And switch back the other way.That's in the nature of American government.It's part of the package of what we have here.And there's a lot of good to them.I open questions up to anybody that hasn't had a chance to ask a question, to anyone of the presenters.My question goes to Professor Ostler, as kind of referenced before, at the city court system that could be appearing before the supreme court.Can you speculate that whether you anticipated that this would come before the Supreme court, and when they rule on that and, how does that immediately impact the state and things that we put into the state constitution?Yeah, there's a couple issues relating to this.And one is right now, we've got a challenge and a very active challenge to the defense of marriage amendment, or the act, I'm sorry.In the federal system, which is a statute, not a constitutional amendment.And the second circuit in New York, for example, just ruled on that.I believe by striking it down.Now, was that going to come up before the Supreme court?A lot of people think that it will, but that's not this issue.That's talking about that federal act that really has to do with the full faith and credit clause of the constitution and things like that.What happens when people move to state to state?Now that's important.It's a different issue.Now with this amendment, if it's passed, could there be a challenge in court?There could be.Who is that likely to reach the Supreme court?Most people that I know who know a lot about the Supreme court, think that kind of challenge is unlikely to because the justices tend to- unless they've got something that's been overruled, that's been sustained up through the court of appeals.They're not going to pluck a case out to decide that because they tend to defer to the way the states came out.So unless that's being upset they're not likely to go after that.I hope that makes sense.My Question is to Grant.Possible the law enforcer.And I appreciate Grant's distinction that the religious perspectives vary.If the Archbishop can persuade, then others can force their conception, of religion down everyone's throat.What's the difference between that and .The Muslims believe that the Qur'an should be the basis of civil law.Isn't this a problem throughout the world, where one religion assumes it has God on its side and forces all of us to follow its religious victings?Well, I understand, I think I understand what you're saying.I think that I would think about it in a somewhat different way.I think that we are by definition in this culture, in a conversation and what we expect of each other, what we, what we hold- what we expect of our institutions isn't a process.And my concern about, so I'll be honest with you.I have some sympathies to the way that you asked that question, but my concern about the way that you ask that question is it tends to shut off the conversation.With the constitutional amendment, isn't the archbishop, should be off the conversation?Yes I believe that this constitutional amendment does in fact shut off the conversation, yes it does.That's my point.Just, just briefly on that, I think the difference is ugly, crazy, wild democracy.You know, that the Archbishop, unlike in countries where there's Sharia law, can't decide something and have it become law.It has to go through the process of democracy.And what's happening in Minnesota is really remarkable.I'm really heart- because I disagree with the Archbishop.I don't think that's a correct thing to be.I mean, obviously I disagree with him about that, about the separate point, but, you know.Look at the reaction that's happened.Look at the people who are here.I mean, what I'm hearing is that the other side is out raising them six to one, that is- I really believe that this election in the end, in this state, is going to be a great American moment.31 states in a row went the other way.The Archbishop wants us to do that.What we're seeing, because of people like these people here and what Grant is doing, what the people in his office are doing.There is against that pile of money that started out a hundred thousand voices.And it's going to start to go the other way.And this is that turning point.Can I say one more, one more thing.So I think maybe it goes without saying that I have a pretty strong disagreement with Derek Bishop on this amendment.There are so many things that he stands for that I'm grateful for.And part of, I think part of our challenge in a political debate, that is, that is in fact, a deeply heated political debate.Part of the challenge is to be able to have it, to make it real and to be able to come out the other end as neighbors and as people who can move forward together on other issues.Cause there will be some.We're talking about my relationship.Talking amendment.I guess the dialogue here is how would you feel if there was a constitutional amendment that would validate your heterosexual relationship, how would you feel?And my point is on this issue, you have much more faith than I do.The amendment will probably pass because when people go into a polling place, they thought, well, of course, in religion it's one man and one woman.That it's not the American way.That is not the bill of rights.I'd like to have your question - - I, you're the law professor.What is the basis for thinking that Minnesota is so exceptional that it can pull apart from this.The polls right now that we're seeing.And I mean, I think that what we're seeing is that, that it's very close or that the opposition is ahead.I am an optimist.I'll admit to that.I think that, you know, I think there's others that we're likely to lose.For example, I've been working on the death penalty referendum in California.We're likely to lose that one.But with this one, I think there's a, there's a good chance.This is going to be that turning point.Okay one last question and then we've got our panel member that has a quick review.The law, in Minnesota.I don't quite get why people are putting such a push on this constitutional thing.And it seems to me that it's kind of strange, but the other part is, that if we want in fact, real change that people should have the freedom to marry in this case, same-sex couples, what do we have to do first?Do we have to engage in constitutional things?And then go back and do something about the law?Or how do you make a real change in this kind of juxtaposition?Well, I have to say that I was at the Capitol the entire time that this amendment legislation was being considered.And I don't think I have an answer for you about why this is something that the proponents of it decided to push forward.Obviously it was a priority that they had.I think there were a lot of different reasons for that.And here we are.In terms of the way that you move forward.I think it does depend on what the outcome of this election is to be, if this amendment passes and it is in the constitution, then the only way to roll that back would be a second constitutional amendment, which I don't expect anybody is projecting, will happen anytime soon.Or perhaps something that comes from the higher court.But as, as the professor mentioned, that does seem to be coming anytime soon, either.If the amendment fails, then I think in Minnesota, we typically use the legislative process as the mechanism to move forward in these kinds of issues that- We are not a state that tends to have a lot of ballot measures.Folks can probably remember, you know, count even on one hand, the ballot measures that you have voted on in this state, very different than other states.I moved here a long time ago from California.And I know that in that state, there is a referendum on just about everything.And so you get a book in advance, so you can study up on, on which referendums you will support.But in Minnesota, typically we use the legislative process in order to move forward on these kinds of things.And I would expect that going forward, that is the way that, that Minnesota will progress.Would you have to operate separately on the constitutional piece then and the original law or does it depend- - It does depend.Yeah, it did.Does it operate separately on the constitutional and then go back and operate off the law?If the outcome that you're talking about was to get to a point where same-sex couples legally were allowed to marry and the constitutional amendment passes, then you would need to do a constitutional change through another ballot measure in order to move forward legislation.Is that, does that answer your question?Okay we lost our panel review people, except Armando's still here but he's actually got a question.Hi I'm Armando, I was just wondering, this is for the reverend.You said if God was, He created gays and lesbians, I was just wondering, why would God set people up for failure like that?If it's an abomination?You know, I'll do my best.I think God created people because God loves people.And people are different from each other.And it's people, not God who make those differences into something that's hurtful.So I wouldn't put at God's feet the pain that gay and lesbian people feel when they're discriminated against by others.I would put that at our feet.And my perspective is that if we weep for people who are hurt, by our behavior and by our laws.God didn't set us up to fail.God weeps with us.And waits for us to fix that.I'd like to just make a couple of comments.We'd like to have everybody fill out the survey tonight.If you take just a second to give us feedback, we will collect those surveys and review the results at the next human rights commission meeting November 13th, Tuesday 7:00 PM at the Maplewood city hall.And we welcome all of your ongoing participation, and this discussion will continue at that meeting.This has been a great panel discussion here tonight.I want to thank the Maplewood staff and commissioners from both Maplewood and Roseville for the significant effort that it took to put this event together.We especially want to thank the audience for your great questions and respectful and civil manner, which people gathered here to talk with neighbors, and finally to our speakers for their outstanding contribution, to this town hall meeting.Thanks everybody.And good night.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Marriage_constitutional_amendment_Town_Hall_Mtg.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Marriage_constitutional_amendment_Town_Hall_Mtg.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Marriage_constitutional_amendment_Town_Hall_Mtg.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/MeasureDForFairfax/MeasureD-cmcm_h264.mp3", "text": "Hi, welcome everybody.This is Community Media Center of Marin TV, CMCM TV, and my name is Craig Slater.I'm here today with Larry Bragman, current Mayor of Fairfax, and Jory Prum.And we are going to be talking about Measure D, a half cent sales tax for Fairfax which is on the ballot November 8.Here's Jory first.My name is Jory Prum, I am with the Commitee to Oppose Measure D. And while the proponents of the Measure D sales tax are making a lot of claims as to why it's necessary and what they've done to avoid it, we've found that when looking at these claims critically, that they actually don't hold up.They claim that sales tax and property tax revenues have decreased.They claim that the state grabbed money from local governments.They claimed that the flood was very costly, which it was, but you know, whether it contributed to the town's financial situation is a whole different story.They claim that they've cut all departmental spending by 4%, and we find that none of these actually hold up.When studying the town's audits, we actually find that they tell a very different story, so.Well Fairfax, like most towns in California, is facing a financial crisis because of the financial, the housing bubble popping in California, and throughout the country.And as a result of that fact, property taxes have actually gone down in Fairfax.In normal times, property taxes go up about 2 1/2 percent.For the last three years, unfortunately for Fairfax, our assessed valuation has gone down while the operating costs of operating the town of Fairfax have gone up.We've concluded after many discussions that the fairest way to handle this is a modest sales tax proposal of half a cent.So in response to the town's assertions that property taxes and sales taxes are down, we don't disagree that they have fallen over the last three years.However, if you take a larger view, you'll actually see that there was a bubble, and the bubble has corrected itself.If you look at overall revenues of the town of Fairfax from 2005 to 2010, you'll find that revenues have actually increased over 13%.If you adjust that for inflation, it actually comes out that the town is up by 4.2% in overall revenues.The state money grabs is another one of their arguments except that while they happened, the state was required to give all the funds back according to the 2010 audit.The flood did happen, of course that was very costly.But it has been paid for by FEMA, OES, and insurance and the town is still negotiating to get some of those funds back, so that's, it's not a final say.But additionally, those funds come from a different account also known as the Storm Capital Fund.And so those don't actually effect the general funds spending.While the town claims to have spent 4% less in all departments, it actually, when you look at the overall information presented by the town's official audits, you find out that actually, spending is up 24 1/2 percent in all departments.Most recently, I was told by town officials that that was as a result of flood spending, and despite the argument about FEMA, OES, and insurance, if we take that argument at face value, it doesn't explain why general government spending us up 75%, but public works, the folks who actually do the repairs around town are only up 1.68% overall.The town also claims that they've left unfilled positions vacant, kind of insinuating that, inferring that they're not hiring, but then again, this year, they created a whole new position.So we don't feel that they're actually doing quite everything they can, or that the whole story is being told.Town of Fairfax has had a frozen police position for the last four years.We froze in the management position of planning director for the last year, that's being handled by the manager.And he's being backed up by somebody we brought in as a part timer to handle special chores.All employee groups in Fairfax have agreed to a continuing wage freeze.Wages have been frozen in Fairfax for the last two years, and under the new collective bargaining agreements we entered into this year, they'll continue to be frozen for two more years.In addition to that, all employee groups have agreed to a 5% pay reduction because they're gonna be picking up 5% of their pensions.So my question to Jory is, are all these groups wrong?Are all these bargaining units wrong?That have looked at the budget and made these concessions for Fairfax?Are the sacrifices being made by these employees simply in vain or for no reason?The fact of the matter is, is that property taxes throughout Marin County have been declining for two years.Last year, the assessor reduced property assessments on 21% of the properties here in Marin.This year, he reduced assessments for 27% of the properties here in Marin County.This has a devastating effect on local government because we depend on property assessments for property taxes.Property taxes pay for most of our general fund, and the fact of the matter is, is that since 2009, our property taxes have declined by over $200,000.That's just a fact, you can look it up at the county assessors office if you don't believe the numbers that we're posting in Fairfax.But I might add, all the numbers that we post in Fairfax have been audited and approved by independent, outside auditors.The town of Fairfax, they do have an audit.It's a general audit, it does not cover the actual budget, it does not cover payroll.It only covers the audits of expenditures and revenues, and we agree that that generally is true and correct.And we are using the numbers that come from those audits, those official documents from the town of Fairfax.What we find when we analyze those audits is that from 2005 to 2010, the town of Fairfax brought in $2.7 million more revenue than they expected.That on average, the town of Fairfax earns an additional $459,000 per year than they expect, in fact, if you chart it out you will notice that every single year, the town has brought in more revenue than they expected.They also spend more money than they expected.From 2005 to 2010, the town spent $909,000 more than they expected to spend.And even with that $2.7 million budget surplus, the town managed to spend the $2.3 million deficit.We don't disagree that over the last two years that the tax revenues are decreasing overall, but over the last five years, they are increased completely.4.2% overall.So we don't say that the firefighters and town employees are wrong, what we're saying is that the information that's being presented to them is not transparent, it's not necessarily accurate.And when you look at the information in a larger scope, rather than saying just the last couple of years, you find that the information being provided is very, very easy to question and easy to find holes with.We hope that the Fairfax voters will do some research for themselves, they'll look at the information we've provided which all cited and sourced, and no one has so far been able to tell us that, with any actual proof that the numbers we are citing are actually incorrect.Thank you.Jory, I'd like to cite a number that you've put in your website that's absolutely incorrect.Go for it.Okay, in the \"No on D\" website, it claims that Fairfax obtained in property tax for the year 2009, approximately $4.6 million.Now if you look at the actual audit for 2009, you'll see that Fairfax actually received about $3.453 million in property tax.So in other words, the \"No on D\" website is off about a million dollars.Now let's go back to your figure about $2.7 million being unaccounted for.The town has stated repeatedly that when we first received FEMA funds back in 2006, those funds were reported as part of the general fund.That was actually noted in the town manager's budget statement for the year 2006, at page three of her budget statement.Now, those funds plus the million dollars that you've misstated on your website might account for that $2.7 million.I don't really know.But it's a disservice to the truth to tell people that Fairfax is not facing reduced general funds from a reduction in its property tax base.It's just a denial of the crisis that we're in.And we're not gonna be able to deal with it unless we first recognize the facts.The town administration has done that.We've frozen salaries, we've frozen budgets.Town employees have done that by taking a salary freeze and a reduction on pensions.I think together, if the voters agree, we can and will get through this crisis but not unless we all understand what's happening around us.Okay, well I thought I was summarizing before, so I'll just continue on.Larry, I'm looking at the 2009 fiscal year budget, and it's, or audit, sorry.And it says, general revenues, property taxes, $4.6 million.I don't know where you're getting your numbers from, but if I can look it up in the audit, I would imagine that anybody can, and find it on the town's website.If you go to the fairfaxsaysno.com website you'll find that all the figures are available directly on the website.We have charted it out so people can see it, we're not skewing the numbers.We have not distorted any of the numbers.We cite exactly where those numbers come from using footnotes.And you can look all those numbers up for yourself, and we hope that you will.Because we love this town, we appreciate that people are taking the time, a chance to actually find out more about this issue, appreciate that the Media Center is covering this issue in such depth, and we hope that you will do some research and learn more about it yourself before you go to the polls.I'm gonna show you, I don't know if you can focus on this, but this is the \"No on D\" website that shows this $4.6 million figure, okay?Now I'm gonna hold up the actual audit, which shows property tax revenue of $3.43 million.So here's the truth in numbers, here's the truth in numbers.Same document.We're in a financial crisis.And Measure D is a modest proposal to get us through it as a town.We can get through the crisis if we work together.If we work together to pass Measure D. Fairfax will not only survive, it will thrive.And that's my vision for Fairfax.It's a thriving, resilient town and it goes to its own beat.And I know Measure D is part of that.I'm seeing now, property tax revenue, that difference is precisely caused by the pension tax override which is property tax based.He's counting one, we're counting the other.Pick and choose numbers, fine, go ahead.The point of it is, the town's budget has been underestimated by over $2.7 million.The town's expenses have been more than $900,000 over budget.The flood has nothing to do with this, it's accounted for in a totally separate fund.We can show it and we can show, if you go to the website, you can see the town's actual words explaining the town flood fund.Craig Slater again.I'm gonna read something from the No camp.\"That the arguments of the town sound believable on the surface but when looked at with a critical eye, it's obvious the justifications are not only false, they're based on a complete lack of fiscal responsibility or accurate financial reporting from town staff, and our elected representatives\".So that's the claim made by the No group, and obviously, the Yes on D camp has a very different view of the management of the town.So it's up for us as citizens to look at what is really going on here.There's clearly a disagreement in the perception of the numbers, and I think it really gets down to each of us doing our job as voters, and finding out about the issues, talk to people who are opponents, talk to people who are proponents.And find out how this might effect you and then how to vote.Hi, my name's Matt Hartwell-Herrera, I'm the campaign manager for Yes for Measure D. And the reason we're supporting this is because we have a simple challenge within Fairfax.Property taxes are down over the last couple years, and expenses have continued to rise, driven by spiraling healthcare costs and pension costs.The town has taken lots of steps in order to make those other costs that we can contain go lower, but we have not been able to bridge the gap and we simply must live within our means, and the town chose a half cent sales tax because it was the fairest way to balance that budget.It allows visitors from outside Fairfax to contribute, it doesn't apply to groceries, it's a small, half cent that replaces a one cent tax that was retired by California, so our taxes will still be lower.This is why Measure D is a good compromise and will be good for Fairfax.It's just to call out the folks who have endorsed Measure D. We have the unanimous Town Counsel of Fairfax, the town finance director, the town treasurer, supervisor Howe Brown from the Marin Board of Supervisors.We have the Fairfax Police, we have the Fairfax Firefighters, we have the Fairfax Chamber of Commerce.The majority of businesses within Fairfax as well as many individual folks within the community, Mark Squire, Gary Graham and others.So there is a tremendous amount of support within the community, and the folks that the citizens count on to represent them, who have been elected and are hired in order to analyze.Thank you.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/MeasureD-cmcm_h264.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/MeasureD-cmcm_h264.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/MeasureD-cmcm_h264.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/Uncondit1956/Uncondit1956.mp3", "text": "These are the proud hills of the state of Virginia in the springtime of 1956.Spring time beckoning to a small boy, urging him to wonder with the wind to the farm perhaps, over the pasture fence to catch a calf.Not an easy thing because after all a calf's a youngster like himself.Ride him?Sure.Well, what's a day without a little rough and tumble?When a boy needs comfort, there's always home and mother and father.This is the world of Randy Kerr of Oakton, Virginia.Typical, except for one thing, Randy was the first child to receive an injection of Salk polio vaccine in the field trials in 1954.Much however had preceded this moment when Randy Kerr made history.In the all-out fight against polio led by the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis, there were many years of struggle and heartbreak.Parents lived in fear of polio's sudden attack and the tragic aftermath.Thousands upon thousands of children and adults fell prey to the crippler.March of Dimes funds were needed everywhere, needed desperately by patients, needed by an army of scientists who searched for a preventive.Then in 1954, a vaccine to prevent paralytic polio developed by Dr. Jonas Salk, a grantee of the National Foundation, was tested in the largest field trials in medical history.Finally, April 12th, 1955, Salk vaccine safe, effective.The next challenge, commercial production of the polio vaccine in quantity.A huge task, a complex process, all detailed in this book, it's officially called a Protocol.Here the manufacturer records every step in the production of one lot of vaccine.The first requirement, trained scientists and technicians.Their every action is important starting with the scrub up, and the equipment they use gets it scrub up too, a scalding steam bath for 15 minutes.When it comes out it's completely sterilized, ready for the big job ahead.Vital to the production of the vaccine are monkeys from the far east, given the best of care.Meanwhile another basic ingredient of the polio vaccine is being prepared, a rich nourishing liquid called Medium 199.Some 68 different elements go into Medium 199.Each is carefully checked, weighed and combined according to the formula, and when all is thoroughly blended, the medium's tested for absolute sterility.Why this elaborate preparation?Into Medium 199 will go monkey kidney tissue, first carefully minced by hand.In these bottles the monkey kidney tissue grows, getting its nourishment from the rich Medium 199.For six days, the bottles rock and the tissue grows.Then because all the nourishment in the medium is exhausted, half is siphoned off to be replaced by fresh medium, but with a difference.The difference, a big one, is that here for the first time live polio virus is planted in the medium.Three different strains of polio virus are added.The completed vaccine will protect against all three types of paralytic polio.And once more, the bottles rock.In four days, the virus so minute yet so lethal multiplies 250 to 1000 times.Another stage in the complex production of vaccine has been reached.The polio virus solution is ready for harvesting.The endless testing has now begun.A titration test.It measures the amount of live virus present in the solution.This test is made seven different times during production.Next, filtration, a vitally important process.First, the virus solution goes through these metal tubes containing porcelain filters, then through sheets of asbestos to strain out all kidney tissue and remove any stray bacteria.More tests, rabbits are inoculated to make sure that no B virus, a dangerous but non-polio virus is in the solutions.Guinea pigs too receive injections to make certain that the solutions are free of tuberculosis bacilli.Finally, the climax of production, inactivation.The power of the polio virus to infect man will be utterly destroyed.The colorless pungent chemical formaldehyde will deal the deadly blow to the polio virus.For 66 hours in a warm incubator room, the inactivation process continues.Then what remains can only do good, provide humans with protection from paralytic polio.A chapter ends.The enemy of man is now ready to become his servant.At every step of the way, checks and double-checks.This technician is working on a tissue culture safety tests, double check on the complete inactivation of the virus.Four such tissue culture tests are conducted on every batch of vaccine.Behind this door, the final phase of production, it calls for a giant tank.Into it will go the three types of inactivated polio virus solution combined here for the first time.The solutions are first filtered on the way into the pooling tank and twice later.Additional chemicals complete and preserve the vaccine, then the preparation is mixed for five hours.At the end of that time, the poliomyelitis vaccine is complete, but testing is not.Two animal tests are performed.One on white mice injected with vaccine is called the LCM tests.And the live monkey potency test, monkeys received poliomyelitis vaccine, then are observed and examined to be sure the vaccine is potent enough to cause formation of polio fighting antibodies in humans.More tests.A sterility test, the sixth of its kind is performed.It takes time and infinite care.Only vaccine found completely free of bacteria is approved for the next step.That step is putting vaccine into bottles under completely sterile conditions.These are the bottle which finally will find their way to doctors offices and clinics all over the country.Even as they reach the end of the production line, other tests are in progress and samples are sent to the government.No vaccine can leave the pharmaceutical house until all tests by the manufacturer and the government are completed satisfactorily.The protocol is finished then sent to the National Institutes of Health for government approval required by law.In Bethesda, Maryland, the National Institutes of Health is a vast center of medical progress, the main research arm of the United States Public Health Service.In the office of Dr. Roderick Murray, chief of the division of biologic standards, the manufacturer's protocol is first reviewed.Then Dr. Murray summons two scientists from his staff, each is given a copy of the protocol which he will study carefully, checking every process, every test for consistency.At the same time, another vital judgment is being made in the laboratories of the National Institutes of Health.Here, a sample from every batch of vaccine is received, then subjected to a whole battery of complex scientific tests.A sterility test confirming those of the manufacturer is carried out.A tissue culture tests on the vaccine sample, again, substantiating tests already made by the manufacturer.Living tissue is inoculated with poliomyelitis vaccine, incubated, then carefully examined.The monkey test, one of the most important tests, 20 monkeys are involved in the testing of every lot of vaccine and each receives three injections from the manufacturers sample.The purpose, once again to confirm the safety and effectiveness of the polio vaccine.These are just some of the painstaking review and testing procedures of the National Institutes of Health, each contributing to the final judgment and recommendation on every lot of vaccine.Once the public health service authorizes its release, the polio vaccine can begin to protect American youngsters.In 1955, over 10 million children received one or more injections of Salk vaccine, including this boy, the President's own grandson, David Eisenhower.And now like millions of boys and girls across the nation, David too is protected against paralytic polio, free to play and enjoy the delights of summertime with the President, his grandfather.From the United States Public Health Service, a report on these vaccinations in 1955, by the distinguished former surgeon general, Dr. Leonard A. Scheele.As we enter the second year of wide-scale use of the Salk polio vaccine, it's my very pleasant duty to report to you the results of polio vaccinations today, on the councilor's findings on the effectiveness of vaccine add up to good news indeed.We had an especially good opportunity to study effectiveness last year.Here is a very simple chart which indicates how the vaccine worked during 1955.It is based on reports from 22 states and New York city.Among vaccinated children as you can see, the attack rate for paralytic polio was only 6.3 per 100,000 while among the unvaccinated, their attack rate was 29.2 for 100,000, almost four times as high.The studies involved about eight and one half million children whose ages range from 5 to 11 years.Even though most of the vaccinated children they had only one injection instead of the full dosage of three, the vaccine was found to be about 78% effective.Put in another way, the boys and girls who received at least one injection of vaccine had about four times as much protection as those without it.We can all be proud of the Salk vaccine brought about by American scientists and American giving.We can all share in the hope that this victory will lead to many more in the years ahead.For a maximum protection from paralytic polio, three inoculations, the second given not less than two weeks after the first, the third not less than seven months later.Your child or any member of your family eligible for polio vaccine in your community should be vaccinated now.Vaccination now will save lives from death or paralysis this year.Make use of increasing supplies of vaccine.Help your child grow up strong and straight, free from crippling polio.Youngsters like David Eisenhower, like polio pioneer, Randy Kerr, are part of a bright new future.A future which would see the unconditional surrender of infantile paralysis.American homes and homes-", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Uncondit1956.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Uncondit1956.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Uncondit1956.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/Underhill_Selectbd_5-30-13/Underhill_Selectbd_5-30-13.mp3", "text": "I'm going to call this meeting to order May 30th, at five o'clock.Just like board meeting two.And we're a first order of businesses to discuss storm damage.Nate.I want to start with Nate and go around the room here and all put our 2 cents in.How's that?Give me your 2 cents on where you're at, what you're thinking, which way you're going to proceed.Just overall picture right now, Nate.Went around the FEMA yesterday.Needs to be taken back, the compactors.Get your numbers for them, and the direction you go.Meeting with Chris Redenall on Tuesday, with all the river and rough issues.Put on the ceilings for right now.Street in there...Can you go over North Underhill road?North Underhill road...Lower structure of the head wall the other day is...That's the one thing that's outstanding as it being back to, correct?Correct.And then we got quite a crater on the north end...A lot of utilities also.A lot of utilities also.Yup.So what direction you've been heading in the last few days, since, you know, since Sunday, I know you got, you just fill them back, filling holes and using the stuff from the pit and doing that.What are you doing?Okay.So Sunday is kind of the last time you really went at it, filling holes, okay.And you been hauling in stone from anywhere, like that?How much do you expect?Road and you got beige roads, got quite a chunk out of it.Lots on poker hill, down drone will have to be revealing all the way up through bill cook, parks county, jonah hill, bridge noel.Rapper road...We got the north end of our tunnel, hover road.Now just on a triage thing, I was walking back North Under hill road.It's going to be, is our big problem right now?Correct?Can we fill in that hole on that structure?Is that structure stable enough to put a temporary road there?So we could fill it in?We could do a quick tar patch job and we could...No tar patch.We'd have to...We need a structural engineer in the short term, correct?Correct.I don't know if we need a motion, but I agree.We need a structural engineer, and we should hire one of the big guys.Either way we look at for a filling.Yes.I agree, a hundred percent.Do you have any names?Did you call around today at all?Would you like me to do it?Okay.Is that the last question?I mean, is that something that would be in the category B?So it's just all part of the emergency?Or is it something that would be in the...Define category B. - Good question.From my understanding it's for emergency purposes.Right.So would you consider this an emergency purpose?Right, yeah.So everything after that emergency services, and everything going forward then would have to be part of the individual roads FEMA estimated cost you per state for their approval.Right.Does anyone have an idea what the hourly rate for a structural engineer is?Just for a bunch of purposes?No, and I imagined for something like that, it'd probably be, if you're gonna put it in a FEMA project, you, they must have, they have seem to have lists for everything.So they might have a list of what they would accept.But I don't think we can take more...We just need someone to look at it and say, yeah, it's passable, yeah it's not passable.You know?Let's just table that one for a second.I mean, it's something we definitely have to deal with, but like Nate says people who get out both ways, we're not holding anybody up.So let's, that's definitely a factor for sure.Mona, why do you take a whack at it for a little bit?Oh, well...I...I guess I'm always coming from the financial part of it, you know, and so, you know, with this category B part of it, which is all the emergency stuff, which is just one FEMA project, if we'd get the FEMA approval, you know, I don't know what that is yet.Cause I haven't seen any of the invoices.So did you like...Did you like add those up or anything, or do you know where the invoices are?All the stuff that happened previously so far?So I don't know.I guess that might be like 50 or 60,000 maybe, or whatever, like you said, we don't have all the invoices.But we have 44,000 in our contingency rainy day reserve fund that we can just, that's gonna take care of I think of a huge part of that.Dwayne has been working on gathering all those pictures, and you know, we went over with them, all the, how the project works and stuff to get everything set up for FEMA. He interviewed and worked with the guys today with Nate's help on finding out where they were and what they did so we can have some good documentation of what happened during those four days and stuff.We go through the stuff contractor and time out.Pretty much around the law for the contractor wherever those holes are.Okay, so then Dwayne's on all that.Dwayne's on that and he's working with Sherry, and Nate and I are kind of teaming up on it, and then hopefully all those invoices will come in hopefully soon and Nate of course will approve and make sure that we don't get charged for maybe a private road and not a public road or whatever.And then we just kind of gather information the way we did last time.And I have talked to our banker and they said, Shelley Clinton from merchant said that, you know, it's good.We could do this next select board meeting.It's good just to get the paperwork set up for a line of credit, choose a number either at we're already approved is to have our financials from the end of June, just choose a number that will get us through the emergency part of it.You don't have to pick the 2 million number, just say, you know, a couple hundred thousand whatever.And then as things happen, you've already got it established to draw.So it's set up and ready to go.And then as things for a month, if you get to FEMA or if you don't and you get more good estimates of what it's going to cost, then we can always increase the amount.What's the line of credit that's available now?To authorize and...Right well, we'll have to set it out.But I had told her, we were looking at a couple of million and she didn't seem too bad and I, but...But at the end, we can do it for a year because you have traveled approver for longterm, but you can do this, this line of credit for a year if you're still working on it and you still haven't finished it off, you can renew for another year.At some point you can either convert it to a long-term note that you're gonna pay off, or you can talk to the bond bank people too.And they said we could also go to the voters, see if they want to do a bond if it's too much convert it to a bond.So I think, I think my...And then the sheet that I laid out there, kind of a thing to...With the cash.I took our current cash of 880,000.And, you know, minus what it's gonna take us to get to the end of the year, minus what it's gonna take us to get to the August 15, the next tax date.And so you have like about $400,000.So I think between the two of your fine between that could mean the loan from the bank and this, I think you're fine.You know, it's, you don't want to take on debt as much as possible, but it's there if you need it, you know.And the lower part of that, the fund balances, you know, we have with Gasby, we have to have a fund balance policy.And we're saying we have to keep 15% in there.If we did that we couldn't spend very much money, but the select board can in emergency reduce that, that we say we're keeping, so.So I think that, you know, the cash is there either from us or from our partners at the bank.And so you wouldn't have to worry about that.The main thing is just making sure we have, you know, like Nate said, getting the information back from FEMA, making sure that everything is processed accurately so that we get our money with paperwork, and yeah.So...And yeah, I guess that's about all I have to say.Just so everybody can feel somewhat reassured that...That you're not going to be not being able to do this stuff.I did have them on this.I guess this was from Brad of the people who were out there.And I checked there's maybe four people, I don't know, and getting the contact information from them.But everybody else is either in our vendor file and get paid immediately.Or two people have some paperwork they got to get back to me, but they're, you know, it's gonna be fine.So I don't think anybody is gonna be held up not getting paid, unless there's somebody that's not on the list that we don't know about.So we'll take care of everybody that helped us and the bank will take care of us, and all that.So that's about it.Oh, FEMA, with a clash and papers structured, normally count all any, or all material, whatever it takes your basic material in any class for that...No material, no nothing.If the structure was gone totally in any of the projects they would pay for it.But majority of the structure stayed, everything else like on Pedro, that steam mower that was the only thing left.Probably a gap there 204...Was still there.And now they're the ones that keep reoccurring.They stated we have documentation from prior years.Was rejoined, they said if we can get that information and they can show that color or make a bridge.So it stops reoccurring.And we have a lot of phone calls.You know what I mean?All we did with bella road over what was there to get people out.Or if people in plastic, and so we pull them plastics you're gonna damage.So, the town was liable for buying new collars.If the collar's gone, they would pay for it.But if it's pre-existing in there, they won't give me any money...Mean that they'll pay you to replace the similar one.Where they couple together, we take it apart and it breaks apart.And we dragged that one back in the collar's gone.Yeah.So that one was just a temporary effect.So you're going to have to get a grade of color in the area the same way the collar has gone.We just put a quick cratchet strap on it, hold it back in the hole and popped it to it.What do you need from us in short term?Can we go around the room?Emergency management asked me to try to collect some more information on private individual damages.Which I got off to them today.And the purpose of that, it's very unlikely that there'll be any kind of federal funding on a personal level, but it also helps assist in the picture of the public part too, as far as damages that happened here.So they were, they asked me to get as much information as I could on that.So I got a list of places that had damage.I didn't get ahold of everybody as to exactly what the damages were.And I've got just some rough estimates here in there, not on everything, but they were happy just to get the list.So keep in touch with them on that.I wanted to just kind of check with Nate here too, on updating the roads hotline.Right now I just have, it sounds like it's going to remain that way.That North Underhill station road is still remaining close to through traffic, and still drive with extreme caution.The question is on the private roads like beaver brook and kelly road, those private roads fire department can't.But again from FEMA's estimate, there's about $150,000 damage on killer from the front of the sector, from the tail.And beaver brook, I have not been over there.I heard that fire department today, they said that they wouldn't put up big truck up there.No, yeah they contacted and they said that they couldn't get in there.Did anybody establish that when something happens to private property or private road or a private driveway, whose responsibility it is in the emergency situation to get it fixed.The one we heard on Friday, we were to get everybody out, whether it was on private property, or not.We did assist what we could reach it off the down road some of these houses.You know but then on Saturday, she did not touch in front of the door right away.Who is that information from?The girl.Rachel.I think she lost our schedule by hiring up there on Saturday.Okay, the theme of language restoration of access, it says in cases where homes are inaccessible as a result of the damage, work to establish emergency access maybe eligible under the PA public act.If an eligible applicant has legal authority to perform the work and provide that the emergency access economically eliminates the need for temporary housing.Bottom line is the town's cost of re-establishing emergency access to residents should be PA eligible.And it says it's part of the category B of the PA public assistance.But only if they can't get there...Well, that's why we need that letter from the fire department saying they can't get to the deep holes.And then, oh our PA not IA. - So that means .Oh, we have to wait for FEMA to give us the go ahead on the B stuff, right?This would be part of B, they say category B of public assistance.That's kind of like, you know, the last time, just as an example, there was someone who was stranded on the other side of big gold, because they washed out.You know, Brad went out and rented like a flatbed.They kind of somehow, or another person over, you know, and we got to get reimbursed under category B with that, although that was their private property, it was, you know, kind of like rescuing them.So it's almost kind of like that, right?There's an emergency and you can't get in or out to their property.You can do it and include it in this emergency category.BPA sounds like it, but, you know.But I don't know if we have anybody like that.There's people that can't get to their places.They can get there by car.You just can't get service people in there.Same thing.Is there any way to, from that information that you have there with someone that just to take it to the next level, because that's definitely some feedback we're getting in there.Right.We really need to nail that down and if that's true, we're supposed to help these people in category D right now, we need to get on that, and finish that part of where we're at.But we need a confirmation from the system.We would like them to come out, and take another look at those roads.I mean, you have to know, you know, if we are responsible, we should be out there working on it.It's a slippery slope.They couldn't get in or out there much because traffic.I want to do what, you know, FEMA tells us to do.That's what we're going to have to do.Well on Friday, they know we had to help people because otherwise .But that was DLT, that's not FEMA either.So we're talking about two different groups here, and two different...One's gotta have authority over the other.You got to find out who the higher up is over there.We can do that tomorrow.Do you guys all feel like there's a good game plan, and good leadership and flow of information here?I mean, it is Dwayne, you know, he...We've really just started, you know.But I think, you know, for me...I understand there was this wonderful map that FEMA Rachel or whatever...It would be really nice to have a map of the roads.Even if you labeled them, Carrie knows all the roads.And she's great with maps too.If you'd be labeled them like, this is A, and then...We could, cause when he just talks about this stuff, we might not really getting it into the bucket we need to get it into.So if we could just, kind of like, label them and maybe even give them our own project numbers initially, so that as we start to do stuff...We don't know where it is.We think she took it back with her, but maybe Carrie, you know...And then when Nate talks about something or whatever, for me, I would feel more like...So it seems like we're in somewhat of a pause mode here waiting on FEMA information before.And you guys go ahead and take that next step on fixing things is that what I'm assuming here.Momentarily, put in there Friday was put in character.We drew it out of here a couple of years ago, when packing stuff.But the stuff we used on Sunday was a little more trashy.So that's going to be taken back out again.We get some good veins, but then Monday, Sunday there were running, you know, I didn't see any buckets of, you know, trash and stuff.You know, that's not back as well.Temporary .So this is where's Dwayne fit on this, on what he's doing in this whole thing for us.I mean, is he just doing odds and ends?Do you have him in charge of paperwork with what would we have in mind?Equipment, hours, who went where, how running around such and such roll.So you should have a file on every single role as it comes in.Records and then pass it on every single day, do something on a Monday, come Thursday.You're going to forget what you did on Monday, where you went.If you were over there for two hours, over here for an hour.Maybe we should put a notebook in a truck.Would that be?I think, and you know what I was talking to, he's taking, he's sitting at the computer downstairs, that's free.And so he, I gave him all this, all the FEMA files from the last year, how they were structured with the pictures, and the spreadsheet and the copies of the invoices.And I showed him the paper files and everything.He's got a great handle on it.He has some great ideas, he's, you know, vast and...Cause when the guys thought at the time may only put seven hours flood, I've asked him to work with them to get those details of where they work.So he's keeping track of that.You know, it was, you know, if you get an invoice from Jim Madell and it's been on, he's worked on seven projects, you know, it's just scan it into every single project.And he's just, you know, he's got some great ideas actually for road maintenance going forward.And then it's going to use last year's files too to see if this is second occurrence, third occurrence on some of those things.So we can get maybe better replacement in that.And I guess my only concern is, you know, I don't want to keep him from something else that Nate and I want to coordinate.Cause I don't want him to think that I'm hogging him completely, and I'm not really doing it, he is, but you know, just that, I don't know how many hours he's allowed to spend it on it probably.But I think the one thing we're missing is I think we should only have, we should have like a FEMA contact that it seems to be sometimes it's going to you, and sometimes it's going to you and stuff.And maybe somehow or another, that really...Haven't gotten anything.We haven't gotten anything.So it's almost just with you and go back anyway, because there were lots of emails last year.So I don't, you know.So I brought up about structure.I'd just love to see you guys, when you guys are all working well on the ground, you're doing your thing you're doing there.But if there's a lead person in the office here, that talking to that FEMA person, or again, you know, your visits, you know your business, they don't need to manage you guys, but ahead of the snake and maybe that is Dwayne.I don't see why it's not?Yeah, the only thing is to, you know, the email.You know, cause a lot of times they send a lot of stuff by email so, but...We can set them up with an email.And then do we have an extra box?Yeah so we can set them up with an email and he just sits down there and stuff, and then he'll know when it has to go to the back way...Yeah so let's have Dwayne at the head of that beast.Sounds good.No, I'm just wondering what he needs in the short term between now and then our next meeting.You have a meeting next week.If you need any, what resources do you need?Private contractor and try to work on it, and we'll start her on .Keep with Ramona because we want to stay within the budget.We don't want to tilt keep on money or if we get connects from FEMA. - Break, right now?Is what you're saying?I'm not saying that you can't spend money.We're saying that you can serve.Your proudly for the weekend, your family around 60.We pretty much figured that now that...But I hear what you're saying I mean, I do.I agree with everything you hear, your brakes are on until we get more word from FEMA. And learn about what direction we're going here.So that makes sense.But why not get estimates?Those don't hurt us.Who usually makes those calls in getting estimates out of this group?A lot of people do it.You can get different ones.Do we need three estimates for everything we looked at here?You know, we have the first thing policy, but in emergencies, we don't really look at it.You don't have to.We're past the emergency here.So we purchasing policy.Yes, but you don't have to go to a form of bidding process.If it's going to, if theses particular project's going to be under $15,000.Then you're supposed to get estimates from other people.They can be informal.It doesn't have to be an RFP, but you should try to get two or three estimates if you don't have those, that many suppliers in your local areas, it's okay.Get one with this whole 15, under 15,000, you don't, you should try and get two or three.If you don't have two or three people.If you, you have like a gravel, you know, there's like two places you call, but you always go to one place.But I mean, it's kind of like, you already do that Nate.I think you already do that in all this stuff you do.You call around.You know, reach out where everybody pretty comparable.It's just whoever, again, you know, we're in the steaming .You're going to get someone to go along with.Exactly, exactly.Right.Which means there's only, that means there's only one person who can do it.You can't find a competitor to get another bedroom because he had a guy who can't long pole.And I was like three tremors who doesn't have the tallest thing.So you can do that, it'd just be good to continually...Well, yeah, when you get the estimates, and those estimates can also flow through to like the files that Dwayne's doing, because we want...Wherever you can get two or three estimates when it makes sense it's a job that there's three guys to go to, I understand if it's no one else can do it, then that's how it falls.But whenever you can.How does, I guess, how does this interfere with, I suppose, greatly your normal step that you were going to be doing this spring in size that, you know, like all those problems you did Did you?Did any of those culverts that were just replaced get washed?You know, you're a couple of weeks out .It'd probably be 150,000 to 200,000 dollars.And then the dirt that goes over the top of it or the stone.We need the stone, okay.Okay.So all those culverts are parts of the road that FEMAs looked at.So they're going to be part of the next project.I just have to look in my responsibilities for her to see stuff...Yeah, but mostly my stuff has to due with structural manage, not structure in terms of, necessarily board structures, but houses and those things.Got anything to add to this being who you are and what you do?What?I missed the whole thing.Just say my hats off to you guys for the work you did.When I got home that day by my driveway, that was according to the pictures we got from people.So, you guys did a great job.If there was some structure there.What would it look like in your book?If it was a new structure?Yeah.It could be a large pipe, or it could be a concrete box.Could be a bridge.I've seen that would get over top twice now, about 10 years.Before it happened and then 2013.No, is that 20 years?Yeah, 20 years, sorry.Where are you going to get that information?First found flooded every couple minutes and five minutes.Might just be in invoices, and...You don't have like...What about, you know, like the computer program that says when callers were changed up it more?It doesn't say the year?Because otherwise we just have the last few months.So you wouldn't have a record of changing the caller.Caller have a statement.Okay, gotcha.How long you think the requirements for documentation is it Jerry's testimony from 1982 that you remember something?Or is it something more than that, I don't know.I mean, I wonder what...They had no documentation, but it was all the neighbors stepping forward to say, it's just gone out such and such a year.And they listed it, and got bumped out by verbal stuff from the neighbors.I just wonder if research on Dwayne's part or someone's department could make enough of what you were working on.Where would you start your research at, that's my question.You have a lot of the historical knowledge yourself, you almost know all the different ones have been handed over the last 11 years, so.And you talk to the people like you, when you talk to the neighbors and people have been around a while and you get them to put it in writing is what I think would help.I remember...I don't know the year and I could look it up because the town got an easement from us to do work at the end of that culver on that property.So that would be a date when that present Culver was installed.I won't say the wrong date, but I can only remember two times when the road washed out once was about 10 years ago.I think.Yeah, that sounds right.If no one has anything to add we're going to just take a quick recess till six, till Greg gets here to continue with our whole business.So if there's nothing else to be said, this storm debriefing on, let's just take a 20 minute break here.Go ahead.I just wanted to clarify what I thought I had heard.It sounds like, we conceivably, you would have some coverage under this plan B. - That's what we're trying to figure out.So we don't know how to proceed.We need to be very careful that if, you know, if we don't start working on people's private roads and start some awful chain of events all over town, fixing up private roads if we're not supposed to.So we really need word from FEMA whoever up top saying, this is how it's supposed to be done.And we don't have that word yet.There's no conversation with you.It's probably unclear when you might even get that clarity.And we're talking just a couple of days, maybe.Yeah, I would assume.I'm only assuming.All we know is they been around did a tour yesterday and then they went off to their office and we haven't seen or heard from since then.So. - Keep all your invoices, take a million pictures, get more quotes to get the road back to 100%.All that documentation will matter.So we're thinking we should do nothing until we hear back from you at this point.But you should probably try to get a quote for the whole road, just a quote, and to get it back to where it was.Now, was that ever B 71 standard?Do you know what that is?You probably don't know.What's that?B 71 is rad, we're looking at B 76.B 76, was that ever B 76?76 standard?I believe so.Iverson built it to the town standards because he thought the town was going to take it over.What year was that road built?78 ish.Yeah, 78.So we understand, we understand it's not the wait.I'm trying to get the answer as quick as we can.And can you make sure you done has got both your contact information I think.So as soon as we get word, we'll let you know.Anything else?Well, I don't know if this is the right kind, but one comment on if this happened again, it seems like for people on both public and private roads, somebody from the town or the fire department, I don't know whose job is emergency services would physically go up each row, even if they had to walk it, and maybe contact people in each home and tell them that they should evacuate.Or if they're, it wasn't possible to evacuate anymore and they should put on their back what they needed.So people were informed because most of this happened during the night and we had no idea what was going on by the time we woke up our road was gone.But they didn't do it on my road.There's only 30 members.Yeah, that's fine.Your point being is you wish that there was more, kind of, emergency outreach, more heads up to someone like you in the middle of the night.Yeah.I don't honestly don't know how to accomplish that, but I hear what you're saying.That's a good idea, but I don't know how we'd accomplish that.I'm sorry?Compare, yeah.It's interesting point.All right anything else?Okay, let's just take a quick recess for 20 minutes here we'll reconvene at six.Okay, go ahead.Okay, we're going to call this Thursday, May 30th select board meeting the order at 6:00 PM. This is a continuation of last Thursday's meeting.South was not available to be here last Thursday for the entire meeting.So we're going to take up this business here.And first on the agenda is public comment.Is anyone here public comment?Okay, we're gonna move right along then to discussing and enforcing court order 13, 1 11.So I just like to kind of go over what this is all about.We have a superior court judgment order against Robert Blaze for a non-permitted structure.He is...He has been ordered to reimburse the town the sum of $4,080 and 54 cents.That reimbursement includes attorney's fees, zoning administrator time, along with some other things.So he had until May 1st to remove the structure.So he has not complied.The town has the right to go in and remove the structure.And if we remove the structure, we need a new court order to recover the demo cost.So we would need to go back to court again, to recover our costs.These, this order, and this violation do run with the property.So the next order, this property sold at tax sale last year.Do we know for the sum of how much?It's about that, though.It is, okay.So we have tax sale.And basically that means that Mr. Blaze needs to come up with the 25,000 plus 12% interest in order to get his land back.Otherwise, as of January 24th, 2014, the property will be the person who bid on it tax sale, which I believe is his Lamelle or Lamelle Lumber.So I'd like to know, was this judgment order recorded in the land records?That's getting us a copy to recording land records and at such time as we receive it, it will be.Okay, I want to keep on that.I want to make sure this...If it is, if it hasn't already been recorded.Yeah, I want to make sure it's recorded.And then did Mr. Blaze receive a certified copy of this judgment order?And he, we have receipt of that.Well, it wasn't sent by us.Okay, it was be the...It was either by the attorney or the court.Okay.So anybody have any comments and...Well, I'd like to actually just, I don't know if Carrie has anything to just add as an overview and then we can hear from other folks, do you have anything to say, Carrie?Just the point of clarification that the order does allow the town to hire a contractor to go in and remove all structures on the property.Not just the one that we know about.Okay but there's not really, as far as other structures.All structures, all tents, those things apply.Yes.Really?Okay.Oh yeah, structures and temporary living shelters located on the defendant's property at 190 bear town road.But again, we do understand that, you know, in order to do that we'd need to find a contractor that would do that sort of work.We would need to hire sheriffs to escort him.We would need to give Mr. Blaze proper notice that we're going to be entering his property to do this.So we would incur quite a cost.I'm not sure how much, we could get estimates, but we would incur quite a cost.And as I said, we would have to go get another court order in order to tack those costs onto this first judgment order.So. - I believe that the cost reimbursement is part of that judgment.No it's not, no it's not.It says it right in here, and I clarified that with chat.So that's above and beyond.These are, because this order only speaks to the $4,000 and not to the cost of the removal.So, anybody else.So, the additional costs, would that also go with the property?I believe it would.But yes, I believe it would.I tried to clarify that today, and I'm not a hundred percent sure, but I believe it would.Although if you think about it in a common sense way, someone buys something at tax sale, I mean, they realize, I'm not sure if he, if Mr. Lamelle knew that this judgment order was in existence when he bought at tax sale.I just wonder, it just seems, something seems not quite right with that.You know, you'd go ahead and buy a property at tax sale.And all of a sudden we come in and say, oh, by the way, here's another $10,000, in fees to clear up the violations on this property.So, and as I said before, I'm not going to send our road crew in to do this work.It just wouldn't ask them, ever ask them to do this.It's not what they're here for.So...You know, just as a discussion, I would...It sure seems likely that Lamelle will wind up with the property, I can't say that for sure.But if he does, you'll be dealing with a much more reasonable person that will want to work with you and get everything cleaned up, I mean, so that's kinda what we have before us is what we have to decide.Do we move forward and incur costs?You know, given the certain circumstances that's just happened is it fair to incur?I don't know how much more costs to do this work and then have to wait at least until January 24th to recover the money.So that's...I'd like to hear, I'd like to make comment I'd like to hear from other people first.Sure.Chris, go ahead.Well, just based on, you saw the turnout of the people that were here at the other class, few morning got postponed and we all feel the same way that Robbie's been able to basically flower a loss since he's been there.And what kind of incentive is there for him to stop breaking the law if we don't enforce these judgments?It's, I mean, he's been living there when he says he's not, and he's put up structures, which don't belong there.I mean, why is he about to break the law and not have to, you know, where's the enforcement then?And I think that that's a disincentive for people to follow the rules that the town sets out.If we allow someone to continually proceed with, you know, with this behavior and it's, you know, mad maybe for the people who live on that road to know what that land was pristine and beautiful before.And it's been turned into a garbage dump with illegal structures, signs that are very threatening and warning that don't even belong there.That haven't been removed from a right of way that I have access to because we bought land up there, still things that haven't been taken care of, and he's turned it into a complete dump.And if we don't enforce the laws that we set up, then what's to stop the next person.We bought the land up there because we didn't want that to happen again.So where's the incentive for people to follow the law?Or, you know, to know that there's going to be a penalty or consequence if we just let him get away with this?And it's been going on for years now.A quick question, is anyone living up there now?I, you know, to be honest, I can't say for certain, but I know that people have been back and forth, even when he said they weren't living there.I know that Karen McKnight saw that structure that is on the court order, and there were lights on and people have been going up there.So, and it's been, you know, it's a fear for us, with our kids to have people going back and forth there that, you know, aren't what we would consider neighborly people.Chris, what makes you think though, with the structure gone that any behavior's going to change?Well, I just think that it will be, if it's, there's no place to really stay or accommodate, he's had the camper up there.He's had other stuff up there.There's, it's like starting to clean up processes, instead of eventually anything in my mind.Okay, but if, let's say we theoretically, we go in there and we tear everything down, and take down the traps and everything else.He's proven himself to be a person that will live in very, very rough conditions.And you also have to look at this from, you're poking a bee's nest here because you go down and you tear all those things down.There's no reason why he's actually not allowed to go throw up a tent and camp for the rest of the summer out there.You're, I just want you to understand, I truly do not feel from what I understand in this situation that removing anything on that property will make him go away until he no longer owns the property.Is he allowed to live there?He's allowed to be on his land for some periods of time.And I don't know how we never enforce him.As you've seen, we can enforce maybe tearing down a structure, but to keep someone from being on their property and camping on, let's say weekends, I don't see how we enforce that at all.So you still have the problem that you have no matter what we do there.I truly do not think, in fact, it may encourage more behavior that you don't like by exacerbating the situation.That's another concern.Not that we should live in fear because of that.But I agree with Seth, I think, you know, we do this, we follow this judgment order.We do, we clean the property up.He has every right to go in there and seasonally camp, and you're not going to stop that.And we have no part of your, you know, your dispute with the right of way.And that's not nothing that we have anything to do with, you know, the signs and so forth.That road was discontinued.It's no longer a town issue the right of way.So I just let you know that part.But I kind of have to agree with Seth.And I know it's...I dunno, it's a difficult situation.I don't think you're going to find many people that would make it to this stage of a violation.I think most, any reasonable sane person would go to a superior, you know, would go, would show up in environmental court and respect the judges order.That's true.I mean, I agree with you.I don't disagree with what you're saying, but then where is the consequences for illegally...Right, well, we've been down this road before with a Sipri parcel, if I'm correct.Sipri removed the structure in compliance.In compliance, that's right.Yeah so there we had someone, illegal structure.We went through the motions, they respected the...I don't know if it...It was the RB. - It was the RB. So they respected the RBs decision, and removed the structure.Chris, I totally hear you.And where I'm conflicted on it is why do we have rules at all if we're not going to enforce them.And that, I completely understand.And I think that's a really valid point.So I'm not taking that away from you for a second.I just think, all I'm saying is if we enforce this rule, I don't see any behavior changing until he loses that property next January, but that's no reason maybe not to enforce rules.Maybe those are two separate things.I mean that's...Otherwise, why do you have it on the books?And then what's to stop other people from feeling other properties and getting...So why would we be respectful?And that's what we're asking as taxpayers.That's one of the reasons why we have government isn't that?Yup, yup.Question.I know nothing of this situation whatsoever.What is this really?Well, it was a supposedly a sugar house.It's a shed type structure, like with a loft in it.12 by 12, maybe with a loft, you know, rough cut lumber six by six posts.Would it be possible to, with the sheriffs escort .Yeah, we still have to clean up the mask though.The fact that you're asking a neighbor to go into another neighbor's property and burn their property down.You know, it's very emotional.These are, you know, property rights.A lot of people know this guy too.And probably guys on the fire department probably know this guy.He's a local guy.So I said, there's definitely, it's a loaded, you know, and that's again, why we don't want to ask the crew or someone like that be involved.This also could be dangerous.You know, whoever, if we did hire someone for this, there definitely needs to be sheriffs involved.And who knows what comes of it from there.It is not a normal deconstruction process I'd say from what we know of the property.And it's very possible.You may not find anyone that would want to do this because you, we would have, it would be wrong not to reveal the whole history of what they're getting into before they go there.So, you know, but again, all speculation until we...I mean, just the fact that we're having this discussion about potential exacerbation and, you know, even say repercussion, that was just, that's not the way a citizen is supposed to behave in a town that's governed by rules and regulations.And we, like you said, we should have been in fear, but at the same time, you're saying let's not disturb the hornet's nest.So that's kind of a paradoxical.I know, but this, when you throw this tax sale thing into the mix, and you think about, you know, here we are, it's, you know, one, June, six months.And we're going to be possibly in a whole different situation, but possibly not.Maybe come up with the money and be back there again.But it's just something to weigh into the...There's risks to the town to go ahead and enforce this, as you can see, right?There's a financial risk, there's other risks.And the thought passes through all our mind is, if this is someone else owning it, it was totally reasonable in January.I know it stinks for you guys up there, but there's only six months left or so, or, you know, of decent weather that you're putting up with this situation.Now I'd be eating my words if he's there in the spring and re-bought his property.And now we're having the same meeting again.Exactly, and that's the thing.If on the, if he doesn't repurchase and if it does end up, I think Lamelle knows what he's getting into the situation, to be honest.So that I don't think there's a financial risk to the town for extending that money.If it's going be picked up by the, I mean, I'm thinking he knows what he was getting into because people have spoken to him.But if not, then Rodney can't have his land back if that additional money is tack on for the removal of structures that are going to end up having to be removed anyway, at some point.That's right, but it wouldn't be on our dime.It would be on the Mel's dime.Not that it's about the money.But again, we're just in a different situation here than last week.You know, we're going to be putting a lot of things off here that we wanted to do and there's big considerations.So, I guess what I could tell you is, I think, I don't know how you guys feel, but we could...We'll go to the next step, try to find someone that would be interested in this type of work.Get an estimate.Yeah, I think that would be a reasonable.So, you know, at least, so we're moving forward in a direction.Does that sound reasonable?Okay.We're going to have to get course.We're going to have to, I don't know.We'll have to take advice from our attorney, but then again, there goes the time clock with the attorney, but did we notify him again that we're coming in, anybody that, you know, I guess we have photographs, maybe that's good enough for the contractor to give a price.You know, to give them some kind of an idea.Then we'll get up, get a cost from the Chimney County Sheriff's department.And then we can...If we can do that between, like I said, we've got lots of things going on, but if we can try to do that between now and next Thursday, we'll try.If not, it'll be the following.I would think that we look for RFPs and then we come back in to July.You give a month to go over all this, to come up with an idea of what the...We got sheriffs, we got contractor, we got an RFP to write.So there's, we've got a lot on our plate in the next week.So I'd say that we revisit this in July one month from now.Yeah, that's just another month goes by.I would just assume if we get...Well we'd have contractor prices, hopefully we would have contractor prices.Hopefully we would have shared price.Yeah.Information, we'd have information.I mean, it would be worth just making a few phone calls, maybe the certain excavating companies to see if they're even interested in that sort of thing.You know, I don't know maybe they're...We could ask the Sheriffs, they've probably been involved in these situations.Maybe they know contractors that would do this work.So they would start there.Well, let's meet the middle issue for two weeks and we'll have some answers to you.And then if we're not there all the way with answers then it'll be...But let's shoot for two weeks, how's that?Okay, that's fine.That's fine.All right.But we understand the hard spot you guys are in.We really do.Yeah.Don't go up and needle them or anything, but see if he's around in it from a distance or just seeing if there's foot traffic or you don't think he's around?Yeah, that's a lot harder than you think, because I don't want to go near there.But you can't go too close in, it's tough.We have a court order to deal with, and we should deal with it accordingly.I agree.So, thank you.For a reason I think it should be enforced.I think waiting until January is the wrong move.I feel that this is a violation against a specific violator basically, and to wait and have somebody else kind of take on that violation when you could enforce it now I think this is the wrong move.I understand that things have gone on in the last week and that flooding takes precedence.And I totally agree with that, but I don't think that putting this off until January is the right move to be perfectly honest.Okay, so let me put it this way.So say we incur, I dunno, 5, $10,000 worth of costs, right?We go to court, we get a separate order for that.We tack that on, now we're up to $14,000.What do you think our chances of getting that from Mr. Blaze are?Probably not very good, but the fact of the matter is there is a violation.I understand that, but we have, I think in a way we have done justice because there, we went to the fact to get a judgment order.We will be reimbursed that money one way or the other from the legal fees.So I know it didn't go to full conclusion, but...You know, at least...I know it doesn't but to me it feels like...The way it just keeps going.Because in a sense, it's almost like he knows this one big press, which is milking the system.Well I don't think reimbursing the full and not the deconstruction costs.Well, we'd have to go for a separate order there, and then I'm not so sure.I would like...I would like clarification from our attorney that that will be tacked onto this judgment order.And Lamelle will be responsible for that.But I don't think it's right to make him responsible for that.I don't think it is either, but it goes with the property.I mean, you know, the judgment orders here, he didn't fulfill, you know, his obligation to tear down the structure.Then we have to go in to fulfill our obligation of enforcement.So violation goes with the...The violation does but the cost...And the cost to remove these structures would be then recorded as a lien against the...Okay.Okay.Fair enough.So I'm just a little kind of questioning the time between the tax sale and the lien.You know, there seems like a little something there that's missing.Maybe Lamelle would like to tear it down himself.That's a good, that's a good thought.That's a good thought.That's a good thought.And then he wouldn't incur the costs in the long run.That's an excellent idea.No but he's, as a contractor or whoever he chooses to use as a contractor.I also don't want to make it sound like the town doesn't have the money or can't afford to do something like this.I don't wanna make that sound the way it is.I mean, funds are tight and we have a lot of expenses, but again, you don't not enforce rules because they're expensive.And I don't think that's...Yeah, like I said I'm not trying to say that, but I'm just saying it adds into the, you know, I'm just looking, you know, say he does get it back at tax sale.You know, does he have to, does all this have to come with it before he gets titled to the property?Or it's just the tax sale.If he comes up with the tax sale money, he still retains title, but these still hang.I think that judgment is still enforceable.No, I realize it's enforceable, but, but he doesn't have to pay is what I'm saying.He has to pay his obligation to the tax sale to get title back to the property.This stuff is separate.It is separate, but he would still be obligated.I realize that somebody can be obligated forever and they're not gonna pay.So it would be an ongoing dispute again.I realize.And just adding 12% every year.And even if the structures are moved in, you know, he puts up another structure.Well, that's a new violation.That's a new enforcement.It seems like it would be.Yeah, I liked Jerry's idea.I think it'd be, probably be prudent to contact Mr. Lamelle and have a conversation with him about this.So there's nothing, there's nothing wrong with that.A good idea.Let's do that.That's a better.So anyway, are we all set?Do you have anything Adrian would like to say?Or okay, we'll do the best we can.Thank you guys for coming in.So we have a Tom garage heat approve audit.Is that something that we have to, is that what you're here for here?Are you here for that or not?Did you talk about Murphy?Yes.And?And we're going to have to reschedule that, cause I totally forgot about...Reschedule him.He was here at the last meeting.I don't know I was out of town.I sent a bunch of emails and never got any response.I don't know what's going on.Okay I think we get skip on this and put that on.I can't go off hand I'd say this has gotten a little bit of glacier pace.Yeah, that's fine.That's fine.So now we have a town hall restoration projects on an email they detailed report needed to be done.Mike Wisell worked with a contractor to put that together.And did everybody review that?Okay how do we...How do we feel?Do you have anything to say Mike or anything you'd like to say?Yes.I think that this, that you have there that outlined the exterior repairs and replacements that you have speaks for itself as far as it goes, but there's the issue of the storm windows.And there was some discussion about a way to thermally improve these large historic windows and yet keep the windows in tact as a historic window.And that was all set to have someone from Parker and Stern speaking here to look at ways that we might be able to accomplish that plan.The events like this was a week ago, your last meeting, call me and say stop for now.So I don't know where we're standing in terms of continuing on with this evaluation and inventory process or whether it's on hold temporarily or permanently or what, but my next step, if you want me to continue with any of this on the town hall restoration would be just to speak with someone like Parker and Sterns and get some hopes for what we would possibly be able to do to improve these windows.And then add that information to the, to the list that you have.So you've got a full rundown of all the things that are recommended, and then you can take that and go out for bids from contractors that would be able to implement this work.Right.Well, I guess we had a little discussion last week when we ended our meeting just near the end, whether we had, you know, properly authorized you to do this work or not.So we could review the minutes from last meeting.Go ahead, Mark.I don't think there's any misunderstandings.Because what I said we needed from Mike in order to have him which is what we required from contractors.And that just to keep in mind going forward purchasing policy and bid process.I never said that Mike could not have this contract.All I said is we needed the payment.Sure, I didn't say that, but there were some other things that were said, and I'm not going to, I don't want to go there cause I want to put that behind us and we can review the tape from last week.Cause I thought it was very clear.But like I said, I want to put that behind us.I want to move forward.I think we have discretion.I came to you and I asked you about our policy, and we do have some discretion when we want to hire design professionals and people of your expertise.So it's whether you feel like you would like to continue and whether this board feels like what we, the decision we made two weeks prior to last Thursday.A policy of how we can hire a design professional without a bid process?I don't have it in front of me, but I...There's professional engineers...The bid process shall not apply to the selection of providers for services that are characterized by a high degree of professional judgment and discretion, including legal financial auditing, engineering, risk management, land surveyors, and insurance services.So I think we're, we're all as a board, trying to be very careful to stick to our policies, have the proper hiring practices in place.Do competitive bidding, all that sort of thing.Whenever we can.I think from what we just read there in the policy, I think it makes total sense and make sure that we hired Mike, who was such a good fit for this project.So I very much strongly would hope that Mike would to make a motion to keep Mike on here working away at this because there's, I must say there's very, very, this is a complicated project on this building.There's not enough staff in our town hall to take on a project like this.And I think, again Brad's idea of hiring some outside skilled services like you offer may make a ton of sense.So I personally like to go forward with that.I agree.Okay, so I don't think we need a motion.We'll just continue the agreement we had.If that's all right with Mike.Now I'd like to revisit the page road project.Can I just get one more step on this one?One of the other questions, Mike and I talked about this project and he was going to meet, like he said, with the window piece, but the other thing I just wanted to...Do you have any input as to a particular list of people to get bids from?Or if you want to advertise in a particular paper, you just want to leave that up to us.Burlington free press, or seven days, or...As far as following the bid process.Yeah, so that was, I was hoping also, I don't think anyone is too busy to be out there looking for contractors and putting out bids.It doesn't, I don't, you're too busy for that.It doesn't.But the financial part does, but not like looking for those contractors.So I also would hope that, Mike you'd be a part of that process because I don't know.Sure.Someone said something about you wondering if Mike still interested.I am.Not at all offended by anything has transpired in the last week.I just want to know why do you want me to do, and I'll be happy to work on this.I'm happy to continue with the air conditioning element of this as well if you want me to be involved in that.I think you're going to go to Pedro.More than eager to help with that.So from my perspective, I'm in.Well, thank you.Thanks.So if you want to just skip the RPC for a minute and talk about, or what you want to talk about AC...Given, you know, given the circumstances too, I don't know.We've put the old air conditioners back in.Well, the monitors in, I know and Pam, my biggest concern with the air conditioning is the health conditions for our workers.You know, for our employees.I'm not a big fan of those AC units.They're the same ones.They get taken down and they get put in the storage.Nobody bleaches them out.Nobody cleans them.Who knows what everyone is breathing in, you know?And I just don't think, I think they are extremely unsightly hanging out the window.So I think they're a security issue.So my goal was to, and the reason I was trying to expedite this work is because in my thoughts were to you because you know, you don't have a lot of time involved and you get things done in a nice, quick order, and thorough.So I just wanted to see the AC units get put in.So...I would still like to pursue getting the prices and then see what, see what kind of money we're talking about.But I don't know.There's a little RFP that they put together for that.And that's been sent out to five contractors that do this type of work and I've contacted each of them by phone, and spoke to them personally about whether they're interested in this.And they all said they were.So I sent it to those.So there's 5 people that in the next, I think it's two weeks, I'd have to look back at the dates, but there's a date when I've said that we need their proposals.And there's someone from, I think it's energy supply company that has already looked at this.And they've given you a proposal, which was kind of the basis that we started all this.And I've contacted them and told them what's up in terms of we have to get multiple prices and they might want to come and look at it again, make sure that their number is still the number they want to go with.So the way it's been set up, those five people are free to contact the town office any time during the workday for the next two weeks to come and look around and see what it is we want to accomplish.And then go back and work up their price.And I've said that if Sherry or Dawn, I can't answer their questions.I can be contacted and I'll get the answers for them.So I think we're in a holding pattern for two weeks, come out here and take a look and give us the price.We'll have the numbers so we can evaluate them and decide who to get to do the job.My only question on the project, and I totally forgot about this.And Mona mentioned it.We had put in the capital improvement to reconfigure the downstairs.And originally we put the AC on hold because we weren't sure it was going to work with the new layout of the downstairs because of walls being put up.Is that still the case?Or do we just want to do this?I don't think we should wait because that's often my nemesis.I'm always waiting for the next thing.I'm trying to get planned up thinking way too far ahead.And if you do that, you never do anything.So...It's just, that was in this coming year.The unit will be of use whether it has to be moved again or not.It's still, at least it's there.It's down there.It's functioning.That's the way I feel.I don't know how you guys feel.It gets quite warm down there in the summer.Humidity down there.The humidity, the volume, the land records.We have some old paper.Sherry has to run the dehumidifier all the time and the wine cellar vault.There's some stuff that's just irreplaceable down there.Is there any reason to throw the...I think we set aside about $5,000 for some engineering ideas for downstairs.Does that ring a bell in the gap improvement plan?Does it make any sense when, since Mike's on all this stuff, is on the building is on the AC for him also just to get someone looking at or him looking at, or someone looking at this so that it isn't at least partially part of the plan.You know, I don't know.I agree we can't take on too much and get bogged down and never get AC done, but I just wonder if that should also be put on Mike's plate or do you think that's overboard?It could, but we can't use that money until July.Yup.And as we've talked about before, if we don't get on the stick with the AC, once it gets hot, everybody's going to be out everywhere putting in AC units.So I think we just need to move forward on the AC and then take that, you know, having an architect look at the layout down there as a separate, right?The layout will change anyways.Yeah, right so whether the AC, you know, the unit will still be good, whether it moves through a different place.I don't think will...But we really don't need a motion on this.This is just information.No, this is just clarification of what whole business.Now, I just wanted to talk about the page road.I know it's not on here, but I know we talked about the grant and, you know, and until we receive the, you know, the final word that we have the grant that we really shouldn't be spending any money, like technically you can't get paid out of this grant because you've already worked before we've been awarded the grant.But I think it's, well-worth, you're very close to being finished.Is that correct?Well, I mean, with the preliminary.I've got a preliminary design on paper, and the next step is to draw up a final plan, some extra details that I haven't drawn at all yet preliminary or otherwise.And put together a set of bidding documents, you know, the general conditions, and tid schedule and that kind of thing.So I'm not too far off, but there's a bit more time involved.I'd say a couple three days worth of time.Okay, so where do we stand right now for your time?All of this you've done so far.We surveyed the bridge...I told you before I'll stick with it, that I'm not going to charge you for that time, because you're volunteering your time, I'll volunteer mine.Putting this preliminary plan together that I've done so far.And then with the town hall, what are we talking total here?Oh, I think I got something like 11 or 12 hours total for everything.And my hourly rate is $70.12 hours.So we almost have a design ready to go for Pedro.I think what I'd like to say about Pedro is, I realized that we shouldn't spend any money until we get the, you know, the final grant in our hand.But we've been told that, that we will be, I don't know how it was the, what do you want to call it?Donna?Was it a...Pre-approval.Pre-approval that we will be getting this structures grant, hopefully that will still stay given the circumstances.But I find that if we spend a little money upfront, you know, whether it's not in the grant, but a little money up front to get ourselves in a better position.So when we do get that grant, we can put it out to bid and get it done.Reimburse yourself for the money you've spent up front, can't you?I don't know about that, but I'm not really concerned.How does that work with like the sidewalk grants or anything where you've got engineering you do ahead of time before you get your grants?It's not qualified.It's not qualified?No, you can't get reimbursed for anything that starts before you get any grant.Okay.I was just going to say, it doesn't sound like it's even a thousand dollars.You know, this really helps get the process going contingency fund and not worry about...Yeah, anything that happens prior to doesn't count as qualifying costs.It's like we're not there, you know.Okay.I want to kind of sit through this and I want to talk about some new business, but...Sorry, I'm not trying to have a conversation here, but I just wanna say that I think we're...It's money well spent hedging our, you know, hedging, our bet that we're gonna, you know, we've gotten a preapproval of this grant we're going to get there.I just think it's going to expedite the situation and everything will flow together.And hopefully we'll be able to get that project done.I noticed that similarly slips away and construction time slips away.And it's already June.And if you're not doing this baseline work, and having that bid material all ready to go, and it takes another whatever amount of time we're going to lose another year here on Pedro.So I agree with Brad that I think it's money well spent that have our ducks in a row by doing the rest of the work of it.Do we need a motion or is this just administrative?This is just clarifying still what we're...I just want to clarify one more piece on that.So you've got a preliminary design on papers.Are, how's it gonna work as far as approval of the design before he goes and does the bid?Cause we talked about various options.So I'm wondering, when did we decide?Well, we should decide.We've kinda, Mike and I've talked about it.We involved Nate.We should make that decision, and, but I think the two proposals, basically we have a bottomless box.I even ran it by the engineer, the FEMA engineer, when you were out there, I said, we have legend the bottom of this.I said, we'd like support two footings, and you know, put the arch box in.And he thought that was a great idea.Now that I see what's happened, maybe the 18 does make sense instead of the 14.I mean, that thing was just...18 foot?Foot.Okay.Anyway, and then, but then we thought, well, maybe this project will be too expensive.So let's put in a second option, which would be the arched...Steel.Steel.Steel instead of the concrete rectangle on footage.Same footing so it's attached to the ground, pinnable edge.And then it was still on, in both cases it was still have lane walls to protect it from blowing out.It's just a much less expensive structure.I'm around numbers here now.But it seems to me that the bottom was concrete box Culver.That's quoted from camp precast, Milton 40,000 range.But just for the structure.No wing walls, no frames.Just drop crane into place and the multiplay arch pipe or rock arch cohort that go down on the footings instead is in the $7,000 range.But the lifespan is less, you know, so it's nicer to have the concrete box Culver, if you can afford it.How much do you think there's going to be in site work?I don't think we need to go there.That depth, what I want to say.Yeah, what I want to get at is the point is Mike has kind of designed it.So he shows both of these options.So when we put it out to bid, we'll get a price for each option.Excellent.Then we'll know it doesn't have to go back out to bid, we'll know where we stand, and then decide what to do.So I think it's a great way to go.And like I said, we're very close.I did hear some comments from Vtrans out there that, you know, I talked about the structures grant and then there were some backpedal anyway, but we'll see, as we go forward.So then, then we have the RFP for the pleasant valley.I had put together an RFP for the paving on pleasant valley road in general.But I didn't know with the changes that we've had, if we're going to take the money that we were going to use for paving that one section of pleasant valley to repair pavement and other areas.So I didn't, I've got an RFP prepared.The only thing it doesn't have is additional technical specifications.I did just a general what we're looking for type of surface.Cause you know, I don't know with any of these technical specs go or not.I have to sit with Nate on that piece, but the basic RFP is ready to go.Yeah, I think, yeah.I think we should wait, obviously should hold off till we have a better idea of where we are, where we're coming, what's going to happen.So I'm just going to put it on the back burner for now.I think that's wise.I just wanted to get that clarified cause it's an outstanding project.So then to move on to new business here, I'd like to just start with a piece of new business before we get into this other stuff.And that is 4 0 6 mitigation.And I'm going to explain what that is.So when there is a FEMA declaration, every time there's a FEMA declaration, there is mitigation money set aside to improve structures and roadways that have repeatedly washed out.So we are currently in the Irene mitigation right now.And the deadline for mitigation applications or grant letter of intent applications are, is June 7th.And I was...I was strongly encouraged by Dick Hoskins of district five engineer to apply for these grants.We all know how large Irene was.And I would think, not that I'm just kinda on a common sense line of thinking that we think the bigger the event, the more the mitigation.So Irene was the biggest event we've seen.I would think there's a lot of heat concurred, that there was a lot of mitigation money in there and that we would probably qualify for that.Basically we just need to, I don't know, this is a website I forwarded to Donna.And there's a bunch of forms and a description of what it's all entailed.But I believe that if something that's repeatedly washed out or have having to be replaced or repaired, you know, a certain number of times, I don't know if there's a magic number for that.Three, okay.So we've got Irish settlement road down in the north end.You know, Nate's suggested that that's washed out six times.Poker hill, I know I've been here for two wash outs of the big four-foot culverts on the north and the south, Pedro road, for sure.But I don't know how that will go with a structures grant.You know, they may, who knows, they may try to pull that and steer us down the mitigation line.I don't know.We've got dune road multiple times that stuff, we've got places all over town.But the situation I see that we're in right now is we don't have time that if we've, if we don't get a letter of intent out by June 7th, we're gonna miss this money, and it'll be gone.The mitigation will be gone.But then we'll be onto another mitigation.Go ahead.That's correct.Anytime there's a declaration.So, and this is something I didn't know.And you wouldn't even have to be, and we were not declared by Irene in this county, but because of that, anybody in the state of Vermont is eligible for this mitigation money.And I had no clue.I have to.I just assumed that we were not involved either until I was told just the other day, someone from Fiona explained to me, there's two things.There's 4 0 4.Mitigation is 4 0 6, and this is 4 0 6.This is public assistance.So as I said, this is the Irene declaration.What needs to be done by June seven?Well, I'm getting there, so let's see.So the letter of intent would include a description and a total estimate of the project.So this is a situation, and I'm gonna use the policy again.I'm going to refer to this policy.I don't know it would be great if we had all kinds of time to put out an RFP, to several different engineering firms, and to have them...This is something I don't think we can do.And if we want to take advantage of the situation and potentially get mitigation money, I'm proposing that we hire some engineering firms or whoever to...Or split it up to, you know, come up with a list of projects.And as I said, just try to contact some engineering firms to see if they can do it on time, and just go there.You know, I think it's...Yeah, I know it sounds crazy, but I'd rather...This opportunity.Well, we've used, you know, Mike is sitting right here, but I don't want to speak for him, but you know, we have Champlain consulting engineers.They've did a study for us.I'm just talking about people that have worked for us in the past.And I happen to know all the engineering firms in this county.I know all of them personally, so this isn't any conflict or I'm not trying to, you know, give suggestions.I know everyone.And literally.And I'm just gonna give you some names of who has worked for us in the past.Champlain consulting has worked for us.They did an Irish settlement, English settlement, lower English settlement.They did a drainage study there.They've currently helped us on our stormwater discharge permits on Mount Vista and another road that the town owns.We've used civil engineering associates, Clark Elliot lives in town here, large engineering firm out of south Burlington.They do all the work on the range.Very well qualified.We have Mike Wisell here that's helped us.True Dell consulting has helped us in the past, but given the fact that they aggressively came after us in the last commission, you know, hearing with Ginny County road commissioners, that didn't set well with me, so.But those are the people that have helped us in the past.All very well qualified.And I would propose that again, you're going to be hedging some money here, and I don't know if you ever, have you ever applied for any of these grants, Mike, can you guide us at all?I have no idea, but they just said, they said it doesn't matter.You could be up in the corner of the Northeast Kingdom and you're not even involved with this mitigation money is it's public.That's why they said 4 0 6.Think of the last six, since there's six letters in public.So that's the way remember.So it's for everybody.Now how much information we have to have on these?Well, as I said that we need to, that's where I just don't think, you know, given the time constraint, you know, what do we got seven days, eight days, but the letter of intent needs to go out by the seventh.The actual grant, I believe is the six, the 12th, I think.But we could talk to Ray Doherty is the contact.And I gave him a call before I got here, but he was gone.I'd like to talk to him and see just how involved, what's involved.You know, I don't think it's necessary to go out and design something.I just think a competent engineer needs to go out, come up with some suggestions, get some estimates, write a description and apply for the grant.So again, hedging your bet, but I was strongly urged to do this.You're going on vacation.Do you have time to do something like this between now and then to reach out, to find different engineering projects?I got to have, I got a no...Yeah.I know.We need to come up...We need to move quickly here.And I don't mind working on this over the weekend, but we need to come up.I'll sit down with Nate, we need to come up with some...And then when you out to have some documentation in the meantime to back it up, but I know we've got some records in the vault downstairs of various flood events.So...That's right, let's just hold it for one more back.You know, if we could find one more back and I know a 90, 98, I think, or 96, there were some big that we have.I saw the records in the ball down there for that event.And they're pretty thorough.Did you guys get flooded during that one?No, I don't know, but I know there's records down there of past flood events.Sherry could probably help round up all that info and go through it.You have any idea of the cost implications of this, as you say, hedging the bet.I don't think we're, you know, I don't think you'd be talking more than, you know, I mean, I don't know.I hate to say, but you know, like maybe, you know, 1500 to 2000 per truck per location per project, you know, I don't know.Maybe they could give us a lump price.If you get, if your group a bunch of them together, maybe they could say, well, we'll do these for X amount of money.And I'd want to get a price before he got involved.You know, just an estimate.But I trust all these people.They, you know, they're confident and they're not gonna, you know, True Dells, you know, I'm not gonna speak badly about them, but we've spent lots of money with them in the past.And...So. - We need a RP, right?No, I'm saying that I don't want, I don't want to go down that road.I want to use.And I know if we had time, if we had time, I just don't split up.First of all, you just got to call these people and see if they could even meet this deadline.Right.They might not even be able to meet it.And if they can't, then we drop it.You know?I mean, I'm willing to work.I'm willing to work on a couple.And if Sherry, if we wanted to team up and try to do what we could, maybe if all the information wasn't there, but our letter of intent was there.I'll talk to Ray Doherty and I'll get this true scoop of what he wants, what he needs.So I'll do that tomorrow.So we got to get the letters out first.Well, the letter of intent needs to be the seventh, but you need to get the engine.First of all, if I talked to him first thing in the morning, I will know more what's involved.And, but you got to make some recommendations.Like we can't just go out to Iris out on that road.Somebody needs to make a recommendation of what to put in there.And then you need to get a cost of what that's going to cost kind of scrambled together like you did on Pedro.I'm done.I don't know, Richmond, Teisberg, Jericho probably done a half a dozen concrete box culverts.I've done a bunch of large pipe designs.I got all the records for that stuff in my files, just to bid what the price is worth.It's not, it doesn't take very long to come up with an estimate of what it's going to cost to build a similar structure.And as long as we can do an estimate, based on that level of detail, not on an actual dissolve, it's not going to take long to do that.For instance, that big pipe by my place, if that's one of the ones you want to look into, I mean, I think in no more than four hours, certainly, probably less.I could do an estimate of what it would take to replace that a little on your structure.Right.You know, that's like $280 for four hours.Now you hire some of the larger firms.Their rates are going to be a bit higher, but it's not going to be double blind or anything.It's gonna be 90 or something instead of 70.So it costs you a little more, but I don't think that it should be a real time consuming effort for engineers to take a look at these.So if you could come up with a list of the structures that you're worried about over the weekend and then make a few calls to see if you could do something a little bit.I don't think it would be a big deal a couple of days.And the first part of the week, next week.By myself anyway, could have a number for you for that.The other thing that occurs to me is if some of these habitual problems, structures that you've got in town are really reasonably small.Like 36 inches or less, forget about it.No, I know.Right, right.The problem is, you know...You know, a lot of these, sometimes they required a drainage study.And engineering firms can do a drainage study.You know, they can do one in an afternoon, you know, they pull it up and they study whether you wait and you know, you try to get first burnout state.You can get that information for free .So divvied it up I think it's an excellent idea.Basically need to do is just, I don't mind calling right early in the morning.And I don't mind making a few calls around to see if people are even interested in making this deadline or interested, and then we can get either by email.Or somehow, you know, make that decision to go forward.So...You might as well take advantage of the money.It's all our money anyhow.So don't forget that.For something more along the way, so.Do we need a motion?We're not spending money right now so I don't know.No we're just, I guess it was just discussion.I don't, well, they could make a, yeah, go ahead.Make a motion to contact six engineering firms to...Well, easy.We're not going to contact six engineering firms.They're going to con...I would like to contact people we've used in the past.And if they're not interested or they can't help us, then I could try to broaden my reach.Contact several engineering firms.Several engineering firms, that sounds good.And see spread this, how many structures?Well, I don't know that we need to come up with an inventory list.Multiple structures over several engineering firms to get our letter of intent to FEMA. - Well, yes, it'd be well, actually it's to the State of Vermont.State of Vermont.It's a 4 0 6 mitigation.For 4 0 6 mitigation.All in favor.I. So, great.Yeah, no problem.And like I said, I wouldn't have known any of this unless FEMA told me and the costings from district five, so.So we have winter sand, hauling winter sand.I had been contacted about a couple of people in town, wanted to know if we were going to do that.And I said, yes, we will be putting out a RFP for all of the winter sand.5 bucks at a time?Well, by the time, whatever, whatever they, whatever the bids come in.You know, then we'll decide, do we have anything, we're not there yet, so.Do we have any?I was wondering why it was on the agenda there.Will get notified and then how they could bid on the process and when it will start.I know we had talked about payment to a portion of it, the town will do a portion of it.How much, if you had a limitation to how many times you could do?Yeah, I want to, first of all, I want to go over and measure the pile up, get a good handle on the volume we have right now in the yard, and then we'll figure out what we're going to need.And then we'll figure out what we got money for in the budget.And then we'll make that decision.But if you get the names of those people that contacted you, we'll make sure to get that information to them.It'll be in the paper.It's just put it in a local paper and the free press prior to seven days.So it'll all be part of the RFP. - Maybe mid to later June.So, and then we put a date on, you know, when we'd want all that material.And my thought was that, yes, you could haul some, you know, when we get closer to the fall, October, November, you know, when it's real rainy and crappy out and you want to, you know, do some of the hauling, you can do that.I just don't want to do the majority of it, that's all.But it'd be nice to get a handle on that yardage.I can bring my instrument over and take a few, take a few shots and estimate it's kind of cone-shaped anyway, so.Blake, he wrote a Rojan.No, I'm sure it's not.Now those trees that are in the broker, they, you think they're in the right of way or are they across the street?Yes, it's probably, I think it's a three rod.We're not supposed to remove any.I've been told by FEMA that we can't cut or move anything out of the right of way of the road.Take him over there.All right.That'd be the time once you got him, you might as well take him anywhere you wanna.Is there?Yeah.Yeah we got a situation on Silly Hill.It's, I just went up there at night, check it out.We got about 11 feet of travel way there right now.And that's the whole, the pole's been fixed.So the wire's been moved up yesterday, but yeah, we've got erosion all over the place.So. But you know what?I just want to tell you, you know, talked about handwork, but shouldn't scoff at that because over on IRA's settlement road has structure over by Mike's.There's a beautiful little hand laid wall there, on the east side of the in-lab, and it's held perfectly and you can tell it's gotta be.And it's held perfectly.It wasn't even touched.I think some of those stones came from an old foundation land.Because we had to use native stones.Native stones, okay.So there's no Rojan problem, and what are we thinking?Well, it's going to take personnel over there.And we talked about using the youth conservation corridor.They said that it was going to be too big, need bigger rock than that.So. Jim Ryan was willing to meet with Nate and look at the site again, but he thinks it's a potential for the better back roads grant.That hasn't come out yet this year.I don't think we're talking a big amount of work here.I mean, it's just that corner we're talking about a few of those, like, of stone.Is there that much?Well, yeah, there might be there.What about the state prison workers?Well, I mean, it's an option.No, I know.But now it sounds like it's getting out of the, the handwork type thing and more machines, so we...All right, let's keep moving along.Contract, this next.Trash contract, it has been a three-year contract with Clean Green, and it comes to, it did actually ends 6 30.This June 30th.I don't know if you guys had a chance to read through that contract.You know, this, this trash thing goes back way before my time here, from my understanding of it.You know, I find a little out of the ordinary from most towns that were even involved in trash.And I know it comes out of having a dump back in the day, and wanting to have trash services for people out here.I did, there are multiple trash haulers in the area now, as you'll see on your roads where there's to sell out here and Meyers and everybody else picking up whatever trash you want.My question, just, I guess this is more of a general question is why...I'd like to look at why we're involved in a trash contract at all.And what you know, why do we feel we need to take that on as a select board, the only, the financial benefit where we do not pay for trash here at the town hall.And we do not pay for trash down at the town garage.And we get a roll off, two roll offs a year.So there is a small financial upside to the contract, but at the same time, we're also, I think in order to renew any contract, the size we'd want to get RFPs, or get it there out to bid and make sure that, you know, it's, it's the right company and doing that.But we have so much to do.We have so many RFPs to get out there.The townspeople have many choices for trash.I'm questioning why we need to have a trash contract at all.That was the alternative.And I think we copied it from Jordan.We did.And at that time where there no other trash haulers out here, or I mean.No, it was just convenient way to do it with.And back in the day, the town hall used to be involved in making stickers, collecting money, doing the whole thing.Now the contractor that does it provides the stickers, goes to the store, collects the money and our hands are basically out of it.So I also don't see why the stickers program wouldn't go on without a contract.They already have the relationship, people already that as a vendor.I again, question, you know, and I'm sure that, I don't, Monique speak to this more than I, but I wonder if there's a liability, any type of liability issue at all, to being involved in a contract, I don't know.I did read it.And I've just kind of been the same.It seems to me that it's something that started with good intention, and has just kind of gone on and on, and kind of gotten scaled back and scale back to, now we're at a point of I'm asking why.The time probably isn't right.I know we had a discussion of trying to get one contractor to handle at least one section at a time.So you have trucks running all over here, duplications of travel.That idea is being kicked around by CSWD, it's called districting.And there are upsides to it for the environment.And there are downsides to it for small haulers.Now and so from a business point of view of a small hauler may go out of business.but then again, you don't have seven trucks driving around your town.Customer choice too.So yeah, there's the up and down side of that.But again, I, with as small the government as we have here to be involved in the trash business or trying to regulate the trash business, I...Well, I think one of the other reasons is that we continue to all along a big emphasis.Chittenden county is to recycle and reduce trash that goes into a landfill.And by being able to offer our citizens a curbside pickup for trash that you pay for and the recyclables go away free.It helps that whole movement toward increase the recycling, decrease the trash on the ground.So there was sort of an environmental bent to it.I think back when we started it and it still is really.What you say makes more sense about, I guess, promoting maybe one hauler to keep, you know, all the traffic down, but I think people should have the choice to hire whoever they want to take the trash.I take my trash to Cambridge.And you know, we no longer, yeah, we ran the dump in the old days.We ran, you went there...We ran the dump, you know, and then beyond that, then we went to stickers and it used to be, you just went out and paid whatever.The downside is in the next 30 days, we'd have to find a trash service for town hall.Well, that's not a big deal.And the town garage.And that will publish the schedule of the waste and recyclables in the newspaper.And that will, I'll put it on the website.And that will reporting days for the semi-annual collection.It also says that recycling for town hall.That was years ago.That's old, old stuff.I think the only thing we need to watch out for is that no one's service is interrupted.So my thought would be, I'd like to get some feedback from Clean Green, whether or not without a contract, if they continue to sell stickers and continue to do their work out here.So if they're willing to continue to do without a contract and no one's worse of the wear.It does say here that services provided to residents and businesses are a private matter between contractor and those individuals and are outside the scope of contract.I'm with you about the liability.I mean, say something happens, you know, and then somehow are we connected in, are we party to the suit?You know, if there was one.I just don't see why we need to be, why does the town government needed to be involved in trash at all?Since we don't own a dump anymore, it just makes no sense, but people should have the freedom hire whoever they want.I mean, it was funny.I was up in South Euro, and a friend of mine came in and bought crabs, and he was buying a bunch of dump stickers.So they still do the same thing too, you know?And so, I think it's just people do it.Cause we always have.How about this as a motion?Can, Donna can you get feedback from them on whether or not they'd continued?If it wouldn't interrupt the service, and they continue to sell stickers and then we revisit it at the next meeting to, the contract itself.If it's not an interruption then.Yeah.Does that make sense?Yeah, and how much, how much trash do you have over there at the garage, Nate?Told me maybe once a month or so.Yeah.There's not a lot.So that'd be the only consideration.Once a week, probably .Alright.So that sounds good.Maybe we should have Clean Green in too for the...I was gonna say, that was my thing since the contract's ending do we want to...Yeah, once one would be the...Next, we have a meeting next Thursday, don't we?Yeah.But that's too soon.I think.I mean, if the chance are ends on the 30th, maybe we could get them on the 20th or something?Yeah.Then we have the sheriff contract that's also coming.Both come in on the 20th.Yeah.Sounds good.Okay, so we have the...Well, I just got, I have this, this was the access permit.Stuff was gone, but we did, David and I decided to grant the access permit next door here.We couldn't find anything on our road policy or otherwise that would give us the authority to deny him that.I think in certain situation, this situation is okay because there's plenty of site distance.We're going to remove the trees out front here.But I put these restrictions on conditions.I said that that he must use an experienced and insured contractor, shall communicate with a road foreman before commencing work in the right of way, or before commencing work, shall have proper sign is traffic control while working within the town right away, curb cuts shall be built to be 71 standards, and big say shall be called before commencing work.So those are the conditions I put on.Sounds reasonable.It's an off week.So, we have the minutes we never approved.Yeah, we skipped over that.Oh yeah.Oh right.The policy.Yeah.Yup.I discussed that with town crew, went over that with them.And just a reminder that it's a policy basically just stating that, you know, crew or anybody on, in the service of the town, cannot, you know, use town property or town tools or anything like that to do anything with their personal equipment.And so that's just a clarification of that policy, and that's been handed out to the crew.Everybody's got it?Okay.So we have an understanding there Nate about that or do you have any comment?Okay, thank you.All right, so now we've got the, can I have the actual minutes because I did read them.I just wanted to...There was a mistake I had made that no one caught next to the name.Okay, right.I remember, I remember someone pointing that out.Make a motion to...I can make a motion to amend the...Approve the.Approve the amended minutes from 4 25 13 select board meeting.I say.All in favor.I. Thanks Jerry.Thanks Jerry.So we have the May 9th, 2013 minutes, which we had the recreation committee in with pool.Excuse me, we just got to finish up this, and we'll be right.We'll be ready to chat.So we have the sign...And we've made some conditions there, I think.This is where we had Mike Wisell to assist with the smaller projects.The red cross shelter, that's kind of curious.I'm just going to kind of discuss this in minutes while we're in it.Just because it's remained.Yeah, there was some talk about that night, Thursday night.At two in the morning when I was down at the fire station, when the state police and the rescue, you know, we wanted to set up a temporary shelter because there's quite a few people that couldn't get home.So we wound up, we're kind flailing around where to go.I thought we could come here, but this is kind of so out of the way, and no one was here, someone offered at the church, but we wound up going to the Browns river middle school, red cross came.But I think it's kind of important to have this.We need to figure out...This.Should we put this on another...We should probably revisit this.I know we kind of said...It really brought it home.We need to contact the school.But if something happened here towards the center, it would just be nice to have multiple locations.So, but anyway.Kind of asked them, and then we decided not, it kind of felt like we didn't wanna have everybody there because it wasn't very, it wasn't very comfortable, you know, in the garage and with stuff going in and out, people going in and out, the doors are open.They try to avoid having the shelter in the same location as a command center.Yeah, that's kind of what we have decided, but that doesn't mean they couldn't house the thing there.And we could take it somewhere else.Yeah.Yeah.Yeah, it's true.Essential school would make sense for here and then...Maybe the church in park street would make sense too, but.Someone like to make a motion to approve the minutes?Like to make a motion to approve the minutes from 5 9 13 select board meeting.I second that.Was there any discussion on that?All in favor.I. - I. - Just all business here, the stoners inquired, if it would be possible where you put it, relocate the speed limit sign, to the same post as the watch children's sign.It makes it hard to see plenty on the driver.No action taken the stance that court needs to check in to sign regulations.The one thing Nate said, we can not move it to the same bowl as the watch children.So it'd be a case of where can we move the speed limit sign within.I had a feeling you can't, you can't gang up signs like that.We can move it south.Is that going to make much of a difference?The sign's line of sight is the question.Well it was her when she was driving her pickup truck coming out of the driveway, she couldn't see towards the village.Or could it be raised, if the sign was raised?Would that help?Okay.All right.You can move it which way, Nate?I could move it towards the glass.And did you see a spot that looked fitting and wouldn't be any resigned site.Okay.Thanks.That came in other day for just a warrant entrance of parking a little bit...That did come in yesterday.Okay.Yup, thanks Nate.Just to note to the CSWD is going to be coming in next time to do it.That would be good to bring up if we could rewind the trash hauling thing.Cause, kind of, what went through my head, as I wonder we, do we have an obligation with them to provide, I wonder if there's some connection there just to talk to them about what would they think if we didn't, you know, support a trash hauler.So we have another seven minutes.Next select board meeting will be the regular meeting on June 6th, made arrangements for Sherry to take the minutes on that as I won't be here.And like said, CSWD is coming in at 6 30.I have another agenda item at six.And Sherry has, I think a liquor control board piece she needs to have done.So I'm trying to keep it light since she's covering.And then the other thing is we have a special select board meeting June 24th at 9:00 AM to set the tax rate.And then I also wanted to discuss, we do not have a meeting scheduled for the week of July 4th because the select board schedule would make it fall on 4th of July.Someone needs to stop by to do warrants.So just a reminder there, and I didn't know, do you want to schedule another meeting at some point prior to two weeks after that, do we want to reschedule for a different night?I don't know how you guys feel, but given the circumstances, we probably ought to try to meet on the 27th.On June 27th?Is that crazy, or?That one week up, we had?One week after.Well, with all this flood stuff, it might be only a five minute meeting, but why else to do it?I'd rather do it then, and then...Then we could off cycle though.Then we wouldn't have another meeting until the 18th.Right?Anyone going on vacation that week?I'm gone, I think the 4th of July, I'm actually going on 6 27 or 6 26.The only thing that really testing is warrants.Well, those have to be done any way.Someone has to stop by and do those anyway, we're talking about just, what...A regular meeting.A regular meeting?Well, we could do the 11th.Is that a better, the 11th?I've open schedule, yeah.Okay, so the 11th we'll do, and then we'll just 18.And then 7.11 and 7 18, okay.So can we back up again?What are other gates coming off of the...24th at 9:00 AM of June.And, we're not really gonna set the tax rate, tax rate sets itself.Review the tax rate.24th of June, at what time?At 9:00 AM. - 9:00 AM. - That should be quick.Yes.Should be 15 minutes.And sorry, what was your...The 6th of June, and then the 20th of June.Our standard meetings.And you're adding the 11th.And then we're going to go instead of July 4th, it's going to be July 11th, and then back on schedule July 18th.6 20.And then someone would need to stop in the week of the fourth to sign warrants.So we're going to be 11 to 18.Okay, yep.July 3rd.Okay.Oh, we have a board of Bateman meeting.Did you guys get that one?Is that new?It's new.It's recent.What's that?One of the Bateman that one coming up.Do you have that in there?I don't have a new board of it, oh I do.What do we do that one coming up here?I don't remember what the date of the board of Bateman is.Is it on the same?Yes, they didn't have enough cause they let him go.That's a whole different one.So, we'll just find out we've got that from, you know when it is?6 13.Make a motion, should we...6 30.6 30 PM, yup.Okay.Adjourn?Make a motion to adjourn this May 5 30, 2013 select board meeting at 7 25.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Underhill_Selectbd_5-30-13.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Underhill_Selectbd_5-30-13.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Underhill_Selectbd_5-30-13.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/20130627BOS/2013_06_27BOS.mp3", "text": "Hi, welcome to the Foxborough Board of Selectmen special meeting on June 27th.Tonight's meetings was asked for by the Kraft Group to try and work out some insurance situations between the town and them.I'd like to welcome the attorneys in the Kraft Group to come up to the table in front of us, please.Okay, just for the record, when we start we can get on the line for the record your names, please.Thanks, Mark.I'm Dick Gelerman, town counsel.Cindy Meyer, town counsel.John Davis from Pierce Davis & Perritano.Jim Cobery, General Counsel of the Kraft Group, - Ian Murphy, the Kraft Group.And, Dick, would you like to start?Yeah.Thank you.So when, when we met with you just two nights ago, just to reiterate the issue, the issue is that the current insurer for the town for law enforcement, the law enforcement policy, has advised the town that as of July 1st, the deductible for events that occur under the law enforcement policy is going to go to $50,000.Because of that increase, which the Board has told me they found unacceptable, we're trying to find solutions to that problem.And we've been working with the Kraft Organization on that.What's happened since Tuesday, with regard to Meyer, is we spoke, I spoke with them on yesterday on Wednesday and asked them to, a couple of things: Would they agree to postpone the increase in the deductible from 7,500 to 50,000?Would they agree to postpone that until we had the opportunity to resolve these insurance issues with the stadium?They declined to do that.I asked them if they -- I asked 'em if, asked 'em if they would consider imposing the $50,000 deductible only for concerts, as opposed to soccer events, on the theory that soccer is relatively benign in terms of crowd behavior.They declined to do that.And then with, with John Davis' help, we asked them whether they would consider a prorated premium change to effectively get them to the same place.The proration thinking being that we get this resolved relatively quickly and, therefore, the cost, the net cost to the town go down.They declined to do that.But the one bit of good news from Meyer, that came in a phone call copied by email today is that the $50,000 deductible is applicable only to stadium events, it's not applicable town-wide.So, that's where we are today with MIA. Attorney Cobery and I have had more conversations with one another today and yesterday than either of us care for.And I do want to say that he's worked very, very, very diligently to try to help the town resolve this issue.He can tell you later, but if I can steal the thunder, they have been able to think they can get in place actually this new policy before the next event; before July 6th.And that's some kind of doing.We've been told by both Meyer and early in talking with Jim that we were really looking at a 30 to 60 day timeline.It looks like they've been able to manage that to go down to about ten days.So here's where we are.You don't have an event coming up until July 6th.We're going to ask the Board after all of the presentations to consider putting over your decision on conditions of the license until July 5th.We're going to ask the Board to approve, to continue its approval of the licenses as long as you get in place by that date a law enforcement policy that provides the coverage to the town in the form acceptable to you with a deductible acceptable to you.Between now and then there's a lot more work to do.And we've been working very hard on it.Cindy's been working both days, drafting agreements, drafting motions, dealing with Meyer as I have with Jim Cobery.So we've all been doing a lot of work and we have made some progress.We are not there yet.We're we're further along but we're not there yet.We have drafted and sent to Jim, sent a copy to the town manager, also, a possible agreement that we could work out.That's going to depend -- the resolution of this is going to depend -- we first have to know what kind of a policy we can get, what it's going to cost.I do think I can represent that that cost -- we'll be able to work out the portion of the cost of the premium.I'm not talking about the deductible, now, in a way that's reasonably reflective of what it would cost us on one side of the town, and, secondly, what it would cost us because of the stadium.I don't know the impacts of what the new deductible or what the deductible will be that Jim's going to tell you about.There are a lot of moving parts to it that he'll explain, but I don't know the impact, once we have in place a policy provided through the stadium's efforts, I don't know the impact of what that would be on Meyer, except for certain that that $50,000 deductible will go down to 75.But we're not to think that the cost of the policy should also go down since they're no longer primary, since they no longer would be providing primary coverage for the town for stadium events.So the net effect cost-wise is hard to calculate at this point.We will get there, but we're just not there tonight.So I guess I'll stop as that introduction.At the end, I will want to get back and talk to you about a motion that we've drafted.And let me say, I know we're all working hard but we're getting paid for it.And here you are two nights out of three.So thank you for that.Cindy, you have anything to add?No, not at the moment, no, Mark.John?No, the only other thing that, and this was, I think Dick alluded to this, but when we realized that there was the issue of that letter that was accomplished the following morning and sent to Mr. Cobery, so that that could be accomplished.And if they can play something within the next ten days, that is a lot more, that's a lot sooner than we were led to believe by other consultants we had spoken to in the past, including Meyer, the other day, when we spoke to Joe Callahan, he thought 30 days was aggressive.He thought it would take more like 60 days.So if something can be placed in time for the first event of July, the 6th, that'd be great.Jim?If you don't mind, I'd like to set the context of what we're doing here, and what is, hopefully, gonna happen over the next ten days?The context, very briefly, is this all started with the Weldner-Dutton protective custody lawsuit.With that lawsuit, we realized that there were some gaps, some areas that we could improve upon, mutually improve upon our indemnification and the town's insurance program.And we spent, and when I say we Dan, John Davis, Cindy, Dick, and I started working on this back in December and spent a lot of time in December, January, February, working out a new form of indemnification agreement, which we were able to do.And so by the end of February, we came to an agreement about a new indemnification.And I think that's a very reasonable document.And I think it does protect all of us much better from situations like the Weldner-Dutton case.When we finished that, we turned our attention to the insurance protocol and what we could do to improve that.And just so you know what we mean by improve that, the current policy is a $7,500 per person deductible.And with the Weldner-Dutton case, what happens there is each person who is involved in that case, in the event they prevail, and I don't think they will prevail, but in the event they prevail, they're not likely to get more than $7,500.But there are a lot of them.There are potentially thousands of plaintiffs in that case.And so if it is certified as a class and you do get a thousand plus plaintiffs, all establishing damages in the $7,500 range, you have a very substantial liability there that's not covered by insurance, that would be part of your existing deductible.And, think we all agree that there should be some room there to improve that coverage.And so starting in early March, we started really working pretty hard to figure out what we could do to improve that.And the first step in the process was to find out if we could improve our insurance policy.And so right now, we provide you with additional insured coverage under our general liability policy.And what that does, plain and simple, is if you are involved in any type of litigation or claim that is the result of our acts or omission or people that we control's acts or omission, then you would presumably have coverage under our insurance policy.What it doesn't do is cover you for acts and omissions that your employees or your agents, people that we don't control would result in liability.And so step number one was to find out if we could change our general liability insurance policy to extend the coverage to include your employees, the police officers, in this case.And our insurance consultant, a gentleman named Mike Norrick, he went ahead and contacted our insurer.And the insurer said, no, that they would not do it.And so we reported that back.And so, and that obviously it was not acceptable, so we started to check with other insurance companies and see if we could change insurers and get a better insurance policy.And Mike approached a number of insurance companies, all of whom said basically the same thing.They're not inclined to do that.And the reason they're not inclined to do it is because they would be in a situation where they would be insuring some folks' activities, and we have no control over them.And the lack of control was something that they really, all of these insurance companies uniformly had difficulty with.And so that information, I came back to the group and we started talking about other ways of resolving this issue.And so the next approach was for our insurance consultant to try to identify opportunities for a town-purchased law enforcement, professional liability insurance policy, or I'm sorry for us to purchase a law enforcement professional insurance liability, covering the activities of the town police force.And we're not able to do that.Same reason: because we don't control them.So we thought about, could we get a separate policy that the town would purchase and we would pay for?We're getting a little warmer with that one.But quite frankly, the insurance companies came back and said they'd prefer to have one policy covering the town as opposed to two policies.If there are two policies, one covering activities at Gillette Stadium and the other covering the rest of the town, the insurers had a concern that there would be what's called \"the other insurance clause issue,\" where the insurance companies effectively point at each other, and each tries to suggest the other one should really be the primary insurer.So, long story, but we eventually settled on the idea that we would try to find a better alternative to existing via insurance policy.And then we would work out some arrangement to allocate the premium associated with that policy and our insurance consultant informally, because we weren't authorized to do anything officially on your behalf, but informally, he went out and contacted insurance companies, and he found three that are active in Massachusetts who were willing to provide that coverage.And they each had a slightly different variant.You all are familiar with insurance and you know there's premiums and deductibles and self-insurance, and every flavor you can possibly imagine.But we found three companies and they were willing to do something, and it seemed like each of them offered something that could be interesting to us collectively.So we spoke with Dick Gelerman and Kevin Pecos and the timeframe of this is roughly April timeframe.And we basically said, hey, if, you can give us a letter that authorizes our consultant, Mike Norrick, to review your loss data, and also to talk officially with these insurance companies, we will be able to get these informal discussions reduced to formal proposals, which we can present to the town manager and whomever else.And then collectively we can decide which insurance product we want to go forward with.We did not receive that letter.We asked for it a number of times, including by email, including in meetings.You know, we had a meeting at town hall in Kevin Pecos' office in mid-May where I emphasized to Kevin that we were six weeks away from what I considered to be a deadline June 30th, end of policy deadline, and I really needed the letter to allow us to get the alternatives reduced to writing so we could resolve this issue.I indicated to Kevin at that time, that six weeks was really a pretty short period of time for us to evaluate proposals.First of all, to obtain proposals, then evaluate them and then buying the insurance policy.So I was pretty emphatic that we really needed to get something pretty quickly.And at that meeting, Kevin told me that he would, that he understood the deadline, understood how to get the authorization letter.And I thought we were going to receive something very shortly thereafter.We did not.And I reminded him of that.I reminded Dick that I needed to get that letter.I didn't get the letter until yesterday.And I received the letter yesterday because Dick and Cindy and John really put a lot of effort into getting the letter for us.And so yesterday was really the first time when we were able to have our insurance consultant go out there and touch the bases and really try to get what we had previously discussed 60 days ago into a more formal position.He's working very, very hard on it.As all of us are working very hard on it.Originally this morning, he told me that this was not even possible to do in less than 30 days; told me I was being too demanding, this was just completely nuts on my part to think that we could make it in time for the Revolution game.He worked very hard late today he sent me an email and I don't know all the details of it yet, but he thinks that he will be able to get some proposals before the 4th of July, and that we will be able to present them to you and hopefully get your approval so that we can have a policy bound before the Revolution game, but he -- I want to emphasize that it's unfortunate it came down to this last minute crisis.It really is.It's not because of the efforts of anyone sitting at this table that it came to this point.I mean, I think all of us were quite proactive and really mindful of the deadline and trying to make sure that it didn't become a crisis.I think that all of us, when it became a crisis, really sprang into action and tried to deal with this as professionally as possible, and to get this all resolved.I wish this were not a crisis to be perfectly frank with all of you.But I think that we are on the cusp of getting it resolved.It's going to require a little bit of luck and a lot more hard work from this group and from Mike Norrick.But I'm sincerely hopeful we can do that.And that's really the background of what we're doing here.Ian, you have anything to add?Nothing to add.Any questions from the Board?Just so I can look at the schedule, the Revolution -- the event on the 6th is what, that's the first Revolution game?Yes.That's the Saturday, 4th of July holiday.It basically comes down to the 5th, if we go in the direction of putting this off.It's just a very, very tight window, just so you can start to think of that in discussing scenarios.Jenny, anything at this time?Not right now.Lorraine?Just a couple of questions, trying to understand the current insurance set up.With the law enforcement policy, that's currently part of our existing general liability coverage.Is that correct?Yeah, it's out of our general town's M-I-I-A policy, yes - It's a form to the MIA contract, yeah.Okay, so we have a certain cost to that, to the town right now, correct?Including the law enforcement policy.Yes - Right - So if we were to have that policy rewritten where that is no longer included, I would assume there's some change in the overall cost to the town of that hump of -- - Yeah, I think, if it were removed entirely, because you have substitute coverage, I imagine there would be an adjustment in the premium or if it was kept intact, but as sort of an excess law enforcement protection over and above alternative coverage, I would, again, expect to be some sort of an adjustment to the preview.Okay, so -- - And I can't speak for MIA, that's just my -- - Right, right.So what I'm trying to figure out is a simple formula for calculating this, because the impact, certainly we've already made it clear, that the $50,000 deductible, we can't do that.So since we have to go this other route in terms of costs, now, for this new policy, I'm thinking that the Delta in our original policy without, which covered us before, we now have a new cost, whatever the Delta is, subtract that from the new cost.And I think that's one way of thinking about how to potentially address the cost impact.Lorraine, if I could, calculating the Delta area is not as simple as taking $50,000 and subtracting $7,500.No, I'm talking about the policy cost, not the deductibles.Okay, but when you're trying to calc -- and I think you're absolutely right.That's the question.But how do you do the calculation?You do need to look at the premium costs.Certainly you need to look at what's the new premium going to cost the town?What's our portion of it?What's the savings on the premium?If Meyer goes from primary to secondary, primary to nothing, those are relatively easy calculations to make.The harder one for me, at least, and we've talked to the active town manager about trying to get some help on this is how do you calculate the costs to the town from going from a $7,500 per plaintiff per claim, where we are now, deductible, to a $50,000 per occurrence deductible?They're different.The potential impact is hugely different on the town.How do you factor that in?And that's one of the issues that we'll certainly have to look at between now and when we see you again on the 5th.But that's an important distinction, Lorraine, going from per claim to per occurrence is a big distinction for the town.It does limit the overall cost.Whereas, we don't have that kind of limit, now.I think, though, what I'm -- the point I'm trying to get at is that if there was not, if there were not these stadium issues, and you starting with the Weldner-Dutton case is really what brought all this to light, that the town would never be faced with that $50,000 deductible, so -- - No, but we have been, and we are faced with a $7,500 deductible per plaintiff.Right.If it's determined to be a class action suit.Yeah, well, even if not, in this case it's times four, could easily, without a class action, get to be seven, five, 7,500 times a much bigger number than four, which isn't the class and do the math.You only have to, it only has to be seven people, and then we're ahead -- - I think you understand where I'm coming from and just trying to keep the town whole, in terms of we were assisting at a $7,500 deductible because of a certain policy that we had and now because of a changed situation -- - Yeah, we're all aware now of the situation that existed for a long time.Unfortunately it never bothered us and, yes, which is why we're here.And that's the solution that we're trying to solve.It's a problem we're trying to solve in a way that keeps us whole, absolutely.If I may, - Hold on one sec.Are you done?Just one other general comment.I appreciate you laying out the timeline, Jim, but I think, I see how hard and hear how hard everyone is working right now.And I think it's really not fair to throw Kevin under the bus like this and not have him be present to explain why there was a delay.I don't know the details of why there was a delay.I do know that he has been absent for some time.And so, everyone at this table knew that he was absent for that time.So, I just would ask that we dismiss that.If I may.Yes.I started working on this issue with Kevin in March, well before anything happened with respect to Kevin.If at any point during that period of time he had simply delivered the authorization letter that I sought, we would never have had this crisis.I feel badly that Kevin's not here.I'm here.This is actually my 15th anniversary.My wife is furious that I'm here, but I'm here and he's not.And I'm here because I have respect for this process.And I want to get this crisis resolved.And it's undeniable that Kevin could have issued this letter at an earlier point in time.It's also undeniable that if he had, we would have had this resolved a long time ago.I just think it's unfortunate that no one on the Board knew that.If I may.I'll get back to that.Good.And you said multiple plaintiffs at $7,500 per deductible.And it could be many more.I think that's what I'm hearing out there.If the town was at that kind of a liability risk, and this just came about because of the Dutton-Weldner case, why would ever we want to proceed in the future, even with that policy, if there was going to be a chance that we could have a class action lawsuit down the road, have a thousand people, times 7,500 bucks to the point of $7.5 million and the revenue stream that we receive per year at that, at two years.But when -- - yeah, - I mean, it would just, and you know, it's not smart business.Do you agree or disagree?I think that's right.One of the goals here ought to be to place a limit, a cap on our exposure for any event that occurs up there which is our fault.And maybe that's the good thing that'll come out of all this is that we'll have accomplished that.But you don't have the exposure in every town.You have it in so many towns that hold a big venue.Does Mansfield have the same exposure with that venue they hold?I mean do you have any -- - Well, one of the differences, Mark, is that we own the stadium and we own the police force.Now -- - We don't -- - We own the land under the stadium.Same as the fixture, I guess.So you know -- - But that's the difference.And, you know, Jim, I'll tell you an easy solution to the problem, and I'm just repeating, but you know, don't own the police force.Have 'em do do their own policing of it.I'm not suggesting that that's not a recommendation.There's all kinds of ramifications from that.But -- - Yeah.-- but that is a solution.But the followup though, and I made the statement a long time ago, I don't know if anybody remembers, but the town is a liability because we own the land that's in the lease agreement.Why wouldn't we just change that and sell the land and get out from this whole situation.I'm askin'.Is there any reason why we wouldn't?I would suggest that's an entirely different topic We've got a short window to get this thing resolved.that question itself is -- I don't think we can begin to talk about that.One more thing.Jim, you kind of arranged that right.You're throwing the town manager right now under the bus.Did you have any documentary, any document to prove any of this or you just -- I mean, I can't take it as hearsay.I can't sit here and listen to hearsay.If you've got something that can prove your point, and if you're gonna make statements like that, you need to prove 'em.That's what I'm saying.Well, I stand by my statements.I will happily send you the emails that I have exchanged over the last three months.I know that you were in a meeting with me when I spoke with Kevin.I know that Selectman Davelas was also in a meeting with me.And I believe it was at that meeting where Kevin told us that he would issue the letter that week, and that he understood the deadline.I mean, we discussed what would happen in the crisis situation and what, if anything, we should be doing to protect the town from that crisis.And it was six weeks ago, which wasn't a lot of time.And we talked about that, but we did talk about it.He did make commitments.You were both there.If I'm wrong, please tell me because I'm not trying to throw him under the bus.What I am trying to do, though, is let you know that this group has been working very, very diligently.This group has been very, very focused on the potential crisis that could result if we miss a deadline.I personally made Kevin aware that we don't want to be in that situation.We collectively don't want to be in a crisis situation.We want to have this insurance issue resolved as early in the process as possible.And we didn't.We haven't.We're sitting here today on the 27th of June in crisis mode, and it didn't have to be that way.But I will send Dick Gelerman the emails that I have, and hopefully he'll provide them with you.But I really do go back to that meeting we had in May, that you were both at and we did talk about this issue and we did talk about what needed to be done.And Kevin did make commitments to all of us that he would do the authorization letter at a minimum.If he had done it back then we would have had the proposals very, very, you know, a week later, ten days later.We would have probably had this meeting in early June.We would have decided upon a particular insurance course of action, and we would never have the crisis that we have right now.And that's not throwing someone under the bus, but that is a statement of fact.And it is about accountability.Tim, you wanna...?Yeah.Again, caution the Board.And then I understand Kevin's not here, the meeting that we were at.And please understand Kevin is working from the time he's meeting with you on your issue.he's also meeting with Meyers, he's meeting with the -- dealing with the Weldner-Dutton case, and he's looking at the town as a whole.So to jump out of that meeting and says that he's gonna do something without considering all the other facets that he's dealing with.Again, if Kevin's not here, I just wish we get off this subject and focus on today is the 27th.We've got an event on the 6th, all this stuff, I'm sure, is gonna fall out one way or the other, cause nobody wants to be in crisis mode.But if we're gonna focus for the next hour on whose fault it was, this is a little bit of uncharted territory.We've got class action suit, we've got a stadium with events coming up.And if we don't start working together and stop pointing the fingers, especially when a 3rd party is not here, we're gonna be spinning a lot of wheels right now.So if we want to get this thing resolved for an event next Saturday, let's talk about what our options are.Now we've spoken about, you know, individual claims versus claims in aggregate.If there's different options out there, and if we can get, maybe -- the good news about that it's crisis mode is people work extra diligently because there's a deadline in a couple of days versus a couple months.We've got to work together on this starting tonight.And if we don't, I mean, basically we have one day, it was the day after the 4th of July.I don't even know who the heck's gonna be here that day.So if we don't leave this room tonight with some type of a consensus, I wouldn't be too comfortable about Saturday on the 6th, so.Sean.Yeah.Two questions.One is, you had mentioned that the insurance company, mentioned that they would prefer to have one policy.Is that the way this is going?Or are we going to have an overlay policy on our existing policy?It's going toward one law enforcement policy covering the town, town-wide as well as at the stadium.And to go back to Mark's statement, you know, if the stadium weren't here, Foxborough would just be a sleepy town in the Boston suburbs.With the stadium here, we have these issues.Is there an instrument out there that the insurance companies may provide that could cap our liability to a reasonable level?Because as you mentioned, even at the $7,500, there's still no limit.And, you take a look at it.And if we were not to prevail in this class action suit we're still open to a substantial amount of payment, which the town would have to bear.So it's re-insurance?Okay.Maybe that's the term?But if there's a re-insurance policy that could be an umbrella over the top that could potentially limit our liability, I think we'd all feel more comfortable because even the $7,500, it's just people aren't forever depending on the number of plaintiffs that come forward.If I may, Jim.Over the past six months, I've actually had the opportunity to learn a lot more about this particular type of insurance than I ever had any interest in learning.And what I've learned is basically the following.Every municipality with a police force buys this law enforcement professional liability insurance.And there are a lot of different ways to buy the insurance.The MIA policy that you buy is one way.And what I mean by one way, your deductible is based upon a per claimant.So every the Weldner-Dutton case is a wonderful example.Every person who was wrongly placed into protective custody has a potential claim for you.And the first $7,500 of each one of those claims is for your account, not for the insurer's account.So that's one way to do this.Another way to do it, and I actually have a copy of a policy here that's also in place in Massachusetts and used by a lot of municipalities, is to do it on a per wrongful event basis.And if that were the case in, if that policy were in place, when the Weldner-Dutton claimants came into being, what would happen is each one of those people would be part of the same wrongful event and they would all fall within the deductible.And the deductibles on those policies are, generally speaking -- And once again, I'm a lawyer, not an insurance consultant, but what I've learned over the last six months is the deductibles on those per wrongful event policies are usually $25,000 to $50,000 and, obviously, higher deductibles generally result in lower premiums and vice versa.There are a lot of variants on those, but those are, in general, the ways to do it.And so municipalities that have a concern about overall exposure, as you just expressed, they like to go for the per wrongful event where you have a cap and then they decide how much of a premium tolerance they have, and they decide whether to buy a $25,000 cap or a $50,000 cap.I understand further that MIA has been evolving their law enforcement coverage to a higher deductible, that you have had the good fortune of keeping the lower deductible for an extended period of time.And, you know, that's part of what's going on here.There a little bit of an anachronism going on with respect to your policy, to your benefit.But I think the alternatives that we will be able to get, will show you that spectrum, and you'll be able to choose where on the risk premium spectrum you want to be.And I will also offer the gratuitous comment that when I first looked at your policy, I thought that I would personally prefer to have the per wrongful event coverage, because I like the catastrophic protection that you get in that circumstance.You know, when you have a $50,000 wrongful event coverage, you're not ever looking at millions of dollars of exposure.You may be looking at more nuisances that you prefer not to deal with, but you never get into a situation like Weldner-Dutton or where you suddenly have potentially a million dollars of exposure.Jim?I'm all set, thanks.Mark, do you have anything to add?- If I may to try to address your issue, Mr. Gray, the per person cap, the per person deductible.I'm not sure whether there is a mechanism, but I have heard of insurers that have said there is a per person deductible, but up to a maximum deductible.So whether it's five persons or ten claimants, I've heard of insurers that do that.I don't know whether that is an option under the MIA policy or under the policies of any of the other insurers that Attorney Cobery is speaking to.Wrongful events, I'm aware that GL policies have per occurrence limits.Professional liabilities have wrongful events limits.And I can appreciate that that can be, for the catastrophic loss, a better protection for someone or an insured like the town of Foxborough.I think we have to appreciate here that, at least with respect to the Weldner-Dutton case, the claimants, there are four, currently four plaintiffs.Counsel for the four plaintiffs has said that there may be in excess of 2,700, and they're talking about more than just one event.So, they're talking about the Bruce Springsteen concert, the Country Fest events, Patriots games.So, I'm not quite sure how many, when they say 2,700, I'm not quite sure how many events they're talking about.The higher deductible, I appreciate that the MIA contract right now is at $7,500.My understanding was that the rationale for increasing it to 50,000 was that the protection that both the town and MIA thought was in place wasn't, turned out not to be in place.So, that's why it's going up to $50,000, and it was conditioned upon that it would stay at $7,500 if alternative insurance was in place.And I don't know, to get to what, whether it makes more sense, frankly, to eliminate the MIA law enforcement policy entirely, or have it as excess law enforcement coverage over whatever the other alternative policy is.I don't know -- - -- trying to find out what the mechanics would be.Right, right, right.So, potentially, you could structure it that if the town re -- kept that existing law enforcement policy in place that that could apply to all town related events, and then this other policy could strictly cover stadium-related events?I would think so.I mean, I'm not an insurance consultant as well, but I always thought that there could be a way to define stadium event in such a way that the new policy covers the stadium events and the MIA policy covers non-stadium events.I think that sounds like the cleanest -- - And they agree to a common definition so that nothing falls through the cracks.Right.Okay.Thank you.Anybody else on the Board, at this point?Bob, anything to add?I'm just sensitive to the timeframe as Jim already mentioned.We have very few days to try to apply for a policy.Understand that's the beginning of the process, correct?Yes.And you know, tomorrow's Friday, you get the weekend and then you have 4th of July on Thursday, and you would need to plan another meeting -- - On the 5th.On the 5th, so, just -- - I won't be in town on the 5th.So those are the issues that you're dealing with.You just have to be aware of the time limitations.I can't.There's no way I can be here on the 5th.James, too.Anybody else gone on the 5th?Something that the whole Board needs to be together.Sean, you?I'm around.The other issue is, if you recall, the events that we permitted are contingent upon an indemnification agreement being reached by June 30th.So come July 1st, it's a potential that those permits are null and void, so we would have to have an extension tonight or up until, I guess, Friday to extend it up until July 4th, 5th, 6th, whenever we do that - Yeah.I have, in anticipation of that, drafted a motion for you, but the, look was -- The two of you are gonna be away on the 5th?Yeah.Yeah, well -- - Yeah, two and a half hours away.Well, let us look into a way of doing a -- I don't know that we can do this.Are you available by phone or by -- - It's not allowed -- - It's not allowed by our bylaws anyway, so, it's just -- - They didn't adopt that provision?No - They voted not to have it.So it's not permitted.So, I think you got 'til Wednesday.Unfortunately.Wednesday, what's the date?Well, we've got five people on Board, we have a quorum of three.Yeah, but it's just not right for the whole Board not to be here.I just think this is something that the whole Board, especially what you, we all have to offer needs to be together as one and I just don't see that.I wouldn't want that to happen.I'm sorry.Can we go in the direction of having the two separate policies?Stadium definition, town definition.See if that works with MIA and whoever the other, I guess, whatever the other potential insurers are.And that way we know we're covered.You know, we wouldn't cancel the M -- you say not cancel the MIA policy.The problem being that right now, we can't tell you if the MIA policy is effective, whether or not you're going to be exposed to the $50,000 deductible.But if we -- - Correct me if I'm wrong, but if the MIA policy will be in effect, - It will be.however, it'll be subject to a $50,000 deductible -- - For stadium events.Correct.Which isn't a problem until July 6th.Correct.Right.So exactly.I said this at the other meeting.Why can't, in fact, we cover that deductible until we get this straightened out?It's the simplest way of getting this through.Because we're unwilling to do so.It's not our responsibility, if you think about it for a moment here.We made application for an event and you, rightfully, said there are some conditions, one of which is that we need to have police details for these events.And that's fine.We're happy to have police details.We're happy to pay the detail rate for them.You are the ones who obtain the law enforcement professional liability insurance.We obtain the general liability insurance.We cannot, you know, I said earlier that our consultant has gone out there and tried to find any way possible for us to buy law enforcement professional liability insurance on your police force, and we cannot.We just simply cannot do it.It's just impossible.For the exact same reason that an insurance company won't issue that policy, we can't do the indemnity.We don't have control over the individuals that we would be asked to indemnify and the Delta between $7500 and $50,000 is a lot of money, I mean, you'd be talking about hundreds of millions, of dollars of potential exposure over people that we don't have any control.So what you're asking, I understand that's something that we've all thought about.If there were a way to do it, we would certainly do it, but it's just too much money with too little control.It just won't work.And that's exactly why we're here because we can't deal with that either.Well, we're dealing with it right now, because -- - Mark, one suggestion I have, in terms of trying to get us to the 5th is.Well, the 5th is out as far as I'm concerned, because I can't be here, Jim can't be here.Well, I'm two and a half hours away; I'll drive back.But if I can address that for a second, Mark, is the open meeting law does not prohibit you from talking to me and you talking to me and what your thoughts are.I can't share that.So it's sequential.I can't say, I can't tell the rest of the Board, \"This is what Mark thinks.This is what Jim -- ,\" but I can listen.If there were a meeting on the 5th, at that meeting, I can express on your behalf what you're both thinking.Hopefully, there'll be some information to respond to, as a way to resolve this so that there can be a meeting.You have a quorum on the 5th.I can present at that meeting, an open meeting, for the first time to your colleagues and what you're thinking on this issue.It would be hard to tell you what I'm thinking, when I don't know the conversation, Dick, that's gonna come forward.Yep that's the limitation, Mark.I think, you know what?I say, go for the 3rd.That's what I say.You know what, we'll try to work with you and Randy'll be here and you need to do it by the 3rd.I want to be here.I think everybody here's a must.This Board works well together.Everybody has to, you know, good insight and good input to put in the conversation.So, Randy, would you like to say something?I'm just curious about the procurement rules that would apply here.Is that another stumbling block for us here or not?You know, bid process and policy gonna be over $25,000.This is subject to a bid because it's the town bank policy.Yeah, I think it has to go to open bid.John, correct?Yup.All right.So that makes it impossible right there.Is that what we're saying?If the town is purchasing it.Yeah.I mean is that what you were saying, Jim, the town would have to purchase it?We cannot purchase it.So that right there we're done.Didn't we just get a new policy from MIA?Yes.It was one of the -- - And the town manager followed the bid process.So that public bid process was adhered to.Mmhmm - This would be an addendum or an amendment to that?Is that -- - It would be a separate policy correct?The MIA could -- - a different insurance company - yeah - So MIA would not be the insurance company on a stand-alone policy.Has anybody seen the bidding, the RFP for that?Well, it's the 30 day procurement, right?I don't know what it said.Randy, help me out here.It's what you do, or you help do.You know, that's a minimum, - Yeah I think that's -- - A minimum of 30 days.And, is it over 25,000?Oh, it's absolutely gonna be over $25,000 - Policy it's on.My, my understanding is that it will be roughly between 30 and $50,000 of premium that's -- - That puts us out of the room right there.Well, could we do a policy for six months and then do another six month policy just to get it under the procure -- No?Randy said no.That's really stretched.Nice thought, but I think that's against the law.There is one piece of legislation - -- how that came about.Yes.There is one piece of legislation that's pending, I'm not sure how it's doing, could raise those limits to $50,000.I could check on that.No, I don't think the legislature's meetin' over the holidays, are they?This session would end this week.I'm not sure if that's one of the goals.We've run into another road block.I'll check on them.Well, thank you for your input, Randy You guys want to take a five minute break and think about this, or do you want to sit here and muddle the thoughts?Muddling sounds good.Yeah.You know, I, I look at the issue and I say the, the MIA policy, as it's going to take effect on July 1st with the $50,000 per person, I understand your concern about that, but that is the same concern that I have about this.So, I certainly share your concern on that one.We are trying our best to make this happen.And everyone is at this table.It's not an effort on my part or Dan's part, it's a universal effort on this side of the table.It may be that it's just going to take longer than next week to get this done, to comply with all the laws, rules, etc.I go back to what I said before.When you approved the event license, you were acting within your statutory power to impose conditions related to public health and safety.And one of the conditions that you imposed was that a police detail take effect.The problem that we have right now is that the insurance for your police detail is unacceptable in terms of the risks that -- - Are we really gonna go down this road, Jim?Which is what?That you don't want us to have our police officers there?That we privately secure the -- - No, I wouldn't suggest that we privately secure them.But if, and I throw this out and I don't offer any criticism whatsoever, but if your risk profile is such that the first 30 days or so, you can't do it, I would be willing to go talk to Lieutenant Stewart and see if he could provide the police presence that you would very legitimately request under the event license for the 6th of July.And until such time as we get this -- - I'll have 350 grievances on my desk on Monday morning, - How are the state police insured?If I might, we have a town bylaw that does not allow for that.Yeah - It states that the Chief of Police, Foxborough Chief of Police is in charge of public safety in town, excluding, you know, a state highway.Yeah, so, it's not a good idea.Well, you know what that's -- - It's not a solution - I don't mean to, I mean, at this point -- - Anything else to say, Dan - -- the disagreement that we're having -- - is $50,000 per occurrence - Yeah, but it's over a contingency.It may or may not occur, right?It may or may not occur.We disagree with the Kraft Organization as to who are to be responsible for that cost, should we have that cost.We may never have that cost.That would be nice.A thought is that we continue to disagree about that issue and hope it doesn't happen.If it does happen, so thought is, you issue the licenses and you put in the provision that if there is a deductible imposed upon the town, a cost to the town of $50,000, for something that occurs, that that is a, $42,500 of that, or some number, is payable by the Kraft Organization.I've been asking and they've declined it.Let me finish.They're gonna say, \"No\".But they could say, if we reached agreement, they could say, \"We don't agree with that condition.We're going to accept it, not file any litigation, today, over it\".But accept that with the understanding that in the event that that does occur, they reserved their rights to challenge that provision.That's a possible solution.What we're doing is -- - If I can interrupt you.Owning a business, I have this thing called worker's compensation, liability, and unemployment taxation.If I don't pay those, they send a notice to everybody I do business with and they cancel it.And I'm out of business 'til it's reinstated.I can't operate without insurance.It's against the law.I'm not saying you don't -- I'm not saying you operate without insurance.We go forward with insurance.but - We have the policy in effect.Policy says that if there's a claim arising out of a stadium event, there's gonna be a $50,000 deductible.What I'm saying to you is there may not be such a thing.I mean, keep in mind that there hasn't been very many.And even with Weldner-Dutton, there's no clear evidence that there even is one today.So we're talking about a potentiality that experience tells us doesn't happen very much.We're not, Jim and I, have I guess in the year that I've been working with him for the first time, we're pretty loud with one another.Okay.We're not -- My sense is we're just not gonna reach agreement on that.What I'm saying is that you issue your licenses, you impose the condition.They don't agree with the condition, but they accept the license.They don't run into court this week and say unlawful condition.They say, we'll accept it.But we're going to reserve our rights in the event that it ever comes to be that there is a $50,000 deductible that we have to face.At that time, if it happens, we litigate it.It's a simple enough thing to litigate and we either win or we lose.But it only is for so long as we can get ourselves the kind of policy that we should have gotten before tonight.Okay, but Dick, is it responsible for us to expose the taxpayer to that sort of claim?I don't think we could sleep at night.Well, John, John, I'd say we.They could call on Monday morning.Oh, hold on, hold on.You have been exposed.You have been exposed to a claim -- - We're trying to avoid being exposed any further, Dick, - I know.I understand that.But you have been exposed to much more money than that and whatever you do, you're going to have some exposure for a deductible, for an insurance policy.You are, you always have, and you will, again.What that number is we're trying to limit.But I don't think you're being irresponsible for doing that.One might argue that it's more responsible to have a $50,000 deductible than $7,500, if it's for a short period of time and we can go to an occurrence basis.Dick, that would be fine if it was an occurrence basis, but it's not, now.The exposure is multiple millions of dollars.Yeah.And I, you know, we're a municipality.We're not a for profit business.I know - So I just don't know how you could expect the Board to accept that as a solution.I don't think our stock holders would like it too much.I see John raising the -- - I have not spoken with Mr. Norrick, your consultant, but if the Krafts have civil rights coverage, because they have civil rights exposure, so I assume the Kraft Organization would have civil rights coverage.Is there no way that the town can be added as an additional insured to the Kraft's policy that provides them civil rights coverage as the named insured?I've asked that question several times.And the answer has always been, \"No\".Because we don't have control over your officers, we cannot extend the coverage in that circumstance.If you'd like to give us control over your officers, it would happen automatically.But I don't think anyone wants that to happen.I think with the bylaws we've gone over that.That's against the law.Couple of other things that are against the law, the procurement thing would be against the law.But then what was contemplated when the Krafts agreed to provide the town with civil rights coverage?Right.Well, I think now you're trying to position me, so I respectfully will decline to answer that.Okay, okay.Well it's like well it's the only an -- - Anybody else got any...So we never had civil rights coverage?Once again, I think you're trying to position me.I'm not.No, no, I don't think you are.Well, we licensed events at the stadium and we had the motion attached to it that if insurance coverage was not, I mean, if this insurance issue, was not cleared by June 30th.then the town, Foxborough, has the right to take back that license and not, not have, you know not license that event.The license is null and void.So it was very clear.It was very clear when we did vote that, that that was a possibility if this insurance issue was not resolved.If I may.Mmhmm.The license conditions require us, it's quid condition three, require us to obtain an insurance certificate with certain details.We have obtained that insurance certificate and we've provided it to the town and we have received no word back that the insurance certificate is acceptable or not acceptable.So at this point in time, I think that you're right, that you did require us to obtain insurance and you set it forth in the terms and conditions that were attached to the license.And we think that we've given you an insurance certificate that complies with what's in those terms and conditions.We think that what's been going on here is that you're looking for additional coverage because of the change in deductible, from the MIA policy.And we're happy to work with you.We really are.And we're really trying very, very hard to deliver some alternatives to help you on that.But that's really the nature of what we're doing here.It's not so much us failing to obtain the coverage that we can reasonably obtain.It's that the time for obtaining the coverage that gives you the right risk profile is just closing so rapidly, that's -- - No, and I appreciate that, but the thing is we cannot let the town be on the hook in case something happens.So, I mean, we are responsible, and I don't want to expose the town of Foxborough to the $50,000 deductible just in case something does happen.It seems the only way out of this in the temporary space is, and I think the Board pretty much stands together on this, is that the deductible will be covered, if it needs to be, by the Kraft Organization.I think it's the only out.I think we beat it up pretty good here.I don't know if you want to take a couple of minutes, like I said, and take a recess and think about it.We don't, we don't have to.We cannot accept that.And you're asking us to do something you don't accept.And I -- - Mark, could I, take a break and talk to Jim for a minute or two.Yes - Take a break.Frank, call us up for about 10 minutes, please.Be right back.Okay, we're back.Thanks for waitin'.Dick, do you have anything to add?I do.What I guess we're going to ask you to do is to put this over until July 3rd, when, hopefully by that date we'll have more concrete information for you.We will do this in a way that does not require a procurement by the town.So we avoid any 30B issues or we'll do it in a way that is in compliance with chapter 30B depending on the numbers.And do you realize that July 3rd is...Wednesday before July 4th.Well, no, it's a lot of - Did you say you're not here the 3rd?Well, I'm not supposed to be, but if I have to be, I will be.Right.I mean, there's nothing they can do about the dates.Well, I understand that, but what time are you planning to have this meeting?'Cause it's not gonna be a 7:00 or 8:00 meeting.It's going to be more like a 4:00 or 5:00 or 6:00 meeting because it's going to go two hours and -- - Mark, is 5:00 okay with the Board?Is -- - 5:00 okay with the Board?That's fine.Jim, are you here or are you gone?I'm here now.Well, you know -- - Let's set it for 5:00.Let's just -- But can you give us a -- - maybe not - -a status quo, if you're not gonna be prepared for the meeting, we'll just -- - I don't want to go and come in back on the 3rd without having an understanding of what direction we might be thinking of going.I mean, in order to avoid the exposure of $50,000 per claim.I got it.I told him.He can't here til 5:30, 6:00.Who can't be?The guy filming.We don't even know where we're going to be.We don't know if we have the room.We don't know -- - Who's saying the FCA wouldn't be able to be ready for us til 6:30.Right.Yeah.And we don't even know where we could have it, yet.There's no way I can come in on Wednesday.Right.Right.So Town Hall's open, Randy?Yeah.Does it have to be recorded?Does it?Well, I think that people deserve the right to see it.I mean -- - Yeah but if there's not -- - But if it's posted, they can come.Yeah, well, you know what, then we're gonna have people come and occupy the room, Cindy, it'd be over 70, say 70 people, and then you can't have the meeting anyways - Bob - Yeah - 6:00 before the 4th of July is going to be five people.Five people - Nobody's gonna be there but us.But actually, Jenny, you know, I know, I appreciate that.But after some of the conversation we've had here tonight, I think we might see 35 police officers there.Yeah - Could we circle back to the -- Let's -- - Yeah.I mean, one of the solutions that we discussed was not having the police other than what's been done all these years, continue with that.So that that's not what we're talking about.We're -- the reason to go to July 3rd is we hope we'll, hopefully we'll have more concrete information about the type of policy.We will do it within the procurement law, and by that I mean, we're not gonna purchase, the town will not be expending its funds for this policy.And we will try to address, I mean, the whole goal is to try to address not having the town exposed to multiple $50,000 deductibles.Randy, would you like to speak?How do we, I thought I heard Mr. Cobery say that they weren't allowed to purchase insurance for that on the town's behalf.The acqu -- we are not going to purchase, it's not going to use any public funds for this acquisition.We get a gift.We have to work those -- - Yeah, but, so if it is a gift, doesn't it have to also be accepted by the Board of Selectmen?Look, there's a lot of things that have to be figured out and ascertained and determined between now and July 3rd, okay?You can't do that sitting here tonight.We have a procurement issue.If we can't address it, then we won't, but give us the opportunity to do so, you know, right.We've got a commitment that they'll pay for it.We just have to figure out a way that they can do so legally.So, we're not looking to a procurement.Okay.Anybody have anything to add?If that is a scenario that works, so be it.We'll go in that direction.But just so I'm clear, we have MIA coverage up until June 30th under the 7,500 per claim.We've already signed and sent in money.I don't know about that.We have the new coverage starting July 1st.So we're covered throughout.Is there an opportunity for either the coverage that ends on June 30th, to extend it another month and work out there where it's not a procurement issue, it's less than 10% of a change, and you can extend it until July 30th on the existing, or take the coverage that's gonna start on July 1st and change it for the first two months.So if the premiums are going to come up, the deductibles will come down and that one month, or two months, bring it through August, would be something that we addressed on a cash value -- - Yeah, I mean, I asked that and I'll ask it again.But I've already asked and been told not, those questions.You asked it to MIA?Yes.In the conference call that we had with Joe Callahan the other day, that was addressed and he said, \"No\".Yeah.At least the second part of that, whether they would give us a 30 day policy, I don't know.Yeah.Yeah.But would they give us the 75 but at a high premium for two months?No. He said they wouldn't do that.Thank you.I have a question about the civil rights coverage after July 1st, and the certificates that we have received, that we have the conditions on that everything has to be acceptable to the town and there's language that's different on here from prior years' certificates.And I don't see the language that says civil rights coverage on here, so I just wanted to ask where that comes in on this policy, on this binder.I'm asking Jim.I don't know what document you have in front of you.This is the document that comes with the applications from the stadium for the license, the certificate of liability.It's the binder that you provided with your application.Right.That was on there before?This is part of, this is pulled from the Country Fest application.So, the new one.The new one.Was it updated before, from the previous -- - This was part of the application that we said we would license subject to if we have -- - Understood, but I -- - It's different from last year's - Was that on there before and then got taken away?Is that what you're saying?I did see it there before.Jim is not acknowledging whether it existed or not.So, I want to know going forward that it, does it exist now?And then I'd also like to ask John, if you could review the prior binders to this binder, just if that's something -- - That we've got on there?Yeah.For these events that we're talking about right now.Does that make sense?Mmhmm.Okay, thank you.I will ask Mike Norrick, if you don't mind to tell me where that's in this certificate, there's a new certificate that we provided that I can certainly send over to you, as well.Okay.That's been sent over -- - since - -- since the application process?Yes, we, traditionally, June 30th is the time when insurance policies roll over and ours does as well.So we sent you a new certificate to show that we have insurance coverage effective July 1st.Just sent that in in the past...Tuesday.So I will tell you this, I don't read these insurance tributes very often.I apologize for that, but we do have civil rights coverage.Where it shows up on that certificate, I don't know.And I will ask Mike to point out to me where it is.The issue that John was raising before is, is it civil rights coverage that covers the Kraft Group and its employees, etc.?Or does that coverage extend to the town?And it's a very nuanced answer that would probably bore you.And I -- - Not really.That's okay -- - We need to know because it's just a black and white question.Jim, could you also ask him, say, I looked at that certificate and unless the new one is different, that covers X of the named insured which would be the Kraft Group.So, that, to me, would exclude actions of the police, the Foxborough police.So that doesn't really cover what we're talking about here.And that's different.Please, allow me.I'm not an insurance lawyer by any stretch of the imagination, but what I understand from talking to Mike Norrick in particular, but also some other people is basically the following.We have fairly robust insurance coverage given the nature of our fairly diverse business portfolio.And we have general liability insurance, property insurance, all those different things that you'd expect.Within the liability portion of our insurance coverage, we have civil rights coverage.We also have as part of our overall insurance regime standard endorsements that relate to, among other things, additional insurance coverage and our endorsement that deals with additional insured coverage says in essence, please, once again, I'm well outside of my expertise here, but what I understand it says is as an additional insured, you are covered in the event that we or people who work for us or over whom we have control, do something that generates liability or the threat of liability.So, a good example of this is when we are the tenant and the landlord, who is purely passive, doesn't do anything but leases us space.When our employees do something that generates liability and the landlord gets sued as part of that, even though the landlord has done nothing, because they are our additional insured in that case, our coverage is extended to them because it's an action or omission of our employee that gave rise to that coverage.So we have that type of coverage and it's routinely extended to our additional insureds.And you are one of the additional insureds.So you have that level of coverage.Where the great minds of this table diverge is whether our coverage should extend to also include the acts or omissions of your employees.And our policy does not, as far as I know, does not go that far.And that's one of the lengthy discussions that John and I have had over the past six months.Yeah, I got one, too.All right, you all set, Paul?What's the next event after the 6th?Bon Jovi on the 12th, - on the 12th.Or the 20th.The 20th - The 20th - I don't know if -- - So, it's not the 12th?No, it's the 20th - I've heard -- - Bon Jovi's the 20th, Swift's the 26th, 27th -- - I've heard over and over again that there's never any situation at any soccer games, that they're very low key.They are - very well under 20,000 people, typically around 15.It's a very uneventful event.So why don't you use -- - You should be in marketing.Mark does not go into marketing - Nobody wants to -- - I'm trying to make a point here.Comes with us for sweep.Mark, why don't you?Can we just work - I just wanna say -- - and come back on the 3rd of July?No, I really don't want to.Because you're interrupting everybody's family lives here and it's becoming troublesome.And everybody here's got a family and they've got things they wanna do.And to over-dedicated yourself during that causes situations with your family, and it's not fair to the spouse, not fair to the kids who've been looking forward to things for a long time, including your own insurer.My solution here that I wanna see happen is you say, you've all stated soccer events, we should just have it.Don't worry about the license it's a soccer event.There's never any issues at 'em.Free up to 4th for everybody, pony up the deductible for that one event, gives you another 14 days to work through this.If everybody says there's not ever any problem at it, cover the deductible for that one event.It gives you another four -- more than 14 days to come through with a plan here.That's all you gotta do.Unfortunately, we can't do that.Well, you can ask your boss.Yeah, no believe me, I hear from him quite a bit.Because, you know what it's just, I don't see it happening any other way.It gives you more time, your pressurin' everybody here on the Board.I mean, you really are.You got, Jenny has plans.Jim's away for the week.I'm gone on Friday.You know, if my boss asked me to work, I tell him no.You know what I'm saying?So I just think it's an unfair thing to do.I understand the urgency in your aspect, but to pony up the deductible for one soccer event, to come through a debt, and free up everybody, give everybody ample time to get this straightened out.It doesn't seem like a lot if ya ask me.If I may, I mean -- - Yeah - We just can't do that is what it comes down to.And I hope you can understand that.I certainly understand the inconvenience and I don't want anyone here to be inconvenienced by any stretch of the imagination.If I could figure out another way, I certainly would.But, unfortunately, we just, as relatively calm as the soccer matches are, we just are not in the insurance business is what it comes down to.But we are insured.So, if all you do is cover the deductible, in writing, for that one event, it gives everybody almost three weeks to get through this.I don't think it's a lot to ask.If you look at the history of the events, have you ever had any problems?'Cause I'm about to make a motion of that aspect to the Board, and I'm hoping they go with me on it.Because I really don't want this to go into next week.I just don't think, I think it's a lot to ask.We've done it before on Christmas.We've had to have major meetings the two days after Christmas.It's not general policy for the Board to just make special meetings for everybody.This Board has been ample to everybody that's ever asked for one.And I'm now asking you just to go back to your boss and ask him a question.That's all.I don't think it's too much to ask.It gives everybody more time, it's one event, the most under-costing event of them all, right?There's hardly any costs at 'em.Hardly any?Right.It's the same group of people.is not a concert kind of atmosphere where it's a mixed group of people that go there once a year or whatever.It's a different entity of people.So that's where I am.What do you think, John?Well, you're asking them to self-insure.No, I'm not asking them to self-insure.I'm asking them to pay the deductible.You're looking for a solution.If we wait until the 5th, I'm not sure what's gonna come out of it.It's unknown.Nothing.I can guarantee right now, nothing'll come out of it.And we're talking about the 3rd, not the 5th.Now, we're talking about the 3rd.Oh man.You know, I wouldn't be certain that nothing'll come out of it.I think something might.I mean, I understand the inconvenience to the Board.I wouldn't be suggesting we go to the 3rd if I thought it was a waste of time.Right - But I can see the inconvenience to you.It's not just the Board.It's a lot more people than just the Board.It's cable access, it's the town.I can tell me, it's the finance department, it's all the people that work for the town, it's trickling down.I just don't see that there's a big issue with that, for that one event.And I'm gonna be adamant about it.And if you allowed me to be adamant.Those events are relatively, relatively calm.Another way to address this issue is for you to lessen the police detail requirement at that event.Just help me please get that ball game now.Yeah, you could say, for that one event, we are gonna allow the stadium to provide their own security.And if something happens, we call Chief O'Leary and get people to come down.I mean, that happens a lot.I mean, where you allow people, other license holders, like liquor license holders in town don't always have to have police details at their bars.Sometimes they do.Over 350 people, you need to have a police detail - But other times they don't.And so it's within your power to say, recognizing that soccer games are relatively benign, and recognizing that this is an extraordinary circumstance, we're gonna allow you to go forward with your team ops force.But it doesn't go on beyond that day, number one.And number two, if something happens, you have to call Chief O'Leary and -- - Now we're back to bylaws.Right?Right.Correct.The bylaws prevented that - I agree with you, but it's really not even up to this Board.It's up to the Chief of Police and he has made it very clear his policy on security up at the stadium.Could we ask chief O'Leary if he could grant some grace on this.Once again, we'll have about 35 grievances on our table on Monday morning.If not before that, probably tomorrow morning.I'm simply trying to help.I mean -- - Well, I am too.Yep.And I think the Board I -- - Can I just ask something?Go ahead, Cindy.How many police officers are there, usually, at the stadium on a soccer event?Oh, 25.It's really pretty small.It's a very small, not like 350 for a football game or more.Or a concert's sometimes more than 350, right?Help me out.You shouldn't have as them about numbers.Well, no, I'm just trying to figure out what type of numbers we're talking about.I really don't think that's relevant because the chief is in charge of security and he is not gonna agree to this.Right.No, he won't.He's just not going to.Lorraine?How does the stadium insure the state police for these types of situations?We don't.They're off property, right?They're not on your property?No, they're on our property, but we don't insure them; they don't ask for insurance and we don't provide insurance to them.And if -- part of what I've learned over the last six months is that's actually relatively common.You know, talked to the Red Sox.We talked to the folks at TD Bank North Garden.They don't have an obligation to provide insurance for the police details or the municipality.They probably provide an indemnity, and the indemnity is very similar to the indemnity that we have now, but there's no insurance requirement there.And, to be fair, Dick and I have a difference of opinion about why the Red Sox and the Bruins and Celtics operate one way and we are being asked, and, you know, I truly like and respect Dick, so I don't want to suggest otherwise, but they don't provide insurance.And the reason for that is: baked into the detail rate, is an overhead component, but I think that's also the case here in Foxborough.You know, we're starting to get off the topic.I'm not, I don't mean to cut you off Jim, but that's really not a part of this discussion.Anybody on the Board feel like my suggestion's good one, about making them cover the -- 'Cause I think that's an amicable solution to this at this point in time, it's a low risk for you.And what I mean, a couple of 50,000, let's stick to the 7,500, so you really only had 42,500.Okay?And it's gotta be in writing.And then you can have your event on the 6th.It gives you to the - Mark it isn't $42,500 because it's per, it's $42,500 per claimant.Right?Well, that's the liability of -- this Board is not gonna -- - Well, I'm just explaining -- - We've been through this over and over again.We're not willing to take that risk.You're not either.So we're at a stalemate.It's business.Okay.And we represent 17,000 people that own the town.So we're asking you since it's such a risk, low risk thing that everybody portrayed to me.over the last ten days, I've heard, \"Oh soccer's no big deal.It's a low risk.You can let it go for the $50,000 deductible, for just those events\".Well, this buys you time, frees up everybody for 21 days, basically.And I think it's a good idea.And I don't think it's that much to ask.So, how does the Board feel about that?Does anybody feel like this is a good solution?Or do we want to sit here and bang heads all night?Can we do that?Yeah, we can make that motion.If they accept it, they accept it.Is it enforceable?No, they're gonna take it as not acceptable.Right.Hmm.I think they've said that they can't, that -- - They said for all, I think their focus, there, Lorraine, is on concert events, larger venues.They're looking to get this fixed up.This gives them more time.I mean, it's either that or nothing at this point.Right.And I mean, really, what are we going to do here?I think, well, I think one thing.If we gave everybody until the 3rd, the outcome is still potentially the same, depending on what happens, we will not compromise on the $50,000 deductible and we will have, - So, then we'll have a two hour meeting - So then on the 3rd, hopefully, doing it on a 3rd potentially gives time to work it out so that we don't get to that point.We're at that point, today.But we're trying to free up the Board from all the inconveniences.Oh, what about this, Mark?It's and I, believe me, I know what you're talking about, trying to give up the day before a holiday.I don't know what you guys talked about in the ten minutes, but if you're, fairly confident that you can get from there to there to the 3rd, expedite it a little bit, work on a Saturday, Sunday, whatever you gotta do, and we'll wrap this up on the 2nd.If you're here on the 2nd, we'll do it.If you're not here on the second, sorry, there's five people, we gotta go with four, three.This is a big enough issue that I think we need to - Hmmm, yeah go a few days to give them an opportunity.Yeah, but if on the 3rd, it's still a stalemate, - Then, cancel.We don't have it.It's canceled.I don't know what else to say, - Right, but I'm wondering if they can discuss this with their entire organization and come back -- - They can go discuss this right now and take five minutes.Mark's suggestion among yourself.It's just for one event.If I could interject, to answer your question, I'll be comfortable well before the 3rd, whether or not the procurement issue is solvable.Okay?I'll let you know, and if I find out there's no hope, then there's no hope, there's no sense of my coming in on the 3rd and telling you that.I'll tell you that well before, and you can cancel the 3rd.But then we still can't make a decision.We need to make a motion tonight to have them have an alternative in place because we're not going to reconvene for some other scheme.No, Mark, I understand that.But if I could just continue -- - Settle down.Mark, you gotta watch what you say and how you say it.Well, everybody sitting at this table, Deb, is trying to circumvent the bylaws, the laws of the town, and it's not working out.And I understand that.But if you go back to the original thing is if the letter was written eight weeks ago -- - Stop.Stop.So, Mark, let me get back to that.If you were to schedule me for the 3rd, if prior to the 3rd, at least on the procurement issue, the bylaw issues, if it's clear to me, we're not going to be able to meet, to comply with those bylaws and with procurement statutes I'll tell you.I'll tell you well before the 3rd.Well not well before the 3rd.I'll probably tell you on Monday.And, it's not the first meeting you've canceled.In terms of the issue, how are we gonna solve the problem, which, to me, the problem is the $50,000.It's not procurement.It's not compliance with bylaws.That's not up to me.That's up to Jim.And he sees it's not gonna happen, he'll tell me, I'll tell you, and you, in other words, I don't expect the Board to convene on the 3rd, without their having the expectation that we've solved the problem.Right - But what I'm saying to you, we can make the motion tonight to back up what I said 15 times about now to allow them to proceed, to have the event, if they will take on the deductible, if they don't want to accept that at that point in time, because you're going to make the Board reconvene one way or another.No, I think that's fine.I think what you're suggesting is fine.So we kick it over to the 3rd.In the event that the Board is unable to reach agreement on that date, then in order to obtain a license, go forward, they're going to have to, for that, there's just one soccer event between..Now and the 20th.Then that's the condition of the Board, if that's how the Board feels.And I get you on that, sure.And all I have to do is draft that motion.Yeah?I think there's two.I think there's one the following weekend - Two soccer events - -- and Bon Jovi's on the 20th - When's the next one?I don't have it in front, sorry.I think its like 6th and 12th - I don't have the soccer schedule.Randy?I thought the 12th rang a bell as well, yeah.I certainly appreciate your efforts.I do want to let you know, though, that Mike Norrick is going out on a limb and saying he will have something for us before the 6th of July.Now we're talking about having it a couple of days earlier.So I, what I'd like to do, if it's okay with you, is I will call Mike first thing tomorrow morning and run this new schedule by him.And if he says it's hopeless, I will send a note to Dick and let him know that.And then this whole thing is -- - Then you can't have an event.I'm trying to give you an out from a motion tonight.Oh, I'm sorry.All I'm suggesting is as soon as I know that it's impossible, I will let you know.And hopefully that'll be at least helpful as far as schedules are concerned.That's the best I can do.Do you want this Board to make a motion where, I'm getting repetitive, that you can have your event as long as your KO group agrees in writing to cover the difference in the deductible, the $50,000, to have the soccer games, giving us time to work through the rest of the situation?Because we're not gonna meet.If you don't come together with some plan, then there's nothing.We're not coming back to the table to talk about it anymore.Then you can't have the event.I think that's how we're going.You're saying, if you don't have nothing together by Monday or Tuesday, you're not gonna ask us to reconvene.If we can't reconvene before the 6th, then there's nothing.Do you want something?Well, I'm probably being too much of a lawyer and I apologize for that, but I'm really looking at this and saying that we have our insurance and we've provided you with this certificate and I need to provide an answer for you.I will do that.This is insurance that we cannot get.And we are facilitating, in essence, we are really trying hard to find insurance for your police detail so that you can have an acceptable level of risk for the events we hold at the stadium.So with all of that in mind, I don't think it would be helpful, if that's what you're asking, to have the motion that you're suggesting.I think what would probably be most helpful, if you wouldn't mind, is for me to check in with Mike Norrick tomorrow and find out what he thinks about the schedule and then let Dick know, and then whatever you feel is appropriate, you certainly should do, but I don't want to cause you to come in when you don't have to.If we don't have something in the way of a proposal, then you know, let's all enjoy the 4th instead.Why don't we post a meeting for Monday and Tuesday and Wednesday, and just have it there in case we need to -- - Just following this to the logical conclusion, then the event doesn't happen.And that's exactly what I said three times.Then, you have nothing.If you don't come to an agreement.To be clear, there'll be litigation, we will be in, so you all know what's going to happen here, we're gonna be in court next week if we can't solve it then.Then what good was that, then what good was during the application process that we had that motion?What good was that?If it's not binding, if we can't pull the license because the condition hasn't -- - Jen, you are gonna pull the license - Yeah but if they do litigation, that means they'll have the event, anyway.I mean, what good, what good is doing anything If the event's going to happen anyway?And what good is trying -- - and putting the town at risk.I am advise -- I would be shocked if you, if a license was pulled that they would simply not hold the event without seeking court intervention.And they probably'll win, but you know what, we did our jobs.Okay, I'm just -- - That's what it's all about here, is protecting the town and for the voters that put us here.Jim us now?This is gonna turn into a rodeo.Mr. Chairman?Yeah?Please, I have, neither one of us have threatened any litigation.And I want to make that clear.We're really trying to work together.And we've been trying to do that for over six months.And I'm gonna try again tomorrow to get Mr. Norrick to move even faster than he's already moving, and I'm sincerely hopeful that this could all have been cooperatively.But, please, we're not threatening any litigation.And we are sincerely hopeful that things work out here.And I do really like your idea, Selectman , and if you wouldn't mind having some contingent dates available to us, we'll keep you informed.Every, chance I get I'll, I'll send a note to Dick, letting him know what's going well, and what's not going well.I can't make any guarantees.I really can't, but we will try our best.Bob, can you post meetings for next Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday?Let's not do that, I didn't agree to any of that.Sorry.If nothing else, and I know they won't agree to it.It is a fall back position that, potentially, will allow the event to take place, - Right.It's a fallback, but I don't know if it's possible.It's showing that you're trying to work through this.You know, I think that we should make that kind of a motion.Anybody disagree with that?I think I do for the reason, if I had the option, they don't want that option.So forcing them something to do that, they said three times, that they don't wanna do.I think we stand back and say, we gave them the application contingent upon an insurance agreement that was worked out.We feel that it's not worked out.So at the end of this exercise, they don't get the permit.The permit has not physically been issued to them at this point.So if they see that is the case, they're still saying, obviously we live in a real world.If I had a guess, the event's going to go forward and then we'll deal with it in the court.But to force somebody that said they don't want to do it to hold their own, to put money up when they said no.I mean, I look at the Boston marathon, that was always a peaceful thing and things change overnight.So to ask a business to take $50,000 liability times 100, 200, 300 people, that's kind of unreal also, to self-insure that number.So we'll do our best the 2nd, the 3rd, the 1st.If it doesn't work, then the event has to be canceled because we have not come up with an agreeable indemnification clause that the town has said that's okay.So, I think there's more liability to say we're going to put it on their shoulders.They're going to say no.And then we're both dealing with an issue after the fact, because they've already said no.So we're going to give them a permit after the fact that they said, no.Well, said Jim.Jenny how do you feel?No, I agree with Jim.Lorraine, you also?Yeah, I think -- - I'll let you know when I'm gonna post the meeting.I'll talk to Bob, 'cause I'm not postin' nothin' tonight.Just for a point of reference.Nothing could be held on Monday night anyway, 'cause it would have to have been posted by this afternoon.Okay.Unless it's under provisions of emergency.Yeah.But this would not be an emergency situation.That'd be a public emergency.So, it'd be Tuesday, the - Tuesday would be the first possible Tuesday and Wednesday, the Tuesday - I'm not inclined to do that at this point in time.So you guys get together.No contact with any board members other than through town counsel or town manager.Okay.Nobody.I don't want anybody having any conversations with anybody, but Bob Cutler and the attorneys to their attorneys.All right?Is that clear?Anything you wanna add to that Jim?I would certainly defer to your lawyers on this, but I don't know if that's legal to be perfectly frank.Dan's town.Well, no, I'm talking about the business.You can talk to them.You know, we've had this discussion before.Nobody can talk about this, about what we talked about tonight with the Board about this.I certainly won't.All right, everybody can make all the little phone calls.they want to Bob Cutler, town counsel, and they will inform me, and I can inform the Board and we'll have another meeting.All right - All right?Is that okay?That way it just keeps it from being a Round Robin.So we're hold on.So it's clear to me.What, what is the action that the Board is taking tonight?None.None.I think we're advising you, based on the ten minute discussion you've had, if there's a way to work it out, we'll do our job and post it for Tuesday.As of now, you're not post, you're going to post a meeting as of Tuesday.Tuesday, Wednesday, - And Wednesday.It's not going to be Friday.Yeah.If you would just post it for the, those days, you don't have to hold it.Post it for Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday.We're just posting a meeting for those days.You do have the issue of, that's all right, but you've got a condition that expires on June 30.It expires and it's either you're gonna renew it or not.It expires Sunday night - Huh?I'm sorry.Sunday night.So the product's expired.Expired.That's all there is to it.So what happens if that happens?Can you, then we?They can always vote every issue.Don't we have to have a public hearing, Bob?Well, you would have.That's a whole process.-- a public hearing -- - Okay.But is it, are you posting a hearing for -- - A meeting - The other thing we do.We do have a vote continuing those things to July 3rd.Okay.But I haven't included the condition that he wants it, 'cause it sounds to me like the Board is not behind it.So we've drafted a motion that, basically puts over, continues the approval until, I say, not later than July 3rd, but it may be later than July 3rd.I could say July 5th.Okay?Knowing that you're going to meet on the 3rd.It's not late, the 3rd is not later than the 5th.And I anticipated a meeting on the 5th, - No but you can still have a meeting on the 3rd.No. - The 2nd or the 3rd.I'm not agreeing to the 5th.I think what he's saying is extend the conditions, the permit expires.The 3rd - The 3rd.So, make the motion to extend it to 3rd, midnight, the 3rd.That way we have Monday, Tuesday -- - I thought we said the 3rd through the 5th.We did originally say that, but that doesn't mean that you have to have a meeting on the 5th, you can have the meeting on the 3rd, but just in case by some folks, say everything's all worked out, but logistically you can't get some final detail you're okay with or any other person's okay with just to leave it in place, so it's not expired.Doesn't mean the meeting has to happen on the 5th.That does seem reasonable - Dick, are you saying that the license expires on the 30th?It's the 30th.The conditions of approval, have a dead -- you have a deadline -- - Because it didn't make sense.-- so I'm extending those.It expires and the event is on the 6th.So yeah.Okay.So we're extending those to not later than the 5th, but my, my associate's absolutely right, It doesn't mean you have to meet on the 5th; it gives us to that day, yes.There won't be a quorum on the 5th.And this is not for a meeting on the 5th.This is for -- - The conditions - -- extending the conditions.Right.Did you make them back?- 3rd at midnight right?Effectively it's the 3rd.It's a placeholder.Dick?What's the relevance of stating the Kenny Chesney, Taylor swift concerts and these dates beyond the 3rd?I'm sorry.What's the relevance of stating these..Oh, they just - I'm just identifying - 'Cause they'll all expire on the 30th - They all expire - Yeah.Okay.I'll make a motion to modify the previous votes taken by the Board of Selectmen, approving the applications for the following concerts at Gillette Stadium.Kenny Chesney, August 23rd and 24th, 2013.Taylor swift, July 26th and 27, 2013, and Bon Jovi, July 20th, 2013.And for soccer events by extending the second condition of such improvements regarding attaining liability insurance with such events, insuring both the applicant and the town.The applicant shall provide insurance not later than July 5th, 2013 in a form satisfactory to this board.All remaining conditions of set application approvals remain in full force and effect.Motion's made, is there a second?Second - Any more discussion?Alls in favor?Aye - Alls opposed?Motion to adjourn.So moved - All in favor.Okay.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/2013_06_27BOS.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/2013_06_27BOS.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/2013_06_27BOS.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/20140310JEDBaker/RF-2014-03-10-JED-01-Baker-UncleJoe-Studio-E911.mp3", "text": "So Baker, let's see what uncle Joe's doing.Hey, uncle Joe, how are you buddy?Oh, pretty good, pretty good.I was waiting for Bill to come in because I know he helps out a lot in instigating things.You know, after 60 years, it's almost like a decommissioning of a fraternity house.And I was just wondering if we're going to have some kind of like a fraternity party over there for all the clients who frequent the place, or listeners, and just have a good party and then we'll have the paddy wagon take us over to the new place and set up.Paddy wagon?The mayor with the fire trucks and all that kind of parade.And are you going to have a sidewalk studio where people walk by and talk to you?Well, there's a lot of questions in there, but let me take the last one first.Yeah, you'll be able to walk right up and look in the window, like the fishbowl at WGN. And that's kind of cool.We're not going to be right on the street, we're going to be in a little bit to get away from the street noise, but you'll be able to walk right up and see me sitting there.You have external speakers, I trust.Yes, we got, that was written into the contract and originally it wasn't there, when we finally got it in there.As a matter of fact, Bill Baker and his many little tidbits of, \"Hey, did you think about this?Did you think about that\"?And I had to keep going back, \"Hey, we got one more thing\".Cause the answer was always no.You know, I didn't think about that.But that was one of the things we added at the last minute is like, we could put an external speaker.but it can't be too loud to keep up the neighborhood or anything.You know what I mean?And then second of all, Uncle Joe, it is such an overwhelming time right now.And we don't know what our party is going to look like.We just are looking at it in either mid June or mid July of having kind of a 90th anniversary slash 10th anniversary slash brand new studio party.And Uncle Joe, you're the first to be invited, okay?All right, buddy.All right, buddy.Talk to you.And Uncle Joe, please help too, because we know we need to make sure that there's enough hot dogs, and what else are you going to serve?You're not going to serve like RC Cola, are you?Let's see if Pepsi will help us out here.Yeah, exactly.There's an opportunity here, so let's not- - Well, I'm not making it up about the lease because I'm not, you know, I make it very clear.I don't want to be a real estate guy.I mean, and that's why we're going down there.Baker's like, \"Well, why don't you just buy and build a place\"?Or a couple of guys in Munster, \"Oh, you could build it here.You could build it there\".I'm like, \"No, I just want to rent and do radio and be left alone.I want the world to leave us alone to do radio\".And then Baker's like, \"All right, is this in the lease?Is that in the lease\"?Hold on chancellor, I forgot.Can I get a speaker?I mean, I went back probably five times.Oh yeah, what about this?Well, you know, I like the- - You're the smartest guy I know, Jim.So I'm sure you got it all exactly- - It's all in there.It just took for awhile.Couldn't you think of this before?It's not all in there, I guarantee it.No, we went through a pretty closely.Oh, sure you did.No you did with me.What about this, Baker?Well, you don't need that, but you need this.Baker, of course, as a real estate lease guy and don't negotiate a lease with him without your lawyer around.I'll just give you that much.Baker, let's talk about a couple of things.Gary's gonna run buses to Purdue, Cal, and Munster, and Highland because nobody else will.There's no buses around here.That's not true.What about the township buses?Aren't those?I listened to Frank on the radio, and he was talking about how he got $28 million.Is that your notes?No, that's not a fixed route bus service.That is a point to point bus service.So a fixed route bus service is the only way to take care of mass transit or transit in our community?No, that's a different discussion.In other words, should we just, if somebody needs to go from here to their kidney dialysis and they don't have a lot of money and they might just get on a bus and go to that kidney dialysis, is it cheaper to keep running those buses up and down, Calumet Avenue and Ridge Road and all that?Or is it cheaper for Frank to have that Dial-A-Ride with Jerry Siska and all those guys?I don't know the answer to that.I mean, that's a public policy thing.Only I know right now is Gary public transport, GBTC is taking it over.And they're taking the lead and coming into Hammond, Munster and Highland.And that's going to help a lot of people that don't have a lot of money.They're expecting 45,000 riders.Who is?The Gary Public Transit Corporation?So that's their study.GPTC. And part of that reason that- - It's like listening to the study that's put together by the South Shore people.I mean, what do you think it's going to say?It's made as instructed.Think it's going to come out saying we don't need it?I understand that.And I understand skepticism on this, because remember when we had the reasonable bus authority people coming in and out of here, and I think they knew that their money was running out and they kept trying to hit numbers.And it just couldn't, you know, the numbers were just not making any sense.Remember Preacher?Preacher just saying, \"Hey, I saw another-\" - That guy was sketchy.What's that?Where is the preacher?He's over there in a corner.He was being a bad boy.I put them in the corner over there.Cause there's no hanky panky going on in Lake County.So, you know, there's more than one way to solve the problem.And I think it's more about a pragmatic way of solving the problem than just expanding the old way of doing things, which is what we do here.I don't know.I think that somehow this whole thing just fell through the cracks and it is another example of our inability, without a central power structure, to get bigger jobs done.We can't run a bus service.Okay, well Gary will have theirs.EC will have theirs.Frank Bervan and the township will have their situation.And then it's all fragmented.It's just like everything else around here.we try to do, all right, let's look- - 1975.Look at E911, okay?The state says, \"All right, everybody in the state, you got to have a county-wide E911, or you're-\" - It was like 10 years ago.It was like 10 years ago.Right, so guess what?What are we doing?Waiting to the last minute.That's part of it.We are waiting to the last minute.And part of it is that we can't work together.17 municipalities plus the county is at 18, and now we've got holdouts in Cedar Lake, Highland, and Saint John and Schererville, and they have valid questions.But is the time past?I mean, is Highland just being obstinate?Is Schererville being obstinate?I don't know.Shouldn't those questions have been vetted over the 10 years?That wasn't long enough?Okay, I agree with you on that.I mean, here it is.So, I mean, spending a bunch of time talking about that, it is what it is.So here's the challenge.How are we going to go about doing it?Say, Hey, we have to do it.It's the state's fault.You need to acquiesce to my point of view or I'm calling the attorney general?Really?Is that what you said?That's what they're saying.So what do you think the attorney general- - I can't wait, Wednesday.I'll call him, don't worry.Right?I mean, what do you think the attorney general, and he's going to be pragmatic about it and say, \"Well, you know, the state's role is this.And the state's role is that\".But I gotta believe that if he's sitting around with his buddies, from that, like I was gonna say that.Southern Indiana.there's gotta be a more politically correct way of saying his rural friends from on the river and the Ohio river.And they're sitting around and one of his buddies, he goes, \"Hey, what goes on up there in Lake County?Oh my God, they can't even get together on an E911.I got to be a referee\".Can't even shovel the snow.Or shovel the snow.But really, I mean, listen, they got to put on this thing where they got a major dispatch center, it's becoming a case to go in front of the Indiana attorney general.You're kidding me.And I understand his position and regardless of what his personal perspective is, he says the right thing.He says his job is to defend his client.And in that role, his client is the state of Indiana.So it's going to be what the law says, because if the law doesn't provide him any opportunity to do anything, he's not going to have much of a say.And I bring up an example is the State Board of Accounts.I mean, they do audits, but there's no enforcement.The attorney general doesn't actually have to enforce anything that's found by that State Board of Accounts.And it just goes to show, if everything's not tied together and it's not looked at as more of a macro perspective on some issues, it gets to be challenging when you talk about micro issues", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/RF-2014-03-10-JED-01-Baker-UncleJoe-Studio-E911.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/RF-2014-03-10-JED-01-Baker-UncleJoe-Studio-E911.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/RF-2014-03-10-JED-01-Baker-UncleJoe-Studio-E911.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/Digital_Civic_Underground_Presented_by_Julia_Vallera/Digital_Civic_Underground_Presented_by_Julia_Vallera.mp3", "text": "Thank you all for coming.We are recording this.So, if anyone would like it to remain private after the recording's finished, let me know at the end of this event.And we'll make sure not to make it public online, but the idea would be that we would share this recording online afterwards.So people who couldn't make it could see it after.Hello, welcome.We have name tags scattered here.You can feel free to write your name, your preferred gender pronoun, if you like.And, what else?Housekeeping.There is bathroom down that, bathroom's down that hallway.There's some water fountains.The ladies bathroom is open, but I understand that that might not be the case for the whole event.They might lock them other.In that case, there's bathrooms downstairs somewhere.I'm not sure exactly.Yeah.Thank you two to share your friends with the CCTV venue and recording and all sorts of stuff.Thank you.Yes.And also to say for those of you who know me that I am, I am not here in official Burlington Telecom capacity today.I am here as Abby Tycoki, so.Anyone who has things they want to discuss about any sales related things, I'm happy to stay after and, and hear that, but this is something separate.So, thank you all for being here.Thanks, Abby.And thank you for helping me connect with all these folks.Okay.So, momentarily, I would like to to do a round of introductions and hear where you're all coming from, what brought you here.To give some context for this particular event, I'll do an introduction of myself and this particular event.And then we'll jump into some stuff that I prepared to look over and then get to some activity where we're brainstorming about particular questions and topics related to digital inclusion.So, my name's Julia Vallera.I'm relatively new to the area.I moved here about a year and a half ago, a little less than that.So I, I'm really excited and inspired by the energy and the people that I've been meeting since I've been here.I've had great conversations about internet related issues.A few of them being related to digital inclusion, web literacy in the area.I'm really excited by the initiatives and the services and the, the various projects that I'm learning about since I came here.So, I'm here as someone who is very passionate about the topic of digital inclusion.I've been working on that topic and web literacy for the last six years.And I moved here from New York city.And then in addition to that, I've been working at, in the area of media and arts for over 15 years.Probably closer to 17 now.So, I really, I'm kind of at this intersection between digital inclusion, technology, art, design, and I dabble in all of those things and often they overlap.So I'm here just to meet everyone and really dig in more with all of your expertise in the room.And I've been managing a lot of local and global projects as well.The work- I work at Mozilla foundation right now, and before that, I was working with a lot of different nonprofits in New York city.Running events and doing different types of trainings for professionals, teachers, young people, collaborating on lots of projects with fellow artists and designers.So, I'm just, I'm very excited about the idea of collaboration.And that's what brings me here.This particular event, I'm hoping is, is the first of many more.So, we had a previous event during innovation week that drew a lot of interested people on the topic of internet health and lots of issues that tie into that.And this is the kind of continued conversation of that event.But, I think drilling down into the digital inclusion piece of that, which we're gonna do today is really a good start to thinking about what we want to do to move forward and with all the people in the room, how we can leverage that in, in continuing this conversation.And then just the last thing is that, it's a flexible agenda.So, so this is, I'm very much interested in hearing the expertise that you're bringing here tonight.And so I've, I've kind of created an outline and an agenda and have topical questions to, to get to, but at the same time, like, I want to hear from you and, and feel free to, you know, surface questions, or thoughts, or any relevant examples as we move on throughout the event tonight.So, with that said, just briefly, this is what we're, we'll be going through.We're gonna do introductions.I'm gonna go through some slides that cover some information related to local initiatives and, and statistics.And then we're gonna do a group activity that I'll talk more in detail about, and then I really want to take a good amount of time, like 10 minutes or so at the end to have reflections.So, we'll have some time to maybe give feedback on this event, what we could do better next time, what we need to include and things like that.Okay.So, now I'd like to know about you all.If we could go around the room and do, our name, preferred gender pronoun, if you prefer to do that, and what brought you here today, where you're from.And I added your favorite winter activity here for selfish reasons.I'm very curious to know, since I'm new to the area, what all of you like to get into during the winter months.Yeah.And, and please try to keep it short, just so we, there's a lot of people here so we can, you know, get through it all.So, maybe no more than a minute each, would be preferable.All right.So, does any side of the room or corner want to start?Let's maybe go this way.Starting in this corner here.Okay.Okay.Sounds good.Well, I didn't want to know about, I heard of ruins in telecom and that's what I'm interested in.As you know, we just had the, the whole sale of that and everything involved with that.And so, this kinda got my attention.I'm not particularly interested in the internet.I never really learnt it.And I frankly don't like it very much.And I find it very difficult because it seems to change all the time.And unless you had somebody sitting right next to you, telling you what's happening, you're just out of it.Thank you.And my- I'm Barbara Winbroff.And I'd say to describe myself, that I'm a community activist here.Great.In Burlington.Thanks for coming.Oh, and what's your favorite winter activity?Avoiding snow.Okay.Well noted.Okay, next.I'm Dennis Moynihan.I'm the executive director for BTV ignite.And I'm here because digital inclusion is one of the things that we're very interested in.BTV Ignites's, our mission is to position Burlington to thrive in a 21st century digital economy and digital inclusion, making sure we're inclusive.We have, web literacy, it's a huge part of that.And my favorite winter activity probably involves something that comes with a court condition.Maybe Steven in the back, and then jumped back then.All right.Stephen Barraclough, I run Burlington Telecom.What brought me here today is that we're in a, a very changing world.And I think it's critically important to me and many people that, somewhere like Burlington actually becomes a, an expression of what you can achieve in an engaged community on the front, on the, on digital literacy and digital inclusion.Now, what can we do that actually brings the best of providing equal opportunity to everyone and actually have Burlington be an example of that?My favorite winter activity used to be skiing.As I got older, my favorite winter activity became, became planning summer.Good ones.Thank you.I'm Carolyn Bates.I'm from Burlington.I've been a resident here since 1973.I came today because some people from Burlington telecom and Katie Teal, which I remember, suggested that I come.And, I have been an activist since way back in the early 90s when we were trying to put dog parks in the city.So anything that seems to go across who I am, or what I believe in, I like to, you know, well, anyway, just like to get things going right and well and, like backwards.And so, I hope that the internet and net inclusion and net neutrality all this, somehow, I could help with that.And winter.Well, let's see.I like walking on the ice along the lake to see all those summer cabins that I can't see it with someone.Oh, that's a good idea.But you have to be sure the ice is cold.Oh, yeah.Right, thank you.Welcome.So, I'm Alan Matson.I have been very involved with the keeping the local cooperative that had put a proposal forward for beats Telecom.Mhm.I think we're trying to figure out next steps.And I also know that Shae got us involved to help sponsor a bit, I think, through Reds and Democracy to help out with you in this evening.And, like I said, so I'm here partly filling the purpo- personally I would, for the cooperative of what next steps might be.And I live in Vermont because I grew up in Minnesota and I love winters.It's hard to pick a favorite.But keeping on Carolyn's team, I also like walking along the ice, close to shore.But usually I need to have about 10 to 15 holes drilled with my tip ups down in ice fishing, so.Ooh, cool.Thank you.Welcome.My name is Dan, a recent Burlington president.About two weeks ago here.I worked remotely with Harvard's Berkman Klein Center for Internet Society, doing research on internet content controls and censorship.I also just recently got back from a, a year long travel fellowship on the topic of internet infrastructure, censorship, and surveillance around the world.And so, I'm here to see what kind of initiatives are already in place, what kind of needs need to be addressed.And see if there's any room for volunteering and getting involved.I'm from Florida, so, there's not a lot of difference between winter and the rest of the seasons, but I'll take any excuse for a hot dog.Thank you.Welcome.Oh, let's just get over here and then we'll bounce back.My name is Paul Sumner.I'm a communications coordinator for the city of Winooski.I have this tweet, actually very appropriately, it's what brought me here.And technically, I've got to say a lot of stuff based on the part we do, try and communicate.I mean, sort of say, and I'd say right now, my favorite winter activity is helping our community member's understand the winter .Mmm.Our community is the winter park vans.The parking vans?The parking vans, in when you see the winter parking vans.Yes.Yeah.That's my favorite activity.Hm?On the computer?My computer?You know, just let people know to show a response.Thank you.We have someone Skyped in.Is he there?He turned up.His video.He's there.Yeah.So, Sean- - Oh, there he is.Sean, can you hear me?Yep.You wanna introduce yourself?Shanghai with Abby at telecom.Yeah, I'm excited to be part of this.I'm semi-snowed in, up in Enosburg.So, this is something that, I wanna be a part of to, kind of expand digital inclusive, digital literacy outside of Geneva county as well.And that, my favorite winter activity is definitely skiing.I think it's specifically move to Vermont just to ski, so.Good to see everybody.Thank you.Alright.And then, so, we'll bounce over here.Hi, St. Philips.I'm a remote employee for Google.I grew up in Vermont and got here about a year ago.And I'm here 'cause Julia sent me a message after I looked up an article.A meeting about net neutrality and and my favorite winter activity is going ice skating with my two girls.Very important.Okay.Thanks for coming.Maybe we'll do zigzag.So, we'll go straight back and then around.I'm L Wagoner.I'm a member of Kapiti Local.And I'm here for the digital inclusion.I think it's incredibly important.And I agree with Stephen that we have an opportunity here to create something that, that the whole country can take a look at and learn from.And I hope we can pull that off.I've been here for, I don't know, since the early 90s.And, my job is helping people with their computers.So, my favorite winter activity, I think, is shoveling snow.Because it gives me a great opportunity to get fit, stay fit, and get something accomplished at the same time.Not that I don't like cross country skiing and stuff like that, but I especially like snow shoveling.That's great.Thank you.That's very funny.More on that later.So, my, my name is Kit Andrews, and I've been back here in Vermont since 1984.And I'm a member of KBTL Co-op.And what brings me here tonight is, I really value the KBTL Co-op community.And like to spend time with KBTL Co-op people.I'm not quite as internet illiterate and phobic as Barbara is, but I'm pretty illiterate and not deeply interested in that stuff.So, one of my favorite winter activities is snow shoveling.I had no idea someone else was going to say that.You're sitting right next to each other.I know.Perfectly positioned.Now a favorite activity- - I'm inviting everybody over tomorrow.Yeah.A favorite activity around the holidays is defined a Messiah singalong.And there's one tonight in the New North End.So, I'm gonna be leaving here early, so I can go sing them aside.Oh, wow.Nice.Thanks for coming.We'll go right next to you in the back.I know.I'm Godsram, I live in Burlington.In Burlington Cohousing.And I'm here because this seems to be an issue that Abby was really concerned about, and I thought, \"Well, if she's concerned and interested in this, maybe it's something I should find out about\".So, I don't know much about it.So, that's why I'm here.And my favorite winter activity, when I can do it, is cross country skiing.Okay.Thanks for coming.My name's Matt Crock.I've been, I spent a number of years in my twenties doing kind of frontline work, doing computer literacy as a social worker with people who've been recently housed after having being homeless.So, kind of, I've had my fingers in that world, and my other affinities are a member of the Laboratory B HackerSpace.And I'm generally involved in, as you know, the co-op movement soldier on many things of ABTL ate a lot of my time over the last five years, but I'm really sort of interested in seeing what, what things the, that, kind of, our community can pull together that are both, kind of, ethically designed and non-extractive, but also very, very involved in the Platform Co-operativism Movement.So, curious to see what people bring to the table.Thanks for coming.I'm Andy Crawford.I work for CCTV. Which runs a bunch of different programs.One of them is John 17, 3:17.He will- I work there as Andy, as a Tech Director.Yeah, sure.We run a bunch of programs at CCTV channel 17.We have a statewide nonprofit organization that helps you find the best deal, planning or common good Vermont into that.And then we have, we also operate a small OpenStack cloud attached to the Burlington home network.So, I'm interested in access to resources, digital resources.Access to digital resources for everything from civic data projects, through small scale entrepreneurial projects, with a focus on localism, hyper-local engagement.Mostly interested in the policies of the small and large scale structural internet.So. - Thanks.I'm David Lansky.I've lived in Burlington 20 some years, I've been, I'm on the board of KBT local, keep it local.I've been, I'm the new member to the port.So, it's only been about a year and I've been very actively involved.I'm here to join the conversation in one of the places I'm hoping we're going.If KBT all had managed to find , what would we do with it?And how much of that can we do, even though, KPL puzzle.And that's figuring out those things we can act on, gives us some direction.And one of my favorite winter activities is dancing.Thanks for coming.I'm Barbara Delfi.I have lived in Burlington for a long time.I live with Don, who's next door to me there.And I'm interested in where, where we think we might be going.I feel pretty confident about, you know, technology and my favorite winter activity is probably sledding.Mmm.Thanks for coming.I'll go dad and I'll- - Do you go?No, you go.I'm Lauren-Glenn Davitian, I work at CCTV. The center for media democracy.We've been interested in digital inclusion for many years, I would say since 1990, when we started the Old North End community technology center.And my favorite winter activity is shoveling.There's 3.Thank you for coming.My name is Solvay and I live in Old North End of Burlington.I've been there since 1991.And I'm here because I'm interested in, and I have a lot of concerns about use of the internet and people not understanding some of the, the risks of things that are going on, commercialization, and data profiling, and manipulation, and filtering.And so, I'm very interested in trying to educate people to understand some of those factors that, that the cool factor about apps.It sort of distracts people from really recognizing what's going on.And so, I'm now thinking about ways that may end inclusion.Part of it is part of it.Everybody understanding options for use of the internet safety, but ways to deal with, potentially, having to try to anonymize things so that you can actually use the internet without having to be profiled, and monitored, and tracked, and filtered, which I've had serious concern about and helping people understand what programming is about and how you are being programmed, if you do not understand the programming that is behind everything that's going on.And my favorite activity, I mean, I like shoveling too, which I just came from before I came here- but I, I like walking, and snowshoeing, and cross country skiing, and ice skating.Thanks for coming.My name's James Lockridge.I'm from King Street, a couple blocks over, and I direct Big Heavy World, which is a volunteer run non-profit that supports local music.And for years, for close to 21 years now, we've used emergent technology to support our local music community.So, I've been a community builder there as a candidate for city council, more than three in Burlington.I have a very keen personal interest in inclusion of all time.And for winter activities, I, I enjoy walking around downtown when it's snowing, and just seeing this, and just living in a beautiful place.But, my favorite of all, and this is a bit of an echo is shoveling what the road cloud gives me.I like the triumph of that.Thank you.Thanks for coming.Hello, I'm Jessica Bright.I'm president of .Some of my work has been around, trying to keep the Civic Cloud running and just generally promoting technology and the community.I imagine I'm probably one of the few people with an actual networking degree in the room, if not the only one, maybe there's someone else.So, I do know a lot about the internet and technology.If you bring that to the table?And I endeavor to do as much work towards that, towards really freedom of the internet, and what I would say is internet works.In my role as president of the lab, I kind of feel that part of it is that everyone has a network and the inner network is a network of networks.And, really what you're buying when you're buying an ISP is the ability to connect to other people's networks.And if people don't understand that on a fundamental level, I don't, I don't think we explained it very well.My day job is at CCTV, but I think that sometimes takes me away from my work, like many people's jobs, but I think the internet helps you get your work done.Winter sport or winter activity.I'm probably gonna say video games like Sims, where you got a lot of blue skies and cups with like seasonal, not seen blue skies, but like it.Yeah.Nice.Thanks for coming.I'm very Mary Danko.I'm the director of the Fletcher Free Library.The library has a long tradition of digital inclusion and providing internet service to the community.So, we're always very interested in this conversation.Absolutely.Particularly, I'm interested, here in Burlington, we have this incredible internet service access to everyone, but not everyone is getting it.So, I'm really interested in trying to find hard data on what are the barriers, why people are not getting connected, and what we can do to help them?Okay.What do you like to do in winter, Mary?Oh, in perfect conditions, cross country skiing.Can't be sticky.Can't be too cold.Thanks for coming.So, I'm Dodeci Bomba.I work for the printer for library.I am one of the people around the tech center.So, we ideally, like, a busy day with people who want to access the internet and people who want some app with the computers.So, I think this is a good thing to know about, more about whats people need, if we can, give or add some experience about what we are dealing with everyday by participating in this kind of meeting.So, for the winter activity, I guess I'm new in the snow.And I don't have like a particular winter activity.That's okay.You get lots of ideas.Stay warm.I'm going to get, I'm gonna let Abby comeback.I'm back just in time.Abby.So, this is Henry.He's three and super into digital inclusion.I went pee in the potty.And he went pee in the potty.Oh, good job, Henry.And I'm Abby Takaki.And I almost simultaneously moved out of Burlington to Essex and started working for the city at Burlington telecom, which, for better or for worse, has given me the opportunity to meet all of you and get really passionate about fiber internet technology, smart cities, gigabit cities.I'm also an executive fellow B2B of night and, and Steven Hildo, he may be regretting it today, was the one who said, \"Look more into this digital divide thing, and find out how it can be implemented here\".And it got me really worked up.I'm passionate about the frustrating lack of data that we have in the city, even though everyone knows there's a need.So, I had a really great experience during innovation week with Julia, and I'm excited to, that she's excited that she's excited to continue the discussion.And my favorite winter activity, just in the past three years, has become making snowmen.Sounds good.And snowwomen.Snowpeople.Trying to be inclusive.Very good, yes.It's snow and impulsive.Great.So, did we get everyone?I think we did.Awesome.So, there are a few goals for today.I'll back up, so you can see these.And again, this is a flexible, can you hear me okay?We're good?This is a flexible event, so, we can steer in whatever direction we need to steer in.But in general, we want to, tonight, draw attention to the digital divide that impacts many diverse communities here in the Burlington, in Burlington, but also in Burlington area.We want to identify what we are all currently doing.So, that was a great start and what we could be doing to increase digital inclusion in the area.And then, also, just to figure out ways to leverage the uniqueness of this area.So, our large, new American population and the universities that we have here, the services that are available, like, all of these really great resources really think about how to leverage those in the best way.So, very quickly, the last event we did, in case some of you weren't there, was an event that focused on a broad view of internet health, and that's a term that has been getting more and more attention lately.Mozilla foundation has been doing a lot of work around five issues related to internet health.And one of those issues is digital inclusion.Another one of those issues is web literacy.And some of these are, these questions were, were what we really focus that event on.So, you can see as you read them, they're pretty broad facing, but some of the outcomes of that were, there seemed to be some trends happening.So, one of the trends after, during the event, and then as we looked at the notes afterward was the need for more data.So, like, a lot more granular data on what we know about who's using the internet, why they're using it, why they're not using it.And how, you know, that may paint a picture of gaps and places where we need to really focus on.And then another one of those outcomes that we noticed was, the need to share the resources that already exist more, more on the forefront of, of the communities that we work in and that we serve and are a part of, because we do have a lot here already.So, that was another thing.And I think another one was just that there's a lot of examples out there that we can draw from, from other cities that are close to our size, or have a similar, I don't know, geographical location and access that we do that we could really learn from.So, those are some bigger outcomes.So, today we decided to drill down, you know, onto the, into the digital inclusion topic specifically.And before we do that and look at some other stuff, I just wanted to make some clarification about terms.So, there's two here.One is digital divide and one is digital inclusion, and those terms often are used simultaneously or in conjunction with each other, but for the sake of this event, I just wanted to clarify, kind of, how they're different.So, digital divide is a term that refers to inequalities in the access that people have to information technology.So, that's a very specific way of pointing to gaps that we know exist.And then digital inclusion is more of a framework.And that framework is used to assess and consider the readiness of communities to provide access to communities.And then, within that framework, and again, these are definitions, there's many definitions out there, many, and a lot of them are great.I picked these, because I think they really, kind of, are quick and easy to understand for the context of this event.So, to think about digital inclusion as a framework here, there's three areas we can think of: access, adoption, and application.So, the access is just the simply, the affordability and the availability of these tools and these resources that connect people digitally.And then the adoption is that digital literacy piece.So, how people understand it, how secure they are, unsafe they are using it.And then the application of it.So, how they're using it to better their lives and create opportunities and seek out opportunities in a community.So, that's kind of the framework we're talking about when we're talking about digital inclusion.This is a great quote, that was, I pulled from a research project called digital inclusion survey.It was from an association.Yes.Over here.Is the list feed better?I'm worried about the mic, though.I'm okay?Okay.I'm trying to speak loudly.Hold the mic.Yes.She said hold the mic.Hold the mic?I think I'm okay.Can you hear me, Alex?Yeah.Like, to hold the mic, that would be better.Oh, okay.Let's try that then.I think that's good.Okay.Are you going to be comfortable?Is it going to be in the way of your presentation?I think it'll be okay.I'll manage.You've got plenty of slack.All right.So, yeah, so you can take a read.I won't read it verbatim, but basically, this quote is referring to that, that fact that access is one thing, but then there's a larger issue of how people understand what they're accessing and then how they apply that.Mimi Ito is a researcher and the founder of Connected Learning Research Network.This is another great quote that I think does a nice job of demonstrating how the, the way that we disperse these tools and the way that we're informing people about them and creating resources around them is a huge part to making them...Oh, thank you.To making them accessible.Can go ahead.So, now I just wanted to point to existing resources where we can find data related to what we, that I know of.And obviously, you all have been doing this work for a while and probably have even more places to point to, but you can go ahead and go.And so, oh, and then, so I, I am like obsessed with quotes.You'll see a lot of these in this presentation, Justin Reich is another really great person to follow.He's managing a research project out of MIT in Cambridge, Massachusetts.This is the quote, just related to that data piece, like, how important it is to have data in order to know exactly what to make, to serve people and to really bridge that divide.Okay.So, we looked at this, Mary brought in some slides at the last event, and I just wanted to refresh everyone's memory.This is the broadband availability data set that is available.I pull just the Chittenden county stats here.It's hard to see, I know it's very small.But basically it is an assessment of the total number of buildings.And then the percentage of those buildings that have access to different levels of broadband.This section is 100, 100 megabytes per second, download and upload speed.So, 100 over 100, and then it goes down 25, over 3 and then 4 over 1.So, you can see, like, the different cities and towns in Chitteden county and how it breaks down.I mean, if you look at it, the, the rate for Burlington is 91.9 with 100 over 100.So, that's pretty good.That's like, but what does that mean?Like, does that mean that these are the buildings now, is every apartment in that building have access?Like, how does it break down further?So, I think there's some pieces there that we could learn more about.Center for rural studies at UVM, I don't know if anyone has worked there or knows more about this.I was intrigued by this report, but it's old, it's from 2010.And this report goes into a lot of detail about household internet connections through a survey.And this is Vermont wide.So, digging through this, this particular one I pulled as an example, is just going into detail about household income in comparison to access to, or ownership of computers, access to broadband, and then some other combinations of the both.So, I think this is great if we could do this again, or...Yes, Lauren?The Vermont department of public service, he's updating the ten-year telecom plan, which they do every three years.And so, they will have the most accurate data around the state.Awesome.I mean, along the lines of what Mary's showed, maybe even more detail.That's great.So, you can talk to them if you want more data.Awesome.Thank you.I'm gonna check with you later to make sure we get it written down, so, I remember.Yes?Is the percentage of a computer, is that considered like, more desktop, or smartphones, or com-books?Probably, like, anything that people wouldn't get access to.That's a great question.And I work with, I imagine.Yeah, no, that's a great question.I'm not sure.And I don't know how a lot of the stuff, I don't know how it breaks down.Like, you know, is it mobile?Is it, are they laptops, desktops, so.I don't think, for sure, in 2010, there were any computer problems with desktops.Yeah.That's not from my time.Yeah.And, so, in league with mobile internet connections.When did the iPhone come out?It went out...Yeah, so Ben, is working on it...But anyway, a really great place.Does anybody know Center for Rural Studies?Yeah.Okay.So, do you know if they're doing report more, current reports, in this type of way, or...They're calling themselves now the Vermont data center.Okay.And Michael Mosher is the primary contact there.So, he's the person to ask about if they're updating.Typically, they do contract work, so, someone will hire them to update certain data sets.So, he's a good resource to talk to about the status of the data.Great.Perfect.Okay, next slide.And this little gem over here, is the Comprehensive Economic Development Strategy, the CEDS. And this is a report that characterizes the state of Chittenden county's economy, its strengths, its weaknesses, opportunities, and threats.And then identify strategies and actions to maintain and to grow it.So, this is a lengthy document, but it goes into a lot of detail.And then, I just put this image here, 'cause I think it's an interesting way to explain in really, in a short way, this circle of prosperity that they're talking about in this report, which is kind of how things, like the health of people and the quality of education really affects that the workforce switching then affects the increase of regional income and opportunity, which then affects the healthiness of the environment and the vibrancy of where we live.So, I put that in there as just kind of, I thought that was a neat way of doing it.Next slide.And so, within that framework of strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats, there's more opportunities than what I pulled here, but these are the ones that are significantly reflective of technology.So, they kind of go through, like, engaging highly skilled and trainable retirement age population, because we have, statistically, we have a larger time of population supporting and growing new American populations.We have that unique feature here in this part of Vermont to promote telecommuting and remote workforce here.So, these are all opportunities that, in this report, which is relatively recent, is pulled out as something we really need to take advantage of.So, that's a great list.Next slide.Another thing this report does, is suggest 14 initial target clusters and industries for attraction and development efforts.And out of the 14, almost half are technology related.So, we have infotech here, digital media, e-commerce, clean tech, and green tech.We have non-profit organizations, I think that ties very closely.And then, we have higher ed, and I would say business and administrative services also is very closely related to this topic.So, I thought that that was interesting that, you know, this report, it's general, it's looking at all industry, but even in their suggestions of what we need to progress, half of them, almost, are tech and digital related.And, so, kind of buried in this report, is something called the environment, community, opportunity, and sustainability scorecard?Has anybody heard of this scorecard?Yeah.Yeah.Okay.So, what this scorecard is, is basically takes these top line.Yes.There's indicators, but there's several indicators for each of the, I guess you would call them objectives or overall, kind of, markers?Results, results.Results.Yes.So, there's these results and then indicators that show how those results are met.Is that a good way of saying it?So, I kind of dug around, dug around, dug around there.It's intriguing.It's, you know, if you like data and you like to read through this stuff, you should definitely go look through it all.'Cause it reports on all kinds of stuff, like, outside of tech, sustainability efforts, clean water, all kinds of stuff.So, in my effort to find the broadband and internet related stuff, it was buried in this, in this result here, which is to ensure adequate infrastructure and facilities.And then, i.e., water supply wastewater, stormwater, broadband, solid waste, and recycling.So, it's buried in this, it's buried in, like, this infrastructure, kind of, group.And then in the indicators, there's no indicator that points to broadband.So, I don't know how we could get that in there.And in my opinion, even more, create a result that's only broadband and then have, like, a handful of indicators that speak directly to that.But I love this as a tool.Next slide.And you probably are all familiar with the VTD performance dashboard, that's online.This is through the city website and each of these are clickable links that bring you to this, this dashboard that does an assessment of these different topic areas.And we have a city open data portal, which is where the, any open data, like, where you can go search for broadband access, for example, would be located.Or any other types of open data that we would want to find.So, I think this is a great place.I couldn't find much here, yet, but I think it's an opportunity.It's new.It's brand new.Great, okay.But I love that it's there.Next slide.Okay, so, that's kind of a landscape of all the things that I could find, and I'm very eager and we'll have a chance to talk about more that weren't there.'Cause we can get them all written down.I wanted to show some examples of digital inclusion initiatives, in and outside of Vermont.And, of course, here's another quote.Danah Boyd is a researcher and author that is very well known on writing about this topic, and, especially around teens, and how they're using the internet.And she says, \"In a world where information is easily available, strong personal networks and access to helpful people often matter more than access to information itself\".And I think that's very powerful and I agree completely.Okay.So, I'm not going to go through all of these projects and I'm going to make this slide deck available after.So, you can, if you'd like, but I do want to show one, two or three of these, that I think are very, very influential for us in this context.And I think we'll go, like, from small to big.So, there's a project and Abby introduced me to this.I'm going to let her speak about it, but it's called E2D. It's located in Davidson, North Carolina.Do you want to talk about that?Yeah, I'll, just like, sorry.Thank you.A quick overview Davis, North Carolina, for anyone who isn't familiar with E2D, is literally started with a daughter who came home and said to her dad, \"All of our homework assignments are on the internet, but I know that I have a friend who's homeless and she doesn't have a computer.She doesn't have a home.She doesn't have internet.That's not fair\".And he said, \"You're right\".And that has now grown into a digital inclusion effort that encompass.It started in tiny, little Davison.They raise money with lemonade stands every year.Lowe's is headquartered near there, so, they ponied up some support.And it's just a really great example of a very small town that made a very big effort, and turned it into something even bigger.It's growing every year and now they're help, they're taking care of all the middle schools in Charlotte.So, like, they went from tiny to huge city.So, I think that's a really cool example of small and then growing to be something really big through something, just a simple question, or, a young girl who pointed out something that's just not fair.And it resulted in that.So, I thought that was really cool example.Yeah.Yeah.That's great, grassroots, kind of, projects to show.Can you click on Open Austin there?So, I have a tree set up.Let me just close that.Close the tree.I think it might be off of...Is this one?Yeah, there we go.So, Open Austin is a volunteer organization that's been running for several years now and is focused mostly on open data, or started to, as a focus on an open data.So, their mission in the beginning was to get the, the Austin government to share their data openly online.And they've been very successful.And so, since they've, they've kind of reached these goals, and as they reach these goals of certain data sets to become available, they've kind of expanded at the same time.So, at the top here, we have, there's events, projects, advocacy, and then just various ways of support.And each of these have, like, the projects, you kind of click on these.Yeah.So, these are all open projects that live on GitHub, which is a place for sharing content and open source code.And these are all, you can see, like, there's a fake news project, there's community data project.These are all community driven projects.So, they've identified needs in their community, in different regions in Austin and built these projects and Open Austin features them and host events around these projects.So, there's just, there's a lot of ways that they're making, they're making it possible for citizens and residents in these different areas to participate in the digital inclusion progress in these areas.So, I think that's brilliant.And then the other thing they do, if you scroll all the way back up, go to advocacy.So, they they've created agendas that they've put here on the website and they've, can you click on candidate questionnaires?So, they've actually prepared questionnaires.Anytime somebody runs for office that they send out to each candidate and they say, \"Fill this out\".And this speaks directly to the digital inclusion and particular needs that that they've identified.And they say, \"What do you think about this?What would you do about this?What would you do\"?And so, you can actually go through these and you can read each of the candidates responses and get a very clear understanding of how they feel about digital inclusion.And if there's a plan or like, you know, if there's not a plan, all of that good stuff.So, and this is, this is the tip of the iceberg with this project.So, it's like a little bit bigger than the grassroots North Carolina project, but it started there.And so now they have all these other elements that are embedded in it.Can you go back?Is there actually a platform for all of this?Is it all hosted there?Well, it's all hosted there.The site, I don't know if the site is hoping, it looks like it might be hosted there, but I'm not sure, but all of those projects are hosted on GitHub.And then if, like, resources, their primary goal is openness.So, all of the resources that they use to run their organization is also on GitHub.Yeah.So, you can access all of that stuff.Can you go back to the slide deck?We're going to open up.Oh...It's okay.Just go down and go back to...Yep.That slide, 24.And click on the top link.Sorry.That one.It's gonna give you that thing.There you go.Thank you.So, this is kind of the next level, and this is the Austin city government page that is dedicated entirely to digital inclusion.So, if you scroll down on this page, each council district has a report and each of these reports is a highly detailed version of what digital inclusion looks like in that region or in that district.So, I mean, click on one, just as an example.So, this goes into great detail about the events that are happening in that region, what progress has been made for digital inclusion in that region, the data in that region.So, it goes, and Austin's a lot bigger than we are.So, I mean, that says, and that could go two different ways.Like, it's a lot bigger, so, they have more resources, or we're a lot smaller, so, we could do this too, right?So, maybe we could, like, there's somewhere in the middle, but, I just love how much details included in each of these reports.And on that main website page, there is a map that people can see any upcoming event related to digital inclusion and internet related and digital topics.Yeah.This one.Okay.Let's go back to the slides.I have a question.Yeah?Are all the people in general just putting information on this, or there's a specific group of people that put information that's available to everyone?That's a good question.For the events, it's probably, I have to look more closely, but it looks like people are just submitting events.So when they run an event, they post it.And then that gets shared on that, kind of, big map that we saw?But the reports themselves happened through the city.So, they have, I'm guessing either, they work with organizations to do that research, or they have people that work internally.But those reports come from the city.They probably have 10 passwords to get on there.Yeah.Lots of passwords.Those are important.So, those are examples.A lot of these others are wonderful.I added some Burlington ones and there's a lot more than this, but these were all really inspiring to...Common Good Vermont, Code for BTV, Burlington Telecoms Edge Unit and Lifeline.So, there's lots of stuff happening locally here that we can use as an example and leverage, but yeah, just kind of a snapshot.Thank you.Okay, so, what do we want to do?The big question of the evening?What time is it right now?Does anybody know?6:40?6:40.6:40.Okay, great.Perfect.We have plenty of time.Again, this is, I don't know what had just happened.Is that an old quote?Did I do this one?Can you go back a slide?Okay, great.So, we're good.We're in the right place.So, this was, we're going to break up net right now and have a break, but also, but also, think about, and brainstorm some questions particularly.And, if you go to the next slide, Abby.So, I don't know what we want to do.I don't have the answer.None of us have that exact, like, thing that's gonna make everything better, right?But we have each other and we have all of this experience.So, these are some things that we can tonight start to brainstorm around.So, one is do more research, and we have, I've put these posters up around the room.So, I don't know where this one is, but it's either, how can we improve?How can I help?Yeah.So, there's a poster back there that says, who can help us get the data we need to identify barriers to digital inclusion?So, like, you know, Lauren had some great suggestions.So, anything related to people, organizations, initiatives, research hubs, like, who can we reach out to, to help us try to get more specific with this data?Identify existing resources.What would a one stop shop look like for digital inclusion in Vermont?Like, could we model it after Open Austin?Or would we want to put it on that city portal that I showed as an example, like, where would it live?What would it look like?And then build alliance.So, you know, having strong advocacy and support and buy-in from the mayor's office and other institutions that are very prominent here is really important.And just recognizing that no single organization can solve the digital divide, right?It's a combination of many.So, you know, what would those guiding principles be for digital inclusion and how would we be able to craft them with all of the expertise in the room and then just reaching a targeted population?You know, we have all of these great, diverse communities here, seniors, the unemployment population, low income households, new Americans, public housing residents, veterans.So, there's like all of these very specific groups that if we had more data, we might know how to serve them better and bridge that gap.So, these are some top line things to kind of think about and what we're going to do next is, next slide.We're going to focus on these three questions.And I pointed out one already, which is, who can help us get this data?How do we start this?Who can we talk to?And there's markers and I have some post-it notes.So, we're going to add ideas related to that question in the back.The second question is, how can we improve future meetings like this?And what could we include to make them more beneficial?So, like I said, in the beginning, I'm hoping this is the first of many conversations.So, what would we want in the next one?How could we really start to be effective with this group and on this topic?And the last question here, is what is our BHAG for this movement?And what is the change we want to see?Does anybody know what BHAG stands for?I have a hand in the back.Big Hairy Audacious Goal.Exactly.So, in other words, what is that big, crazy goal that we want for this movement, this digital inclusion movement?So, all answers are welcome.This is a brainstorming opportunity.And then in addition to that question, is just, what is the change we want to see?So, we may not have these answers tonight.It's likely we don't, because we don't have a lot of information yet, but we could have fun brainstorming a little there.The last poster I have is the parking lot poster.And this is a very important poster, because this parking lot poster, which is in the back as well, is a place for you to add things that aren't on these posters yet.So, questions that we still have that I didn't address.Topics or concerns that you didn't, we didn't address tonight that would affect digital inclusion, suggestions.Anything that you think is relative to this conversation, but can't put it on a poster, throw it in the parking lot and we'll use it for the next conversation.I think that's the last slide.Is that the last one?Yeah.Aren't you going to end with an awesome quote?Oh, you're right.Oh, I failed.It's all over.We can all go home.Okay.So, I'm gonna end there before we jump on these posters here and take questions, if you have them, I would like everyone to go on a break.You know, I've been talking for a while, but yeah.What do you guys, any questions?What is the big, hairy goal here?Yeah.Good question.I'm curious.Good question.And I don't have the answer.If you stop moving, the floor becomes lava, or the room becomes dark or something.Yeah.We all have to constantly shift and move.The motion detector is all the way over there, which makes no sense.I'm curious.I mean, does anybody have a thought on that?What that goal would be?I think mine would be, like, every single person in Burlington, has...Sorry.Every single person in Burlington, and then Chittenden county, and then Vermont, and then the country, and then the world has affordable or, you know, whatever, free, super affordable access to the fastest internet available and all of the tools and resources necessary to use it.I think we should rephrase that.I think everyone should be able to make their network, their personal network access, any other network on the planet.Yes!I love it.Because they want to internetwork it with the other networks on the planet and they need to own and have their own network first to internetwork with another network and whether their network is simply their phone, and that's why I'm asking those questions, whether it's a phone, or a Chromebook, or a more comprehensive computer, and you may have a router or network, you know, what is it?Where is that barrier?And if you know someone only has a phone, but they say that they're connected, are they?Do they have their own network that can connect to other networks?Is that the barrier?I think those are good questions to ask.I love that that's an example then of how that is two different things.You know, it's different for every one of us and the people who have no interest.I'm struggling with the big goal too.But for me, it's something different than digital.My voice carries.It's something different than just giving people access because in 2017 more people have access than they used to.But I often say that, as we talk about a digital economy, the pace of change is accelerating in our society.It wrapped around digital technology, digital technology is empowering us, but also changing our world.And I summarize that when I'm talking about what I'm trying to do is to make sure that this disruption is happening for us as a community and not happening to us.Now, that means lots of all kinds of very wooly things.But it's the fact that our employers are able to use, to be cursed with people using the technology in the way that they, they get access to the right employees.And that recent graduates are speaking the same digital language as our employers, for example.Or that something that works for you today, doesn't change on you.The internet, somebody said the internet is always changing.So, how do we make sure that we're riding that wave and we're proactive?And it's a very, very broad thing.And I think it needs to be nailed down, but there's something around that that for me is a big challenge.Yeah.Yes.One of the things that I really like is the you showed from the Austin community-based was hosted on GitHub.And if that's really done on GitHub, and it's all open source, I think that's a crucial piece of the model.I think it's very important that whatever happens here, it's important that, much, if not all of it, is done in open source tools with available code and that any research is reproducible research, so that you're publishing, \"here's the code we used to process the data, here's the link to the data, here's the report that came out of it\".So somebody else can dissect it.And it is fully transparent.Yeah.If we build that into the culture of what we're doing, and then we also bridge to the maker community who was working with, you know, Raspberry PIs and Arduinos and experimenting and making everything from art to robots, with this technology.Using open source tools in transparent ways, we make this more accessible to everybody.I think that's a real, that accessibility takes the mystery out of it and makes it available to all of us.You're right.Hold on, one minute.Alex, again?Yeah, absolutely.Okay.We'll do a couple more, I saw three hands go up and then I do want to capture these suggestions so they don't get lost in the air.So, let's do the rest that at hands I saw?Whoa, whoa.Hold on, I just got...Oh, so sorry about that.Oh, are you writing?Oh, thank you.Okay.Yes, in the front?Well, I find that my difficulty is that people, even though they know a lot about the internet, don't know how to teach it.And they'll, they'll go off into the jargon of the internet and lose me within seconds.Yeah.And, and you're always trying to, you know, get what they're saying, but they're going so fast, and aren't really good teachers.Mhm.So, I think that's a skill that's very different than the average teacher.I agree completely.We're getting all these notes down.Yes.I was gonna piggyback on what Barbara said, in saying that we need classes that have extremely easy ways to understand things.And I think we should use Macbook computers because they're a lot easier.Maybe there's some place, part of city hall where they have classes on a weekly basis where people can come in and people can teach them on a one-on-one, help them find exactly the things that they need.Mhm.And I would look to think, there was a book written by one of the Photoshop gurus on how to use your iPhone when it first came out.And I compared that with one, for those other computers, not in saves, it was so easy, you could understand it, that maybe we can look to someone like that to write a comprehensive use of the internet, both that goes nationwide or international, so you can start off having similar or the same language.If I could just quickly add- - Yeah.Jessamyn west, who's a librarian in Vermont, has written that book, actually.And she does work on digital inclusion.I think she'd be a great person to bring up here.And she has given very simple ways to discuss how to use computers, how to use the internet, working in all different kinds of demographics.She's also, she serves on the board of Wikimedia with me, as well.So, she's very- - And she's based in Vermont?Yeah.Wow.We need to get her to come next time.If only we had a librarian in the room that knew Jessamyn.I'm friends with Jessamyn.I think that, I mean, I think sometimes if we do, we keep hearing, you know, this is something that the library can do.We do, we have classes, you can book a librarian, and they will sit side by side with you and do those things.Sometimes our resources are really stretched right now.And I think a lot of what we're hearing now, is we're getting the late, late, late, late adopters.And they are definitely the hardest folks to bring along.And it's a challenge.Yeah.But I'm hearing a lot of similar kind of feelings and thoughts here.What literacy, digital literacy...In the back?You want visual litters, so people can understand visually, not verbally.Right.Donald?It has to be something entirely different.And I may end up making a total fool of myself, even though I've worked in technology for quite a while, I don't think of my digital IQ as being particularly high.But Barbara and I live in a community of 32 families.And they're all ages, lots of different abilities, lots of different incomes.We're basically a privileged community.Anyways, there may be some benefits, but it's a community we could study.Yeah.It's a community where, I mean, it's already happening.Like canopy, the 200 dose.Well, I've been going through different families and showing them how they can get access to that.And so, but that's just a minor example.I mean, we have people on a totally different level, we could do a survey very easily.I just wouldn't know how to go...It would be nice to make a study out of this thing, start with the survey, so we could identify where we're starting at, try to define the goal of where we want to be, and then sort of measure that, you know, it would be a nice project that we could use as a model for doing this with other communities.Now, there's being a co-housing community, collaboration is a really key piece, and we're learning how to do that.And one of the things we're learning is about how the internet is a source of abuse.It's a source of, you need to be careful.I mean, we have more, we practically have more rules within our community about what you say in an email to everybody, and what you don't.And what you know, so there's that piece.So, there's a social piece, as well as the, the digital skills and resources.And I don't have, I mean, I have a little piece of an idea how we could do this, but boy, if we would do this, I would need a lot of help.Just even coming up with the original survey.And I would love for that to happen.And how do we deploy it, so that the people who need it are taking the survey?It would have to be super grassroots, I think, which is kind of exciting.Like, it can't be something we put out on the internet.That's a perfect example, like, having people invested and involved that could say, like, \"take the survey so that we know how, what, who we need to serve and how we can serve you better\".Right?Well, we can, we just, we just did a survey and got a 41 response.65 was a whole different thing.Yeah.But it's a community where you could do that.And, but I wouldn't even know exactly how to, what questions to ask to begin with.Right, and that's what we would want to build.That's something we could think about here when they put this through.Yes?Yeah.I think the notion of reaching folks where they're at and trying to really assess what are their barriers to accessing the digital economy, and I serve on a few boards, and a couple of cases, residents, one of them is affordable housing, it's Northgate apartments, actually.And one of the few of the board members don't use email and don't use the internet and it really puts them at a significant disadvantage.And I can already tell that there's like a divide in our group.And it's unfortunate because the board is almost all residents.I happen to be a community member who serves on that board, but it's 10 residents in 4 community reps and it's the largest affordable housing complex in Vermont.It's resident owned, resident control.It's a truly unique community, but right there in that group, we've got folks who are being left out and left behind.So, I think engaging people where they're at to find out what would make you more able and capable to access technology?Do you want to, first of all, of course, and if you do and you see the benefits, what supports do we need to give you to be able to access that?And if you don't, why not?Yeah.Yeah.So, kind of related to that, I was on a board, that's kind of, I'm one of the youngest people on it.It's mostly, kind of, two generations above me.And so we had, there's a lot of tension for awhile over use of technology, because there's, and I think this is something that I'm involved in the neighborhood planning assembly in the New North End.And this is something, I think, there are two where we see, kind of, open meeting law hasn't caught up with what's possible for engaging online governance.And so, we eventually got to the point where I sat down with all the people on the board who wanted to, and it was like, \"this is why we don't send attachment emails, this is why we use Google Docs instead.and this is how we use this, kind of, online voting system so we don't have to make all of our decisions in in-person meetings\".And after, when it was, kind of, when we got drilled down and got clear on what are the benefits of these things, adoption was very quick...Yeah.But it was, sort of, there was kind of like a block of, without sort of comprehending what those benefits were, you know, why learn the new system, if the old system is somewhat workable, because those gains in efficiency, and sort of what's possible, aren't visible.And so, the thing that I've been, kind of, really thinking about, in terms of setting goals is, you know, the idea of having in-person once a month neighborhood meetings is great, but it also, there's inherently just a limited number of people who can show up and be involved in things that are, you know, key for engagement with city counselors and, you know, development planning in each neighborhood.And if we can kind of set, for me, what the big hairy audacious goal would be is getting the citizenry of Burlington to the point where we could have complimentary online platforms that people would feel comfortable with, but that could engage a vast, greater number of people that are currently engaged by these in-person meetings.Yeah.That's great.I think we got those.I think we got the notes down.Lauren's writing vigorously over there.Yeah.I saw a hand over here.I just want to point out from just hearing the room, I just hear three basic categories, which is just general access to internet working education about anything and everything surrounding technology and then particularly applications, which are much more thermal and are gonna move, you know, the thing that might be applicable today, might be something better tomorrow.Like, you know, 10, 15 years ago email was so, like, awesome and past me.Right?But yeah, we have a better way of doing it.Yeah.For a lot of things.Also, the irony here, the fact that you're, I don't know the right word of like, clearly we're all in this room because of the internet.Like, that's how you found out about this meeting, but we didn't do anything to reach out to the people who are trying to help.So, how do we bridge that and make this whole thing more inclusive?Let alone, a solving agent?Yeah.Yeah.This is perhaps an oblique comment, but I think, maybe necessary is to think about consent with who gets the internet and whether they want it in the first place.We've heard like pitterings of that in other comments, but I just want to drill down and say that as we think of the internet as a saluatory force, it's, you know, it has all of these benefits, good for job applications increasingly necessary.And throughout your life, it's also can be used as a tool for surveillance and for privacy violations.And with many of the targeted groups, they are also targeted groups, right?So, when we think about the ways that we're going to bring out surveys to vulnerable communities and then how to engage them in ways that, first, has their consent, that they want to be using the internet, and then, also that whatever apps or resources that are provided to them have very transparent ways of saying, this is how your data is being collected, how it's being used.And that if you want to request your data, you can, other people were talking about open source and get help.That's one effort for transparency.So, I guess I would, I would be concerned in the process that both the method and an outcome, there's privacy built in.Yeah.And I think that that also ties into the notion of being a contributor to what contents being created.So, like at a very basic level, like, if we're going to make surveys or ask for information, like, maybe the people who we're surveying should have a role in that process or, you know, whatever the case.So, but that's a really good thing to remind us of.Yes?That was sort of related to what I was going to say is that I have serious concerns about people using the free apps and thinking it's so cool.And there's so much going on that they don't know.And we don't really have a good way of, right now, there's no rules about that.So, I have concerns about all the Google apps that everybody uses.And so, even Facebook and Twitter and all of these things, I choose not to have a Facebook account, not because I'm technologically deliberate, and could not do it, I'm very concerned about this.And so, one of the scary things is that this inclusion process and access process is layering on top of free apps that are to make it convenient and efficient for us to network, and get to know each other, and share information, and documents.But in fact, it's just totally being data mined profiled.And so it really, it bothers me every time somebody says, oh, let's just, you know, I mean, I hate to say it, the Google Docs thing, you know, and others, we don't have platforms that are actually the equivalent that we know what's going on and that we have the ability to say no.And so, I'm really supportive of what you're saying, because to me, it's really a tricky thing right now, because the way everybody's connecting with is free apps and you don't have any control over what's going on.And the people that do ancestry DNA, I mean, what are you thinking?Things like that, just crazy.Well, let's do you next and then we'll go over there.Okay.I have a candidate PA. - You what?Oh, okay.Wait, what?For the BHAG. - Big, hairy, audacious goal.BHAG. - Open source user completely own the control data version of Facebook.Isn't that ?Social.No, they're VC funded.Let's do it!Social a co-op.All right, all right.Ello, which is the Burlington, is kind of a step towards that.But I don't use Facebook for some of the same reasons.That I won't put anything out there, of mine that I can't take back.And I mean, yeah, there there's so many parts to that.And there's so many ways, it's still, I think knowing what those vulnerabilities are, are a part of digital inclusion.So, choosing not to use it as very much part of the conversation, but knowing why you're choosing, and, like, what you can say, I don't want to use this because it does- If I have to sign this agreement that makes you give that.So, like, that literacy is a big part of this conversation.In effect, a movement to build a...We own it, we manage it, we use these principles to guide what's out there.This is a very different approach.Check out platform cooperative.Yes.On my behalf, would be to live in a community where there are no barriers to enter to connection.Right.So, we need that data.Right.To find out what those- And I would just echo what you said about, there's definitely a literacy component about under working, working with what you have, and making it as safe and secure, and you can even be offense in the way you act online, that can thwart some of those things, but people have to know, and you have to teach them, and having a healthy digital community does that.Yeah.Yes.I agree.I'm choosing to be excluded, because of the lack of ability to control.So. - Exactly.And you are fortunate, because you have all of that knowledge to say, like, \"this is dangerous\".But I'm also excluded from participating.My sisters and my friends know more about my sister's activities than I do.I don't participate in LinkedIn. So, professionally, I have challenges.Any of those things, it's really a digital exclusion of a different form.Absolutely.Well, that brought me to the point that I was making.And I'm really trying to take a step back and say, what are we talking about it as a group here?And what I tend to get into with folks that don't understand technology, is we're talking about this application, or that application, or this application.All is built off of two things, which is really the networks you're talking about, the computer systems that use those networks, and are part of that network, and the literacy around that.The education around that.And that's what she's really getting at.And part of that might even be, you can't necessarily even escape the surveillance around you.How many people have a cell phone in your pocket right now that's picking up your voice, picking up everything we're doing, every moment we're here, you can't actually escape it.How many people are running a messenger app on their phone right now, it's picking up everything we're doing?I bet there's at least one in the room.Point being is, education, lets you understand what the applications can do and what the capability of these systems might be.It might be better to flood with disinformation and to think that you can actually avoid it completely, but that's an education thing.It's not about whether you're using that application or not.Does that make sense?The default should be privacy.Not open and give it all away.That's my concern, because you can't introduce- - We just don't live in that world.I guess the education I'm trying to get, is that it's an education aspect and a network aspect and we'd get lost in these conversations, weighing applications, talking about this application, or that application.And I think it would be very difficult to start saying, unless we come up with, like, something, is there some kind of application that we think is really going to help our community access the internet and education around the internet?That's why I'm having a hard time synthesizing from our conversation.Yeah.And so, another thing is just like, we should have something to match an online service in an offline way.So, like this education that we're speaking of, you know, obviously putting stuff online is very beneficial for people who know how to get to it and feel comfortable getting at it, but we should also have things available for people that don't feel comfortable in those spaces, but can access the same information and learn the same thing in perhaps an in-person session or with printouts.I mean, it's like providing options.I think, at least at the stage we're at, and the communities we would maybe wanting to reach is important.Yes?I'm looking at hearing everyone and just my own, having been with the internet for years, I still get lost on, I still get mixed up, I still hit the wrong thing, I still have pages fly up, or blow up, or won't open.And I'm looking at things that are paths with that little phone.That's supposed to be a simpleton phone.And it has, I think, 6 or 7 words on and his phone and his messages.It has photos and you just push, I presume, you just push it.And I'm looking at...Perhaps, we need to really write a software.Maybe it's specifically a software for a town that wants to have a private, or just in town space that we use, or regardless, one that's super simple for us to use.So, when someone opens up the computer screen, all they do is press go, or they express stop, or they press enter.You know, they press maybe one of four words to get where they need to go.And it just keeps simplifying the process.And instead of complicating it, as I feel it does, as I try to dig beyond the very basic thing.Even still, trying to go to Google and sometimes it doesn't, you know, it doesn't happen.So, it can...Can some of us start writing or is there some software out there that's called easy for the seniors.One word only at a time, you know?And, you know, that could be cool.People here could write it and then it could be sold to other people.And maybe we could make a little...I would love it.These are all really great suggestions.Obviously it's going to take us a little while to figure out what we want to do and to figure out what that big, hairy, audacious goal could be for this group.And I think it will be in steps.So for, the next, like, if we think about this as a movement, let's say.A local movement to really, kind of, grow digital inclusion in the area, what would be our immediate next steps?We want to turn this into a regular gathering?How frequent would it be?Would we want to create a place online for us to connect using an app, like Signal, that's encrypted and one of the safest that exists as far as privacy is concerned right now, where we could connect with each other and share content, would we want to, I mean, what do you think?Like, how could we move forward in a small way and to meet the capacities we all have and the interests that we all have, what do you think?What would be good?Like, synthesizing a lot of these comments is the first thing, I think, you know, I will collect it all.Lauren?I think there's a lot of work that's been going on for a long time on this issue.Yeah.And I'm not sure starting a movement is particularly the next move.I mean, in my opinion, I think there is- Here's the centeralized.Here's the future...A decentralized effort.I think that we need to identify who's doing this work and needs, and we can leverage their efforts.Great.Because there is already work identity that's going on to get resources, skills, training, whatever, through the library.And maybe other places.And the library's probably got resource constraints and they've got issues that they can just help them.So, I would say leverage what we're already doing instead of creating new work and then see what the data actually does show about where the gaps are that, for example, the library or other entities are, may not know.And that might point towards another area, or a particular group of people, as you said.Yep.But I think that we want to apply our effort to what's working and help it work better.I agree.And then, from that, new things come, but there isn't anything new that anyone's said.I think what we're missing as a community, is a digital security plan.And that might not be the way to put it, but that we actually have a plan about how we, what our goals are, and which, I think, is what you're trying to get at.What are our goals as a community?Now, we want open networks, we want access for all, we want whatever the people said, and then we want privacy protection.And then each one of those has deliverables underneath them.You know, that in the legislature, you're looking at privacy and for data, not only for broadband providers, but data aggregators, right?So, there's stuff going on now.There's stuff there's a telecom plan going on.Nobody ever shows up to talk about it and they ask for input.So...Exactly.Yeah.So, I'm just, this is a long way of saying, I just think there's a lot happening and building on that inventory of what's happening and seeing what resources are needed.And then the collective effort of this group and intelligence can help put pressure...Yeah.In a movement like way on those areas where we need to leverage more resources or more protection.Yeah.I saw lots of hands, kind of, sprinkled.Just a quick story about something that happened here when the city was pursuing a cable company and the cable company said to the city, it's been, Bernie was mayor, \"we're going to stop you\".And Bernie said, \"yeah, right.You're gonna stop us.We're going to do it anyway\".They said, \"okay, what do you need?And Bernie said, \"I need you to ensure that senior citizens living in public housing and other low-income seniors will have a fixed cable rate forever\".And it didn't last forever, but it lasts as long as that company was around- - They owed us a million dollars.And a million dollars as well, to please the city.So it was a $10 flat fee for all seniors, from there on that lasted for, well over a decade, probably 15 years, maybe, maybe closer to 20.And it was before BT arrived, obviously.So, I'm just saying, something like that, that ensures access for folks who really need access would make a huge difference.And I think we just have to be practically.And, like, that educational thing.Right, exactly.Right.And the device too, right.Yep.Exactly.Yeah, yep.Yes?I'm looking at this and seeing all these different areas and let's see if we can pick one, maybe it's a library, where we can let everyone know that if you have questions at all about the internet, you could go to the library as a starting point because they're always there.So, we don't have to worry about someone not being there.And people can go to the library free, it's wheelchair accessible, it has bathrooms, it has nice places to sit and that at least the conversation could be started there.Perhaps we can help initiate or fundraise, whatever you might need to start collecting information that people are bringing in.Access and helping you get access that they need to use so that they can work on the internet and let you be the focal point with, from which we all can bring in information.And as you have questions, you can come back to us.Maybe we can form an email for them to come back to us, but we need to centralize all this into one space and it seems like we really need education and we need access.And we want some privacy and we need to simplify the whole system.I think it's really interesting that both our innovation week event and this one, we landed at, we have so many resources, how do we let everyone know about them?And then how do we utilize them and leverage them in the ways that we need, and I'm building a new collection, or growing your collection at the library might be exactly it.And then how do we get the word out?That that is the hub for Burlington, digital inclusion?And just talking about resources, we know that PT offers a very reduced rate to folks in the community, $10 a month, but we have people that aren't taking advantage of it.So, we still feel like, what are the barriers?Why is it, they don't have the device?Is it that they're nervous about security?Is it an, I think we really need to drill into...Let's say that usually when people are struggling that hard, going to check all their T's and get everything figured out is probably very difficult for them.We have to get to them 'cause they can't, they can't...Well, we've got senior citizen places, but I'm sayin' let's get the library as the hub from which everything works.Mhm, yes.And do a fundraiser for it.I think what's most interesting to me, in this whole conversation, it's certainly it's things we've thought about before, you know, sitting here talking to that is the idea of regionalization, right?So, coming from Winooski, you know, we talk about things that are happening in Burlington.And I think quite often our community is compared, I think, other communities.Now, we can talk about essence and stuff like that, kind of unfairly.It's different sizes, obviously, there's different tax spaces.I think regionalization is huge.So, you know, we talk about, you know, some of these things with Burlington telecom, I know one of our projects that our planning commission is looking at right now, I don't know if you guys saw this, but there's the main street revitalization project.So, within that, there is sort of this research around, including, you know, along with, some of the stuff that you were showing about wastewater and all of that stuff, it is very much included to sort of think about high speed internet, and fiber, and stuff.The city lights building.I love the city lights building!So, they have, you know, the Burlington telecom, correct me if I'm wrong, the supply gigabit.Big building in Vermont.Yeah, exactly.So, many of our community members always ask how come we don't have access to Burlington telecom?By the way, you're 10 offices at Burlington telecom, as well.Right, right, right.So, yeah, a lot of our community members say, \"why are we boxed into Comcast?Why don't we have access to this Burlington telecom\"?And in that conversation, one of the most fascinating things I saw, one at the LOI's was sort of this idea that it could be regionalized, or it could be offered at least to other communities to get into them.I think, to answer a lot of these questions that we're talking about, whether security, or access, or anything, regionalization is huge.So, they talk about regionalizing, you know, the emergency response system and the 911 stuff.There's conversations about regionalizing the airport.It's, sort of, I think we often get lost within our own boundary lines.Right?I think that's, it's huge in the work that we're trying to do, I think it's going to be huge in the work that everybody's doing.So, let me just clear up quick feedback saying that the whole reason that BT got eight letters of intent was because of the regionalization aspect and the whole focus going forward is expanding more broadly throughout Chittenden county.And that'll start happening sooner rather than later.And the whole focus beyond that should be, how do we actually broaden even further, so that broadband can become a reality in some of the more remote communities, you know, for monitor's full of meaningfully underutilized fiber networks that press across the state that run past most towns and cities, or through most towns and cities in the state.And they're just sitting there unused say, couldn't agree more with.And I wonder too if, you know, to sort of share the burden, right?If an organization like the Chitteden County Regional Planning Commission, CCRPC, you know, they've been super gracious with us and number of huge amount of projects and it's great.They've got a great team.They're a huge resource for us.You know, I think regionalizations is going to be key.Yeah.That's a great point.Yeah.Is there a mailing list or a website or something where I could access or others could access the things that we've been talking about?Is there one to tap into?Is there anyone here that didn't actually register for the events online?And then, yeah.So, if you did, I know how to get to them, you don't.Anybody who didn't register online, if you want to just give us your contact information before you go, and then we'll- - Yeah, we can use, you know, this group as a way to start a community.But also if there's one that already exists, we could connect there as well.So, I don't know.It's kind of a question and an offer at the same time.Like, we could...Abby and I can work to, you know, connect all of us through the library.So, maybe do the library.I don't know.We can figure that out.But also, if that already exists somewhere, like, there's a community that is good to leverage to continue this conversation, we can also do that.I don't know if anyone has thoughts on the best thing to do.Is that, is it almost 7:30 right now?Yeah.Okay.I say listen to a lot of different ideas.That one thing that I've learned building products for awhile is that it's easy to get ahead of yourself and start thinking about the features and the aspects that you're going to be delivering, but the real key is who's life you're making better through the product.And so, if we're looking at digital inclusion, then the first people who we should be talking to are people who are digitally excluded and it's tough to, you can get really ahead of yourself thinking about what you think their problems are, but until you actually meet them, and talk to them, and understand, it could be a different concept.So, the things that we might think in this room might not be good, ideal solutions if they...Don't agree for a solution for a problem that doesn't actually exist.So that data, that like, information is the key.So, I'm like, I'm kind of a metric skeptical.So, I really like talking to people.So, I would try to find the people that whose lives would be better.Because lots of stuff can get lost as a .And so, I think that could be an interesting next step is if we had an inclusive, Burlington would never leave what would be different and who are the people that we think would have a Delta of change here and go to them and say, \"how you feel about this idea of the library, or this other idea, or what's your idea\"?Any mayoral or city county council candidates that as they're knocking on doors would be willing to start those conversations for us?Sure, sure.I plan on doing that.Yeah, I'm running a war three, and I plan on...And there was someone else who was here...We have in Burlington, bike recycle where if your income below a certain threshold, they'll set you up with a bicycle and a lock for $25.And they have a program where they train people to work on bikes.And, it's a great program between resource and the schools, We can do a program where kids are learning how to repair computers, are showing up at somebody's house, and for $20, here's a used laptop or a used computer.In resources, selling used machines with windows on them for $75.That's actually included in our program.Right?So- - Are we trying to work with resource and for a number of years now, what the challenge we found is really them being able to have enough scale and capability to, to do anything in a meaningful way, we've even bought machines, refurbished machines from resource, and then further subsidize them to deliver it an even cheaper price to low-income families.But it's never proved to be sustainable because of just the lack of hardware.Yeah, and their inability to really get to the populations that need it the most, so that they know that this resource exists.So, a little program that struggles, we can learn from and build on.Yeah.Yeah.We're kind of at the end.One more?Yeah.I just want him to say is that I did a lot of photos and cuts, and that some of the people there who were part of class and it's a group of maybe 30, 40 people.Perhaps we could start right there, and they're homeless, some of them, most of them, and that's why we start small and see what we can do with them.I know the heads of it.I think...So, I'm kind of leaning towards now, after hearing all of this, is that maybe we should plan the next conversation, but invite individuals from communities or places that are within, have those barriers.Yes.Maybe?As a next step, at least to start to, 'cause I don't, yeah, I don't think we know really enough right now about what we need to make or how we need to do this.So, maybe that's something we could work on.And then what we'll do is send you just a follow up and maybe a survey, just to get feedback on this event.And in that survey could be like, what communities do you know of that we could reach out to, to invite to the next conversation?So, we can start to think about what to build to know what we need to do.Does that sound like a good plan, at least for...I still think we gotta have a target the library right away.Just to start collecting data from people who come in.I think you're .Yeah.Yeah.We'll talk.That sounds great.So, so, yeah.Thank you everyone for joining.This was a really amazing conversation.I'm thrilled with everyone's experience and contribution tonight.And I can't wait to read through those notes that Lauren's taking.There was so much good stuff that was said.Yeah.Thank you for a good one.Thank you.Thank you.Thank you too!", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Digital_Civic_Underground_Presented_by_Julia_Vallera.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Digital_Civic_Underground_Presented_by_Julia_Vallera.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Digital_Civic_Underground_Presented_by_Julia_Vallera.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/ZBA040416CL19/ZBA_040416-CL19.mp3", "text": "Good evening.Welcome to the South Belmont zoning board of appeals meeting of April 4th, 2016, Just by brief way of introduction.We are still waiting for a couple of members who are expected to appear, but we have a quorum and we can proceed.With me as chairman, John McManus, associate member, I'm Eric Smith, Jim Sacartus and Nick Inesey.I'll just give a brief introduction.Generally speaking, what we do is we hear the applications.We ask the applicants to make a brief presentation, and I have a podium which will ask the applicants and anybody else who wishes to speak, to speak from.And we asked the applicant to make a brief presentation the members have read the written material, submitted to the boards, and you just need to hit the highlights mostly for the benefit of the audience.The board may ask some questions at that point.We'll ask the, if there's anybody in the audience who wishes to speak in support of the opposition, excuse me, support of the application.We'd ask people to speak if they were in opposition to the application, there may be some more questions from the board.And then assuming that the, all the materials have been presented and the record is finished, we would take it under advisement.If it is taken under advisement, we attempt to vote on, at the end of the evening tonight.But we go through all the public hearings first.With that I've received a request from Diane Miller the architect for the applicant to number, case number 16-03 to go first, rather than second, because she's got a, a Belmont high school building committee.Their kickoff meeting is tonight.So if the board has any issues with proceeding that way, that's what I would propose to do.I note that this was initially presented at the last meeting on March 7th and Craig white who was present is not here.And Gan-Ja who was present is also not here tonight.I, you know, I just know I was expecting them, but both Nick Inesey and Tino Machaco have watched the tapes in the last, last meeting presentation.So they're all up to speed on matters.And they filed the appropriate certifications with RR so that they will be participating on this decision tonight.So with that, Miller, I believe we have, we have revised plans, which made a number of changes.And if you could just briefly summarize those shorts - Thank you very much for accommodating my schedule tonight.I really appreciate it.So I'm Diane Miller from Miller Designs.With me here tonight, our and George Young, the homeowners.And just to recap from last month, what we are proposing is a two-storey rear addition.It is a second floor extension above an existing space, and then it is a new one storey volume behind that.So I have the model with me again.So this is the front of the house.This is Goden street Chenery terrace.The second floor addition is this portion here.That's just taking the gambrel roof and extending it back a little bit.And then this one storey volume is the new proposed one storey addition.So I can pass that around - I think we've seen - can you perhaps focus on the changes form the last application?Sure.So it was three special permits storey height, front yard setback, and lot coverage.We, just to remind you guys, we have the signatures from the 12 neighbors.We have one neighbor who I believe is here again, to speak in favor.And then another immediate abutter that had submitted a letter.Storey height and front yard setback were both relative to the second floor addition.Real quickly.We talked about those in, in terms of storey height, because it's three and a half stories existing, mainly that's driven by the basement, which is because of this steep slope, the topography on Goden street.However, a few things working in our favor are that the, the slope is high at both of the streets.So those are the high points in the site.And the gambrel roof is actually, it makes it feel much lower because the second floor space has low roof, low ceiling and eave space with the gambrel.So it kind of hunkers down.The overall height of the house is in terms of the linear dimension is 24.1 feet, which is actually about 12 feet lower than what the height requirement would be.And then in terms of the front yard setback, it's a corner lot as I had mentioned.And so it's a 13.25 front setback to Chenery terrace, which is the secondary street, the house faces Goden.So if that worries side yard setback, it would be, you know, three and a half feet more than what would be required.So that brings us to the issue that you guys really were concerned about last time, the first two were things that I think were largely acceptable, but the concern was about the lot coverage.And so after doing some soul searching, what my clients agreed to do is to remove their existing garage structure.And that will compensate for the added lot coverage of the proposed addition.And so what we have in your packet here is basically a- one other thing that they're doing in, in agreeing to remove the garage, they had some storage needs that they needed to address.And so the one storey portion of the addition would get two feet bigger so that they would have a little bit more storage space in that back basement room.But the net result of these changes is that the existing lot coverage right now is 25.3% We were previously proposing 29%.We are now proposing going down to 25.1%.So from 25.3% down to 25.1%.So we're reducing the lot coverage with this sort of compromise with the garage.I also just wanted to note that the open space is at about 75%.So that's significantly more than the 50% open space that's required.And even with the rear of the ones who are rear addition, once this proposed addition were built, it would align pretty closely with their neighbors house, that the folks that are here this evening, so their house sticks out currently much more so than this existing structure.So it's not really gonna block much.And in fact, getting rid of the garage structure, which is right here is going to open things up a lot on Chenery Terrace in terms of the visibility.So that's basically the change that we made.So we're hoping that that will satisfy the board's concerns.Thank you.Any questions members?Where are the extra two feet of the addition?The extra two feet are on the first floor only.So on the plans that I submitted, I have revision bubbles showing the dimensions.It's basically taking that mudroom and playroom and making.So on, on this - this roof here, this hip roof would just extend out two more feet.This, this piece.Okay, we are now looking for three special permits, one for lot coverage, which is now supposed to be at 25.1%, the side setback, is the same as the existing, which is really, it's the, Goden street, not the Goden street, excuse me, it's the Chenery Terrace front edge.And then the, the other side setback.The zoning compliance checklist shows that as being the sites at bay being 8.5, but that was actually to the garage.So the principal dwelling was 10.1. But with that again, you're not proposing to change that, so.Correct.And the cover stores is three and a half, but it was three and a half before, right?Was there any more questions in that case?We just ask if there's anybody who would like to speak in support of the application?Sir, if you could come to the podium and identify yourself for the record please.There's a sign up sheet they can sign too.You don't have to do that right now, there's a sign up sheet, if you could also sign it.Oh, okay.Hi I'm Jack Jurris.I live at 82 Goden street with my wife.We're the uphill, up Goden street neighbors.The 74, we have a similar house.I spoke a month ago to support it.And so I'll be brief, but we still are in support of the revised plan.We think it's a good plan.It certainly a compatible with our house and we feel with, with the neighborhood.We think it's a good plan for that house.It's conservative bit it adds what it needs.So we, we hope you look at that favorably.Thank you.Thank you.Anyone else?Is there anyone in opposition to the proposal?Okay.That being said in that case, we'll take it under advisement.Okay, thank you very much.Okay.The next applications is another continued case, case number 15-44, 334 Pleasant Street, the applicant is Michael Columba, seeking, it was initially four special permits, but the building height is compliant.So it's actually three special permits to convert the existing two-storey retail office building at 3-34 Pleasant Street into a hotel, it's located in local business three zoning district.Thank you, Mr. Chairman, my name is Robert Levy, an attorney for the applicant.There was a submittal meet with the board over a week ago to address certain issues that were raised at the last meeting.The first submittal deals with a delivery, trash pickup and delivery, which was, which was an issue we discussed last time.And you'll see here's a letter from Belmont suites hotel, signed by Mr. Columba saying that they will be proposed as to have two trash pickups a week, no earlier than 10:00 AM and no later than 3:00 PM, which I'm sure the pickups do not occur during high traffic areas times.Second, there was an issue as to, question as to deliveries as was noted and as stated in the letter, and there will be an in-house laundry service.So there won't be laundry trucks delivering.There will be some food products delivered, which will happen from Mr. Columba's Commissary and Waltham.That will be seven several times a week.And again, those deliveries will be at off peak traffic times.The next submittal we have is a lighting report from MEA engineering associates, dealing with the lighting.There are light fixtures on the sides of the building that are compliant with the dark sky guidelines and will not radiate illumination above the horizontal plane of the fixture shield.That report is dated March 21 and is part of your package insofar as any lightening on Brighton street or Pleasant Street, those lines will not exceed normal street line levels for public ways.We also provided you with some product data for the air conditioning compressors, which will be located on the roof.The compressors, I have a standard rating of a 73 DBA. They will be located on the roof, as I said, and insofar as the P-TECH units are concerned, those should be located closer to the street lines.This report, by asking text dated March 22, which concludes that both those units, the P-TECH units will not exceed the, the bylaw of 55 DBA's daytime and 45 DBA's nighttime.As a result of this analysis, there are a couple of the units we will be putting an architectural barrier around to help damper the sound, there will be a faux balcony around them, which will block it.And the engineer opines that they will be well below the 45 DBA required by the noise ordinance.I believe those are the - there's also a new elevation, which shows the screening that will be on the building for the P-TECH units.So I see that Sentec acoustic consulting recommendations include the architectural barriers, those little balconies shown on elevations.So you're proposing to comply with this recommendation?Yes.That's correct.yes And I believe that those are the outstanding issues that were left open at the last meeting.Members.Any questions?There was one issue Eric, that I heard you raise on the tape having to do with the fact that the closest thing to this on the list is hotel, is apartment house.And there was not an SP in that column for this, did that ever get resolved?I didn't hear that.Well, made a presentation with respect to the zoning bylaw.You know, whether we find it convincing is another question, but if you wish to ask them to address that point, feel free.Well under the schedule of use regulations.There was no itemized item for hotels or motels, We've conceded that.The closest thing that we could fit into- we believe under the business district, there is an other retail sales and services, and the hotel, so we suggest this is allowed as an ancillary use in that district.We've also believed that it was certainly contemplated when the bylaw was enacted, that hotels would be allowed in the city.By the reason that the general regulations, including for off street parking include a category.This is 5.1.2 C, which specifically regulates for parking purposes for hotels.Were there any columns in that zoning in the table that referred to hotels?There was not.I see.So we suggest that falls into other.Why do you think you fall into, into the other category more than you fit into the apartment category?Because I think the - typically apartment use and hotel use are two separate uses other than the fact that that people are living there.This is not an apartment complex.And we believe that since - typically most ordinances do have separate hotel uses, I'll concede that.Since Belmont does not, whether that was intentionally or by omission, you know, our belief is that the only, the closest square hole for the square peg is in other use.Can you elaborate on the differences you see between hotel use and apartment use?Well, obviously a hotel use is more transitory and people are coming there for shorter periods of time than someone living there.There is a greater turnover rate than you would see in an apartment house and you know.Other than, the only similarity is that people are sleeping there at night.Between that, of that in the hotels and apartments, there are other amenities that we're having, that you wouldn't typically find in an apartment house, such as food service.We don't believe they're that similar.Well, it's similar to a hotel use, but it apartment use.So the two main defining factors you see are the transitory nature of a hotel and the presence of - - There's other amenities to it.And it's also providing another service for the town, than you would see in an apartment.Providing short term housing for guests of your residence.And I'm sure if you listen to the last hearing we discussed about what would the typical guests that we receive.We're going to have people coming in, visiting residents, coming in for graduations, coming in to go to medical centers and the like.You remember there was one speaker who pointed out that this did provide a service that was not present in case of an apartment, namely, the ability to not have to have a house guests.An advantage to some of us.What do you anticipate?What is the longest stay someone could stay at the hotel?All we can tell you, comment maybe, anecdotally, Mr. Columba has another, had another facility in Waltham.It's similar to this.That's the only comment I have to tell you.With my experience at the Crescent suites, which was completely you know, every unit was furnished with full kitchens.Only about 5% would be there more than a month.95% would be a week or less, two days, a weekend that nature.From time to time we would have somebody who was relocating here for a job.That they would be here for a three month stay, but that was rare even at the Crescent suites.And I expect it to be even less so here, because I'm only going to have what three units I think?Only three units have a kitchen.And one of them is handicapped I believe.Yeah one of them is handicap.Otherwise it's only a few units, have a full kitchen.Everything else will not be suitable for a very extended stay.You studied this area before you took the hotel and you realized there was a large roomed hotel going on Arsenal street and Water town as well?Yeah actually I tried to buy that years ago, I'm familiar with it.So what, why did you think that this would be a good spot for you?Because this accommodates more, the Belmont community, but I mean, from me to, I mean, to Water town's is what, 10 miles?10 miles?From me to Water town, from where that is.Yeah.I think it's a little less than that.It's in Arsenal street, across from the mall.Again, I'm serving the Belmont, Darlington, Lexington community.And I'm going to be between Cambridge and Walton, the center.I know there's a few hotels in Darlington, but again, it's a concentrated area of Belmont, Darlington, the route through traffic, you know?Yeah.See it more as a boutique type hotel.It's not carrying the national flag.Yes.It's only 18 units.You know what I'm saying?I'm not really, you know, again, a little bit of corporate, a little bit of, you know, personal residents, visitors, all of the things that we mentioned last week.I mean last month.So, I read somewhere that if you don't get the hotel, you're going to have it go back to a convenience store again?Well, obviously at some point I have to put the building to use.I can't sit on it for, you know, forever.You know, I mean, I would rent it as offices upstairs and rent the first floor.I mean, I have a lot of people that are waiting for decisions of what I, you know, they would rent it and put a convenience store back in there.You know, another question for you, did you study the trip generations over there and that travel?Did you see how close the trip generations were to the other project that was developed across the street?It was a timing thing.Yeah.It was only for - - At rush at rush hour, it was lower.By four cars.I don't think we need to read the date.Stance matters.So there would be four units that could only be for 30 days stays?Four units, we're allowed a full kitchen.When I say full kitchen, you know, just as, full size stove, refrigerator, a little bit of cabinetry.Again, there's only one bed.So it's only good for a single or couple.And this is usually, you know, I would say are a lot of the long-term stays, were people that had, for example, a snow storm that caused damage to their house.So the insurance company would put them up in a hotel for a month, six weeks until the house was repaired.People relocating from other parts of the country for jobs, you know, parents receiving, you know, I would have a lot of parents come from the summer visiting the students, you know, their children from, you know, Saudi Arabia, Europe, Asia, whatever, you know.I mean, those would be the long extended stay.People will come over and use this as a base while they were visiting with their kids, people who moved to Florida from Belmont, who come back and visit the children or just had a baby or new marriage, you know, a lot of personal use for having a place to stay, temporarily.Yep.Just have one quick question about the, is there any change in the rooftop HVAC units from the earlier presentation to this one?No. - I didn't think so.And even though the Sentec report says that the rooftop units on their own do not generate excessive decibels at the property line, we're still putting them in an acoustic enclosure connected to the elevator penthouse.So it will be much less than what the code allows.Yeah and also, instead of using one big commercial unit, which has a high decibel, I went with three smaller residential units, which would be a lot less noisy and with each timeout difference it would be a lot less noisy.Any other questions, members?The light fixture, sidelighting, I'm reading MEA's report here, is this fixture the same one that lines the streets in the town center Belmont, thought I heard that.It's the same manufacturer, the same basic fixture, yes.And the reflectors?Yes.And it shielded, this one that has the, the fixture shield, which, you know, for the dark skies initiative and also to prevent, you know, it cuts off so that it does not spill excessive.Is that different than what we have in the town center?I think it's the same as what we have at the town center, except that the ones in the town center have higher voltage lighting.They're brighter.More lumens coming in.And more lumens coming out of those.But the potential for direct glare is the same because the reflectors are the same.I, you know, the lighting engineer did not find an issue with that.I honestly can't comment, I don't know.It's the same reflector but it's supposed to be a non-glare reflector, that's why it's got the refracted finish to them.It's supposed to spread that out.So I really.Why is there an issue with the one about Belmont center?I don't know if there's an issue with these folks here, I have an issue.But the shield can be controlled.So after they're installed, the shields can actually be redirected so that no glare would be going outside the property line.Do you want me to show those?No glare from somebody driving down the street, like, like you do get glare on the fixture here.Well, these have a shield on one side, they can literally just shine on this side and not in the backside, you know or they can be controlled.At least that's what I heard from the engineer when I met with them, they can control visibly, with the dark sky laws, you know?So when they install it, you know, they'll come out at night and they'll fix it.And aim the lights so that it doesn't spill outside the property.They can actually, you know, mitigate that with, you know, wattage, you know, less lumens, you know, so that they can achieve the desired design criteria that, that they work on.And I think last time, one of the concerns was what are the foot candle readings?What do they mean on the photo metric plan at the property line?I think the engineer specifically deals with that, which you said, basically it's zero, it's zero at the property line.Right.And that's what I think we should all be after.I, I can't - I don't know what zero means to the lighting engineer here.That means that it's less than 0.1 lumens foot counts, less than 0.1 foot candles.And it's less than that.So. - Just like this, so this is aiming on this side, you don't see this, you get very little glare on that side.You know, that can be mitigated.Like I said, after it's installed, you know, they can come in at night and they can mitigate all that by aiming or closing, you know, the, the shields.Any other questions?All right.Let me ask if there's anybody, and obviously the plan is essentially the same as last time, but be with the changes that have been described, does anybody have any, any anguishes or support?And by the way, just so you know, we obviously we've, we were here last time, so if you've already expressed general support or something, you don't need to do it again.It's just that I'm focusing on the changes to the plan.Okay, sir, if you could.I'm Donald Mercy I'm a towny.And I was living this precinct and I've been a resident of Belmont for many years, and I've seen different changes and different projects.And I'm concerned about this project here.If this hotel does not generate and do things they'd like to see done.You've got to be very careful on what they might do on what decision that you give them.And the suggestions I'm making is you have a maximum stay of 30 days.If you start going over, or use that concept.But if you go over that, you might have residence in there.That's going to cost the town money to service them.And I don't think that we want to put any more heavy load on the town.And I think there should be no cooking at all on these premises, because particularly in the rooms, and this will make sure that we don't have these.The ability to convert this into a long-term use.So I don't think there should be any cooking or the equipment.If you say, oh, you're not going to have equipment, but they put a stove and they don't cook.Okay.They were abiding by one law, but, you know, make sure there's no equipment in there.And as a suggestion, I would also propose a fine for any violations of these things.I'm throwing out a number here, a $300 a day penalty and adjusted for inflation.Because if you put a number on it now, 10 years down the line, there's a violation.We need an inflation adjustment on any.I think the, the town, the bylaws cover, whatever it can be covered with respective fines.Well, I'll go through it and whatever you can use, fine, what you can't use.That's fine, also.I'm only going from my own experiences as a property manager, commercial property, some of the things that I deal with, and I shouldn't.Make sure that any of those fines are paid, that the legal and collection fees are paid by the property owner.Can you move on to your next point, please?Well, I'm going down my notes and.I'm just asking if you can move on to your next point.And any fees to be paid, should be paid by the property owner, not the operator.The property will have equity.Can you please move on to your next point?We've discussed fines.That's that's my main thing.I don't want put any economic load on the town and I think.Is there anyone else who wishes to express to support?And then we will turn to opposition.My name is Brian Kemmer.I live at 283 Fitzmaurice circle, which is the house immediately behind the proposed hotel from Brighton street.I've come to an agreement with the developer to provide shielding in the way of five shrubs between the landing and my property.And I'd like that to be reflected in any special permit that is issued.I have given some thought to the noise from the air conditioner on the roof.I don't think it will be a problem at all.The furnace is currently in the basement.I do however, have a concern that at some time in the future, an HVAC unit, that could create noise could be put on the roof.And the side setback to the building could be 20 feet, but it's only two feet.So I would request the permanent restriction be placed on any heating unit on the roof.Now, the developer doesn't propose one at all.There will be an HVAC there at three HVAC. - And I thought about those.Those will be as quiet as the two that I have, at least 10 feet from my bedroom window.I'm not concerned about that.And I don't think they'll cause any noise problems.I would also request that construction not start until 7:30 AM in the morning.Mr. Kemmer.You realize you want to get anything.I'm not giving you legal advice here, but you might want to get anything in writing, considering your property recorded at the registry of deeds or some sort of something on the deed of the restriction on the property.I mean, this really doesn't hold much weight.Can a permanent restriction be placed on the special permit for the building?I would suggest talking to an attorney before you enter into some agreement.I have and they thought that this might.I don't know.Just a thought, - well, I don't think it's a serious problem because there's no proposal to put a furnace on the roof.No. I'm talking about the trees.That was definitely suggested by my attorney and I'm satisfied with it.Okay.The restriction was only on a heating unit on the roof.That's correct.Not a general HVAC - Just heating that creates more noise.And as I said, that just won't be a problem.Is there anyone else wants to speak in support?Is there anyone who wants to speak in opposition?Okay.Thank you, chairman Smith.My name is Scott Harper.I'm not in a butter or a nearby neighbor of this development.My interest arises out of my acquaintance with the Athena McGinnis.Who's a close friend and church member of mine.At congregational church who lives only four doors in a historic house.I don't know the exact address.I didn't come here tonight anticipating to speak to those, but she has urged me over several weeks to come tomorrow night.She was under the impression that the hearing on this was tomorrow night and support her opposition to what I'm.My direct interest acknowledges from providing her rides to and from church on occasions where I utilize the, that street for the traffic issues involved.That's an extremely busy street.It's always been a concern of myself and others at my church who provide Ms. McGinnis rides to and from church and assist or otherwise, getting in and out of her driveway.She currently does not drive herself.Although I think she is continues to be licensed, but backing out of her driveway onto Brighton street is extremely hazardous.When I take her to and from, I go slow, pause in traffic and back into her driveway.So I can pull out with good visibility of the north and south traffic on that street.I suggested to her that perhaps this would actually be less of a bur- The hotel would be less of a traffic burden than a convenience store because much of the traffic might be going right back to Pleasant Street and onto route two.I don't know.It sounds like you've already assessed some of those traffic impacts, but I would just say that my concern directly would be concerning any traffic effects on the streets.So thank you.Hi, my name is Diane Mabardy.I'm a long time long term resident of Belmont, Diane Mabardy.I'm here, my father is 84 years old and unable to come out in the snow, but, and I was unable to come to the last meeting.Our issue with the property, that's in question, is that in Belmont for this particular piece of property, there is no special use allowed for an overnight stay.So when you're talking about the business use and how you can think of this property, being able to be used for an overnight stay, you can't use it for a hospital.You can't use it for an apartment building.You can't use it for first senior center.You can't use it for senior, senior living.You can't use it for a recreational facility.You can't have an exercise facility, and a restaurant needs a special permit.So I'm trying to figure out, how this property could even come up to be a hotel.There is a problem with the transient business coming in.There is no 24 hour for-profit business in Belmont.So that is opening up Belmont to a new avenue.I mean, if one hotel goes in it's, if it's allowable in that area, I don't believe that this is allowable.He's in the business of construction, in development.He's in the business of building a hotel and selling it.Where here just - we're just talking about project as proposed- - No, I understand that.Sure.So anyway, so the problem is with, that we'd find is that not as the project stands, because we still do not believe that this hotel use is something that should be permitted.This was first permitted back in the eighties, when the Manfredi's owned the property as a mixed use office retail, that's what it was.I was here.I know the Manfredi's and we went through that same process when they were building it, because I lived in the house on the street behind it, on Fitzmaurice circle.So our issue is the transient.They don't even have enough parking for their employees and their visitors.That means that the parking is now going to be, the overflow is going to be on the residential streets.I mean, they have 19 rooms, they have 18 parking spots.They have staff, they have maids, they have cleaning people.They have service people.Where are those people gonna park?So we're just, we're opposed to this project.My name is Antoine Hayes.I live on 38 Plimith.I'm a town meeting member, precinct 8.I have this delivered to you, from Athena McGinnis.She asked me to deliver this to you.Okay.Thank you very much, we'll pass it around.I don't know if the applicant has seen this, its just a.Potentially an expression of opposition, we'll pass around.And then we also received a letter this afternoon, from Miss Claire Stone expressing opposition.And she noted that there was an earlier variant application.I looked at the earlier variants decision from 1983, and I must admit it doesn't seem to me to bear on the issues here.Okay.Well, if there's nobody else, then.Just a quick Comment, first off we have, we have not seen any of the opposition though, any of the letters that are presented to you.So we can't comment on those.Just a couple quick comments.First of all, as far as the overnight use regulations do permit it as an accessory use, lodging and boarding for daily, weekly, or longer periods.And that's allowed as a matter of right, without a special permit.Insofar as the length of the stay, under the mass law, any stay over 90 days will trigger the cessation of any room tax being paid.So the better way of saying it for the first 90 days and room taxes is due for it.So I assume that it's contemplated, that a 90 day stay is not a excessive length of stay under a hotel use.We don't anticipate that in any event, as Mr Columba said, 30 is usually the maximum that they want to put a condition that says it can't be more than 90 days and any single tenant.We wouldn't object to that.So far as putting any other utilities on the roof.I would suggest if we had to come back and alter the plan, we'd have to come back before this board.And for modification, if we're going to put some other, you know, utilities or heating equipment, and at that time it would be open to a public hearing for people to comment on.It's not anticipated, other than the three air conditioning units, that there's going to be any other facilities, you know, on the roof.But I've been doing this long enough to say, never say never.Things change it, but we would certainly want to come back before the board for last, if any changes.Would you be willing to have a condition on that point subject to further board review in the event you wish to you- you don't want an, so what you're saying is, I think you don't want an absolute prohibition on putting additional units, it would be okay with coming, having to come back here.Sorry, just one other question before you wrap up, with Mr. Kemmer his agreement with respect to the, you know, request for screening, I take it you don't have any problem with, our making of condition.I haven't seen that.What was it?It's reflected in the landscape plan already.The landscape plan that we submitted for last meeting has those trees on it, and we're fully committed to provide those and those on our property, correct.Can I just, can I just summarize what I heard and let me know if it's correct.We heard opposition that said we should deny it because Belmont has no overnight business kinds of models, your rebuttal it sounds like is that people have as of right, without a special permit, the ability to rent anyway.So clearly it's contemplated there.And secondly, there's that section five or something in the zoning ordinance that talks about parking for hotels, which the implication of which is well, must've been contemplated.Is that that's correct.Were there any rebuttal, other rebuttal points besides those two?On that issue?No. - Okay.Thank you.Thank you very much.Mr. Mercer I've got one more quick question real quick.I want to make sure we lean heavily on the duration of an occupant.If this hotel is not successful, I don't want them to have permissions to go through some other type of occupancy without a permit.If we put up 30 days or whatever you see the maximum occupancy of that, it's going to tighten it down.So if in fact the hotel is not successful with the rooms that are there.Then you've come back to your people to decide what you want to do with the building.I don't want that to be cut off.They'll be converting it into something else.If there's a use permit, which is specific to this use.Well, when I think, I think you could restrict it to the number of days of occupancy of anybody going in there.So your position is we're on a slippery slope and past 30 days, it starts to become with the fact that its an apartment building.It could be in fact, an apartment and particularly because it has kitchen facilities in to get other people coming in here, living here permanently because they have no other place to live, their rent to be adjusted accordingly.We see a building now that is deteriorating because it was not successful for what it was built for.I don't want to see that again, particularly, and allowing somebody to convert it into another use because they've already got these permits going through here.So. - If they're going to change the use, It needs to come back.This would be specific to this year's.But then, but then you'll tighten the number of days now.If we have a bad authority.We can talk about it.How many people are here in connection with this matter?May I just ask that obviously a lot of other, how many people are here for other matters?I think we need to keep going.Okay.The next matter is case number 16-04.The application of Randira Ajar for a special permit under section 3.3 of the zoning bylaw to operate a childcare, large family at 120 Lewis road located in the general residence, zoning district, is the applicant here?Good evening, chairman, everybody.I am Shashira Ajar, Randira is my wife and the daycare is named after her.She is here presented.We have this large daycare that is up to 10, is the capacity, operating on that side from 2009 onwards.So it's six years plus, and we have been doing it.Nobody has gone so far to say that we had made a lot of noise or they have any kind of trouble.This traffic issues, commuter issues, sometimes in the winter, like last year was an exceptionally brutal winter.A lot of snow, we worked with a neighbor who expressed this thing, that the bus should be allowed to come.So we say we went, everybody is, went happy after that.So there has been no concern about that in general terms.So we have a good deal of space and plenty of light.We have an excellent park in the back.So we go to the park as often as we can.And that also relieves the pressure on the backyard and some possible stress on the neighbors by way of noise, because children are there.They will play there.So we use that park to the maximum extent, and we live in the backyard in the fall, we are required for one hour out outdoor time.Out of that, we use no more than 30 minutes in the backyard.And we do more than one hour in the park.So we are taking every care to take care of the neighbors concern's needs on their position.And any other thing that you will say that I should do, we'll be happy to try it.Just a few, a few questions.First of all.So do you and your wife live at 118?It's a two family home.We live on both floors.We keep one like more like a guest room also.So there are two bedrooms.There are not that many rooms on either floor.So we live on board, yes.I just, I just want to understand is, I mean, I understand it's 120 is the proposed space for the childcare.And is there anybody actually living in 120 right now?Yes.We live.We have a kitchen.We have office.We live there sometimes.Sometimes we live upstairs.When family comes.Do you have a license.Yeah.We have license.We have a license running from 2006.And at that time we were renting on Concorde Avenue.So after three years, from 2009 to '12, we got licensed, for this space, this side.And then again, 2012 to 2015, that was the period of license.And the current license is from 2015 to 2018.It is at my place.It is suppose to be displayed at the place.And that is in the daycare.Why don't we have a copy of it?I can send a copy, but nobody said that we are supposed to do it.That nobody said that I can do it.I can send it tomorrow.If there's a number - there's a number of conditions that we -assuming we were to grant it.And we typically, obviously to be granted a special permit, the applicant, which would be your wife, needs to have the OCC license.And you are now, as you're asking for an application for 10, a large family daycare.Which means that you need to have an assistant.Is there anything?Yeah, that is there last daycare is from 2009.The only one.My question is just right now, when you understand that to have- if you were to be granted a special permit so that you could keep operating, you need to have not only one licensed person but you need to have an assistant.And who you have, who are your assistants?You have them currently?Yeah, we have one assistant.Where is the assistant?Assistant works eight to five.Who is she or he?She is Renulammy Shanice.She lives in Water town about a mile from, a mile and a half from our place.And she works there.Does she have experience?She has lots, she's a grandmother.She has worked for Nepal, she is a Green card holder.We have checked all those things diligently.And she's a very good worker.Why is this case before us tonight?We don't have the license.We don't have any of the information that we need.How can we make a decision on this tonight?Yeah.Well, one thing we've been talking about doing is you're going to get, make those lists of things that should be submitted because each of the ones that are before us tonight, none of them have submitted the licenses, which is an issue, obviously.So, I think we just, me and Nick we were talking about this.We're kind of wasting our time here because it doesn't have the license, you know?So we don't have a copy of the license.We don't.We couldn't grant the license if we wanted to, there's no, I don't think there's a floor plan.We have presented pictures.We had presented what salaries are paid, that plan and.Yeah, I mean, we have in the past granted subject to the filing of licenses.So that would be, if we were to grant this one, it would be a condition here.So, we should go back to the questions.So you were looking, you were looking for nine to five.When did, what is the first person dropped off, and the last person picked up?It is always about 8:05 to say, 5:10, something like.We closed the door at 5:20, definitely not 5:50.That's how late.Okay.Is the backyard fenced?Yes, backyard is fenced.And obviously there's a number of conditions that are usually imposed.Well, first of all, it's not a condition set.The special permits, personal to the applicant can't be transferred.And it also, we want to make sure that you've got, in addition to the fencing and the backyard, fire alarms, smoke alarms.This time, it was renewed for a fourth time in August and department of early education and care people came and saw that.So it, it is there and we have a log.We make a periodic check of the smoke and fire things.We do a drill once a month.We do those things.And are there any children living at 118 or 120 at this point?Any children living there under the ages of seven?No. - Okay.Any more questions board members?Is there anyone here to express support for this application?Is there anyone here to express opposition or concerns about this application?My name is Robert Croix.I live on Stoltz road, which is, I'm not in a butter but in the direct neighborhood.And so I'm concerned about what large means in terms of large daycare.It means up to 10, and including 10.So it can't go over 10?.No. That's the definition.That's my concern is that could happen, and get up to twenty.'Cause there is traffic in the area and there was concerns about that.Thank you chairman my name is Scott Harper.I live at 96 Lewis road, which is about four houses down from 120, from the applicant.I, so I'm not an immediate of butter.I haven't, I will note that during their current operation, I'm not sure what the size of the operation is at present.Is it up to 10 right now?Can anybody inform me of that?I don't know you'll have to ask the applicant.Yes up to 10.Okay.So this is for a renewal of the same level of existing use?The addition here is that they had the state, as I understand that they've had the state licenses for it, they have not had a special permit.Which is why we are here tonight.I think generally my, Yes.Right.And I don't think my, my own opinion and I have some familiarity with the larger daycare operation at Plymouth congregational church.I generally favor small neighborhood daycare.So I think if they're well run, it's more personal care.It's a preferred alternative to transporting children longer distances to larger institutions.My only, and I think this one has been generally well run.I have not experienced any noise issues.I think it's a great location because it's only about a block and a half from an underutilized park.And I think they do utilize that park for recreation of the children.I haven't heard complaints from my neighbors about noise of the children, disturbing them, my only concern which I share with my wife and another neighbor at 88 Lewis road, Kathy Nelson and Bill Wilson, or Kathy Johnson and Bill Wilson is, is the issue of traffic.I don't know if there's a way to restrict the number of cars there at any one time.I know people's work schedules generally require that there'd be a flurry of drop-offs.My wife, who's a teacher at Belmont in the Belmont public schools is often leaving for work at about five-to-eight.She has commented on a number of occasions about how, when people drop off at this daycare, they come up heading North on Lewis road, pull over to the left side, facing oncoming traffic and unload children in the street.And she has expressed some concern about that.Being a safety issue.There are two on this property, there are two spaces that are indented from the street, a parking area.I think if a restriction were passed that required that those not be utilized during the times, by permanent parkers at the residence during the times of drop-off and pickup pickup.And those two spaces would be available for people to pull in and discharge their children in a much safer manner.Additionally, just an emphasis that people should be driving in the proper direction to pull over to that curb.If there were three cars in front of that space dropping off at once, that would be a total of five cars dropping off at once.If the sidewalk and easement were maintained free of the leaves and snow, people could drop off safely without extending into the street side.Lewis road is one block off of School street.It is a frequent high speed cut-through for people trying to avoid the light at School street that are going right at school street and Belmont street.So many people come up and if they see the light is red, they'll take a left on Lewis and go racing down several blocks down Lewis.Is your suggestion that the, essentially, be required to drop off children only on the- - On the side of the sidewalk.-on the sidewalk side, which is the side where the building- - or in the indented permanent parking space on the property.And I think if that concern were addressed, I think 10 is a reasonable number of children.And with that concern and maybe some staggered pickup times where they address their clientele's drop-off needs, to restrict the number of cars that were there at any one time where you're- I'd be supportive of the application.Thank you.Anyone else?Hi, I'm Yolanda Lu and I own the two family house that is diagonal across from this daycare that's been operating without the special permit from the town for the last five or six years.So I'd like to talk about two things.Number one, the parking and traffic situation that is caused by the size of the operation, and number two, some real consequences of that, that we've experienced in the last few years as well, due to the traffic and parking situations.So, first of all, I'm a working mother.We know there are lots of, you know, dual working families in the neighborhood.And so I've also investigated large family daycare centers.Most of them had more parking than what's available at this particular residence or this particular house.Yes, they have an indentation there, but most of the time it's parked by people who are operating the daycare.Maybe there's one slot for a car, but when you think about how congested it is in the morning with the pickup and the drop-off, you know, there are cars on both sides.It makes it very hard to back out when there's car's also driving through in commuting.So most people choose not to park in the parking, one parking space available.That's not occupied by the operators of the daycare.We're talking about a block between Fairview and Elm, which are both high traffic roads, completely occupied on both sides by two family houses.So you're talking about most of those houses are also in tandem parking situations as well.So you're talking about 16, two family houses on an average size high density, residential block.Okay.And with, you know, people who are also leaving out from work coming in and out during the day during high traffic times.So the situation here is, you know, we talk to some of the neighbors, some of who weren't able to make it.My mother who, when she was living down the street, had the situation where her car was actually backed into and hit by one of the customers of the daycare, the neighbor right across from us, right across from the daycare and next door to us also had his car hit.The neighbors at 112 and 114 told us that they've had their driveway blocked.They've also had issues during the snow season that was mentioned by the operators where, you know, after shoveling out, then they couldn't use the own space.And then that created a situation for, you know, all the different cars having to, you know, do the shuffle, you know, back and forth, you know, in the driveways.And so, you know, we feel that this is a problem that is not a future problem, but one that's already experienced by the daycare that's operating for, you know, a good number of years and has not been solved yet.And we don't see that they are making any attempt to solve that as well.Thank you.Thanks.My other comment is that I think the fair way to assess the proper use of the 118 units is to ask from a tax perspective, how much they claim as a business expense and how much they claim as a residential expense.Thank you.Any questions members?Okay.We'll take it under advisement.Okay.The next is a case number 16-05.This is the application of Byko Akukwe, for a special permit under section 3.3 of the zoning bylaw to operate a family daycare home at 137 Sycamore street located in a general residence district.Hello.Hi, I'm Shaun.I'm with Byko, her English isn't that well, she speaks Japanese mainly.So we had to request a special permit for a daycare, a license of 10.This is an application for a family daycare home, which is up to six.Secondly, including six, not 10.Six is fine.Let's see.Do you have a license?That's good.I'm going to explain about the license, if I may?We have asked the EC not to issue or renew any licenses, unless they have proof that they do have a special permit from us.So if we're going to ask for a license to be attached to that application, that means we're going to ask them first to get their license there, which is what we told them not to.So I wanna know how we're going to proceed going forward.I mean, these two.We're not trying to create a catch 22 here.And that seems to be the definition of it.The thing, I mean, we're one of three municipalities I believe that do not require special permits.And we asked EEC to make an order tomorrow not to renew any, any licenses before they clear with us that, you know, they have it so.I don't know which way to go, should I ask them for the license?Or not?In this case I was told it's going to be just a home daycare not a large family.I'm sure that's what the application is for.That's what I prepared But maybe I misunderstood what they needed, but usually I explain those things.Normally we got for these applications.What the day looked like, you know, an agenda or an agenda of the day for, you know, what was going to go on during the day.The times, the drop-offs.And pick-ups a picture of the layout itself or the layout, what the backyard looked like.Excuse me?Yeah.But normally what we got was all of that.And usually before this got a copy of the license as well, now we don't get a copy of the license.I'm just asking which way to go.It sounds to me like this should be an offline discussion we need, we certainly need to have a, a summary of what is needed for each of these applications.But here, I think, let me just, so you've got, if, if we were to grant it, we obviously would ask you- and you'd have to file a copy of the license with the board.Let's see here.I just want to ask some questions.So you were looking for an application up to, and including six, you've got the license.Do you have any assistants?Not that- you do.Do they have a license from the OCC?Yes.And the play area outside?Is it fenced?I'm not quite- the area down in the back?Okay.And how do you get from the inside of the house to that fenced area in the back?From the front entrance, go around the driveway.And we have a kids playing sign - Okay.I noticed that there was a railing missing, and the sign.There was no fence.Oh, you talking about- wind just took that down.On the far side.The wind?Yeah that's what I was guessing, okay.So you got the fenced area.So what hours are you looking?Would you plan on operating?Eight to six.So that'd be, the drop-offs would be within the eight to six, right?You're not having people drop, pick up after six.And you understand that we usually have a bunch of conditions, which I've already mentioned, so I'm not gonna go through them again, but it'd be personal to you and condition, smoke detectors, things of that sort.Members, any questions.Okay.These two modes of ingress?Just ask him, I don't know.Are there supposed to be two modes of ingress?We have two points of ingress, we do.We actually had three, but one right now, the railing fell off the, on the back steps.So we're not using that one we're using the other one that comes out to the back.You've got a front door and then what was the third?We have one that goes straight out the back and then we have one that goes down then the stairs to the back, the other back.Are there any other questions?Is there anyone here to speak in support this application?Is there anyone here to speak in opposition, to express concern about the application?Thank you.We'll take that under advisement.Okay.The next case number is 16-06, which is the application of a Marybell Coveragall.Did I get that right?For a special permit under section 3.3 of the zoning bylaw to operate a family daycare home at 155 Beach street located in a general residence district.Is the applicant here?If the applicant's not here, it's a first.I guess I would just suggest, is there anybody here who wants to speak to in support of, or in opposition to the center?Is there anyone else here for this application concerning 155 Beach street?In that case, I'd suggest we just continue it to find out if they want to appear next time they can appear next time.Otherwise we'll just dismiss this.A vote to continue this one, to the next meeting?Second.General notion, seconded, all in favor.And I feel just notify the applicants.Yeah, they need to be here.On this case then you're recusing yourself.We've only got four members, we won't have a quorum on it.You've got a quorum but I think you have to ask them whether they want to proceed or not.I'm recusing myself with the next application so.There's nothing special.The next case in case number 16-07, the applicant is seeking, a special permit at 21 Jason road.The applicant is Robert C. Ketchum and is seeking a special permit under section 1.5 of the zoning bylaw to construct a one-storey rear addition, minimum required rear setback is 28.36.Existing is 23.8 and proposes 17.5 at 21 Jason road located in a single residency zoning district is Mr. Ketchum here?Okay.Why don't you - Mr. Ketchum we only have four members.Eric had to recuse himself.So that means that in order for you to prevail on the special permit, you would have to have the votes of all of the members you have either the option of- - I think we prefer to come back, if we can.Unless Mr. Smith will recuse himself again.Normally we have, three other board members at a minimum.So you'd like to continue it to the next meeting?Yes.Okay.Do I have a motion?Do I have a second?All those in favor.Thank you.John second, John.All right.Does anyone want to get Eric?Where is Eric?How'd I do as a chairman?I was pretty good.Okay.I did well Eric.Very quick.I made you proud.So why don't we just take these in the order that we've heard them.So the first will be.Case number 16-03 74 Goden street.The concern that was expressed on the, we're just going to sit on this one.Well, there's five of us here and Nick and Tino both watched the tape.So I guess it would the five of us who set, okay, so.This was one where they, the concern was expressed last time, principally about the lot coverage, which I think was- They've adjusted that, by removing the garage and therefore the lot coverage is now reducing and otherwise the application is more or less the same other than the kicking out the back two feet.Does anybody have any concerns over this one?Nope.Okay.In that case, I entertain a motion to approve.Make a motion.Anyone who wishes to approve?James seconds.All in favor.Jim seconded, Nick moved.Who would like to write this one?John.John McManus will write.Okay, the next is case number 15-44 and which is 334 Pleasant Street.And on this one, again, the five of us are present.Nick and Tino have filed the prerequisite of the certification, having watched the videotapes and John has been here for all of them live.I've been here for all the time.And so as Jim, so it will be the five of us who vote.It seems to me there's sort of two questions here.The first is whether this is a, something that can be granted at all.And then if it is, if it were to be granted, should it be granted with certain conditions.It just sort of seems to me, those are worthwhile addressing separately.So I'll just kick it off by saying that I, I don't think this is a something that we can approve under the bylaw.The context being that neither lodging nor hotel is a described use in section 3.3, the closest that I can see in the schedule 3.3, chosen analogous uses would be other, apartment house, which is defined as a dwelling.Containing no fewer than five dwelling units, but that use is actually prohibited in LB-3 districts and most other districts in the town, lodging and boarding is permitted as a use in LB-3 but it's permitted only as an accessory use, which requires that to be a principal residential use so that doesn't apply here.And even if they were applicable, it concerns rental, with not more than three rooms without separate cooking facilities.So as the applicant said, they're relying on section 3.2, which is a use not classifiable under any listed category, which could be allowed, can be allowed only by special permit from the board of appeals upon the board's determination that the use is similar in its impact on the neighborhood, the environments and the town, to a use which is permitted to roll out on special permit.And also that the sub section 7.3 special permit criteria test is met.I don't see any permitted use that similar in its impact to a hotel.The notice suggests that the similar use might be other, retail sales and services, but lodging, I think is different from sales.Renting rooms is not selling in the retail sales sense.And here we've got, it's an overnight use, which is an activity which is not otherwise permitted in the town generally.So I don't see anything analogous and I don't think that it falls within the bylaw.And this is in my view, a situation where if it's be permitted, I think town meeting would need to decide, it would be a permitted use.It just needs to be a hotel is not something that was inadvertently admitted from the scheduled uses although I acknowledge that section 5.1.2 does contain a sort of mysterious free floating mention of hotels in the context of discussing parking spaces.Does anybody else have any thoughts on that issue?I mean that, I would reason that way, except for that straight piece of legislation that talks about hotel in the context of parking.I mean, it's very odd that that exists, but there's nothing in the table in any of those columns in the table that talks about where these hotels are allowed.So given that I would just classify them under other retail sales and services, the reasoning being that well, it is a service providing a room even.I mean, there's no sale of goods, but there's that service.So otherwise, how do you reconcile that stray hotel you mentioned in the parking rule?Well, it seems to me that section 3.3 is where uses are allowed.And I think that the, the 5.1.2 references, are frankly speaking in error.They were drafting and drafting, and they were revising the parking permits and lifting it from some other channels bylaw.But I just think it seems to me that- I appreciate others using this, but it just seems to me that 3.3 is where you would put a use and a hotel, is such a distinctive kind of use that if it were contemplating being permitted, It would have been mentioned.I agree with you Eric.Yeah, the Airbnb.I think if you push that to the back to the planning and I know it's on the agenda is something that we move in that direction.Yeah.I mean, it seems to me that, if it were, if Belmont is going to have hotels, I think town meetings should say that we can have hotels.It just seems to me, for us to provide a hotel, allow a hotel as other retail sales and services is stretching the bylaw beyond it's.And only because it's an overnight thing.I mean, in terms, yes.You know, this is, I would say that it's lodging.It's overnight, which is something different for anything else.And I don't think lodging is a retail service and especially in the context of the most analogous use in my view, which is the apartment use that have been here for longer periods of time being prohibited.There's also the fundamental logical inconsistency with the fact that in the context of this hotel, long-term, you state tendency is bad, whereas in the context of Airbnbs and that sort of thing, it's the opposite.it's hard to sort of intellectually reconcile those two theories.What would you call a retail service?Things like a dentist, a- - Well the definition.Do we have a definition for that?Yeah section 1.4, it talks about Butler retail, sales and services as an establishment, primarily engaged in the retail sale of goods services and or products, including baked products, ice cream, and or candy for consumption offsite with no additional seating provided onsite, such uses may include incidental food service.I mean, I think it sounds like many of the stores in downtown Belmont, but it doesn't sound like- - So it sounds like the service of providing food is an example they gave.I thought it would be like hair salon, manicure, pedicure and massage therapy or those, which is like a service.Right.So if right, my view is, if we, if this is where I'm hung up - if this is what we- This is our collective view, then we don't need to reach the question of whether or not it should be allowed conditions to vote.So the theory is that reference to parking in section five is, just that- - it's so weird to have parking for a hotel, And then in the place where the uses are, dismiss it.We entertained that warehouse and turned it down for .The one on Holt Street.The one with the lot shaped like a T. - So you can turn it down , it was a grandfathered figure type of use of building.Whereas here it's a new use.I hate to see that lot unimprove.'Cause I consider it to be unimproved right now, and the lot across the street from it as well.And I really don't- I mean, I was in the neighborhood to see the Crescent and I drove by there and I went back and parking- I didn't see a car back there.I'm not saying that nobody goes to your hotel, I'm just suggesting that traffic is not what one might think, It might be in that area.So I would hope to believe that there would be some prac, in this poorly put together document here And I would say, yeah, we can allow that to be an improvement.which I think would benefit the neighbors.What does that, where is that parking?Is that 5.2 or something?5.1.2. - And is it something that we approve and then kick to the planning board and say they'll fix it?Well what's the timeline for the turnout?A year?And on top of that if we do vote and it goes either way, I mean, if it goes the wrong way for the applicant, does that mean they're- It's two years out before they can do anything again?Well, you know, no, I mean, it seems to me that if we were to vote on this ground, High and town meeting were to say the hotels permitted and the planning board to amend the bylaws, then obviously that would not be, you know, kind of two year commitment.The minute that bylaw became effective, it would be right back here.Yeah, I know.I must say, I think the applicant did a great deal of work on this application.It shows and know, obviously this- If we were to grant it, I would certainly propose a number of conditions, but it seems to me that I just can't get to the point of reaching.So should we have a vote on this preliminary issue?And then if it, if this preliminary issue is an obstacle, then we end here and if it's not an obstacle then we proceed to decide.The table's in 3.3. - What would be, whether we should consider it?The vote would be, I guess, to deny the ground that the hotel use is not contemplated by the bylaw.And they would continue on with the case?Then that would be a denial.And they would have, if they wanted to go and ask and recommended change, they put it in the case with, if we were to go with it that way, then the case would end there.So I would allow the case.And I would be allowed, we then move on to consideration with the application.I take that back.The proposed motions- This is one of those negative motions.This would be a motion to deny.So an Aye is to deny.And an Ney is to proceed?Right and the Ney is to proceed, so.Do I hear a motion to deny the application as a Hotel use is not contemplated by bylaw.We've got a motion by John.Did I hear a second?Second.Nick seconds.So with an Aye, is to deny.So all in favor, say aye.So we've got 1, 2, 3, all opposed?Yeah, it needs to go to the planning board.Okay.So we have a vote of three in favor of denial.Two opposed.So three in favor of denying.Yeah, that's what I'm trying to figure out.To grant a special permit requires affirmative relief of four.John, you made the motion to deny, correct?Yup.Oh, you voted against your motion?Just making sure I got this right.Obviously, if there's three in favor of denial, then that is that fails to meet- because you're going to need four to get affirmative relief.So in that case I think the vote of three in favor of denial carries the vote.I really wanted a hotel.I don't like having house guests.Can you reiterate?The regulation here, about how we vote on these?Statute says you granting- you grant affirmative relief.And you need affirmative relief to be granted a special permit.You need a vote of four, out of, on a five person board.It's four out of any number.Isn't it?It's not like only- - Well if only four were sitting there.You'd still need four affirmative votes.But if you have 10 sitting, four would be enough.We only sit in five, only five people vote on any application.But it requires four?Four affirmative votes to get it, it's in Chapter 48 section- - We voted to deny, and didn't pass it.And that would suggest denying it doesn't pass.But either way, even if we went the other way, it still wouldn't be enough votes.So if I make a motion to approve, you and I are yes, they're going to say no, it's three to two, right?Let's say it's to say.It's the same thing.There's too many attorneys sitting at this table.Tino, were you yes or no?On the motion to deny on the grounds that it's just not in the bylaws, a yes.Reluctantly.All right.If no one else wants to write it I'll write it.I'll write it Sounds like a fun one to write.Okay.So Tino is going to write it.Thank you.Okay.Now we got to keep moving.Okay.The first one is, we're not moving onto case number 16-04, which is the application for the large family daycare at 120 Lewis road.They left.They left?Okay.Now I understand why they don't have the license, cause its too- - I have prepared the list.I just hadn't send it off because I don't have all the cases covered.I have four out of like six, but I think that we still have a different list and this is one of them.I go over the, for the licenses.I have always asked them for the floor plan for pictures, for their hours, everything has been asked.They didn't provide it.It is not for me.I mean, it's not my fault that I haven't mentioned it.Can we please get a copy of the licenses?Even if it was a previous before they applied.So at least we have some references.If they're an existing operation, it would be helpful to have them.We always had on an application.Well, we had a license, floor plan, a picture of the backyard.And then we had, not the agenda, but hours, the curriculum, like, you know, and it was always nice to see all of that and the assistant.And I think the assistant, doesn't the assistant have to be licensed?Yeah.Right.Yeah.I'll check what I have before the end of the week for the review.And remember one we had where an area wasn't, didn't have trees.I have to do that decision actually.If the trees weren't- we made her put trees in on the corner there, up in Belmont.So you always look for a way that kids can escape from the backyard.We don't want to do it that way.So that's why we want the picture of the backyard.So. - I'll send you what I have just add to it.Then we'll discuss it next time, when it comes to that.This one in terms of, in terms of what they should be submitted.Yes.This one is, I think is somewhat different though, because I mean, obviously there was some, some genuine concerns about drop off and traffic.And now it seems to me that, this was a situation where I've walked by it and looked at it and there are things they could do.If, one, we can obviously, stagger, which is something we would want to condition.And we could also say drop off only on the, on the side of the street, where they are on the right-hand side, you know?So that there, you don't have people dropping off on the far side of the street crossing.And then we could also say that the, the applicant, I mean, I heard the point about, the applicant apparently parking in front of the house, which is where people would want to drop off.The reason for this is that the driveway is not really a usable driveway.If you look at it, there's a stairway that goes in, so they can't actually drive up the driveway.So 120 Lewis, how close is it to the main road on the bottom?That's where we're at.What's that?Yes.What is, that's far.It's between it's between Fairview and Elm.So how close to Fairview is it.It's at the far end from Fairview it's near, it's near Elm.they're very narrow drop-offs and pick-ups must be very difficult.What happens is, they basically line up the block, There are eight houses on both sides, sixteen families, they're all two family houses, each family has two cars.So there has to be people who live there.Usually one person is parking out front.So there has to be usually one person.So you staggered the sta- They have to be on the same side as the traffic goes, and then- - If its written, we're not going to have the guys, at 7:30 in the morning there just- - People live on that side of the road, unfortunately.Review on this?So if we hear from the neighbors of the numb- leaving to the conditions.A six month review?It seems to it's.I was definitely going, it seems to me that we have to, try to- If we're going to grant it, we impose those things, you know, staggering drop-offs, drop off only on the side of the street adjacent to 218, 120.And that if, if you're living there, the occupants shouldn't be parked in your front.And of course I can't preclude other people's parking, So we'll do a fix.And then a review after- - six months or a year.I'd say, I'd say a year.We need to know, that would give us enough time.And if we hear complaints then they know they've got a problem.The whole office it's not going to have the time to go there every morning to see, like, if it complies or not what I will need from neighbors will keep the record.Cars being here, you know, driveways being blocked.Stuff like that.Do you want to, do you want a shorter review period?I mean, I don't.I'm concerned about it as well, but I just, - Well we could just deny the permit.Based on that.And all those complaints.I think that the fact that, there wasn't police before is, now they have a reason to pay a little bit more attention.Yeah.So if after a year we have a lot of these complaints, then, then they're going to have a problem.Okay.Is that, in addition to the consideration, the fact that, there might be a suspicion that 118 unit is and not actually a residence?Yeah.I mean, that is, I, I did think about that issue and it seems to me that I think the point of those residents, obviously they don't want purely commercial properties, but where you have people living in the same building.I mean, a lot of people.I know people that had two families, who've made it into one family.I mean, so on.If they're living in the same building, I think you might- that would be acceptable.Obviously they could not, you know, move someplace else, rent out the upper floor and then continue to use the lower floor as a - that would be a problem.What about the license?So we're going to consider all of this without a license?Well just said that they don't require the license for application because, they have to have the special permit.The first thing I'll do tomorrow, ask them to make sure they have it.I'll copy Nick.If he's going to make the decision to have just a note to say that, you know, presented the following day or.We can do, we condition it on submission of the license, in this case, since this is a large family, they have to submit license for the assistant as well.So you've got two licenses and then they've.you have the usual conditions in addition to the ones we just discussed.And then the hours are eight to five.Those aren't normal hours though.Usually it's earlier.Usually it's earlier hours.What about waking up at 7:30.But I think, I think that I asked them that question actually.And they said that the eight was fine, but they said 5:20 was quite awful.They closed the door.So it probably should be a 5:30.Yeah, 5:30, but normally it's the eight o'clock hours aren't what normally, people do.And as I recall, when I was doing it, was normally like the sevens-fifteens and the 7:30's is like the eight o'clock is when you're hitting the school traffic.Yeah.But that's, that's what they ask.Don't want give them more.So the space that's used as a daycare, nobody lives there?It's just.The testimony was equivocal, shall we say?So he lives with- - He lives in a two family, and the other floor is unclear.If I may, initially we send them the letter that, you know, they need a special permit.They sent us back a letter saying that, you know, they live on one floor and the other floor was totally available for the daycare.And we told them, that's not what the bylaw says.You need to live in the house.Otherwise it would be a daycare, for which you need to have handicap accessibility ramp.It's a, it's the business, which is allowed, but they need to do the modeling for like a hundred thousand dollars to add bathrooms and everything else.So they sent me another letter saying that, no, they do live in both units.We have them all.I mean, that's why I included everything we have.And well, when they said, like, they live in both, I couldn't say you can't apply anymore.So they're applying as if they do live in the house, that is what they said.It just seems like quibbling.That seems a little too family.In my view, because, so long as they're living in the building, it shouldn't be an issue.And there's only one other space and that's dedicated to the daycare.But if they were living someplace else that would be a different story.That would not be- - Right, so this is a case where they're in the same building.They're saying they're living in the unit.Otherwise we can't issue them this permit.As a building code, unless they're living in the house occupying the house, it would be a daycare as a commercial use, which needs handicap accessibility, handicap bathrooms, lifts, elevators, the whole nine yards.This is because they're living in the houses.Why EEC gives them the permit for a large family daycare, because they live in the house.That's how they're allowed to by the building code by the EEC. - So this is a building code issue.Correct.So the minute they said, like, you know, we don't live in the house, totally changes the character of the daycare into a commercial daycare, which still they're allowed to by zoning.It's the building code now, you know, forces them to take more measures like 24 Sycamore Street is coming, rather than not going to come in for parking- - Now you're kind of on a slippery slope because what, it puts a triple Decker?But he's saying that it's not.Maybe its not, isn't a zoning issue.He's saying it's a building code issue.In other words, if there's nobody living in the unit, I mean, we can still grant a special permit for it, but they would have to do additional things to it.Well it is a zoning issue, because I think if, isn't there a definition of family daycare that says that- - It says in a residential property, if I recall correctly, so.For a two family, strictly, for a single but for a two family strictly they're living there.So if even the sleep down there, like, you know, once a week or just cook something in that kitchen, they're not living there, we're not going to go-.Monitor that.Keeping the back door open from upstairs and downstairs.So no one bothered by this?No. - So do I hear, and we obviously just discussed a number of conditions.Don't hear a motion to approve subject to those conditions?I make a motion to approve subject to the conditions that we discussed.I'll Second.So Nick moves, subject conditions are approved.All in favor?You got the same name without, okay.Okay.I have a question.may I ask a question?Sure.This property where they have a business, a daycare, they pay the same amount of taxes?I don't know.They come from another town, using the park, using the roads.They're not coming from another town.They're living there.They're just living upstairs.I think he was talking about, is that what you mean?Yeah.Okay.I don't know.I don't know the answer to your question.All right.So the next one- - So do I. - Don't go down that road.Fair.As long as you're registered with the town of Belmont.Okay.So then we've got a number 16-05, which is 137 Sycamore street.Is this license going to be issued to this young lady?The young lady.Yes, the applicant.It's personal to her and it's obviously, I just need her to submit her OCC license.She says she has an assistant.I just need the assistant's license as well.They've got a fence.The hours were eight to six requested.Other than that, I'll give you conditions.I'm going to write all the daycare ones.I'm going to just blow 'em all up.Truly appreciate it.I own three.I'm going to do another three.All right.He has a template for these, Eric.I do.There is one with all conditions, but we're going to have one for applications too.So you're going to ask her for a license too?Yes.Yes.And we'll have staggered drop offs because Sycamore is as bad as any street.Very busy street.Even though it's at least a little wider and wider.But there's about 10 or 15- - There's at least 10, maybe 20 daycares on Sycamore and the surrounding streets.No, it does work staggered.And also there was one person who had a circular driveway that we made them block off their circular driveway on Sycamore.So she couldn't use it so that it wouldn't be like the Speedway over there on Sycamore.But if it works, it works.Does anybody have any concerns about the 137 Sycamore application?Where there was just one.The only thing I had was is, is this going to be an all Japanese school?It wasn't a concern, but everything's written in Japanese.It seems to be quite likely.I don't know.I'll sign up and let you know.Well sign up!I just didn't know.I was just curious.I meant to ask because I was just wondering, looking at this.Yeah, no, I understand that.It doesn't matter to me.When someone showed up in the past and it was called the Montessori school.I think, it doesn't matter to me.And this to me is not a floor plan for a daycare.This is somebody took a pencil and wrote out a floor plan, we need a regular floor plan.No, but something more than, don't you agree?Because we'd have to have how to get in, how to get out, the fire situation or am I wrong?Are we, I mean, we didn't ask.We agreed that it didn't have to be professionally drawn?But how does fire, how does the fire department look at it?Don't they have to present something to fire?This is a single house up to six kids.It's considered to be a safe, like a family kind of.I mean you won't question a family with six kids or like three kids, five.Since the maximum occupancy is less than 15, which is like, even like with the large families, anything less than 15 is sufficient.But if I go to the fire department, what do I give the fire department to show them?It as a single house.They'll just take it as a single house.We've asked them to inspect the smoke detectors.I'll make a motion to approve the special permit.I'll second.All in favor.That's all.Five-0.That was five in favor.So that one was a 5-0.That wasn't we didn't have a no?No. - Okay.So what do we just continue with this one?Yeah.And the other two were, oh, the person who didn't come didn't show up yet.We've already continued that.And then the other ones.Just write it anyway.And then we've got the minutes that were circulated, we probably should make some edits to them.Were there any issues on the minutes, there were the minutes of- - Correct.The revision of the two was corrected.I'll make a motion to approve the minutes of December 7th, 2015, February 1st, 2016 and March 7th, 2016.Ill second.With the changes of Eric and Craig.We don't require a special engineer to do all this.Shaun you did changes.Didn't you mind?One.With John's changes.So we followed the changes, motion to approve.I'll second - A minor formal problem.I can't really vote on the March 7th.'Cause I wasn't here.Yes you can.You've watched it.Oh yeah good point.Okay so all in favor.Opposed?No - The second was?Your?John, you were.Okay.Motion to be adjourned.All in favor.Thank you all.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/ZBA_040416-CL19.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/ZBA_040416-CL19.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/ZBA_040416-CL19.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/IEM111615/IEM_11-16-15.mp3", "text": "Aloha, will the Infrastructure Environmental Management Committee, please come to order.It is Monday, November 16th, 2015, and it's about 1:37 in the afternoon.And let me give the roll call of who is present.Myself, obviously, Chair Li Cochran and from East Maui, we have Bob Carroll.Good afternoon, Chair.Aloha and Ms. Gladys Baisa.Good afternoon, Chair.Aloha and we have Mr. Don Guzman.Good afternoon, Chair.Good afternoon.And non-voting but here visiting with us today is Mr. Don Couch.Good afternoon, Chair.Aloha.Be excused for today will be Vice Chair of this committee, Ricky Hocomma and also Stacy Covello and Council Chair, Mike White will be joining us shortly.From the administration, we have Corporation Counsel, Rochelle Thompson, aloha, and our staff, Legislative Analyst Jordan Molina, and also Legislative Secretary Raina Yapp.And let me check in with our district offices.In Hana, Don Lono, are you there?Yes, good afternoon, Chair, this Don Lono at the Hana office.Aloha, Don.Lanai, Ms. Denise Fernandez.Good afternoon Chair, this is Denise Fernandez on Lanai.And Amola Kaim is Elelkon.Good afternoon, Chair.This is Elelkon, Amola Kaim.Thank you ladies for being there and members, today we have three items on the agenda, IEM 27, restoration of Maui's coral reefs.IEM 40, termination of license agreement affecting lots, 143, 144 and 145 of the Pukalani lots at Kehua in Pukalani.IEM 42, grant of sewer line easement to Hospice Maui Incorporated, which is in Wailuku.And at this time I shall set the parameters for testimony, three minutes to testify, please state your name and the organization you might be representing.And also please stick to speaking on the items that are listed on the agenda today.And at this time I shall open the floor for public testimony without objections.No objections.Thank you very much, so ordered.And first on our list in the gallery to testify is Mr. Greg Lagoi.Testifying on IEM 42.Aloha everyone, my name is Greg Lagoi.I'm the Chief Executive Officer of Hospice Maui.Hospice Maui is sitting atop county leased land.We leased from the county.We are building a a five bed hospice residence.And at the beginning of the process, our engineer had gotten assurances from the Department of health that we would be able to have our own individual wastewater system on site, a septic system.We're on sand 'cause we're on the Sand Hills.During the lengthy process that also involved the environmental assessment we had to do, the Department of Health changed and said that we needed to find a sewer access.There is no sewer on Mahalani Street, but across Mahalani Street from us is another county owned lot that is leased to Lokahi Pacific.And on that lot, there is a sewer lateral that we would have access to.And so we are asking for the county to grant an easement to another branch of the county.I'm not sure to whom, but housing and human concerns, is the branch that deals with our lease.And then the easement would go across Mahalani Street and across the lot that is leased to Lokahi Pacific.To my knowledge, there's no controversy or issues at all involved.And I'm happy to answer any questions that have to do with this particular question.Thank you.Thank you.Thank you, Mr. Lagoi.Members, any need for clarification of our testifier?Seeing none, thank you for your presence today.Next testifier in the gallery is Robin Newbold, speaking on IEM 27.And she is Chair of the Maui Nui Marine Resource Council.Aloha Kedko, I'm Robin Newbold, Chair of the Maui Nui Resource Council.Thank you, Madam Chair for having us back to talk to your committee.And I want to thank all of the committee members.It's good to see you again, it's been awhile.So thank you for being here and for your interest in what's happening on our coral reefs.Since you passed the resolution to save, protect, and enhance the coral reefs of Maui Nui, the Maui Coral Reef Recovery Team has been busy researching, 25 years of research that's been done on the reefs.And unfortunately has found that the reefs have been declining for the past 25 years.They haven't gone back further than that, but in all likelihood, it's even worse than we think.Excuse me.Today, Teken Hammond who's the Chair...I'm sorry, she's the coordinator of implementing the coral reef recovery plan, will be talking to you about the outcomes of that study.It's a real simple study, we got it down to two pages, one page front and back, and then we have references so you can see all the different research studies that we cited that took into account as we came up with this information and on the back of that, there's a page listing all the team members.So all that information is available to you.To make it even easier, we did a one-page summary of all that.So you can see at the top that the issues that we found that are going on with the coral reefs, and then we didn't want to leave it at that.We wanted to have recommendations, for how we can turn this around.How we can work with you and the county and the state to turn things around, reverse this trim.So I was gonna introduce members of the panel, but since they're not sitting there yet, we'll let them introduce themselves.I would like to say one more thing though.And that is that as part of our study, we would like to find out how much people know before we talk to them about the status of Maui's reefs and then how much they know afterwards.See if talking to people is really effective.So we have a survey and I believe that that's with your packet and on the front as the pre-survey.And of course, ideally you would take that and you're just helping us with our database.If you have a chance to go over that and then a post survey of what you thought before and what you thought after we talked with you.So with that I'm gonna...Any questions, otherwise I'll move onto the next person.Thank you, Ms. Newbold.Does that concludes your testimony?Members, any need for clarification?Seeing none, thank you Ms. Newbold.And the next testifier is Tamara Paulton Speaking on IEM 27.Aloha Chair and committee members.Thank you for this opportunity to testify today.I'm in full support of the Maui Nui Marine Resource Council packet and I just wanted to say, I go in the ocean almost every day and it's really bad and having been alive for that long, and I've never seen it this bad.Almost every time I put my face in the water, I see a bleach coral in my area.The last few years, we've had more brown water runoff events than I can count.If you've ever been to Kapalua Bay in the last 30 years, you'll notice a huge difference within just the last five years.It used to be so many collector urchins that you couldn't even count them all, now you have to look for them.And the diversity of fish is just not there.I hate to speak negatively about Honolua bay, but being that it's a marine preserve, you're not seeing the numbers and the amounts of fish that should reflect the marine preserve at this time.We're working on getting it better.And that being said, there's not much that we individually can do for climate change and we can try and change the way that business does business.I read a report that people that are making salt, ocean salt, not even refined iodized salt, are finding plastic in their salt nowadays, because there's so much little pieces of plastic in the ocean.I can try forward you that at a later date.I wasn't prepared but, that was sent to me by a world expert toxicologist, Craig Downs, that you can't even make salt off the ocean anymore without finding little pieces of plastic.So I would urge you to take action and try and stop the sale of microbeads in our products that they sell in this island environment.Try to stop the sale of sunscreens that have oxybenzone or ebobenzone.They're just small little things that we can do, promote the use of rash guards.And it will make a big difference if everybody gets on the same page and makes our oceans and our marine life a priority.Thank you.Thank you, Ms. Paulton.Members, any need for clarification of our testifier?See none.Thank you for your time, Ms. Paulton.Okay and let's check in with our district offices.In Hana, Ms. Lono, do you have any testifiers?Ms. Lono, Hana.Hello?Are you there?Yes, this is Don Lono at the Hana office and there's no one waiting to testify.Thank you.In Lonai, Ms. Fernandez, anyone there to testify?There's no one waiting to testify on Lonai.Thank you, and on Molokai?Ms. Elkon, anyone there to testify?There's no one her on Molokai waiting to testify.Thank you ladies for being there.And anyone else in the gallery here wanting to testify, please come down to the podium.I don't see anyone.So members, without objections, I shall now close the floor for public testimony.No objections.Thank you very much.And let's get onto our first item and this will be IEM 27 and this is the...And it's in regards to the resolution 15-19, that we adopted on February 18th, 2015, which we, the council recognized the importance of saving, protecting, and enhancing the reef ecosystems of Maui County for their cultural, ecological, subsistence and economic benefits.And as we had our testifiers come, we've invited back Maui Nui Marine Resource Council to serve as resource persons, for this committee's discussion here today.And last time they were here was nine months ago on February 2nd, 2015.So I know we will probably have to set the room up for all of them to come and sit with us.Let me read the county communication.It is county communication, 13-303 from myself transmitting a proposed Rezo relating to coral reef recovery plan for Maui County and correspondence was dated December 16th, 2013 from myself, transmitting a report from Maui Coral reef recovery team, entitled, A practical plan for the technical and cultural restoration of Maui's Coral reefs.And this correspondence dated October 28th, 2015 from Robin Newbold, Chair of Maui Nui Marine Resource Council and discuss the...Wait.Oh, sorry.Maui Nui's transmitting report entitled, \"Maui's Coral Reefs Declining Trends:1993 to 2015\".So with that members, we shall take a brief recess.So we may set up the floor to bring down our panelists and have a presentation and some discussion.We are now in a brief recess.Infrastructure Environmental Management Committee, please reconvene.And thank you panelists for being here.And let me just briefly say who we have available.We have Teagan Hammon, Maui Coral Reef recovery Plan Coordinator.I guess their names are pretty boldly shown in front of them.Mike Fields, Senior Scientist, Emiratis U.S Geological Survey.Aloha, thank you for being here.Ekulu Lindsey, Polanui Hugh, community manage Makai area.Russell Sparks, Maui Division of Aquatic Resources and Mark Decos, Director, Hawaii Association for Marine Education and Research.And today's discussion, we shall be given a presentation and then we can follow up with questions and definitely some discussions as a committee with our panelists here today.So I shall turn the floor over, I guess to yourself, Teagan, you're gonna take the lead on this one?Yes.Okay, do we have microphones?Yeah, I think it's a portable that can hand around.Can you guys hear me?Great, okay.Thank you so much, everybody for having us here and your attention on this really important topic.My name is Teagan Hammond.I work for a Maui Nui Marine Resource Council, coordinating the implementation of the coral recovery team.And I really sit here on behalf of much greater minds than myself, that represent the members of the council and the recovery team.Their names are listed on the back of the reef report that you received.And I encourage you to familiarize yourself with who the members are, as I'll do my humble best to represent their voices here.The recovery team and the council endeavored in the last few months to write a report, which summarizes a diverse set of data, over the last 15 years of what's happening in our reefs.That's really hard for you guys to go out and find all that information and summarize it in one place.And so the report that we've just presented with you represents that summary, and we encourage you guys to use this as a resource and offer it to you as a resource that you guys can use to quote, as you're talking and having your conversations with folks as well.Appreciate your feedback, if you have any in ways that we can help make this more useful for you in the future.Let's see.So for each of the speakers here before you, we've assigned ourselves to address one of the five bullets of recommendations that have been made.Mine will be starting at the end.Number five, to promote a collaborative approach to marine resource management around Maui.And this involves having briefings and building partnerships and lines of communication with each of you, including developers and everybody in our community.Today, we're gonna challenge you with these facts and provide solutions to discuss and identify ways forward we can work together on.And we really hope to open up continued discussions with each of you guys for your input on how we can make these solutions more practical and realistic in our day-to-day.So quickly just going through the report, as Robin really greatly mentioned, we have a summary that's just a single page and it has the five bullet points of the issues that we're facing and recommended solutions, which each of the speakers will address.So I'm quickly going to read these for you.During the past two decades, nearly one quarter of Maui's corals have been lost of the site surveyed, with half of Maui's reef sites currently experiencing declining health.As a note, these are very highly advanced rates of decline.This is not normal.Since 1995, the biomass or mount by weight of culturally and economically important reef fish species found on Maui has declined significantly.We are now second in line behind Oahu as the lowest in the state.The average amount of reef fish found around Maui's reefs is second lowest of all the islands in the state.That's the third point.Nearly 90% of water quality samples taken around Maui in the period of 2012 to 2014, have exceeded state water quality standards for turbidity, nutrients and or bacteria.As you all know, water quality is extremely important for the health of our reefs.The economic value of our state's coral reefs was estimated in 2002 at $10 billion.So this is a very important issue for all factors.The value that American people hold for our reefs in Hawaii is up at $33.57 billion.So these impacts are extremely important for us to address now.The three primary drivers are the final bullet on the issues we're facing.The impacts that we're seeing are due to introduction of land-based pollutants and sediments, overfishing, coupled with poor regulation and enforcement.And the third is insufficient resting sites providing adequate time for recovery from the stresses that our oceans receive.Excuse me, the next section, the five bullet points of recommended health that each of these speakers will address is the need for building capacity at a community level to engage communities through the CMMA process.Equally, we'll talk more about that.Enhancing enforcement of current rules and regulations within Maui's coastal waters is something that fishermen themselves as well call for.Expanding the network of coral reef areas under protection around Maui with a target of protecting 20% by 2020.Right now we're at less than 2%.Comparatively to the world, this is very low than other places in the nation.Implement policies and practices to reduce flow of sediment and nutrients.Mark will address that and promoting a collaborative approach to marine resource management around Maui.I'm hopeful that our conversations can continue and we can keep figuring out ways forward.This photo is actually where Tamara was discussing.This is Fleming's beach park, at a recent brown water event.This photo is taken after a stop work order was lifted for a Project Moka and as you can see, it's very alarming, not a great place to get in the water.With that, I'm gonna pass the mic.These pictures up here just show you guys the reef report.And as you all have copies, I'm gonna skip by them, and pass the mic to Dr. Mike Field.Thank you.Thank you, T. Aloha and thank you for the opportunity to sit here today and talk to you.In brief, what I'm going to do, is show you a series of slides and talk about many of the things you know, but I want to review why coral reefs are so important.What's happening to them today?And very importantly, what the important actions are that you can take to change the direction of the way things are going.So the role of coral reefs, first of all, biodiversity, an extremely important function that they provide all over the world.They cover only a half a percent of the sea floor, but 25% of all marine species.Food source, a primary source of protein for most island nations and a nursery for the commercial species, this one off shore.Coastal resilience protecting against tsunamis and large storms and there are other roles that coral reefs play as well.cultural and recreational and there are many, many, they are very important.So what we know is that there's a worldwide crisis going on with coral reefs.It started in the mid 80s and it started accelerating in the mid nineties.There are many causes, but the main cause is by far are unsustainable fishing, which moves the larger herbivores from the population reefs.Land-based pollution and that really means sediment runoff from island watersheds, and now climate change.These are the big three.There are other things that can harm reefs, but they're just bumps and cuts and bruises compared to these are the three that are starting to wipe out coral reefs around the world.And now we know this problem has arrived in Hawaii.It hadn't for a while because there are colder waters here, but now of course, runoff and sedimentation has been a problem for a number of years.There are some pictures from south Molokai and the West Maui, but more to the telling of the pictures that have appeared recently in the press, The one on the left is from the Seattle Times.This is not just Hawaii News, this is a worldwide news, what's been happening here.The other pictures from iconic places of Maui.Molokini and Olowalu and many, many others.Why this matters, and I think everybody here is well aware of it, but the point is that dead reefs are quickly flattened.Here's a picture of reefs that are bleached from the great barrier reef in Australia, and then destroyed.When they're destroyed, sediment covers them.The reef will not come back, it is gone.And this is a lesson that there are places I could show you on the north shore of Lanai, where the reefs are gone and they're not coming back.Same thing on south shore of Molokai.So we lose probably forever.Habitat proficient invertebrates, barriers for storm protection, sites for family and community recreation.The result of this is the economic and cultural value, will be greatly reduced within one generation.We're not talking about the year 2060, 2080, 2050.This is happening now, and it's going to happen fast.The Chair of DNIR, Suzanne Case recently made the statement that, if we fail to protect the coral reefs and lose them, negative impacts on the overall ocean ecosystem and on Hawaii's economy.So let's look at these just for a minute.The maps up here are the four islands and Maui Nui show you red and yellow.The yellow is more than 10%, but less than 50% live coral.The red is 50 to 90%.You won't find maps like this in Florida, or most places in the Caribbean.They think 10% is a lot of coral coverage.Hawaii is very lucky, but the numbers are changing and they're changing right before our eyes.So what I've done here on this map is map out nine reef tracks that total almost 15,000 acres, a really enriched coral.Three, South Molokai, two, Lanai, and the other four Maui.Kolabi, even though it shows red, recent mapping there shows that those percentages are overstated and there's not much coral in those locations.So we look at these and we say that there's a lot there.It's a very complex, very rich reefs and there's a lot of it.But they're all starting to suffer these impacts.What can we do about it?We can look at it and start to protect areas of it.There are many ways to offer protection from community-based up to MPAs, but protect it is the only way that it's gonna survive.What we know about it, these reefs is...We have have enough information, you have enough information to make intelligent decisions today.We know the percentage of coral cover on the reefs.We know the detailed topography, we know the fish populations.We can make maps that show the distribution of coral, where it is and what's being used and how to best treat it in the future.Give you an example of that, here is the iconic Olowalu Reef Track and the map above it shows the results of some computer models.We've also done actual satellite test models during the larval times when the corals are spawning, the current flow from Olowalu along West Maui and over to Molokai.If Olowalu reef dies, so might West Maui and part of Molokai.It is a seed as a mother reef for many of these other reefs.So given the ongoing and increasing threats to Mai Nui Coral Reef Complex, can anything be done?And we would say, yes.Reducing all stressors, other stressors.Over fishing and runoff and climate.If we can't stop climate, we can at least take the other two out of the picture.Give the corals a chance, establish a safe place where they can battle the climate change as best they can.Setting aside 15 to 20% or more, so the fish can grow and and corals can fight warming, is the only way.This has been recognized worldwide.Most countries have anywhere from 20 to 50% of their coastal waters protected now and it's essential.I can't emphasize this enough, there is no other choice.If corals are gonna survive warming, the other threats have to be taken out of the picture.And just to give you an idea of when people worried about protection, this is a map of Olowalu and there's a little box, maybe not even very visible there, that represents 15%.So it's a very, very large reef.And if you set aside 15%, there's still a lot of reef that is available for all the uses that we like to think of.Marine protected areas are important for fish, as well as for the corals.And this plot from Alan Freelander shows very clearly that there areas where there's pristine seas, shown that the stars have much higher biomass, than areas that aren't.And the areas that aren't the small green boxes, which include Hawaii and most of the Caribbean and Western Pacific, those small boxes make up more than 99% of the world's reefs.The large fish populations have been decimated.And so go the coral reefs in following them.In Hawaii, the open to fishing and partial protection shows significantly lower biomass, or fish population than no take and community-based protected areas.We know enough to design protection areas now, we know that full protection from fishing or community manage is essential.We need a range of habitat complexities that need to take in consideration larval trajectories and where population spawn.We need a variety of habitats from shoreline to deep, including sand channels, rocky areas, everything's possible.Low of algae cover and representative wave exposures.And finally, I would add that MPAs are effective tool for fisheries and conservation, and are essential for coral reefs.They still only account for less than 1% of the oceans, but every country on earth is starting to embrace them.MPAs are most effective when fishing pressure's high nearby, and these have to be scaled for human needs.And I would end by saying that MPAs will give you more fish and larger fish.And I would say that if they don't, then you take them apart and don't use them anymore, but they will.They'll give more fish and larger fish.Whether they will say coral reefs, we don't know, but we have to try, because, right now the reefs are not responding to all the pressures and we have to remove those that we can remove.Thank you.Thank you Mr. Field.Aloha.Aloha.I'll be speaking about the building the capacity and increase the number of community managed marine areas around Maui to implement the coral reef recovery strategies through collaborative efforts.So, this is my backyard, Polanui Hiu.Polanui is the name of the Ahupuaa that we live in.And the idea of bringing back balance to this place started with my dad at Lindsey and my son, Kaelo, riding a canoe, looking at what was under the water.The seed was planted then that we should do something.And a few of us met with the local marine managed area, the Fijian Consort that came in.We met with them and found out what they had done.So a bunch of us started to community manage Hakai area, and we have since grown into a network.Roughly speaking, our efforts here at Polanui have been ongoing for about five years.And it goes from where Pumana pool is to between Lahana shores in 505 Front Street and it's roughly a half mile off coastline, 222 acres out to about 60 feet in depth.And bringing back down as to this area, and really understanding a lot of the stressors to it has been real challenging for the last five years.So we are working towards the community-based subsistence fishing area, designation through DLNR, and trying to add a a rest period, about a five-year rest period to bring back the size and biodiversity of what used to be.And outreaching to the many different groups that we have here in La Haina and throughout all of Maui Nui and anybody, future leaders, to bring back balance and to have them understand why it's important to take care of these things, because they were there long before us.We've since created a Maui Nui Makai Network, that includes six different groups.We have Namamu Mules and Kipahulu Ohana in Hana.Ourselves, Polanui in Lahaina as well as Wailuku Simeme in Kahalui Harbor.And you can see the points right here on the map.So all of us are working towards bringing balance and that balance really is us and the humbug we make an ocean in the mountains.So correcting these things, we can do all the legwork in the ocean and on land.But it's not without the political will that we can be successful.So the co-management throughout the process is an important thing for us to work towards.Haena has gotten great support.And they're the first on the books for a CVSFA designation.Their mayor had supported them throughout the process.So that was one of my asks here is to have the support from you folks, as well as the mayor to move forward.And this is what we've done.It's awesome to have a plan, but the majority of these plans get put on a shelf.I represent the people who can do something with that plan, make it happen so that future generations can enjoy what I had as a kid, because right now it's barren.Get fish.What kind of small?We need more fish.Aloha.My name is Russell Sparks.I'm with the Division of Aquatic Resources.I've been working here on Maui with the division for about 18 years now.And what I'm going to do today is I want to just quickly go through some relevant information about Maui's reefs.Talk about some of our current management successes, many of which probably happened because of support from the county council and the mayor at the time that we moved them forward.And I hope, 'cause I imagine a lot of you are questioning well, this is state jurisdiction, not county jurisdiction so how do we help?Well, simple as resolutions or letters of support, go a long way to the very confrontational, controversial rule-making process oftentimes, so simple things like that could have a huge impact as well.So I'll go through some of what we've been doing on Maui.I'll touch briefly on compliance and other changes, social changes, things that Sizikola that talked about within the communities that at least give me hope.And I think it gives a lot of people hope that we might actually move forward.So as Dr. Field mentioned there, our ongoing stresses with our research, just a few, some disease, bleaching, algae blooms covering the reef.These are graphs that simplify greatly coral cover on several of our reefs so basically all they're looking at is the percent coral cover.And when you take a two-dimensional picture of the reef over time, and you can see on West Maui in particular, where we're doing a lot of management efforts, there seems to be a fairly substantial decline over the last couple of decades.Other areas of concern, Maliah, and also Papalula Point on the North Shore, showing what we describe as a total collapse of our reef ecosystems and the reasons for that vary.I don't have time to go into it.Usually takes me a couple of hours to delve into this in detail.So we'll avoid that, but I do want to point out, 'cause we're going to talk about resilience in the face of stresses and negative impacts on our reef.I want to point out the bottom graph, which is Hana point, just in Wai'ahi canal, natural area reserve.In 2005, there was a bloom of crown of thorns, sea stars and those guys came through and they munched pretty much most of the coral down.So you can see a coral decline that went from in upper 20%, probably like 25 or 26% down to less than 10.Down to around 5% in some places.But then over the subsequent nine years or so, came right back up to where it was before.So the point there is reefs can be resilient.They can bounce back, they can deal with these stresses, but Ahi Canal is a reserve.There's no efficient allowance.So there's very healthy marine fish resources.It's also an area isolated from a lot of the land impacts that we have, particularly in areas where people live.So that helped that reef ecosystem bounce back from that stress.Moving forward today, this is a picture from a Molokini, looking out along some of the salt benches there.Every single coral along that area is bleached.This is a picture taken at Olowalu of one of the really large, old, low corals.Some of these corals are four to 500 years old.And when you see them bleach out like this, and then subsequently current photos have shown this coral and others nearly completely overgrown with algae.So you're looking at a coral that right now, what it's experiencing today is worse than anything it's experienced over the last four to 500 years.Where we're throwing more at these things now than they've seen over that period of time.And that's really alarming, really concerning.So bleaching this year was the worst ever recorded in Hawaii and you've heard this already.This is actually a new major stress for our corals up to this time last year, there was some bleaching, but this year was much worse.So up until about now we've heard about it.We've worried about it, we've talked about it, but now we're experiencing it.And the long-term survival of these corals is gonna depend quite a bit on the ability for us to reduce these overall stressors, things that Dr. Field talked about already.What I want to talk about then to give you a little idea of what's possible, is the herbivore fishery management area, Kahekili.Prior to implementing this site, we were seeing coral cover that was up around 50, 60% rapidly declined down to the 30s.And we were noticing periodic blooms of algae, which was providing probably the majority of the stress that these reefs, overgrowing the coral, causing stress, knocking it back.Just to give you a picture of that if you started in 1999, when we started our cramp surveys down to 2007 there, you can see how the algae periodically filled in, and just get a general sense of what that decline and coral cover is.You look at the coral is becoming a little smaller and patchier and separated out.The other thing we noticed there was that fish biomass shown in this graph, is about half of what it is on other sites around Maui, but also the Maui sites are about half of what they are in some of the more pristine areas on the big island, et cetera, Big concern there though is the orangy graph, which is the parrotfish biomass was extremely low in this area.With that information, we set up the Kahekili Herbivore Fisheries Management Area, as a fisheries management area, which prohibited the taking a three families of fish, surgeonfish, parrotfish and Ninui or chubs, prohibited the taking of sea urchins and prohibited fish feeding so that the fish would eat the algae rather than the peas and the other things given to them.We continue to allow fishing.In fact, we encourage fishing.This is not anti-fishing.It's about simply the fish that are important to help protect the reef and if the reef ecosystem improves, we would expect fishing to improve.And we want fishers to experience that as well.Over a five-year period, just looking at parrot fish, these are the small body parrotfish.There's several species, but these are the ones that are are small.They get to be a little over a foot in size and they live for about six to 10 years.You could see a rather rapid increase after the closure, which is the dotted line on the left side of the graph, up to nearly twice as much biomass.And that has held more or less stable since that period, when you look at large bodied parrotfish, and these are actually much more important on the reef because of their size, the size of their bite and the effect they have in controlling algae and stimulating other factors on the reef, you see a slower increase.These fish live longer, they grow slower.So that's to be expected, up till about 2013.After that point, they dropped back down to what they were at baseline levels at the start of the reserve.This is likely due to fishing.So yes, it's protected, but unfortunately illegal fishing still happens.And this is one of the biggest challenges we have in resource management is how we get compliance with the rules once we make them.Enforcement is certainly part of that.I'm not gonna talk about enforcement 'cause I don't work for enforcement.It's best to speak with them about the challenges of actually formally enforcing these rules.But there's a lot of other things such as outreach, education, bringing people into the fold of all, why we have these rules and why you need to comply with them.As Ekulu talked about community management, as communities get more involved in the process, working with us, more aware of what's going on, they changed the social structure as well.So it's not acceptable to go out and poach and take fish.It's looked down on, it's shame.So these changes take time, but hopefully that's how we'll start to build compliance because knocking that back down, sets us back another five years and makes it that much harder for us to get where we need to be.Short term successes with this.Coral hasn't changed much on these reefs, but if you see that red line on the bottom, that's crystal's carlanalogy, that's the purple and pink stuff that grows on the bottom.It's critically important on cementing our reefs together, but it's also a landing pad for coral recruits.So new coral recruits seek out this crystal's coralonology to settle and grow.So you need to have that.So anyway, going back, you can see how that has gone from nearly 2% up to about 14%.Here's a picture.This is what we're looking at.You had coral, in between the coral you had algae.Much of those areas now look more like this, where the fleshy algae much less present, but you see that purple and pink stuff on the ground setting that reef up for recovery.So we're seeing that as an early sign that's very positive.Looking at it on a broader scale, the green stuff, there's the two graphs on the left are before the management went into effect, and the two on the right are after.And it just shows it on a general scale, the increase in biomass of parrotfish with the green circles and then the crustal's coralanalogy is those pink circles.So you can see how the reefs have filled in over time.So that's just an example of what's possible as we change the ecosystem back to a more normal state on our reefs.There's a lot of good things that have happened around Maui that make Maui distinct from the rest of the state.We're the only place that has a total ban on the use of lay gillnets.And that went into effect in 2007.We have this Kahekili Herbivore Fisheries Management Area, that's showing a lot of positives and what's possible with the management.And then more recently we implemented parrotfish and goldfish rules, which include bag size and size limits.And for parrot fish actually protect the terminal phase males of the two large species.So if we can get compliance with these things, we would expect to see more of biomass on our reefs.And hopefully that would help provide some of that resilience.It's not gonna do all of it though.We do need to do just as Dr. Field talked about, we need to look at networks of marine managed areas to hedge our bets, set up some of these areas for protection for the future.Community co-management, as Ekulu mentioned, critical things that we need to support and really help these guys out as they work through the management areas of their specific locations.We could really use more county support with watershed management efforts.We have the West Maui Ridge to Reef Initiative.We've spent a lot of time and effort with numerous people, including county representatives coming up with plans to deal with some of the stressors to the watershed in that area.But it always falls back to needing more support from the county public works to maintain and manage and clean out the filters in the storm drains and things of that sort.Reuse and distribution of wastewater, all of these things.A lot of things come together where the county is a major player in how we manage our watershed.So we just need to work better, closer together in that and set these priorities.And I'm gonna leave it at that.I probably ran too long anyway, but certainly glad to answer questions later.Thank you, Russell.Aloha.Thank you guys for allowing us to talk and speak to you guys today.My name is Mark Decos.I'm the Director of the Hawaii Association for Marine Education and Research.And I'm just gonna touch on the land-based side of things.We talked about the things that we can control, the extraction, and then the land-based pollution.Russell touched on a lot of the extraction stuff.You've seen these photos, we're seeing a lot more of these photos.I've heard you guys are discussing this in your council meetings where we're getting much more discharge happening on the reefs.Sediment is the number one problem that's impacting our reefs that we have control over.So I really started to look into why is this becoming more and more of a problem?So sediment 101, whenever there's a construction, anytime you displace dirt, you move vegetation development pretty much.You're gonna allow those soils to be free to move down the mountain by wind or by by water.So we recognize that and so we have...We actually have pretty good laws to prevent that from entering the water.We have the Clean Water Act and when a developer applies for a permit, they are required to get what we call the NPDS permit.And the permit basically states, we'll allow you to discharge, but you have to meet the Department of Health's water quality standards, right?And those standards are pretty strict, and if we look at what those standards are, it's really hard to see there, but basically their values of turbidity and nutrients and whatnot, the threshold can't breach.So we have all the laws in place to prevent that discharge from reaching the ocean.So what is the problem?Well, a lot of these permits, we call the NPS Permit, that allows you to go and disturb the earth, they're self-monitored.So your requirement for compliance is to basically walk the grounds, look at what we call BMPs, Best Management Practices.A lot of times they're sediment basins to capture that sediment in the water or they're silk fences.There's a lot of different types, but there's no actual monitoring of the discharge.So if you're not monitoring what's coming out of the outflow points, it really doesn't matter how well your BMPs look, you're still discharging impaired water.So the difficulty here as well, DOH has so much of a budget, so much staff.They can't go and monitor and take samples of all of these discharge areas.So how do we prevent that sediment, which carries with it all the pollutants, all the nutrients.How do we keep at its source?Well, they have automated monitors now, so people are using them on the east coast.And basically, they're just sensors that you can put in front of a discharge area.You can have them measure turbidity, pH, suspended solids.You can add whatever sensors you want to them, and you can attach a remote communicator.Basically through satellite or through a Wi-fi signal, you can send all that information in real time.So either to the enforcement, to the developer themselves.So this is real time data that's coming in.Once they're installed, you sit back, sit in your office and you'll get a text message, if there's a breach in one of the parameters.Very low cost once they're set up.And like I said, the current way of measuring, we mentioned the water quality standards are 90% impaired in Maui and just as bad in the other counties as well.When you go and sample like they do now, again it's once a month or a couple of times a year, it's really hard to understand where the inputs are coming from.DOH has a mandate to manage that watershed.You're getting inputs from development, from natural sources, from the ungulates, disturbing the dirt.There's a lot of different sources.It's very hard to capture and figure out where all those sources are and develop what they call a pollutant budget.If you set up these automators, you're basically controlling and understanding what those points sources are contributing.So there's no mystery there.It helps DOH to understand it.And if you can look at rainfall data, and very subtle changes.If you get all of a sudden, a sudden...Sometimes these basins or whatever, are pretty good up until a rain threshold, and then it bursts and you get a massive amount of sediment.And just to remind the sediment, once it's on the reef, it's done.You cannot mitigate after that.You have to keep it from reaching the reef, because once it's on there, it gets resuspended over and over again by the wave action.And that continues to kill and kill and kill the reef.And any little babies can not settle on that soft bottom, the coral polyps than the spawn.So you don't get regeneration of new growth.So again, just lots of data can come in in real time, very hard to go and sample during a rain event.So a lot of times people don't get out there too long after this.You can look on your computer any time.You can get very sophisticated where these are long-term permanent systems that need some extra structure.If there's theft situations, you can put them in...You have different ways of dealing with issues where these are remote stations that could be tampered with.Now, the question is who does this?How is it paid for and all that?So my suggestion would be through the application, the MPDs permit.You pay a fee, so you could have a fee of fund, the mitigation fund that helps with the monitoring, so a third party.So just like if you were to get an appraisal on your house, we all like to get our own appraiser to basically elevate that value.But now the banks, you're not allowed.We have a third party.The appraisers have to meet a certain criteria.You get them, they do the evaluation.So when a project and we're gonna have incredible growth here on Maui in the next decade.So there's gonna be a lot of more opportunities of events like this.They're gonna be more and more common.So how do we stop that from happening?So if they implement a fee that goes and allows the establishment of these automated sensors, you just basically park them out at the discharge spots.And then when there's a breach that occurs, the developer's notified immediately they can take care of it.Maybe there's a stop work order until they get it under control.And the developer's paying for that service.So there's no extra budget needed.There's no extra manpower needed by DOH. And you understand exactly where and when these events are happening.Thinking a bit outside the box, there are ways we can get a handle on these major problems.And again, the stuff that we can control is the stuff that we should be focused in doing something about now.Thank you.Thank you.And any further person going to present or that's the end of the presentation?Okay.Well, thank you very much panelists.And at this point members, we can open up the floor at this point for questions and answers, discussion and all of the above.Mr. Couch.Well, I'm not really a member so let them go first.Okay.Yes, Mr. Carroll.Thank you, Chair.And thank you for bringing this forward today.And all of the participants over here are truly appreciated.What you've said over here when you bring forward, is known and it's been known for a long time.Unfortunately, the political will has not been out there, especially at the state level.It's disturbing, the county, we do what we can to control the pollution that you see on the screen.We have the laws, our problems was enforcement and it needs to go further.But we need more support from the state.The state needs to be more involved.I'll give you two examples.Turtle, many years ago in the 70s, me and a group of people, trying to get the commercial selling in with turtle to be illegal.About six people went up there and said, \"It's all right to sell turtle\".We stayed back down until the feds came inside and stopped it.There has been no political will up there for the state to do what's necessary to preserve our environment.When it came up to make spirit fish legal to sell, we went to the state and we said, \"Hey, our environment cannot take this extra load.It's not good for anyone\".We went to DLNR. DLNR would not give us the support.They said it was too hard to enforce.That is about as lean as you can get.They supported the state at all levels.All levels needs to be.We need to get the public.We need to get the people that are listening to this on a carpool.We need them to go over there and support the positions that you have come up with here, this panel, and support the council and the state, and even federal, if necessary.But we really need to get the public to come forward and to understand, and to support what you will come up here with today, because we need to do it all.I appreciate your coming.And I hope this is something that will go further.And I hope that we can keep up the pressure.There's no one specific person to blame.All the decisions were made with turtle and everything else.People give into not going on the right track because they didn't understand, because there weren't enough people out there that were pressing for it and all that needs to change.Thank you, Chair.Thank you, Mr. Carroll, for sharing.Ms. Baisa.Yes.Thank you very much, Chair.And thank you to all of the panelists for being here today.This is definitely a problem that we all need to be very concerned about.I have an old fisherman in my house.And so, I know how things have changed because I listened to his remarks about what he sees and what he saw before.It is sad.But I'm looking at your suggestions about how we can reverse this.And I'm concerned.It's funny because in another committee, in fact, in Mr. Guzman's committee right now, we're talking about coral permits.And I didn't hear a whole lot of talk about how that affects this, but yet my husband often talks about how he's worried about all the sunscreen in the water and all that activity, and the impact that it has.Anybody want to comment?Whoever would like to say, go ahead.Thank you.Everything has an impact as was mentioned.I think the key thing is we can take action on things that we can, and we particularly need to look at some of the major impacts and it's been stated over and over and over again, when you boil it down to three major impacts on our reefs that are gonna threaten their existence so overfishing, land-based pollution and climate change.Can't do much about climate change, but we can start to address the other things.Sunscreen gets a lot of press from time to time.There's been a recent study about it, and I'm sure at a certain level, it does add another layer of stress on our corals, but it's not...A lot of people will glom on to that because, why I don't use sunscreen, it's all the visitors that are the problem.And it's very likely a minor, minor contributor.It wouldn't hurt if people would stop using sunscreen that has particularly the certain ingredients that are bad.It wouldn't hurt if they wore rash guards and things, and just put sunscreen on their face and some exposed areas rather than spray it all over their whole body.But I hesitate to jump on things like that as major cures 'cause I don't think they will have that big of impact.Overuse in general can be a big factor as well.And the coral permits are one way that the county is trying to come to grips with that and control it.And hopefully the state will come along.They now have a system where they can permit all ocean activities, commercial activities, and hopefully the permitting processes to start to better managing it and spreading it out and reducing the impacts, not just for coral reefs, but also to reduce the conflict with other users.But again, I hesitate to jump on that as the major cause.I think we can certainly address certain things and we should when we can, but we need to also keep in our mind these major factors, and figuring out the best way to move forward on those.Thank you for that.Of course, the other area that I'm very interested in and I put a communication in just about a week ago to talk about stormwater, and in attending the Hawaii Water Association Meeting this year, I heard a little bit about stormwater utilities and this is gaining popularity all over the place.And we're going to talk about it.Hopefully the chair will schedule it to find out what is happening in other areas to control storm water.Because while some of this is obviously development based, a lot of it just happens.The water runs down the hill.It's been running down long before I got here and it's still running.And so I think we need to do something really...We have to do something too, when we see these pictures of all that brown water, it's obviously a real serious issue.So that's another thing that I'm very interested in is how do we try and deal with some of that too?It's not anybody's causing it.It just happens, it's always happened.So how can we get that water and put it someplace else where it's not causing problems.But again, thank you very, very much for being here today.Information is important as we have to make some tough decisions.Thank you.Thank you, Ms. Baisa.Thank you, Mr. Sparks.Mr. Guzman, did you have any comments, questions?Yeah.Thank you Chair for bringing forward this subject matter.I'd also like to thank all the participants for the information and this is one step closer for at least sharing the knowledge to the constituents through Akaku and at least getting the message out there.One of my questions is basically, there are three primary stressors: climate, land-based pollution and overfishing.On the overfishing portion of it, I'm gonna have three different questions, but on the overfishing issue, do you have any statistics on how many fish or aquatic fisheries that are basically being taken out by illegal activity, versus Hawaiian gathering rights?Is that an issue that comes up?Is overfishing due to more of the illegal activity or the legal activity that's going on?Probably, there's a lot of legal activity.There's not a whole lot of restrictions on fishing.So unfortunately we don't have a fishing license requirement in this state.So it was really hard for us to get a good grip on the amount of people who are fishing and the model take.Commercial fishermen are required to submit reports.So we have some idea of what the commercial take is, but those reports are not validated.So we're basically taking what they tell us they caught.And some indications suggest that those reports under-reported by at least three times, if not more.And so we do some studies to get a feel for it.My guess would be that non-commercial fishing is huge just because there's so many people doing it.However, commercial fishing has a few people, but they're very effective at doing it.So, rather than sectioning out how people are doing or why they're doing it, it's very important that we just look at how we can manage it for all uses.And then, like you said, even if you do have the regulations in place, if there's illegal fishing going on, it's still a problem that needs to be addressed.So part of that, with marine managed areas, part of that could be that the enforcement is a lot easier.You have an area with a zone and let's say it's a no-take area.If somebody is in there taking fish, enforcement's a lot easier than if, there's just different types of fishing that's allowed.Other than that, I think the real hope's gonna be just changing people's mindsets and awareness so that if somebody is out there illegally doing it, it's really shunned on by their friends and family and peers.Do you foresee or at least have any idea how the county could help?I guess not really enforced, but I guess it could be enforcement, but we don't have jurisdiction in that area, in the ocean.What other means, that you can foresee the county helping out in enforcement limiting the fishing?Aside from, we could probably send out Rezos to encourage the state, but like Mr. Carroll says, a lot of times it falls on deaf ears.So is there anything that you can think of that in your expertise that the county could legislate to help prevent the overfishing?I'm not sure I can answer that directly.As a complete outsider, let me offer a thought here though.And it reflects back to council member Carroll's comments about the concern that the county has, and yet it's a state issue.I've worked on all the coral reefs in the main Hawaiian islands, except Niihau.I've seen the problems and I'm very much aware of how things are looked at.And I may be wrong in this.But what I see is that the county of Maui, is such a political and economic force in the state.That it just seems to me again, as an outsider, that the state should listen.If the county asks for something that is very important to its future and its well being, and its residents for the future, it seems to me, it can have that clout with the state.You're not asking the state to do anything to Hawaii or the big island, but you're asking for yourselves and I would think the state would listen.I don't know, maybe I don't understand all the politics, but I think the county has a very big stick in this to talk this day.It's your backyard and I don't see why they won't help.Yeah, I don't see why.Can I get a copy of that video and send it to the state?I just wanted to add one more thing.I'm sorry, just to answer your question and also of Carroll's was that we are gonna be having additional briefings.So in December, at some time we're in discussion with Suzanne Case from DLNR and Bruce Anderson with DAR and there'll be coming over here for meetings anyway, and we'll be sitting down and having the same discussion with them and absolutely asking as we are with you folks, how we can best provide support and likewise, vice versa.So I'll pass that question on as well with them.Chair, I would propose that if there could be at least one or two items that we could address in a foreign plan or some type of legislation, if that could be put together before the state ledge opens their opening ceremony, I know that all of us usually go there for the opening ceremony and speak to as many state legislators as possible.And that's the time that we get to bend their ear on certain issues that are close to, or at least mean a lot to each and every one of us.So I think if you can get that going, prior to the opening of the ledge, each one of us would do our part to present to as many legislators as possible.I think that's one way of starting it out.The other one is, Chair, the land-based pollutions.Was there any opportunity to bring in public works or environmental management, Mr. Gonoza, and ask him a few questions and concerns in relation to some of this sentiments and other pollutants that are damaging our reefs because he didn't have them scheduled to be part of that panel.No, not at this point, but they are definitely well aware and have brought that up to Director Goode and others, but for sure we can hone in on just that specific on another time, but no, they're not here today to discuss solely on that one particular issue.It's a huge one, I know, but no, not at this time.I did want to comment though that I like your take in regards to all of us working together with our experts, bringing their knowledge and information into our policies we create and aligning it on the state level.But let's not forget also that Mr. Ricky Okama had nominated myself too, on a federal level, in regards to addressing and bringing a voice of ours to that level of government.And so if we can just align county to state, to federal collectively, I think that would be really a great strategy.And I want to give kudos to this body here, Maui Nui Marine Resource, who basically did draft all the wording and the expertise that I took up to the federal level, because they are our eyes on the reef, so to speak and have the best knowledge.And that's why they're here today, obviously, too.I've got to meet Leo Asuncion, who is our Pacific islands region representative.He's Planning Program Manager for Hawaii Coastal Zone Management.I feel good about having dual representation up at the federal level for collectively as, not just Maui voice, but as a state too.And I think we can make great headway that way.And so I think, yes, locally, but I can bring it up to the federal level too, which I'm very, very excited to do and very happy to do.Mr. Carroll, did you- - Thank you, Chair.I would like if I could give our panel over here, it's a copy of the bill for a restricting of spirit fish and also the poundage and the sale or spirit fish, the total poundage.If I could give it to the panel, just for their information.Thank you, Chair.Yes, Mr. Coach.Thank you, Madam Chair.And thank you guys for being here.We always learn from you when you guys come up and give us your presentations.And one of the things I wanted to ask, we got some of the information, but on the overfishing, are we getting pushback from people doing the fishing, the fishermen and the fisher women?Are we getting pushback from and then trying, if we decide to do the CMMAs where they can't fish in certain areas.I'm assuming that part of the CMMA prohibits fishing or certain fishing.I don't like pointing fingers at fishermen for overfishing.Understood.There are different types of fishermen.Those that really Malama and know how, and there are others who use for economic gain.So for us at Polanui, we've gotten good support for a five-year rest period, because they see there's hardly any resources.So they support it.I think most fishermen are against protected areas, but will be for it, if they know there's a light at the end of the tunnel to help support.Because fishing is not just catching fish, it's family time.And without that family time, you're taking away something from them that's very important.So for us, in our small area and allowing that to come back, and reopening up with additional restrictions is important for our management system.But yeah, they can push back, guarantee.But it has to be done in a way that's inclusive.So I would encourage all fishermen to become involved and be a part of the solution throughout the barriers and come up with solutions to each one of the barriers that can help them get to help us so we can help everybody.So it's a very tricky part.I don't like taking those things away, but we do have a responsibility to maintain it.So including them is more important than excluding.So I welcome all fishermen to come and join us in our conversations, in our management plans.'Cause I want to hear the pushback and I want to hear them now before we move any further, because they need to be a part of the solution.I know Mr. Field talked about, I think it was him that talked about particular fish that are banned or was that...But other fish that can be taken.And like you said, Mr. Sparks, that's very hard to enforce.But I like the idea of maybe a rest period, maybe a rolling rest period.Somebody showed us 15% of the Olowalu Reef was really tiny portion.So maybe you take 20% or whatever, 30% of the Olowalu reef and rest that for five or six years and then move.Would that help?'Cause it will help with, still allowing fishing in certain areas, but not in the whole ecosystem.That concept is a popular one that a lot of people gravitate towards.And I'm not sure if it's historical or traditionally done.However, in traditional times they also had a lot of control over effort.How many people were fishing?Fishing in their autopilot, et cetera.Modern times the only example we have of something like that is the Waikiki FMA. And the research has been done on that today.It shows that it's actually worse than areas that are open to fishing all the time.And the reason for that is there's a derby mentality.So you close it for a year or two, I forget what the timing is.The fish come back, you open it up and it's like opening day, everybody is there.So you increase fishing effort beyond what it would be if it was open all the time.So that's the world we live in today, which makes that concept difficult.Beyond that, a lot of the fish that are very important, live for a long time.So they may take five years to mature, and move in onto these reefs where they're important, as grazers eating the algae.But then from that point forward, mortality is really low, natural mortality.And they may live up to 30, 40.Some Kala or unicorn fish have been shown to live up to 50 years old.So these large adults, natural mortality is low and they play an important part in the reef.So if you close an area off for, let's say 10 years and you get a mature population back up, you open it up, that could be lost.All of that gain over the last 10 years could be lost in one year or less.And you're right back to the same point.Just like when I thought about the large parrotfish, slowly coming up and then suddenly back down.So I don't know.I think in the case, Ekulu's talking about a rest area and then they would have other protections in place to help manage the resources once they get up to a point perhaps where they could be harvested, but just rolling closures where you close an area and then open and close another area, probably not gonna work, just given the fishing effort and everything we have today.Okay.Yeah, I can see how very complex the overfishing problem is because you don't want to take away their rights and we don't have a licensing system.I don't think we have a size limit.Do we have the size limits?I know usually when the size limits is, you can keep the big ones, but leave the small ones in there.And it's my understanding that some of the science says now, no, you want to leave the big ones and take the small ones.Yeah.We have minimum sizes on a lot of fish to protect them at the point where they become reproductively mature, but we do not have maximum size limits on almost everything.The only example even gets close to that as our new rules for parrotfish, which protect the terminal phase males.We can take a recess.Do you need to take a recess?Yes.Members, we'll take a five minute recess.Will the Infrastructure Environmental Management Committee, please reconvene and thank you for a quick break.Yes, Mr. Coach.Thank you.I had one, maybe two more questions to finish this.I know we talked about the fishing.Now, one thing I didn't hear anybody saying, and maybe because of what's going on, that this may not be effective at all, but I've been seeing documentaries and doing some studies and seeing presentations about artificial reefs.Putting artificial reefs out front to protect the reefs, using the reef balls and things like that.Are you guys looking into some of that?Would that help?I know probably wouldn't help the whole bleaching situation, but would it help in any way?I guess I'll take that one too.We do have an artificial reef program.Pretty much all of the islands have established artificial reef areas.We've put different types of modules.And even as far back as tires set in concrete, and there are other things.The program is centered around building habitat that is good for fish, particularly fish that people might target.So actually, it's a fisheries enhancement program.It's not a replacement of natural coral reef mindset.There are efforts where you really carefully engineer the type of material and you potentially plant corals and things of that sort.It's a possibility as a last resort, to mitigate or to replace some lost reefs.But my viewpoint is we would serve much better if we protected our natural reefs, and try to improve the situation so that they recruited out and grew and were healthy and thrive on their own, rather than relating back to putting concrete structures on.We always could do that, but it's not gonna really bring back the reefs the way they are naturally.I just want to second Russell's comments.This is being done of course, in the Caribbean where they have a severe coral loss problem, they're trying different things.But we think about it in a matter of scale, we're talking about 15,000 acres of really good coral.At least it was until a couple of months ago, but it's still pretty good.And replacing it with little plots here and there.It's the difference in scale that we're not gonna achieve.And we should put our effort in protecting what we have.I just want to emphasize, we've gotten back naturally to the things we can control, like land-based pollution and fishing.Climate is now the 500 pound gorilla in the room.There were thousands of acres bleached in the Northwest Hawaiian islands, which have no runoff and no problems like that.And so what everybody says or everybody sees happening is that this problem will...It may not just incrementally get worse.Next year may be an off year, but we'll be seeing more of these.This is unprecedented, and we'll be seeing more of those.And we have taken into account that the entire reef track is really at risk, and so we have to do what we can to put these other stressors.Thank you, Dr. Hugh.Thank you.Thank you.Any further comments, questions?I do like to announce the presence of Council Chair, Mike White.Aloha, thank you.Thank you, Chair.I'm sorry I missed the presentation.I caught some of the latter part of it watching downstairs, but one of the things that Mr Field mentioned was this is our backyard, and I've always felt that there should be more cooperation between the state and the counties, because we have this dividing line at the high water mark.What's above the high water mark is our responsibility and what's below the high water mark is the states.And I think that allows too high a level of cop-out.And I would love to see us develop some protected areas that we could then help DLNR to police by putting our own resources into deputizing people that would work alongside with DLNR or become part of DLNR. But I think that we've got a responsibility to protect this resource and having lived here all my life, I've not ever seen us really take it terribly seriously.DLNR is one of the most poorly funded parts of the state government.And yet they're responsible for overseeing a huge stretch of not only our land, but our oceans.And I remember I was in the legislature once.We passed the subsistence fishing zone for the island of Molokai.I don't remember the gentleman's name, but he had been working in aquatics for many, many years.I called him and I said, \"It looks like we're gonna be able to get a bill just for Molokai.Should we just take the Senate version or try again next year\"?And he said, \"It took me 20 years just to change the size of the opening in gillnets.So take what you got and run like hell\".And that basically points out the fact that, I don't think lawmakers have taken a full responsibility for protecting what's out there.We don't have fishing licenses.As even Mr. Sparks said, we don't have an idea what the take is, except from commercial fishermen.But we've all got a responsibility to protect the reefs.And if over fishing or fishing is part of the problem, then we should be dealing with it.And from a county perspective, I wouldn't mind putting some resources towards that.We spend more than any other county, with respect to watershed protection.Well, that's just one end of it, but I wouldn't have a problem.I don't think anyone else in this room would have a problem providing resources to assist with the near shore waters because they're part of our home, just like the land is.So I really appreciate you guys coming.I wish I didn't have another meeting that I had to deal with, but I really appreciate your time and energy that you've put into this.Thank you, Chair White.Members any further discussion, comments for our panelists here today?Seeing none, I want to thank all of you for your time, energy, and effort, and especially your expertise.And again, thank you for contributing to my position with the Governance Coordinating Committee with the National Ocean Policy Makers up on the federal level.And I'll tell you members and Maui county as a whole, and to the state that the people that you see right in front of us are really helping to make some great policies to help address all the things that we discussed here today.So it's gonna take all the efforts.Yes, Mr. White, I know local county federal level, and collectively, we can get things done and I feel a great tide or a groundswell of movement with everyone.I think we're all forced into this corner right now with global warming and what have you, that we need to take action swiftly, quickly and so thank you all members.And we shall now take a brief recess to reset the room, and it looks like we have public works here to join us next.So with that, thanks everybody.And we will be in a short recess.Will the Infrastructure Environmental Management Committee please reconvene and members, we are onto our next item, IEM 40.This is in regards to termination of license agreement affecting lots, 143, 144 and 145 of the Pukalani lots at Kehua, Pukalani.And this is a count of communication.15-241 from Director of Public Works, transmitting a proposed resolution entitled, \"Termination of License Affecting Lots 143, 144 and 145 of the Pukalani lots at Kehua Kula island of Maui Hawaii\".The purpose of the proposed resolution is to terminate an unused license in favor of the county of Maui for drain and sewer line purposes on three lots in Pukalani Maui, Hawaii.And with that, I will turn the floor over to Director Goode of public works for some opening comments.So, Dr. Goode.Good afternoon, Chair, members of the committee.Dave Goode here from the Department of Public Works.And before you today is an interesting case for us.And first I'm gonna ask if the members have the map showing where this is located.It's actually on page two of our transmittal, and I know that it was supposed to be in red.My copy, it was in black so it was hard to see.So I'll make sure members all see where we're talking about.Director, it's transmittal August 31st, dated August 31st on the cover page.Is that correct?Okay.So there's a map on the second page.Yes, I see it.It says shown in red and mine just happens to be black.So it was really hard to see.Just want to make sure the members have it.I have the red line here.Okay, we got red.Yes, I do.You guys got red?Okay, better than my copy goes.Okay.This particular portion of the lower end of Pukalani was developed in the early 50s.And they had these long, skinny lots around Malcolm Makai and cross a couple of our...Across, I guess, in some ways, our roadway.And they have they're private lots.We do not own them.They're last owned by, it looks like Frank Munoz, Jesse Munoz and Emmmanuel Sui.And as far as we know, they were never probated, but they also included on these long, skinny lots, a license to the county of Maui for future drainage or sewer lines improvements.We never installed any drain line improvements, we never installed any sewer line improvements.We had no intention of installing either of them.So we were interested in canceling that license because we do get an occasional call from someone that says, \"You gotta come clean out your lots\".They're not our lots and the license just gave us the right to install, either drain our sewer lines.And yet we have no intention of doing so.So we want to basically cancel license.Normally a license, you can ask core council here, but normally a license has a 30 day cancel clause by either party.And usually with some kind of notice, given the other party.There's no notice in here.The way the license is written, it's written, as it says, acts as an easement.So, I thought it's best that we have a council action.It would be a resolution and we can then record on the property to show that the county has no interest in executing this license.If for some reason in the future, it is desired by the county to use these parcels.And by the way, these parcels are 10 feet wide.It's really not enough room to even backhoe in there and work.But if for some reason, the county did want to acquire those parcels, the parcels are basically sitting out there.Again, last owned by three individuals who as far as we know, never probated them out.So I suppose we could go to court, get control of the properties if indeed we needed to.So anyway, that's the purpose of this resolution today, again, is to formally sever our ties with the license agreement and carry on.Thank you, Director Goode.Members, any questions and before I get comments from the floor, I do have a question for corporation counsel, Ms. Thompson.It appears that the Rezo doesn't reference any provisions of state or county law for terminating such licenses.Should we be concerned with that to figure out a legal process of our involvement in doing this type of action at all?Thank you, Chair.The nature of this easement would be more in common law and related to abandonment of easements.Say, if the owner wanted to come back to the county and say, you've never used this property for 65 years.And so therefore you've effectively abandoned your right to use it, but that is all related to common law usage and chapter 344 of the Maui County Code discusses the county's disposition of county property in easements or in fee simple.But that wouldn't apply to this case since we're really just relinquishing the right to use someone else's property, which I believe is practice drafted.Okay, very good.Thank you for that clarification, Ms. Thompson.Members, the floor is now open for questions, comments, anything of director or corporation council here?No, everyone's all good?We're all good, Mr. Goode.Okay, so with that then I shall make my recommendation.I would like to recommend adoption of the proposed resolution and of course incorporating any non-substantive revisions and filing of the county communication.Thank you, it's been moved by Chair White, seconded by Ms. Baisa and members, any need for further discussion on the matter?Seeing none then, all those in favor, say aye.Aye.Any opposed, say no.Seeing no oppose measure passes with, let us see.Three at five eyes, two excused and zero nos.So, okay.That's all done.Director Goode, thank you for your presence here today and explanation.So next on our agenda, we have IEM 42, and this is grant of sewer line easement to Hospice Maui Incorporated in Wailuku.And this item is a county communication, 15-262 from Director of Housing and Human Concerns.Ms. Ryman, would you like to come and join us?And transmitting proposed resolution entitled, \"Authorizing the Granting of Easements for Sewer Line Purposes to Hospice Maui Inc, Pursuant to Chapter 3.44, Maui County Code\".And the purpose of the proposed resolution is to grant to Hospice Maui, Inc., a sewer line easement for the limited purpose of installing underground sewer pipelines and related facilities within the leased premises and other real property owned by the county of Maui to connect to public sewer system.So at this point I shall welcome Director of Housing and Human Concerns, Ms. Carol Ryman, aloha.Aloha Chair.Aloha.And I'm opening up the floor to yourself and Director Goode, whoever would like to speak to the item, you may.Thank you, Chair.Members of the committee, my name is Carol Ryman, Director of Housing and Human Concerns.So basically Hospice Maui, the side of Mahalani Street that they are currently at does not have any sewage systems.So this easement is to allow them to hook up to the county sewage facility that's on the other side of the street.And it will go under Mahalani Road and Mahalani Road from what I understand is in the jurisdiction of Public Works and so they're good as here as well.Okay.Thank you, Ms. Ryman and Director.Goode, did you have some comments to add at all?Just briefly Chair, just as it relates to the roadway.If the hospice is in charge of the line, if they have to do anything to the line, they always notify us and we'd work with them.Okay.All right, very good.Pretty straightforward there.Ms. Thompson, yes.Thank you, Chair.I just wanted to correct.There was some testimony earlier that this was an easement from the county to the county and that's not correct.It's actually an easement to benefit Hospice Maui as an easement for a term that coincides with the lease term of the hospice facility.Okay, did I read that out of our agenda item?It was just to correct what was said by Mr. Logoi, the public testifier.Oh okay, got it.Thank you very much for that clarification and members, any need for further discussion, comments?Yes, Ms. Baisa.Thank you very much Chair and I would like to comment.I want to say that I'm very happy that we're at this juncture here.Hospice has been trying for a very long time to get this taken care of and it's a big need in our community.I think we're all realizing more as we watch the news and what goes on that we really need this facility.So I'm very happy that this is here today and that I can support it.And I asked my colleagues to do so too.Thank you for your comments, Ms. Baisa.Any further discussion or comments?Seeing none then, I shall make my recommendation.Recommendations.Thank you.I want to entertain a motion to recommend adoption of the proposed resolution entitled: Authorizing the granting of easements for sewer line purposes to Hospice Maui Inc., pursuant to chapter 3.44 Maui County Code, incorporate any non-substantive revisions and filing of county communication 15-262.Thank you.It's been moved by Chair White, seconded by Ms. Baisa.And at this time, any discussion needed?Seeing none, all those in favor, say aye.Aye.Any opposed, say no.Seeing no opposed, motion passes with five ayes, two excused and zero nos and members with that, I believe we have completed our agenda today, and thank you very much for all attending and this meeting is adjourned.\u266a Around you everywhere \u266a \u266a Take a walk in the country \u266a \u266a Feel the wind in your hair \u266a \u266a Take a walk in the country \u266a", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/IEM_11-16-15.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/IEM_11-16-15.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/IEM_11-16-15.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/Plan_Peters_2022_-_Closing_Presentation_-_Audience_Q_A/Plan_Peters_2022_-_Closing_Presentation_-_Audience_Q_A.mp3", "text": "Okay, in conjunction with this process here, again, I'm going back to what you had said earlier.You were also going to keep an eye on the criteria and the way things are going with the economy and some of the other things, which means you may have to keep reprioritizing to go along with the conditions at the time of just everything in there...Sure, sure.Okay.Everybody hear that?Just because of changing conditions we want to be cognizant of that as we proceed with the plan to make sure that those kinds of influences are considered as we plan.Is that fair?Yes.Yes.Yeah.So the thing to keep in mind is obviously this is a long range plan, so even the recession, as painful as it was for a lot of people, is kind of a blip on the radar screen.It's going to take some areas longer than others to get out of that.It certainly has had a profound impact on how some development is done and will be done in the future.And I think we talked about that Tuesday night, the changing face of commercial, for example, how over-built so many communities are, and developers are starting to rethink that the demand for commercial, the type of commercial.And that's one reason why mixed-use development is becoming more popular, because commercial is being scaled down and offices and residential are being added to make the projects more viable.But, yeah, we certainly will be looking at that.And that's one reason why we did the market study, is so we would have some understanding, as we move forward, what is reasonable and what isn't, you know, so many communities do a plan without benefit of really understanding how much need or demand there is without looking at surrounding communities.You know, if we were just looking at Peters Township in a vacuum and not considering Southpoint, we might be inclined to say, \"Well, you know, we could support a big office research industrial park here\".Which isn't feasible.So understanding the market conditions helps us to stay fairly well grounded and come up with a more implementable plan.Sure.I guess just watching the news constantly.It's amazing, just even with the commercial businesses, how some of the giants are talking about cutting back the number of stores they have throughout the country.Sure.And I'm sure that would have an impact on a lot of areas like ours throughout the country, because when you're closing stores that also hurts the community.It does, but it can also be an opportunity.And we worked with some communities, where they, one in particular that I can think of, they had two big box stores side-by-side, both went out of business and they came to us and said, \"Okay, do us a plan, figure out what we do with, whatever it was, 40 acres of parking lot and vacant buildings\".And they reinvented that whole area into more of a community center with recreation, entertainment, some small retail.But, you know, who would have thought 10 years ago that national chains would not exist anymore.But again, going back to one of the examples that Matt showed, it can be an opportunity because right now the big box is the focal point.Kmart is the focal point in that shopping center.But 20 years from now, that could be totally different.So we want to keep an open mind about what the possibilities might be.Yes sir?Thank you very much.One thing about, um...And all the models were impressive.You got chits and color codes and everything else, and one thing that wasn't mentioned was taxes on what the implications that your various strategies would do the taxes.I'm sure that would have an impact in adoptability - Yeah.This one right now part of what we're doing.If you remember from the Tuesday night presentation, the trend development scenario now, so if you just do nothing and build out under your zoning, your annual shortfall is, about 300 to $350,000.If anyone is really keeping a close watch of their tax bill, that's about a mill millage, one mill of increase tax.Or you could do and to try to offset some of that.But right now you are running a deficit each year and using reserve funds to cover that.So as part of this, as we, as we dream up other things that's going to be one thing we look at is, are we closing the gap?Are we lengthening in the gap?Where do we fall in that?Yes, taxes are very important.In this plan has any thought been given to marketing Peters Township?Now you talk about a tax shortfall.Yeah.We have a great library over here - Mm hm.That would cost millions to duplicate in any one of a number of surrounding communities.Correct.Finley Bibb.I could go on.Why don't we market our library to these communities?And of course, be able to receive some compensation for that market.We've got a community center which serves approximately 5% of the population of this township.I have yet to see a wedding ceremony or a wedding party over there.I mean, that's a facility that could be generating income.And, producing income that could offset that tax increase that you're talking about.Has any thought been given to marketing Peters Township services?There hasn't been any conclusions on that yet, but there's no reason that wouldn't move forward.Matt, sorry to interrupt you.Can you please just summarize again?Sorry.Sorry.The question was: Has there been any thought given in the planning process today about marketing some of the assets you already have?Like the library, like the recreation center and things like that.Is that correct?Yes - Okay.And my answer started by saying not at this point, but that's what the planning process is all about.We start very high level and we continue to get focused and refine.And that's one of those things that is, as Paul continues in the process, that that should be brought up.I will tell you because we work around the country, that is a very successful strategy that we've seen others use.And what that means is you need to create, well, a brand and identity of Peters Township and what it is, and then you need to go sell it, right?So not only would you, there's some towns I used to work with in Texas, that they would create packages of all the assets of what they offered and they would go to those trade shows and that, and they'd have a booth that talks about why they're great.You know, there's no reason you couldn't do that on a smaller scale with your community assets, trying to compete in here.Because, let's be very honest with ourselves while we need to be friendly with our neighbors, for economic development sometimes you're competing with your neighbors, right?So it's friendly competition I hope, but you need to put your best foot forward in order to capitalize.Because when somebody does site selection and they come and see what you have to offer, make it as easy as you can for those people to get the information.Even planning services for those, less well-funded communities would be, not only a boom to them in developing those communities, but also a boom to our community, through generation of income.And offset it because he, the young man in the front row is dead right.Taxes are going to be a problem as more of us get older and that's happening.I think there's more AARP cards in this audience than there are anything else.And taxes are certainly something that potential home buyers look at.We're in competition for new homes, with places like North Strabane and other communities.We've got to remain competitive and certainly that boils down to in many ways, taxes and services, most, more services at the least possible cost.That's the winning strategy.It is.Just to add to your point about marketing the library.I think that reinforces the idea of strengthening this as a town center and giving people an opportunity to do something more than just visit the library, but create public spaces for events.Provide more shops and things to do so that they can play off one another.And there's a reason to come here and stay for awhile.Well, if I may say something, when we were doing our petition, we went on, we have a trail night.And it was, it gets quite busy.But we didn't get many signatures because most of the people were coming from other places to walk the trail.So I do view our trail and that was a focus in our group, our trail was a big asset to our community, and I think it really needs to be developed.Yeah I think a lot of groups said that.Did the whole audience hear that?That the trail's a large asset.Yeah.Yes.Just a quick question: Ah, in all the other workshops which I wasn't a part of, I'm just kind of wondering about the, the type of transit.With areas in conjunction with what you're talking about the other day, parking is going to be an issue in some of these areas, especially, you know, if you have a big facility and a lot of people need to get to.Are we thinking ahead and how we can maybe bus people?Have a transit system at our area, which we, I don't believe we do have one.To get around maybe from the senior centers to the town center, the store whatever the case may be.Or maybe some of us want to meet into some of these other new areas you're talking about as a model, to see what they're all about.We don't have to use our car.You don't have to worry about the parking problems and stuff like that.Is there some discussion in that area or thoughts?Um, the question was about transit and what level of dialogue was there on transit and what were any conclusions that occurred and the like?Is that correct?Mm-hm - Okay.Um, if I'm thinking back through the four events, I would say that that the discussion on transit was probably lukewarm, at this point.There were people who wanted it, and then there were people who did not want it.So the answer falls somewhere in between.The resources are on the team to look at transit as part of the process continuing.But transit is successful when you have riders.And riders, it's simple, right?And riders are generated a lot of times by density and by use.So like all coming together.So what happens in, This reminds me of a project that I did in Memphis, Tennessee, where everybody wanted light rail transit.So like the station at the library, now, that y'all know where that is, the light rail station.People are like, can we extend that?Can we extend it?Well, this happened in Memphis.And they said, we want the light rail extended, but we only want to have, you know, three units an acre.And they said, well, look, it cost me this much to build that technology.So in exchange, you have ridership, I need at least this many riders to be there.And the density wasn't there.some general rules of thumb like for, for light rail and ones with a park and ride.You want like 25 units an acre.Is that what you're using?So I mean, very dense, dense types of developments.So the reason I'm saying that is when it comes to transit, we need to make sure we make, make sure our transportation technology and our land use decisions are one in the same.So if we want transit and you know, I'm not saying either way, but if we want transit, then we have to have a discussion about what land use patterns and densities will allow that.If we don't, ah, if we want to have a certain land use pattern and development density within the community that does not support transit, you need to know that's the case so that you understand why transit providers might not be knocking down your door to give you transit.I mean, there's all different levels.You know, we talked about light rail, just 'cause, 'cause I drove by library, but you know, you could have the smaller bus demand service.There's all kinds of different levels.But it's all gonna come down to whether they can sustain their business.And that's going to come down to ridership.Alright.I'm assuming it's way too early for this.But at some point this plan is all going to come together.The township's gonna move forward.Will there be any time when individual property owners or neighborhoods when they finally see what's going on right in their neighborhood, where they'll have a voice to say, \"either yes we did, that is what we imagined or no, we don't, we didn't want that here in our specific area\".Well it's so much easier to write a plan I'm involved in.But they're very successful right?No, ah, because Paul's going to be heading the process from here forward for the plan.But you know, I can tell you that you have to involve and talk with those people.And I mean, there's legal informal ways like public adoption hearings and stuff like that.But there's also other opportunities like just having drop-in sessions, where once the draft plan is in the hands of township staff, they announce they have it.And you know, for a week or something, you have almost like when we were in college where you had office hours and you could go drop in and ask the township anything you want, let's go find my property.What does it mean?What's going on?Let me give you a formal comment that I would like you to have attached to your staff report or something of that nature.So that everything is there to let that happen.We need to be very honest with ourselves.This plan will not be successful without the support of community.It would just go on a million dollar shelf, just like all the reports go on.Right?So all those things are going to be in the report.And to follow up, that's a conversation we want to have with the steering committee to find out what they suggest we do somewhere between here and the public hearing.Like I said, anything we do what we posted on the website.But if they feel that we need a more formal opportunity and open another open house or something like that.Ah, then there's certainly amenable to do that kind of thing.Well, just like I talked about working with the planning commission and township council, we don't want the public to be blindsided either, so...And as, as Paul's saying, as he's going to discuss with the steering committee there's options.But just everybody in this room understand that the planning department downstairs we're open 8:30 to 4:30 every day.We would welcome anybody at any time to come in and discuss this.Your ideas, your concerns, we're open to anybody come in and we'll talk to anybody at any time.So know that we have a very open door policy, so you're welcome to come in at any time.We'll get it.Yes sir?Is there any process by which the community plans to reach out to, for example, manufacturers, ah, bring some of that into the township.We have a solid little bit of the rail line in the Neisha it's designated as industrial.You know, just off the top of my head, going back to the senior citizen, there's an awful lot of manufacturing of artificial joints, for example, that's just one example, - Sure.A very clean industry, requiring high-tech and skilled workers to attract that kind of a business.Any thoughts along those lines?Well, in fact, in our market study, Howard was here on Tuesday night.He did identify, not a complete laundry list, but identified a number of business types that aren't here now that based on his experience and his work around the country, he thinks there may be some opportunity to explore.And that certainly could be one of them.Oh, we had a great conversation the other day over lunch about, you know, again, the changing dynamic of how things are done with the internet, with shopping online, with, you know, his feeling and I've read articles about within 10 years, many people won't even go shopping for clothes because you will go in once, get measured completely, go online, tell them what you want.It's manufactured in a factory no bigger than this, by two or three people running machines.I mean, it's, - There was an advertisement on the radio today and it actually took into account female sizes by height.And so a size 10 or whatever, was slightly different.Yeah.On the radio today.So, we can't even conceive right now of all the changes that we will witness in 10 or 20 years.The rate of change is accelerating.Exactly.Exactly.We do have the facility already in chip manufacturing parts for in-clients.Great, good to hear.That is just so you know.So that, as a part of that implementation recommendations in the plan, we'll be looking at things like that.Looking at branding, we've already had some discussions with staff about whether things like tax increment financing and community improvement districts that other states use are potentially available to Peters Township to fund redevelopment.So it's too early to know what those actions are going to be, but we want to go beyond just zoning changes.We want to look at organizational changes.We want to look at capital improvements.We want to look at the waterfront in terms of how we accomplish the things that we're setting out to do.Just for the sake of, we're videotaping these presentations, obviously for people that are at home that couldn't attend this evening.So, I know I'm repeating, but the question was: Ah, manufacturing and the specific thing was implants.And our planning director had said that there is already a facility within Peters township that has been manufacturing those and has done so for awhile.Yes ma'am?I just need a clarification.You're talking about marketing the services within Peters Township.And, if I'm clear on this, say some of the neighboring parks or the small communities really cannot afford to have the big, bigger libraries or even a library.I can think of 84 and Finleyville right off the top of my head.So, basically this would be Peters Township offering the people, if they would want to come and use our facilities, ah, say the rec center, then there would be a charge to them.But at least they would have something available to them that they don't have in their small communities.Is that what you're talking about?Well, let me repeat, the question, I guess is for clarification, the concept that I think this gentleman brought up earlier.Marketing facilities, that Peters Township has that they're well-known for, that they're proud of that other communities in the surrounding area may not have, or may not have the level of quality that Peters Township does.Would we market to them and charge them to use those facilities?Those are policy decisions.You know, I think we've already heard from staff here that there is, there are a number of cooperative agreements in place with adjoining communities to share services.That might be the next step to actually market Peters Township assets to surrounding areas.Whether they're charged for it or not charged, or how much As Matt said, that's beyond my pay grade.Most of the...Another example of that would be a regional police department.You had raised your hand - How long did you guys touch upon a little things like more density and mixed use?What are the tax implications for the school district?Is that a good idea?A bad idea?What does that exactly bring to the community from a dollars and cents point?Does it, that's a great question.The question was if we could expand on the idea, the concept of mixed use in terms of the use, the density and its common characteristics specifically in terms of impacts to schools or other services provided by the town, the tax base and those kinds of things.Correct.Okay.That's an interesting question.Because two people could probably hire Paul and I separately to argue the point back and forth because a lot of it is all, I need more information kind of thing.And what I mean by that is, there is, you know, sort of a minimum definition of mixed use, which is two or more uses, but they could be uses that don't have any synergy together.They can be used as that look like two different developments and they only share an entrance.So you have to have meaningful mixed use.And when I say mixed use, I'm talking about like destination mixed use.when I started to make some of these statements.Mixed use development is the way we're defining it, being something more dense and with more uses on the same site than what you have been in the township today.By its very nature of having more stuff on the land would have a higher total building value, which usually translates into greater taxes.On the same piece of land because the land value would be the same.I think I was probably thinking along the lines of making that an apartment building, as opposed to mixed use, which we don't have any.Does that bring more people in or does it take pressure off the school district?You know, because there's residents that maybe not have kids in there, but they're still paying the school tax.Yeah, well, I mean is as a general rule, you know, non-residential uses pay taxes.If it goes into a general fund for schools, then that money could be used to help offset.But if you have a separate millage rate, that's charged just to say residents for schools - And we do - Then there would be no benefit by having more non-residential because they're not actually being taxed for the schools.But there's interesting ways you can do it.You know some committees we work in, you can start to earmark some of like a sales tax or some other fees and taxes in order to help offset.But usually the legal test is to have a rational nexus, meaning you have to have a connection sort of for what you're charging and the service that you're providing.So again, it gets very complicated.Your specific question about an apartment complex versus a mixed use development.Obviously if the mixed use development ended up having some combination that had less units than the apartment complex, then you would have less impact on schools, 'cause you'd have less students.But the tax question is a little more complicated.We'd have to run through it.Maybe to take that one step further.In looking at different types of residential, single family versus multi-family versus condos.There, and there is no universal number, but in all the studies that I'm aware of, single family homes generate more school kids than condos and even more than apartments.So, you know, that gets entered into the equation that the condo developer or the apartment owner is paying taxes, but not using the school system to the same extent as the single family subdivision.So, you know, those are, like I said, we did look at that.In fact, uh, we looked at that to see if those were numbers we could use in this exercise.But the numbers are all over the board.You know, I think relatively speaking, what I just said is consistent across all studies.But the actual numbers of how many kids come from a home versus an apartment versus a condo differ by region and based on other factors as well.So by the time we're done to the end of this one, we'll have a better answer for that question?You'll have an answer.Part of it depends, I mean, literally is as recent as this afternoon, we're still trying to work with the school district to get the right generation right to assume.So I could give you a conclusion based on what we've done today, but we could have the wrong rates.So, I mean, it would be premature at this point to give you an answer, but all that stuff does get factored in.And once we have good data, we'll get good answers.But that woman went first and then you're next, okay?Throughout all of these last three days, did you hear much of anybody say or allude to the fact that while Peter's Township isn't really broke very bad, if it isn't broke, don't fix it; is the way it's going is fairly good.As all the ones that I attended, all the sessions that I attended, for example, the ones with the stickers, we were given a packet of stickers and there was a certain amount of stickers in each packet.And you had to put the stickers on which sort of translate into, well, we need quite a bit of change because there was a lot of stickers in there.You have to put them somewhere.Yeah, you had to.So, um, if I would have had that pack, I would maybe only picked out one or two stickers well we may, we need a little bit of change, but not a lot of change.Did you hear any of that?That Peters Township isn't that bad?I like Peters Township because I do.I like the school.My kids go to school and I'm proud of it.But maybe the way it's going is not that bad.And it should somewhat continue that way.Did you hear any of that?Yes.The, the question that was raised was how often, and to what level did you hear that everything is fine at Peter's Township?Just leave us as we are.We're happy as we are, and we want to continue down that path.Is that correct?Okay.We did hear that in each session, in the beginning of each session, you know, why, do you remember we asked, what do you like most about Peter's township?What do you like?What's your biggest challenges kind of things.It did come out a lot in the beginning of the sessions about, hey, we just like it the way it is.We moved here for a reason.As those conversations wen went on though, there were kind of two important things that came to light that had people scratch their head, but maybe not change your opinion, but at least thinking about it.The first one being that Peters Township welcomed most of you all from somewhere else, is that correct?Okay.So at some point they opened you with him with open arms.So you came and added to what Peters Township is.And so, it may be wrong of you not to invite the next person to come.And then the second thing that came up a little bit was, well, the one way to keep Peters Township exactly as it is today is to not allow any more development.And those people who have zoning that allow development right now, we're not very happy about that.Because they felt that they had rights and they had counted on some things and what their land can become and what it is.So those two things were discussion points.Now it didn't mean it that it either swayed anybody one way or another, but I'm just reporting to you kind of what was said, rather than me giving a conclusion of what I felt, the opinion or my opinion of that is.But that's kind of how it came up and how the discussions led after that.It was overwhelmingly supported that everyone likes living in Peters Township and they want to protect it to whatever extent they can.Because they want to keep it the way it is.But if, if growth is going to occur, they want to grow with their eyes open and kind of know what's coming and be prepared for it.Rather than find out some day that you wake up and you just want to move.So that, that's kind of just some vibe.But I don't want to give you my conclusions, but that's the vibe.And I found it interesting that out of 11 groups, only three chose the trend packet.In other words, keep going the way we are.And even among those groups, in most cases, if you look at their, I mean, you can look at the map and figure out which one, had 83 stickers and which one had 40.But even among the groups that picked the trend packet, in most cases, they've also added some mixed use development, in nodes or isolated locations around the township.Which indicated to us that even though they, they generally want things to continue as they have, they do recognize that some of the things we've talked about Tuesday night are concerns.You know, the lack of other commercial areas, the lack of housing opportunity, and things like that.So, I think one of the outcomes of this is that it wasn't an all or nothing kind of proposition.All of the groups had many commonalities in terms of where they wanted to see development and the types of development more or less that they were comfortable with.And just one more thing, it's always great when we keep piling on, right?I just want to bring up this map to give some context to that.Remember, this is the growth map that we had.And as Paul had mentioned, a lot of tables did come, come around to the conclusion they wanted some type of destination to go to.But if you look at the size of these circles compared to the township as a whole, it was not that we needed to start over, we were on a bad path, kind of an idea.It was about adding choice and more to the portfolio, but it wasn't about erasing, so to speak.One more.Any other questions?Next question?I think she was next.Oh this is the lady over here.I'm sorry.Um, so, what happens, is there a strategy, let's say you skipped, you know, 10, 15 years from now and we have grown and we're fully maximizing all our land use.What is the strategy for sustaining that into the future?And is there anything we can do now till then to make it so that it's sustainable?What do you do?What is the strategy?Sure.Do you want to start?I can start and then you can have the last two.Well, that's, that's the purpose of the plan because that's one of the words that we've been throwing about is sustainability.And is the current model going to sustain us into the future or do we have to make some mid-course corrections, if you will.And that's why I said a few minutes ago, even though, you know, when we finish all this and we have a good plan and the majority of people love it, it's been adopted all that, the job isn't done, because things do change and we will have to look at it annually to make sure that if we need to make mid-course corrections, we can.But you know, based on what we heard yesterday, I think a lot of people are starting to understand that we do have the opportunity and probably have the need to do some things a little differently than what we've done in the past.And, you know, again, change is happening at such a rapid rate.We don't have a crystal ball.We can't predict what 10 years is going to look like from now.We're basing it on what we know when we read what other communities are doing.I think that we're going to do a good job, but I think the community needs to be vigilant and monitor the plan and monitor progress and make changes as needed.One thing I would just add quickly is I would encourage you and you always want to plan with the end in mind.But I would encourage you, and I told you earlier that this isn't my plan.So this is just a suggestion, but what I'll encourage you to do and other communities have done is, even though they're called guiding principles, I like to call them the timeless principles.So when you all come up with timeless principles and start with a steering committee and they share and ask for your opinions, take those seriously.Because those should be things that no matter how many times you update your plan, they stay true.So for example, we just finished a plan in Londonderry New Hampshire.And some of the guiding principles that they had were: stay forever green.So very, very simple, but could adapt to whatever new situations came up.But you knew no matter from now to the end you wanted to be green.They wanted to be a walkable community.They wanted to enhance their municipal advantage.Those were the type of statements as principals they made, because if the game changes a little bit, it's okay.But they do not want to leave their principles because once you do, what you did behind you may not be good anymore.So always planning with that in mind and the principals are general enough that they shouldn't be able to withstand recessions and all that kind of stuff and stay true to them.And that's how I make sure that they end up working.Jamie had a question.My observation was, you said Tuesday night Peters Township is 98% single family homes.And the national average is 74.And in our group, which was the group over here, they put half of their lots all over that undeveloped ground in, uh, Brighton?Right.Right.And I looked at all the maps and I looked at the map you have here.We want some change, but we want it controlled, right?And there's certain areas we'd like to see that change.Yeah.There was consensus on where change would be contemplated.I wouldn't even say welcomed.Where it would be contemplated.First is mapping it all out in half acre lots.In keeping us at 98%, half acre lots.That was the, that was the theme that came out of this week's events.Now this week's event just so everyone knows gets combined with all the different ways input is being put into this plan.And so it'll all be balanced, but out of this week's events, that's what consensus can be reached.The plan, which I think you mentioned was due in November, - August.August.Pardon me.I may ask for the extension though.It's okay by me.I know.The plan, when it is finished and adopted, within 10 years, how much of this original plan do you think will be final in the 10 year period?How much of it will...Final in terms of implemented?10%?20%?The question is 10 years from now, in your experience, how far down the road will we be in terms of implementing the plan?As it was written.Yeah.Well, there, there are a couple different things.One would be, the action recommendations that will be in the plan.We would hope 10 years from now, the majority of those would have been put in place.In terms of land use that's much more difficult to determine because again, there's economic factors and so on.But I certainly expect that in the lengthy list of action steps that we put in the plan.If the township is committed to the plan, which I have every reason to believe they will be.They'll start going down that list and implementing those recommendations.I'd be very disappointed if a majority of those weren't in place 10 years from now, if not all of them.So a majority, you're talking say 70%?I sure, - We have to say it's, let's just go back to the 2001.And when the plan was completed then.So some of the recommendations that were then were things like the rec center, the improvements to center church and east of Murray, the improvements that are soon to be happening around route 19, lands use, sometimes it's slow as Paul was talking about.So this is a long range plan.There might be, depending on the recommendations, some things might be able to be implemented very quickly.They're quick steps that we can take.They might be a year goal and we can get those things done.There's other things that depend on the market and private investment as well, as well as state funds and local funds to get things done.It depends on the recommendations.There's things that can be done quickly.There's things that will take time for us to get done.And then there's other things that might rely on outside things that we can't control type of thing.Yes ma'am.We're really talking of the long range plan and I, being a fairly new transplant to here.I agree that it's a great view, but I think we don't, we don't want to forget about Peters' current identity that is making it attractive currently because we have to keep those people coming for the next five to six years as we build out.So currently, the identity is the rural, which attracts people, as well as the schools.And tonight it concerns me that in your meetings today that the school was not a focus.Because when we're looking, when we came, we were looking at communities, Peters' schools stand out and that pulls people into look.And then they see the beauty of the rural.And then if we can add a town center down the line, I mean, this is a good plan, but I just want us to keep that focus on the identity that makes us Peters right now.The statement that was made was: Schools, the rural or green character are what attracted you and others to the township.And you want to make sure that that stays in the forefront of everybody's mind and for both protection enhancement, and did I miss anything else?That's good.Okay.Yes.I mean, we, agree in all the research and the discussions we've had, the schools and the character come up over and over again.We are working with the school district and that relationship will continue throughout, throughout the plan.As these issues come up, and the timing is not on purpose, but sometimes we don't site the school until we know what development's going to look like as a whole, for example.So you want to be able to maintain the same service you provide, but at the level we're talking about right now, which is, which is even higher.We're talking more about like, do we need a new school?And if we do, how many more do we need?And then you decide where it goes by where the development patterns and things look like.So, all those conversations occur, but it looks kind of like spaghetti, you know, they all kind of interweave back and forth within each other.And there is the actually organized chaos going on when you see all this stuff happening.But, just rest assured that both the schools and I can't remember which map it was, cause there's more than one, but, but green kept coming up over and over within the community values that were stated on these maps of reasons that were important.And that's one of the reasons why you see some areas where people want to do focused growth.Which meant in the other areas, they would like to see some of the green remain as well.So, and there's, we talked about ideas about, you know, how do you introduce the green?There was the idea about there were two chips in the game.One was half acre lots, what I'll call sort of the predominant neighborhood type that's here right now.And then there was a chip that was the exact same amount of units, but it mandated 40% in open space, land and open space.So it was more of a green type concept.And so that those things are being discussed right now.No conclusions are being made because we're still working on vision and all of that.But once the vision comes out and the steering committee starts to share that that's where you need to test them and push back and make sure that those words are into those statements.And you know, and one thing that did come up in our work assignment, we came from a very planned community.Very manicured.Was that as we go into those areas where the developer's allowed to make smaller plans, but you have open space, we have to be careful that the developer doesn't take the hillside that's unusable and give that as the open space.And you know, that is going to be very important to how Peters continues - I had that exact conversation today with the recreation department.I just, I said, we'd like to have open space, but, you know, we don't want to have to use ropes to climb them.So yeah, usable open space is very important.You've got a third person piling on now so, I just like to point out too, that with our steering committee, I mentioned, those representatives are here.We also have one of the school board members who is on the steering committee as well.So there was a long conversation with the school district today.And those lines have definitely been opened up.I've been on the phone multiple times getting information for Matt, so, those lines of communication are open.The steering committees has heard definitely loud and clear.Schools are a big thing.And then we also have the representative on scene as well.So just to point out.I think one of the underpinnings of this plan, we need to keep in mind that there's some great things about this community that we want to build on, not ignore.And certainly schools are near if not at the top of that list, along with the open space, rural character and taxes and so on.So we also recognize that there are some challenges and we need to address those, but we don't want to diminish what's great about this community either.And I can tell you from my experience, having done many plans like this, we don't always get cooperation from the school district.Though we try, many times the school district is off in their own, doing their own thing.They're playing very close to the vest.They don't want to divulge their plans or, you know even try to coordinate with the community in terms of where growth is going and so on.I was very gratified we met with the school superintendent and his assistant.Acting.Um, not some third level.Acting Superintendent.Not some third level person from the administration.So, you know, that signaled to me that they are interested.We had a great conversation.They really were interested in what was coming out of the scenario workshop and coordinating with us.So we're off to a great start with them.I know there's probably many, many more questions and we're going to allow some, we can take one more and then we can definitely have conversations afterwards.It's about quarter to, so we'll take one more question and we want to go ahead and get onto the raffle.The real reason you came.Take a look at some maps and you guys can come up and ask questions.Sorry for dominating the conversation.This gentleman right here.Generally speaking, how many more years of growth do we have?The reason was I was reading an article that said a community is good as long as it's growing, but they'll start having problems as soon as they stop growing.The question and statement that was raised was how long is left until Peters Township builds out because there was some research that was done that showed that communities tend to start decaying when they don't grow.And they just get stagnant and start to decline.It's okay, that's fine.Uh, I don't have a year that the Peters Township builds out because of the fact that it's kind of a roller coaster.Especially if you look at the last 10 years.Nobody would have thought about the recession and no one's going, you know stopping all development in a small time.But I can tell you that at this point in time, you have about a third of your land left to develop, and I can tell you what that ends up being.And then you can look at different growth coders to see about how long would it take to get you there.But if you plan on only being one number, there's a lot of chance of being wrong.Remember when I showed you in the opening presentation, how you plan for a hurricane.So you would want a high and a low estimate.And then you know you're going to be somewhere in between.So it's kind of how that, it's not tomorrow.You got plenty more room to grow for several years, but I don't want to tell you exactly what year it is because you know, there's so many factors that could affect - You have a range?Sometime between now and the year 5000.Right now the past couple of years is a rough number.This is just rough.There's been about a hundred new homes a year.For the past couple years - Okay.We had a high point, obviously back in the early 2000's late 90's, early 2000's, where there was a big spike in growth.And obviously we dropped off a little bit, but we're seeing past three, four years, it started to come up again.200 would surprise you.What's that?200 a year would surprise you.It used to be the norm.But I would tell you that we talked about life cycles of communities Tuesday night.And there are a lot of communities that are built out.Most cities are built out.They don't have any more vacant land for development.They can't annex any more land, but through redevelopment, taking some of the older areas or the declining areas and reinventing those areas, communities continue to thrive.So just because you used all the land, doesn't mean that you're going to start to necessarily...You don't stop growing.Right, right.Exactly.Oh, stop reaching please.Alright, first before I get to this, I just like to say, thank you, to you guys, again, and also to give our consultants a round of applause.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Plan_Peters_2022_-_Closing_Presentation_-_Audience_Q_A.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Plan_Peters_2022_-_Closing_Presentation_-_Audience_Q_A.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Plan_Peters_2022_-_Closing_Presentation_-_Audience_Q_A.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/Practici1953/Practici1953.mp3", "text": "At the heart of our struggles to maintain and strengthen a democratic way of life are the nation's schools.Now as never before American education is challenged to help prepare the new generation for the vital business of acting as free individuals in a free society.The public continues to expect certain immediate results from our schools.Whatever else my children ought to know when and where important events happen.Teach them the facts.In my opinion make them strong and healthy.My kids are to do better than me.Why they are to be taught to read and write good English.There's always been this rich variety of individual demands but nowadays almost every adult agrees on one basic goal for all students.Schools are to turn out good citizens.Yes good citizens.That's right.Absolutely.This country always needs good citizens.Teaching students subject matter in democratic situations that develop better citizens.Is being done more and more in alert school system.This school happens to be in Michigan, but it could be any other school anywhere.Any school where parents and teachers are concerned about how and what their children learn to prepare them for citizenship.Let's ask some questions.There Arthur Davis, not his real name but it'll do.Teaches American History been doing it for years.Let's talk to him.Excuse me Mr Davis.We've heard fine reports about this school and about the good things that you and your students have been doing.Can you tell us something about how and why you came to use your present method of teaching?Well that's pretty big order.I might tell you how I first became interested in trying it out.Its fairly typical of our other teachers experiences.Our staff for some time had been aware of the limitations of its teaching methods.Through considerable reading, committee work, discussion, experimenting and in meetings with parents and seven groups.We tried to find the answer.The authoritarian method with the teacher dominating, we felt wasn't the answer.Letting the students do as they pleased.The laissez-faire method also was inadequate.Neither method produced the best citizen.We discovered, as others have, that the answer sprang from the very nature of our democratic society.In essence it's to use teaching methods which will produce better citizens while teaching subject matter.Teaching methods which develop and draw upon the knowledge, skills, and attitudes of all the students.Our first problem was to find a workable definition of the characteristics of good citizenship.The Detroit Citizenship Study gave us one of the best answers.But what interests us is how do you develop qualities through a regular school program?Well, suppose we take last year's class.No group is identical of course but it was an average group.Davis felt the familiar excitement that every teacher feel at the start of a new term.Following my pre-planned rather closely.The first few days were spent on orientation getting to know each other's names, background, and hobbies.Learning is best accomplished among friendly youngsters, acquainted with each other.We talked a little about what we learned in other social studies classes.And took several tests to determine how much knowledge of American history the students already had.And what their interests and attitudes where.There was the usual number of personal problems.That with the democratic method could be adjusted.Helen, sky.Hal, domineering and and ignoring others rights.And Harold Coren.Harold always running away from facts.Harold's attitude for instance, was apparent when the class was choosing among various ways by which the class could be conducted.Authoritarian, laissez-faire, or Democratic.So how can we run a class democratically everyone for themselves - They discussed it from every conceivable angle.Then they voted against the autocratic method with the teacher dominating.Against the laissez-faire method with the students doing just about what they pleased.And they settled for the Democratic pattern, shared responsibility, mutual respect with the teacher as a resource a consultant and the guide to better learning.Hey!What do you think?About what?Oh I'm not sure.Do you think we learned as much by letting us kids run the class?Oh, we're not going to run it by ourselves.Mr. Davis is going to help.Well, I don't know.I sort of like what he said.Getting everybody's ideas and talk over what we want to do.I think it's fair and I think we'll learn more.Come on let's go.They've begun to see some of the possibilities of working together democratically, share responsibility, and set up goals for the year.Choose topics to study.To find answers to problems.To think critically share and discuss findings.And finally evaluate their accomplishments and discuss together ways of improvement.Harold had been against trying out the new method but he was popular enough to be elected class chairman.Shared responsibility continue with the election of a secretary.The chairman lead the discussion and set up goals.Of course I had helped my suggestion now and then and mostly the steps were to read and think individually.Then for each student to make his own list of goals.Next their ideas were combined and resigned in small groups.Finally, the whole class and I together for discussion.The outcome was this.From the study of American history they wanted to achieve the following goals.To become a better citizen.To learn how to read and write better.To understand our American way of life.To learn own how to solve problem - To understand the United States as a major power in the world today.Parents continued to keep in touch with what was happening.And occasionally one would be more impatient than the others.Isn't it all this is a waste of time?After all your job is to teach American history.Orientation really doesn't waste time is to Cory.You'll find these students interested in learning because they had a part in making the decisions.OK but when you get around to studying history?Well, our next steps were what you would probably call studying history.We've selected our first topic for study in the same way as we had established our goals.First I presented background material and ideas.Then individually they read and did some thinking.Then discuss topics in small groups.Finally we arrived at a consensus through class discussion.We chose as our first general topic, what democracy means to me.Out of our discussion on the main topic emerged several problems.How did the democracy to get started and develop?How important is democracy in the world today?How does the democracy differ from other forms of government?What contributions have the outstanding leaders made to democracy?How can democracy be improved in our city?Each student voted for the problem he wanted to work on.Four problem groups were formed.And the chairman and record are selected in each.The groups began by filling in the work plans.I worked closely with each group.This step was a test as to whether the groups could work democratically.Sometimes they got into trouble.I think I'd like to preview those film Strips on the Constitution.No, I want to do that.I know how to work the projector.Now wait a minute.Why can't you both do it.Jane owns about filmstrips and Al you're good with a projector.That sounds like a good way to do it.Yeah how about it Al?Well I guess you're right.I'll try it.The influence of the class gradually was causing Al to respect others.A second group was doing as well.They'd seen the importance of individual responsibility.Now, who'd going to report on Jefferson?Oh, Helen you took at trip last summer.How about it?I'm not sure I could do it.Oh sure you can.You could use your snapshots and I'll give you a hand with it.Helen's self-confidence was being bolstered.In time she'd make a fuller contribution.The third group however was tussling with our local skeptic.Mr Davis.We're not getting any place.Well, what seems to be the trouble.I can't seem to get started.In spite of what Harold Cory has to say.We still think we have some democracy in this town.No, we haven't.We just think we have.All politicians are crooked.Everything's fix.What are your facts Harold?We just know that's all.Everybody know it.Hey do you have any facts to prove your point?We'll never get any place this way.Why don't you give us an assignment Mr Davis?Now just a minute folks.Faith says our community is democrat Harold says it isn't.Now they both can't be right.How can we find the truth.Look we talk about what democracy man in orientation.Now let's talk with people around town here and see what they think too small.We know it and discuss it again I think we all know for sure what we're talking about a very good idea.how about the rest of you.So we doing.yes that's a good idea.Why don't we go to mister mayor for First thing.they were learning a basic lesson.democracy doesn't operate by itself in a vacuum.Critical thinking based upon facts.Is very important and so they work they struggled they plan and they grew.Each group was now engrossed in its problems students found the library a valuable source for needed information outsiders may have been surprised at their eagerness.But for teachers using this method.It's a familiar and rewarding result local citizens had to think twice when asked to compare democracy with other forms of government The communities mayor and city manager were interviewed by one of our groups.Harold was introduced to an exciting new world of facts While each individual talent found a way to contribute each group.Organized its growing mass of information our class had become a team.And every student was the better for it.The projects were nearly complete.At last.Each group made its report..Helen - thank you.This is Station W. USA Today we have a most unusual program featuring early leaders of our democracy the year Seventeen eighty seven our speakers George Washington.Thomas Jefferson.Alexander Hamilton.The topic for a discussion is \"The need for a federal constitution\".Mr Washington will present his view as first.Madam Chairman , fellow countryman the reasons for a federal constitution.Are Social, Economic, military and political.I should discuss these one of the time..Our group worked on the problem.How did democracy get started in the south.Our report is built around a series of filmstrips and chapter three in our textbook.James Caviler introduced first illustratively discussion.Are all around on our projector.Our group has studied the problem.How can democracy be improved in our city.We couldn't all agree to decided to give individual report and to invite two leading citizens who could talk with us this is why.And this is Emerson this is Emerson chairman of the League of Women Voters who suggest how young people and adults can work together to improve democracy in our city.is the reason.Mr Chairman and members of the client.Our organization is concerned with this matter.we're glad that you are discussing it in class.Because you see we need citizens who not only talk about democracy but who are willing to work to improve it.Carol Corey will report when he found out from the mayor here.Thank you.And first I've got to admit I thought I knew all the answers to this problem then we visited the mayor the mayor changed my mind about a lot of things he had solutions to several problems they were.Harold spa there should have heard that he wanted Harold to learn the facts.Class discussion following each of the reports they deal some important inclusion interest was greater facts were learned better and remembered longer because they were related to very real everyday problems.This was also clearly shown through various kinds of evaluations by the entire class on worksheet by each group by taking several kinds of achievement tests and through teacher pupil conferences between myself and each student.and now I've just been looking over your progress sheet.Tell me why didn't you evaluate yourself on respecting rights of others.How do I rate myself on that I never thought about it much.So I got in this class.I don't know what to do about it anyway.I know you already have done something about it.I have?certainly you recognize that you have this problem.That's the first step towards improvement..Well I have listened to people without.Interrupting them - good.What else could I do - In conferences like this one I could gauge the extent to which my students were improving gradually in the give and take of the class sessions have had begun to develop more respect for the rights of others.Helen gain self confidence and became a responsible member of the group arrow in making skillful use of information was reaching towards maturity in this class some grow a great deal some grow a little.But all gain something from their experience.A last question that today this.Can other subjects be taught this way.They certainly can.And many are.Actually I haven't been talking just about American history.I've described democratic method of teaching which can be used to varying degrees by any teacher on any grade level in any subject.For example here is a third grade on a field trip with say a plan to get first hand information about their questions in science here is a sixth grade class sharing their findings as to how fractions are used in their home there is a Latin student and his teacher evaluating his progress through a teacher student interview.It's true there are easier ways to teach.But I know of no more effective way to help our students learn not only to learn more facts.But to learn how to put democracy.Into practice these days parents and teachers alike realize it must be their serious concern to help our young people become better citizens.For Democracy is not only an effective use of facts but a dynamic way of people living and working together Americas you.Our next generation must be prepared to help build their future of life will step in that direction is practicing democracy in the classroom.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Practici1953.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Practici1953.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Practici1953.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/ProfileJ26_2/14675b.mp3", "text": "Motion pictures.Well, I believe in motion pictures, but the motion pictures I believe are the motion pictures in people's minds.And the motion picture as we turn, that is the cinema, is merely a means of putting motion pictures in people's minds.Now there many more economical and faster ways of inducing pictures in people's minds than by means of motion pictures.Motion pictures may be a bit more vivid, and may be more specific.They may be more stimulating from an emotional standpoint.They may be more realistic, but if you're dealing with familiar situations, and you can talk in terms of the previous experience of the people to whom you are talking, and can make that sufficiently vivid by still pictures, or even by words without pictures, it's far more economical, of course.So that only about a third of our work is in motion picture field.The rest is verbal in terms of talks, illustrative talks, yes, and dramatic productions of one kind or another.We produce live shows.And in fact, we are, at times, the largest employers of the theatrical...help, should we say?In the country because we, at times, we have as many as 14 roadshows out at one time.I wonder if I may ask you to do something for me, Mr. Handy.You, on your garment, have no outer pocket.And I'm familiar with why you have your suit tailored without it, but I think it's an interesting story, and I'd like you to share it with our audience.I don't think I'm peculiar in this, but...Well, let's put it...Temptation is hard to resist, at least I find it so.And when I had a pocket there, I was inclined to put things in it.It's the easiest pocket to reach with my right hand, like that.So I had a way of putting things there.And they interfered with what I'm most interested in, which is maintaining attention and keeping interest on the thing that you're talking about.In other words, the concentration on communication, whereas I might be watching your pencils instead of listening carefully and watching you.Right, and I had particular weakness because I used to, on a blackboard or on a chart, as we call it, these turnover charts, I would use green, and red, and black, and sometimes a fourth color, to emphasize or give special significance to particular points that I was making.Sometimes those are symbolic, such as green for something good to do and red for go slow.A danger sign.And that sort of thing.Well, the convenient place to have those pencils, so they didn't slow me down in the flow of my conversation, or my presentation, or communication, was in this pocket.And they would take attention when I didn't want them to take attention.So, to remove temptation, I had all my suits thereafter made without that pocket.I suppose for similar reasons, I have come to learn of certain wardrobe do's and don'ts that your freelance actors, and performers, and so forth, are asked to cooperate with in Handy Productions.Such as, I believe, one time, the button down collar was taboo.I think you discouraged the use of the bow tie when it, perhaps, was not widely worn.And at one time, I think you would have preferred an actor without a mustache rather than with one.Am I right, Jam?Yes, and that is all based on the same idea.It's difficult to keep your own attention on what you're talking about and stick to the subject.Let alone to have your hearers stick to it.And anything that is conspicuous.Now, there may come a time again when smooth faces or upper lips are conspicuous.But that particular time, mustaches were conspicuous, and they were distracting.So far as the wardrobe was concerned, we do recommend to Speakers, Executives, if they have a communication job, we suggest that they have a tie that be not conspicuous.Sometimes it's conspicuous to have a tie the same color as your suit.In fact, I think we're pretty close to that time now.Yes.I had a fancy at the time, personally, for silk ties.I had quite a collection and variety of them.I had the experience of talking to a Sales Executive, and presenting to him what I thought was a very good recommendation, a suggestion for the solution to the problem.And what I got through, he said to me, he said, \"Jam..\".I was on a first name acquaintance with him.Well I think I may say it was no less than Tom Watson, Sr., of the IBM. - Oh!He said, \"Jam, would you mind starting all over again?I have been so interested in that beautiful tie that you're wearing that I haven't heard a word you said\".Well, I decided I would leave my colorful ties at home.That was the end of your silk collection?I had a sofa cushion made out of them.Mr. Handy, I'm very much interested in something, too, that you were obviously a pioneer in, and that was the documentary film.And I know of your attraction to the kind of man that Tom Edison was, and I recall that you had a great deal to do with the presentation of one of the early documentary films on his life.Didn't you, sir?Yes.I learned a great deal from Tom Edison.I wrote a paid story on him: One of a series of interviews that I had with the business leaders and outstanding personalities at that time, particularly inventors, people of new ideas, while really following up some of these suppressed desires that I'd had at my father's family table when I was an infant.I sold the Tribune on letting me do a series of that kind in which I could ask the questions, I didn't tell them that, that I hadn't been allowed to ask when I was six, seven, eight, and nine, and 10 from that standpoint.Well, sure.So in interviewing Tom Edison, I had learned a good deal, and I wanted a third helping.I went down to find out what he then considered his greatest invention.And after showing off my previous knowledge, I discovered that it wasn't at all what I thought.That instead of it being the motion picture, or the phonograph, or the electric light bulb, that he thought his greatest invention was the central service station from which an entire community or city could draw power: electrical current.Well, I had dug up a lot of other things that were surprising, and among them, was his concept of the motion picture.And I discovered that he had originally intended that invention to be as an educational tool.And that he had envisioned a transformation in our schools.And he was living without that realization of his dream!And the suffering is from the disappointment of seeing it being used for entertainment.Which at that time, well, times haven't changed too much, was devoted almost exclusively to love, murder, mystery, crime, and sex that isn't crime, exactly.That sort of thing, and he was disappointed.So I immediately then thought, well, I wonder if I couldn't save this daughter of yours from the life of shame under which the motion picture industry has led her.And the Perils of Pauline.And all that sort of thing.And why not have some factual films?One of the earliest was a documentary, a life of Thomas Edison.And as a matter of fact- - In the silent days.Wasn't Pancho Villa another of your subjects there?Yes.Pursuing factual films, and looking for some excitements in it, and using the Tribune to promote them on a participation or rentals basis, we sent a correspondent down there to talk to Pancho Villa, and to get the inside story from him on why he should behave the way he was behaving, how he got that way, and talked to him sympathetically, and he allowed us to take motion pictures.We brought them in, and we circulated them in the theaters.And that way, broke new ground.We, at that time, however, had already pioneered the Celic Tribune News, News Weekly, which was a presentation of factual material in the theaters.With the pressure of newspaper publicity, we had demonstrated that people were also interested in the facts of life, as well as the facts of life as they quote, unquote - Yes, unquote.Presented them.Mr. Handy, you have, during your very, very interesting and colorful, and productive years in this business, done so many things.I'd like to ask a question that I mean not to be a provocative one, necessarily, but if you and I were to meet on a train or today, possibly in a jet airplane, and we got to chatting, and I said to you, \"Mr. Handy, what do you do\"?How would you describe your occupation?Well, you might have something entirely new.And I might hear something entirely new.I suppose I'm along that line once.It is a bit difficult business to describe because we set out to accelerate the processes of education, and we interpret that term very broadly, and also to make them more pleasant.I always loved to learn, but I hated to study.And I thought there might be a lot of other people who felt the same way.So I could describe our business in terms of...Well, I could just use that phrase: What we do is accelerate education.But, chances are, I'd get some more questions.I've discovered that.Or I might say, our job is to make education painless.That also has the disadvantage of being an interesting statement that leads to another question.It is an interesting statement because a number of years ago, you made one very close to that, I think, when you said that education should be a pleasure and not a pain in the head.Pain in the head.And it can even become a pain at the neck if you let that headache continue long enough.That's as a matter of fact.Well, I once gave myself the challenge of stating that differently every time.This question of mine, you mean?Yes, your question, what's your business?And giving a different answer each time.At the same time, see that that answer was explicit, that it was true, and that it was succinct.And for a whole year, I stuck to that resolution.Every time I had a seatmate on a plane, I travel, fly, about 75,000 miles a year, have for, well, I suppose 30 years...I would give a different answer to that question.I even made the game harder for myself by always asking my seatmate what's his business so that he would have to ask me.And you know that for that entire year, and I suppose I must have answered the question at least 180 times in the 360 days that I was moving around on trains and planes, I gave a different answer every time, and it was a true answer.Of course, that I'm not surprised by.Each time.Mr. Handy, there are so many interesting facets that I want to be sure we at least touch on this afternoon.And you pointed out earlier that you came from a family of seven, and of course, I know that Mr. Jamison Handy has a family of his own, but I don't know what his number is, and what these people do, and I'd like to hear a little bit about them.Well, I have five of them, and none of them are in my business.One of my daughters earns some extra money by teaching, in a class, elementary school.I have another son who is a business executive.He's been a salesman and a sales manager.I have one who has no use for business.He thinks it's a pain in the neck.I have a daughter who has given me grandchildren.Wonderful.And in matter of fact, a great-grandson.You were away from home, as you pointed out, so much that I'm told that Mrs.Handy has made up for some of the lost time when you didn't go back to the University of Michigan, and has a kind of hobby of her own of going to school.Well, she likes continuing education, and I think I finally sold her on education.Maybe, maybe I didn't.You know, women sell themselves sometimes, and let you think you contributed to their education.Sincerely, and maybe I have a little bit.Hope so.But about 10 years ago, she started going to college.She's slightly my junior, but not very much...And she's been going college ever since.Although she's earned a sabbatical holiday, and she's not going to college this semester.But she's gone to a number of colleges.I am away from home, but she will come and stay with me, as a commitment, she always keeps it.Any time I stay in the same place, we stay in the same place for two weeks.That seldom happens.I'm gonna be in Detroit all this week, but that puts her up pretty well in the clear.On the other hand that interrupts her education.She went to summer school at Columbia one year, and I think it was about an eight-week term, and I complicated things by staying here for a couple of weeks.So, out of the eight weeks, she missed two.But she succeeded in getting an A. I'm quite proud of that.I would be, indeed.On a condensed or fast course.Mr. Handy, a while ago, when you were relating how you did a little fast cross-country work to get your story to the Tribune on the occasion of the demonstration at the University of Michigan.Running downtown to the telegraph office.Yes.I related this hour with another sport in which you have participated with outstanding success, and I'd like to talk about your swimming.I'm especially anxious, too, because if I may, and I'd like to read a little bit that was printed in the Illinois Athletic Club Tri-color on its 45th anniversary when Commander Francis McDermott wrote as follows, \"In August of 1907, our tank opened, and among the swimmers, we had Harry Hepner, Perry McGilvery, and Jamison Handy.Only one of them had a reputation at that time: Handy.He was truly a one man team.He's the only man in the history of swimming and any AAU Association to hold every championship: 50 yards, 100 yards, 220, 440, 880, and the mile, 150 yard backstroke, and 200 yards breaststroke.He held the Central Association Championship, both indoor and outdoor, for several years\".And you're still going at it strong in the swimming department, aren't you, Jam?Well, I still swim daily.Five or 600 yards.I like to pull water around and work my body through it.Well, you're not likely to volunteer this information, so I want to tell, if I may, this myself: That Mr. Jamison Handy was elected to the Swimming Hall of Fame just last year in 1960.And you were the 23rd to achieve that distinction.Again, I congratulate you.Well, that was most largely for my contribution in devising new techniques in swimming.As a matter of fact, it's a mistake to think of me as an athlete because I won my championships and broke my records largely with my head.The head is quite important in swimming.And one of the techniques which I have advocated is using the head physically in swimming more as the fish and the porpoises do.And we're getting pretty good acceptance of that.Although we still have a way to do.But my records and the versatility to which you apply there, due to the fact that I got pushed around.The minute I would develop a new technique and break the records, some of these long-eared fish whose hands were farther from their heads when they're stretched out, that is when visualizing the end, you start with your feet and you touch with your hands...They took those records away!So I had to move into another territory and make another change.So I went from one device to another.That's how I happened to get into breaststroke.Was all based on notions we used in the breaststroke.Then, a side kick like this, where these muscles aren't as strong, they don't get as much practice as you're running.So I just came to kick pool that way in both directions.They were using, in the backstroke, they were using both arms together, this way.I used them one at the time, like that, and that way avoided the loss of momentum, and broke the records.But in swimming, as these talented long-eared fish, particularly the basketball potential, shall we say?Started to use those techniques, they broke my records.Many of them didn't stay on the books more than a year.Well, I think one remarkable achievement that Robert Ripley had occasionally publicized, as a matter of fact.Of course, it's well known, I think that you were a member of the US Olympic Swimming Team when you were quite a young man.When was that, Mr. Handy?1904.And you were then in what event?I was in the quarter-mile breaststroke, and in the half-mile, and in the mile.Now, it was not on that subject that Mr. Ripley found it so unusual and, therefore, reported it.What was more amazing is that, 20 years later, you were again representing the United States on the Olympic Team.Well, I represented the second time, I represented America as one of the Broken-Down Swimmers.You know what the Broken-Down Swimmers are?I'm afraid not.They're the Water Polo players.Oh. - So, the second time I went back with the Water Polo players.And that was partly the realization of a suppressed desire because I had been selected for the 1908 team, but my employers thought I'd made all the contribution I should make at that time, and I didn't get a chance to go.With that disappointment, I wanted to find some way in.They wanted you to show up- - I got just ahead of somebody who has duplicated my record, at least technically, by making the team 28 years apart as a yaughtsman.Very interesting, Mr. Handy.There was something else that I wanted to ask you: And you say you travel so much and swim daily, I want to know why swimming attracts you.Well, from the standpoint of efficiency, I use every part of my body, which is difficult to do without a hockey team or a basketball squad for these days.And it's something that you can do alone, although it's fun to do with other people...when I can get all the activity I want, get my arteries all flushed out, use every finger that I have, and every hole.Get a lot of action in a short time.And I can do that in 10 minutes, and if I have company so much the better, but I don't have to make an appointment to do it, and I can do it when I get off an airplane at 11:00 at night, or at 5:00 in the morning, if necessary.So I carry a swimming suit with me.I was gonna tell you it'd be safe guess to assume that you have a quantitatively adequate wardrobe of swimming suits.Well, I have a few.I have a light one, one that I can put in a match box.Fits very nicely in my bag.I carry a bag nowadays.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/14675b.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/14675b.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/14675b.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/170511BCFirePublicSafety/170511-BC-FirePublicSafety.mp3", "text": "First item of order.Approval of minutes.Any corrections, deletions, substitutions, or otherwise?Make a motion to approve.Second.Okay, moved by Archie, second by Ed. All in favor?Ay. - Okay, we have any public testimony?On any agenda items?See none, move on.New member orientation...Did you guys review the manuals?That's why other boats down here.We need you guys to recite section.Thanks Edwin.Okay, is there anything else that corporation council needs to go over with the new members?Usually do a quick presentation.When do you do that?Now.Okay.Thank you chair.Welcome, Sir Kennison, Sir Lundberg, apologize for not being here last month.I gave you guys a packet a little while ago.There's a few little handouts in there.The first one, new board of commission member orientation...Oh sorry, if any of the other members want another packet I can get you one I just don't carry them with me.So let Jill know and she can let me know.So, if you just want to go over this, the new member and new board and commission member orientation packet.Just kind of goes over some generally, general frequently asked questions.If you have any questions feel free to contact myself or Jill and Jill can get in touch with me.The next bigger one is a guide to the Sunshine Law.It's produced by the State of Hawaii Office of Information Practices.There's a lot of details in the Sunshine Law.So, in my presentations I generally don't get into hypotheticals of, \"if this, then that\", you know.It's more as topics come up I'm typically at these meetings so please ask if you have any questions.Generally speaking, I request that it's a self-policing policy so all I ask is try not to talk about board business with other board members outside of board meetings.You can talk about stuff with members of the public not board members.Anybody can talk about board business with it.But between board members we ask that all those communications happen in a meeting, down to emails and everything.If you're gonna have to email the group please run it through board secretary and please do not reply to those emails to the whole group.They will just be collected by the board secretary.There's other intricate things, I believe there's discussion to go into a sub committees and all that.When the matters come up we'll go into that in more detail at that time.But generally speaking please keep board business discussions at board meetings between board members.The next packet is, it's a article, or you know, I'm not sure what you want to call it.But it's written by Professor Van Dyke.It's kind of a breakdown.It's a different way to read the Sunshine Law.It's kinda dated at this point but the information still holds true.The next one is the Chapter 2.56, Maui County Code of Ethics.If you have any questions on that please let us know.The next one is Article 10 of the Charter the Code of Ethics.Again, if you have any questions on that please let us know but essentially there's a few prohibitions.To me, it comes down to more, you guys are all professionals, very well respected people in the community.Try not to do things that are conflicts of interest or improper.And if you do believe you have a conflict of interest or something in the Code of Ethics, there's a question.We'll probably refer you to try and get an advisor opinion from the Board of Ethics.So that's my presentation in a nutshell.I know both of you gentlemen have been on many commissions before but if you have any questions...Thank your chair.Yeah, I don't know who's chair right now but..Just like, I know both of you guys have been on many commissions before so you kinda know the drill.Our chair has arrived so I am relieved.Thank you vice chair, you're on time.So lets move on to item number six, my emergency management.Hi, good morning so you have in front of you our monthly report.Just a few items, we had received our staff specialist three list and we actually were able to conduct interviews yesterday and we're hoping to make an offer to one of the candidates that we interviewed for that position.So, we'll be full staff if that person takes the position.As far as training and exercises we finished our EOC basic training for our partners so that was over about a five week period where they were coming in on Mondays to do that and now we're moving on into hurricane preparedness for community things.There was a zeta tabletop exercise which seems a little bit odd because the focus has kind of moved away from zeta but as we're getting into the season again where mosquitoes and high travel we had that particular exercise.On the preparedness side our HARP program is continuing in West Maui.They've been very successful in terms of good turnout.We've had a lot of repeat personnel.We weren't sure if the people would come to each meeting every month but we've seen a steady participation in that.And after this month, which is tropical cyclone, they move away from hazard awareness into actual planning.So we'll see how many people start to come out for the planning piece of it, which is more pencil to the paper kind of stuff.I'll just move down to the response piece.The emergent...event, I guess we'll call it, that we've been involved in is the rat lung worm disease.A lot of times people forget that we also are participating with the Department of Health during those types of events.So really we're just...we're not the lead on that, Department of Health always remains the lead on that.But we continue to support in terms of coordination and especially with their messaging piece of it.If you have any questions on the report I'm happy to take those otherwise I'll move into the piece that commissioner John Kyle asked about last week, or last month with the activation levels.Questions?Okay.You have two handouts in front of you.The first one, nice bright color coded one is our EOC activation levels.We used to just have three but then FEMA and the National Incident Management System had recommended a four tier.Which was very much similar to what we had.We just didn't have our day to day operations on there which is level four.So you can see it starts at level four, normal operations steady state so that's today.It's blue because we call it blue sky day.You know, it's just a nice day.We're always monitoring for things that might happen with a no notice event.So the EOC is not staffed at that time.The number three enhanced steady state is something has come up that maybe requires us to pay attention to it a little bit more.We don't have the EOC staffed really at that point, but our standby person who is on call or on standby throughout the evening hours and off hours is monitoring that actively, looking at notifications from the weather service or whatever event it might be.A level two is a partial activation.That's the most common thing that we have after a level three.That's when we have some of our partners in.It maybe is a event that's focused on a specific geographic area, it's not island or county wide.So we'll have the emergency support functions in who would be affected by that particular event.And then a level one activation is a full activation.We have all of our county partners and state and other partners in.Staffing all of the emergency support functions in anticipation of something that we know is coming.Or it's happening or occurring as we are speaking and the response and recovery's going to require additional resources than just one or two particular agencies.The next page I just made a quick kind of at a glance.There are some events that automatically trigger a certain activation level.And that's what you see on that chart there.So with a tropical cyclone when the forecast or advisories are issued again we see that coming.So it starts out with just our staff and maybe we've made a notification for people who have something in their day to day operations that they would do.Then as it escalates from watch to warning you'll see that activation level then scales up to a two and a one.The one that is most...I'll say difficult to...Maybe difficult's not the right word.The one that's the most fluid probably is a flood scenario because a flood watch will come out and it'll be maybe county wide and so we know there's potential for heavy rains etcetera.And then when they issue an advisory, that means that heavy rains are occurring in a certain area and flooding may be imminent.But then when it goes to a warning level it's more than just nuisance flooding.So the advisory is what they call nuisance flooding.So there will be flooding and ponding on the roads, but it's not getting into peoples homes.Its not endangering life so much as it is maybe properties, but not at a higher level.So when we go to a warning our staff automatically goes into the EOC. Because during a warning for a flood it goes from nothing to something pretty quickly.So again we've already been in contact with our partners.They obviously know it's raining outside.But as we're monitoring the situation and just in contact with our partners, that call of when to, for the standby EOC person, to call the other partners is a judgment call I'll say.And that's the one I think that is the most fluid as far as, warning doesn't automatically bring in the other partners.And then things that are a no notice event like an earthquake or a mass casualty, they happen when they happen and then that's an automatic EOC activation level.Charles, did that answer your question?Yes, it answers a lot of questions but I still have a few questions.Sure.Now as far as districts and notification and actions they take, Lanai, Molokai, Lahaina.Now at what point do you recommend that they take action or measures to prepare for a storm?So those are the same as what we do here on this island so its a county wide notification.Its the other ones like the flood, again that it's happening strictly in a specific district.Those are the ones that are a little bit more challenging for us but I would recommend similar to what we have here.And I can talk, we still haven't been able to hire our part time person in those districts.But that person would be the one that would staff and activate, either by themself or with partners, in those EOC's.Okay, well I guess what I'm looking at is let's say a storm is coming in and there's certain measures that district supervisors for the Public Works can take.So I guess, what's the trigger point for their activation or recommendation from you to the Public Works to start preparing?So those would usually start happening at a watch level and those at the EOC we're not, we're recommending for the departments to activate their own plan.So Public Works has their own triggers for that and they match up with ours.So when we call a watch, that's why too we're always in consultation with the weather service when they're gonna make that call.Because it does trigger actions in departmental emergency plans.Is there a standard as far as measures that can be taken once they get a trigger point?For example, you know of course Molokai, for example, Steven Arcy used to start filling up his trucks, start staging them in critical areas.Is there a standard that you know that the Public Works takes?Yeah, same thing.Okay.Both for tsunami and tropical cyclones, a watch triggers actions by each of those departments.And is it basically a standard plan or every district supervisor has their own plan?And are others aware of that plan?It's a standard plan department wide so Public Works has their plan when we go into one of these levels.I can't speak to their personnel as far as how well they know their internal plan.My next question would be, as far as the utility companies, that are very important, what's your dialogue with them as far as their notifications?Cause they can take the same precautionary measures too that they, you know, there's points where water departments, they'll shut down, you know, they'll lock down.As far as dialogue with them where are you or when does that happen?Sure, so the way we have the EOC staffed now, in our operations section we have three branches.And one of the branches is infrastructure.And the MECO Department of Water Supply with the county, the telephone company.So, our public and private utilities are part of infrastructure branch.So they're called in and they're on our call list.Okay, they are?Yup, they're part of our...All the water departments, all the private guys they all come in?No, not all the private water guys come in.They have a liaison because we don't have that much room so when we notify them they notify- - I know there's some partnerships like Maui- - Yes, yes.Okay, so they have a representative that attends something- - They have one that represents private water, yes.Thank you.You're welcome.Travis, would you be interested in that part time position?I know, keep your eyes out when it comes open.I had a question, it goes back to the rat lung worm disease.Oh, ah huh.Is there a known hot spot of the origin of the disease itself?Here on Maui or in general?In general, is there a place where the rats have the disease and that's why its coming out of that area?Or do they know?Not that I'm aware of, I mean, here it's been we've been seeing it obviously in East Maui but...I know on the big island it was linked to a cow heart and a slug in there right?Well that was just that particular incident but they've had rat lung worm on the big island for a long time already.And I think when they started to do some more research there's been individual instances on the other, in the other counties as well.But the key for us again is cause we've seen a little bit of panic with that particular disease.Where people are not buying local produce and we just want to stress that it's not that you cannot buy the local produce.It comes down to the consumers.The farmers are doing what they can and then the intermediary is doing what they can to make sure that it's clean and safe.But as a consumer it's up to us also to make sure that we're washing it.And that's all it takes is washing it properly.It doesn't even take you know those special things that they're selling at the store, those sprays and things like that.If you take the time and wash your produce and it's not just, we should tell folks, all produce.And so that's kind of the slogan that we're working on is wash all produce all the time.Even if it says pre-washed, even if it's from the mainland, cause they have other things in their produce too sometimes.So it's just a habit that we need to retrain ourselves on as a community is wash all produce all the time.Any more questions?Thank you Ann.Thank you.Let us now move on to item number seven, Fire Department.Aloha, good morning members before you you have our monthly highlights for the month of April.Okay, does your team need any questions as before we move forward?But at any point in time as we go through each item you are welcome to ask questions.All right item 7A the department highlights for motions and interviews.If you see there we have gone through the process of going through our recruit trainees.We did a performance agility tests at the end of March.And we qualified some people for our openings that we have.We currently have 17 openings and we will be starting that class July first of this year.We wanted to do it in March, excuse me, in May but we did not have the funding to move forward, so it moves us back.The average recruit class lasts six and a half months so that pushes us into January of 2018.Our projected retirements are 20 for this year.We had five thus far so we anticipate 15 more.So that might cause us a shortage issue of going towards the end of the year.And that's something that we try to have discussions with council and the mayor's office.Chief?Yes.Would you describe a little bit more about what you said when you didn't have the funds?Okay- - You had to delay the training class because you didn't have funds?Yes, so our department ran into a shortage somewhere around November of 2016 and as we move forward to move around funding from different programs to make it, project it til June 30th we came with a short fall of 1.2 million moving forward in payroll and what have you.So in those areas we utilized overtime for our training instructors to come in and help with the process of the recruit class.And so that was an issue and a topic and we did not have the funding to pay for the recruits during this fiscal year.So that's where the shortages are - And have you thought about going back to county council asking for a special assessment?We did, and...Sorry for pulling you into this.No, so we provided the information for them and no money was added to our budget for this fiscal year to handle it.But there was a lengthy discussion about it.Your a million and a half short?Roughly.And what will that grow by the end of the fiscal year?Hopefully not by much.We ask for a budget amendment to move forward to the 30th to handle all of those payroll issues.And we had the amendment, I believe it's in second reading, if I'm not mistaken, for next week and hopefully we get that and nothing drastic happens between now and June 30th.But this is our fifth year that we've gone in for a budget amendment.Let me guess, the first four didn't get it?There's a question I was gonna ask you- - So the first four every year thus far, this is our fifth year that we've gone in for a budget amendment.Every year we've gotten a budget amendment for the shortage.Every year?Yeah.Thank you chief.You're welcome.You said every year you had a new budget.Every year, so it's ranged from $80,000 to $2,000,000.So, as we present our budget those are the things that go into the process from the mayor's office and then it gets cut during the budget deliberations with council.So a lot of our projections are pretty close to what we need but then the cuts are made and we have to go back through this process over and over again.I'm curious who do you submit the request to?The chair, budget chair?Yes.So the process goes through a transmittal form which goes from us to the mayor's office to budget, from budget to the chair of the council and then from the budget, I mean from the council chair to the budget chair.And then they'll either schedule it or not.Thank you - You're welcome - Next question here.Sure.Chief, you know when you do have recruitment for classes how is it advertised?It is online as well as in the Maui news and I believe the Star Advertiser.But it doesn't go into the Molokai district?I can't answer that question.You can't answer me cause that's how Molokai people don't know when the recruitments happen.That comes out of our personal department but I can pass that information on.Yeah.Can we get that advertisement too as commissioner?Notifications?Yeah.It kind of doesn't necessarily go through the fire department, the department of personnel services handles that so you can ask for a quest but it's not something handled internally by the department.But I'll ask.Cause I mean, I think that would be an effective way to get more Molokai people to apply because they just don't know about it.I wonder if our personnel services has a notification list.They do.So you just put your name on it and- - So now they have it electronically so an individual can go on, even if they're not looking for anybody, provide their information on that list and then when they do send the list out on the first mail out of the newspaper then it would come to them on the following Monday, so usually goes out on a Sunday and on a Monday they'll get an email blast.As long as their email address information is correct.And updated.I guess you can let the newspapers of Molokai know that, have people just sign up or it.That's a good idea, it should pay for itself though man.It'd sure alleviate the non-employment issue.So based on that information or that request I will send that information to Department of Personnel Services.Thank you.Members, I'd like to welcome Miss Cher Betas to the meeting.I'm sorry, all right so moving from 7, item 7D on number of incident reports, if we can look in your handouts for the month of April.And do you have any questions?No questions?I just noticed that what do you call false alarms stays pretty consistent the amount yeah?Sure does.Yeah.Any questions members?Just one question about this false alarms, are they from alarm companies or are they from people actually pulling alarms?Its a mix of both.I believe I spoke, I'm not sure if it was last month or the month before but anytime we have the alarm companies issue we go and if it's more than three times we send them a letter.They usually get on them pretty quick.Is there anybody you're actually tracking, whose constant repeat.False alarm goes to the car - Fire and hazard - We have one that is separate, ours passed before the police false alarm bill.So we have a process that we can use to go after those individuals or companies that have false alarms.I mean anything that you know you can do to reduce you know this cry wolf syndrome.And a lot of times when we get a rash of this it's due to bad weather.So electronically things don't run properly.That's when you'll see the influx and it doesn't just happen to us but police department, civil events and emergency management.The big problem I noticed when I was working was alarms weren't being serviced.Right.And the batteries weren't being replaced and when there was a power outage you're supposed to switch to that battery that's backed up but if the batteries dead it triggers the alarm.So I think, but they really need, somebody really needs to look at insuring that alarm companies service these alarms on a regular basis to prevent this excessive response to false alarms.For the most part we have in excess of 6,000 commercial properties and all of those have fire alarms so if we're talking 50 out of those 6,000 that we know of I think the ratio is really good considering.We do anything excessive we do reach out through our Fire Prevention Bureau and through our inspection process that is on the checklist at all times.So it is looked at on a daily basis throughout our community, hopefully that helps.Thank you.You're welcome.Chief, you made a question on the alarms.Do all these commercial properties, like multiples, or quick malls and all, do they all have lock boxes or do you know...It is a requirement from us, is if they start off new we require them to do the lock box.And so majority of them have that.We try not to use that as a lesson so yeah that's available to us.Any more questions?Okay so item 7C fire department 2000 fiscal year 2018 budget updates.Which of the three- - All right so out of our 83 items that we put forward through the mayors office only four of those items made it through to council.And then I'm gonna talk a little bit about some of the cuts.All right so, you know county wide funding where they try to put most of the equipment in.So we go along with Department of Public Works and Environmental Management they put it in.That fund for our ladder truck that cut $400,000 so from 1.2 million to, I believe it was 800 so that doesn't get us a sufficient ladder truck but we're in the process of putting that out to bid and see where it ends up.And then maybe going back to ask for a amendment for the bid that comes in, the winning bid.I have a question Chief.Sure.You know when they make these cuts?Do they consult with you guys experts on their decision, why they're making the cuts when you guys know that something that you need?Smart.Thank you for that question.That is a really good question, the answer is no.I know they try to do research with other departments within Hawaii of what one of the measuring points that they have to really consider is specifications what are the differences and what are different needs of the other counties as opposed to ours.We're pretty clear on what our needs are and I'm not sure what the whole process about their decisions are but this is not the first time that that's happened so it really puts the damper on the whole process and the whole timing of the contracts when they actually go out.So thank you for that question.So the good news is the two battalion chiefs that this commission as well as our administration has been fighting for has been put on for a limited term.So what that means is we were able to hire the two people but they'll be limited not permanent.And the findings of an audit that they also approved that council will pay for whatever that findings come out will either make those positions permanent or eliminate them completely.So I'm not sure how that process is gonna work.I'm still waiting on the information for that but our department will be full cooperation with that audit.One of the suggestions we had was that the accreditation is a full blown audit of the department.And that was already paid for to a non-profit which was much less cost wise but the council felt that they wanted to do something independently so that was the decision that was made.That they will fund that and we'll be in full cooperation with that.Chief what was the limitations on the two positions?Based on the findings of the audit.There wasn't a two year term or anything?No, we're not sure what the total time frame pending the audit.So the only thing that I asked was that it provide and fit the National Fire Protection Agencies Associations guidelines.So they accepted it in that fashion so I'm very comfortable, it doesn't matter who they hire.When do you anticipate the audit being complete?I have no idea cause they haven't chosen an auditor, an auditor firm yet.So I guess that would be just disappointing if you hire the two bodies, got em on and the audit finishes six months later and then those bodies are adjusted.There is that possibility but going into that- - They'll be fine for the fiscal year cause I believe you have the funding for one year.All positions are only for one year with a active budget.So technically we got the positions but we don't have the funding for the positions so we have to make adjustments for that as well.So those are the kinds of things- - Thank you - Okay well it didn't show em on our- - Yeah but they're funded.Thank you I'm sorry I've just been corrected.Funded out of the current budget.Yeah the F-loan, the fyet budget which kicks in July 1st but they give positions at mine.Okay that was good.And that's awesome cause we were under the assumption that, cause it didn't show up on our spreadsheet.Sir, thank you.All right, and some of the notable items that will need more funding moving forward is our helicopter.The new contracts came out and it was slightly higher of course you know the last contract was done four years ago on a annual cost basis so that needs to be adjusted at some point in time.There was discussion about eliminating our ocean safety battalion chief.That got put in back in there as well as funding and so my whole thing was I just wanted to move it from our admin program to the ocean safety program so I could keep all of that money and funding and personnel in that same program.A couple minor adjustments we're taking out of our maintenance program.They moved our four mechanics to the operations program and we still don't understand how and why that happened but the funding was maintained.Funding maintained which is- - They just moved to operations so- kind of a interesting process, not sure what the whole thoughts were behind that but it doesn't really affect us and we're gonna manage it the same so just a clarification to the board.Any questions on 7C?All right moving forward 7D so the Maui Fire Department standards of covered accreditation report.Last month we handed out a folder that included those two reports.And I'm not sure if anybody was able to go through that and may have some questions but what I'd like to do is go over the first report which is called the standards of cover.And that information is compiled internally by our people.So through dispatch and all of our report management system all of those data is provided for you.And in this standards of cover the data and information shows where we need to improve.So this is the final report for that and it covers every aspect of our response and how our emergency areas that we cover for all the districts.So, you're gonna see some different response times in different areas based on the distances and the resources.So if anybody has any questions on the standards of cover this is a quite robust document so even if it's not at this time you know let the chair know or me and I'll be able to answer the questions for you.So a lot of work, about a year and a half of work went into this document.And it is all part of the accreditation process.I have a question Chief, you know for that accreditation the response from the station to the scene what is the time part of the crediting, like 12 minutes?Its all dependent, its all dependent for district and what we provided to the accreditation board.So for instance any city area its about 16 minutes, 12 to 16 minutes, depending.And that's for your first and second.Then like the, say like, cause there's a big gap between Paia and Hana- - Yes.Now would that fall under a different category because of its geographical- - Yes, it falls under a rural timeline and even those we don't meet because of our roadways and the distance.Just a comment, I thought this was pretty awesome, lot of work, you can see that a lot of work went into it and you know being a former member is very impressive to see all this work of documenting that our department does.And you know, did you put a team together to put this - - Yes, so you know for about seven years we've been asking for a accreditation manager just one person.And we all know that that one person wouldn't be able to compile anything like this at any point even if they did that for 24 hours a day.So what we did is we put a team together and what we call it is a cadre system, so basically like instructors and what have you but we put together a team to help with this accreditation process.So we put teams for the standard of cover.We put teams for the emergency response areas.We put teams for all of those things.So some of the over time that is brought up goes into that process.We did not pay the accreditation board anything other than to pay for the travel of the individual's coming out cause they're non-profit.But they are the experts in this area of management so I believe that this process was very effective and efficient.And they help us to provide these kinds of documents for you.Thank your commissioner some time for that.Now any more questions on the standards of cover?Chief one quick question, looking at your response times again and looking for Hana specifically and in 13 it was 26 minutes - What page?Oh page 50, 50, five zero 2013 the fire response was 26 minutes and in 15 it goes to 45 minutes.What's causing such a dramatic change?In response time for Hana?Okay so how that works is they'll take an average the top 90% of all responses during that annual year.So what that says is that their distant to response halts or further than the one the 90% that was done the year before.But they still have to be factored in so there's no way for us to...So, you know, Manipulate the data, so the data is what it is.And so we have to take that 90% of all of those calls.That becomes your average for that year.And I'm glad that you picked up on that cause those are the things that the accreditation board looks at.So in our tour of the island they saw the challenges that we have and they've given suggestions in their report of how to manage that.I have a question Chief.Yes?I was wondering how many audits has this organization done with other fire departments?Thousands.We do all of them, all of them except for- - They're the only body that does this internationally as well as the United States.And only 242 departments in the United States are accredited out of the 10,000 or so that are, exist.I guess you were just unlucky that someone calls bad feelings call forward.Well absolutely yes, we had some calls that have been running up to five hours.So its really, really interesting.When you take them on a tour then you take them around totally around the island they know that there's no station in Kipahulu.Yeah.Its really not.So its really good that we go through the data, the statistics and really work out because our constituents need to understand what we are up against.And then so this information helps us provide what we need in a budget as well right.So like I said our open arms to that audit from a third party, and this was a third party, but we'll do it all over again.Its not an issue for us, we have nothing to hide.We wanna learn more and we want to be able to provide that information as much as possible.This information will provide - Yes.All right moving over to the next report, which is the accreditation report.This report, if you look on the first page is composed and written by the four peer accessors that showed up on Maui in January.And this is the report they provided with us.The breakdown, the areas that we need to work on.They also touch on some of the things that we do very well.What page is that?It is accreditation report cover page.Look for the tab.So this one is, this report is much more specific to the needs and what our department needs to work on and focus because all of the other core competencies were already met.So one of the real issues is we have a deadline for August of this year and based on our budgeting and what set forward that we're not gonna make that deadline.So we were hoping to go through this process, provide the information and have the cadres work on all the information that needs to be assessed and turned in and then they'll come out and do another assessment and our hopes are to pass and be accredited officially in March but that's not gonna happen cause we do not have the funding to put the teams together to work on these items.So we're only eight items shy of the total.Most departments go through this process anyway.So the real issue here is that we invested a lot of money and time to go through this process of a self assessor and that was done in the eighth edition so starting January of 2018 all assessments done after that will have to be done in the ninth edition.So they'll be a whole another process that we have to kind of get all over again.So I really was trying to get this done by August of this year but it's not gonna be done.So when you say eighth edition ninth edition that's how many years that you've been working on it?No, it's the editions that the accreditation body comes out with so they see times.So I believe the eighth edition has been out approximately five to six years and they're making changes.Oh okay.Right, so they provided us with a window of opportunity for three years to get it done and we just were unable so we're gonna have to start from scratch, literally, the next time we go through this process.At least your procedures directing us there.That's great - So there's a lot of positives so that whole process right there sounds negative but there's a lot of positives that was learned through the process.And we're gonna continue to press forward.So with these equipment- - Right and that was one of the areas that we failed these in our facilities.Because we have no real means of managing maintenance of our facilities.Where as other departments have people that actually, they have building maintenance repairs.We have none, we have 15 facilities and we have nobody to take care of them.How many areas did you succeed in and how many areas did you fail in?We failed in eight.Out of?Out of 86, I believe.And those 86 have to be met.So there's 264 other ones that we met the majority of those as well but eight of the core just did not meet.Eight out of 86?The chief is up on this.Yeah that's pretty good.The budget that's being worked on right now?No- - or the council for next year?Chief, I have a question, I know you provided all the council people with the information here.Now with a budget process I'm sure they read this already a couple times.Who is less responsive to the reason as far as council?What does that mean?Who's the less responsive to the needs of the fire department in the budget?That's very subjective.I know- - I would recommend if you want to look into personally but I don't think the Chief has an opinion on that.That's why I- - Yeah.Probably have to read the minutes on that.Yes, read the minutes and make your own conclusions.Thank you for the question.So Chief i just have one major concern.The funding that you need to complete the accreditation was it supported by the county administration?Yes, see before we started off on this process we went to the classes, we understood what we needed to do.We started to front load the process with whatever funding we had nine years ago.And every year thus far.And then two years ago we had to get the mayor to sign off and support this so he has supported the process.Its just when it gets to the next level that its not supported.So you're pretty close, I know just like the police department, you go through a review process internally where you kick around, okay what do we need you know and then you put it together and things get cut internally then it goes up to the mayors office that things being cut but the final problem is seems like just to get over that hurdle we need to work a little bit better with a legislative portion to get the funding that we need.Yes that's a good question.So just for clarification purposes, accreditation is uh...Basically an audit of the department and its whole operations.So prior to that, like I said, we front loaded a lot of things and one of the areas that we did was our area of certification for our needs and training for our department members.That we are up to snuff with and we just try to get the whole department as a whole in all of its policies and all of its standing orders and standard operating guidelines to be on the same process.And hopefully one day we'll get the support needed.You're just the feet.Yes so being shiny is not very far.Its extremely frustrating to come this far in the process and not being able to finish.I feel you.Chief what dollar value are we looking at?What is, what would the funding mechanism, what would the dollars be that you feel you need to finish this out?Well initially I would say 6 out of the 8 would come into some overtime.Which would probably be about $40,000.Okay so 40 grand, what else?The other two would come into some processes and software and what have you for our records managing.That we are not sure what the total cost would be but even if we estimated it at $100,000 or $150,000 that's still in reach.So for $200,000 you'd finish this project?I would say yes, that's an estimate, yes.So once the program, say you got the funding, mutual funding for the program to finish you know meeting the eight things that we're not meeting right now.Has there been any discussion with council about should they decide to adopt accreditation is there a big change in pay for the department?No, not at all.There's no change in pay all it's saying is that our department has met the standards of accreditation which is higher than a minimum.That's all we're asking because we want to be able to provide the community with the best possible service.And a third party would say that the Maui Fire Department cuts ratings.That was a goal of this commission when I got hired.So I'm just trying to carry on what was asked of me within my means.Chief I have a follow up question, so it we were able somehow to get the funding to finish accreditation is the timing still be a factor?That would still be a huge factor because there's other departments that we have to work with.And we'd have to have all of their support as well.So I don't know if three months or two months would make it happen but if we had the funds we would try very hard to make it happen.That's all I could promise you.Is there a way to ask the accreditation board for an extension without funding?No, we tried that already, in fact I went through that process in November to ask for an extension and they basically said the extension would be to August, September of this year.But we had to have provided all of the information moving forward, if not, we would show no accredibility moving forward so- - Just to get them to show up in January, to fly here we crossed a large hurdle to get through that process.Question here.Chief, you know the, as part of their accreditation process do they also look at how you staff the department?Absolutely - So what's the three battalion chiefs on the West side and Molokai and all that.Was that part of the- - Yes.And like taking away those positions, would that affect accreditation?Yes.So I guess the question for me then is to ask the council \"do you guys really want our department to be accredited or not?Because if you do then you need to staff us correctly.I think that's the question to be asked.I mean, if you gotta put it in nuts and bolts to them right.Because if you say its only gonna cost 200,000 more dollars to be accredited I mean what better standard to have.I agree.I wonder if there's a way that we could send a letter` up and have the commission of chairs signature strongly voicing our opinion of the accreditation process and what it means to finish.I was wondering how leverage this body into putting pressure on the mayor and the chair of county council to take this seriously.You guys might want to put that out on a agenda item for next month and that way- - It's every month that this goes by is one less month that he's got -- - - Just a suggestion but I would really, if you're gonna write that letter from this body you may want to get more detailed solid information and numbers from the Chief rather than some back of the envelope calculations - If you wanted to write one on your own I wouldn't suggest saying it's from the body.Our power is as a collected group its not as individuals.So if there was a motion put on the floor I don't see it on your agenda page.So you'll -- -- - - I would suggest that for such general purposes.So what we can do members is we can bump our next meeting date and time and we can have a request to have item agendized.We can discuss it at the next meeting.I will work on providing you with more hard numbers.Any more questions members?I just want to say well done.This is really, really, really well done and I think, especially if it's not costing any money for the taxpayers moving forward on this is, in my eyes, its a no brainer, job well done.Thank you.Thank you commissioner Ka lepta, any more questions members?Just one more, just a compliment again of what this document does, it really identifies.Being a former member you, you think you feel certain ways but here it is in black and white and some color.It's a really good document even for me to go through and it and see it.So thank you.Will this document be available to public?At some point cause we'll put it on our website.So I appreciate you bringing that up because its really, you know, there's a word that's being tossed around, quite often, transparency.And I think going through the accreditation process can not send that message stronger to the people than transparency.I don't even understand how its not supported.Its extremely important for our community and our visitors to know that they're coming into a accredited area.And for us to want to do that.It takes a lot of work from all of our members within the department wanting to make that happen.You know, nobody wants somebody to come in their back yard and tell em how for clean their yard.But we're willing to say \"Hey how can we make it better\"?And it goes for everything I mean they came in and helped us with our ocean safety processes as well they turned us onto more information in that realm so once we go into the ninth edition all of that has to be clear as well.So right now they would've allowed us to move forward then have that a work in progress.So I don't know how much that will cost us, so that's an added thing moving on to the ninth as well.But thank you very much for the discussion and the support.We hope that some point in time that this can be achieved.For you as well as the community.Thank you for the opportunity.All right, so quick announcement next meeting is Thursday June 8th at the Fire Prevention Bureau at 10:30 in the morning.We have that request to add on the agenda possible letter of support for staff to uncover accreditation.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/170511-BC-FirePublicSafety.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/170511-BC-FirePublicSafety.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/170511-BC-FirePublicSafety.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/17DaysTh1945/17DaysTh1945.mp3", "text": "There was nothing particularly unusual about that 7, 30th, 1945.Subways, railroad terminals, and ferry boats is for office bound millions.Women went about their housework and later their days shopping.Part of this normal life was newspaper.Taken as a matter of course, by everyone.So regular and complete a part of normal everyday living that finding newspapers on the news then, buying them morning and night was taken pretty much for granted.Never a thought of the rumbling presses that produced them.Completely oblivious to the vast transportation system that placed them so conveniently on 14 thousand, strategically located news stands through out the city.No reason to contemplate what life without newspapers would mean.Until it suddenly, and with little warning, STRIKE!1700 delivery men ceased work.newspaper trucks stopped rolling.News stands formerly piled high with eight daily New York newspapers where devoid of newspapers, devoid of customers.Barron as a desert waste.With the lone exception of PM, news stands were as bare as mother Hubbard's cupboard.13 million metropolitan new Yorkers, deprived of their daily newspaper fair.And this at a time when great events were in the making the world over.President Truman was on his way to a meeting of the big three.Japanese cities were being laid waste by B-29s.Thousands of American boys were returning home from European battlefields.Now newspapers were more than a habit, more than a convenience.They were a necessity.Here then was the time of all times for radio, the psychological moment.For years, the point has been argued, discussion has raised pro and con, will radio eventually supplant newspaper?Isn't it easier to turn a switch, than to read an editorial?Yes, for radio, here was a heaven sent opportunity.Reluctant to profit by adversity.Hesitant to capitalize misfortune.Radio nevertheless had a job to do.A public service to perform.And radio rose, nobly, to the occasion.Newscasters and commentators labored long and hard.Radio news programs were substantially increased.Many newspapers either started or increased their regular news radio roundup.The times was on the air every hour, on the hour.The Herald Tribune had a regular news period.The news doubled its schedule.Went on the air 48 times a day.At almost any hour, day or night.The public could flip a dial, and hear a newscast.Certainly if news by a radio, could satisfy the news hungry public.Radio was giving it every chance.But something was lacking, an appetizer is a poor substitute for a full meal.A starving man languages on a Hollywood diet.Radio was apparently not the right answer.Newspaper readers, telephone then, and discovered that despite tickets newspapers were still being published every day.Learned, they could have obtain copies by going directly to the newspaper plant.Here is the Herald Tribune plant on the first day of the strike.Showing the truck loading platform used to sell papers in the emergency.The first day of the strike, Herald Tribune circulation plummeted to 15,000.But as more and more loyal Tribune readers learned they could buy the paper at the plant, they went to the Herald Tribune in ever increasing numbers.On the last day of the strike, the Herald Tribune sold 65,000 copies.By far, the greater portion of them in direct, over the counter sale, to Tribune readers, who had taken the time and trouble, to come far out of their way to get a copy of their favorite morning newspaper.This represents as surprisingly high percentage of Tribune circulation achieved under extremely difficult condition.Meanwhile, a flood of Tribune readers phoned the paper.Please give me more information on the change in red point value.Is it true that president Truman is out of the country?On what troop ship is my husband returning home?Now let's move to the journal American.Here is a newspaper plant, so disadvantageously located for the general public, that the paper maintains frequent bus service for its own employee, to a nearby transportation center.The sirens of east river shipping convoys provide a musical background for the roar of the presses.Despite its inaccessible location journal, American readers traveled, to the plant on south street, in droves.Circulation on the first day of the strike drops to 4,000.But by the end of the strike, daily sales figures climbed to 25,000.Mirror fans lined up at the Mirror plant in mounting crescendo.Daily sales figures are unavailable, but through teaming rain and glazing heat, Mirror readers made the trip to the plant, stood in line, made their purchase.The New York Sun, here was new York's longest picket line.It is impossible to show the full effect of the Sun readership line, because the paper was sold inside the building.Sun readers entered the marble lobby of the building, shown in the center, made their purchase inside, and emerged through the door, at the left.When sales got too heavy for the emergency office, boxes were set up in the Marble foyer, to serve as temporary news stands.Then during rush hours, the place looked like grand station.Circulation climbed from a low of 23,000, on the first day of the strike, to a high of 78,000 on the last day.The New York world Telegraph.This plant is located downtown, near the New Jersey commuting terminal.The entrance where papers were sold is situated on a narrow side street, in deep shadow, untouched by the rays of the afternoon sun.This made it impossible to take color pictures.There was nothing shadowy, however, about the long lines of world telegram readers.Who came from near and far.Readers made the trip to the World Telegram Plant, all the way from New Haven, Connecticut, from the far corner of long island.Lines five blocks long were a daily occurrence.Thousands filed slowly into the telegram building, and emerged, triumphantly, with their favorite afternoon newspaper.Circulation rose from 15,000, on the first day of the strike, to 50,000 on the last day.The New York Times, because of its Times Square location, and because it is a morning paper, the largest Time's crowd during weekdays occurred at night, and are not shown here.Blocks adjacent to the Times, were frequently choked with readers for a couple of hours around theater closing time.A New Jersey resident bought five copies of the paper, to auction off at a Red Cross meeting.When the copies of the Times has got as far as Asbury park, New Jersey, although well-read by train passengers, they were sold for a dollar a copy of current.50 cents if a day old, a news stand manager at Little Silver, New Jersey, was offered a dollar for a day old Time, but refused to sell because he wanted to read it himself.Times' daily circulation rose from 38,000, on the first day of the strike, to 210,000, the final day.The New York News.For 22 hours out of every 24, News readers poured in and out of the News building, two to four abreast, from six o'clock in the morning to 4 am the next morning.Lines began forming in the afternoon about five o'clock.Stood for 3 hours, to await the first edition at 8:15 PM. The longest line occurred on a Saturday night, to buy the Sunday news.This line, 17 blocks long, snaked its way along Third avenue, back and forth on cross streets, to 32nd street.City police went through the subways at 34th street, warning passengers bound for the news building, to get off of there, to join the line, instead of going on up to 42nd Street.Assistant Chief Inspector, John de Martino of the New York City Police Department said, - This was the biggest lineup crowd in my experience at average 30,000 per hours.People stood in line for 2 hours, before reaching the counter.42nd street grew accustomed to a daily ritual.Passing trolley cars were parked, while motormen and passengers got off to buy the paper.Taxis, private cars, the street, and adjacent blocks were packed throughout each evening, with vehicles, while passengers and drivers bought the news.One of the picketers, after shedding his sign, nightly went inside to buy his paper.From 37,000 over the counter sales, on the first day of the strike, sales zoom to 915,000 on the last day.Of which 584,000 sales, were made over the counter to individuals in the lines you see.Happily, however, even laborer strike, has its lighter moment.By courtesy of Movietone News, Mayor F. H. LaGuardia reads the comic.Now here in full picture is the laundry Wagon with the yellow laundry writing.And what brought back the driver, you know, he uh was very calmly, sitting down with his back toward the back of the wagon, eating his lunch.And our little friend at the hub, uh what was her name?I'll have it in minute, she's inside with the money.As she said, \"when are you going to let me out of here\"?He said, \" \" He said, \"Easy sister, easy\".And then the next picture, and we hear the sound from inside the wagon.Open the door, and Wet Wash says, \"I let you off, when you decided to give me a better cut of that dough\".From the inside.And we see the inside.\"Now, I offered $1,000.What do you think I am\"?\"This is my money\"!And if you remember, she stopped stripping them, tearing up the laundry, and she had all of the money in bills, in the pillows.That we hear wet wash, \"Listen baby,\" \"I know you're a maid at bamboozles,\" \"I saw you there last week,\" \"And I know that something funny about that dough\".\"Now when we get it, it's going to be 50/50\"!\"Okay?Then maybe you like some more,\" \"of your laundry, torn to pieces, RIIIIIIIIP\"!She's ripping the lingerie there, delicate piece of lingerie, and he looks in, \"Ye Gods, I lose my job over there\".\"Stop, you win!I'll settle for five grand\"!, now, get this picture, Here was wet wash, the doors of the laundry wagon are open, and he's leaning with his back toward, the wagon.And he's counting his money.Two, three, 4,000!Now he's getting into the hundreds 600, 700, 800, and the picture shows, a hand, affectless, specking out.She's got hold of that iron pot.Remember the iron pot took from the , gardeners flat, to put the money in, and \"CRASH\"!She cracked it on his head.knocked out.Hey children, what does it all mean?It means that dirty money, never brings any luck.Thus New York learn that as the newspapers could not to go to the public.The public would come to the paper.During the 17 days of the strike, the public came to the various plants, bought a total of 10 million, 628 thousand newspaper, trouble inconvenience.This was the price paid each day for New York newspapers, by long lines of people in rain and sun, standing for hours on hard concrete, risking bodily harm by cutting through picket lines, impervious to shouted warnings of tickets in a city, heavily unionized.Men, women, and children in all walks of life, giving up a summer evening of pleasure or relaxation.Going without lunch or postponing dinner for hours.Coming for miles and oven warm subways, to stand for a long period, in halting, or slow moving files.Patient, perspiring, persistent.All for a few penny purchase.Such is the miracle of journalism, and such as the significance of newspapers to their reader, newspapers, which can be read and re-read.Newspapers in which the public can read all about it, in their own time, at their own convenience.And thus, was New York's sigh of relief, When the strike finally was ended, when, within the hour, the trucks were rolling, and New York life returned to normal.Once again, dramatic proof has been given that no other medium can take the place of newspapers in the lives of the people.And the fundamental reason, why newspapers are held in such high regard by the American public, lies in that long cherished bull mark of liberty- Freedom, of the press!", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/17DaysTh1945.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/17DaysTh1945.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/17DaysTh1945.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/17DaysTh1945/17DaysTh1945.mp3", "text": "There was nothing particularly unusual about that seven 30th, 1945.Subways, railroad, terminals, and ferry boats is for office bound men.Women went about their housework and later their days shopping.Part of this normal life was newspapers, taken as a matter of course, by everyone.So regular and complete a part of normal everyday living that finding newspapers on the newsstands, buying them morning and night was taken pretty much for granted.Never a thought of the rumbling presses that produced them, completely oblivious to the vast transportation system that placed them so conveniently on 14,000 strategically located newsstands throughout the city.No reason to contemplate what life without newspapers would mean.Until suddenly and with little warning, strike!1,700 delivery men ceased work.Newspaper trucks stopped rolling.Newsstands formerly piled high with eight daily New York newspapers, were devoid of newspapers, devoid of customers, barren as a desert waste.With the lone exception of PM, newsstands were as bear as Mother Hubbard's cupboard.13 million metropolitan New Yorkers deprived of their daily newspaper fare, and this at a time when great events were in the making the world over.President Truman was on his way to a meeting of the big three.Japanese cities were being laid waste by B-29's.Thousands of American boys were returning home from European battlefields.Now, newspapers were more than a habit, more than a convenience.They were a necessity.Here then was the time of all times for radio.The psychological moment.For years, the point has been argued, discussion has raged pro and con, will radio eventually supplant newspapers?Isn't it easier to turn a switch than to read an editorial?Yes, for radio.Here was a heaven sent opportunity.Reluctant to profit by adversity, hesitant to capitalize misfortune, radio nevertheless had a job to do, a public service to perform, and radio rose, nobly to the occasion.Newscasters and commentators, labored long and hard.Radio news programs were substantially increased.Many newspapers either started or increased their regular news radio roundup.The Times was on the air every hour on the hour.The Herald Tribune had a regular news period.The news doubled its schedule, went on the air 48 times a day.At almost any hour, day or night, the public could flip a dial and hear a newscast.Certainly, if news by a radio could satisfy the news-hungry public, radio was giving it every chance.But something was lacking.An appetizer is a poor substitute for a full meal.A starving man languishes on a Hollywood diet.Radio was apparently not the right answer.Newspaper readers telephoned in, and discovered that despite pickets, newspapers were still being published every day.Learned they could obtain copies by going directly to the newspaper plant.Here is the Herald Tribune plant on the first day of the strike, showing the truck loading platform used to sell papers in the emergency.The first day of the strike, Herald Tribune's circulation plummeted to 15,000, but as more and more loyal Tribune readers learned they could buy the paper at the plant, they went to the Herald Tribune in ever increasing numbers.On the last day of the strike, the Herald Tribune sold 65,000 copies, by far the greater portion of them in direct over-the-counter sales to Tribune readers who had taken the time and trouble to come far out of their way to get a copy of their favorite morning newspaper.This represents as surprisingly high percentage of Tribune circulation achieved under extremely difficult conditions.Meanwhile, a flood of Tribune readers phoned the paper.Please give me more information on the change in red point value.Is it true that President Truman is out of the country?On what troop ship is my husband returning home?Now let's move to the Journal American.Here is a newspaper plant so disadvantageously located for the general public, that the paper maintains frequent bus service for its own employees to a nearby transportation center.The sirens of East River shipping convoys provide a musical background for the roar of the presses.Despite its inaccessible location, Journal American readers traveled to the plant on South street in droves.Circulation on the first day of the strike dropped to 4,000.But by the end of the strike, daily sales figures climb to 25,000.Mirror fans lined up at the Mirror plant in mounting crescendo.Daily sales figures are unavailable, but through teeming rain and blazing heat, Mirror readers made the trip to the plant, stood in line, made their purchase.The New York Sun.Here was New York's longest picket line.It is impossible to show the full effect of the Sun readership line because the paper was sold inside the building.Sun readers entered the marble lobby of the building, shown in the center, made their purchase inside and emerged through the door at the left.When sales got too heavy for the emergency office, boxes were set up in the marble foyer to serve as temporary newsstands.During rush hour, the place looked like Grand Station.Circulation climbed from a low of 23,000 on the first day of the strike to a high of 78,000 on the last day.The New York World-Telegram.This plant is located downtown near the New Jersey commuting terminal.The entrance where papers were sold is situated on a narrow side street in deep shadow, untouched by the rays of the afternoon sun.This made it impossible to take color pictures.There was nothing shadowy, however, about the long lines of World-Telegram readers, who came from near and far.Readers made the trip to the World-Telegram plant all the way from New Haven, Connecticut, from the far corner of Long Island.Lines five blocks long were a daily occurrence.Thousands filed slowly into the Telegram building and emerged triumphantly with their favorite afternoon newspaper.Circulation rose from 15,000 on the first day of the strike to 50,000 on the last day.The New York times.Because of its Times Square location and because it is a morning newspaper, the largest Times crowd during weekdays occurred at night and are not shown here.Blocks adjacent to the Times were frequently choked with readers for a couple of hours around theater closing time.A New Jersey resident bought five copies of the paper to auction off at a Red Cross meeting.When the copies of the Times got as far as Asbury Park, New Jersey, although well-read by train passengers, they were sold for a dollar a copy if current, 50 cents if a day old.A newsstand manager at Little Silver, New Jersey, was offered the dollar for a day old Times, but refused to sell because he wanted to read it himself.Times daily circulation rose from 38,000 on the first day of the strike to 210,000 the final day.The New York News.For 22 hours out of every 24, news readers poured in and out of the News building two to four abreast from 6:00 in the morning to four the next morning.Lines began forming in the afternoon about 5 O'clock, stood for three hours to await the first edition at 8:15 p.m. The longest line occurred on a Saturday night to buy the Sunday News.This line, 17 blocks long, snaked it way along 3rd Avenue, back and forth on cross streets to 32nd Street.City police went through the subways at 34th Street, warning passengers bound for the News building to get off of there to join the line instead of going on up to 42nd Street.Assistant Chief Inspector John D. Martino of the New York City Police Department said: - This was the biggest lineup crowd in my experience.It averaged 30,000 per hour.People stood in line for two hours before reaching the counter.42nd Street grew accustomed to a daily ritual.Passing trolley cars were parked while motormen and passengers got off to buy the paper.Taxis, private cars, the street and adjacent blocks were packed throughout each evening with vehicles while passengers and drivers bought the news.One of the picketers, after shedding his sign, nightly went inside to buy his paper.From 37,000 over-the-counter sales on the first day of the strike, sales zoomed to 915,000 on the last day, of which 584,000 sales were made over the counter to individuals in the lines you see.Happily, however, even labor strike has it's lighter moment.By courtesy of Movietone News, Mayor F.H. La Guardia reads the comics.Ah, here's Dick Tracy.Now here in the first picture is the laundry wagon.It's a yellow laundry wagon.And Wet Wash, that's the driver, you know.He's very calmly sitting down with his back toward the back of the wagon eating his lunch, and our little friend What is her name?I'll get it in a minute.She's inside with the money.As she says, \"When are you going to let me out of here?He said, wait why?I said easy to say, easy.And then the next picture, and we hear the sound from inside the wagon.Open the door and Wet Wash says, I'll let you off when you decided to give me a better cut of that dough.From the inside, and we see the inside now.I offered you a $1,000.What do you think I am?This is my money.And if you remember, she start stripping and tearing up the laundry and she has all of the money in bills in the pillows there.And we hear Wet Wash \"Listen baby, I know you're a maid at bamboozles.I saw you there last week.And I know there's something phony about that dough.Now when we get it, it's going to be fifty fifty.Okay?Then maybe you'd like some more of your laundry torn to pieces.Rip....she's ripping that laundry there and then a little delicate piece of lingerie and he looks in.Ye gods, I lose my job over this.Stop you win.I'll settled for five grand.Now, get this picture.Here is Wet Wash, the doors of the laundry wagon are open.He's leaning with his back toward the wagon.And he's counting his money.Two, three, 4,000.Now he's getting into the hundreds.600, 700, 800 and the picture shows and affectless specking out.She's got hold of that iron pot.Remember the iron pot she took from the Van Heusens.God ness flat, to put the money in and crash she crashes it on his head, knocked out.Hey children, what does it all mean?It means that dirty money never brings any luck.That's New York learn that as the newspapers, but not to go to the public.The public would come to the paper.During the 17 days of the strike, the public came to the various plants, bought a total of 10 million, 628,000 newspapers trouble inconvenience.This was the price paid each day for New York, newspapers by long lines of people in rain and sun standing for hours on hard concrete, risking bodily harm by cutting through picket lines, impervious to shouted warnings of tickets in a city, heavily unionized men, women, and children in all walks of life, giving up a summer evening of pleasure or relaxation going without lunch or postponing dinner, four hours coming four miles in northern subway's to stand for a long period in holding our slow moving files.Patient, perspiring, persistent, all for a few penny purchase.Such is the miracle of journalism and such as the significance of newspapers to their readers, newspapers, which can be read and re-read newspapers in which the public can read all about it in their own time at their own convenience.And thus was New York sigh of relief.When the strike finally was ended, when within the hour, the trucks were rolling and New York life returned to normal.Once again, dramatic proof has been given, that no other medium can take the place of newspapers in the lives of the people.And the fundamental reason why newspapers are held in such high regard by the American public lies in that long-cherished bulwark of Liberty, Freedom of the press.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/17DaysTh1945.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/17DaysTh1945.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/17DaysTh1945.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/FromtheG1954/FromtheG1954.mp3", "text": "More and more often these days an interesting story is being presented to men and women in homes and offices all over America.Through a booklet facts about vitamins, minerals and Nutrilite Food Supplement, and the person who presents the story is a member of your own community.Your Nutrilite distributor.The factual story has its beginning in one of the loveliest spots in America, approximately 100 miles east of the city of Long Beach California, or some of America's most beautiful valleys.Here are the tall majestic peaks of the San Jacinto Mountains tower above one of the richest valleys in the entire west.Acre after acre of apricots and peaches adorn the valley like living jewels.And here is the rich and hearty green of alfalfa.Many years ago farmers in this beautiful area found that the soil and climate were ideal for raising the finest alfalfa and only the finest will do here because this is part of one of the famous Nutrilite Products, alfalfa farms.But it is interesting to see what steps are taken to ensure such a high quality alfalfa.A very important step is the preparation of a high grade compost to use on the soil.This machine is called a fox chopper.After the top alfalfa has been cut for dehydration, this machine cuts a further portion of the stalk.This to be used as part of the compost.Raw materials used in the compost include in addition to the alfalfa cuttings, animal manures, limestone rock, phosphate rock, red rock and other mineral compounds.When the proper ingredients for a compost pile have been assembled, they are loaded by this power lift into a specially constructed mixer.As the materials are spread, they are thoroughly mixed to ensure the most uniform decomposition.After several weeks, when the compost has gone through a period of desired decomposition, it is turn.Again the natural bacteria found in the various materials start the necessary decomposition.And in several more weeks, these piles of compost are ready for use.During these processes, the compost is kept moist at all times.When the compost is ready for use, it is deposited in liberal amounts on the alfalfa field.The compost is used in conjunction with hybrid earthworms cultivated at the Nutrilite farms.The earthworms aerate the soil, and help to work the compost into the ground.The effectiveness of the compost as a fertilizer is shown by the quality and size of a fruit and flowers at the Nutrilite farms, which have been grown with this specially prepared mixture.After being cut and thoroughly composted, the fields are irrigated by overhead sprinklers and each field is thoroughly watered twice between cutting.Good soils, special composts, proper irrigation, sunshine, and fresh air produce this top grade alfalfa now ready for dehydration.When coming for dehydration, Nutrilite Products takes only the upper few inches of the plant.The remainder is then cut for the compost pile.As the alfalfa is harvested, it is carried up by the conveyor belt and dropped into a wagon.Thus, the alfalfa is cut, gathered and loaded in one operation without touching the ground and is correctly taken from a field to the dehydration area.The process of dehydration is an interesting one.Let's follow it.The fresh alfalfa is put into this chopper and is cut into pieces small enough to ensure quick, easy and efficient dehydration.The chopped alfalfa is then carried mechanically to this tray loader, which spreads the alfalfa on trays evenly and in the right amount.Workmen then load the trays into a drying rack and check to make sure the trays are properly loaded for dehydration.As the racks of fresh alfalfa are put into the dehydrator, racks of alfalfa which have been the hydrated under rigidly controlled temperature are removed.When the dehydrated alfalfa is removed from the dehydrator, it is emptied into a large hopper.It then goes through the hammer mill to bring it to a flower like fineness and is poured from the hoppers into barrows.The select watercress and parsley, which are contained in Nutrilite Food Supplement are processed here in the same manner.When a barrow is full, it is weighed and the weight recorded.And at the same time the container is flushed with a harmless inert gas.The barrow is then sealed.The purpose of the inert gas is to displace air, which has an oxidizing effect on the alfalfa, watercress and parsley meal.The number put on this barrel is one of the steps of constant control quality control.This is but one of the accurate records kept even long after the finished product has been eaten possibly at some far distant point.The alfalfa, watercress and parsley meal is now ready for the next phase in the long Nutrilite process.Sealed, numbered and recorded the containers are sent by truck to the processing plant.Buena Park, California is a thriving community, some 20 miles northeast of Long Beach.Here in Buena Park is the home of Nutrilite Products Incorporated.The Nutrilite plant is large and modern.The scope of activity here is indicated by the amount of space required.So that many phases of a Nutrilite operation may be performed within the confines of this one area.The size of this storage building gives us an idea of the activities of the entire plant, Materials used in compounding Nutrilite are stored here until the Nutrilite Control Laboratory has checked and approved their quality and potency to ensure that they meet the high standards set by Nutrilite Products.This building is the extraction laboratory.Only Carl Rehnborg and his immediate assistants are admitted to this building where these exclusive extraction processes are a closely guarded secret.Here is produced the exclusive Nutrilite concentrate.This is a concentrate chemically and mechanically extracted from alfalfa, watercress, parsley and yeast, and is found only in Nutrilite Food Supplement.You should meet Carl Rehnborg.He is the man who developed Nutrilite Food Supplement.He has devoted many years to study and work in the field of nutrition.The Nutrilite concentrate processed by methods known only to Nutrilite and obtainable only in Nutrilite Products was developed by Mr. Rehnborg.This is where the Nutrilite capsule compound, composed of a Nutrilite concentrate and added crystalline, vitamins and vitamin concentrates is mixed.All possible care is taken to ensure the highest quality finished product.The Nutrilite concentrate is placed in the mixer together with the added crystalline, vitamins and vitamin concentrates in proper proportion.A harmless inert gas is introduced into the mixture to prevent oxidation.After thorough mixing and blending, the Nutrilite compound is ready for encapsulating.The encapsulating process takes place here.This machine places empty capsules into a circular metal disk.The capsules are automatically uncapped.The machine then fills the lower part of the capsule with the Nutrilite compound, which has been fed into a hopper on the machine.This is weighed and the weight and the batch number recorded by the operator.Thus, we see another step in the rigid control exercise by Nutrilite Products.The filled disk is now returned to the machine for capping of the capsule.And the finished capsules are ready for packaging.Several times during the processing of each batch samplings are made and an extremely sensitive and delicate scale is used to ensure the correct weight for every batch of material process.Thus more rigid control.Samples also go to the quality control laboratory for analysis to make certain that the Nutrilite rigid standards are maintained.Processing of the minerals is also done with great care.The minerals derived from alfalfa, watercress and parsley by Nutrilite processes and the added minerals used in Nutrilite Food Supplement are here carefully weighed and measured.Another step in the rigid control.All the mineral ingredients are placed in this machine and thoroughly mixed.To ensure a proper consistency, the mixture is spread on trays and placed in a drying room.Following the drying process, the mixture is placed in an oscillator, which sifts the material into a fine granular form ready for tableting.The mineral mixture is fed into a hopper in the tableting machine and is drawn down onto our revolving plate, which contains indentations each of which is filled automatically.Two sets of funders work together to compress the mixture into tablet form under several tons of pressure per square inch.And here again is further evidence of Nutrilite constant control.Throughout this stage of the operation, the tablets are sampled frequently and weighed on these very delicate scales.Weight and batch number are recorded.And samples also go to the quality control laboratory for analysis to assure that the highest standards are maintained.When it has been determined that the mineral tablets and the vitamin capsules have met the rigid Nutrilite requirements, both are brought to this room for packaging.The filled capsules are empty into hoppers from which they are drawn by slotted trays into bottles.Thus the count is automatic.This operation also permits a last visual inspection.As the filled bottles move along the line, a special machine stuffs cotton into each bottle to ensure a from pack.To guard against oxidation this machine draws off the air and forces a harmless inert gas into each bottle.The bottles are then sealed airtight automatically by a machine that firmly affixes the screw cap.The bottles are now ready for labeling.Here the final operation takes place.Labels are affixed to the bottles mechanically, and the bottles are now ready to package.The mineral tablets are emptied into a hopper and then are fed into automatic counters.The counter releases, the tablet into cellophane bags, which are then placed in boxes.A last visual inspection is made here also.The bottle of capsules and the box of tablets are packed into one box.And once again, we notice that each is identified with its batch number.The package is then sealed in cellophane packed one dozen to a carton and the operation at the Nutrilite Products plant is complete.From the time the barreled alfalfa, watercress and parsley left the Nutrilite Product farms through the extracting, adding of minerals, crystalline, vitamins and vitamin concentrates, measuring, boxing and weigh a constant check has been made and a constant control maintained.Headquarters for the complete control plan are the Nutrilite Product's laboratories also located in Buena Park.The activity of the Nutrilite laboratories is divided into research and control.The equipment here is some of the most recently developed and most unique in its field.The finest and most definitive mineral analysis is ensured by the use of the spectrograph.Invaluable in the type of analysis carried on in the laboratory.The Nutrilite laboratory is not only evidence of the thoroughness and care, which is lavished on the preparation of Nutrilite Food Supplement, but it is a constant reminder of the unceasing efforts in the direction of further progress in the field of food supplementation made by this highly competent, carefully trained staff.Let's return now to the Nutrilite plant.Here we have seen the preparation of the Nutrilite Food Supplement.The ultimate destination of which is your home.Here in Long Beach California are located the offices of Mytinger and Casselberry.Mytinger and Casselberry Incorporated is the exclusive international distributor of Nutrilite Food Supplement.This building and the large, highly trained staff are needed to meet the tremendous demand for Nutrilite Food Supplement.These young women are handling the correspondence made necessary by the hundreds of thousands of men and women who avail themselves at Nutrilite Food Supplement.And in turn, the entire sales organization was made possible by the founders and chief executives of Mytinger and Casselberry incorporated, Mr. Lee Mytinger and Dr. William Casselberry.These two men provide leadership and inspiration to the many thousands of distributors of Nutrilite Food Supplement.So we bring to a close the story of the preparation of Nutrilite Food Supplement from its start in the alfalfa fields of a beautiful Hemet Valley.Through the precise scientific compounding of the Nutrilite concentrate and the added crystalline, vitamins, vitamin concentrates and minerals at Nutrilite Products Incorporate.Through the unceasing research and analysis at the Nutrilite laboratory.Through each step of rigid control, which assures you have the greatest accuracy and the highest quality.Nutrilite truly a distinguished product among food and supplements.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/FromtheG1954.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/FromtheG1954.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/FromtheG1954.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/GoodWrin1951/GoodWrin1951.mp3", "text": "Good evening Ladies and gentlemen, this is John Nesbitt, bringing you the Hollywood premiere of Sunny Sweet in his latest picture, Good Wrinkles.Here he is now.And listen to those fans.Can we have your autograph?There are many celebrities here, but tonight all eyes are on Sunny-sweet.Please, Sunny, please- - May I have your autograph?Maybe I can break in here and get him to say a few words.All about the scene.Please, Sunny, sign mine first- - Here's mine!Yes.I know what you would have said, \"Six or seven prunes a day are good for you in every way\".And that's good advice.There he goes, a Hollywood star now.Let me tell you the story of how this local boy made good.Sunny comes from a famous French family in California.He was born on a balmy spring day and as any baby, at first he just laid there drinking in the sunshine.As the months passed by, Sunny was nourished by mother nature with nutrient riches that poured down from the warm California sunshine and up from the rich soil in which the parent tree was rooted.By the time fall had come, Sunny was fully grown.Ready to go into the world.There he goes, off to seek adventure, in Hollywood.Well, Sunny was soon to find out, that there was much new world of his.In the first place, he had never realized that all prunes are plums, but all plums are not prunes.For prunes, you see, are a special kind of plum, that can be dried without fermenting.But Sunny qualifies, and his career as a movie star was well underway.He was soon to find out that there were many prunes from his family here at the studio, and that he would have the opportunity to work with some of them.Sunny's French prune family, sometimes called the prune D'Agen, is famous for its sweetness, flavor and quality.Prunes of the French prune family run to the middle sizes.So when you see the words, medium, large, or extra large on the package, remember these sizes refer to French prunes, which never grows so large as some other varieties, but which are never surpassed in sweetness and good eating quality.In his first picture, Sunny played the part of a French duke in his regal costume, he fittingly represents true prune royalty.For French prunes are the most popular of all prunes.Quiet!Action!There are larger prunes, to be sure.Here's Pearl, one of Sunny's best friends.She is an Imperial prune and her family, which thrives in very few areas, is not sufficiently numerous to be a major factor in the prune industry.My, but she is a shy one, and rightly so.Well she comes from a prune family that is shy in many ways, especially at fruit bearing time.From Pearl, Sunny learned that there were various other varieties of prunes.But most of them are grown only in small quantities and are not important on a commercial scale.She told him, that should he come upon any members of the prune family grown in the Pacific Northwest, he would find them noticeably tart.This tartness being due to a larger acid content and a slightly smaller sugar content than the French prunes grown in California.Sunday finished his role as the duke and the studio assigned him almost immediately to a film in which he portrayed a world's champion prize fighter.He played many important parts in the movies, just as prunes in real life play an important part in keeping us healthy.And Now with his great supply of prune energy, movie actor, Sunny wind up for the knockout punch.Sunny knocks out Fatigue, just as prune sugar energy overcomes fatigue in our bodies.The average sugar content of French prunes is 49 and a half percent, which comes from their long natural ripening in the sun.Prune sugar is in the form of readily digestible carbohydrates, chiefly invert sugar, which is readily absorbed into the blood to do the job of supplying quick energy, so needed when the going gets a bit rough and the tired body needs a pickup.Now let's see some of the requirements for that good to feel good feeling.If you don't mind, I'll be scientific for a few moments.There is carotene, for instance, which is changed by the body to vitamin A. Prunes are an excellent source of carotene, and therefore of this valuable vitamin.Of which, the minimum requirement is 5,000 international units per day.This is the vitamin that does so much to protect precious eyesight.And it's important for proper growth too.Then there is riboflavin, one of the B complex vitamins.Prunes have a higher riboflavin content than any other fruit.The average requirement of this vitamin is one and eight tenths milligrams per day.It is needed for steady nerves, a clear skin and good digestion as well as for proper growth.Thiamine, also known as vitamin B1, contributes to healthy nerves, a good appetite and proper growth.The daily requirement of thiamine is one and two tenths milligrams.Also, there is the mineral, iron.so necessary for its blood regenerating powers and an essential part of every living tissue in the body.Your daily requirement of iron is 12 milligrams.This is Sunny's way of showing just how much good six or seven prunes a day can do for you.They furnish a great percentage of these essential needs of man.Six or seven quality prunes are approximately 50 grams of edible fruit, which furnish 27% of the average daily minimum requirement of vitamin A, 38 and one half percent of the daily requirement of riboflavin or vitamin B2, 12 and a half percent of the daily requirement of thiamine, or vitamin B1, and 16 and six tenths percent of the average daily minimum requirement of iron to feel good.The story of Sunny's life as a movie star would never be complete without his most famous role, as Dr. Sunny.It's a natural for him, for prunes can surely do much to keep us healthy and well.As every nurse and dietician learns early in her training, prunes are highly effective as a gentle natural aid to regularity.This is due partly to the abundance of soft fruit cellulose food bulk in its natural and most valuable form.And partly to the presence of a specific laxative element which has certain chemical and physiological properties, similar to catholic and chlorogenic acid.Calling Dr. Sweet, calling Dr. Sunny Sweet, emergency at room 208.Hey!Doc!Emergency.Room two O eight.Say, aah?Hmm, coated tongue.Hmm, most irregular, eh?But Dr. Sonny knows the answer.The patient will be well in no time.And now he says with the rest of us, it's good to feel good.Now let's turn from Sunday's Hollywood career and get a little better acquainted with his family background.We've found that prunes are unique and more than just their down right tastiness and food value.For example, there's the way prunes are harvested.In the springtime, they begin their gradual development and throughout the summer are richly nourished by mother nature.Finally, in August, they begin to ripen.However, the finest prunes are not picked like other fruit, but are allowed to hang in the sunshine until they're so plump and heavy with juicy goodness, they drop from the trees of their own weight.When nature says, \"you're ready\", down they go.The soil has been previously turned and worked to a cushiony mattress to catch the falling fruit.And there they lie, purple and plump, all ready to be carefully gathered by hand.Now, here we are at the plant.Let's see how plums become prunes by what is known as the dehydrating process.They are first put through a hot 15 second alkaline bath to slightly crack the skins and allow for more rapid evaporation of the moisture in the fruit.Next, they are thoroughly rinsed.Then they are spread in single layers on large trays to be dried.While open field drying was the only method employed for many years, this method has now been largely replaced by modern mechanical dehydrators.And it is in these dehydrators that the prune, as we know it best, actually comes to be.These are truly good wrinkles.The one place where wrinkles are looked upon as a sign of distinction.The next step is to sort the prunes according to size.As they pass over a series of graduated holes in the sorting conveyor, they drop through the holes they fit and are thus automatically graded.Prune sizes are designated by the number of prunes it takes to make a pound.Naturally the fewer, the prunes to the pound, the larger the individual prunes.The medium size is graded 67 or less prunes to the pound.The large size runs 53 prunes or less to the pound.Then comes the extra-large size, which averages 43 prunes or less to the pound.Thus, you are reminded again, the fewer the prunes per pound, the larger the fruit.The final step before packaging is the special Sunsweet tenderize process.Using only heat and moisture, this process leaves the prunes, plump and tender, which permits very rapid cooking, thus eliminating the vitamin loss, which sometimes results from longer preparation.From the tenderize process, the prunes are immediately packed steaming hot, into parchment paper bags, which are enclosed in protective cartons.Also as an added protection against air, dust, light and heat, the cartons are in turn enclosed and sealed in a lustrous gold or silver foil wrapper.This hot packing and foil sealing ensures uniform, moisture, tenderness and fine eating quality throughout the contents of the package.In addition to protecting the whole rich goodness of the fruit, the foil wrapper is an easy way to always identify your favorite brand.Fresh from the carton, the prunes are ready to be served in an infinite variety of ways.Raw, for example.The special tenderize process makes prunes so tender and good, you can eat them, just like candy right out of the box.And raw, they provide all the qualities of a natural fruit.Or prepare them in this simple way.Just fill a jar with prunes, add boiling water, to cover, screw on the lid, let cool, then place in your refrigerator for several days.The longer they stand, the thicker, the juice.This American breakfast tradition is delicious when served with a little cream or with a dash of lemon, or just sitting pretty in their own juice.For serving with meat, spiced and pickled prunes or prune pie, a tempting luscious dessert with a billowy merengue that can be put together in a twinkling.Prune whip is another famous American dish, the perfect dessert for a perfect meal.Here's another wonderful treat: prune birthday cake, a tender, moist, fruity cake just right for every day of the year.And for special occasions too, such as Junior's birthday party.Our country however, it isn't the only one that knows all about the select- uses of prunes.They are a favorite fruit in many countries.Let's see what the people of Scandinavia know about prunes.If you should find unexpected guests are on the way and a quick sweet bread is what you'll need.Just try prune biscuit roll.Prepare about two cups of your favorite biscuit mix by merely adding milk, then roll the dough to a quarter inch thickness and spread evenly with one and a half cups of chopped and pitted cooked prunes.You then top the prunes with a quarter cup of melted butter, one half cup of sugar, spiced with cinnamon or nutmeg, and carefully roll like a jelly roll.Then place the role in a buttered baking dish and bake in a moderate oven for 45 minutes to an hour.When cool, the roll is cut into slices.And there you are.As easy as that coffee time's complete with dainty prune biscuit rolls.Here's the desserts, the vanilla cream portion in this bowl is a blend of eggs, quarter -- served cold.Delicious!Another delightful dessert of theirs, which can be served hot or cold, is prunes with merengue.The merengue is spread over the prunes and the dessert is baked until the top is golden brown.If you have a sweet tooth, serve it with cream or vanilla sauce, and it's a mouthwatering treat.Another favorite of theirs, prune souffle as light and fluffy as a dream.And believe it or not, the Scandinavians even make a soup of prunes, which they serve cold.A Swedish specialty, no doubt, but try it sometime.You might like it.Scandinavian cooks use prunes a great deal with meat, especially with fatty meats like pork.One method is to stuff spare ribs with pitted prunes before baking.This adds a delicate succulent flavor to the ribs.Another popular method of theirs is to serve boiled prunes right along with fried or baked pork chops.Yet another delicious way they combine meat with prunes is to place the prunes on slices of pork, rolling them until they're crisp and brown.Ans here is an idea of theirs that works wonders with fowl.Stuff chicken, turkey, or duck with prunes.The sweetness and richness of the prunes really enhances the flavor of the fowl.Yes, there are hundreds of ways to serve prunes.And to help in preparing these you have seen, plus countless other prune delicacies, Sunsweet has gathered together a wonderful collection of prune recipes, which have been put into a handy booklet.Merely mail your requests to Sunsweet Box six seven O, San Jose, California, for a free copy.However you serve these prunes, you can be sure they are a delicious, full flavored, perfect eating fruit.Just as important, they are rich in nature's own vitamins and valuable food minerals.A quick energy food that gives children and adults alike that good to feel good feeling.Serve prunes often.They are good any way, any time.So there in all his Regal splendor, sits Sunny, proud of his Royal heritage, proud too of the golden carton, which he sponsors.And which is your guarantee of extra tenderness and extra goodness in the prunes you buy.Your sure guide, to good wrinkles, When you go shopping for prunes.\u266a Prunes that they are good for you in every way, \u266a \u266a buy Sunsweet prunes, then you will agree, \u266a \u266a cooked or raw, they're heavenly \u266a", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/GoodWrin1951.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/GoodWrin1951.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/GoodWrin1951.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/Grant_History/Grant_History.mp3", "text": "The year was 1849 and the great surge westward across north America had already begun.The region of land called Minnesota received territorial status.And with that status came pioneers.This was the place to go then, because this was new territory where land could be procured cheaply, and the promoters painted a wonderful picture.But the promoters never had to work too hard when it came to this area.Lush farm country with rolling Hills and a horizon that seemed to go on forever.This was the land these first settlers came upon.Those who dared venture beyond the safe Haven of Stillwater had names like Albion Masterman, and William Rutherford.They along with men, such as James Rutherford, Samuel Webster, Jesse soul, and a few others were the first non-indigenous people to populate Greenfield.A township organized on October 20th, 1858 in the home of Thomas Ramsden.The following officers were chosen three town supervisors.One of which shall be designated as chairman one town clerk, one assessor, one collector, one overseer of the poor, two constables, two justices of the peace as many overseers of roads as there are road districts in the town.And as many pound masters as the electors may determine, it seemed as if every person in the township would need a title to fill all of the offices.It was Greenfield township to begin with and why that was picked I suppose it sounded rather romantic.The agrarian movement has started in Greenfield sound nice and lush but, it turned out there was another in Western, I believe in Western Hennepin county that also named themselves Greenfield.So in 1864, a new name was proposed by the town clerk, Jesse soul.The new moniker would honor the great civil war hero general Ulysses S Grant.Previous to the name change.The townsfolk had been busy bringing their families from the east dock to join them.Working the land and establishing ordinances.The first of which was enacted in 1859 to prohibit free running swine.By 1863, other animals got into the act and the ordinance was broadened to include all farm animals and dogs.Each dog was described by name, color, and owner in the town records.Any stray found could be impounded.And if after public notice, no one claimed them in ten days, the animals were forfeited to the person caring for them.With the 1860s came great change to Washington county, the civil war was upon the country and the need for food to nourish the soldiers great.Wheat became the cash crop of the fertile Meadows of grant township.Local historian, Jerry Brochures details some of the trades used in the area.Wheat farming and dairying, really dairy farmers it was a central part of their operation.Some sheep raising, which was carrying on with the old Rutherford tradition of raising sheep back in the north of England, which is where William and James his father had come.In addition to England, the Rutherford neighborhood became populated by people from Canada, Ireland and the east coast states of Maine, New York, New Hampshire and Massachusetts.I want to be careful when we speak of that Rutherford neighborhood, we don't want to just talk about the Rutherford's because there were others, of course, who were just as early.The Masterminds, the Ramsdens are the main ones that come to mind, but the Rutherford's along with those other families were the first farmers in the area.Probably the first farmers closest to the city of Stillwater.While farming took out much of the pioneers time, they managed to include other more enjoyable activities as well.We're hardworking people and try to establish a community here.And once they had established a community, then they, they did get together for many different things.They would, I imagine they probably were involved in helping each other build buildings.And the typical thing you'd expect at the time, or they tried once they got here, they tried to establish this Rutherford center was sort of a an area of these people who had arrived here, had something in common and, and try to better themselves intellectually too I think they actually started reading groups and, and, and tried to bring some of the culture of the east, to the wilds of the west.And with fancy music boxes and pianos that survive the long haul across country, people were able to enjoy their leisure time just as well as they had in the east.Later on many would have the opportunity to charter a streetcar straight to the Wildwood amusement park.Where merry-go-rounds, rollercoasters, dancing, pavilions, laughing, and shooting galleries, picnic facilities, bowling allies and swimming beaches on the shores of the great white bear lake, beckoned to them.But life was not all fun and games.People also had to consider how their hard earned money was spent, in 1870 $1 would get you four and a half pounds of coffee, and 20 cents would give you two pounds of crackers.And when you were outfitting, the family, you would always take into consideration the quarters spent for five dozen buttons and the parasol worth 40 cents.But it is perhaps the stories of the individual families that makes grant township's history come alive.We begin with Thomas and Jane Ramston in whose home the first ever town meeting was held.He'd seen so much of the world he'd done so much.I mean, the start sailing at the age of eight and in the British Navy and go around the world and quit, give up the ocean at 21 I mean, he already had a career before most of us were growing up and he started out as a cabin boy and, and served the officers and then worked learned the art of carpentry, and join and joiner.So he was a finished carpenter and lived in England for two years after he got out of the Navy and then came to America.It was rumored in the area that the former seaman had a pot of gold, buried in one corner of his garden.Although never proven, he always had enough to supply all of his wants.In fact, at the 1874, Minnesota state fair, Thomas took first prize for his oats and first premium for his apples.The Ramsdens were accomplished farmers.Just about anything you can imagine in this country, when my great grandfather settled it, he was a carpenter.So he didn't really get into the farming other than subsistence type of farming, you know, a few cattle, some hogs and chickens, the old style farm farm, where you got a few of everything.My grandfather got more into the dairy part of it was expanding that.Bruce Ramsden is a fourth generation farmer in grant township.He describes the home, his great, great grandfather built after staking his claim in 1851.The first house that Tom built on the farm and grant was a bi-level.To fit the top of graphy of the land, the kitchen and work rooms were on the first floor and the living room was around the second floor.A summer kitchen was also built a few feet away from the main house.I might add that the farm had at one time 16 buildings, not including the outhouse.Tom earned a spotless reputation among his friends and neighbors.He helped to organize the township of Greenfield, now, Grant and served as the town treasurer for 26 years from 1865 to 1891.The first meeting to organize the town of Greenfield was held in Tom Ramsdens house on October 20th, 1858.And now onto the namesakes of the neighborhood, William and James Rutherford.The Rutherford's are known across the country for bringing the first two genuine English sheepdogs to America.William, the younger of the two brothers was the first to head west.Oh, I'm sure it was the availability of good cheap farmland.Basically William stated in an account of his journey's that he didn't know where he was headed, but he was headed west and made his way to Chicago and up the Mississippi river.And I guess came upon this area and found it pretty desirable.After spending three years in Stillwater, William settled down on a 160 acre homestead in Grant township.A letter to his fiance, Christiana Holcom, dated January 7th, 1849 describes the backbreaking work of an early settler.Well, all about the 1st of November, I built me a shanty out in the timber about one mile from my farm and one mile from Mr Botwell's.And since that time I have lived in it, I am cutting and hauling rails to fence our farm, - But eventually life did become easier for the William Rutherford's.As is evidenced by the construction of their beautiful home, which still stands today.Some rooms in the home were used as an end for weary travelers between Stillwater and Saint Paul.The third floor had another use entirely.Third floor of the old Westford house was used as a dance hall, and they'd have their neighborhood gatherings and do the, oh, I suppose, square dancing and whatever types of dances that they did at that time.And the music was a fiddling.Stories written at the time, given account of a large well-stocked farm.The daughters all skilled in the art of housekeeping, attended the affairs of the household.Ever ready with a kind word and a helping hand to minister to the wants of the many who find shelter beneath their hospitable roof.It was said that William Rutherford was a very kindhearted man who had one failing.He would take oats when the stove pipe came down on a cold morning.In spite of that fault, William managed to do all he could for the neighborhood, including the donation of the home cemetery now called the Rutherford cemetery.When the first death occurred, they naturally had to find a burial ground and William had built a shanty as he a log shanty, as he referred to it, it must have been sometime in 1848 or 49.And when he went to Michigan to marry and bring back his bride, he found that the a log house had been burned.I'm not sure if we know how I think there's some legend that the Indians may have burned it, but we, you know, we don't know.And then he decided to donate that for a burial ground.Legend has it, that the sign over the gate is William's very own signature.He and most of his neighbors are now laid to rest there.Besides Rutherford Masterman, Ramsman, Ferocious, Newman, Taft, Paolo.It seems that a giving nature was a family trait.For brother James Rutherford leased a school site for district seven without charge to the community.The first school district was organized in 1855 and the first school house built one year later.An interesting note to education in those early years, a man was hired to teach in the winter while a woman was hired for the summer months.The man was needed to control the older farm boys who only attended during the four winter months.James and Elizabeth Rutherford and their children ran a large dairy with quite a large stock of poultry on a farm, just down the road from his brothers.Over the years, the original 36 square miles of grant township was broken down and split into many different cities and towns.In 1918, part of grant was formed into Lincoln town as is evidenced by this picture of the Lincoln town grade school.Early in 1931, the need for yet another split in this section of Washington county began to develop momentum.This time residents were urging the incorporation of a town to be known as, That name had been selected because it was the last streetcar stop on the line.was officially voted into existence August 7th, 1931.In 1972 eventually took over what was remaining of Lincoln town.Wheelerknee, Birchwood and Dalewood, we're all part of the original grand township.The names and faces have changed since the early days of grant township, but the purity and vision of their community, yet remains.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Grant_History.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Grant_History.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Grant_History.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/Gvtvnews-GVTVNEWS021411NCTV11Episode978Part2717-4/Gvtvnews-GVTVNEWS021411NCTV11Episode978Part2717.mp3", "text": "In today's local news headlines, area artist under arrest, man in custody on suspicion of attempted murder charge.Nevada City Mayor says, look at outsourcing for police and Harrison Senum saying, better force, not different force.And pet photo day to benefit disabled child.In today's first local story, written by Kyle Megan of The Union an Alta Sierra man, was in critical condition, Friday in a Roseville Hospital after he was allegedly beaten with a wooden log on Thursday.James Turner, 75, was found unconscious by a friend Thursday evening at Alta Sierra Airport after apparently suffering a head trauma, said Nevada County Sheriff, Keith Royal.He was recovering Friday in Sutter Roseville Hospital, where he was transported by air after he was discovered.Cody Feiler or Feler, 30, also was an Alta Sierra man was in custody with police on Thursday night on suspicion of attempted murder in connection with the incident.Feiler, was well-known musician and painter in the local arts community.At 3:00 PM, Thursday an Alta Sierra resident from 18 DAS Buckand Norlene Way near the airstrip called 911 to report Feiler had allegedly been vandalizing his property and making death threats.Feiler had allegedly pulled the man's address sign out of the ground and destroyed the solar light.\"He was making some very bizarre statements at the time,\" Royal said.He was talking about meeting God and how he had beaten someone up and found a gold sword under a rock.Feiler returned to a home he was staying in at Norlene where deputies found him naked in a bath tub at about 3:30 PM. For his own protection and others, Sheriff deputies took Feiler into protective custody, at the time.They transported Feiler to Sierra Nevada Memorial Hospital in Grass Valley for evaluation, initial test shows he is not under influence of any substances.Meanwhile, shortly after 4:00 PM, a friend of Turner's received a call from him, he sounded stressed and winded and said he would meet her at Alta Sierra home.Royal said, it was likely Turner had already been in touch at the time, but was still able to call.When Turner's friend went to his home at about 6:00 PM she didn't see Turner and walked to the Alta Sierra Airport Norlene Way where he often walks.At about 7:15 PM, she found Turner on the ground near the runway, suffering from apparent head trauma and called for an ambulance.Once their rescuers, rescuers determined Turner's injuries were not consistent with those of someone who fell to the ground.Investigators followed blood droplets to a wooden pile and believed they found a log there used to strike Turner in the face and head.Armed with this information Sheriff deputies questioned Feiler in connection with the incident.\"He made admissions to injuring this individual,\" Royal added.The subsequent search of Feiler's home, turned up clothes with blood on them.At that point deputy's arrested Feiler on the charge of attempted murder and took him to Wayne Brown Correctional Facility in Nevada City for questioning.Feiler was booked into the jail around 3:00 AM after questioning and was in custody on a nobel charge as of Friday afternoon.Messages left for Feiler's family for comment were not returned, Friday.Feiler previously ran an art studio in Grass Valley from 2008 to early last year at St. Joseph's Cultural Center, said Director, Joseph Gouda.And a story written by Trina Klaus dubbed to Union Is Nevada City getting the best police service for the money it's spending?Could it get the desired level of service for less, even if it means letting another agency take over city policing?City leaders wouldn't discuss the matter when a proposal to outsource policing was offered two weeks ago.And they disagreed on how to move forward to address concerns about policing that have been raised.Mayor Robert Bergemann wants to take a look at policing in a Nevada County seat present service and what people want and what they're willing to pay for and bring back for discussion the possibility that someone else could do better than Nevada City Police Department.\"You get the information, then you figure out what to do,\" said Bergemann, who adds, he hopes to place the topic on a city council agenda in the near term.The next city council meeting is set for February 24th and the agenda will be set next week.Others on council disagree.Councilwoman Sally Harris, supports the city's present course, which is to focus on concerns about bordering, especially on commercial street in the streets, public parking lot.Those are the only areas of concern about the police and that she had heard residents raise, she said.Presentation on the city's option for addressing loitering included in along Broad Street in Callaghan Park is expected to be heard in council on May 11th.Councilwoman Renette Senum, wants the city to look at policing in a holistically way and see how the department can develop better relationships with residents and business owners, both supports maintain the city's own department.Council member, David McKay and Duane Strawser were not reached for comment.\"I do not want our police department to be outsourced,\" Senum said.\"I support a better police department this is an opportunity to reinvent ourselves and be better\".Nevada City's Public Safety Program is projected to cost the town more than 1.2 million in the 2010, '11 fiscal year.Employing 16 people, actual costs are higher state and federal grants pay for three sworn officers, Police Chief Blue Travado said, and Travado was given the city what he called a bargain in his own salary.The man with 44 years of law enforcement experiences working for a halftime salary of 48,000.\"I work more than 20 hours a week,\" he added.So in the bargain will end more than a year ago Travado told the council his intention to retire, approaching 70 and making already marking 15 years with the city.He would like to step aside in about a year, but is willing to stay on as needed.\"Level of service or the service in Nevada City Police force has at least one patrol officer on duty at all times plus supervisory officers,\" Travado said.Overnight shifts are overlapping, mainly when they close bars.One of the officers is dedicated to work in the Nevada County narcotics task forces salaries paid largely from the state and federal grants.\"Those funds are in jeopardy as legislation, both levels try to cut costs,\" County Sheriff Keith Ross said.\"Two more officers are paid through federal stimulus grant that will end a little over a year from now,\" Travado added.In addition to the sworn officers, two community service officers walk their beats, their wages come from the parking meter revenue and are not counted in the department budget.The city already contracts with the County Sheriff's office to receive emergency calls and dispatch officers at a cost of 120,000 yearly.Sheriff dispatchers fielded 5,765 calls from Nevada City in 2010.According to figures compiled by the communications manager, Andrew Trygg.Of those 2,704 less than half were calls for service.The rest were calls from officers themselves who check in with dispatch on a regular basis if situation arise.The most common calls included those for disturbance, such as arguments, noise and barking dogs, 365 calls.Suspicious circumstances, 303.Alarms going off, 177 and the 911 calls, 143, according to Trygg's figures.Nevada City also contracts Grass Valley for animal control services costing, 48,000 a year.Cost for the present level of service already are low, Councilwoman Harris said.Public safety it's expected to consume about 39% of current fiscal year's budget and that is in line with such a cost of other towns and lower than many, she added.Nevada city has seen a reduction in taxes, said fund city operations, leading to layoffs and furloughs in recent years.But city staff believes that decline will level off and revenue will start slowly growing again.\"That implies we don't need to make drastic cuts unless we're willing to really cut to services,\" Harris added.\"If we're willing to do that, then there's all kinds of options at this point.I don't think our budget requires it and I don't think our citizens want less public safety service.Improving policing is high on the council's list of important issues, but having another agency provide the service doesn't guarantee that is going to be cheaper than it is now,\" she added.\"We've already the lowest paid agency in the county,\" Travado said.Most sheriff deputies earned the range of 53,000 to 65,000 yearly plus benefits.According to the county wage scale officer in Nevada City, makes nearly 53,500 plus benefits.Lieutenants and captains in the county level makes significantly more than city chief's annual salary is 79,000.Bergemann says a proposal for this Grass Valley Police Department to handle policing and in Nevada City was offered as a result of strategic planning the Nevada City Council on July, 2010.Strawser, now vice-president, mayor worked with Foster and undersheriff Richard Kimball to get the information, what would cost to outsource public safety.Foster's proposal would save money by eliminating supervisory positions and consolidating other activities.Sheriffs Royal did not submit a formal proposal, but if he were to, he would also save on supervisors and take advantage of services already in these department, such as investigations.Both Foster and Royal said their agencies could save the city money.\"Of course it comes down to what they, Nevada City leaders want,\" Royal added.\"The surprise to me is the city council chose not to review the proposal before making a decision to not consider outsourcing their police services,\" Foster added.\"Considering such an idea, doesn't make it a done deal,\" Mayor Bergemann said.\"We're down to looking at cost savings and the biggest of the big expenses it's police,\" he said.\"City should determine what is the present level of service, explore what people want, figure out what it costs, find out where the residents are willing to pay more, adjust the level of service to the people's desire and revenue available.Then look at cost saving measures, including outsourcing.We need to generate the information to determine whether outsourcing makes sense,\" Bergemann added.Turning Leaf Studios and Grass Valley will have a Valentine's pet photo day 10:00 AM to 5:30 PM Monday, well that's today, for a donation of an amount.Photographer Michele Coomler, will offer a 15 minute portrait session for pet owners and their beloved furry friends.Session will include an 8x10 color print.Photo event is a fundraiser for Santos Kline, a local youth diagnosed with a number of disabilities, including mental retardation to brain cyst, Tourette Syndrome, mild autism and Asperger's and more.And that's it today.Thanks a lot for watching and we'll talk to you tomorrow.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Gvtvnews-GVTVNEWS021411NCTV11Episode978Part2717.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Gvtvnews-GVTVNEWS021411NCTV11Episode978Part2717.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Gvtvnews-GVTVNEWS021411NCTV11Episode978Part2717.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/Gvtvnews-GVTVNEWS021411NCTV11Episode978Part2717-4/Gvtvnews-GVTVNEWS021411NCTV11Episode978Part2717.mp3", "text": "In today's local news headlines, area artists under arrest, man in custody on suspicion of attempted murder charge.Nevada City Mayor says, \"look at outsourcing for police\" and Harrison Simmons, say \"better force, not different force\".And pet photo day to benefit disabled child.In today's first local story written by Kyle Megan of The Union and Alta Sierre man was in critical condition Friday in a Roseville hospital, after he was allegedly beaten with a wooden log on Thursday.James Turner, 75.Was found unconscious by a friend Thursday evening at Alta Sierra airport after apparently suffering a head trauma.Said Nevada county, sheriff Keith Royal.He was recovering Friday in Sutter Roseville hospital, where he was transported by air, After he was discovered, Cody Feiler, 30 also was of Alta Sierra.A man was in custody with police on Thursday night, on suspicion of attempted murder in connection with the incident.Feiler was well-known musician and painter in the local arts community.At 3:00 PM, Thursday, an Alta Sierra resident from the 18000 block of Norlene Way near the airstrip, called 911 to report Feiler had allegedly been vandalizing his property and making death threats.Feiler had allegedly pulled the mans address sign out of the ground and destroyed a solar light.\"He was making some very bizarre statements at that time,\" Royal said.\"He talked about meeting with God, and how he had beaten someone up, and found a gold sword under a rock\".Feiler returned to a home he is staying at on Norlene, where deputies found him naked in a bathtub at about 3:30 p.m. For his own protection and others, Sheriff deputies took Feiler into protective custody at that time.They transported Feiler to Sierra Nevada Memorial Hospital in Grass Valley for an evaluation.Initial testing shows he was not under the influence of any substances.Meanwhile, shortly after 4 p.m., a friend of Turner's received a call from him.He sounded stressed and winded and said he would meet her at his Alta Sierra home, Royal said, \"It is likely Turner had already been attacked by that time, but was still able to make a call\".When Turner's friend went to his home at about 6 p.m., she didn't see Turner and walked to the Alta Sierra Airport on Norlene Way, where he often walks.At about 7:15 p.m., she found Turner on the ground near the runway suffering from apparent head trauma and called for an ambulance.Once there, rescuers determined Turner's injuries were not consistent with those of someone who fell to the ground.Investigators followed blood droplets to a wood pile and believe they found a log there used to strike Turner on the face and head.Armed with this information, Sheriff's deputies questioned Feiler in connection with the incident.\"He made admissions to injuring this individual,\" Royal added.A subsequent search of Feiler's home turned up clothes with blood on them.At that point, deputies arrested Feiler on the charge of attempted murder and took him to the Wayne Brown Correctional Facility in Nevada City for questioning.Feiler was booked into the jail around 3 a.m. after questioning and was in custody on the no-bail charge as of Friday afternoon.Messages left with Feiler's family for comment were not returned Friday.Feiler previously ran an art studio in Grass Valley from 2008 to early last year at the St. Joseph's Cultural Center, said Director Joseph Guida.And a story written by Trina Kliest of The Union.Is Nevada City getting the best police service for the money its spending?.Could it get the desired level of service for less even if that means letting another agency take over city policing?.City leaders wouldn't discuss the matter when a proposal to outsource policing was offered two weeks ago, and they disagree on how to move forward to address concerns about policing that have been raised.Mayor Robert Bergman wants to take a look at policing in the Nevada County seat, present service, what people want, what they're willing to pay for and bring back for discussion the possibility that someone else could do it better than the Nevada City Police Department.\"You get the information, and then you figure out what to do,\" said Bergman, who added he hopes to place the topic on a City Council agenda in the near-term.The next City Council meeting is set for Feb 24th, and the agenda will be set next week.Others on the council disagree.Councilwoman Sally Harris supports the city's present course, which is to focus on concerns about loitering especially on Commercial Street and that street's public parking lot.Those are the only areas of concern about policing that she has heard residents raise, she said.A presentation on the city's options for addressing loitering including along Broad Street and in Calanan Park is expected to be heard by the council on May 11th.Councilwoman Reinette Senum wants the city to look at policing in a holistically way and see how the department can development better relationships with residents and business owners.Both support maintaining the city's own department.Council members David McKay and Duane Strawser were not be reached for comment.\"I do not want our police department to be outsourced,\" Senum said.\"I support a better police department.This is an opportunity to reinvent ourselves and be better\".Nevada City's public safety program is projected to cost the town more than $1.2 million in the 2010-11 fiscal year, employing 16 people.Actual costs are higher state and federal grants pay for three sworn officers, Police Chief Lou Trovato said.And Trovato has given the city what he calls \"a bargain\" in his own salary.The man with 44 years of law enforcement experience is working for a half-time salary of $48,000.But, \"I work with more then, I work more than 20 hours a week,\" he added.Soon, the bargain will end.More than a year ago, Trovato told the council of his intention to retire.Approaching 70 and already marking 15 years with the city, he would like to step aside in about a year, but is willing to stay on as needed.Level service.The Nevada City police force has at least one patrol officer on duty at all times, plus supervisory officers, Trovato said.Overnight shifts are some overlap mainly when they close bars.One of the officers is dedicated to working with the Nevada County Narcotics Task Force, and his salary is paid largely from state and federal grants.Those funds are in jeopardy as legislators at both levels try to cut costs, county Sheriff Keith Royal said.Two more officers are paid through a federal stimulus grant that will end in a little over a year from now, Trovato added.In addition to the sworn officers, two community service officers walk their beats, their wages come from parking meter revenue and are not counted in the department budget.The city already contracts with the county Sheriff's Office to receive emergency calls and dispatch officers, at a cost of 120,000 yearly.Dispatchers fielded 5,765 calls from Nevada City in 2010.According to figures compiled by Communications Manager Andrew Trygg.Of those, 2,704 less than half were calls for service.The rest were calls from officers themselves, who check in with dispatch on a regular basis as situations arise.The most common calls included those for disturbances such as arguments, noise and barking dogs 365 calls, suspicious circumstances 303, alarms going off 177 calls and 911 calls 143, according to Trygg's figures.Nevada City also contracts with Grass Valley for animal control services, costing about 48,000 yearly.\"Costs for the present level of service already are low\", Councilwoman Harris said.Public safety is expected to consume about 39 percent of the current fiscal year's budget and that is in line with such costs of other towns and lower than many, she added.Nevada City has seen a reduction in the taxes that fund city operations, leading to layoffs and furloughs in recent years.But city staff believes that decline will level off, and revenue will start slowly growing again.\"That implies we don't need to make drastic cuts, unless we're willing to really cut the services,\" Harris added.\"If we're willing to do that, then there's all kinds of options, but at this point, I don't think our budget requires it, and I don't think our citizens want less public safety service\".Improved policing is high on the council's list of important issues.But \"having another agency provide that service doesn't guarantee that is going to be cheaper than it is now,\" she added.\"We're already the lowest-paid agency in the county,\" Trovato said.Most sheriff's deputies earn in the range of 53,000 to nearly $65,000 yearly plus benefits, according to the county wage scale.An officer in Nevada City makes nearly 53,500, plus benefits.Lieutenants and captains at the county level make significantly more than the city chief's annual salary of 79,000.And Bergman says, a proposal from the Grass Valley Police Department to handle policing in Nevada City was offered as a result of a strategic planning meeting for Nevada City Council in July 2010.Strawser, now vice mayor, worked with Foster and Undersheriff Richard Kimball to get information on what it would cost to outsource public safety.Foster's proposal would save money by eliminating supervisory positions and consolidating other activities.Sheriff Royal did not submit a formal proposal, but if he were to, he would also save on supervisors and take advantage of services already in his department, such as investigations.Both Foster and Royal said their agencies could save the city money.\"Of course, it comes down to what they, Nevada City leaders, want\", Royal added.\"The surprise to me is the City Council chose not even to review the proposal before making a decision to not consider outsourcing their police service,\" Foster added.Considering such an idea doesn't make it a done deal, Mayor Bergman said.\"We're down to looking at cost savings, and the biggest of the big expenses is police,\" he said.The city should determine what is the present level of service, explore what people want, figure out what it costs, find out whether residents are willing to pay more, adjust the level of service to the peoples desire and revenue available, then look to cost-saving measures including outsourcing, \"We need to generate the information to determine whether outsourcing makes sense,\" Bergman added.Turning Leaf Studios and Grass Valley will have a Valentine's pet photo day 10:00 AM to 5:30 PM Monday.Well that's today.For a donation of an amount for photographer Michelle Kumler will offer a 15 minute portrait session for pet owners and their beloved furry friends.Session will include an eight by 10 color print.Photo event is a fundraiser for Santos Kline.A local youth diagnosed with a number of disabilities, including mental retardation, a brain cyst, Tourette syndrome, mild autism and Asperger's and more.And that's it today.Thanks a lot for watching and we'll talk to you tomorrow.-", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Gvtvnews-GVTVNEWS021411NCTV11Episode978Part2717.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Gvtvnews-GVTVNEWS021411NCTV11Episode978Part2717.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Gvtvnews-GVTVNEWS021411NCTV11Episode978Part2717.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/Jericho_Town_Meeting_2013_-_School_District_Meeting/Jericho_Town_Meeting_2013_-_School_District_Meeting.mp3", "text": "Alright, here we go.I'd like to call the meeting of the Jericho Town School District to order.Can you hear me?Yes.The microphone working up to par way back?Okay.I'll just remind you that I'm Dave Barrington, I'm also School Moderator in a separate election.And Susan is here to represent the directors of the board and she's feeling lonely so be a comfort to her.I draw your attention to the warning, which is on page 56 of the town report.And at the same time, I'm gonna draw your attention to the reports of the officers of the school which start on page 58, and the budget which is on page 61.Seem to me to be the critical things you wanna pay attention to.We're a little bit at sea about how to proceed because we are going...There are a set of reports in the town report and we also have a budget to prove.And Susan is going to speak to both town reports and budget.So I haven't quite figured out how to fit that in, but we'll see what we can do.I'll begin by asking what you would like to do with Article I, which is to hear and act upon the reports of the town officers, of the school officers.And I remind you, this is an explicit reference to the written reports that are in the report, whether you are happy with them and submit it, or whether you'd like to make comments or corrections to the reports of the directors.And just remind you of that Susan will also give an oral report.Article I. - Okay, so Article I has been moved by Jesse, and is there a second?Thank you, gentlemen.What would I do without you?So I think without...I think what I'll do is move on to written reports.If you have any comments or questions about those, and then we'll treat Susan's presentation as all relevant to Article Two.I'm sort of making this up.Anything about the written reports you'd like to comment on the budget.So the question is on Article TwoI. Thank you.I think the meat of the matter would be when we listen to Susan.So Gary nothing, I take it that you have no comments to the written reports and they can be accepted as presented.I'm gonna ask for your vote on that.All those in favor accepting Article one reports as presented, please say aye.Aye.Oppose, nay.Abstain, abstain.Article One is passed.Okay, Article Two is the inevitable article to allow the school board to do business.This comes up every year, it's routine.It reads,\" voters \"with the Jericho Town School District \"authorize the school board under 16 PSA 52, \"nine to borrow money like issuance of bonds or notes, \"not in excess of anticipated revenue for the school year\".That this is in order to make it possible for money to be available to short term until taxes are collected to keep things moving.What do you wish to do with Article Two?Moved by Paul Gross and seconded by?Okay, any questions or comments or discussion about authorizing the school board?So none?Are you ready to vote?All those in favor, please say aye.Aye.Oppose, no.And abstain, abstain.Article Two's passing unanimously.All right, let's get article...Let's see what you wanna do with Article Three.So Article Three is to vote a budget of $3,798,598 to meet the expenses and liabilities of the town school district.What do you wish to do with Article Three?Paul Gross moves the article onto the floor.Is there a second so we can finish it off?Jesse Fountain.Jesee Fountain, second.All right, so I will invite Susan then to give her presentation, which as I say is a combination of report, information, and aid in understanding the budget.Use the mic, please And feel free by the way to interrupt at any time, it is actually possible for you.I should say just a couple of interesting things.You can amend this project by changing the money, but you cannot direct that money to a specific purpose.There's a peculiarity of school meetings that you can say, \"Well, I wanna increase the school budget \"and advise the directors how to assign that increase\".But you can't tell them how to do it.That's the business that we have before you.Yeah.So that means we could amend the bottom line but we can't amend ?That's right.You have to advise them as to how to proceed.I raised before to reaffirm .Hey, good afternoon.Can you hear me?Okay.Let me...Let's see.Well, let's see where you are.Start talking.Good afternoon.Keep talking.Welcome to this whatever- - How's that?That you want me to go to this Jericho town school.Back people, are you hearing her?That's all I got.Okay, how about if I put it a little closer?Is that better?Yes.Use your teacher voice.All right, I'll do that.I'll use my mother voice.Okay, there we go.Go. - Okay.That's better.There we go.So welcome and appreciate that this...I have come to believe over the years that it is the true diehards who care so deeply about our town and our school who just come back after the lovely lunch period to listen to us talk about our school.So appreciate everyone being here and welcome questions and comments.I am here representing all five of the board members, so none of whom was able to make it.One who made still be straggling in, but others who had work commitments.So can we go to the vision slide?There we go.I will always like to start with just reminding us all of Jericho Elementary School's, vision statement, which is to provide a quality education to all students.We do this by celebrating diversity, forming a strong academic foundation, ensuring that students understand their local community and environment, and nurturing children's innate curiosity so that they can participate in our democratic society and in the global community.We do this in a collegial and innovative environment.And I'm not gonna read each of these items, but you can peruse the ways...Some of the many ways in which we celebrate diversity.Could you explain PBIS?Sure.PBIS stands for positive behavioral intervention and support.And it's basically a school-wide.I don't know if I would call it discipline system, but I don't really love that word.What would you say Vicky?School-wide behavioral support system.School-wide behavioral support system.And I don't like the word discipline because it connotes to me that we're only responding to negative behaviors and that is not what PBIS is all about, but that's what it stands for.Okay, ways in which we form a strong academic foundation.There are many, is there a few of the highlights.Understanding our local community and nurturing learners innate curiosity.I might just add not on this slide, but of note.I think our fabulous enrichment program that we have at Jericho Elementary School, which is available to all students.And new this year and integrated arts program going by the acronym of COLM, which stands for connecting our library and music.So kids are doing some projects that connect to sort of some of their special classes and some really interesting, fun, innovative ways.And if anyone's interested, we can talk more about that later.Okay, so our vision statement informs our action plan, curriculum, and assessment, which all sort of then inform each other.Just information on enrollment last year, this year, and what's anticipated for next year.So you can see that our enrollment is actually going up due in large part to a large incoming large kindergarten class, this current school year.Why is the old school special education member ?That's just a function of how many students we have at any given time who actually are eligible to receive special education services.So it's relatively the kids in the population ?Correct.Right.And staff.Just a little snapshot of staff.We have 14 full-time classroom teachers, around nine other teachers, which include foreign language, our music, PE, actively the library is in there.Yes, instructional aids and special education aids.We have lumped together in one number.Do you want me to- - And they come out of the local budget or is that something ?The special ed, I believe come from the special ed budget, which is...And the instructional assistants for the regular education classroom aids, such as we have in our kindergarten classrooms for example, that always come from the local budget.Yeah, that's a good question.Okay.And another little snapshot of who we are as a district.Okay, now we want to...Oh, another little photo.We wanted to talk a little bit about the fairly hot off the press' most recent NECAP, which stands for the new England common assessment program results.This is based on testing that was administered in the fall of 2012, which best assesses progress from the 2011-2012 school year.And you can see that we are...Jericho Elementary continues to score significantly above the state averages in math, reading, and science.This is data for third and fourth graders, but because that's the first year that we administer NECAPs. Oh, the bullets are gonna come up one by one.Susan?Yes.In the report, there's more segmented discussion about subgroups- - Yes.And the results on the NECAPs- - I know, I thought that would be too hard to read as a slide.So I didn't put it all in there, but it is in the report.Yeah, question.Yeah.It seems to be a significant gender differentiation.And the fact that .Susan, would you repeat the question?He's not on a microphone.Yeah, Jesse was just mentioning that...Jesse, what page is that?What page- - On page 60.On page 60, there's a more explicit breakdown of the NECAP scores disaggregated by some of the sub groups, including gender and disability status and economic status.And Jesse was pointing out that he's noticing some discrepancies between female scores and scores of our boys.I'm gonna turf that one to Vicky, do you wanna...Do you wanna take a stab?Is that something that we see sort of nationwide or what can we do about this?I mean, we recognize that somebody's gotta be...I don't know, we did expect to see consistent results.just introduce yourself.Yes, I'm Vickie , the building principal.So it's something that we're beginning to see.Used to be that you would see their scores better than females scores.So the trend's changing, the female scores being better than male scores.We had this question from the floor last year.And so what we did is we looked at it over time.This is a small snapshot, so we kind of walked it out over time to see what we looked like not K-4 but K-8.And we seem to level out though the girls tend to continue to be...The gap narrows, but girls tend to be doing a little bit better across time as well as across grade levels.Sort of another factor within this that we saw as a subgroup is the number of students that you have...Sort of what cross-references you have male and female, but then you have your disability category within that.So you might be male disabled or you might be female disabled.So we saw some pieces of the year that kind of .So was it gender?Was it disability?And the number of children who were boys who were disabled?So there was a...It's a piece of data that we started looking at more closely, really based on the kind of the conversation that happened last year.I tend to think of...When I look at my sub scores, I tend to look at SES and I tend to look at disability.I hadn't looked closely at gender until last year kind of thinking more about that.So typically when I look at my scores, the place that worries me is low SES. Across the board, that seems to be the place where there's a gap that I'm most worried about, but certainly sort of this data and the data that I've looked at in the past year can we be much more wondering about that sort of looking at...And I think some of the work around common core.So if you look at that reading score, there's gonna be a huge increase in looking at informational texts versus non-fiction versus fiction text, and really increasing that number.Boys tend to like non-fiction texts more.So as you look at common core standards, there'll be a real sort of increase in the number of that amount of text children are supposed to be reading, which is sort of a change for elementary education, certainly middle school or high school education, that's the focus.And we're really looking at that at the elementary level.So I'm thinking that a number of the things that are gonna happen within common core will kind of address those issues.Does anyone else have any questions about the NECAP data before I move on?Move closer to the mic, please.In looking at the male-female discrepancy, which was to me, I wonder if you could also include in your information gathering, children who are living with a male parent or a female parent for both parents.And if that...If the presence or absence of a male parent makes any difference?That you have to gather data over time, but I would encourage you to do that.Lizzie.I wanna ditto what she just said.I don't think that's too wacky.And in fact, I would say that with the fall of NASA, Star Trek Star Wars kinds of stuff...Kids aren't...You've gotta get them excited about science.They've gotta have a kind of a math and science club feeling.We've gotta get excited about it.Perhaps somebody can come in and help with school with robotics and get the kids excited about these things to help some of the boys who are excited and think of themselves as men of science.So indeed this past school year...This current school year, we have a science in residence program that our enrichment teacher and one of our parents has organized to kind of...We basically invite scientists, real, practicing scientists who come in and tell us what it is to be a scientist and what you get to do.And we've had a geologists come in, we've had a physicist come in and it's really been exciting.We've had a person who studies wildlife biology.So that's really neat.It's like a celebrity comes to school and that celebrity is a scientist, so it's been pretty exciting.And I think those things are a piece of the work- - Sorry.The other case- - Sorry and get out of the way.The other case would be really looking at that science and what science inquiry means, and really looking at our science units to increase inquiry.If you look at our...We're working on that obviously increased the most exciting part of science .If you look at our current science curriculum, it's strong inquiry, you'll see a strong inquiry unit.In first grade, second grade, we really were changing those units to make them stronger inquiry based units.And then again, looking at third grade as a strong inquiry base, and then trying to improve that within fourth grade.So we really saw some places where children take that science test only once in our school, they take at the spring of fourth grade.So some of the strongest inquiry work was in first and third grade.So really looking to move that across time.So you will see kids who get to have that experience more often.So more inquiry experience and understanding the rigor around that, that you sort of the rigor around sciences.It's not just an experiment that you really have to know how to collect and analyze and use data.So that science inquiry task that they have to do is pretty rigorous around those kind of pieces.And we've been also thinking about some work.Our first grade teachers are combining their data unit and mathematics with their science unit.So really to kind of say that this is connected sort of trying to show those connections.So I think we are beginning to address it.What's happening nationwide is we're gonna have the next generation science standards coming in.So if you watch the new common core and reading and writing and mathematics and sort of next on the plate is a science so we're kind of preparing for that.So ongoing work which is critical, I agree.Okay, let's move on to the budget.Those of you who attend to every year, I'm sure that you now understand all the ins and outs of how the budget relates for your property taxes, but in case there's anyone new or anyone who takes a long time to finally get it like myself.I'm gonna go over this 'cause I think that's really important to understand, and it is fairly complex way that this works here for us in Vermont.So yeah, that would be helpful.Let's just...Yeah there should be a little bit more, there we go.So property tax rates are based on education, spending per equalized pupil.And you can see where they asterisks what an equalized pupil actually is, how we're defining an equalized pupil.Stop me at anytime if you have questions.Districts which have have the same education spending per equalized pupil will have the same equalized property tax rate.With me so far?Okay.Pending legislative approval, the statewide homestead tax rate is going to be 92 cents.Something we have no control over.And the base education amount also does fine...Which is also defined by the legislature of $8,915.I think it's really important to emphasize that that is a number that is not intended and was never intended to be a recommended per pupil expenditure.It's a number that is used for calculating the tax rate, current symbol.Okay.So if the education spending per equalized pupil is equal to the base education amount, then the tax rate will be 92 cents.Spending more than the base education amount per equalized pupil will increase the tax rate.Okay.Now, just a little caveat here.But at Act 130, just to point out that the town...Jericho Town School District could place its own tax rate and the MMU school district also pay for its own tax rate.And then the two tax rates are prorated by the number of equalized pupils in each district and added together.So we end up with one overall tax rate.So based on this proposed budget, our education spending per equalized pupil at the elementary level is $14,786, which is 65.86% more than the base ed, base education amount.And so then you could see what that will do to the tax rate, which is increase it by 65.86% and leave us with a tax rate of $1.53.That then gets prorated by the number of elementary school aged equalized pupil in Jericho, or I'm sorry, by the percentage of pupils which aren't elementary pupils.And we end up with our prorated homestead tax rate, dumped it all.Okay.Questions so far?I'm Rob Allen.You started your presentation with the fact that the number of students is going up last year to this year by a considerable jump.Does that mean that the number of actual students this year will be higher than the number of equalized students because of the two-year averaging?So we through our spending per pupil is artificially high because our enrollment's going up year-over-year?Well, yes to the first part of the question.And Vicky, did you wanna say something about that?Oh, Bob Fanie.Hi, I'm Bob Fanie, a Business Manager for Chittenden East.And if there is a lag with the equalized pupil because of the average.So you could have a- - The weighted daily average.It's a two year average daily membership, and there's some weighting factors that are incorporated in the calculation.So you can see differences.The directions could be different until there's a catch-up, if there's a sharp change in the number of students in a particular district.It's that answer?Yes.Yes.Yes.Yes.So 'till next year.Okay so...Yep.Oh, let me talk to Austin.I did a question about how is the percentage of elementary students calculate it?Is that something like K through four versus five through 12 in Jericho?Yeah.K through four, we are defining elementary pupils as students who would attend Jericho Elementary School.So that's K through four only.Fifth through 12th grade is part of the MMU school district for our purposes.Okay, so the common level appraisal.I'm not gonna go through all of this.You can read it, ask me if you have questions.Basically right now, Jericho CLA is so close to 100% that it is not going to change your tax rate for this.It's in the 10th of a cent range, the change, the tax rate and then it ended up rounding back to the 47 cents.So that simplifies that for this year, at least.So this sort of this chart shows how the elementary portion, elementary home portion, that homestead tax rate combines with the Mt. Vans fields portion for students in grades five through 12, to get our overall tax rate.And just a little bit about income sensitivity, if we could just go to that next slide.Just like to point out that there is adjustment for income sensitivity.So you can see that up through an income of $90,000, there is some adjustment in a downward fashion of what you have to pay, what you would have to pay.I believe that caps out at 90,000, household income about 2000.The last year, this slide will have to be up here because Act 82 was phasing out.But basically Act 82 limited the amount of increased spending that school boards could...School districts can propose.Well, we can propose anything we wanted, but at over a certain cap, there would have to be a complicated two vote sort of situation, which fortunately for us, we are not in this year.So we were able to come in under the maximum increase allowed.This might be a little hard to see.This is also on page 66, was sort of summary of the budget.And what I tried to do with this chart was just include the line items that have gone up or gone down with a couple of exceptions that snuck in into my chart that have gone up and down by 4% or more.So that you could see really what's driving the budget this year.And what is driving the budget, our increases in teacher salaries by the negotiated settlement.So that's sort of a given health significant, pre-healthcare premium increases.A very large increase, 13.81% increase in our Jericho's portion of the special education assessment.Right.Yeah, because- - What was the question?We pay based on the number...Our total number of students.We pay this...They're asking about the special education assessment, which Vicky and I just talked about this.Why, even though we have fewer students eligible for special ed currently this year, why our special education costs are going up.And a special education budget is calculated as a supervisory, union-wide system that we are part of where each school is assessed a certain share of the special ed total cost based on how many students we have.So that based on in the district.So we have 230 odd students.So our share of the special education assessment is...Or the special ed budget.What we're assessed is based on that number of students.Smaller elementary schools pay a smaller share, bigger schools, pay a bigger share because the predictability of need from year-to-year it's unpredictable.So right now, we may be paying more than we're actually using.Other years, we may be kind of getting a good deal, basically.It would not be feasible for us to set that budget in a way that...It's just the amount of the special ed need is unpredictable.So we can't just have a flat number from year to year.Does that make sense?It's Marsha Morel.I'm just wondering where is the cost per special ed service or whatever.I mean, where that is either going up or down.I mean, I hear our assessment's going up and I base that my assumption is on our enrollment is going up, so we have more kids.But where do we affect that budget?That total amount spent so that as our percent goes up or stays the same, we can make some kind of decisions on that number.Finished up my question.Yeah, I think so.I mean, one thing I can say to speak to that is that, I mean need in general for special ed services is going up.So we're needing more special educators.We have more kids who are eligible for special ed services, and we're obligated to provide appropriate education for every student regardless of need.So if as a district, as a supervisory union, we have more special education eligible students.We're going to have, the budget is going to go up.And I think that just the general trend, not this year in this school, but the general trend is that more kids are being identified as in need of special ed services.So that's one sort of a general statement.The special ed budget is approved on a supervisory union level.So that's the central office.It's part of this, it's a central office.So I'm not really sure how we affect that as an individual board, unless we decide that we're not gonna participate at all, or that we're gonna somehow decide as an elementary school that we want to contract out or pay for our own special ed services.But that's a big risk.Because if we have one student come in next week, who we weren't budgeted for, that could entail another expense in the tens of thousands of dollars that wasn't budgeted for.And because students go in and out with not a lot of predictability, this is kind of a way that we assure that we are able to afford to provide the special ed services for any student who might need them.And kids will be identified sometimes in the middle of the school year.We didn't know Johny was gonna need a one-on-one aid, but now he does.Does that answer your question, or not really?What I'm really trying to figure out is where do we figure out how much .Are the cost of individually going up after .You can choose the number of ways to provide .Yeah.That's fine.It could be going up .I'm sorry, I'll address the question.This special education budget is prepared by the Special Education Director.She's an employee of the Supervisory Union.Each student need is evaluated and then determine what services are appropriate for that student.Once all this information is gathered, it is sent to the state and they'll review for appropriateness.The individual, a plan that is prepared for each special education student.So that's really where we have a first step of checking to make sure that the budget is appropriate and then the money is being spent properly.If things happen during the course of the year, then we'll have to spend more than we budgeted.We end up doing the first cut of this draft budget almost a year ahead of time.It's really hard to predict what's gonna happen to put into the budget.We have to spend the money.It's by statute.We have to provide the services for the special education students.And we track the expenditures during the course of the year, if there's any adjustments that can be made, that takes place.What we're seeing lately is increased number of students and also increased need for each student so that they're meeting more one-on-one services.And of course that's gonna drive up cost.So that's what has been happening.I also just would like to point out that one decision that the Jericho school board did make was to decrease our funding of our contingency fund by $10,000 this year in order to try to offset some of the increases over which we have very little control so that we could hold down the bottom line to a relatively smaller increase than we would have had if we had continued to fund the contingency at the level to which we would like to in different economic circumstances.And we're also saving a little bit of money as our debt gets paid off.So that's helpful.Okay.I guess sort of moving out of the budget section here, except to show you our estimates for class size by grade level for next school year.So you can see it, that sort of in the lower.In the earlier grades, we have some higher numbers which is good.And some of the smaller classes we'll be phasing out and moving on to middle school.That is not per teacher.No, I'm sorry.Yeah, that's not per teacher.That's the total grade.That's the total grade, yeah.I should probably change the title of that slide.That's a little confusing, yes.Right, grade size.Grade sizes, yeah.Yeah.Each grade level has three teachers with the exception of fourth grade, which has two.So you can do the math, that math but...Okay.And just briefly the things to kind of keep in mind for future annual school meetings.Our capital plan, a significant amount of work was done this past year on the heating and ventilating system of the school.So we have a much, much better, more functional HVAC system.And we also have both, two relatively new roofs.So we're feeling good about some of the infrastructure expenditures that we've made in the last few years.And our capital plan is going through a major overhaul and update this year.We tend to do that every three to five years, and this year it's being looked at.And with the help of our facilities coordinator, who is employed half-time by the Supervisory Union, that's a new position this year.And he's helping Vicky and Lucian Lop here, head custodian, look at the plan and look at...And just to be aware of what we'll be needing to keep in mind for the future with regard to our building.Hi. - Yeah.Well, Ben Jocelyn.There's a pretty substantial crack in that top court of this particular trust.Right between the bolts, there's crack running all the way from the wall, all the way across the roof, it looks like.Any information on that?I was not aware, Vicky were you?Lucia?No, but certainly this roof has been redone and repaired within...This were our first roofs, we did three years ago.So everything was structurally looked at at that point in time.So some of what you see underneath here, if you go into one of our first grade rooms, there's bolts hanging out of the wall, they're no longer sort of...They're no longer functional that what the roof did.So we basically rebuilt a roof over at this place where we sort of rechanged our slope, rebuild the roof.So in terms of structural, we're in good shape on this wingless 57 80.This wing has been redone.So the roof that really- Probably was originally.So when they looked at the roof, we started...We went in from the top down rather than...We went in from above and fixed things.There was a flat roof over here that they rebuilt.And so all the work within from the top.So your roof and your structure right here is in good shape, but we're not having any leaks or any problems anywhere in the roofs now at this point.The only other sort of leaks moisture you have were when we replaced the heating system, we were getting pinhole leaks in our heating system as well.So we really are seeing a redecreasing those kind of leaks.So you don't need to worry about our roofs.We're in great shape, Mr. .We think in our lifetime, we're not gonna have to worry about either roof, that's our plan.Okay, we love our new roofs, especially our 50-year standing seam metal roof.That was just put on last summer.And pre-k, if you've been following the national news at all, you might have heard president Obama speak to universal pre-k in his State of the Union Address.There've been a few recent articles in national publications in the last couple of weeks that I've seen with some pretty high-level policy makers talking about the importance of a universal pre-kindergarten available to all four-year olds nationwide.And we are, as a board, philosophically very, very much in supportive pre-k.We did not feel this year that it was something that was physically sort of doable in the current budget climate, or in the context of the budget that we're working with.But it is something that on the state level is being talked about a great deal.And we're really looking toward the legislature to see what happens possibly even in this session with regard to pre-k.So I think it's a question that probably will be coming up before us as a school board and as school board...School voters in the next couple of years.So something to think about.Okay, thank you.And please let us know what other questions you might have or comments.On anything I said or anything I didn't say.Hi, I'm Tom Joslin.I noticed the health insurance is going up nearly 23%.I was wondering how much of that reflects insurance premium rates and how much of that is a change in the composition of enrollees in the the health plan?I might have to defer to Bob on this, but I believe that most of it is premiums going up.I don't have the actual breakdown between the two, but there are healthcare coverage changes within that figure.And there is a 14% premium increase included in the budget, but I don't have this with .Jesse Belvin.The board of directors report mentions, I assume the retirement of Mr. Driscoll and Mrs.Johnson.Yes.And the addition of Karen Reinhardt as the mathematics coach.And the teacher's salaries, which sounds to me like the reduction of at least one full-time equivalent and yet line 110 has an increase in teacher salary.So I assume that there've been replacements hired or something for the classroom teachers.Well, yes.We're down one classroom teacher, but that position was replaced for the full-time math/science coach.So our total number of teachers is the same.And the reason the reason there was an increase is because we have negotiated settlement, which gives teachers a salary increase every year.Other questions?Hi. - Hi, I'm just wondering how many full-time teachers teach and that composed the $1,088,000.One million- - Looking at line 110.Okay.Jericho School District, it was in the report.Oh, yes.Actually it's 1,088,844.Okay so- - You mentioned- - Can we go back to that slide.You know?Yeah, because it's not just class...That's not just classroom teachers that are in that set in that number.Okay.Just have to look at my...Just don't wanna misquote you here.So we have 14 classroom teachers and 9.2 full-time equivalent other teachers.Does that include aids?That does not include aids.Okay, so there's 9.2- - Aids is separate line item.They're in the classroom with the teacher, but they're not actually teaching, right?Right, but in terms of the numbers...What's represented in teacher salaries is classroom teachers but also...So when I have my classroom teacher, I mean a first grade teacher or a third grade teacher, a second grade teacher, other teachers, the art teacher, the music teacher, the PE teacher, the foreign language teacher, the math/science coach.Those are all also lumped into the bat line item for teacher salaries.Aids are a separate line item, but they are paraprofessionals that are in the classroom either as a general education aid, social support classroom teacher- - Right.Or as a special education aid, which has a separate- - Within that line item .Okay.In the million dollar.18.8. - For the first one.In that line, 110.Okay.Okay.I'm just trying to determine on my own self and the negotiated salary increases.Yes.Are they voted on by the taxpayers?They are...Well, by proxy.I mean, they're probably voted on by you vote for your school board members and your school board.Each school board in the Supervisory Union sends representatives to each school board has to vote on the negotiated settlement.The settlement is the teacher negotiation.So in salary negotiations happens on supervisory union level.So Jericho's teachers have the same contract as Underhill teachers, as Huntington teachers, as Bolton teachers, as MMU grounds, teachers.So that happens on the Supervisory Union level.And each school board sends a representative to the Negotiations Committee and ultimately any contract is voted on by all the school boards has to be approved by all of the boards in order to fly.So is it a forum where taxpayers can actually discuss this with the school board?Yeah, and every school board meeting is open to the public.Right.And we do welcome- - How much was last year's increase?The last time that it was approved.How much was the increase?The current contract, the new, latest contract.Bob, do you know that?For teachers it's 3% average increase .But that doesn't include- - And that's a one-year contract.That's a one-year contract that will be voted on again?It'll come up and it'll be renegotiated again, yeah.So that was, well, what we have is a one-year contract right now.Are there health care...Just out of curiosity, are the 18% rise in healthcare that's in this budget?Is it also negotiated at that point or is that some school board not negotiate that?Well, I mean, it is.I mean, it is in a way, although some of that comes from...I mean, some of that is not in our control, comes from state the Vermont...What is it?The school board insurance trust.So some of our costs in terms of the health care, that's not something that we can vote on.But they're not capped though.There's no cap on those expenses.Those could go up to 20%.And the school board would not...That's not something that the school board limit.I mean, when they negotiate with this...When those rates go up, are they capped in any way?Are those expenses capped in any way or is it just something that you have to pay?I don't really know the answer to that question.Can we get you a mic, please?Try and see if that works.Is it on?Yep.Rate of increase on the healthcare premium is 14%.And that's pretty much a number that we receive from our healthcare carrier.I guess what can limit the amount of the increase is how much the employee can contribute towards that healthcare cost.And that does get negotiated within the contract.So that would probably be the only thing that would limit how much the increase could go up.I guess that's about it.That would be the only item that I'm aware of.I wish we had more control over it.But unfortunately, the cost just seemed to keep going up.So this is your chance to ask anything about the budget and we are near the end of the discussion, I believe.Anything else?All right, so I'll draw your attention to the action on the floor or on Article Three, which is the budget article.Devote a budget of $3,798,598 to meet the expenses and liabilities of the town school district.Are you ready to vote on the budget as presented?All those in favor, please say, aye.Aye.Oppose, nay.Nay.Abstain, abstain.The budget has passed.Article Four is to transact any other business thought .This is your chance to bring up anything that is relevant to the affairs of the district.Jesse Pelton, just a matter of curiosity, I guess, about two things.I'm wondering how having Mansfield Academy in the building is working out for all students.And I'd like to request my annual report on safe routes.Oh, I can answer both of those, but I'll let Becky...Well, you can.I mean, it seems more appropriate for you to speak to that, both of those things.So having Mansfield Academy as part of our school has been a wonderful, easy transition.I think it's really worked well and their locations seems to work wonderfully for them and they relate.They just feel like part of our community and at the same time really are protected and have the supports they need in order to feel, not be in the general population an any more so that they are comfortable.So I think it's been wonderful, better than we could expect.Becky, could you just explain what the Mansfield Academy is?So Mansfield Academy is district alternative program for elementary.There's a program for kindergarten through grade 12.We have the elementary portion of that program kindergarteners for fourth graders.So it's really children with some emotional, social-emotional difficulties who really need an alternative setting.So we have children...We just have children from different elementary schools within the district who are housed here in this it's gone very well.And then with safe routes to school, we knew that question was coming.Friday.If people know we've got a large infrastructure grant from San Francisco that we were hoping that you would see a wonderful new front of our building this school year.But because of hurricane issues, our proposal sat at .So we couldn't go out to bid for last summer.We looked like we have bid ready documents as of the end of this week.And hopefully we'll be going out to bid within the next few weeks for a summer project.So you will see what that will do is really provide an easier entrance for walkers and bike riders to our school.When JES was built, it was a school for...Time to go home .The school was built for a really up commuter traffic and really trying to improve that.So you will see traffic calming in the front, dropping off and picking up the kids by car, looking different and also ways for kids to come in from the back of the building and be able to know like, \"Where do you go\".If you come from one of our paths, you kind of go like, \"How do I get into this school\"?So barring looks like everything's in place.They have to do a little bit more in terms of looking at drainage or those kinds of things and we'll be going out to bid.So this time next year, you'll see the second infrastructure grant.We originally got original grant and was connected to Streetscapes which extended our sidewalks beyond the Streetscape Project so that kids could walk safely to school.Anything else proper?Well done, go ahead.Help yourself.Yep.Has anyone considered that you have a walking school bus?It's been tried in some other communities.Basically a walking school buses instead of having the adult supervisor being the school bus driver with the kids inside the school bus that either in certain times a year or within certain close distances of the school that there would be a responsible adult shepherding the kids to school by walking, would that be a way of sort of encouraging people to school in a more supervised in a little bit safer manner?I mean, if we're talking about these sorts of things, is that something that has been considered?Yes.Would you like to come walk with us?We walk in.We do a walk during International Walk to School Day.We have had times of more often and less frequent and less frequent walking school buses.We certainly do and we gather in the neighborhoods and walk into school and celebrate that.So with that, we need volunteers from once the weather gets better and also really...Part of our cases, we have a safe routes to school plan and that we've written in part of those things in order to kind of take the next level, the next step.Really, we needed to create...Improve some of our infrastructure to make it safer for kids.And that's kinda what we've been waiting for.We're at some level of a platinum member or one of those things to safe routes to school.So the events we do, we're renowned for what we do around bike safety, through our phys ed program now.And that's really our phys ed teacher has taken that on and has done an outstanding job with that and we recognized for that.So indeed, encouraging walking to school is something walking to school.And because many of our kids ride buses during those events, we're encouraging walking to school, we also encourage walking at school to kind of think about once you get to school and doing walking.So walking, bike riding, and really having a safe place so that when you enter this...When you come from route 15, there's an easy way to get to the front door by sidewalk to make that.So it's just easier for families to be able to do that.So yes, come walk with us.We'd love to have you .Okay, what else?It's all in your mind.Okay, hearing nothing or seeing no sign, I'm gonna suggest that somebody move to adjourn.Paul Gross and a second.Jesse?So there's no objection, the meeting has come to a close.Thank you all for coming.It's a nice turnout for the school meeting.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Jericho_Town_Meeting_2013_-_School_District_Meeting.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Jericho_Town_Meeting_2013_-_School_District_Meeting.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Jericho_Town_Meeting_2013_-_School_District_Meeting.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/FarmersTalk_-_Lincoln_Peak/FarmersTalk_-_Lincoln_Peak.mp3", "text": "All right.Once again, my name is Jon Wright with Taylor Farm and this is Farmer's Talk, and today we are in New Haven, Vermont with Chris Granstrom of Lincoln Peak Vineyard.Can you tell me just a little brief background of the history of Lincoln Peak?Sure, yeah.So I'll sort of work backwards, if that's all right.Right now we have about 12 acres of producing vineyard, oh a little less because we we're in the process of replacing some.Well for the last few years, we've claimed to be the largest grape producer in Vermont.We may lose that title here in the next year or two, but we have been and I think the main thing that sets our business apart from a lot of the other wineries in this state is that we do grow all the grapes right here on our own property, we're not importing grapes, which is great, in the sense that we have complete control of the quality, all the decisions that have to be made in terms of growing and harvesting the grapes, but of course, it's limiting in then we can't decide to expand and bring in more product and so it works both ways, but I think it lends a certain amount of credibility, authenticity to what we're doing, 'cause it's really a local product, it's all grown right here, it's not imported from someplace else.And I think our customers, respond to that.We started planting about 2002, in terms of any size, I think we've put in about half an acre in 2002.Before that, we had a strawberry farm here for about 24 years, so my daughter, Sarah, who we'll meet, grew up in the strawberry business and then the early on, was out dealing with the public in a pretty intensive way, and we actually started the strawberry farm way back in 1981 when my wife and I first moved to this property and built a house and got going.So we've been here, we've been growing things and for a long time.So why strawberries or grapes?I'm sure that - That was gonna be my next question, yeah.was gonna be your next question, I'm sure it is.Well, it was a combination of things, I mean, we've been doing the strawberries for a lot of years, our production wasn't quite as good, we had very generous crop rotations, but even so...We are replanting back into the same field, even though, in most cases you would have two, two and a half years of cover crops and green manure crops between strawberry plantings, and still the vigor was starting to go down a little bit, and I think, personally, it was time for kind of a new challenge in life, and also we had just heard about them.Really, the most important reason is we just heard about these new grape varieties had been developed, mostly from University of Minnesota and also from a private grape breeder out in Wisconsin, a fellow named Elmer Swenson, and we thought, well, this is going to take off in the north, there's never been the possibility of growing good wine grapes in the north before and now there is, and let's get it on the ground floor.So we actually started as a nursery, propagating and supplying vines to other vineyards.And you continued to do that as part of the business?We did, we're not doing it any longer, but we did it for about six or seven years.Of course, to get the cuttings for the nursery, we had to have at least a small vineyard to go out and get through the wood to propagate, and so we were growing grapes almost in spite of ourselves and then selling grapes to other wineries, and finally we just couldn't stand to see ourselves putting all this effort into this beautiful crop and then loading it in the back of a truck and seeing it go up the road.So we started making wine and then gradually, not of course, but then gradually, the wine took over and we realized we couldn't do both and let the nursery part of the business go.Now I'm completely out of my element here.Tell me a little bit about vineyards.How many vineyards are there currently in Vermont?Yeah, well that changes and of course it depends on where you draw the line between kind of a hobby and a commercial vineyard.I think the answer is probably around 18 to 20.A lot of them are sort of in the half acre to two acre range, which is sort of commercial, but just borderline, it's certainly a supplemental thing.So, I mean, grapes have this kind of romantic image around them, people love to think of the idea of growing grapes and making wine, so a lot of people have kind of gotten bit by the bug and decided to put in a half an acre, an acre and see what happens, and like anything else, some realize it's not romantic at all, it's mostly just hard, repetitive manual work and they say, it's not for me and some others love it and do a great job.Now what made this all possible?15 years ago, Vermont wasn't considered a great growing region.So what's changed is really the genetics of the grapevines.This fellow Elmer Swenson, I mentioned, a great story, grew up on a little tiny dairy farm in Osceola, Wisconsin.I don't think he went past eighth grade.I don't think he was ever interested in farming or dairy farming or cows, but he was one of these people that was put on earth with a purpose, and his purpose was to work with grapes.And he spent a lifetime, and for the first 30 years of his grape-growing career and really in complete isolation, hybridizing the old fashioned way with gathering pollen with a little paint brush and painting it on the flower of the other vine and marking it, saving the seeds, planting out the seeds, watching what develops, choosing the best of those, doing it over and over again.And finally, into his middle age, people started to realize what this guy was doing, and people realized that he was creating this whole collection of grape varieties that were adapted to the Wisconsin climate, and not to get too technical on you, but people that had previously tried to breed grapes for more Northern climates, were using as kind of their base material, a species called Vitis, Vitis is the grape genus, species called Vitis labrusca, which is kind of the Concord grape family, and the trouble with Concord grapes is, they taste like, grape juice, grape jelly, everybody knows what that tastes like, but they don't make very good wine.And what Elmer realized was for the most part, avoid that Vitis labrusca and use Vitis riparia, which is the wild grape that grows in Vermont and grows all across the northern tier states as kind of his genetic source of cold hardiness, and Vitis riparia has its own challenges, it tends to be high in acid, but it doesn't have those kind of off flavors that the Vitis labrusca brought to the wine grapes when it was in the genetic background, and so, Elmer, in his own way, had sort of taken grape breeding for northern climates down a new road, so to speak.Did you ever have the opportunity to meet him?I did.I went out and spent a day with him.He was in his early 90's at the time and it was fascinating, he was just a great guy, and then as Elmer got, he passed away a few years ago, well in his 90s, as his work got better known, the University of Minnesota - Picked up on it.Picked up on what he had done and then with vastly more resources of course, and a more scientific rigor and not just following what he did, bringing in their own ideas, of course.Have continued a really active grape breeding program and have developed some wonderful variety.So what we're growing here now, includes some of Elmer Swensen's grapes and some of the University of Minnesota grapes, but what changed, to get back to your original question, 15 years ago, was the availability of these new grape varieties that are adapted to this climate, yeah.And are they well adapted?Are there still challenges here with this climate?As far as winter hardiness, at least in the Champlain valley, they're perfectly well-adapted, there's really no issue with winter damage here.Something like spring frost is still an issue, but that's an issue in any place.If you're in California or you're in France, Italy, they have trouble with spring frost, So that's just part of grape-growing.So what are some of the challenges with grape growing?Expand on that a little bit.For me, we had an extremely challenging, wet summer.Was that a problem for you?Sure, that's a tough question to answer.You've just gotta get your, first, I think the grower has to get their mind wrapped around what's involved in growing grapes.There's just a lot of little details, a lot of small decisions along the way, there's no one big secret to success, like most things in life, it's just a lot of very small steps.Correcting little mistakes along the way.Correcting your mistakes and finally you've made more good choices than bad choices, and you say, yeah, it's working, you know?I'm still working on that piece.Yeah, right.So as far as the growing goes, like anything else, just getting this all prepared and weed control in the early years, there's pests and diseases, I'm sure we'll talk about that, understanding the training and how to train them, how to prune them.Those are the challenges, and then dealing with the weather and you do what you can.Now Sarah mentioned a little before the interview that we've now had a fairly nice warm, relatively dry period, which has been perfect for you.Yeah, indeed.So I said, well, you know grapes, you'd think of California or the Mediterranean, they typically grow in a place with dry summers.And so we're kind of pushing a little bit, because we don't always have the dry summers.In fact, it seems like the last 10 years we've had more trouble with wet weather than we have with dry weather.So yeah, we put up with all the rain in the early summer as best we could, we had to do more disease control, we had to deal with weeds, but once the kind of the weather turned around there, it's really been a nice summer for us, and it's dry.Describe the season's from spring through harvest.What are your jobs?What are you...Okay.So we'd probably start in winter because we prune in the winter time, and it's a very skilled job, and it's tens of thousands of individual cuts as we go up and down the rows.How many people do you typically have helping you?Well, it changes from year to year.Last year I had a key employee who's now gone on to start his own vineyard, but he did the bulk of it himself.I would jump in occasionally, and it took him four or five months to get through the whole thing.We start in December and finished probably in April.So we get them pruned, clear the brush out of the vineyards, burn the brush and piles, just to eliminate the disease source.Next step is what we call a tie up, and if there's loose arms on the canes, we go through, tie them up to the trellis wires, and then the weather warms up and we keep an eye on the buds that start to develop.At that point, we're looking at frost, there's not a lot we can do about frost danger, and then we're, of course, from then on throughout the season, we're looking at insects and diseases, they have to be controlled, it's impossible to grow grapes without controlling them.So you can't be in any way, shape, or fashion considered organic?Well, there are people that have tried organic grape growing in Vermont, I admire what they do, I don't think any of them have continued with it, they've tried it, and after a number of years, realize that - Just can't do it.the organic materials that are available to this, you certainly can't do it without spraying anything, and the organic materials that are available, the spray are just not effective enough to maintain a healthy vineyard, and so, but it's possible to pick and choose, the least toxic, the smallest intervention and still keep the vineyard healthy.So that's the route we go down and so, we have to do it.So in a year like this where it rained a lot in the early summer, we have to spray a little more because the fungus diseases have the perfect conditions to keep spreading.Once it dries out like this, we can cut way back because it's not wet, don't have to spray.Is fungus one of the biggest problems?Fungus is the biggest problem.There's really only one serious insect that we have to keep an eye on, but we monitor that closely and only spray when we absolutely have to.So you have to have some horticulture, some entomology, some chemistry?All those things.So midsummer is fairly?So midsummer, there is a pretty intensive workload because the key to growing good grapes, to put it in a nutshell, is getting the sunshine to shine on the grape clusters while they're ripening, and of course the grapes, the shoots tend to grow in any direction and a lot of them will grow right along the wire, where in that position they're shading the grape clusters, and then the sun's not getting to them, you're not going to make good wine.So we go through with the crew and this is just hands-on work, we grab those shoots and pull them from here where they're shading the grape clusters and we pull them down so they're out of the way, and then we often rip a few leaves off, as we go, so the sun hits right around the grape cluster area, we call it the fruit zone.And then a year like this year, when we had so much rain, that the vegetative vigor is just ongoing, and so we've had to go through a second time, and do that again.It's really labor-intensive, but in the long run here, it really makes a huge difference in the quality of the wine.How is your crop looking this year?Right now, the crop looks beautiful.I'm surprised at how good it does look after the rain in the beginning of the summer, but we got through that, we've had a couple of nice hot spells that have brought the ripening development along, and we've put in the time and effort and as the business owner, the money, to do all that shoot positioning and leaf pulling, and right now they're gorgeous and we could be picking as soon as a week from now, which would be the first week of September, which is really on the early side for us, but we like it, we like to have it early because then if we need to wait, we have a little bit of good weather on the other end.If we're pushed right to the end of the season, then sometimes you're forced to do a situation where you have to pick them - Runnin' out of warmth.because we running out of warmth, and there's no point in waiting any longer.So the harvest time, you've got to try to gather up some competent and enthusiastic harvesters?You bet.How many people do you?Well, we on a good day, we have.Do you go to Middlebury and drag some students out for the afternoon?No, that doesn't work.We do have the one plant biology class, comes out as one of their labs and picks grapes for an afternoon, and which is kind of fun, the kids are enthusiastic.We ended up putting an ad on Craigslist and on just things like the Front Porch Forum and things like that, and year after year, we pull together a good crew.How many people do you?So we usually end up hiring about six more people, plus we have our regular employees who are here and sorta change gears into harvest mode.So we might have eight or nine people working on a given day, and of course, it's busy with the tourists are here for the fall foliage, so it's busy in the shop as well.Take in the double whammy.Gotta keep all that going at the same time.But we've been lucky, in terms of being able to pull a local crew together every year.I think it helps that it's grapes.People think grape picking is more exciting than whatever, potato picking or something.Give them a little wine and keep them happy.Yeah, we can each drink a little wine now and then.Now, how does the harvesting actually work?You snip the grape clusters?We have a little pair of lightweight shears, yellow plastic totes that hold about 28 pounds, and you just go along the row, clip, clip, and you'll get two or three clusters in your hand, put them in the basket.Do you have to treat them?I've harvested apples.We treat them gently.Even though you're going to be crushing them.Exactly.We don't want them to be crushed too soon.Yeah.Yeah.So we treat them gently and the totes we use will stack on top of each other so they don't crush the ones below.So we pick them, line up a bunch under the vines, we drive through with a tractor and we just have a little homemade wagon built just to fit two bins wide.So a little bit like apple harvesting?Yeah, a little bit like that - A mini scale.Sure, and then of course, we come down here and as soon as we back the wagon into a processing area, that we called or like every winery calls, the crush pad because we crush the grapes there, we unload them into the crusher, destemmer, they go into the press or into the tank, we hose out the bins and put them right back on the wagon.The crew is out there, we try not to make them wait for empty bins.So it's instantaneous, you don't store the fruit.Oh no, no, it's instantaneous, it's ongoing all the time, and we're paying the crew a piece rate, so much per pound, so when the wagon comes in, there are all the bins and marks, so we run it over a scale, mark how many pounds it is, into the crusher goes and then right back out.And so they'll pick until about three o'clock or so and then we'll have our final pickups, we'll usually have a big load of grapes at the end of the day and we'll process those and hope to get out in time to get some sleep.Yeah, so you can be going late into the night.Yeah, you can.You can be going into the night for sure.And how long does the harvest take?Is this a month?Yeah, a month or a little less, if the weather is all good, three and a half weeks, something like that.And can you go through the vineyard in a clean sweep or do you have to come back as fruit ripens?No, it's a one-time through.Yeah.Yeah.It's a one-time through, we try to, just as the grapes change colors, which is usually early August, we go through, the crew that's been doing the shoot positioning and leaf falling, we go through one more time, looking for any clusters that are lagging, that are still green after the other ones have turned color and cut those off, just drop them on the ground because they will eventually turn color, but there'll be way behind the other ones and there'll be underripe at harvest time, but there's no way to distinguish them, so we try to get rid of those, we're not bringing underripe fruit in with the good ones.Would that alter the flavor of the wine?So, as grapes ripen, the sugar levels are going up, the acid levels are going down and the flavors are developing.So if you get ones that are underripe in there, I mean the main issue, I think, would be that the acid, it would keep pushing the acid low because we're always fighting kind of borderline high acid levels, so we want to do whatever we can to keep that under any kind of threshold.Sweeten it up a little bit.What's this?I'm curious about this mechanism that can de-stem the grapes.How does that work?Is it a tumbler?Yeah, yeah.So you dump it into a hopper.It's got an auger that brings it down to one end, and inside it's covered so you don't see it, but there's a cylinder with holes in it and the holes are big enough for grapes to go through, but not for the grape stems to go through, and it's rolling one way and there's a shaft down the middle with little paddles off of it and that's turning the other way, and those are angled, so it kind of pushes it from one end to the other, it kind of moves it along slowly.And is there washing in that?No, there's no washing.So those paddles are knocking the grapes off the stems and kind of flinging them through those little holes, the stems can't get through and they slowly work their way down the cylinder and then just dump out onto the ground at the end.And then our vineyard actually does another thing.Beneath that, there is a pair of matched rubber rollers that you can set the distance on as to how much you want to crush them and they'll go through that and get crushed, and then they come through and at that point it's just what you call a must, it's mass of crushed grapes and we have a big three inch hose, we can pump that out.How did you, I mean, we've just talked about the grape growing.Now tell me a little bit about the wine making part or, first of all, how many pounds of grapes, what's your yield?How many pounds?Can you talk about that?Sure.It varies, of course, from year to year, I would say, we're not necessarily shooting for the highest possible yield, because with grapes, when you get to a really high yield, it tends to dilute the flavors and the sugars to some extent and the wine quality wouldn't be as good.So we're shooting for kind of that perfect balance point where we have a good solid yield, but we haven't overshot it, to the point where we're compromising the wine quality.So for our 12 acres, kind of a yield number that we would be shooting for would probably be about 85,000 pounds of grapes, 40 some tons.And so what does that turn into in terms of wine?We make about a little over 2000 cases of wine and a case is 12 bottles, there's three quarters of a liter in a bottle, so that's nine liters in a case of wine.Once you get into the wine world, you get out of gallons.You talk in liters.You talk in liters.Everything in terms of grams and liters.When I go home we're back in the ounces and pounds, but over here everything is grams and liters just because that's the way it all works.So yeah, and so the red grapes, bring them in on the wagon, put them through the crusher, goes through that must pump, into the hose, into the tank.We add the yeast, the entire grape ferments together, because for about the first week, during that week, the wine, as it's developing, is extracting flavors and colors from the skins that are in there with it.Then after that week, roughly, we'll press it.Then we have just the pure wine and the skins and the seeds we'll separate, just take out and compost.So I'm still confused, during this process, you're continually adding more from the harvest?No, no.Yeah, good question.We'll fill up one tank at a time within a day, whatever we pick that day, we'll fill up a tank, so that tank is a unit and that goes through the wine-making that ferments together.So during that week, twice a day, we pump the wine off the bottom of the tank and up over the top of the tank, because as soon as it starts to ferment, all those little carbon dioxide bubbles grab a hold of the grape skins and push them up to the top.So you get what we call the cap at the top and then the juice becoming wine in the middle, and then the seeds settle to the bottom, but we want to have contacts, for the reasons I said between the wine and the skins.So we pump it over and wet down that cap, and let the wine and juice and wine trickle down through those skins at least twice a day.Yeah, yeah.So then at the end of the week, we pump off what we call the free wine, the wine that separates itself in that middle section, and then we shovel the skins into a press and press those.To get out any residual.Get out whatever.And then that press wine, we call it, is different from the free wine.Usually the flavors aren't as delicate, it's a little rougher tasting, but it tends to have more tannins which is a nice component to wine, So we're sort of tasting that, we might keep it separate just for a minute, separately, then blend it back in later or we may be tasting it as it's pressing, and the harder you press it, it changes continuously as you're pressing, we may kind of cut it off at a certain point and say, okay, anything that comes out from now, we'll put into a same tank.You must be drinking wine every night.Somebody gotta do it man, it's tough.I think it's great.Yes, we go from here.That's be great!There you go.Linda picks up each of the cases of empty bottles and slaps them down on the table, and then two at a time, she put some of those little valves, actually give a small squirt of nitrogen in each bottle, which blows out the cardboard dust and actually replaces all the oxygen in the bottle with nitrogen.And when we then go to put them on the filler, that just means that the wine doesn't have any oxygen exposure and the nitrogen does not matter at all.So then the next person grabs each bottle, pops 'em on the filler.It's a gravity filler.That same person takes it off, puts it to the one side.And the corker, Eric today, grabs the whole bottle, puts it on the corker.The corker actually pulls a vacuum in the little two inch space in the neck of the bottle, sucks out all of the air and then pumps the cork in and puts it back in the case.So every bottle has been handled at least four times before it goes to sale.You always a wine drinker, or is this something that you've?No, people ask me that and I enjoyed wine, but I was not really serious or fanatical about it, or really that knowledgeable about it.I've pretty much came to this from the farming side, rather than the wine side.But of course, as I've gotten into it, I've learned a tremendous amount about wine and it's a wonderful thing.It's a wonderful thing to know about, it's a whole world of experience to enjoy.Yeah, and it's been one of the more satisfying parts about it.I'm sure it's very rewarding.It's very rewarding learning all about it.And it's not some great mystery that you have to have, some specialized knowledge about it.The main thing is just to taste a lot of different kinds of wines and take the time to pay attention to what you're tasting.And all of a sudden you start to see patterns and recognize certain flavors and then it all clicks into place.So this is a look at our range of wines.We make 10 different wines.There are two grapes with the biggest production, our Marquette and La Crescent.Marquette is our dry red wine.This is overall our biggest selling wine.We also make a ros\u00e9 from the Marquette grape, which is same grape, different winemaking technique.We call that Hartwood, that's a new wine for us.That's been really popular.The Le Crescent is a white wine grape, and we actually make three different wines from that.We make, why don't we call it just the Crescent, which is on the, it's not completely dry, but it's on the dry side with just a small amount of residual sugar.Then we also make a sweeter version, which we call Ragtime White.And it's not only sweeter, but it's got a little different flavor profile as well.And it's got a little spiciness to go along with the sweetness.Then we make one, we call Late Harvest, which is sweeter still.And this is more of just a pure fruit flavor with a nice mouth feel to it.And really delicious, it's a kind of a dessert wine or something with an aged cheese and a nice aged Gouda cheese - Yeah, there you go.would be perfect with this, but we have, we have ideal conditions for making ice wine here, right now...Can you talk about that little bit?Ice wine is the grapes are actually frozen.So right now the world's center of ice wine production is Ontario, Canada, but it's really, the conditions here are better.We have better grape varieties.We have more consistent cold weather in the early winter.So ice wine is a dessert wine, it's made by leaving the grapes on the vines, into the early winter.You pick 'em the first time it reaches 18 degrees Fahrenheit.At that temperature, they're about three quarters frozen, but what freezes is pure water.And the one quarter that's not frozen, is concentrated of everything else.All the flavors, sugars are in that one quarter that's not frozen.So you press the grapes while they're still frozen, you leave the water behind as ice crystals and you get this super concentrated juice.And it's just a fabulous product.And that is something that you're working on?Oh, we make it, we make it now.But what I'm saying is, I think Vermont has the potential, but we sell it all here.We sell it all right here.It's not a big production item for us.It sells at a very high price because it takes so many more grapes and there's a lot more risk involved.And you're cold when you're harvesting.You're cold, right - I just want to backup a minute, thinking about regions of production, are people doing this over in New York state, across the pond?There are some, I'm not as familiar with what's going on over there.There are a few starting in the Champlain valley.And then actually there's a little cluster getting started over in the St. Lawrence valley, kind of north of Watertown, in that area.Anything in the Connecticut river valley or not quite?Yeah, there's some vineyards going over there.I think the Champlain valley tends to be a little drier, a little less foggy in the fall.And so the conditions are a little bit better here, but we're still, an emerging grape region goes through a transition and you can tell when you're sort of starting to be serious and that goes, and that's from when people plant grapes on the land they happen to own already.But when people start looking for good land, that's suited to grapes and that really hasn't happened in Vermont yet, and...But Sarah's coming along.Yeah, that could happen.I mean, we obviously planted grapes on the land we happened to have, it's pretty good for grapes.It's not perfect.I would say that our biggest problem here is the soil is just too rich and fertile, which causes all that vegetative growth.I was talking about that we have to deal with in the early summer.What a problem to have.Well, it is.It is a problem.The ideal grape regions are on this kind of poorer, gravelly, bony soil, and really, there's no magic to that.It's just that they don't grow so much.Yeah, grapes are.So the grapes get a lot more sun, it's all about getting the sun on those grapes.So I think there are good sites in Vermont.I think I know what they are, but I'm not going to be the one to go - Develop them.develop them.But maybe somebody will.But as you're driving down the road, you think, ah, boy, that would be a good spot.I think, if I had to spell it out.In this kind of the southern Champlain valley, kind of from Shoreham all the way down to like West Haven, that on the hilltops, there's this shaley soil, I think it's called Farmington for the most part.And I think those shaley hilltops in the southern Champlain valley, I think that that is just the perfect environment for Vermont grapes.So there you go, that's the tip of the day, you just spilled the beans.There you go.So people ask me sometimes, how has climate change affected grape growing here?Well, actually people say, well, the reason that we're growing grapes in Vermont is because the climate is warming up.No, it's not.Yeah, development.It's because of the new genetics we have, these new varieties.I don't know what climate changes can do.All I can say is, looking over the last, eight, 10 years, what it seems like, is that it's getting more rain, more and more rain.Particularly early in the season.Particularly early in the season, yeah I mean, so which is not good for us.The winters are milder, but that's not really, it seems, but that's not really a big issue for us because these grapes are adapted to a cold winter anyway.Frost, if we start getting like early heat waves and then turns back to cold, that could be an issue, but that's kind of always happened, I guess.So it's hard to know, if the successive rainfall is kind of our local version of climate change.That's not good for us, but that seems to be kind of the only consistent change that I've seen recently.Yeah, our lifespan is relatively short to be talking.I feel, clearly, we are seeing some changes and some pretty dramatic changes.It concerns me that those changes are going to accelerate with time, but just have to do what we can.Marketing, you, wholesale wine around the state?Yeah, we have a distributor who picks up our wine, takes it to stores and restaurants around the state.Just within Vermont?Just within Vermont, yeah.Then we also have our little shop here and in terms of volume, I think we sell probably two thirds of the wine right here out of our shop.And the other third is going through the distributor.Obviously like every farmer, we like to get the full retail dollar, if possible.So we like to sell it here, but it also is great to have our product spread around where people see it and become aware of us, and maybe even come visit us someday.And do you get a nice flow of visitors?We do, yeah.Do you get a lot during the harvest season?People curious about...yeah, we do, it's definitely, I mean, we have our local kind of our local customers and our tourists and the tourists are important and we can't do without them and our local people are our repeat customers and we want to treat them right, too.So, we build in some incentives for people to come, price incentives for people to come back, and give us a repeat business, which is, good for them and helps us build loyalty with people.And then we do events, we have every other Friday.We have a band here and it's free, people can come and bring a picnic and we get, on a nice day, we can get fabulous crowds here.It's a lot of fun.\u266a Two dollars in the jukebox \u266a \u266a A dime at a time \u266a \u266a Play the same old song \u266a \u266a About a love gone wrong 'til closing time \u266a \u266a Two dollars oughta do me \u266a \u266a If you'll buy the wine \u266a \u266a And I'll feed that jukebox \u266a \u266a One dime at a time \u266a And I have to say, that the response we've gotten, people just love it.They just think it's a fabulous thing.It feels like kind of a community gathering.More than a commercial event.And of course, we're selling wine by the glass so that's a little more profit margin for us because we're selling it that way.And admission is free.The only money we're taking in is the sale of our own agricultural product.And so it's still, and we're allowed to sell our own product on our farm, even though it's not a commercial zone.So we're still within the letter of the zoning laws that way.Are there liability challenges with that or does it go...Oh, we have all kinds of insurance.We pay a lot of money for insurance.For sure.Now, what are your hopes and aspirations for the business?You have 12 acres.Would you like to expand that or?No, I think we're at - Capacity.where we want to be.And there's a pretty good balance between the grapes we can produce, the size of our facility and kind of what we can do in terms of marketing now, plus I'm 60.So I'm not really out to conquer the world anymore.It was a lot of years to get this up to where it was operating in the black.And I just want to see it work.As far as challenges go, I mean, our main challenge is just to keep making the wine quality better and better.You know what I mean?And we feel good about where it is, but it can always be better.You know what I mean?And so we're always working, both on the grape growing techniques and the wine-making techniques to see how we can get a better product.So, Chris, I really want to thank you for taking the time to talk with us today.It's been a wonderful educational opportunity for me.Beautiful facility you have, and it was a pleasure to have a little walk out in the vineyard.You bet, well, thank you.It's fun to stop for a minute and be forced to step back and look at the big picture.'Cause a lot of times, like most farmers, we just have our heads down and are worried about the next hour and so it's kind of fun, just to stop and talk about it with another farmer.And so, I've enjoyed the conversation.Well good.We'll be up for one of your wine tasting, music nights for sure.Sounds great.Very good, thanks.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/FarmersTalk_-_Lincoln_Peak.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/FarmersTalk_-_Lincoln_Peak.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/FarmersTalk_-_Lincoln_Peak.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/keytocity_RT_02_19_2012/Key_to_the_City1_INTRODUCTION.mp3", "text": "Good afternoon.Say, are we live here?I want to welcome everybody to Schenectady City Hall.In our first, of what we hope, will be a monthly open house program in Schenectady.Thankful to our partners in Key Bank and their Key to the City Mortgage Initiative.Which in this market, is a unique product, which I believe makes the city of Schenectady more competitive and creates greater opportunity for home ownership in our community.And I do thank our partners at Key Bank.This is the largest open house undertaking that I believe has ever happened in the city of Schenectady.And I thank Prudential Realty for focusing on this and being the initiative in all our partners that are joining as we look to build on today's success.And again, make it a monthly event that markets Schenectady and attracts owner-occupied individuals to our great housing stock.I want to recognize some of my colleagues here, Council Member Peggy King, Lisa Peraso, Carl Erickson, our colleagues in the Schenectady City School District, School Board President Kathy Lewis, School Board Member Ron Lindsey.If anybody else?Cheryl.Oh, Cheryl.Sorry.Welcome also.And we'll hear briefly from our School Superintendent in a few minutes.But, we need responsible homeowners in the city of Schenectady.And I want to do everything in my power in utilizing city staff and resources to attract people to this community.It is an opportunity here that is, I believe, unparalleled.Where we talk about high taxes, we talk about some of the urban problems, and why people tend to discount the city of Schenectady in other communities.And if you do the analysis, and some of this is available in the packets, we have Realtors, and some of the individuals from Key can talk to you.The market has overly compensated for some of those perceived conditions that exist in the market.I mean that our housing prices are far lower than they should be.And as a result of that, some of the taxes and fees represent a greater proportion than in some of our suburban locations or other communities.And people look at that and they say \"Oh, it's too high.We don't want to live here\".But when you break it down, if you buy a house and you look at your costs of home ownership: the mortgage, taxes, insurance, and other related fees.In fact, home ownership in the City of Schenectady is far more competitive than any of the other communities in the region.Some of the questions come up about the school district.And we acknowledged there've been problems in the past, but there's a team in place that is committed to changing that.We're fortunate to have John Hugalsky as the Interim Superintendent, working with Kathy Lewis and the other members of the school board.They are changing that, dealing with the past problems and reinforcing what is really an unparalleled offering of courses in this School District.It is, I believe second to none in the Capital District.And if people want to move here, want to take advantage of the school district, you're going to find that there's opportunities and educational excitement, that again, is unequaled and unparalleled in the region.And that if people sort through kind of the rhetoric, some of the disinformation, Schenectady is the opportunity, the place people should be.We should look at Schenectady and I want people to live here, move here, and participate in this community.And it's with that, I'd like to introduce one of our partners, Jay Christiana, President of Prudential Manor homes, who has been a key driver in putting this together.Key is kind of a good term to use today.Good afternoon.I'd like to thank Mayor McCarthy and Key Bank for making us a part of today's event.We look forward to continuing this type of promotion with the City of Schenectady for many years, to come.Our company, Prudential Manor Homes Realtors, started 90 years ago, right up the street.There we go, little bit better.Started about 90 years ago, right up the street where Pinhead Susan's now stands.Schenectady is a very important community to us and we appreciate everything the Mayor to do to promote this terrific city.We will have associates at all of the homes that are open on today's tour to answer any of the questions that you may have.Associate Broker, Mary Delasandro, will be here to answer questions, and Donna Ricatella will be on the bus this afternoon.I invite you to download the Prudential Manor mobile app today.This will help you with, with the tour today.It's available in the app stores on any smartphone.And it'll show you where all the properties in the area are listed and give you more information.I just thank you again, and we look forward to a great event today.Thank you.Thank you.Next speaker is a good friend, a great leader.And as we go through a transition phase in the school district, that we are truly have been blessed to have the expertise and knowledge of John Hugalski.He really has opened up the city school district to what we all know it can be, should be, and will continue to grow.And John, thank you for being here today and participating in this.Thanks for those kind words.When I think about Keys to the City, this city, or any other city, among the keys, are the school systems.I came here just about two years ago when a lot of tension was on adults and adult related problems.I'm happy to tell you, we're focusing now on students, on learning, and on teaching.We have a wonderful school system that gets lost in some of the noise.As a long-time educator, I see up close, what's really positive about this school district.We have more offerings for our students than any of the other school districts in this area.It's a wonderful place.You want evidence of that?We just recently, the board just recently completed a process of looking for a new Superintendent.We were able to attract accomplished educators to apply for the city because they see what's here already and the potential to take it even further.Matter of fact, the gentleman who was selected, specifically responded to questions around why he came.He wanted to come to this city so that he could have his own young children join in the school system and experience what an urban school system of this diversity and outstanding programs could offer.No one can speak louder about this school district than someone who would make that kind of commitment.So we really got a great school system and it is one of the keys to the city, and it should attract more and more people to come and live here.Thank you.And now one of our key partners, Joseph Reed Hammer, from KeyBank, and it is a unique product that Key has put together in this market.And I am truly thankful, appreciative of the efforts of KeyBank and look forward to working with you in the future as we continue to make this city a great place to live and work.Thank you everyone for coming today.Today is the day that Key to the City comes home.Today home buyers can see for themselves the exceptional quality of homes this program makes affordable here in the city of Schenectady.We've been very pleased with the response this program has had among home buyers in Schenectady.At the start, home buyers here had to take our word for it.They knew about the program because we announced it publicly.However, today they can take a tour of a remarkable selection of high quality, affordable homes that are available in the welcoming neighborhoods of Schenectady.Key to the City is a true partnership that works as partnerships should, with everyone bringing something unique to the table.The city of Schenectady, brings leadership and attracting new residents to it's town.The city also brings to bare the expertise of many city departments, demonstrating a commitment to provide you a higher quality of life for the city residents.Prudential Manor Home has been a great partner from the start.They bring many years of experience and professionalism as well as an outstanding selection of homes here within Schenectady.And KeyBank is proud to provide affordable financing that enables home buyers, including first-time home buyers, to join those who already know what a great community the City of Schenectady is to raise a family in.The numbers of the programs speak for themselves.We've had 17 closings since inception of this program started at the end of September.That's six more since our meeting here this past January, we've had over 98 new inquiries since January 3rd in reference to this program; bringing the total interest of prospective home buyers over 270, since November.We have seven loans currently in progress that we expect to be wrapping up here shortly in February.So you can see the program is working and it's taken effect here in Schenectady.We're all glad you could all be here today.And we're glad to all the homeowners that are in a position to take advantage of this unique financing.We welcome you to see the fine values of the homes here in Schenectady.Thank you.Our original concept, when we started this, was to kind of start out small this month and let it build over the course of the next few months.By the individuals here, we clearly see that it's been far more successful than I thought.I appreciate everybody's interest, their participation.I had made the commitment to make City staff available at homes.Commissioner Olsen is here, Chief Delarocco, Chief Chiers, Assistant Chief Kilcullin.Unfortunately, we don't have quite as many public employees to send out to every house today, but we will have different people at different places.And if people have questions, we'll follow up as best we can today and get back to people on Tuesday and Wednesday so that we will convince people this is the best community.We want people to be here, and want them to take pride in Schenectady.And with that, I would open it up for any questions that individuals may have before we start the formal tour.What specifically are the incentives to attract home buyers to the city?The simple summary of KeyBank, at this time, they will write a note at a hundred percent to value, really with $500 down, they will loan up to $50,000 above that.So a homeowner can go in, make repairs, modifications to a home, update the heating system, put a new kitchen in, bathroom.It's a again, unique product in this market, where other banks are looking for 20% down, higher participation by the owner.So it's just, it's creative financing.In terms of quality of life, what sense?You've got proctors, you've got a great school district.We're seeing investment by General Electric.We have a great park system, and we have just a number of opportunities here where Schenectady continues to get better every day.It seems like a kind of, almost desperate marketing attempt to get people to live in a city that you must admit, doesn't have a great reputation.I will tell you, I believe that reputation is propagated primarily by the media, and I know that you look at -- - So it's all my fault then?No, it's not all your fault, but if it the old saying, if it bleeds, it leads.The good things, the incremental things, that are happening every day are not necessarily those things that are newsworthy.The program delivering the school district is not something that you read about.Those kids there, that are taking advantage of it, they're really going to be great leaders for the future.And it's part of this effort today, is to get that message out, that there are a lot of good things that are happening here that aren't necessarily newsworthy every day.But it is a good community, and we want people to participate in it.Can you expand on the program the School District?Probably the Superintendent might be better to actually deal with that or the President of the school board.We have, as an example, in our High School, a number of wonderful offerings that are not available in other places.As an example, International Baccalaureate Program.We have an outstanding Fine Arts Program.We have an outstanding Cisco Program, that's recognized by Cisco, and sends many people to us.We have just a wide range of offerings.Our Course Offering Booklet for our high school, I would stack up against any in the State.The breadth of offerings is impressive.The number of outstanding students who graduate and go on to the finest universities and colleges in this land, and do it successfully, is evidence to how well they're prepared.I don't have any feedback on program incentive.Is there any other incentive, in play?Because when I look at the listing at some of these properties, then the price for a two bedroom I mean, extra for is high.So, if there's any break, or tax break or anything?Because I already have 2 properties in the city of Seattle.So, I've not qualified for that, any other programs for somebody like me?This program is for owner-occupied housing, and that's the push that we're trying to do, is attract owner-occupied individuals here to this community.Yes, sir.My name is Steve Brown, I'm also a member of Occupy Schenectady.We know the involvement of banks in the disaster in this country today.And it was due to these 100% loans that they gave to people and selling mortgages out and so on.How do we know that is bank is not involved in this activity?I'd say that this is somewhat of a much more conservative package.I know that, the acronyms that used to exist in the market were ninja loans, no income, no asset, no job, but you could qualify for a $250,000 mortgage.Not once, but twice, but three times.Those are the things that were wrong, that's you had the collapse.KeyBank is for credit qualified, owner occupied, one and two family houses.It's in fact, a fairly conservative mortgage package.With the down payment, some of the other things, it is far more competitive than other instruments that are available on the market today.So why 100%?If you qualify this good to a customer, why do you ask to get 100 percent loan ?I'll let Key address the thing that, they believe, that's again, a conservative package.Hi, I'm Joel.I'm the District Sales Manager for KeyBank here in Albany.There's often a negative connotation with a 100% financing.However, we're responsibly lending.We're offering pre and post-purchase counseling to our clients.So we're not only educating them on how to pay their bills, we're also educating them how to maintain the home, pay the bills after they closed in the mortgage.The other question is if they already qualify, you don't need to teach them those things.They're already qualified.Why 100% percent, because they're just good a customer, you don't need to give them that.You know what I'm saying?This is just a sales marketing pitch or something, you know what this is about one real estate agent trying to get a lot of people here, and the bank is going to rip you off again.You know, it's just the same thing over and over.We've had this stories so much.But again, we're fortunate to have Key and Prudential be the point persons on this.It is not exclusive to any bank or any real estate firm.The City stands, ready, willing, able to work with other realty agencies and other banks.And we have ongoing discussions with banks, realtors to expand and build on this program.And that you're trying to cast negative aspersions on what is a good program.It's an incentive that makes Schenectady more competitive in this market.And I'm proud to stand here and have Key as a partner today.Yes ma'am.I just want to say, I'm not sure, what the question is over here.However, I just feel that this situation has to be a two-part thing.And as the bank takes you through these steps, as the consumer, you have to advocate yourself and ask the questions and find out where you're going to be with this before you sign.Which means if you don't understand something, you have to ask.I think we're so complacent and we sit back and want the bank to figure everything off of, but you know what?We need to be proactive.And going back to what you're saying, I think it's a two-fold thing.If you come in here trying to get home and it doesn't add up and you feel you can't do it, then you have to say, look, I can't do this.That's exactly correct.We don't want people to be in homes that they cannot afford.One of the key things to this financing program, again, is the ongoing education program.So that people learn to manage money better, learn to look at other opportunities for retirement investments, other things.And it becomes the total financial package.And so again, I'm proud to have KeyBank as a partner in this undertaking.Other questions, or should we......yes, sir?Is there any incentives for first time home buyers, are there any literature on that?There are some, in some of the package and Mr. Mike Yousefi, who's right here, can also talk to individuals on specific questions if they may have.I want to thank everybody for coming today and appreciate your time consideration.And if you have questions, comments, you have a staff here and we'll be available throughout the day.Thank you.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Key_to_the_City1_INTRODUCTION.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Key_to_the_City1_INTRODUCTION.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Key_to_the_City1_INTRODUCTION.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/keytocity_RT_02_19_2012/Key_to_the_City1_INTRODUCTION.mp3", "text": "Mr Olsen.Good afternoon.What is it, we live here?What a welcome everybody to Schenectady City Hall in our first of what we hope will be a monthly open house program in Schenectady.Thankful to our partners in KeyBank and their key to the city mortgage initiative.Which in this market is a unique product, which I believe makes the city of Schenectady more competitive and creates greater opportunity for home ownership in our community.And I do thank our partners at KeyBank.This is the largest open house undertaking that I believe has ever happened in the city of Schenectady and I thank Prudential Realty for focusing on this and being initiative and all our partners that are joining as we look to build on today's success.And again, make it a monthly event that markets Schenectady and attracts owner-occupied individuals to our great housing stock.Want to recognize some of my colleagues here, council member Peggy king, Lisa Perazzo, Carl Erickson, our colleagues in the Schenectady City School District, school board president Cathy Lewis, school board member Bryan Lindsey.If anybody else - oh, Cheryl.Sorry.Welcome also, and we'll hear briefly from our school superintendent in a few minutes.But we need responsible homeowners in the city of Schenectady and I want to do everything in my power in utilizing city staff and resources to attract people to this community.It is an opportunity here that is, I believe, unparalleled where we talk about high taxes, we talk about some of the urban problems and why people tend to discount the city of Schenectady in other communities.And if you do the analysis and some of this is available in the packets and we have realtors and some of the individuals from Key who can talk to you.The market has overly compensated for some of those perceived conditions that exist in the market.I mean that our housing prices are far lower than they should be.And as a result of that, some of the taxes and fees represent a greater proportion than in some of our suburban locations or other communities.And people look at that and they say, \"oh, it's too high, we don't want to live here\".But when you break it down, if you buy a house and you look at your costs of home ownership; the mortgage taxes, insurance, and other related fees, in fact, home ownership in the city of Schenectady is far more competitive than any of the other communities in the region.Some of the questions come up about the school district and we acknowledged there've been problems in the past but there's a team in place that is committed to changing that.We're fortunate to have Jan Regulski as the interim superintendent, working with Cathy Lewis and the other members of the school board.They are changing that dealing with the past problems and reinforcing what is really an unparalleled offering of courses in this school district.It is, I believe second to none in the capital district.And if people want to move here, want to take advantage of the school district, you're going to find that there's opportunities and educational excitement that again, is unequaled and unparalleled in the region.And that if people sort through kind of the rhetoric, some of the disinformation, Schenectady is the opportunity, the place people should be, they should look at Schenectady and I want people to live here, move here and participate in this community.And it's with that, I'd like to introduce one of our partners, Jay Christiana, president of Prudential Manor Homes who has been a key driver in putting this together.He is kind of a good term to use today.Welcome - Thank you - Good afternoon, good afternoon.I'd like to thank Mayor McCarthy and KeyBank for making us a part of today's event.We look forward to continuing this type of promotion with the city of Schenectady for many years to come.Our company, Prudential Manor Homes, REALTORS started 90 years ago right up the street.I'm sorry, Can I?There we go.A little bit better.Started about 90 years ago, right up the street where pinhead Susan's now stands.Schenectady is a very important community to us and we appreciate everything the mayor continues to do to promote this terrific city.We will have associates at all of the homes that are open on today's tour to answer any of the questions that you may have.Associate broker Mary Della Sandra will be here to answer questions and Donna, Rick and Talla will be on the, the bus this afternoon.I invite you to download the Prudential Manor mobile app today.This will help you with, with the tour today.It's available in the app stores on any, any smartphone and it'll show you where all the properties in the area are, are listed and give you more information.I just thank you again, and we look forward to a great event today.Thank you.Thank you.Next speaker is a good friend, a great leader.and as we go through a transition phase in the school district, that we are truly have been blessed to have the expertise and knowledge of Jan Regulski.He really has opened up the City School District to what we all know it can be, should be and will continue to grow.And Jan, thank you for being here today and participating in this.Thanks for those kind words.When I think about keys to the city, this city, or any other city, among the keys are the school systems, I came here just about two years ago when a lot of the attention was on adults and adult related problems.I'm happy to tell you, we're focusing now on students, on learning and on teaching.We have a wonderful school system that gets lost in some of the noise.As a long-time educator, I see up close, what's really positive about this school district.We have more offerings for our students than any of the other school districts in this area.It's a wonderful place.If you want evidence of that, we just recently, the board just recently completed a process of looking for a new superintendent.We were able to attract accomplished educators to apply for the city because they see what's here already and the potential to take it even further.Matter of fact, the gentleman who was selected specifically responded to questions around why he came.He wanted to come to this city so that he could have his own young children join in the school system and experience what an urban school system of this diversity and outstanding programs could offer.No one can speak louder about this school district than someone who would make that kind of commitment.So we really got a great school system and it is one of the keys to the city and it should attract more and more people to come and live here.Thank you.And now one of our key partners, Joseph Riedhammer from KeyBank, and it is a unique product that Key has put together in this market.And I am truly thankful, appreciative of the efforts of KeyBank and look forward to working with you in the future.So we continue to make this city a great place to live and work.Thank you.Thank you everyone for coming today.Today is the day that Key to the City comes home.Today, home buyers can see for themselves the exceptional quality of homes this program makes affordable here in the city of Schenectady.We've been very pleased with the response this program has had among home buyers in Schenectady.At the start, home buyers here had to take our word for it.They knew about the program because we announced it publicly.However, today they can take a tour of a remarkable selection of high quality affordable homes that are available, and the welcoming neighborhoods of Schenectady.Key to the City is a true partnership that works as partnerships should, with everyone bringing something unique to the table.The city of Schenectady, brings leadership and attracting new residents to astound.The city also brings to bear the expertise of many city departments demonstrating a commitment to providing a higher quality of life for the city residents.Prudential Manor Home has been a great partner from the start.They bring many years of experience and professionalism as well as an outstanding selection of homes here within Schenectady.And KeyBank is proud to provide affordable financing that enables home buyers, including first-time home buyers, to join those who already know what a great community the city of Schenectady is to raise a family in.The numbers of the programs speak for themselves.We've had 17 closing since inception of this program started at the end of September.That's six more since our meeting here this past January.We've had over 98 new inquiries since January 3rd in reference to this program, bringing the total interest of prospective home buyers, over 270, since November.We have seven loans currently in progress that we expect to be wrapping up here, shortly in February.So you can see the program is working and it's taken effect here in Schenectady.We're all glad you could all be here today.And we're glad to all the homeowners that are in a position to take advantage of this unique financing.We welcome you to see the fine values of the homes here in Schenectady.Thank you.The original concept when we started this was to kind of start out small this month and let it build over the course of the next few months by the individuals here.We clearly see that it's been far more successful than I thought.I appreciate everybody's interest, their participation.I had made the commitment to make city staff available at homes.Commissioner Olsen is here.Chief Della Rocco, Chief cheers, Assistant Chief Kale Collin.Unfortunately, we don't have quite as many public employees to send out to every house today, but we will have different people at different places.And if people have questions, we'll follow up as best we can today and get back to people on Tuesday and Wednesday so that we will convince people, if this is the best community, we want people to be here and 1 or 2 take pride in Schenectady.And with that, I would open it up for any questions that individuals may have before we start the formal tour.What specifically are the incentives to attract home buyers to the city?The simple summary of KeyBank.At this time, they will write a note at a 100% to value, really with $500 down, they will loan up to $50,000 above that.So a homeowner can go in, make repairs, modifications to a home.Update the heating system, put a new kitchen in, bathroom.It's a again, unique product in this market where other banks are looking for 20% down, higher participation by the owner.So it's just, it's creative financing.In terms of quality of life, in a sense - You got practice, you've got a great school district, we're seeing investment by general electric.we have a great park system and we have just a number of opportunities here that, where Schenectady continues to get better every day.It seems like a, kind of an almost desperate marketing attempt in a city that, you must admit, doesn't have a great reputation.I will tell you, I believe that reputation is propagated primarily by the media.So it's all my fault then?So that, no, it's not all your fault but if it, the old saying, if it bleeds, it leads.The good things, the incremental things that are happening every day are not necessarily those things that are newsworthy.The program delivering the school district is not something that you read about.Those kids there that are taking advantage of it, they're really going to be great leaders for the future and it's part of this effort today; is to get that message out that there are a lot of good things that are happening here that aren't necessarily newsworthy every day, but it is a good community and we want people to participate in it.Could you expand on the programme delivering the school district?Probably the superintendent might be better to actually deal with that or the president of the school board.What we have, as an example in our high school; a number of wonderful offerings that are not available in other places.As an example, International Baccalaureate programme, we have an outstanding fine arts programme, We have an outstanding Cisco programme, that's recognized by Cisco and sends many people to us.We have just a wide range of offerings.Our course offering booklet for our high school, I would stack up against any in the state.The breadth of offerings is impressive.The number of outstanding students who graduate and go on to the finest universities and colleges doesn't just land, and do it successfully is evidence to how well they're prepared.I don't have any feedback on programme incentive.Is there any other incentive in place?Because when I go, I've done this thing with some of these properties, the price for a 2 bedroom, I mean, extra for gas, is hot.So if there's any break, a tax break or anything because I already have a 2 property in the city of Seattle.So owner-occupied would, I've not qualified for that.But is there any - This program is for owner-occupied housing and that's the push that we're trying to do is attract owner-occupied individuals here to this community.Yes, sir.My name if Keith Rouse, I was a member of Schenectady.We know the involvement of banks in the disaster in Wisconsin today.And it was due to these 100%, you know, loans and it hit people and selling their mortgages out and so on.How do we know that this bank is not involved in this?I'd say this is somewhat of a much more conservative package.I know that the acronyms that used to exist in the market were ninja loans, no income, no asset, no job, but you could qualify for a $250,000 mortgage, not once, but twice, but three times.Those are the things that are were wrong.That's why you have the collapse.KeyBank is for credit qualified owner-occupied 1 and 2 family houses.It's in fact, a fairly conservative mortgage package with the down payment.Some of the other things, it is far more competitive than other instruments that are available in the market today.So why 100%?If you qualify, just go to a, a custom loan, why do you ask to get a 100% or the original?I'll let Key and address these, the thing that they believe that's again, a conservative package.Hi. I'm Joel Bizure.I'm the district sales manager for KeyBank here in Albany.There's often a negative connotation with a 100% financing.However, we're responsibly lending.We're offering pre and post-purchase counseling to our clients.So we're not only educating them on how to pay their bills, we're also educating them on how to maintain the home, pay the bills after they closed in the mortgage and stay in the home.The question is, the question is if they already qualify, you don't need to teach them anything, if you're already qualified, why a 100%?Because they're just a customer, you don't need to give them that.You know what I'm saying?This is just a sales marketing pitch or something, you know, this is about one bank and one real estate agent trying to get a lot of people here and the bank is going to rip you off again.You know, it's just the same thing over and over.We've heard these stories so much in the - But again, we're fortunate to have Key and Prudential be the point persons on this.It is not exclusive to any bank or any real estate firm.The city stands, ready, willing, able to work with other Realty agencies and other banks.And we have ongoing discussions with banks, realtors to expand and build on this programme.And that you're trying to cast negative aspersions on what is a good programme.It's an incentive that makes Schenectady more competitive in this market.And I'm proud to stand here and have Key as a partner today.Yes ma'am yes.I think, I just want to say, you know, I'm not sure, I'm not sure what the question is over here.However, I just feel that the situation has to be a two-part thing.And as the bank takes you through these steps, as the consumer, you have to advocate yourself and ask the questions and find out where you're going to be with this before you sign.Which means, if you don't understand something you have to ask.I think we're so complacent and we sit back and want the bank to figure everything off for us then you know what?We need to be proactive.And going back to what you're saying, I think it's a two-fold thing.If you come in here trying to get home and it doesn't add up and you feel you can't do it, then you have to say, look, I can't do it - That's exactly correct.We don't want people to be in homes that they cannot afford.but it's, it's an opp - one of the key things to this financing programme again, is the ongoing education programme so that people learn to manage money better, learn to look at other opportunities for retirement investments and other things, and it becomes the total financial package.And so again, I'm proud to have KeyBank as a partner in this undertaking.Other questions, or should we - yes, sir?Is there any incentive for first time home buyers?I mean any literature on that?There are some, in some of the package and Mr. Mike Yousefi, who's right here, can also talk to individuals on specific questions that they might have.Want to thank everybody for coming today and appreciate your time, consideration.And if you have questions, comments, you have a staff here and we'll be available throughout the day.Thank you.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Key_to_the_City1_INTRODUCTION.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Key_to_the_City1_INTRODUCTION.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Key_to_the_City1_INTRODUCTION.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/CCIEM01252016/CC_IEM_01-25-2016.mp3", "text": "\u266a Let the world stop turning \u266a \u266a Let the sun stop burning \u266a \u266a Let them tell me love- \u266a - Aloha.The meeting of the Infrastructure and Environmental Management Committee shall now come to order.Today is January 25th, 2016.And the time is 1:32 around.Please silence all cell phones and any noise making devices.And joining us here for the meeting, I am Elle Cochran, the Chair.Vice Chair of the committee is Riki Hokama, and we have, aloha.And we have Ms. Gladys Baisa.Good afternoon, Chair.Good afternoon.Ms. Stacy Crivello.Good afternoon, Chair.Aloha.And Mr. Don Guzman.Good afternoon, Chair.Good afternoon.Chair of the Council, Mike White is excused.And Mr. Bob Carroll will be joining us very shortly.From the administration, we have director of public works, Director, David Goode.Good afternoon.Aloha.Ms. Rochelle Thompson of Corporation Council.Good afternoon, chair.Good afternoon.And from our staff, we have hardworking Committee Secretary Raina Yap, handing out some paperwork to us.And legislative analysts, we have Scott Jensen and sitting in is Steve Seeley.Aloha and welcome.We've checked in with our district offices, Mr. Jensen says everyone's present there.So at this time, let me mention, we have two agenda items, members.IEM 12, and this is in regards to prohibiting parking on portions of Kahawai street in Wailuku.IEM 48 authorizing the installation of utility poles for the Kahoma Village project in Lahaina.And at this time, anyone here in the gallery wanting to sign up for testimony, please sign up at the front desk.And it looks like we have one person signed up to testify.And you'll have three minutes.And please stick to one of the items on the agenda today.And Mr. Jensen, call the first testifier please.Oh, members without objections, I shall now open the floor for testimony.No objections.Thank you very much.Mr. Jensen.Madam chair, the first testifier is Carrie Yoshizawa.She'll be testifying on IEM item 12.Thank you.Good afternoon Chair and County Council members.My name is Carrie Yoshizawa and I'm here before you asking for your support and approval to prohibit parking on the Iao Stream side of Kahawai street.More specifically it's the portion of Kahawai street, which is located between Market Street and Makua street.My request is being submitted to protect the health, safety, and welfare of the public.I testified before you over two years ago relating to the same matter, bringing to your attention my concerns over the dangerous conditions on Kahawai street, due to numerous vehicles being parked on the street and along the Iao Stream.Now that construction has been completed at Habitat for Humanity and the tenants have moved in, the problems in Kahawai street is constant.Personal vehicles, large oversized vehicles, company vans and buses can be found parked throughout the day.The operators of these larger vehicles tend to park half of their vehicle, or more, on the sidewalk, which in turns restricts access for those walking on Kahawai Street.With the lane of travel in Kahawai Street being so narrow and limited, and now the sidewalk blocked, it potentially puts those individuals in a situation where they may have to go and walk on the busy, narrow roadway because these parked vehicles are restricting complete and open access to the sidewalks.Kahawai Street is busy.I've seen it grown over the years.Over the past several years and more recently, I've had many close calls on that roadway with my kids in the car.I've seen cars nearly exchanging side view mirrors because that's how close they're getting.At times I found that traffic backs up onto the busy Market Street because those vehicles are attempting to turn left onto Kahawai Street, can't make that left because there's already two or three vehicles waiting for the car coming in the opposite direction to come through.There just isn't enough room for those vehicles.I would like to thank council member Mike Victorino as he came out with an analyst for onsite inspection of the area in question, and had met with the residents on this safety issue.They truly appreciate and remember his efforts to help them regarding their safety concerns.Thank you for allowing me to provide public testimony before you today.And again, I ask for your support to prohibit parking on Kahawai Street, along the Iao Stream.I am hear and available to answer any questions you may have.Thank you.Thank you.And thank you for your time to testify.Members, any need for clarification of the testifier?Seeing none.Thank you again for your time.Are there any other testifiers in the gallery.Madam Chair, no one is currently signed up.Thank you, Mr. Jensen.We'll check in with the district offices.In Hana, Ms. Lono, anyone there to testify?Ms. Lono?Hana, are we on?Good afternoon Chair, this is Joan Lono in Hana and there is no one waiting to testify.Thank you Ms. Lono.On Lanai, Ms. Fernandez, anyone there to testify?Good afternoon Chair, this is Denise Fernandez on Lanai and there is no one waiting to testify.Thank you, Ms. Fernandez and on Molokai, Ms. Al-khan anyone there to testify?Good afternoon Chair, this is Ella Al-khan on Molokai and there is no one here waiting to testify.Thank you ladies for being there.At this time, members, seeing no one here in the gallery to further testimony or in district offices, with no objections, I shall now close public testimony.Thank you very much.And ladies, thank you for being there.So members, let's jump into our first item.I E M 12, and this is parking on Kahawai Street, Wailuku and this is county communication, 13-30 from council member, Mike Victorino, who referred this matter, prohibiting parking on Kahawai Street from Market to Makua Lane in Wailuku.And the correspondence is dated January 19th, 2016 from Michael P Victorino, presiding office in protempor transmitting proposal entitled A Bill For An Ordinance Amending The Traffic Code Of The County Of Maui To Prohibit Parking On Portions Of Kahawai Street in Wailuku, Maui, Hawaii.And the purpose of this proposed bill is to prohibit parking on the south side of Kahawai Street between Market Street and Makua Street where indicated by signs to eliminate unsafe traffic conditions.And we can pass this bill on first reading with or without revisions, and also consider filing of this county communication.Members, the transmittal dated 20, we have a transmittal dated January 12th, also from Director of Public Works.And the Director attaches a Public Works Commission recommendation from December 16th, 2015 in support of the bill and transmittal further comments on some of the non-substantive housekeeping matters included in the proposed bill.And I, as the testifier mentioned, I would like to thank Council Member Victorino for his persistence in getting this bill before this committee, as well as Legislative Analyst, Jordan Molina and his efforts in drafting this proposed bill.So members, with that, I'll turn the floor over to Director Good.But before that, let me recognize Council Member Bob Carroll has joined us.Aloha Mr. Carol.Okay, and now Director Good, the floor is yours.Okay.Thank you Chair.Good afternoon.Good afternoon.Chair, members, David Good here at Director Department of Public Works.And I wanna thank our members of the public for persevering on this.Our staff worked with, actually a former staff, Jordan Molina for the Committee, Councilman Victorino, to identify some areas where parking could be allowed along Kahawai between Market and Makua.And they've identified a couple areas.One is, and these areas are tight.And if you've been up in Kahawai, you know there's not much room.So, we were shooting for a minimum of nine foot travel lanes and then squeezing out where we can squeeze in seven feet wide of parking.So if it met that criteria, that would be okay for that street.And we identified a couple areas.So as you're heading Malcolm on the left-hand side, along the Stream, basically more or less fronting the new Habitat for Humanity project there's room there for, I'm going to say, four to six cars and then going farther Malka as the road and the stream start to diverge, there's a kind of a triangular area in there where there's, again, four to six, seven cars perhaps can fit in that area.And that way it would still leave us nine foot travel lanes for two-way traffic room for folks to park.So that's what was presented.This was worked on internally then presented the Public Works Commission that recommended approval.The bill also contains a lot of housekeeping changes to our no parking ordinance.The ordinance includes all the districts of Maui, where parking is prohibited in certain manners.And so there's a lot of housekeeping that was done in that bill.So we're supportive of that.We did note a couple other items that could be amended and it's something we could actually do later, Chair if the Committee desires or something, we try to squeeze in at this time.And that's noted on my communication.And that summarizes where we're at.Thank you, Director and members, yes.Do you have a Open for discussion.Chart or map for us, Chair?That visually shows all the verbal recommendations.Madame Chair - Does the back of the handout explained that Director Good?Yeah, this was on the January 12th communications from our department.It was just put on the desk so you might not have picked it up yet.No. The final back page has a diagram and unfortunately, member Victorino was not here with us today to go over this, but I'm sure we're well aware that he is in very much support of this measure, at this time.Does everyone have the drawing?We'll take a brief recess to the call of the Chair.Aloha.will the Infrastructure and Environmental Management Committee please reconvene and thank you for that brief recess.And would you like to go through a little bit, basically why we recessed and we can go through it in a little more detail, but real quickly in the entire ordinance, there's more than just the Kahawai Street that we're discussing.So Corporation Council had gone through to basically do clean up language, I guess, so to speak, make it more clear, concise.For example, an area in Hana, it used to say 140 feet fronting Helene hall.Now that 140 feet has been taken out to just say, prohibited parking in front of Helene Hall, the distance in the front of Helene Hall.So, don't need the wordiness of the particular footage.It's saying the same thing, but just in a more simpler layman's language.And it goes through the entire ordinance doing that.Making sure the correct Hawaiian spelling of streets are corrected.East, North and things of that nature.So really, I guess Corporation Council felt that it was a lot of more housekeeping and didn't have to be put into motions and made into votes taken on the floor to do these adjustments, but we can go through it, line by line, if need be.At this time though, I'll open the floor up for discussion in regards to the Kahawai discussion here with Director Good.And I think we, whoever has been in my committee before recalls discussing this in the past couple of years, as testifier has said, we've been really trying to figure out how this is all going to blend in well with the community and the use of this road.So floor is now open for discussion and questions if you have from our department.Mr. Guzman?Thank you Chair.And I also would like to thank Mr. Victorino for proposing the changes along with the department.My question is, I believe Mr. Good mentioned that there were sections of the street that could have parking.Is that also indicated in the amended ordinance or is that something that needs to come in later?Director?Thank you Chair.So, memember Guzman, you're talking about Kahawai?Yes, yes.Yeah, so the way we've worded it is to say the no parking where prohibited, by signs.That way, it'll allow parking in between those signs.Okay.So we'll have the arrow saying no parking this way, but it'll allow - Okay parking in the other direction.Okay.Thank you.And I guess my other questions would be for the other sections.Can I ask that question - Sure, go ahead.on a number 25 as amended, it's deleting the school hours and just amending it to school days.So does that mean that anytime it's a school day, the entire day is off limits for parking?It appears in the original ordinance, it gave hours, where in you, you can't park between certain hours and now you're just saying school days.So I just would like to have that clarified is that when it's a school day, the entire day and night is prohibited by parking.Sorry.Mr. Guzman, what item is this?Oh, it would be number, as amended 25, in the original is number 27.Because I'm looking at one that says during school days as prohibited by signs.Yes, correct.So they take off the hours, but it says the prohibited by signs.So obviously the signs will dictate when the prohibitions occur as the sign will state put up by Public Works.Yeah.And my question is, well, I guess, does this sign, does it mean that when it's a school day, Monday through Friday, the entire day and night are prohibited because in the original you're actually have hours set between 7:00 AM and 8:00 AM and between 1:30 and 2:30 are prohibited parking times.So are the signs, will they have specific times on them because you're deleting that part of the designation of it.Thank you.Director, did you have a comment or Corporation Counsel the reason for that new language?Thank you Chair, My understanding is that the signs do have the times on them and that it's easier to respond to the change in school day, such as Wednesdays are early out, but I believe that the time changed slightly.So it's easier to respond, to change the sign, to reflect the hours that the students are going to be in the vicinity or when it's only one way.And that kind of thing.Can I have a follow up question on- - Sure Mr. Guzman - Yes, just maybe for Corporation Counsel.How will enforcement be conducted if it's not indicated in the ordinance on the times.And then if you have a very vague sign, how is notice going to be given to the general public on when not to park there?The signs would have to be specific as to the times.Okay.But you're saying if it changes, and school hours do change, they're not consistent throughout three years, two years, whatever it may be, that would mean that we would have to go back and change the signs.I assume we would need to change the signs if it was a very large deviation, if it fell between the hours then maybe we wouldn't change it, if it was 15 minutes within the time period that was needed for the safety of the kids.I would assume that it would be less expensive for us to change an ordinance than it would be to change all the signs if the Department of Education ever changed their hours of operation.I don't know, because I think a couple of years ago Pomakai had their days early release on Wednesdays.And then now I believe on Friday.So it changes, you never know.I just wanted to see if there's a way to work that out without, causing too much problems.Go ahead, Corporation Council - You'd have to change, if you wanted the specific times in the ordinance, you'd also have to reflect it on the signs.You'd have to do both.Versus if there's a change, like you said, at one school one day, if you have in the ordinance that at school days, as on the posted signs, then you had changed the times on the signs.Yes.Are you okay, Mr. Guzman?Kind of getting it or not really?Okay.Yes.Mr. Hokama.Quickly Chair.I can be in support of the requests regarding the Kahawai Street in Happy Valley.I understand that area well and so I can be right to air on a pedestrian safety and a resident safety versus vehicular convenience.Regarding the other things, such as what Mr. Guzman brought up.I liked the specificity of hours in the ordinance.And I've been around long enough that somebody's gonna say, Hey, there was no sign when I was there.Why are you tagging me?Why are you doing this reliance on signage?I rather rely on law.And so I rather retain the language as is in the current code.Thank you.Thank you, Mr. Hokama.Memembers any, discussion?As I understand that change, I guess the determination with the sign versus what's in the language, the sign is going to- It's stating during school days, school hours, but here are the hours on these signs in front of the school.These are the hours that were prohibiting parking.And I know for me in Lahaina areas where we know you're not supposed to park in certain places, it makes the most sense, but until we had put up a sign, the police officers could not cite these cars.So that, which was what the department told my office.So that is why I had to call their Public Works to go and put up tow away zone signs, no parking from here to corner signs or whatever the case may be.And that was what I- So for me, I know that I'm told signs need to go up in order for people of enforcement to cite.Is how I've been told by department in Lahaina anyways.So, but I understand memembers, I had to ask the question if we were going off topic, but we're not, because I know the intent of today's meeting is prohibiting parking on Kahawai Street.And it seems like we're all good about that part of it.Then we go into the ordinance and it lists every other district in this entire county.And then this is where Mr. Molina and I believe Mr. Hopper though, had worked on this and signed off on it at the time too.So he is unfortunately not here, but Ms. Rochelle Thompson is picking that up and thinking a lot of housekeeping type items.So members, we can make that call though, if we want to leave that part in, by all means, we have that, right.So yes, Mr. Hokama.I would just have you consider Chair, since I assume there's more of a consensus, I'm happy to make the appropriate motions to move up Kahawai Street consideration.And if we need more work on the so-called housekeeping approach that we use another meeting to work on the remaining concerns.But I'm happy to have initial concern why are we here to move forward to the council process.Okay.Mr. Jensen.Yes Madam Chair, hearing the consensus of the members, one appropriate, which is to be in modify the recommendation to just handle the insertion of that new item labeled in this proposed bill as item 43 and limit any non-substantive changes to just the appropriate numbering changes.And just as this item is labeled parking on Kahawai Street, filed this item, and then let housekeeping changes in a separate bill, be proposed at a future time.Okay.Very good.Thank you.Director, Yeah?All good - Sounding good.Okay.Sure - Yeah, very good Mr. Hakama.I'm happy to make the motion to implement that.Second.Okay.All right.Second It's been moved by Mr. Hokama and seconded by Mr. Guzman and any further discussion?Seeing none, all those in - One question - Yes, Mr. Hokama - Is your staff recommending other communications also as part of the main motion at this time?It wasn't necessarily a recommendation, just a comment, but as the item is specific to parking on Kahawai Street, it appears to then have a secondary bill coming with housekeeping changes Island-wide that would perhaps be more appropriate for a separate communication.Okay.And then filing of the appropriate communications Chair - Okay.As part of the motion.Okay, and filing of communication.All right members, any further discussion needed at this point?Seeing none, all those in favor, say aye.Aye Any opposed?No opposed.Motion carries with six ayes, one excused and zero no's.Okay.And we'll be bringing up the rest of this discussion on another item and work on that.Thank you very much members.And next item is authorizing the installation of utility poles for the Kahoma Village project in Lahaina, IEM 48 and this is County Communication 15-303 from Director of Public Works, transmitting a proposed resolution entitled Resolution Granting Permission to Place Utility Poles Along a Public Highway for Kahoma Village Project.And the purpose of this proposed resolution is to authorize the installation of 10 utility poles by Stanford Card Development, LLC. For the Kahoma Village project.The 10 utility poles to be installed will replace eight existing poles.And will exceed the height of the existing poles by more than five feet.And, at this point, I shall turn the floor over to Public Works Director Good for some discussion.Thank you Chair.First of all, I did a handout today, this 11 by 17 site plan showing where the new poles would be along Front street.As you may recall, Kahoma Village came in for a 201H approval a year, year and a half ago.They're finalizing their improvement package and designs.And going through that process, they worked with Valley Electric and their electrical consultant to move the poles from where they currently are inward towards the project.In doing that and accounting for the new driveways, the other pole heights along this area of Front Street, existing utilities on the polls, et cetera.It was determined that they would need a couple extra poles plus relocating the eight inward.In fact, they'll be located in a road widening lot, that's currently gonna move them into their property, which is going to be dedicated back to us.So the question came to us is do they need council approval or not?And so the ordinance wasn't really clear on this particular case, but we thought it best that, I certainly call it best, that we come to council with it because we are adding a couple poles and they are certainly higher, even though they are going to private property, which will become public property.So anyway, again, because of the spacing related to the driveways poles that are across the street that they need to feed to et cetera, as determined that they needed a couple extra polls.My understanding is the pole height will match that a little farther north on the other side of the stream.So as you go down past Safeway it's the same height as those polls.This just happens to be an older section I was in in front of vacant land.And if you have any very technical questions, the project engineering electrical consultants are here from ECM. - Okay.Thank you, Director And members, this is the company who is installing the poles Director or your department?.No, they're the companies electrical designers.So - Oh, okay.they worked with Valley Electric to come up with the spacing plan.And I'm sure they tried to minimize number of polls because polls are money so in order to facilitate the project and these other needs, that's what they upped the minimum required.And Valley Electric approved it.Okay.Members, would you like the resource people to come down for some questions?I think Mr. Good can answer.Okay.Yes.Mr. Hokama?I just want to know.So all the poles being part of the request, Director, all is street light pole and power poles, or just power poles?Well, I think what they're going to do is they'll mount the streetlights on the pole.So the notes here that they have.So are we going to have more lighting then along Front Street?Is that a good assumption on our part.I believe so, but I think that's when I need the electrical consultants to- - Oh, okay respond to Maybe it's fine we can have the consultant respond to those questions Chair, please.Okay, Gentlemen, would you like to come and join us down here for some questions on, I guess, lighting on the polls.Yeah, you can come to the podium.Thank you.So director, I guess undergrounding was never asked.Undergrounding of utilities.I believe they received an exemption in the 201H for the undergrounding.Oh, okay.Cause it's costly.I know, it adds cost to the project.But this portion of the code where it talked about either adding poles or adding Heights was not a requested exemption at the time.Probably because they didn't know at that time.Okay.Thank you.And thank you, gentlemen, if you can just introduce yourselves and tell us who you represent.Mark Rickard with ECM incorporated, we're the electrical consultants for this project.Aloha.Gerald Kuda, the same.Thank you.Okay.Did you hear the question or Mr. Hokama would you like to repeat?Yeah.So gentlemen, tell us, with this request you have what, 10, 11 poles?All of them will be a power poles with street lights attached to it?Not all of them.Most of the street lights would be on poles that are fronting intersections.There's not much out there now, so it probably would be more lighting if that's what you're asking, but it's not as if we're putting lights on all 10 poles.Okay, okay.I know for some lighting means security, so some viewed as a good thing.It does, but we also get objections from homeowners like across the street.That's why, yeah.My thing is with the lighting scheduled with this request, do you feel it will bring more intensity of lighting?You know, we do have a street lighting ordinance and the shooting requirements those kinds of things for night skies quality.So can you give us how you're approaching is this.Is just to maintain the existing illumination or you trying to bring better clarity, so there's a stronger white light presence, so easier detection of colors and negative factors?Not necessarily.The light out there now is limited.The lights we'd be adding on the utility poles, like I said, would be for county standard and at intersections, not necessarily light the whole road and area.The lights used will be Meco standard because it is county street.So in that area be 150 watt, I believe HPS. Their normal, full cut-off cobraheads.And then the spacing, we just making a summary, the spacing between the poles is what the utility is recommending to you, as the consultant to the project.Correct.Okay.Thank you very much, Chair.You're welcome, Mr. Hokama.Memembers, any further questions?Yes, Mr. Guzman.Oh, thank you, Chair.I just want to follow up on the line of questioning with Mr. Hokama.On the lighting poles that, according to the map, it looks like there's three over here, but it's pointing to a circle and an X. Is the circle the electrical pole and the other one is the lighting pole?There's an X and circle, I don't know if you have a copy of the map.This says relocated power pole, increased pole height and add streetlight.So are these the approximate locations that the streetlights will- That's a separate pole for the streetlight?No, the streetlight would be on the Meco utility poles.Okay, so then what is the X and the circle?So every time there's a box that says pole height and street light, it points to two, a circle and an X. - I believe it's pointing to the pole it's replacing.Oh, okay.So the X is the replacement.The removal.Right, right.So the red line is the old line that's been removed.Okay.And the black line behind it.Well, there's a property line is in black too, but behind that would be the poles, the utility poles.Okay.So then, I guess, the black line that is pointing to those one, two, those three areas are where the streetlights will be located?Correct.Okay.Thank you.Thank you, Mr. Guzman Members, any further questions of the gentleman here?See none.Gentlemen.Thank you.Thank you for being here and taking your time.Thank you.And if you look at that top photo on the handout from Director Good, this area is very dark.It's unlit in the evenings, and it'll definitely make it a lot safer, Mr. Hokama with the extra lighting coming in and the polls, those polls have been there forever.And they're kind of in the way.Oh, I'm sorry, Chair, - Yeah I just have another question that popped up.The new poles that are coming up, the new material that they're going to be using is what are they going to replace it with wood again or?Wood, yes.It looks like - Wood their nodding their head yes - it's the same.Yes, wood.Wood.Oh, okay.Yeah.Thank you.Thanks.And I've had comments because the polls, the existing polls are kind of in the sidewalk and they kind of, one of them actually goes out onto the asphalt of the roadway and that one in particular, just to share a real quick short story, my brother ran into it.And then he's like, what, why did you drive into it and the boy goes, why did things stay in the way?He's like, he wasn't wrong.The poll is wrong.It's in the road.So, okay.Okay.But so yes, it will be, everyone will be happy to move the post out of the roadways.Chair there's a good chance your brother owns that pole.No, - Or he insurance company.he doesn't want it.So members, I think this is a good added infrastructure for this area of town, which is definitely been neglected for a long time.And I know this project has its pros and cons from this community, but overall it is a 201H and is pushing forward.And currently, unfortunately it is at a standstill due to some water issues.But other than that, it looks like Mr. Carr is moving forward with whatever infrastructure he can put forward at this time in order to make it happen when water permits and whatever else he needs to address.Did you have any further, yes, Director Good.Yeah, Ms. Thompson here noted something we probably should have seen.In the handout that I provided actually talks about eight relocated poles and three new poles for a total of 11 and about the resume mentions 10.So I looked at the ECM folks up here is 11 the better number to use?11 - If we go with the higher number it only ends up being 10 were covered.As well, so.Chair, I'd like to note that.Okay - So it's actually to install 11 new utility poles.No, no, no.Is that correct, Ms. Thompson?It's eight and three right on the Front Street.Eight existing, Oh!It looks like it, yeah.Yeah, so it'd be eight relocate and three new.Eight relocating and three new.Okay.And so we'll make note of that in the new resolution.Okay Good, good eye Ms. Thompson.All right members, do we have further discussion.Your recommendation, please?Thank you.I will entertain a motion to recommend adoption of the proposed resolution with, I guess, changes amendments in the utility count, entitled Resolution Granting Permission To Place Utility Poles Along A Public Highway for the Kahoma village project and incorporating any non-substantive revisions and filing of county communication 15-303.So moved, Chair.Second.Thank you.It's been moved by Mr. Hokama and seconded by Councilman Guzman.And at this time, any need for discussion on the motion?Seeing none, all those in favor, say aye.Aye.Any opposed?No opposed.Motion passes with seven, six aye's, one excused and one excused, sorry.And with that, motion passes.Members that looks like we have completed our agenda today.So this meeting is adjourned.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/CC_IEM_01-25-2016.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/CC_IEM_01-25-2016.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/CC_IEM_01-25-2016.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/The_Comedy_of_State_Everyone_Has_A_First_Time/The_Comedy_of_State_Everyone_Has_A_First_Time.mp3", "text": "\u266a I'd fight for you \u266a \u266a I never knew that I could feel this way \u266a \u266a I'm right for you \u266a \u266a This kinda love don't happen everyday \u266a - My name is Brenda Churchill, and I'm here with, what's your name?Kendall Farrell.Kendall Farrell.And we're doing the Comedy Of State this afternoon as an interactive, a little bit of an interactive talk show.Hey.Now, when the title of the program is Everyone Has A First Time.And I would say that this is my first time doing a taped show.But I've actually done a couple shows already.One was for here, Channel 17.My friends on The T also did a show with me and- - We love Nikki and Emoji.Oh Nikki and Emoji are hot stuff.And all things LGBTQ out of work in media down in Montpelier also did a nice interview for me.And I'm just excited to have the opportunity to get my message out and bring in some queer comics, and have fun with the, have fun with my friend Kendall.Thanks for having me, Brenda.You're welcome.I'm gonna throw in a little disclaimer that anything that's said here today is actually my opinion and does not represent anybody from the folks that I represent as the, excuse me, what is it I am?I am the liaison for the LGBTQIA Alliance of Vermont.And, as such, we'll probably talk a little bit about that as well, but I wanna get to my guest, Kendall Farrell.Kendall's from Burlington right now, and he's a standup comedian.And this is your, I think this was your bio.Yeah, I think we pulled it from my Facebook page.Whose wry slash style and dry wit has made him a favorite in his home state.He won the annual Vermont Funniest Comedian contest in 2015, profiled seven days, regular at the comedy club.He's opened for headliners all over New England, performed on Night Train.And how was that?Was that a big club?Night Train.It's at a place called Little Field in Park Slope and why it's snack hosts.And it's the lineups they get there are just like insane.That was a lot of fun and why it was super nice.Nice, locally, we got a, of course at the Vermont Comedy Club, Comedy and Crepes, the Skinny Pancake, Brews and Bros and Foam Brewers, Barn Party at the Zen Barn and something that ties in with our theme today, which is the United We Stand Up. - Yeah.That was political.That was such a fun show, Danny Russell.And I host that.Some Vermonters and I know Annie Russell from VPR. - Yeah.Where she's, I think now the deputy news director.She, I was glad to see her.It was a lot of fun.That show was a riot.And also very funny.Oh, she was, she was.Keeping with the both the political theme and the first time thing, I could relate a little bit about my first time with the Pride parade.And this was about three years ago.I got to pull my, or I got to drive my big red jeep up Church Street.It was a panic.I had people waving, screaming, shouting.I was just hopeful I wasn't running over anybody.And behind me was a trailer full of my gay young friends, bouncing spouts into RuPaul.And so I was also honored this year with my friend Craig Mitchell, to be co-marshal.Oh Craig.I asked him to change it to marshmallow, but they didn't quite get the marshmallow, but Craig and I got to go up.I'm surprised you got resistance on that.Craig and I got to go up Church Street together.We were laughing and joking all the way up through.And then I got beautiful roses from my friend Meg.And it was just a really wonderful day, I had a blast.Were you in this year's Pride parade?I, yeah, they did it in Battery Park this year, which was super fun.I missed the parade part of it, but I was there for the big party afterwards.I had to come, I had to leave work early and then go back to work afterwards.Oh my goodness.But it was a lot of fun.It was the, whole park was packed.Now you and Annie do a routine or have done a routine.Yeah.And it, the one I saw, I happened to be down in our state's capitol.But you've been all over the state doing this routine?Yeah.Yeah, we took it.So the show is called United We Stand Up and it's like a politically themed comedy shows.So what we do is we bring a bunch of standup comedians in, some from Vermont, some from out of state, sort of a mix of people and just people who have sort of politically relevant material.And then at the end of the show, there's an interview with a local politician or political figure in general.So we've had David Zuckerman on this show.He was our guest at the Vermont Comedy Club, city counselor, Max Tracy from Burlington, the newest city councilor Ali Jang.We had him right after he was elected.And yeah, so it's a lot of fun and Annie and I love doing it.Annie is moving to...I heard that.So the series is on a hiatus for a while.And you're moving as long as you mentioned that, we'll just talk about it.Your taking off and going to the big apple for a brighter and bigger things to do.The big apple, yeah.I, a lot of Vermont comedians have, former Vermont comedians are living there now.So I'm excited to join my fellow expatriates.You think you'll be able to find a political venue to bring New York politics to the forefront?Yeah, I don't, it has been kind of on my mind because I have no journalism skills.So Annie was like really important to the show because she knows about like journalistic ethics and all.You know, she's very talented interviewer.So she kind of would like book all the political guests and she spearheaded that part.And I would kind of book the comedians.Sure.And manage that part of the show.But I've been thinking a lot about ways that we could keep it going or, Annie's gonna be in Chicago.Maybe I would go visit her or maybe she could come visit me.Annie I'm pitching this to you.I hope you're watching.It sounds like a road trip.Yeah.In any case, what would you like to do with today on the show?What have you you got in mind?Oh, I guess if we're talking about first, first times.Yeah that's good.I have a funny story about the first time I went to a Pride parade.The first time I ever went to a Pride parade, I was there for probably like a half an hour before I heard some like this poor, like disenfranchised straight bro.He was like walking by and he was like, man, well why don't we have a straight Pride parade?I just remember thinking like, I don't know, man, but if I had to guess, I would say there are probably just aren't enough straight parade planners out there.I don't know who he thinks is like stopping him though.Like go nuts.Are you kidding me?I don't know about you, but I would love nothing more than to see that.Nothing would delight me more.Oh my, - I don't know what it's gonna look like.I keep like imagining it's just gonna be like a bunch of really drunk people in the parking lot of like a Home Depot.Just like barbecuing and listening to like Kid Rock.Straight pride.There you go.We'll put it in the bin to check on where, and see what we can do there.That is just a joke, of course.Of course it is.Yeah.Straight people will never take Home Depot away from lesbians.I think we all know that.No, that is a great place to shop.Yeah.I've been told.Yeah, there's another local community and has a really funny joke.I won't give it away in case you have a run, but about how the hottest place to meet single lesbians in Burlington is at Pet Food Warehouse.Wow.I'll have to make a note of that.Yeah, right then, keeping you private then.But then I gotta get a pet.Yeah.I don't think Sues has a pet.I think she just hangs out there.She's just like trolling for a pussy at the Pet Food Warehouse.It can be done, it can be done.I think she has done it.I hope Sues is watching too.Yeah we'll have to get her on the show to refute or substantiate those claims.Sues would be a great guest.I think she would too.She just wound up her first year up in St. Alban's last night.I think you guys did the show at the, what's the venue that...Twigs.Twigs yeah.Yeah, that's always a fun show.Lot of local entertainment up there.And she's been doing that show now for a year and I've been to a couple of those shows and they're great.They're always great.Yeah.She's got a rapport with the audience and she can warm you up and get anybody laughing.I'm just curious when you're doing a comedy routine, are you able to discern the differences between a gay crowd, like with your LOL comedy series and a straight crowd?And how do you change that up?How do you do that different?Yeah, well I think like, it depends on maybe not if they're like straight or gay, but just like where you are.Okay.Like I think the further away from the cities, you got, like, they're a little progressive enclaves and stuff.But like you go, like, you know, there used to be shows, we were just talking about out in Morrisville Moogs Place.Yeah.Used to be shows at Moogs Place and like you go out there and people, like they have no, it's not that they don't like gay people, but they just have no idea what Grindr is, or, you know, like they don't know about, like, I think they're just ill-informed about gay sex.So it was pretty shocking for that, for this whole lot of info's.Yeah, that might be a tough venue.I will tell you that my friend Christine showed her documentary denial at the library in Montpelier this past week.And it was predominantly gay crowd and they all got the jokes, the innuendo, all the overlays that were in there and all the things.I was asking her at first.Where has that happened before?She says Spain.I said, what?She says, well, they had subtitles.And they laughed at everything that was...That's so funny.It was spot on so I said, well, that must mean that the written word is stronger than the spoken word, but only in Spanish.I suppose so.I was gonna take a few minutes to review what I do within the LGBTQ Alliance.Yes.And, I'm gonna kinda read what is our mission and purpose statement and the LGBTQIA Alliance of Vermont comprised of representatives from a range of LGBTQIA organizations and individuals from the broader Vermont community.Our mission is to anticipate and collaboratively respond to proposed and enacted laws, policies, action and community level crisis that impact LGBTQIA Vermonters.The Alliance provides expert advice to elected officials, political activists, state indices, community-based and professional organizations, and other interested parties representing and protecting the interests and rights of the LG, of LGBTQIA Vermonters.The group seeks to fairly represent the collective voice of the LGBTQIA Vermonters through advocacy, community building, education and representation.Now within the context of the Alliance, there's five organizations that are our cornerstone or original groupings.And I don't know if you know them all.Can you guess?I think Green Mountain Crossroads is probably one of them.They are.Outright Vermont.Outright Vermont is yeah.The Pride Center.Yeah.God, I'm trying not to cheat and look at my sheet here.They could provide answers to the quiz.Yeah, I got three of them.Okay so.Can I cheat?Yeah you can cheat.Oh, Vermont Cares.Oh, those guys are great.I thought they were part of the Pride Center.No, Peter Jacobson's executive director there.And actually I'm gonna review some of the fundraisers he's got coming up.There's an AIDS walk in the city hall park on October 1st at 10:00 AM. I would go right to their website for information on that to register and by all means contribute to that.That's important.Rainbow Umbrella of Central Vermont actually put on the first Pride Solidarity March that coincided with the official Pride date this past year, and it was very successful.We had people represented from all communities there.Cool.And we had speakers afterwards.That is anticipated to be again next year.Oh great.The Pride Center just completed the Pride celebration two weeks ago and I mentioned that Greg and I - That was fun.were co-grand marshmallows, were gonna adopt that, co-grand marshmallows.Yeah, I think you guys should push for that.I think we should.Green Mountain Crossroads, which is down in Brattleboro, Vermont.I was just down there a couple of days ago.HB Lozito is sponsoring again, a very successful two-day seminar out in the country.It's October 27th.And again, go to Green Mountain Crossroads to register and find out more information.I'm one of the presenters for that as well.Oh, very cool.Yeah, so, and lastly, we have Outright Vermont, not leastly though.Dana Kaplan, new executive director there.He is having a Firetruck Poll fundraiser on Church Street, September 30th.Oh, I think they've done this before.Haven't they?They have done it before.Have you participated or watched it?Yeah, I think the Comedy Club put together a team to be part of it last year.And I was out of town I think, but it looked, I was really sad to miss it.Big fundraiser for our friends at Outright.And one of the things that you can do is you can go on their website, you can look at their information there and there are interestingly, one of the unique things that they've come up with for fundraising is that they've found individuals that will post their fundraiser on their website.So if you're interested in doing that, follow some of the guidelines there and post that, and you too can earn funds for the Firetruck Poll or better yet sponsor a team, be on a team, just come out and have fun.I guarantee the weather that day is gonna be beautiful and crisp and cool.I promise it will be.You promise, yeah.Tom Messner and I have been talking.Oh yeah.So, you know, again, these are the organizations that I represent from the state house.And as nonprofits they're always working very hard to generate funds, to keep their staff, they're partially grant funded, but contributions go a long, a long, long way.A couple of the things that I also wanna mention are what we've identified as challenges that are currently being confronted by Vermont's LGBTQIA communities.We're doing that through some interesting things that I've uncovered this summer.One of the things that I'm working on is the changing your driver's licenses to add the letter X to it.We've been working with folks at several different levels to see if we can make that happen.And that...I remember, I think we chatted about that a little bit and it sounds like there's, we're not gonna have to do that through the legislature.Yeah, we're actually looking to do it administratively, which is really a huge cost savings because you don't have to run it through the legislative process.It is part of the DMVs upgrade to their systems.So we're asking that we, we're working to ask if we can get that inserted in there.And that actually follows what Canada's doing with their passports now.Oh, I didn't even know that.They're actually, they're adding X to that.New York is working on similar legislation.It's already been adopted in Oregon, in California.So states that are much larger than us, including a whole country are working towards this.And I think it'll be great for young folks who are coming up and have to put their first legal document in.Yeah.And they don't have to lie and say, well, I'm not M and not F, X works.X will work for lots of folks.Yeah.That is one of the things we also have coming up in the Senate.This session is H333.This bill proposes to require that any single use toilet in any public building or place of public accommodations be identified as gender free.I mean, my gosh, who wouldn't wanna have the opportunity to use one or the other when there's a line at one and you can go in the other.Yeah, I can.There's probably a joke there somewhere.Yeah.I don't know, I feel like I mean, you're not gonna get in trouble for going in the other.I've never gotten in trouble for using a women's room before.And I use it all the time because they're always nicer.And also they're like, there's usually, there's always some old man like cleaning the men's room.I don't know.I've run into that everywhere I go.It happens...I know there's a joke there.I think you're right and I think they have both of the...There's always some sort of like mess that's being cleaned up in the men's room.So it always says like an out of order sign.I'm hopeful that this will go right through.It did get through the house, I did testify there and I believe we'll have a good result with that.I've been also getting out to meet folks, which has been really interesting.I've got a literal laundry list of folks that I've been able to have time with.And, you know, just from a educational standpoint, anybody who's listening to this, anybody who's a citizen, you don't even have to have been legally able to vote, but these folks will talk to you.They'll definitely spend some time with you and they wanna hear what your concerns are.And I would really suggest that you look up your local representative and speak with them.Most recently, I've been, I've talked to Phil Scott, TJ Donovan, Beca Balant, Tristan Toleno, Celine Colburn, Brian Chia, Sina, who is also a really talented DJ here in the area.Yes.Barbara Rachelson, Deanna Gonzalez, Jill Kruinsky, Connor Casey who's the executive director of the Vermont Democrats.Oh my goodness, Mark Hughes had me on his radio program a couple of weeks ago.How was that?It was interesting.He wanted me to come down and co-host with him at Goddard College at 7:00 AM. And I said, probably not.Not only the drive would be fun, but just getting down there in one piece would be interesting.Yeah.But we're gonna do that again.Cindy Weed and Dan Connor up in my neck of the woods have been always open to conversations with me.Also spoken with senate leader, pro temp Tim Ashe, speaker of the house, Mitzi Johnson.And it's really been great to have the ear of the lieutenant governor as well.Like you said, David Zuckerman.Yes.That came and sat down with you so.Yes.That's pretty enjoyable.Taylor, what are you doing over there?Sorry.You're wrecking the place, but we've, all of these folks have been identified as folks that we can go and speak with.And they're very open to conversation.We're really lucky to have worked with, this'll be just a little bit of prop for my co-liaison Keith Goslant who has been around a long time, was on the Freedom to Marry caucus for the men.And he has been both my trainer, my teacher, my mentor and a friend.And it's been a blessing to have somebody to bring me through this process.Like I said, I always tell people, I wished that I'd had pay more attention to civics in high school to know what's going on.Yeah, yeah.And that's kind of that.So let's see, where are we?What have I left out?What do we wanna cover?Oh my gosh, I was kind of curious about what your experience has been like working with governor Scott and his new administration.Well, it's kind of interesting because we had early on identified that we'd like to get in and speak with the governor.Everybody knows he's got a two-year term and he's about a third of the way through the two, both the terms.And we had the opportunity to sit down and speak with him last week.It was really good We had about an hour of his time.And he asked a lot of questions and Keith Goslant and myself were able to provide a lot of information and things that he was genuinely interested in.And I feel good having a governor that will take the time to sit down and listen.And folks within his office also are remarkable.We had a great conversation afterwards with Rachel Feldman.And we spent some time discussing some of the nuances of the conversation that we had with governor Scott.TJ Donovan, very much the same way, very open and asking questions.And if you ever thought law enforcement wasn't on your side, you need to spend some time with the man because as the enforcer of all of our laws, he is definitely watching out for us.I now have his personal phone number.I don't know if he wants you to know that on TV, but if you...Can we put it on the screen?There, no, no.I don't think that'd be appropriate.But what I would like to say is that if anybody has a...Just gonna text every night, like, you up?That's somebody else you're thinking.One of the things that we did cover was how to report an incident.And he advocates that if anybody in the community has incidents of bias, any type of hate speech, anything that maybe we're observing in other states and it filters into Vermont, if you let me know, I will let them know.And it may be part of a larger case study, or they may already have information or complaints about the individual or group.So nothing is too blunt.This is public service you mean?Yeah, they do have a chain between the state and the state's attorney general, the FBI, local law enforcement.As much as they have bad press, they also have some good press and they have good people that work there and TJ is one of them.So I'm really glad to have him on our side.That's good.He marched in the Pride parade with us.Oh no way.Which was really cool, really cool.So we had him in several people from his office that were in there with us.Cool.You know, being able to talk to folks or call them up or send them an email, really is one of the strengths that I think I have in the position that I'm doing because if I say, can we get a meeting?Nobody's declined time with me.Yeah, no one has, for United We Stand Up, the only people who have said no to the show are Republicans.Been very hard to book a conservative.Which is too bad because Annie and I are nice people, but we've had, yeah, everybody has been, that's the nice thing about living in a small state is that your public officials are all very accessible.And we've had great luck booking people for the show.And the thing is about Vermont politicians, almost every single politician we've interviewed has either had to leave early or get there late because they have some sort of animal that they're taking care of.Everybody, David is a farmer.Yes, yeah.David, I think if I'm remembering correctly, he could only do Annie and my show, if his horse didn't give birth that day, which is a weird booking.That's a show stopper.I had to book around that.Speaking of Republicans.I have not had the opportunity yet to reach out to Republicans.But I will tell you that the...Well Governor Scott.Well Governor Scott is the top Republican, but you know, with that said, he should be accessible to everybody and I think that all the electorate should.My own county of Franklin, I have the Senate minority leader Dustin Degree.And he's on my list actually in the next couple of weeks to reach out.So I anticipate reaching across the aisle, so to speak.Well that's good.And I don't identify as either Democrat or Republican.And I know that many people have very strong feelings within the LGBTQ community, but keep an open mind and I will when we sit down.Yeah.Yeah, I think it's certainly important to just talk to people as individuals.But I wonder how Governor Scott, it seems like he was interested in what you were saying and was responsive to the issues you were bringing up.I wonder how he feels about his party's hard line on those same issues.If you've noticed any of the press that's come out of the governor's office lately, he has denounced the rescission of DACA. He has also come out with 10 other governors for the current health care program, not to repeal and replace that the current Federal Republicans wanna do.He understands the people of Vermont.And while the nuances of taxes and teachers and things might've gotten into a different category with some folks, I think sincerely, he thinks about our community and really does.I know that Republicans will be Republicans and Democrats will be Democrats.But with that said, I think it's a pretty good state for some partisan work and passing of the first part through H333 through the house had very little objection, as well as some of the other things that we're doing.So I'm looking forward to working with everybody and the governor.And the legislature is where we're headed.Yes.You've got any more comedy for us, cause I'm really dying to hear some jokes.Oh yes should we end on a joke?Well we're good, yeah.Well, I don't know if, are you on any dating apps Brenda?Did I admit to?None that you admit to.Yeah I'd have to say one or two.One or two.Do you mind if I ask which ones?If I could remember them, that's how often that I go in there.Okay Cupid is a common one, a lot of people on.Okay Cupid is one of the ones.And that seems fairly LGBTQ friendly so.Oh really?I haven't tried it.Well mostly L, so that's mostly.Mostly, yeah, that's why.It could be, it could be.There's not much for me there.Yeah, I don't know.I am on Grindr and Tinder look me up.Self promotion.And I, okay, Grindr.And, yeah being on Grindr is fun, but it also makes me like terrified of getting murdered.Tell me about that.You're really in the green mountain state, you might feel like you're getting murdered.It makes me nervous about getting murdered because if you get murdered, you just lose any sense of privacy you once had.They just, the cops go through all your stuff.I just feel like I don't need that kind of hassle in my death, you know.What do they go through?What are they?Well, I would, they, if I got murdered, they would have to go through my Grindr account.And that is absolutely my worst nightmare.Is that on your PC or cell phone?It's on my phone.Oh boy.Which is, yeah.That's pretty damning.These poor cops are not even gonna know what this guy's face looks like.They're just gonna have to work backwards, like a picture of his leg, headless torso.There's no registry for that headless torso pictures?No, it's just going to, I'm so afraid.It's gonna be all over the evening news like splashed across, like, have you seen this faceless torso?Contact the Burlington PD. - Oh my goodness.And beware that he could have shaved by now.I know.My worst nightmare.Don't know if everybody will get that but I know all of the folks who are gay will probably, yeah.Yes.You don't have to be gay to be on Grindr.I think that's...You can use it.You can use it to find people, gay people in your area.You could also use it to avoid gay people in your area, how you use it as your business.Okay, I'm gonna start to wrap up a little bit.I got the 30 minute notice.So better than stretch this into 45 minutes.I wanna let you know that my co-liaison on Keith Goslant and myself are planning a road trip actually to four different locations this fall.We wanna talk to the LGBTQIA community without any filters.We need to know what's going on in there.And we wanna be able to have a very firm commitment to you guys, as well as my organization that we're representing you not ourselves and not our own ideas so we need to hear from you.And we'll announce that pretty broadly.I am gonna take a moment to introduce my next guest, Taylor Radke.She's a young queer comedian and a friend.And also I read here, this can't be right.You're recovering from a near fatal accident, plane crash?Something like that.Okay were you're trying to fly or was it, oh, it was a skateboard.Oh, I must've misread that.Cool.Yeah, and you can find her at Zero Gravity pouring your favorite so hopefully soon.And I wanna also give a shout out to Zero Gravity for their great contribution during the Pride celebration.They did a promotion with beer, which is okay with me and donated back to the Pride Center.And I wanna really thank Kendall for being here with us today in my show debut and being the beautiful co-host that you are.Well thanks for having me Brenda.I know you're gonna be successful going down to New York City.And we'll see you again when you come up to Vermont.You certainly will be invited.I'm sure anywhere, everywhere.I hope so.Okay.And this is Brenda Churchill for the Comedy of State.Some news and some queer comics and hopefully a fresh perspective on for you guys.And we'll see you soon.I wanna thank you very much for watching.Have a great evening or day or night.Yeah.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/The_Comedy_of_State_Everyone_Has_A_First_Time.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/The_Comedy_of_State_Everyone_Has_A_First_Time.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/The_Comedy_of_State_Everyone_Has_A_First_Time.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/BelmontSchoolsNOWJimDavis040416CL19/BelmontSchoolsNOW_JimDavis_040416-CL19.mp3", "text": "Welcome to Belmont Schools now.My name is John Phelan.I'm the superintendent of the Belmont Public Schools, and today I'm joined by Jim Davis, athletic director of the Belmont Public Schools.First, I'd like to update everyone in the audience with the important issues and events going on in the Belmont Public Schools, and after that, I will introduce Jim Davis, and we'll have a great discussion about high school athletics.First, I wanna update everyone on the Chenery principal screening committee search.As you know, Kristen St. George will not be back at the middle school next year, and the committee has been formed to hire a new principal at the Chenery.We have a team of people that encompass two teachers, three administrators, three parents, as well as the sitting principal to screen all the applicants who submitted their interest in Belmont and will be having interviews soon and also be hosting parent nights and staff afternoons for them to get to know the finalists.We will keep you posted on all this information so you too can attend the time for parents and the community members to interview and ask questions of our finalist candidates.That will take place on April 11th and April 13th at the Chenery middle school.I also want to give you an update on the calendar conversation that was held at the school committee meeting over the last two meetings in April and in March.The school committee did make a decision to have a calendar that kept with it's start time of the first Wednesday in September, as it has in the past.Also a calendar that recognizes a no school day for next year's national election.Due to the fact that safety issues are a concern as over 16,000 voters revolve through the three schools that hold voting precincts.Additionally, the school committee decided in a very, very deep conversation after reviewing the data and listening to many, many conversations at the school committee table with the community to not recognize holidays as part of their school calendar.The result is that there will be school in yom kippur next year in the 16, 17 school year and there will be a full day of school on Good Friday.The decision by the school committee was not taken lightly, and I believe as I sat at the table, it was based on the true respect that we want to be able to hold for all of the different groups and families that we have and that represent the Belmont community.If you have any questions about the calendar, please feel free to call the superintendents office.And the new calendar is posted on our Belmont public school website.I lastly would like to thank at this time, Laurie Slap, who is the chairperson of the Belmont school committee, for all of her hard work over the last six years as a school committee member.Laurie slap is someone who prides herself on doing best by students and teachers at the Belmont public schools and has invested hours and hours over the course of six years to do work on the school committee, on the warren committee, on the capital committee, as well as her work on the policy committee throughout her time in tenure on the school committee.So thank you very much to Laurie slap and we look forward to the new members coming on the school committee when the election takes place next week in early April.Lastly, I was very fortunate to be able to speak at a PTO event at the Wellington elementary school last week and the big topic of discussion from that group was space in the increase in enrollment.This has been a theme that we've been addressing all year with short-term planning and long-term planning for the district.What I talked about at that meeting was the fact that we do look to add 11 classroom spaces in the 2016, 17 school year.We will do so at the elementary level, by reallocating some space at the Burbank.This will be the last square footage of space that we have at the elementary level.And we feel that if we have an increase in class size at any of the grades catered for, we will be able to add two classrooms to cut down on class size across the district, at our elementary level.At the middle school, we will be looking to add six modular classrooms that will be procured by the town, hopefully a town meeting this May at the cost of about $1.4 million.I presented this information along with Jerry Boyle director of facilities to the capital committee last week.And we were very thankful to the school committee, the capital committee, the warren committee, and the board of selectmen, all of whom are working hard to create a financing package that will best suit the town to support this very, very needed cause of extra space that is needed at the Chenery.And lastly, at our high school, as you know, we are currently utilizing three modular spaces behind the high school, and we will expand to move into three more spaces, utilizing all the space behind the middle, the high school for modular space.This is a lot of work for our staff and our facilities and our teachers.We truly look forward to this Summer, preparing those spaces to get ready for school in September of 2016.And by the time you watch this episode, we will have had our first meeting of the Belmont high school building project committee, which will meet on April 4th, which is tonight, the day of this filming, to discuss how we will approach the work of building a new high school in Belmont.Belmont has been awarded an eligibility period status to get materials into the MSBA, to form a committee, to create information so they can review our package, to move forward with a new high school in Belmont.We look forward to the building committee and the work that they will do over the next few years to ensure that Belmont has an outstanding and long-standing high school that will serve the community for many years to come, so more to come on the high school building project.So I'd like to say today that I'm here with Jim Davis, the director of athletics, who's with me coming back from his MIAA conference in the Cape and another conference in Connecticut, where Jim was named the president's award of merit by the Massachusetts secondary school athletic directors.This is an outstanding achievement that Jim achieved within the state of his athletic director peers, and is also being named as the representative to the regional New England, New York, New Jersey post for the national association.So, Jim, congratulations, well done and thank you very much for being here.Thanks, thanks for having me.So tell me about that process.Tell me who awarded you this distinction and how does it work to be in the national association?So it's a unique honor in the sense that it's selected by my peers.So the, my peers here in the Commonwealth saw the work that I've done and they were able to put forth my name and be recognized as a president's award of merit.Each one of the sections in the state have an opportunity to do that, pick an outstanding athletic administrator from their district, and they were all recognized this past week down at our state associations conference.The opportunity to serve on the national, at the national level, on the national board is a distinct process in the sense that our state, every 24 years gets the opportunity to present a candidate to go on, to serve across the country on the board of directors.And so initially started with an interview process here in Massachusetts that was selected and then it went onto the section meeting, which was held two weeks ago in Connecticut, where my candidacy was reviewed by the members, all the New England states, as well as New York and New Jersey and they gave a stamp of approval.So the final step will be my application to the national, and it will be approved.And in December of 2016, for my term to start in December of 2017.Very exciting, very well deserved and on behalf of the Belmont public schools in the community, thank you for all the work you do.And it's great to see it recognized, not only throughout the state and throughout the league, but also nationally.So this is great for the Belmont public schools.So they're recognizing you because of all the good work we do and you do with coaches, who do great work with students.So can you tell me a little bit about how the athletic school year has gone, fall season, winter season and how we're preparing now for the spring season?Sure.It's really kind of ironic that we're in, taping today.It's supposed to be a start of our spring sports.Our boys lacrosse team had a chance to get out on the field and play their first game on Saturday.And everybody else was slated open up today, but we've got snow coming down.We've got snow coming down outside.So we'll deal with that, what mother nature dishes out, we'll work on rescheduling and getting the spring season going, but we've had a tremendous year thus far.If we look back in the fall, we had league championships in field hockey and golf, to kind of get the ball rolling.Those teams did very, very well in the state tournament.And then we had our girls swim team who had a tough sessional meet but had a lot of kids place really high, to only go on the next week to the state championship and finished just a few points out of first place.We had three young ladies that were recognized as all scholastics, two on the swim team, and one on our girls field hockey team, this fall.And we had a host of other programs that went on to compete at the state level.Our girls' cross-country team did a tremendous job this year.They fought really hard and got into the state championship meet.It's not an easy thing to do out of the number of teams and competitors but they represented our school and our community very, very well.And that momentum just rolled into the winter.You know, we had our girls hockey team come back on board here in Belmont, after being a co-op for the last several years with Watertown.And we had strong numbers for the program, which was really great to see, two new hockey coaches in both the girls and the boys program.And they both did a phenomenal job.We had skiers qualify for the state ski championship.We had two young ladies and one young man go and represent Belmont high school at the state championship for ski.And you think about it, where we're located geographically, not a lot of snow, particularly this winter, yet we had three of the top kids in our league go on and compete at the state level and represent Belmont very, very well.I think probably the marquee programs that got, probably the most airtime and the most press this winter, were both our boys and girls basketball teams, both had great runs in the tournament.Our boys team was action packed each time out.They had a couple of milestones this year, not only winning the league, but also Matt Kerans, who is our senior point guard, broke the school record, scoring a thousand points and also set the all time scoring record with 1,322 points over his four year career.So great kudos to Matt and all the hard work that he's done.And our girl's basketball team, we call them the road warriors.They made it into the tournament.They were a middle level C team, and they met all comers.Their first game, they had to travel up to Marblehead, not an easy place to get to, but had a really tough start.It was kind of rocky at the beginning, but then they came away and they held that team to five points in the second half, and one running away.And then next up, we had to travel up to the north shore, up to Newbury port, and the girls kept the magic running again, and we were successful there.And they advanced to the semi-finals, which is where we had been last year.And they took on a really highly seated team in Arlington Catholic and our girls just played tremendous team, authentic team defense, very tenacious, and they were victorious there.And then we faced our cross town rivals in Watertown, and the north finals, gave it all that we could and just came up a little bit short, but the girls and the fans that came out to support them and represent them, I mean one thing I can say about the community of Belmont, when our teams advanced to the state tournament, everybody comes out, not only a student body, but the community and it's a great thing to see and witness.It was that, it happened to be at that game, it was a great game.The students were there in full force, the parents were there and there were a lot of parents of non high school students that just came out to see the girls play, phenomenal.Tell me what is getting ready for fall.And then after that, I wanted to, I mean, what's getting ready for spring and after that, I want to talk about all the good work that our boosters and all of our friends have groups.Sure.So we are getting geared up, as I said earlier, you know, our boys lacrosse program has already stepped out.They had their first contest this past Saturday, and all of our other teams are getting ready to roll.I anticipate great seasons out of all of them, of particular interest, our tennis programs are, always compete and very strong, Middlesex league, but they always seem to find a way to advance to the state tournament.I expect our baseball program, as well as our softball program, to come out of the gate.I know our softball players, this is a seasoned team, they're looking for a breakout season this year.And I anticipate that they'll do very, very well.Our girls track program, who last year captured the league championship, which hadn't been captured in a very long time, return, a lot of those kids back, and so I expect great things from them as well as our boys track program.I anticipate they'll do very, very well.And then both of our lacrosse programs will be in the hunt.They have great numbers.You know, those are some of the programs that, down the road, we could be looking at expanding that program, adding another level, whether it be a freshmen level program or a, some of the schools are offering multi levels at the JV level.So it's really, really exciting, good stuff.And the spring season is always one of my favorite seasons because you can get outside, after being indoors all winter long, it's a chance to get outside.And if anybody has the opportunity to come by Belmont high school any afternoon, you'll see hundreds of student athletes out there, on all the different playing fields and surfaces, doing what they love and that's being involved in our program.You know, Jim, we, every year you give us information about how many students are participating, as we start to prepare the budget and get ready for the next fiscal year and the enrollment's going up in the district.But more importantly, the enrollment of student athletes who are participating in afterschool activities in sports is huge.And I would actually extend that in Arturo Assadourian, who's your counterpart, also seeing a rise in numbers of the students that are taking part in the music and performing arts after the school day.Tell me how important you feel it is, for students to be involved in the co-curricular and extracurricular activities and what that means to a high school experience.Yeah, for a lot of kids, this is their opportunity to connect to the school.And we try to find as many different avenues for that to take place, whether it's through interscholastic athletics, whether it's through a club or activity, or one of the fine and performing arts programs that take place, it's just a, it's a way for our students to be connected.But it's also an opportunity for the students to see teachers in a different light.Many of our coaches are teachers within the system.And when that happens, it just creates a great opportunity for both the teacher and the student to connect outside of the classroom.And I would echo the fact that our numbers continue to rise.I think it's indicative of our community and the passion that our students have for not only interscholastic athletics, but also for the fine and performing arts and the different activities that take place.And and I will mention that, aside from the interscholastic athletic programs that we have taking place, this spring we have three actual clubs that are athletic based.The first being our ultimate Frisbee, which is a co-ed program, Mark Wagner, one of the parents in the community, is the advisor for that.And so we've been able to secure them some space in the town for them to compete as well as have some contests at Belmont high school.And then we have two rugby programs, both a boys and a girls program that have been strong.Our girls program was established last year.We really had some girls playing on a co-ed program for the last several years, but last year was kind of the stepping off point for getting a critical mass, to have that take place and we have it again in this year.And on the boys side, they have great strong numbers and that program, it's been in existence for, I think over seven years, we've won some championships along those lines, and both of those programs are due to come online through the MIA as recognized sports next spring.So that's an exciting time.So if we looked at the numbers per se, and participation, whether it's through interscholastic athletics, fine or performing arts or the clubs or activities, we're up in the high eighties to low 90% of at least having students involved in at least one of those types of activities, which is really outstanding.I couldn't agree more that the success in your academics, in a lot of ways, can be measured by the success outside the classroom, connecting to school, connecting to coaches, club advisors, whether it be the drama teacher or the ultimate Frisbee advisor, all of that brings the students connected to school, which then brings them connected to the classroom.We have a lot of community members that help out.The sports programs and all the friends of groups really highlighted last year by the amount of money raised by the community to do the majority of the field house floor for our volleyball and boys and girls basketball seasons and indoor track, which will be then completed by the capital funds this summer.Tell me how important and how valuable the parents are and the friends of groups and the boosters are to the programming at Belmont high.Yeah, they're the, kind of the unsung heroes, I would say.They're critically important, in the sense of, not only supporting their own student athlete, but the, everybody else within those programs, from doing team dinners, to hosting end of the season dinners and such, they're just, they're the backbone of the program and such.They also make things happen that we can't get through our regular operating budget and they're able to provide some financial resources, to acquire, whether it's equipment or special items, that the programs are looking to add.It's just been immense.And you spoke about the fact that the boosters have kicked in and helped out, for example, with the floor project at Belmont high school last year, they've been instrumental, and refurbishing the fitness center at BHS, as well as doing yeoman's work over at the Whitefield house.They continue to look for projects to get involved with and team with, and they certainly have the resources within the community, the network to make those things happen.They have a couple of things coming up that, if I could mention, - please do - This coming Sunday on the 10th of April is the first annual Becca Pizzi family fun run.And the boosters are there behind that, getting that up and running, no pun intended.And then they have a, their annual Patriots, charity basketball game, which is going to take place on Monday, May 16th.So they've got a couple of significant events that help bring in dollars to their coffer so that they can do more for our student athletes here at BHS. - Well, Jim, thank you very much.It's great to hear all the success that we're having on the fields, on the courts, in the classroom, the success of the teams.I truly appreciate your leadership, within the community and within the school.And you are responsible, also, for the middle school sports program, we should note, and also for the wellness, your our director of wellness, which is a huge part of our SEL work in the Belmont public schools recently.And I appreciate your work on that front as well.So we'd like to end this meeting in session of Belmont schools now, with some great footage of the boys and girls varsity playoff run, that took place this year, as well as a great highlight film of the other sports and our student athletes performing for Belmont high school.Thank you very much and have a great day.Just to forward to Jenny Call.Jenny Call gets a bucket for two - Over to Tan, back to Christofori, over to Call.Call goes up, four, three, out to Christofori.Christofori goes up the middle, over to Nikolaidis, Nikolaidis to Tan for 3, 14, 15.We got ourselves a ball game.Five minutes to play.Three for Carly Christofori .Winklaar puts it up for two and draws the foul, to Jenny Call.Call to Winklaar, Winklaar will go in.She goes up for two and she gets it.Nikolaidis to Christofori to Call.Call goes up for three and she gets to three, Christofori goes in, back out to Call, Call goes for three, that's her second 3, for Jenny Call.Belmont retains possession, Christofori for 3, and it's good.Winklaar to call.Call goes in, Call goes up and it's good for two.Christofori, 10 seconds on the shortcut.Christofori goes up for three.There's three for Christofori.So Winklaar, Winklaar going, there's two by Sarah Stewart.To Call, Call goes up, no good.Nickolaidis goes up for two, and she is fouled.Call, to Tan, Tan for three and it's good, for three, Belmont up by 1 40, 39.Irini makes her first, 45 45, tie ballgame.She makes her second.Belmont is now off by 1, 47 48, less than a minute to play.Belmont will get possession with 3.9 seconds to play.Up buy one.There is a bucket for Becca 10.There is the game, your Belmont Marauders, win the game.49 to 47, very close game, very - - Winklaar bakes.Hit's it out to Call, Call down the lane, around and in, eight seven, Winklaar for three, bang!Belmont goes up 10 eight, crossed to Stewart, inside to Tan, Tan drives and puts it up with her left hand, nice shot.For another cutter.Ball in the corner, to Tan.Tan puts up a three pointer, it's good and ties the ballgame at 20 a piece.Cross ahead to Stewart and she misses, puts it up a second time and it's good.Belmont goes up 22 20.Three point attempt, no good.Rebound by Winklaar.Winklaar puts it up, it is good, at the buzzer.Christofori driving to the hoop, hit's it up and it's good.That's the next one up, it's around, no good, rebound by the cougars and the ball game is over!Belmont wins and goes to the finals against the winner of the Triton, Watertown game.Welcome to Carl J. Torres gymnasium here at Woburn Memorial high school for tonight's division, two north final mass madness, MIAA tournament matchups between the Belmont Marauders and their rivals, the Watertown Raiders.Half court picks the dribble up now to Christofori, back to Call, good look at it three, it's up, and it's good.Shama lama ding dong, Otis Day and the Knights.Do you mind if we dance with your dates, big three.G in this room, a lot of anxiety for these kids, Christofori with the line drive three and it falls.Good ball movement there, ball protection.As she tries to take the baseline, strong take, it's up and one, count it!And that's just the senior knowing no help was coming.And it's, excuse me, Nikolaidis.Nikolaidis back to Christofori.Christofori now, using that offhand to get space, there's the long shot and it's good, they're going to give it a long two, for senior captain, Sarah Stewart.Christofori handling up top, using the screen, back she goes to Call, Call will take the Stewart screen around.Good look at a shot, there it's a log too and rattles it home.That's just quality offense.Love her coming off that screen by Stewart, loved what I saw there.And the long pass to Murphy was knocked away by Call, she'll flip it to Christofori, what a nifty move, twinkle toes all the way to the hoop to pass - outside.Unafraid to pull the trigger, there was Christofori, there's Winklaar with the rainbow three, it's the rainbow connection, and it's a tie ball game with one - - Nice little pass to Giorgio, back to Stuart, Stuart shoots and Belmont leads the game 31 to 29.Scrambling here's Call, has to get it in, she does to Christofori.Antonel is guarding her, Christofori's by her, left-hand up and good.Just like you said Kim, just like - - Antonell is guarding her as we see Samari Winklaar getting up and making moves to the table, nifty spin by Christofori.And it's good.For good, Christophori finds Call.Call uses the screen, puts up at three and it's good.46 to 41, the score, timeout bell press, call to a jumpstart for Christofori, Christofori shoots, in and out, no good.Watertown up with it.That could be the ball game.And time ticks down.Ladies and gentlemen, the Watertown Raiders are the D two north girls' basketball champions.Congratulations to them.Congratulations to the Belmont Marauders for a hard fought basketball game, 46 41, the final score.Welcome to winter field house for MIAA tournament basketball featuring the hometown Belmont Marauders against the visiting Brighton Bengals.2 54 to go on the first period.Karen's from the corner.Bingo.Bingo, bingo, three points.Good balls on the floor.Nice play by Ramsey - Ramsey, the dirt dog, they're going to find Bartle's in the corner in this shot.And it is silky smooth.Here's Wagner, backing them down, up top to Karen's long shots, good!Then he's with Karen's and giving him the ball, Karen's with the drive.There's the Paul Pierce look.Bartel's up top, binds Karen's, Karen's for 3, shot's good!41 32 Belmont, the grand man strikes again.Uses the Wagner stream, long pass to Ramsey, skips to Shaughnessy, Shaughnessy to Ramsey, Ramsey to Bartels, here's the movement, up with Shaughnessy, and it's good, and one.Bartles working, kicks it out to Ramsey.Ramsey up top to Karens, Karens will stop and pop, and it's good.Yes, he's on fire.Karens to Ramsey, Ramsey to Bartles, Bartles inside to Shaughnessy, Shaughnessy - and it's good!They are really trying to shoot from the perimeter now.Skip pass to Ramsey, Ramsey with an open look, and it's good!switches it up with Bartels, inside to Shaughnessy, Shaughnessy up with it.That's your game.Lucky 65 63, as we close on two minutes.Here's Karens, nice feed there from Wagner, cross over from Karens, right to the rack.A great game by the Brighton Bengals, well-deserved win 72 to 6 - - Tough way to end the season for the Belmont Marauders.Four years ago, a bunch of people saying \"Oh, there's this guy at Belmont, he's a freshman, course number four, boys so good, you gotta go see him\".So I went and saw him and he was excellent.And I don't do a whole lot of, like, recruiting, you know, but I asked him to come be a part of my team and he's like, \"no, thank you, I already have a team\".And I was like, oh wow, he's got like, you know, he's loyal and he was good.You know, it may have irked me a little bit, but I said, wow, good for him.So I stayed connected to him and he called me later in the fall and said, \"I think your program would actually be really good for me\".So I said well, I appreciate that you stayed loyal, but I think it would be too, so come on over.And Matt was one of the easiest guys to coach for four years because he's just the best.He does what you ask him to do.And he is a basketball kid.And I know everyone here is, but I get to coach a lot of guys, and some girls now too, that, you can really tell when it matters to somebody in a profound way.And it's not everything that Matt is.I think he's a wonderful kid, a very well rounded young man, but it's part about how he will be identified and being that kind of person myself, my whole life, I just stayed in basketball all my life, I guess.But it was great to see it and for it to be a guy from my home town, who wore my number, and scored way more points than me, it was a source of pride, when you can really get to know him, then to develop our relationship has been, it's what coaching is about to me and I know that I'll be connected with him for decades and decades to come.So when coach Pritchard asked me to come here and present him with his banner for becoming the all-time leading scorer at Belmont high, I was honored to do it myself, every guy with a banner up there playing, they're remarkable players.You belong right beside them, I'm proud of you and looking forward to your future and I care about you a lot buddy, so, come on up here, let me give you this banner.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/BelmontSchoolsNOW_JimDavis_040416-CL19.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/BelmontSchoolsNOW_JimDavis_040416-CL19.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/BelmontSchoolsNOW_JimDavis_040416-CL19.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/cctv17vt-12_17_2018_Winooski_Mayor_s_Press_Conference/12_17_2018_Winooski_Mayor_s_Press_Conference.mp3", "text": "It's - It's not as bad as we predicted - Yeah - There could have, there's much more - Now had you known this at six o'clock, then that might be.Yeah.That would be pretty bad - That was next for our meeting.I probably just - Unfortunately probably not - I'll be quick with comments and you guys have got to the written statement can go pretty quickly to your questions.Great.You guys okay, too?So good evening and good evening to the live audience via channel 17 news.My name is Seth Leonard, Mayor of Winooski.And earlier today issued an announcement that I will be resigning the post of Mayor Winooski, effective January the 28th, 2019.Serving this community in the capacity of mayor for the last four years has been the greatest privilege and honor that I've had in my life.When you come into an office like this, it, it, it's never about your vision and what you're there to accomplish.It's your job to turn back towards the community, understand what it is that they value, the things that they want to see done in their community.And it's your job to then take that and create a workable work plan, right?A vision that we can actually execute.I am extremely, extremely proud of the work we've accomplished in the last four years as a mayor.And two years before that as city counselor, when I came to the office, I talked a lot about the idea that Whinooski really needed a plan, a solid path to move forward and to our future.And some of the key elements around that have been about investment infrastructure, making sure we're taking really good care of the thing where we're most visibly responsible for steering, which is this the taxpayer's resources, right?Those tax dollars and investing them in a way that people believed in and investing them in a way that they saw a vision coming into fruition into reality.And I'm really proud of where we stand here today.And we've got a couple big projects, right?Outlaid are right here for folks that I think are wonderful demonstrations of how we've tried to take that vision and turn it into action.That's what the last especially year been about is.We've spent a lot of time developing a master plan.We spent a lot of time talking about whether our community needs or wants a pool.We've spent a lot of time talking about where we want our critical investments to be in, go and what our community's going to look like into the future.And we believe this year, we're putting forward a budget.That's going to be very representative of that vision.And I'm proud for this to be my last action.And the last thing that I look forward to running through is in terms of a community conversation.So this year's budget is going to have a couple of components that I think you're really gonna you.You've probably followed for quite some time, starting with Myers Memorial pool, right?The pools been non-operational for about three years now.And in the course of that time, it's become apparent that it's a really important community asset.Not just from an activity standpoint, but from a community building standpoint, for the ability to, for our community members to build that safe, healthy, connected community.We also moving forward with our main street reconstruction.These are parts of the budget, right?We're going to service the debt on these two big projects.This includes over over $20 million in investment to do a head-to-toe redo of main street, all new infrastructure, new street scape to again, provide another opportunity for us to have a vibrant gateway into our city.Via main street and an area that fulfills that vision, that people of Whinooski have said over and over again, we want to be this walkable, vibrant destination community.And we're really proud of this project and the impact we know it's going to have in the city's future.In addition to that, we're, we'll be rolling out details very soon in regards to a new parking structure in the downtown.And this is our opportunity to shore up the vibrancy down there, right?We've done a lot to create a business community, and district in that area that I think we can all be really proud of Whinooski.We, you know, we went under with this, the state's largest redevelopment project in its history, right?And the reconstruction of our downtown.And now we're trying to be stewards to get that to the final destination of sustainability, and we're well on our way.And the addition of this parking garage and we believe is going to be a wonderful asset for that future.Additionally, it's going to come at no cost to the taxpayers from a tax standpoint, right?We're going to cash flow the revenues from the garage towards the debt of it.So there'll be a net neutral impact to the taxpayers.They won't see a hike in their taxes as a result of that garage being constructed.Additionally, another big focus in an area that we've tried to work very hard on is coming up with a capital improvement plan that not doesn't focus just on gateway districts, but also in our neighborhoods.And this year we'll be putting forward a, a proposal to also bond for the reconstruction of Hickock street, which is a residential neighborhood.A lot of folks know in the, in the heart of one of our most densely populated residential areas.So with that, we again will be cashflow out of the capital budget.So it comes at no impact to the taxpayers from a net new tech standpoint.So we're looking with the main street project with the with the, we're also gonna be proposing to taxpayers and voters that they allow us to do a 1% sales tax on rooms, meals, alcohol in general sales.We believe that's an opportunity for us to share the expense of the main street reconstruction project in specifically with the businesses and also with the folks who come into our community and spend dollars every day.So it's a very typical tax in our area, right?We're surrounded Burlington South, Burlington culture, Essex, South Burlington, other communities in our area also have this tax.And we think it's time for Whinooski to look at the same to reinvest that in infrastructure.So, you know, again, this has never been about me and this work's never been about me.It's been about this community, and I have a deep love and passion for our community.It's our job as a government, not to create the community that we want to see, it's our job to create what is essentially a canvas for the community to be able to pay it on.And I am so immensely proud of the work we've done to do that.And there's no better sense.And stepping away from a position like this than to have extreme confidence in the leadership that you're leaving behind.And I can't say enough about the people, the humans that work here in the city hall and execute that vision every day, because, but for them, none of that work gets done.And I specifically want to call out our city manager, Jesse Baker, who in just two short years has done a tremendous job of leading our staff, bringing a lot of these projects that were long in the thought process to fruition.And we're on the precipice now.We've gotten to the point where we took the community's feedback and vision, we've designed these projects, we've put the finances together and we're offering for our budget to execute that vision, that future.And I hope in some way that that maybe makes the job for the next person that steps into this role as Mayor of Winooski, a little easier, they've got some big things that they'll be already working through.So there won't be a lot of pressure to come up with a lot of big ideas right off the bat.And I just want to acknowledge that we have a very deep, and talented bench in our city in terms of engaged, intelligent people who have leadership qualities.And I know we're going to have some wonderful people step up, maybe end up with multiple people step up.So I'm leaving at an exciting time and we are at an extremely exciting place as a community.We don't look like any other community in Vermont.We are the most diverse most densely-populated while the rest of Vermont is getting older, we're getting younger, and we have the most diverse demographics in the state.And it's beautiful.It creates an unbelievable fabric, community fabric here that's unlike anywhere else.And I'm so, so proud to have had the opportunity to, for the last six years to serve the people Whinooski at an elected capacity.And I can't be more grateful to all of our residents because they make all this happen.They've given us this opportunity to lead, and I hope that they feel like we've, we've done well with that vision and moved the community forward and the way the most represents what they want to see and a place that they enjoy living, and are proud of.Cause I sure am.And so with that, I'll take any questions you guys may have.I forgot to turn on my microphone.I couldn't do that again because yeah.Just curiosity, it says that you took a, the job of the community, director of community development - Mm hmm - And were counseling finance, USCA, what what exact average, I'm assuming just recently you had to grapple with this decision.Yeah.So I accepted the position last weekend, the charter and the transition items we needed to work through too took us a little time.We wanted to ensure that we could clearly explain to a counselor, should they choose to run for office or for others.What progression did it happen from a process standpoint?So that's why we've delayed it by a few days to try to make sure that we had answers to all those questions we knew it would come up.And that's a full time position, obviously?I'm sorry the?That's a full time?Yes, yeah.So I'm currently the housing program director at USCA rural development.So yeah, the mayor stipend in Whinooski is about for $1,400 a year.So. - How do you feel your time as Whinooski mayor will stay with you in your career moving forward?Hmm.That's a great question.Well, I am a practitioner in my professional career and a lot of cases I look I'm looking from the lens as a funder.That's looking at how to help a community be successful.It's very beneficial to see that work from the community's eyes and standpoint in Winooski.We have to engage in a lot of partners to make all this happen, right?There's no project that we do by ourselves.We're very reliant on other funding, streams and sources, state, federal, local, regional partnerships to make that work.So certainly, you know, that's something that I hope I've brought to this seat from a professional capacity standpoint and, you know, some knowledge base for the city to its benefit.And then from my own, it's been a tremendous experience to see that work through those eye, that lens, you know, a great example right now is we're working through affordable housing, right?We have a housing commission and we're looking at potential updates to zoning that could, that we think are going to better reflect the mix of housing we want to see in the community.And that's something I do quite frankly, in my professional life too.So it's, it's, it's hard for those not to intersect that times, which is frankly, part of the reason why it makes sense right now to, to step down just from a professional standpoint, not being able to do both.Yeah.That, that leads to my question, because you were saying that you're very proud of what you have accomplished in this time.You feel that there are a lot of things.Coming up you feel like this is a good transitional period for you.Do you wish it could have kind of been better?Yeah.Months or things like that?So there's no perfect time.Right?I actually think it's a fantastic time, because what my role in job coming in to me was to listen to the community, to try to craft a vision that included deliverables, right?Projects, things that helped achieve that vision and a result in the community that people wanted to see.We've done that work, right?The taxpayers still have to vote, right?They have to vote yes.On these items, if they want us to actually execute them.So if they agree that this is the correct division, that this is the right vision, and these are the right steps towards it in the proposed total 6% increase is something that everybody can get behind.Then that closes, that closes the chapter on these conversations, the projects, then go forward and look in a policy seat.The city doesn't need me to oversee these projects, right?That's that's the city manager and the administration's job.They'll make sure that they get executed.It's our job to come up with what we think is a sustainable policy path and finance package.That's reasonable to the taxpayers.Honestly for me, do you think that professionally, basically this movements, you know, where are you, I guess, in this stage, in your career and your life where you want to be, because this was, this was your fourth year, right?Mm hmm So that's kind of, my question is to really the root reason of why you're here.Yeah, sure.So I have a very honest question I ask myself anytime there was an opportunity from either a civic or professional direction and it's, how can I, how can I use my talents, my abilities to make as much of a difference in as many lives as possible and impact my community in the best way possible.And to me right now, this has been a fantastic opportunity.I'm really proud of the work that we've done for me right now.This is an opportunity to work with resources that impact the entire state of Vermont in a way that is dramatic.And it's, to me, affordable housing is the foundation of a healthy community, right?So I, I believe very strongly in that work.It's been my life's passion, something I've done for a decade.And in the course of getting this opportunity, I can't imagine a better chance that could be available to me right now to make that difference.So I measure it and the difference that I can make, and it's not to downplay the role here and what we've been able to achieve, but that's the decision I arrived at.Thank you.Yeah.Thank you guys.Hey, in seriousness too, if I really have appreciated working with all the media in Vermont, you know, you guys do a great job.Thanks for, thanks for all your work.Keep people informed and engaged anything from you, sir.Not allowed to.Yeah.Well, thanks again to everybody at channel 17 too, you guys go above and beyond to ensure we have public access to all these meetings and you've been a tremendous partner.And the great part right.Is for the next month and a half, I'm going to be talking about this budget.So I'm not gone yet.So you'll hear lots more from me there and especially thank you guys.Appreciate it.Thank you.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/12_17_2018_Winooski_Mayor_s_Press_Conference.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/12_17_2018_Winooski_Mayor_s_Press_Conference.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/12_17_2018_Winooski_Mayor_s_Press_Conference.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/cctv17vt-7_26_2018_Forum_-_Democratic_Primary_for_US_Senator/7_26_2018_Forum_-_Democratic_Primary_for_US_Senator.mp3", "text": "Okay, looked down at me as if I am nobody.However, this is a great opportunity for me to talk directly to Vermont voters, some of them that I met and some of them who has voted for me in absentee, without even meeting me.Thank you all so very much.From my heart, I am truly blessed and I am very grateful.And I am a Democrat, who is also an immigrant American.I was born in Nigeria and I got the amnesty from the Congressional Democrats, the Immigration Act of 1986.I came to the United States right after high school.I came here legally, but I overstayed.So when the Congressional Democrats signed the act of 1986, the Immigration Act, I am the dreamer who today is a beneficiary and I really would like the same opportunity to be extended, to the Obama Dreamer.And, President Reagan actually signed the Immigration Law of 1986.So I'm indeed very grateful and from talking to some of the Vermonters, they really do like me and I hope they'll vote for me, which is why I'm getting this opportunity to talk to you.Thank you.And I hope you vote for me on August 14th in the Democratic primary.Senator Sanders, who doesn't show up for the meeting, just snubs me and as a matter of fact; he is not the Democrat and I don't know why he's not here to defend his seat.I was ready to give him a debate of a lifetime.However, since he did not show up.I'm very still thankful again.And I believe in social security, I believe because I am also an accountant who is able to calculate social security ..how much people will get paid when they retire.I know I look young, but I'm also a senior citizen.I am 55 years old and I would be turning 56.Also when I mention social security, I also, I also want to let the Vermonters know that you can take every word that I say I will not promise what I am unable to deliver.I will do what I promise.I will not tell the college student they will get free education because I also went to college and I am an accountant.I am a licensed insurance agent who also has a young daughter who is 21 years old with a serious heart problem.That brings me to the support of Obamacare.Why I work tirelessly for President Barack Obama from whom I didn't get paid, but I actually enjoyed servicing President Obama as an activist, because I really do understand as an insurance agent, when I'm out in the Atlanta area as an agent, I wouldn't try to force insurance on anyone so that I can make commission.And I really, really do care about people and also because I have a daughter that has Down Syndrome and actually has an artificial valve.I really do care about people.And I would like to help using my experience as an accountant and also as an insurance agent to legislate for you.I am also a law abiding citizen.I have been in this country for as long as Senator Sanders has been a politician.And he's not here to debate me.I don't...I was in fact talking to an elderly individual yesterday and is Bernie's friend.He loves Bernie.And I say, oh I love him too.But I do disagree with his politics.I said, what has Bernie done for you?What do I need to do to make you change your mind?And the first thing out of his mind, is that..well Bernie is helping me to get my social security.I'm like no sir.Bernie is not helping you to get your social security.You are paid.And this gentleman, that I was talking to, is actually a retired attorney.Then I asked him, Sir, you practice law.You are an attorney.He has also run for political office.He told me he ran twice.Then I say, Senator Sanders is not giving you anything that I couldn't do for you.Well Folasade, as we move along here, we have a number of questions.So we kind of want to get your opinion and your position on a number of these important topics.So if we can move right along here, I do want to ask if you are elected, what is your first legislative priority that you would bring to the, to the floor of the U.S. Congress?Well sir.As I was talking to the elderly that I was talking to yesterday?Social security, I wouldn't say is probably number two, but I did not finish the conversation with the man.And I would like to wrap it up in a minute.So then I asked him, I told him that you paid into your social security, Sir.I am an accountant.Bernie is not helping you to do anything.The only thing is if I am your Senator, I will make sure that the government or the system does not privatize your social security so that you don't ended up losing your money in the stock market.Like, you know, I am also an accountant.Then I said.Then he also said that Bernie takes brings ambassadors here from Sweden.I'm like, what does that got to do with you?Then he said...I'm like..the ambassadors that Bernie is bringing.Then anyway I asked him How much have you donated to Bernie?So he talks about, oh, he was the one who mentioned that Bernie buys him Christmas dinner at the Hilton.So I'm like, how much are you paying?Don't you think you are the one who is exactly paying for your own dinner.I think he mentioned like he gives Bernie a hundred.Then I'm like, so at twenty-five dollars a plate to $30 a plate you are actually paying for your own dinner.Then he said, well, so if you give Bernie one hundred you can buy for dinner, Christmas dinner.He said, he gives more than that, that it's actually...the money that he gives Bernie every year, he can actually buy, he can buy ten dinners.I'm like, so you see.And I can honestly look at Vermonters' faces, no one from Vermont, from this state, has donated a dime into my campaign.And I am Sade Adeluola.I will tirelessly work for you if I should become your U.S. Senator.And I hope you just give me a chance in the primary so that I can have a chance too in the general election, to win the general election.Also, I would like to say my number one thing is immigration reform.Towards the end I wasn't happy with the Democrats and I wasn't happy with President Obama as swell.My number one thing, while I have supported President Obama since 2008, was the immigration reform and we didn't get that.And we didn't get that.So I was angry when the Dreamers were let down.So my one thing would be immigration.Hmm mmm - because also I do not like the fact that children, infants, was separated from their mothers, family, people.That is really, really very sad.You, in fact, I mean have benefited from the U.S. immigration policy.Yes sir.Can you speak then a little bit more about how you feel that benefit that you've received should be open to, to more people in the world.See?Unlike Senator Bernie Sanders, who is not here to debate me, I heard him saying all close the ICE. Or what was the exact term?close out the ICE. I would never say that because, ICE, unless you really go through our system and the immigration system, for a path to citizenship, you will never understand the system.It's easier for people to just judge and say get them out.They don't belong here.They are this.They are this.They are that.What I really would like to do is I would like to, I would never say close out the ICE, eradicate ICE. I would never say that because I know ICE is part of the system for so many years and the situation now, because Congress hasn't done anything, they refuse to do their jobs.Hmm mmm - I was one of the activists who would yell at Congresspeople and say, do your jobs.Do your job.And I also send out the email.They didn't do anything.So the already bad situation has been worsened as of today.So eradicating ICE is not the solution.So I totally disagree with Senator Bernie Sanders and some other Democrats who are saying close out the ICE. That is not the solution because ICE does so many other things other than..They are the judicial system, the immigration system, the legal system.So there are so many parts.within the ICE. If somebody wants to become U.S. citizen, they have to go to immigration and customs enforcement.As you are looking at me, I was also an importer, Italian.I was importing goods from Italy, Austria, Switzerland and Paris.So I go through the immigration system - Mmm - and I truly, and also through, I go through the customs, the U.S. customs.So I really do understand how our system..the same way.I am also a tax preparer.So I will never tell you closed out the IRS. - Okay.I would never say that.You had mentioned earlier in your opening comments, Folasade, your concerns about health care.You have a daughter who is using the health care system seriously, let's say.Do you think healthcare is a right of every U.S. citizen?Yes, sir.I believe health care, it's not just a right.It has to do with kindness and humanity, which is the way that my mother died in Nigeria.Hmm - Oh, she died because she didn't have anyone to sign for her to have a C-section during a pre-set induction, a labor induction.So healthcare is not just a right, It has to do with humanity.I know if you are a doctor, and you see my daughter having a heart attack you will stop and help her.You will not.even care whether she has insurance.You will not care whether she's a Republican or Democrat.You will not care whether she is Black or White.You would care less whether she even has a supporting family like me.You will do the right thing.It is the right thing to do.And we must help people in need.Healthcare is the most.I really do support Medicaid for the poor and Medicare for the elders.I do not believe we need to cut taxes for the upper 1% so that they would not pay their fair share.I disagree with a lot of things that is going on.And as an accountant and a licensed insurance agent and a mother to a very, very fortunate angel who is lucky to be alive.I am truly very thankful from my heart.Folasade, we have come to almost the end of our show.It goes so fast, unfortunately, so many areas that we have yet to cover.So give us your closing statement here about your candidacy.If there's any area of concern that we have yet to care..to cover now would be the opportunity to uh..to voice your..Well like I said, I am truly so very, very thankful for the wonderful opportunity that I have as an American.I am very, truly blessed.I am your dreamer.I am that child who was so pleased.I am the person who is here deliberately to help the Vermonters.I've never been a politician.I've never worked for the government.I am a genuine democratic activist, and I will want to ask every Vermonter to give me a chance.I promise never to serve more than two terms.Like I said, if I am your U.S. Senator, I will work for you tirelessly.I will fight for you endlessly and I hope you vote for me on August the 14th.Thank you so very much.And thanks to CCTV for this great opportunity to be heard.Thank you very much.I wish I can talk on.- Thanks.Folasade Adeluola, a pleasure having you on the show this evening.Thank you for your candidacy.Thank you.It takes great courage to put your name on a ballot.Thank you.I'm Matt Kelly, a reminder that here in the state of Vermont, we do have early voting.You can go and cast your vote today, if you'd like at your local town office and in the state of Vermont, if you aren't registered, you can register up to and including election day.For a complete list of upcoming candidate forums.Visit our website CHseventeen.tv.And for all of us here at town meeting television, I'm Matt Kelly.Thank you for watching.Good night.Thank you so much, Mr. Kelly.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/7_26_2018_Forum_-_Democratic_Primary_for_US_Senator.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/7_26_2018_Forum_-_Democratic_Primary_for_US_Senator.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/7_26_2018_Forum_-_Democratic_Primary_for_US_Senator.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/gov.house.hbs.hrs03TRN2167_071017b.2/hrs03TRN2167_071017b.2.mp3", "text": "The subcommittee will come to order.It looks like we have a few members that are coming back.I have we'll start on a second round of questions.Let me ask you why the rulemaking, is it 2020 as opposed to 2019, 2021?How did you arrive at the year 2020.Essentially we took a look at the amount of aircraft that would have to be retrofitted, and if you look at the GA community with 200,000 aircraft, even with 10 years, that's 20,000 aircraft a year that have to be retrofitted.So that's a fairly aggressive schedule actually.So that was pretty much one of the drivers.The other component was we wanted to work with industry and demonstrate that we were going to make this investment and not pull away.This is, you know, been brought to our attention as something that they were concerned with.So we did the best we could to lay out an aggressive schedule that put that ground infrastructure in place and the best we came up with was 2013.So technically you would equip, you'd want to see that ground infrastructure in place as well.So the capabilities are there starting in 2010, you know, we'll be putting in the ground infrastructure that this is the uplink capability, but by 2013 will be completed.So really it's, you're looking at seven years of using the service nationwide.I'm going to ask you a couple of questions about the Mr. Scovel talked about complemented the FAA for the contract and said, it's a robust contract.And I want to talk a little bit about that in a second, but so the, just for the record, and so the subcommittee members know in putting the contract together, as far as the ITT's responsibilities and, and what needs to be accomplished and in timelines and targets, who else was consulted in the process pass is represented here, Mr. Brantley at the table, he has 11,000 members that he represents, the air traffic controllers are an integral part of operating the system.Once it's up and running, and wonder if you would tell us how much input the agencies and stakeholders here were involved.Sure, as I mentioned earlier, when we set up the program office for implementation, which was approximately January 2006, one of the first things we did was develop a governance structure, in that governance structure we have stakeholders which essentially are internal to the FAA, both in the regulatory side and the air traffic organization.So you have people from airports involved.I have our safety oversight organization, our, the people that put together the economic analysis, our policy, people for the NPRM on the ATO side, essentially all the vice presidents for the air traffic organization.Once a month, we meet, we essentially bring the program issues to the table and we discuss things and, and consolidate on an answer.The other piece of that, that governance structure is also the, at Mac, which started in February, 2006.So the air traffic management advisory council, essentially the steering meet and steering group established us as a work group and then that's where we meet once a month over at RTCA, and typically what we're doing is we develop the strategy.So those strategies are basically the interdependencies of the program and the things that were in the contract basically are appealed out from that.Additionally, what we did was as by June, 2006 we had gone through our first investment analysis, which really was a strong signal that we were funded to move forward with ADSB starting at that point, we, in June, 2006, we had our first industry day and we had three of those industry days where we worked with the manufacturers, the people that came to the industry days and solicited information we presented, and we had dialogue and all this kind of merged together to create the product as you see in the contract.Mr. Brantley, we'd like to hear from you as well, where either you personally, or your organization or your members consultant.No, Mr. Chairman, we weren't, you know, with respect to modernization efforts, we'd very much like to be involved.I think our members have a lot to offer the agency, but beginning about four years ago, the agency informed us that our participation was no longer welcome or needed and we have not been involved since.and prior to that, we were involved in, in the ADSB program.But somewhere around three or four years ago, you were told that you were no longer welcome - Yes Sir.Why don't you respond to them.Sure, I would like to actually, prior to the implementation phase moving forward.So September, 2005 was a key decision point for the FAA to select ADSB technology to move forward.Prior to that was the testing demonstration work that occurred up in Alaska.In fact, what we developed there is certified bypass.So we have our employees were involved with the development of the certification process and procedures for those particular elements, which validated the requirements.That's what basically gave the confidence in moving forward in selecting ADSB over radar and over multilateral ration.At that point in time that was, those were the three alternatives at the conclusion of that investment decision we move forward and, you know, basically they moved into implementation and set up a program office and so we've been in a, I would say a planning state since January, 2006, up until this point, we've gone through three additional joint resource councils, which is a vest investment decisions that acquire the funding for the full program to award the contract.So all the requirements that we're talking about were validated in the test and demonstration phase with the use of the employees of the effect.It's troubling to me personally.And I think to other members of this committee, we've held hearings on the flight service station contract with Lockheed Martin.We have held hearings on the issue of safety in the workplace, in air traffic control towers and other FAA facilities, and it has been apparent in the past that when the administration is making decisions that they're not consulting with all of the stakeholders and I think that was noted by both the GAO. And I think maybe even Mr. Scovel's predecessor, and maybe even Mr. Scovel, I don't want to speak for you, but there is a disconnect, and I just had that discussion with a few members of the subcommittee earlier today, and you're not the person that can correct that problem, but certainly we need to take that up with the acting administrator it's troubling in, It is not in the best interest of what we want is the final product and improving the, in this case, the air traffic control system.Let me ask Mr. Scovel a final question in your testimony, you indicate that ITT will have a monopoly over providing ADSB services for the next 18 years, Wonder if you might talk a little bit about your concerns regarding competition and consumer issues as a result of one contractor that will be in charge and have, I think in your words, a monopoly over the ADSB services for the next 18 years.Yes.Mr. Chairman.ITT will have virtually a monopoly over the service the information that's generated through the ADSB system, FAA owns the data, but through the contract, FAA has consented to ITT being able to market, to package, to sell that data to users who might be interested, they might include air carriers.Our information is that UPS has indicated they would certainly be interested airports as well.Then they would find a multitude of uses.And we know that ITT is certainly looking on that prospect favorably.As a policy decision FAA and the administration are certainly free to enter into a contract with these terms.We do have concerns about the nature of the data that's being transmitted, that's being permitted to be used in this fashion, perhaps marketing concerns as well with competition factors.We would urge FAA to regulate, to examine and carefully regulate if appropriate, this use of data generated by the contract as it goes forward.I thank you, and the chair now recognizes the ranking member, Mr. Petra.Okay.Thank you very much.I'm not sure if more than one member of the panel may want to address this subject, but we're all pretty familiar with the radar based system and all the NORAD and all the different things that we have in place to try to provide security in our airspace.So on how will this new system workers are separate systems or how have you, is this being, is there a, has this been scrutinized?Are there ways this will enhance our security or help us to deal with the unauthorized entrance into our airspace of more effectively and this kind of thing?As part of the governance structure, I mentioned earlier, DOD participates at that stakeholders meeting that we discussed and our involvement with them is looking at ways that we can exploit the technology, specific applications that have been coming up are right here in the ADA. So the air defense identification zone, where if you are ADSB equipped, it's obvious who you are, you have your identification, And therefore you can exploit that as knowing there were friendly, as opposed to worrying if they're foe same things in their special use airspace or the military operations area.So there, there are ways of exploiting the capability of the identification of coming off the aircraft now and being able to take advantage of it so.But now, their staff tells me they're worried about people pretending to be someone else or using what spoofing, I guess, could you, I don't guess we don't want to go into what you do, but you have ways of dealing with spoofers or?Correct in the specification, it's called out that you have to have a means for independent validation of the actual aircraft that were surveilling.So that means that they have another, they have to have another method that's independent of using ADSB. The concern with spoofing deals with the power level of the signal that comes down from the satellites very low, and you can perturb it and you could make it to look like something else.And so it's vulnerable from that degree.So what we're, what we've requested in the specification is that we have independent validation of those targets.And to point out that they can do that with their own means the contractor can, but we also have our radars in place.And so when you combine all that information, you're able to validate that that target truly is who they are.Chair recognizes gentlemen from North Carolina Mr. Hayes, the gentlemen from Michigan is recognized, and we'll just give him his time and not yours Mr. Hayes how's that Mr. Alias.Thank you, Mr. Costello.I apologize for the late arrival, but I was at another committee meeting where I'm the ranking member and I had to be there.Fortunately, they gave up when votes came.So I dashed over here, Mr. Hayes, I understand has already played his user role as a staunch defender of general, general aviation.But there's one specific question I wanted to ask.If you can have any guidance on, there are a great many older general aviation planes around assessments, 152, 172, 182, some older, and some are recent.I think ADSB is a great thing.And as a student pilot, I would love to have it because it's very hard today to operate the aircraft and be aware of all the airplanes around you.But I'm concerned about the cost.If you have an airplane that's worth only $20 to $40,000, you think twice about adding too much to it.Plus many of these planes are owned by individuals who don't have high incomes.If they have higher incomes, they'd buy better airplanes.Can you give me a ballpark figure of what the cost is going to be for someone trying to put an ADSB unit in an older airplane like that.And I know that it'll be easy to make the transition, but I still worry about the costs.Can you give me any figures on that?Sure.I understand your concerns on that.In fact, the Alaska probably provides us with the best image of what that was because there were over 400 aircraft that got retrofitted and some of these were of the type that it wasn't just about putting in a new piece of equipment.You had to make major modifications to the, to the panel, wiring antennas.So all that provided us with enough rich information to get a good feel for it.You hear us using numbers that are like 10K to 18K. And when we say the 18K you're really pushing that on.That's the ones that were more in, you know, in invasive to the actual aircraft.Also, I would suggest that, you know, as we start this off, there's the early adopters that are gonna end up probably paying a little bit more, but over time, I think the market forces will lower those prices and we speculating somewhere on the order of 30% reduction.Sorry, are you saying that about 10K would put the basic unit in the average plan?If there's not - For those - Pardon?Excuse me, for the general aviation type aircraft.Yes, right.Okay, so the 30% off that would get it down to roughly 7,000.Okay, thank you very much that's helpful.I'll be happy to yield the remainder of my time to Mr. Hayes.Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Taylor, Benny, he worked for the government and we don't want any more $600 hammers now.$6,000, you can get the box six months ago.It's gone down since then I don't want to mislead people.If anyone of them wants you to talk about; is the levels of equipage.You can equip so that you can transmit.You don't have to have an expensive multifunction display to receive lots of angst amongst the aviation community because of what the FAA has done to them in the past.We've got, we've got proof we're not doing it to them again here.So talk about the levels of equipment.If you're going to be a transmit and ADSB guy transmit and receive.And on up, if you talk about that a little bit.So you've heard the terms earlier called ADSB out and ADBS in, So ADSB out is; you can just have the pure function of transmitting your information.The new services that could be provided is basically expanding our service volume.So today radars have floors and they don't see below the floors in places like Alaska.We learned that we can't see below the radar.You can basically do them procedural separation with ADSB and the way we deploy the infrastructure.ADSB out can now feed the air traffic controllers, where they could provide air traffic control separation services.So that's an example of just utilizing ADSB out.Other examples of, of applications for ADSB out would be search and rescue.So there's definitely an improvement in that, in that case, in the case of Emery Riddle, they could use it to strictly for collecting the data on the ground and then replaying it for looking at how their student pilots are doing and, and use it for training purposes.Now you bring it to the next level.ADSB in is if I'm transmitting out information, that's an enabler for other aircraft to receive it and display it.And that's where you get that increased situational awareness that we were just talking about.So not only can you see traffic, but now we have the opportunity to uplink weather to the cockpit.And so you're talking about the ADSB in components and it's essentially providing more information into the cockpit to increase the situational awareness, which translates into safety.Thank you, Mr. Chairman, can I carry on?Benny you talking over our head again, but What I'm looking for is a handheld unit, 1295 out in the end.It's certainly possible.This is the Blackberry sitting out there on the ground national airport, looking at the weather over Montebello, knowing exactly what's going on in spite of what the guy in the front is telling us.And this kind of technology given competition is absolutely in my opinion, if handled properly again, because people want it because Mr. Kaffle Odyssey and other manufacturers have a 220,000 customer base that they want to sell to.That's what I am anticipating that we want to do, but again, the various ways that we can incentivize folks to equip in AOPA was talking during the break period about ways that we can use the system more effectively.And my question for you and Mr. Kaffle Odyssey is under the contract, there's, it doesn't speak directly to the fact, if you want another unit in grand rapids, a ground station, and they don't have one, what would be the process, And does the contract allow for that increased coverage using the same alias and all that routine, and we need it FAA, can you help us?How would you deal with that under the contract?So the contract was set up in a very flexible manner.Two things that that occurred this year was in some of the reauthorization language.There was discussion about using airport improvement funds for airports to acquire the ground infrastructure.What that does is provide the, the expansion of our ground infrastructure beyond our baseline.It also would accommodate possibilities of acquiring the radios that you would use on vehicles, such as your fire trucks and safety vehicles.And then the contract has in it, what we call generic service volumes.And so we'd be able to use funds from other sources to essentially purchase this capability.And then we can, we have multiple ways of taking the airport improvement funds and funneling it through this contract vehicle so that you can open up new service volumes.So 220,000 customers just went almost into the infinity.I mean, basically in terms of users and of course for a ground vehicle, you wouldn't have the same requirements in multi-function display.I was giving Mr. Petra a hard time about high definition TV. I don't have one of those, I don't know how to work it, but somebody, you know, you don't need a multifunction display in your pickup truck.It's on the airport, but if you want it, you can put it there.So folks that are a sport pilots and things like that, they should be able to transmit for a very inexpensive figure.Everybody agree with that, and again, Mr. Bradley, we have not forgotten that we, the chairman was absolutely correct.We gotta have everybody on board if the general public and that Susan involved here is going to benefit to the maximum amount.I don't know where the clock is going up or down.I yield back Mr. Chairman.I thank the gentleman, just a final question for Mr. Scovel, and I guess to maybe Mr. Campus Hutto, maybe you can comment as well.Mr. Scovel, in your written testimony, you have a chart in here table one, ADSB key milestones.and of course you have project completion date, October, 2007 for the NPRM issued, and second is February of 2008 critical design review for the ground system and then August of 08 the key side, initial operating capacity of broadcast at Fort Myers.From your standpoint, when should the FAA, when is the next major project or the next major step in the completion of ADSB that the FAA needs to be watching carefully, and this subcommittee needs to be watching carefully to see if in fact, the contract a contractor is performing as the contract calls for.Mr. Chairman, I'd pick the very first item that you mentioned off the list that appears in the chart in our written testimony, the notice of proposed rule making was issued a short while ago.The comments to that rule are due from industry in early January.Those comments are, should give us a pretty good indication of how industry views the long-term prospects for this program.We know, and FAA itself has identified for us as it in its view, its primary risk being user acceptance and aircraft equipage.If those comments in response to the notice of proposed rulemaking, come back and really hit that point hard and pounded home.Then we will know that ADSB has a, an uphill that FAA has an uphill job in properly executing the contract.We were confident that industry recognizes the potential, but it's rather the timetable, the mandate and the articulation of the user benefits long-term, which really will result from ADSB in, We should see some of those indications in their comments to the proposed rule.We in the legislation that we passed out of the house, HR 2881, in that legislation, we asked the IGS office to submit an annual report to the Congress concerning ADSB in, and I'm wondering when is the next scheduled report that you are to submit to the Congress on ADSB?Well, I'll need to check with my staff, sir, and get back to you on that.I don't have it readily available.We are certainly prepared and look forward to meeting the committee's requests.I thank you, Mr. Hayes, if you have further questions, I'd be happy to allow you more time.Thanks Mr. Chairman.I think it would be very instructive for those of us who remain for this video to be shown it graphically demonstrates the space and the time savings involved in ADSB So if you wouldn't mind.and the other thing is when I was in Alaska the last time, and is it Dan hill in Alaska, Vinny that's supervisor that Anchorage or Jim hill, Jim hill, he took me through and met with the controllers and the supervisors and the FAA. It was fascinating because the test area initially is in Bethel Alaska.If you will put a map of Alaska up and your mind is a huge area in the Yukon and Kuskokwim Delta area, tremendous amount of fishing, a lot of airplanes, fish bonding.One of the controllers brother works there in an airplane.So the combination of the controller, seeing it from the inside and the brother with the airplane and the difference in time with the airplane it's equipped and being able to land on a low visibility conditions was dramatic.So these are real world examples.And again, where we're an uncontrolled airspace like Mr. Salazar was talking about in Colorado.I mean, it gives you a shot in the arm, not a nice scar shot, just a shot in the arm.And I think this would be very helpful with, could you run that for as many and tell us what you're showing us.Okay, where you're looking at is basically the, the airspace that's considered oceanic.As you look at that, that light shaded blue area, that's about a hundreds, a thousand square miles of what we call oceanic airspace.And so as you see aircraft leaving, either out of Mexico, what you're seeing is that's radar coverage up to the light blue area.Once they go into that light blue area, what we do is we sanitize the airspace around the aircraft because we really don't have any surveillance capability.So that, that is about 120 miles behind an aircraft and in 50 miles on either side of it.So that's a fairly large volume of airspace.That's considered sanitized from a safety perspective.That's, that's great, but you know, we could make better use of that airspace.So as, as they approach on the United States coast, you'll also notice that we pick them up and radar coverage.So this gives you an example of, you know, the capacity constrained by our separation standards as a function of, you know, keeping safe separation between the aircraft.And then the point out, there's also a whole lot of low altitude activity going on, and it, you know, it goes pretty far out as well, cause they're doing deep oil exploration.So there's a lot of platforms on the base underneath this, and we'd like to exploit those platforms that deploy our ADSB infrastructure, and again that's something we could not accomplish by with radars.So we have these nice tight, you know, small units that can be deployed on the, on the oil platforms, providing services.Now that you can see that we can clearly put five miles separation.So you've increased capacity, you reduce ground delays, you provide surveillance not only for the high altitude, but you also providing it for the low altitude.So now we can provide or extend our surveillance capabilities off shore 200 miles out and provide the helicopter operators with surveillance.So, as I mentioned, this was kind of a win-win situation.We work closely with the helicopter associations in national to get access to those platforms in kind contributions from them are providing the transportation, the electricity, the telecommunications, and the space.and that's probably one of the most highly priced real estate in the world; is getting access on those platforms.So worked out to be a pretty good deal where they gave us access.We were able to deploy our infrastructure or we'll be able to deploy our infrastructure.It'll give us high altitude capability and low altitude capability.And You can do that, in other places where you don't have radar as well.That's correct.Pacific, Atlantic, Colorado, Alaska.Absolutely.Very good.Mr. Ellers, any other comment or question.As soon as they get to down to 500 bucks, I'll be up first in line to buy one, But I first have to buy the airplane to.But we thank all of you for being here to testify and to answer our questions.This is an issue that we will be following very closely as I know the inspector general when the FAA will, and we of course all have the same goal in mind, and that is to get the system up and running implemented in and get the maximum use of it is early as we possibly can.The FAA, quite frankly, not only this administration, but previous administrations, they do not have the best track record in following through on contracts and monitoring them.We hope that that will not be the case with ITT and with the ADSB and it will be the responsibility of the FAA to monitor it, to make sure that ITT is performing.It will be our responsibility in this sub committee to provide aggressive oversight, to make certain that the contract is being followed and implemented as it is spelled out.and to make certain that the FAA is providing the right oversight as well.So with that again, we thank the witnesses and the subcommittee stance, adjourn.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/hrs03TRN2167_071017b.2.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/hrs03TRN2167_071017b.2.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/hrs03TRN2167_071017b.2.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/NewsMaga00_3/NewsMaga00_3.mp3", "text": "\"The news magazine of the screen\".\"Living glimpses of history in the making\".Presented as a public service by Standard Oil Company.With an uneasy truce in Korea, the Vanguard of 5,000 Indian troops arrives in Seoul.Many of them wearing colorful, native turbines on route to Munsan to take custody of prisoners of war refusing repatriation.15,000 anti-communist Chinese POWs and 8,000 North Koreans head for Munsan too.Steadfast in their refusal to return to red rule, eager in their determination to remain among free men.Meanwhile, a GI project of peace, a new school is opened in Yangzhou and are the youngsters eager to start but first, they pledge allegiance to their republic and offer thanks to American service men whose contributions built it.Construction of this church also was made possible by the generosity of GIs who see their dream come true.Faith still shines brightly in Korea.But the United Nations cannot lower her guard.Spilling out of giant transports Paratroops take part in the biggest training exercises since the armistice.American soldiers sharpen airborne striking power in Operation Back Door.Operation Homecoming in the United States reunites president and Mrs.Eisenhower with their only son John, home from a year of frontline duty in Korea, a happy moment for the Eisenhower's.Returning too is general William Dean released at Panmunjom after three years as a red POW. Tired and worn, but covered with glory an old soldier comes back.Another homecoming in England finds United Kingdom troops arriving in south Hampton.Ashore are their loved ones seeking the faces of the heroes for whom they have waited so long.The boys are back.In a twinkling the months of captivity are swept away in the breathless joy of reunion.Safe again, ready soldiers who shared with the other allies the privation, hardships, suffering and frustration of Korea.The future Chancellor Konrad Adenauer's pro-American government is at stake in the crucial west German parliamentary elections.Armed guards watch rail stations to intercept communist agents arriving from the east zone to sabotage the voting.And back they go, where they came from.Adenauer, friend of the free world casts his ballot.Meanwhile, reinforced police guards handle communist agitators who have managed to slip through.The resounding triumph for the West, Adenauer wins a smashing victory.Near the red zone border, meanwhile, tanks rumble through the village of Greenberg as American, French, and British troops join in NATO war games.It's Europe's first atomic maneuvers with both teams launching mock atomic attacks as NATO prepares against possible aggression from the East.Back in West Berlin's Olympic stadium, the city's 3000 man police force puts on a spectacular show.The whip blank precision of a man before a tremendous crowd reflects their readiness for any emergency in red and circled West Berlin.The tensions that grip Berlin are forgotten by the first group of youngsters boarding a United States Air Force plane, or a month's holiday in the Western sector.The Children's Airlift, as the project is called, whisks the first of a thousand youngsters to Frankfurt and the start of what will be for most of the travelers, their first vacation.Some will be guests of British and German families.Others stay at an American camp where there are heaping portions of food for all.And even double helpings, if there's room for it.An act of hope and a lesson in democracy for the youngsters of a beleaguered, divided Berlin.The Sultan of Morocco is marked for death as he rides to Muslim prayer services.Now the assassination attempt.The attacker knifes a guard but is clubbed to the ground in a frenzy frantic few seconds.The attempt is foiled as shown in this astonishing on the spot camera record.The agent Sultan shaken, but unhurt, continues on to offer prayers for his deliverance.The stricken Liberian freighter Greenville, lashed by 80 mile an hour winds and pounded by 50 foot high waves, groans helplessly in Mid-Atlantic, a hazardous haven for twenty-six seamen.Now a dramatic saga of brave man against the merciless sea filmed by Dr. Walter Hudson of Cincinnati, a passenger aboard the Ile De France.Rhe liners crewman man the lifeboats in a daring attempt to rescue the Greenville's crew huddled under the bridge at upper left.The sea continues it's savage beating as one by one, the men abandoned ship, dropping into the icy waters to await the arrival of lifeboats.The ship heels to the Atlantic's raft.Two of her crew parish in the wild waters, but twenty-four are snatched to safety and carried to the storm tossed Ile De France, leaving behind the Greenville doomed and empty.Tiny bits of art, postage stamps are exhibited in Milan.Italy's president is among the visitors.The artists design is scaled down photographically in making the engraving for the stamp.These were designed by the late Corrado Mezzana, a Roman painter.The careful pen work and precise detail of the stamps emphasize the artist's skill.His big drawings lose none of their meticulous craftsmanship, even when reduced many times.This stamp honors Galileo, the Italian astronomer.And this one commemorates St. Catherine.Details are preserved in the tiny engravings from which stamps are printed.Mezzana also designed stamps for Vatican City.And while he wasn't a famous artist, Mezzana work is in steady demand by every Italian who writes a letter.From art in miniature to art in majestic signs and the unending pursuit of perfection is essential, whether the work be large or small.At 84, Pietro Canonica's gifted hands still carve into marble qualities of firmness and determination.Marconi, the inventor of the wireless, was among Kings and great statesman who posed for Canonica.The delicate features of women have been captured as easily by his genius.Heroic proportions mark some of his work, as in this equestrian statue of a king.And even slaves were his subjects.This was executed in Russia and tells the story of land slaves freed by Czar Alexander III. Such work won Canonica undying fame.Almost alive, aren't they?Riding out of the past as the last Czar of Russia, Nicholas the second and his family.Nicholas asked Canonica to execute this work at his court.And baby hoods fleeting charm lives forever.Grand Coulee dam in Washington state, the world's biggest concrete structure.Behind it is stored water from the mighty Columbia River.Water to transform a million acres of wasteland into productive farms.Through these huge pipes water is lifted 280 feet from the dam's reservoir to outlets.At the head works where it pours forth at a peak rate of more than 6 billion gallons a day.More than enough water if pumped at full capacity to supply every 24 hours, half a dozen cities the size of New York.The world's largest pumps are operated at Grand Coulee Dam by electricity to lift the water used for irrigation.The dam itself supplies the electric current.In fact, the production of electricity is the other major purpose of the dam.The water taken for agricultural purposes after being lifted from the lake behind the dam, flows out of another reservoir to start a twisting journey of 60 miles or more through canals, tunnels and siphons, before it arrives on some farmers land.Into the distribution system, rushes the water from its storage reservoir and on to the 6,000 square miles lying in the big bend of the Columbia River.Bite fed irrigation ditches carry the water through most of the area by gravity.80% of the landed benefits is privately owned.Water on the land and on the land crops grow again in the Columbia Basin.The story of fire told through magic.Fire magic that's entertaining and educational too.The magician is Dr. Llewellyn Heard, who likes to play with fire.A Research chemist, he studies oil processes and products.Some of the products, this rubbery grease for instance, are most unusual.But the principle subject of his research is fire.Here a sheet of chemically treated paper begins to char when exposed to air, outlining a picture of grandfather.A chemistry lesson with an artistic flourish.And now a combustion prank to startle even Dr. Heard, this one through our own magic, camera magic.With alcohol and chromic acid no one needs a match, the combustion is spontaneous.Next sulfuric acid and sugar, a compound that grows and grows and smells just terrible.Abracadabra, alakazam, sugar burn and sulfur bubble.Presto, liquids change color before your eyes.Smoke rings, not from cigarettes or cigars, but phosphine which bubbles through the water and burns as soon as it reaches air, a ringer in Dr. Heard's bag of combustion tricks.Mix powdered wood with fire, and it's almost explosive.Again.But playing with fire can be hazardous.Dr. Heard loses more fingers that way.Oh, well four are almost as good as five.What's the basket for?Fire fun and facts through Dr. Llewellyn Heard's amazing fire magic.A mid temperature is averaging 120 degrees in the searing Mojave desert.The army puts soldiers wearing special uniforms through tests to find out how equipment and men would survive in blistering desert warfare.A pair of very durable GIs dummies, Joe and Jake, are wired for heat tests.Soldiers are wired too, to study the effects of heat on light and dark uniforms.Off on a 12-mile hike, destination, nowhere.Wires connect instruments, measuring reaction to heat and exertion.The GIs are carefully checked for ill effects.As the old army ditty goes, what do you do in the infantry?You march, you march, you march.This is Amazon Annie, the first atomic cannon undergoing tough maneuverability tests.Sharp turns aren't any problem for the huge weapon, which fires atomic or standard shells.It can travel 35 miles an hour.And despite its ponderous 85 tons, Amazon Annie rolls smoothly along, even over bridges built for less than half its weight.It's immense bulk is distributed on two transporters, so that the canon can negotiate standard bridges.The gunfire is an atomic show.A mushroom of smoke rises more than 20 miles away in the first pictures released by the defense department of America's new atomic weapon in action.Testing men and equipment, searching, probing for new ways to bolster the nation's defense as military research goes on.More than 300 natives in this primitive village in British Malaya are today taking their first big step toward civilization.They've burned the remains of their settlement after harvesting all the crops they can carry and moving their houses aboard rafts.Now they're ready to sail to a new site 25 miles away and a life they've never known before, where they'll find such things as doctors, schools for their children and skilled advice in farming.But before they can reach their new home, a dangerous journey faces the fleet of crudely built rafts.Due to a dry season, the river Labeer has been falling fast.Youths and men at that the sweeps are ready to challenge the disaster that lurks in the mud banks, rocks and rapids.Still another danger lies along shore.Communists terrorists are operating in a state of Calantan, although it's a British protectorate.The fleet is approaching the rapids.Aboard the rafts loose articles are safely stowed.Household goods made fast.Steadily move the hand powered sweeps.Steady eyes are on the river.Rapids ahead.On shore Malayan home guards constantly patrol against the communists.And finally the natives near their new home where the government of Calantan state has everything in readiness.The 19 acre site has been carved out of virgin jungle.Land for cultivation lies nearby and buildings have already been erected.British and Malayan officials inspect the village, as the natives pitch in to complete the work.Modern tools and native hands make the chores go faster.In this Northeastern Malayan state the natives are chiefly tillers of the soil and there's plenty of work ahead before a crop can be harvested.But there are also new homes, new experiences, new sights for the natives.From the states welfare workers come food and clothes to help get them started in their new community.The youngsters quickly adapt themselves to their surroundings.Household chores are well underway.Dangers of the journey almost forgotten.And the old settlement that house so many memories seems far away as the villagers begin their new life.A postage stamp commemorates Sagamore Hill, President Theodore Roosevelt's home.Sagamore hill, the rambling frame house at Oyster Bay, New York.Once the most famous home in America where national and international history was made by our 26th President, Theodore Roosevelt.He was born here in New York City in 1858.At the age of eight, he was a sickly delicate youngster.10 years later, Teddy was a student at Harvard.To build his health he became a frontiersman.And for three years, a cowboy in the Dakotas.As a Colonel in the Rough Riders, which he helped to organize during the Spanish American War, he led the charge at San Juan Hill in Cuba, smashing the spirit of the Spanish defenders.At war's end, he was elected Governor of New York.In 1901, at 43, he became America's youngest President.And later the first chief executive to fly.With a patriotic passion, he dynamically championed the American way.Now from the News Magazine library, most complete library of news films in the world, come unforgettable motion pictures of his later life.A month after leaving office, Teddy was on the high seas bound for Africa and the big game that stocks the dark continent.He spent 10 months among the natives on a dangerous jungle safari.Returning home, he found Europe drifting toward World War I. When America entered, he hurried to the White House to pledge his support to President Wilson in the critical days that lay ahead.Americans everywhere across the country, joined in exciting spontaneous tributes to the stars and stripes.The former President tirelessly calling the nation to arms toured the country.At giant Liberty loan rallies, he pleaded for every Americans support and was joined by the immortal French actress, Sarah Bernhardt, fiery and vigorous at 72.But the old soldier shown here, visiting the famous rainbow division in training, wanted to do more.He volunteered to raise a division of his own and serve as its Commander in Europe.The offer, however could not be accepted.He received his setback graciously, continuing to tour American camps, stirring the troops that turned out by the hundreds of thousands to hear his voice.With the armistice, he returned to Sagamore Hill and the neighbors who dropped by often to chat.Teddy was never too busy to talk with them.From one of those talks, now being rerecorded from an old phonograph cylinder, you will hear the only record of Theodore Roosevelt's voice believed in existence.The soundtrack is at left an actual photograph of his voice.Listen.\"I wish to see you boys - ...in the same way I'd expect any one of you to act in a football game.In other words, don't flinch, don't foul and hit the line hard\".For a quarter of a century Teddy Roosevelt and Sagamore Hill symbolized a vigorous bustling nation.Today the house and the empty porch with their many memories are a national shrine, a place of pilgrimage for Americans who cherish the concepts of truth, justice and courage to which Theodore Roosevelt offered a lifetime of devotion.In the sitting room, it seems only yesterday that tea was being served by the gracious Edith Kermit Roosevelt.The nursery, like all nurseries, remains cluttered with the toys of the late president's four sons and two daughters.There are Teddy bears, of course, for the toy was named after the popular Teddy with his official blessings.To the dining room downstairs came leaders upstate during the seven years that Sagamore Hill served as America's summer White House.The silk bedspread was a gift from the Empress of China.And here is Teddy's shaving stand with brush and mug.The trophy room, his favorite room, the mounting board for the trophies of hunting expeditions and mementos of his strenuous life.Theodore Roosevelt, one of the most versatile men ever to become president, surveys the fruits of a lifetime of rich adventure and the amazing assortment of gifts showered on him by admirers the world over.Here too, draped over the axle of his plane, is the flag from the grave of his youngest son Quentin, killed in France in 1918.The Rough Riders' Anthem recall with the daring exploits of Colonel Teddy, a beloved figure.His many trophies are tests to his matchless marksmanship as a big game hunter.Off the trophy room is the Library, stocked with the books Teddy read unceasingly or wrote himself and where he worked while at Sagamore Hill.Tirelessly he toiled at this desk until death in 1919 stilled his fighting spirit.But the rich legacy he left America lives on.The inspiring story of a frail sickly youngster who made himself strong by determined effort and who dedicated his every energy to his country.On a stone nearby, his creed; \"Keep your eyes on the stars and keep your feet on the ground\".The qualities of Theodore Roosevelt are the qualities which preserve our nation.Love for people, faith in life, and above all love of country.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/NewsMaga00_3.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/NewsMaga00_3.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/NewsMaga00_3.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/iRead2Know_1_-_The_Adventures_of_Eshe_the_Ethiopian_Elephant/iRead2Know_1_-_The_Adventures_of_Eshe_the_Ethiopian_Elephant.mp3", "text": "\u266a Oh, oh \u266a \u266a Picture perfect \u266a \u266a Oh, oh \u266a \u266a When the light captures your smile \u266a \u266a So mature, so juvenile \u266a \u266a The way you talk, your sense of style \u266a \u266a Has captured my imagination \u266a \u266a And every funny thing you do \u266a \u266a The way you turn my sky blue \u266a \u266a Every time I look at you \u266a \u266a I don't need no explanation \u266a \u266a Simple chemistry \u266a \u266a When you're next to me \u266a \u266a Look like an angel \u266a \u266a And you sound like poetry \u266a \u266a Picture perfect every single time \u266a \u266a And I know that it's real \u266a \u266a When you put your hand in mine \u266a \u266a Picture perfect \u266a \u266a Kicking it with you \u266a \u266a And doing nothing at all \u266a \u266a Is everything I want to do \u266a - Eshe is a young, outgoing, and lovable African elephant.She lives deep in the green grasslands of Ethiopia.Eshe loves her home in the Ethiopian forest.Her home has many hills and a big lake called Lake Tana and a beautiful waterfall called the Blue Nile Falls.Eshe loves to laugh and play with her family and her forest friends.She has so much fun all day long.Eshe runs free through the forest under the beautiful African sun until the bright stars come out at night.Eshe sleeps a happy, safe sleep with her mom lovingly by her side.Mom, what does my name mean?Well, in Swahili, Eshe means life.In Amharic, the first language in the entire world, your name means hooray and okay.That's what I said when I gave birth to you, my dear Eshe.Now, go to sleep.Eshe thinks she looks funny because she has the biggest, longest trunk.Eshe quickly learns that her trunk helps her a lot.She can even smell a skunk with her trunk.Yikes, run!A skunk!A skunk!Eshe learns to pick up many things that she wants with her trunk.She can pick up very big things and very little things.Her trunk has two fingers at the end.Eshe sprays water out of her trunk.Swish spray, my very own water fountain, hooray!Eshe does cool tricks with her trunk, showing off for her friends.Eshe's ears are so, so, so big!They just keep on growing.These big ears help Eshe hear sounds from far, far away.Wow, look at those big ears!Hey, I heard that!Laughs Eshe.I like my ears.I can even hear the most quiet whisper.And my ears keep me nice and cool in this hot African sun.Flat, flat, flat goes Eshe's big ears Eshe runs.Eshe loves to eat fruit, grass, leaves, roots, and flowers.An Ethiopian rose is a great snack.Yummy!Eshe's big trunk and fingers help her get all kinds of food that she can find.Eshe loves to eat those big Ethiopian pancakes her mom makes called injera for breakfast, and queen of sheba salad for lunch.Eshe runs, swims, eats, plays and laughs with her whole family.Eshe is very happy when she is with her whole family.Eshe's family is called a herd.Eshe's mom leads the herd.Eshe loves her mom so much.Kiss, kiss, kiss, mommy.I love you.Eshe gives her mom the Ethiopian three kiss greeting every day.One day Eshe's mom makes a special rule.Eshe, you must go to school.Go to school and learn new things.Eshe says - Mom, where is the school?Follow the path Eshe, you will find your way.Eshe has one problem.Where's the school?Eshe needs to find the school.She wants to be at school on time.She has so many questions about what school will be like.Who is her teacher?What do you do all day in school?Eshe is a little afraid but she bravely walks the forest path.She sees a very big, bright purple glow, like a spotlight, and a very small purple frog with a crown.Oh, hi purple frog.Where's the school?Purple frog wisely says - Eshe, go to blue monkey's tree.He lives by the school.You'll hear him singing.Eshe hears a song.Hi blue monkey.Where's the school?Blue monkey sings - Go to the pink dolphins river.She swims by the school.- Eshe hears a splash splash, splash.Hi pink dolphin.Where's the school?Pink dolphin says, as she splashed dances - It's by white tigers cave.He runs on the road by the school.Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh.White tiger runs by in a flash.Hey wait.White tiger, where's the school?White tiger says shyly - Well, just follow the yellow snake.He slides by the school.Slither, slither, slither.I am in a tether tether tether wall wall wall.Woe is me and my fate as a snake.Hi yellow snake.Um, are you okay?Don't run away.Where's the school?Yellow snake was surprised Eshe was not afraid of him.Oh, ask Bongo.She jumps around by the school.Jump, jump, jump.Bongos' ribbons fly as she jumps so high.Hi Bongo.Where's the school?Bongo says - Go to butterfly castle.I go to fancy parties there.Eshe was confused.The castle is by the school.Then surprise, surprise, surprise.Eshe sees the butterfly castle, a castle filled with many different butterflies swirling about.Wow, you are all so beautiful.You are all so many colors.Hello there.Can anyone tell me where the school is?Eshe cries out - I really can't be late.The butterflies make a beautiful rainbow right before Eshe's eyes.Hurry, Eshe, follow us all to the school.At last, Eshe sees the school in the distance.She sees the other children going into the school.Eshe is very excited.Eshe is very proud.Eshe found her way to school with her friends help.The butterflies flew, Bongo jumped, yellow snake slid, white tiger ran, pink dolphins swam, blue monkey sang, purple frog glowed.What a great gang!thinks Eshe.Horray, horray, horray!Eshe, you found the school!Eshe smiles and waves goodbye.Thank you my friends!With a smile on her face and a tear in her eye.A new adventure begins.Eshe's first day of school.Eshe is very excited.Today is her first day of school.Her mother says, - Eshe please listen to your teacher and follow all her rules.Eshe sees her classmates.They are all sitting quietly in their seats.So Eshe shyly walks to her seat.Everyone is looking at her.Eshe hears some whispering.Eshe wishes she can not hear what they are saying.Now, here is one more problem.One very big problem.One super problem.Eshe cannot fit into her seat.Eshe tries this way, Eshe tries that way.Eshe wiggles, Eshe swiggles.Some classmates start to giggle.Eshe shimmies, Eshe shakes.Eshe pushes, Eshe squishes, Eshe squirms.But Eshe cannot fit into her seat no matter what she does.No matter how hard she tries.Everyone is looking at Eshe Everyone is laughing out loud at Eshe.Eshe is feeling very sad.A very good day is now going very badly.Suddenly, Eshe's trunk smell something a little funny.It smells like smoke.Ring, ring, ring goes the bell.Children, children!the teacher calls out.This is a fire alarm.Please stay calm.Please get in line quickly.But the children do not listen.They run and run.They push and push.They squoosh.They bump, they thump.They shimmy.They shake.They squirm like worms.They all try to squeeze out the door at one time, but they cannot fit no matter how hard they try.They all plopped down to the ground.They plop, they drop.Thump!They're getting nowhere.\"Oh my\" thinks Eshe, as she smells more smoke.Eshe has an idea.She scoops up each boy and girl with her trunk and puts them on her back one by one.Eshe runs out the door leading the whole pack, the whole school was behind Eshe and all the boys and girls riding on her back.The boys and girls cheer for Eshe.Horray, Eshe.Horray!The firetruck is outside the school.The fireman thank Eshe for being so cool.Good job, Eshe.You were calm.You were thinking.This is always good in an emergency.You are all safe, boys and girls.Time to go back into the school.Eshe gets in line with her new friends.Hi Eshe, I'm Maya.Hi, Eshe.My name is Susie.Hi Eshe, I'm Jimmy.Hey, I'm Justin.As they all walk into the classroom, they see a change.A big change.The seats are all in a big circle with a big space in the center.This is Eshe's new seat.This new seat cannot be beat.Eshe does not need to wiggle this way and that.She does not need to push.She does not need to squoosh.She does not need to squirm like a worm.She does not need to shimmy.She does not need to shake.Eshe just sits on her mat and smiles.Eshe listens to her teacher as she begins the lessons.What a day.Eshe thinks.\"I am learning so much.I am so happy.I feel like dancing the Eskisa\".And a new adventure begins.Tap two, three, shuffle, hop, step.Tap, tap, tap.1, 2, 3, kick.Jazz walk, kick jump, and kick ball change.Ballet plie and up.Plie and up.Arabesque.1, 2, 3, 1, 2, 3 wild step.Eshe points her toes and springs into the air and lands with a big fall.Thump!Oh, hi grandma.I'm dancing.I see that, Eshe.Says grandma as she Eshe a big hug.Eshe gives grandma three big kisses.Kiss, kiss, kiss.Let's go my sweet Eshe.Let's go get a treat.Grandma, I love to dance.Eshe says as she crunches.But I'm not very good.Well Eshe, maybe you just have not found the right dance for you.Keep practicing.Grandma.Did you ever dance?Why yes Eshe, I was in the eskista dance troupe, our traditional Ethiopian dance, the shoulder dance.Show me, grandma.Show me?Oh my, I have not done this in awhile.Here goes.Grandma begins to shake her shoulders with a smile.Then grandma really shakes her whole body.Grandma dances the eskista.She looks so happy.Grandma, you are a great dancer.Did grandpa dance with you?Why, yes.I met him at my show long ago.When I dance I remember him.That puts the love in my dance.Eshe was not sure she understood, but she goes home and practices her dancing anyway.At night, Eshe dreams.She is in a big show in a glittering costume.Sparkling on the stage.Everyone is clapping for her.Rainforest talent show, rainforest talent show.Eshe hears as she wakes up.When is show?Eshe asks purple frog as he passes out the flyers.It's in three weeks, Eshe.This is to audition for the show.What's that?Asks Eshe.An audition is showing your talent in a tryout to see if you can be in the show.I'm a judge as you know.Rainforest talent show, rainforest talent show, sign up now.Blue monkey rushes over to purple frog.I'm a blue, blue, blue, blue monkey, just hanging around up in my tree.I'm blue, blue, blue monkey.I'm just singing my song.Come listen to me.My band plays the blues.It sounds good.Says purple frog.I will see you later.Purple frog, purple frog, purple frog.Yellow snake slithers around him.Can I sing my new country song?I'm a yellow snake.Oh, how my heart just breaks when the kids just run away and say, I don't like snakes anyway.They don't even know me.They don't even care.They don't see I'm lonely.They don't know I'm there.Yellow snake whines his lyrics and sings out loud.Sure, sure yellow snake, take one.Says purple frog.Well, I have to get going.I have to pass out all the flyers before it gets too late.So I have to glow.Eshe laughs.Purple frog glows at Eshe.Eshe, do you want to try out for the show?Before Eshe answers a flash of white is in their sight.Bright light.Are they following me?Who?Eshe asks white tiger.My fans, the paparazzi.Everybody.White tiger runs past her and grabs a flyer.Whoosh.Yes, I'll take a flyer purple frog.Eshe says, shyly.Good.Tomorrow by the school.That's where we will be.I will be judging.Look for me.What is your talent Eshe?Um, um, um Bongo?I can't give you a flyer while you are jumping to the sky.Bongo lands splat on her legs, like a cat.She swoops up a flyer with her horns and she is off.Dancing.Says Eshe.My talent is dancing.Okay, see you tomorrow.Says purple frog.He rushes away and leaves some purple glow that stays.Eshe goes home to practice her dancing.Eshe gets up early in the morning to go to the audition.She watches the pink dolphins water ballet, while she sings about being pink.What do you think about a dolphin who is pink?I play all day with my friends who are all gray.I really know a purple frog who glows, A blue monkey in a tree, and an elephant named Eshe.Sings pink dolphin.White tiger is next.And her opera is the best.A group of turtles do a chorus kick in a line.Bongo does her Acrobat.Now it's time for Eshe's act, but Eshe can't move.She is stuck like glue.Come on Eshe, don't be shy.Eshe runs and waves goodbye.I'll be back.Eshe hopes grandma is home.Grandma come with me.Where, Eshe?It's a surprise.Eshe lies.Eshe walks her grandma onto the stage and proudly announces her grandma's eskista dance.Grandma's shoulders shake and her body shimmies.Come Eshe, do it with me.Eshe can't say no.Eshe hops on stage.Her shoulders roll.Eshe and grandma are dancing together.Eshe sees the light in her grandma's eyes.The judges are amazed.Yes.Yes.You are in the show.We want both of you.Eshe, you were born to do the eskista.Says grandma.I just put the love in my dance.Big love for you.Eshe's grandma squeezes her tight as they walk home.Eshe picks up something to eat.Ouch!Hey girl, yikes!And a new adventure begins.Eshe meets banana frog.\u266a Yeah \u266a \u266a Picture perfect \u266a \u266a Every single time \u266a \u266a I know that it's real \u266a \u266a When you put your hand in mine \u266a \u266a Picture perfect \u266a \u266a Kicking it with you \u266a \u266a Nothing at all \u266a \u266a Is everything I want to do \u266a \u266a Picture perfect \u266a \u266a Nothing more to wish \u266a \u266a I know that it's real \u266a \u266a It's written all over your kiss \u266a \u266a Picture perfect \u266a \u266a Words can not explain \u266a \u266a The way I feel inside \u266a \u266a My hearts on a speeding train \u266a \u266a Picture perfect \u266a \u266a I know that it's real \u266a \u266a When you put your hand in mine \u266a \u266a Picture perfect \u266a \u266a Oh, oh \u266a \u266a Picture perfect \u266a \u266a Oh, oh \u266a \u266a When the light catches your smile \u266a \u266a So mature, so juvenile \u266a \u266a The way you talk, your sense of style \u266a \u266a Has captured my imagination \u266a \u266a And every funny thing you do \u266a \u266a The way you turn my sky blue \u266a \u266a Every time I look at you \u266a \u266a I don't need no explanation \u266a \u266a Simple chemistry \u266a \u266a When you're next to me \u266a \u266a Look like an angel \u266a \u266a And you sound like poetry \u266a \u266a Picture perfect \u266a \u266a Every single time \u266a \u266a And I know that it's real \u266a", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/iRead2Know_1_-_The_Adventures_of_Eshe_the_Ethiopian_Elephant.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/iRead2Know_1_-_The_Adventures_of_Eshe_the_Ethiopian_Elephant.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/iRead2Know_1_-_The_Adventures_of_Eshe_the_Ethiopian_Elephant.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/WhiteAmm1942/WhiteAmm1942.mp3", "text": "1942.America, rising quickly from the crime of Pearl Harbor, answer the challenge to liberty and freedom.Hoards of sleek planes are guarding the skies over our homeland, while countless others are battling a treacherous foe.Mighty, floating fortresses are ranging the seven seas, relentlessly hunting down the enemy.And at the same time, watching over the vital supply lanes to our allies.Huge juggernauts of American design and manufacture are rumbling along many foreign terrains in ever-increasing numbers.And far behind the actual battlefronts, another war is being waged; the war of production and still more production.Our armed forces must constantly be supplied and reinforced.The and industrial output, Many times our normal peacetime capacity.shipyards are humming with activity day and night.Thousands of new workers have been added to the payrolls, skilled men to faction the battleships, destroyers, and submarines that are making our fleet the greatest in the world.They find the guarded doors of giant plants throughout the country.Airplanes of every type in design are being built by the thousands.Sleek fighters, capable of doing over 400 miles an hour, dive bombers, that can swoop down on their prey at a speed of over 600 miles an hour.First, the skeleton of the plane is speedily formed by scores of skilled specialists.Every part must be fitted with microscopic accuracy.While the plane is being assembled, other workmen are building and testing the new powerful motors that will carry the plane into the sky.Equally important to the all-out war effort, is production of tanks.These titans, some of which weigh over 50 tons, and contain more than 40,000 specially made parts, are now rolling off the assembly lines at a fantastic rate.Ready to take their place in the fight for freedom.But while tanks, and planes, and ships are most important.They are about but a few of the thousands of varied articles and products necessary for defense.More production means greater supplies of raw materials, materials that come from everywhere.Pig iron to feed blast furnaces, burning up huge quantities of steel necessary to arms production.Pig iron, copper, aluminum, coal, pouring from the caverns of the earth.Rubber, for the tires on which roll the modern mechanized army, and for a thousand other uses.Rubber that comes from the plantations of the tropics.Materials from everywhere.Take leather for example, so important to the production of ammunition belts, bolsters, and gas masks.Where does it come from?Why from the Western steer, of course.That's his contribution to national defense, and his cousin the cow does her bit, too.By providing the country with the most important factor in personal defense - pure wholesome milk.While milk with its bond-building calcium, and health building vitamins, fortifies the body and makes America strong by making her citizens strong.Young America learns the milk drinking habit early.While their young bodies are constantly using up energy, in the variety of activities, that make up the day of the typical healthy youngster.Swimming and skating and football are great fun, and the children love them, but they are energy burners, and this energy must be replaced by nourishing foods.That is why it's smart mothers start their children off right each morning with a brimming glass of milk.They know that no other foods supplies as many helpful elements.And what is proved for the children is even proven for adults.The tension and pace of these nerve-wracking days take a toll of our energies that is potentially dangerous, unless we take extra care on the choice of proper food.More and more people are beginning to realize the importance of cream on their cereals and butter on bread, topped off with a glass of milk.For breakfast is the meal that sets us up for the rigors of city life, the continuous energy-draining effort to keep up with the pace and prob the city itself.Today, the speed up in our daily activities is greater than ever before.And consequently, we are more in need of a midday pick-me-up.That is why many large department stores have set up milk bars where the tired shopper and the children may pause a moment and replenish their store of energy.That is why milk buyers have sprung up everywhere.For whereas men and women realize that now is the time for all of us to be at the peak of our productive capacity and milk at lunchtime supplies the extra pep and vitality that we need to work more efficiently under the increasing tension.For working as they do and tower the concrete and stone, that glass of milk is their only chance to capture the helpful elements that come from broad green fields, bright sunshine, and fresh country air.Here in the peaceful surroundings of the dairy country, it's mother nature's arsenal.While she manufacturers quiet ammunition.These cows have nothing to do but graze in the sun all day and sap up the health and vitality of the countryside, so that it may be passed on in their milk to the people who are cooped up in the cities.These herds are made up of the finest breeds of dairy cows.This is a Guernsey cow.This type was brought to America in 1818, from the Ireland Guernsey and the English channel.The Guernsey is a medium-sized cow, golden brown and white, producing a rich milk yellow and creamy in color.The black and white marking of this cow identify it as Holstein, originally developed in Holland.There are more Holstein's in the United States than any other breed.This large, rugged brown cow is a Brown Swiss.The breed was developed in Switzerland and deported to this country after the civil war in 1869.They Ayrshire cow originated in Scotland.It is reddish-brown and white in color and produces a very high quality of milk.This small fawn-colored cow, the Jersey, originating on the island of Jersey in the English channel.The Jersey cow produces a small quantity of an exceptionally rich milk.The world's best known cow, Elsie, is a pure bred Jersey.Now, after a full day's grazing, the cows are on their way back to their spotless stalls.A far cry from the conditions prevalent in 1851, when Gail Borden was experimenting with milk preservation.At that time, cows were kept in dirty unhelpful surroundings.Gail Borden realized that cleanliness was of utmost importance in the handling of cows and milk.But although this fact seems obvious to us now, he had to fight farmers, tooth and nail, to get his views accepted.Today, the things for which he fought have become the standards of the milk business.Cleanliness is the watch word and everything from the barns and attendants, to the cows themselves, is under rigid inspection.For milk is more than just a business today, it is a public responsibility.Here the cows are being fed carefully-prepared, vitamin-rich, silage and grain as a sort of dessert to top off their day in the pasture.And if she's thirsty, she need only press her mouth into the basin of this automatic button right beside her.Now before the cow is ready for milking, she's carefully washed down by attendants who know, as does everyone else in the milk business, that you just can't be too clean where our milk is concerned.Then the cow is ready for one of her regular visits by the doctor.No, there's nothing wrong with her.This doctor is one of a staff who was paid to keep cows well.For you can't be sick and have anything to do with milk.After a thorough examination, the doctor then takes a sample of the cow's milk.carefully checks for color and flakiness.And if the milk is up to the established high standard, the cow is then ready for the milker.In this modern day, milk production is as highly mechanized and efficient as any other large industry.The cow still makes the milk, but then modern efficient machinery steps in.These mechanical milkers, for example, are both cleaner and faster than the old milking by hand process.And from the cow's standpoint, far more gentle.The greatest advance in mechanical milk production that has ever been made is undoubtedly the Rotolactor.Employing the principle of the assembly line, this large merry-go-round type of machine saves time by bringing the cow to the attendant instead of making it necessary for the attendant to go to each cow.the cow enters at one end of the machine, into it's own separate enclosure, each complete with a milking machine and the receptacle for the milk.The cows are first thoroughly washed by the attendants, The receptacle tool sterilized with scalding water before it is used.Then as the cows move around the attendants attach the milking machine.The Rotolactor affords the utmost in protection for the purity of milk.Since the human hand has so little to do with the milking process.The milk leaves the cow and it's pumped directly into the sterilized glass containers.A further safeguard is effected by taking the entire machine apart several times each day, for thorough sterilization of every part.At frequent intervals, a large laboratory off the milking room take samples of the milk for examination.Constant supervision of milk quality assures a uniformly pure product.In five minutes, the milking process is completed.And as each cow steps off the Rotolactor, another one steps on.While it is undoubtedly the most ingenious, the Rotolactor is but one of the many Borden developments designed to provide you with better, purer milk.The milk is then chilled before shipment.In other localities, the milk is brought to large receiving stations by the farmer's themselves.They're advised about the sanitary precautions that must be taken, not only on the production of milk, but on the transportation as well.This milk, too, was carefully tested by plant technicians who sample each and every kind of milk that is brought in.The milk is then weighed, for farmers are paid by the pound, not by the quart.Meanwhile, the cans and lids are sent through a washing machine where they are thoroughly sterilized.Each farmer picks up only the cans that bear his number, And and he keeps them securely sealed until ready for use again.In the laboratory, every known testing device is employed to check the appearance, purity, and quality of the milk.A very careful record is kept of each farmer's product, a sample of which was sent to the laboratory for detailed analysis, from which the amount of money due each farmer is computed.These tests also give the farmer valuable information on cow feeding and diet, that will further raise the quality of milk from his farm.Thus the laboratory serves a two-fold purpose.First by ensuring the absolute purity up today's milk, and at the same time investigating and discovering the means of making tomorrow's milk, even finer.After preliminary refrigeration, the milk is then rushed to the city in large stainless steel glass-lined tank trucks insulated to keep the milk ice cold.Carrying the freshness and helpfulness of the air and sunshine of the country to the city dweller.Arriving at the plant in the city, The milk is pasteurized for 30 minutes at a temperature of 143 degrees Fahrenheit as a final guarantee of safety.An automatic graph keeps a constant record of each individual pasteurization tank.Under the health-giving rays of the ultraviolet lights, some of the milk is aerated before pasteurization and thus important vitamin B is added to the many food elements milk already contains In the filling room, the bottles come out of the washing machine, where they've been thoroughly scald and sterilized for a period of 22 minutes onto a conveyor that carries them directly to the filling machine.Like an army of glass soldiers, they march up at the rate of 120 every minute to each machine to receive their quota of white ammunition.A powerful defender in the constant fight for a better health.As the filled bottles are placed in their cases, watchful attendants again examine them for imperfections and pass on only perfect bottles for delivery.These are the twin quart bottles stepping up for their double helping of white ammunition.One, two, one, two, the pace never slackens, movement never stops.For milk must be rushed from the cow to your table in the shortest possible time.Here, as everywhere, in the process of milk production, the laboratory plays an important part.Every step of pasteurization and bottling is carefully watched by scores of skilled technicians, utilizing every type of modern testing equipment and laboratory apparatus.It is their observations that make the milk you drink the safest, purest, and most helpful food you can buy.Another method of packaging milk is the single service container.It is manufactured entirely by automatic machines, from start to finish, no hand ever touches it.Once the container is farmed, it is coated inside enough with scalding paraffin.The result, a highly personalized container that is used only once.So popular in stores because of the ease of handling, and because there is no deposit required.The containers are filled and packed in exactly the same manner as the bottles.This machine manufacturers ice, which is used to keep the milk cold while it is being delivered.Refrigeration is essential because milk is a very perishable food and must be protected on every step of its journey.And now the milk is on the home stretch, in their refrigerated trucks, a silent army of milkmen set out in the wee hours of the morning to deliver their bottled health down every street, along every avenue, rolls the dawn patrol.We all take the bottle of milk for granted, but very few of us appreciate the long and intricate process that has made it possible to bring the magic fluid from the farm to our doorstep.A process involving selected herds of cattle, scientific farming, constant inspection, laboratory research, modern production machinery, and mechanized transportation.But it is far more important for us to appreciate the fact that milk is the foundation on which to build the family meals.For packed into a quart of milk are a lot of essential food values that would be more difficult and far more expensive to secure otherwise.Bottle boxes are furnished by the thousands to families whose milk would otherwise be exposed to the elements.Incidentally, the man who made this box never saw it.For he is one of the shop full of blind men, who are kept gainfully employed the year round, making these boxes.Not only does milk go to homes, but every morning a huge fleet of these heavy-duty refrigerated wholesale delivery vehicles rolls out of the branches on their way to serve the store as restaurants, hotels, and hospitals of the metropolitan area.Today, milk is a featured item in food stores.In many self service markets, these visual refrigerators, permit a customer to select her own milk cream, butter, milk, and other dairy products.And today milk is playing an important part in the training of the greatest armed forces in our history.A famous general once said, \"The more milk you put into a soldier, the more fight you get out of him\".For milk, with its helpful vitamins and mineral elements build strong men.And in this time of need, it is strong men who'll give America it's strength.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/WhiteAmm1942.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/WhiteAmm1942.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/WhiteAmm1942.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/fashion_favorites_2/fashion_favorites_2.mp3", "text": "The size alone of the four DuPont rayon plants gives some idea of the amount of specialized equipment and scientific craftsmanship needed to produce each year millions of pounds of fine rayon yarn.Yarns that are converted by leading textile mills into fabrics that make garments, draperies and countless other fine articles found in the apparel and home furnishing departments of stores all over America.Actually, these buildings are not factories but giant laboratories where skilled technicians follow specifications as high as those required in small experimental equipment.Within these walls work craftsmen to whom quality is a creed, with the most modern equipment obtainable.The interior of this DuPont cellulose acetate rayon plant reveals a maze of intricate, elaborate apparatus: a labyrinth of containers, mixers, and other machinery linked by a network of pipes and valves.To the layman, a picturesque puzzle of queer-looking objects of every shape and size, but in expert hands, precision instruments that play major roles in the production of fine rayon yarn.Here, nothing is left to chance.Constant control of every process is maintained by accurate devices that check and record every operating factor.Continual checking and testing throughout every step of the way is one big factor in DuPont quality.These laboratories dot every building, examine the product of each important process, make sure that nothing passes on for further treatment until it measures up to the highest standards set and rigidly maintained.Manufacture of viscose process rayon begins by steeping or soaking sheets of cellulose: the first step in changing them into the spinning solution as we saw in the laboratory.But while the principle is the same as with the glass beaker, here, the operation of steeping is carried out with exacting precision.Just the right amount of cellulose is placed in each compartment of the specially designed steeping press.The sodium hydroxide solution is checked repeatedly to be sure it's just right, and the sheets are allowed to soften and soak for a definite, predetermined length of time before an automatically operated hydraulic ram begins to squeeze out some of the liquid.Its pressure is carefully governed so that the sheets will weigh just so much more wet than when dry.Even the weather in this room, as in all other operations, is manmade, perfectly suited at all times to this particular process.Every factor that can affect the ultimate quality of the rayon is scientifically controlled to a fine degree.The soft, pulpy sheets pour through chutes to the floor below to be shredded into crumb.These ingenious shredders gently crumble the sheets, pulling them apart but not grinding them.This machine also uniformly distributes the liquid remaining in the cellulose so that its action is the same on every crumb.On the floor below, the crumbs are poured into steel, cabinet-like containers.Here are the crumbs are stored for aging under constant temperature.Every container bears an accurate record of its contents, so it may be individually checked and controlled.Accurate scientific analysis determines when the right degree of aging has been reached.At the correct stage, the crumbs are released from storage and passed onto the next treatment, which we remember is the addition of a liquid that changes them in color from white to orange.In actual manufacture, this process is carried out in huge rotating churns that are individually cooled to a precise temperature.The snow-white cellulose enters the barrel-like interior of the churn, which contains a pipe through which carbon disulfide is fed.This liquid flows into the churn, rotating at a definite rate of speed, perfectly blending with the crumbs, which gradually darken in color.Here again, close control of every factor is absolutely necessary if our cellulose is to make fine, rayon yarn.The speed of the machinery is closely regulated.Exact timing is highly important.For proper air conditioning, the air is completely changed 22 times every hour.When the process is finished, the cellulose xanthate, or orange-colored crumbs, are emptied from the churn.Notice how greatly they've increased in size and darkened in color, an indication that they are now ready to be converted into the spinning solution.In the laboratory, we carried out this step by dissolving the crumbs in a solution of water and dilute sodium hydroxide contained in a glass beaker.In the plant, the spinning solution is made in huge, cylindrical mixing tanks, in which exact proportions of the ingredients are accurately maintained.Each lot produced is thoroughly analyzed by control laboratories located right in the plant.All DuPont rayon yarn enjoys uniform, high quality, mainly because its quality is never taken for granted.It is constantly tested and proved throughout every step of its scientific manufacture.To ensure the highest possible degree of uniformity in the spinning solution, and in the finished yarn, the various lots are blended together.Each huge blending tank is equipped with positive stirring blades that thoroughly mix the solution.At this point, the desired degree of luster in the finished yarn is also permanently fixed.If brilliance is wanted, the blended solution is used without further treatment.The addition of a special pigment or certain types of oil, changes the solution so that the yarn it produces will be dull in appearance.The amount of delusterant added determines a final degree of dullness in the finished yarn.After blending, the spinning solution is allowed to ripen for an exact period of time to bring it to just the right condition for spinning.Unless it is properly aged, the yarn it produces will suffer in quality, so during its stay in the aging tanks, the solution is regularly tested and checked.In precision-built presses, all foreign matter is completely removed by thorough filtering: not once, but again and again.Throughout every stage of manufacturing, the purity of the spinning solution is constantly safeguarded.Each piece of equipment is constructed of metals, specially selected to resist corrosion and contamination of the products being handled.The pipelines, valves, tanks, mixers, and other machines are designed and built to make the purest and finest spinning solution that science can produce.The only kind of spinning solution that measures up to DuPont's high, rigid specifications before it is approved for spinning into top quality rayon yarn.The actual spinning of the solution is one of the most fascinating operations in all industry.We saw previously how a thin stream of the solution changes to a coarse strand of crude rayon when dropped into a hardening bath, but the crude rayon formed in this way is entirely unsuited for making cloth, as can be readily seen by comparing it with true rayon yarn.To make this yarn requires a specially-designed, precision-built apparatus that is an outstanding example of modern machinery.The liquid passes through still one more filter before it emerges from minute openings and a tiny nozzle called a spinneret.How fine are these openings?Well, generally they range in size from five thousandths to two thousands of an inch: the thickness of a human hair.Each hole forms an individual filament, and there may be any number up to 400 or more of them in a single thimble-like spinneret.Notice how the liquid solution coagulates when the spinneret is lowered into the spinning bath, and expert hands skillfully leads the yarn through a series of guides up and around a rotating glass wheel, then down through a funnel into a whirling pot, which collects it.Each thread-like filament forms immediately as a spinning solution leaves the holes in the spinneret.The speed of the glass wheel largely determines the thickness of the yarn, although this characteristic also depends upon the size and number of the spinneret holes and the amount of spinning solution forced through them per minute.The collecting pot rotates at a very high speed, from six to 10,000 revolutions per minute.The rotation twists the filaments together, and the yarn is distributed alternately from top to bottom so that it will lie properly against the wall of the pot to form a symmetrical cake.When removed from the pot, the cake of rayon consists of about 29% yarn by weight and 71% spinning bath liquid, which must be removed.At predetermined intervals, a cake of fine quality yarn is removed from each one of hundreds of spinning machines.In other plants, DuPont acetate rayon is spun by yet another method.The spinning solution made from cellulose acetate by a different chemical process, known as the cellulose acetate process, is forced through tiny holes in a spinneret located about 15 feet above the level of the floor.When the solution passes through a column of warm air, one ingredient, acetone, evaporates, and the liquid solidifies to form slender filaments of rayon.By the time they reach the bottom of the warm air column, the filaments are perfectly dry.Here, they are collected and guided out of the column to a device that winds the yard on bobbins.The acetate rayon yarn as it comes from the spinning machine is a finished product.After twisting, it is ready for weaving or knitting into fine fabrics.Each bobbin is numbered for easy, positive identification so that every bit of yarn can be traced back to the machine that made it.All DuPont viscose-processed rayon is also carefully marked for reference before passing on through the finishing operations.Repeated thorough washing with pure warm water gradually softens and cleanses the yarn and gives it a smooth, pleasant feel.Much of the moisture's removed in a specially-designed machine called a centrifugal extractor.Each cake is placed in an individual chamber, which spins like a top at extremely high speed, throwing off water without harming the yarn's fine texture and construction.Final drying is accomplished in automatic tunnel ovens, through which the yarn travels on conveyors.An exact degree of heat is maintained so that the yarn is dried gently and slowly.Now the yarn is ready for winding into the form desired by the fabric manufacturer.The bobbins are so designed that at each stage of the processing, strain is eliminated.This permits proper tension in twisting, coning, tubing and skeining.From raw material to finished product, all DuPont rayon, whether made by the viscose process, or the cellulose acetate process, is continually checked by a rigid testing routine.A continuous check on winding tension is made by periodically testing the tension of the running yarn.Specimen cones are regularly picked at random and rewound on a special machine that permits thorough inspection of the continuous yarn.A highly-trained operator expertly examines the rayon as it passes in front of a black background that easily shows up any imperfections.Still, other precision-built testing appliances make sure that the physical qualities of samples of every lot measure up to DuPont's high standards.Testing for yardage is accurately accomplished by a winding reel that turns it in exact degree of speed and measures the yarn precisely.Measured specimens of known length are then weighed on a sensitive gram scale to ensure the uniformity of the yarn.The amount of stretch or elongation of any textile material, as well as its tensile strength, are both of considerable importance because they affect the service ability and wear of the fabrics made from it.This testing device precisely records the amount of twist per inch in any given specimen of yarn.The construction of practically every type of fabric greatly depends on how the yarn is twisted, so uniform twisting is highly important.Inspection of the yarn as it passes over a strong light within a dark room is still another DuPont control.By the expert eyes of skilled operators, any imperfection is immediately detected.Nothing but perfection gets by.But with this organization, careful surface inspection isn't enough by any means.Thorough microscopic examination tells the additional story of what's beneath the surface of the yarn.Cross-sections of samples from every lab produced are prepared by making tiny wax candles with a strip of yarn forming the wick in the center.The candle is then accurately cut into paper-thin slices, each of which contains a tiny cross-section of yarn for its core.When a slice is placed in a powerful microscope, and the focus properly adjusted, the structure of each tiny filament is plainly revealed.To the untrained eye, such a picture means nothing, but to the DuPont expert, the size, shape and arrangement of every fiber tell a definite story about the quality of the yarn being tested.Notice a difference between lustrous rayon and dull rayon as revealed by the microscope.The tiny specks of pigment in the sample on the right are embedded within each individual fiber, a permanent part of its basic structure.By scientific preparation and analysis of photo micro graphs of specimens of yarn from every lot produced, the quality of the yarn is constantly safeguarded.Even when it has passed every other test, all DuPont rayon is carefully checked again before shipping.To you, the skein inspection may appear hurried and haphazard, but with these girls, years of training and knowing just what to look for have made hand and eye super sensitive to any possible defect.No single cone, skein or tube leaves any plant without this final, thorough checkup.From beginning to end, one hard and fast policy dictates and controls the outcome of every operation.Test and check, check and test, every step of the way.From the raw materials to the finished products, nothing is taken for granted.The result of each process is scientifically analyzed by accurate fact-finding equipment in the hands of experienced, capable technicians.It takes plenty of time, skill, painstaking care and effort to follow such a procedure in large-scale production.But that's the only way fine rayon is made.Yarns that make possible fabrics that lend new beauty and attractiveness to clothing and home furnishing, countless articles of distinction to be found in fine shops and department stores from coast to coast, smart dresses for every occasion: for woman, miss or child, made of every conceivable type of material.For lingerie and negligees, there are satins, French crepes, flat crepes, taffetas, and knitted fabrics of every type.Fine menswear, too, gains variety and good looks through fabrics made of DuPont rayon yarn: underwear, ties, sweaters, shirts, pajamas, hose, slacks, and tropical suitings for sportswear.Leading curtain departments everywhere feature rayon marquisettes, voiles, ninons, and plain and novelty weaves.Draperies and bedspreads: rich brocades, brocatelles, jacquards, repps, twills, moirees, satins, damasks and plain weaves.And for fine furniture, DuPont rayon provide outstanding upholstery fabrics.For 1,001 essential articles of daily use, DuPont rayon yarns insure beauty and long life backed by the symbol of rayon quality, pure assurance that the yarns used are made to the highest standards of quality, precision and honest, careful craftsmanship.Rayon yarns that take a merited place beside every other important development that has added beauty, luxury, ease and comfort to our daily life.Rayon yarns by DuPont.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/fashion_favorites_2.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/fashion_favorites_2.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/fashion_favorites_2.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/StoryWit1950/StoryWit1950.mp3", "text": "Frontiers of science, a series of information films presented as a public service, documenting the latest developments in medicine and science in the space age.The future can be found in many places.It can be seen reflected in the eyes of those who are privileged to look at it.Here at this bell telephone exhibit it can be found in the shape and form.And made from the metal and the wire the time and the effort of those who are privileged to create it.Now, I like to show you what our recent development the transistor may do for future telephone service.First, I'm going to throw this switch and turn back the clock to the days before you could talk on the telephone over distances of say several hundred miles.Now I want you all to listen in while I talk on this telephone.Well, I don't think any of you could really understand what I was saying, but let's throw another switch.And start coming back to the present.Now, you can hear me clearly over a line that represents the same distances.That's because we know you as repeater units containing sound amplifying vacuum tubes that give your a voice of boost as it goes across country.Tomorrow will still be here as well as previously.But look how small this repeater unit is it's smaller easier to make amplifier, but made possible by developing the transistor, the tiny piece of sound amplifying equipment that requires no warm-up time and has an almost indefinite lifespan.Our research people are hard at work finding out what else it may be able to do where else we may be able to put it to use.This is a business that has always dealt in the future.That's the way Alexander Graham bell thought of it.When the business was started back in 1876, - I was in some haste to invent the telephone, but it has urgent work to do.Talks things and makes your laugh and quite an honored work.In my view of the future the novelty will wear off the instrument will blind, it will grow light, convenient, and familiar to every hand, a common tool within the means of every factory, business, every home.And connected to a central switching office, which can connect any two subscribers in a matter of seconds.And then I see its lines and poles matching thousands of miles connecting the head office of every city in the land to the head office of every other city.And then I see perhaps in the next century, the tiniest farthest Hamlet woven into the wild fabric telephone people must always be looking ahead.It was that way in 1922, when you might've heard this kind of conversation by some engineers who had the job of looking into the future.Say Charlie Got a minute?Sure, what's on your mind?Take a look at this chart.What do you make of it?Well, if we keep on adding customers as we have in the past, and if our customers continue to place more and more calls with a manual equipment we have in now, - you won't be able to give the kind of service our customers expect from us.I'll make you a little bet that never happens - Oh, what's the answer?You know, that's the question telephone people have been asking themselves for years now.And the finding the answer and a type of telephone service that switched calls automatically.It took the time and energy of many telephone people who made use of what was already known about dial switching systems in developing the new equipment and new techniques, which would make this better, faster, automatic service a reality.But the people they served the future had been met before it ever arrived.Today if most telephones are a dial.There were problems, sure.Dial is a pretty complicated affair.Ask some of the old timers.They'll tell you - Glad to, I can still remember how we sweated it out together.Drawing seconds for a dialect changed that could be produced not only on a sheet of tracing clause, but on an assembly line as well.As a production supervisor I know from experience, it's tough enough to make a change on a production line that's already in business, let alone starting from scratch to set up a new one for something we'd never made before.Out in the field, we installation people have always had the problem of installing the new stuff and cutting it into the line without interfering with any one service.Our customers like to feel they can use their telephone any time and making that possible has always been part of our job.There was the problem of finding a new spot for the operators who handle the manual switchboards that preceded dial.What happened to the operators?There are thousands more today than there were before dial more improvements in telephone service the more calls to handle.More calls mean more jobs to do, and more people to fill those jobs.We've always felt, that in the long run, the best equipment we could provide produce the best results.Not only for the people we're in business to serve, but for those who helped to make that service possible as well.People like Frank Dubrovnik, cable inspector, Mary Jane Holmes, service representative Eleanor O'Brien, operator, Luke Benson, field representative.Each of whom in his own friendly fashion made that service a reality on an ever increasing basis.If you have any doubts on that score ask those of us pick up our mail at RFD boxes.Since the end of the war well over a million of us have had telephones installed.The vast spaces of America that represent a living for the farmer.Present a tremendous problem for anyone with the responsibility of providing telephone service in those places.If to take a lot of construction work a lot of telephone poles to bring in a telephone to someone in a rural area.We're still using polls today.Since the end of the war, we put up about 2 million of them.The difference being, we now use wire that requirement one pole for support, whereas three were needed before.How come?Ask the men from our research and manufacturing organizations.How come?They're the ones who follow the job from an induction furnace where they test and it was poured through the prescribed heat treatment.Through the making of the test prior the end time became a red hot snake goes slithering steel racing through a Western electric wire mill, and eventually turned into the extra spanked telephone line that crosses Dave Baker's pasture, new wires, speeding, power driven, augers that earn a lot of the earth, a place to set a telephone pole, sharp tongue wire plows that bite into the ground as if they really enjoyed it and lays special rubber covered wire, as well as a new way of using power lines as telephone pathways have stretched the long arm of friendly telephone service to many a friendly farmhouse door.Besides serving as a path for telephone wire and acting as a highway for the newest pans continental airplanes that fly so high they cannot be seen only heard.The air above the earth serves as a highway for something else that can be heard, but not seen.The only visible sign in these conversations is the radio relay tower they come from through whose lens as microwave radio beams carrying not only the telephone messages you speak, but the radio programs you hear the television shows you see.To the next tower on a Hilltop, 25 miles away, which receives the signal and sends it to the next Hilltop tower.And so on until its destination is reached Another communications highway of the present and the future is to be found in coaxial cable.The basic coaxial cable can handle 1800 telephone conversations at one time.And that's a lot of telephone service not to forget television programs, tele typewriter news services and radio programs.Coaxial cable like this has already crisscrossed the country pushed past some of our last frontiers guided by a 20th century type of pioneer who swapped his covered wagon and team of oxen for a diesel power and cable plow and left in his wake, not a wagon trail, but a network of electronic highways.Another frontier and the everlasting campaign to improve service is to be found in the town of Media, Pennsylvania not far from Philadelphia.It's Monday morning in Media and Mrs.Douglas of the hill crest avenue Douglas's can hardly wait telephone Philadelphia to order a real bargain.She spotted in her Sunday paper.There she goes.It's an out of town call but she dials the number directly without having to reach an operator.One of the most important problems that had to be solved to furnish this service was finding a way of automatically keeping track of how long Mrs.Douglas has conversations lasted the telephone number she called and telephone number.So she could be correctly billed.This array of impressive looking equipment and the central office went into action to do just that.It's not enough for the equipment to remember.It's got to make a record as well here at this recorder.The billing information from Mrs.Douglas call and others from media is punched out in code on a reel tape.At an accounting center in Philadelphia the information is processed by machines, which have had such brains and skill that they can translate The coded perforations into a record efficient does this equipment is it's put an early step in the development of an automatic message accounting system.In the laboratory is the man who developed new equipment and the men who will have to build it are always at work.Not only in proving what has been developed, but creating new things as well.Like the latest crossbar switching system whose automatic switching of telephone calls has made possible operator toll, dialing.However, it's one thing for highly skilled scientists technicians to do the power equipment in the laboratory and quite another to mass produce it on a production line.What goes into it?Where do we get it?How much does it cost?What are the conditions under which it must be handled?What tools will be required for it's assembly?What production procedures will be followed?What skills will be required by people employed of this operation, What training will they need in addition to their previous experience?Is adequate test equipment available?What rate of production is indicated by the specifications?in this case as in all cases, the combination of Western electric working with the bell laboratories on crossbar switching equipment from the very beginning, Made it possible for those questions to be answered before they were ever asked and paved the way for operator toll dialing.A new technique and telephone service that makes it possible for operators to dial long distance calls directly, without going through other operators along the way or are at a distant place.That's quite an improvement in long distance service.When you consider that in 1927, if you wanted to make a long distance call, you picked up your telephone and then something like this took place.Number please - May I have long distance?One moment please.This is long distance.I want to call Chicago, the number is war based 20 98 - Thank you.We will call you when ready with Chicago.The long distance operator passed the call on to a line operator who found an available line to Chicago And over it reached an operator at the incoming switchboard for Chicago long distance calls, - Chicago - Wall badge 20 98 - The Chicago operator put the call through to the Wall badge central office - Wall badge - 20 98 - And finally, the operator was able to ring your party time required about five minutes on the average and in 1927 that was good long distance service.Today in many places with many more on the way you give your long distance operator the number.And she called into action the crossbar dial switching system, which sets in motion the corresponding equipment in Chicago.And the next thing you know Wall badge to 2 20 98 is ringing.Time required about one minute, We've come a long ways since 1927 because we wanted to come a long way.What's made it tough?Has been the complicated equipment necessary to give telephone service.When we develop something new it's a physical impossibility and financially impractical to rip out everything we have in service one day and replace it with all new equipment the next besides, Who has to tell this man that his call is not so important?But that it can wait.Or this girl?The country's telephone service can't be turned off while the telephone company changes over to new models.Wherever you go in the Villa system from the operators at the other end of your line, who take pride in the part they play in furnishing your telephone service.To the construction people who see to it that tomorrow is telephone lines are put in today.You will find telephone people building for the future.The future of the telephone business is bright and rich with promise for the millions of telephone users like yourselves who was quick acceptance and ready use of each improvement and telephone service has helped make possible an endless chain of accomplishments.What will it be this time?An operator dial call to Cleveland?Or the ballet on channel two by means of coaxial cable?An important call by mobile telephone service to a transcontinental truck on U.S. one.To a ship putting out to sea.Or to a train racing across country.It has been the faith of the American people who have invested their savings in the bell system and the present.As well as the desire of telephone men and women everywhere to keep on furnishing more and better telephone service in the future that makes this story a story without end.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/StoryWit1950.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/StoryWit1950.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/StoryWit1950.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/Aliceheimer_s_at_MMCTV_-_An_Interview_with_Dana_Walrath/Aliceheimer_s_at_MMCTV_-_An_Interview_with_Dana_Walrath.mp3", "text": "My mother's name is Alice.And when she had dementia, she came and lived with us.She had gotten kicked out of her apartment and she was still too well to go live in a lockdown unit.And I wasn't especially close to her, and yet I could not imagine her any place other than here.And so she moved up here, and it ended up being this incredible time of us being able to kind of heal and laugh and enjoy a relationship that we hadn't had before.So the \"Aliceheimer's\" is how I started thinking of it, instead of Alzheimer's that'd just be the sadness of the loss.I watched her use the loss as a way to kind of gain other things.So she kind of was able to do a lot of things that she couldn't do when all of her kind of social conscience was getting in her way.So she, in some ways, was more herself and that was something that we could together really run with and have a good time.And so we handled lots of aspects of dementia differently from most people.So I started drawing about it, and then writing about it.And now those two things are really integrated.The original drawings of course, had the little writing on them too.When my mother lived with us, I discovered graphic narratives.I just fell in love with the medium.And I was using that time to kind of push my creative writing forward.So, and I was bringing all sorts of graphic narratives into the house, and every last one of them, my mother just loved reading.And so I, because she loved the medium so much, I knew that when I wanted to tell our story, that that was the right way to go.I was messing around with comics.I was sometimes trying to do it just completely digitally drawing on a tablet PC. But I'm a little too old-fashioned for that, and I didn't really find the voice until I got back to paper.And I found the voice for the work the day I cut up a cheap paperback copy of Lewis Carroll's \"Alice in Wonderland\" to make Alice's bathrobe.And I had already been doing a lot of collage work.Throughout my life, I've done collage work.And the minute I did that, I realized, \"I know what the story, how to tell this story\".I sat down, I did my sketchbook.December 1st through December 23rd, I just pored through it kind of in one of those white heat frenzies.And because I was a storyteller as well as a visual artist, my sketchbook really told a story.I'd started on page eight, 'cause I knew like I had found the voice there with the bathrobe and the halos and so on and so forth.And then I went back to page one, started telling it, and then kind of knew how it was gonna go till the end.Then people, all of those were posted digitally through the Brooklyn Art Library, and people started commenting.And then people who I shared the link with who were part of the project said, \"We want to be able to comment on this and we can't make comments there.You should start a blog\".So I put them all up on a blog, and then I realized that blogs work better, instead of having 26 drawings on one post, to make them come out one by one.So in January of 2011, I began using each drawing to then inspire a vignette, a piece of a story about our lives and interactions.And then from there, because of course I'd given away the originals to the Brooklyn Art Library, I started playing around with printing them up, I had digital copies of everything, but printing them up and printing some of them up really large.My oldest son, when he first saw them, said, \"Mom, I want to see these gigantic\".And so I made some, so that Alice was life-size, I made some smaller sizes, and then I started sewing back into them, first on canvas, but then I switched over to sewing into paper.And while I was using thick materials, I'd print on a thick material, it gets hard to shove a needle through a material.And so I kept on.So I got myself an awl to poke holes in it.And then I realized that, oh my gosh, my grandfather was a shoemaker.He probably worked with an awl all the time.And so it was sort of all these different layers kind of came about through the act of making the drawings, and then revisiting them and retelling them.I think when you're a medical anthropologist, you understand medical systems as cultural systems that are beliefs and practices.And the medical medicine in the United States is about science.It's about doctors who know the science of our bodies and how to fix it.And so it's really great with the kinds of things that doctors have already figured out how to fix, but in something like Alzheimer's, it's still uncurable.And most of the efforts in our culture are about raising money for more research.And this is a lovely thing to do, but in the meantime, I know they're not gonna cure it for my mother, and I'm not sure when that's gonna happen.And I think about death and dying, and I want us as a society to be able to be more at peace with that, and that when an illness is at the end of the life cycle, and maybe we can't change it, maybe we're never gonna be able to figure out exactly what's going on with the plaques and tangles, well then maybe let's just change the society, so that we can make it easier on the people that are living in that different kind of a state.And I think that one of the best ways to change things is humor.And I think that if we laugh and we lighten up about what's going on, then we all of a sudden get creative and we have new ways to handle it.One of the biggest things is that physicians view hallucinations always as something that we need to medicate.I mean, that's a symptom of something that's bad.My mother does have a kind of dementia where she does hallucinate a lot.And when she was with us, we just got so we understood them.We could read them.We could kind of learn from them.So at first it was just seeing my father and the maple trees.And I finally figured out that she was just missing him and wanting to make peace with him.And she kind of, I don't know if it was subconsciously, but there he was up and in the sky somehow or another, you know, maybe metaphorically, approaching Heaven and or something like that.And so, or she would sometimes see her parents and be trying to make peace with them, because I think at the end of life, everybody needs to make peace, with others and with themselves.So we use those hallucinations as a chance to talk about those things and make peace.And we used, so instead of saying, \"They're not there,\" and, \"Of course he's not there,\" and trying to correct the reality, we would just say, \"Oh, you're in a different reality\".And sometimes it would happen, a lot of, that she would think she was around World War II and that there were soldiers around the house and, or she'd think that we were eating dog meat for dinner and I'd have to say, \"No no , it's steak.We bought it at the country store,\" or what have you.And so I would just sort of explain, \"Well, I'm in 2010.You can buy this from the store\".And she was very comfortable saying, \"Oh, okay, I'm in 1944 and you're in 2010.That makes sense,\" and we could just move on.Whereas if I had said, \"What are you doing in World War II again?It's not really there,\" you know, it would have been a conflict.And let's see, we incorporated rituals into our daily lives that sort of made, were soothing, 'cause that's something that anthropologists always focus on.We look at the rituals that exist in medicine, like changing into the gown and the rituals of the medical exam.So we just kind of embraced whatever rituals would work and made that a part of life.The way we coped with every sort of non-conforming behavior that Alzheimer's brought out, is we treated it like it was a superpower.So when she'd say, \"Don't you see him, he's right there,\" instead of saying, \"No, he's not there,\" I'd say, \"I can't see him, but you can 'cause you have special powers\".And that affirming of her reality kept her from getting agitated.And so when I went to draw, I knew I had to capture that, and being able to fly is one of the coolest things that we all want to do.And so Alice was flying very, very early in the story.And I think the next drawing that came right after that, was about her being ungrounded, so only half of her showing.And that's how I thought of Alzheimer's disease.It wasn't, she was still here.She was with us, but she wasn't grounded the way the rest of us are.She was kind of floating in a different world.So those, that then ended up kind of being a trope that's continued in the artwork and in the stories and, and I guess it hearkens to the special power and that it's not just something to deny.There's insights from the losses.All belief systems have rituals, and Armenian belief systems, I mean, they're a very ancient Christian nation, the first nation to adopt Christianity as a state religion, back in 301.And so that's a part of her upbringing, and I felt like I wanted to honor that and really had the coolest experience circling back around that with her.I mean, she grew up in a religious family.She completely rejected it, so I did not grow up in a religious family.I went off to Sunday School with my Methodist friends, went to shul with my Jewish friends, to Quaker summer camp, to everything.But during Alzheimer's, I thought it might be really nice to bring my mom to Armenian church and, you know, sure enough, we got there and she just kind of got into the service and standing up and down and, and started kind of chanting along, 'cause she had done this every Sunday of her childhood.So again, the iconography, it kind of came in subconsciously.I didn't realize it the first time I drew a halo around her head, but when I drew it, I said, \"Oh my gosh, that looks like an Armenian manuscript\".And then maybe that stimulated me to start thinking about, \"You know, it might be helpful to bring her to church someday\".And sure enough, after the service, the priest came up to her and asked her what was her name?And she didn't say, \"Alice\".She said , which means dove in Armenian, and it's the name her parents gave her.I was a professor, so I was used to speaking to people.But to speak about your artwork is different.It's more intimate.And I think the first gallery talk that I gave was at Dianne Shullenberger's gallery in Jericho and at her \"Delicious Words\" series.And it was lovely to be able to just directly connect with people and know how the artwork touched them.And I had already read some of my writing there, but that was the first time that I spoke about the artwork.And since then, you know, I've been speaking at festivals, the Full Circle Festival in Burlington.I spoke at TEDxYerevan last year back in Armenia, TEDxBattenkill, speaking at the international comics and medicine conferences.And I mean, actually been going all over.I go to academic things and then more open to the public things.And I have to say that when I'm at the academic things, what I love is making it be more down to earth and rather than erudite, because I think that that's the strength about \"Aliceheimer's,\" that I've written it in a way that I'm trying to really connect with people, and that's what you're supposed to do in public things.So when I am in a more formal setting, I still try and make it very interactive and, and make people talk to each other, and make people think about things that are personal, and people respond that we're all looking for opportunities to process these hard things, like watching a loved one lose their memories completely and not recognize them, and die.And so I want this to be a venue for us to be able to embrace the positive, and also find a way to cope with the loss.So one book is done, the first volume of it, and it came out with an Armenian publisher.Harvest published it last fall, and it's available through Phoenix Books, and also at Grand Isle Art Works.And what I'm working on now is a second book, that's going to be told in more classic comics form.So the first volume, it was a series of comics that then I went back into afterwards and wrote a series of vignettes, just strictly words, that were inspired by each one of the pictures.This next book is gonna take the form of, like \"Maus\" or the \"Fun Home\" or \"Persepolis,\" just in straight graphic narrative form.I'm gonna blend the story of Alice and her memory loss and her Armenian upbringing as an immigrant in New York City with going to Armenia and talking to old people there.And inevitably the first thing that anybody would say to me in Armenia when I said, \"My mother has dementia,\" would be, \"Oh, was she a genocide survivor\"?So in their mindset, it made complete sense that you would lose your memory, if you were hiding traumatic memories, you know, things that were just too painful to remember.Biomedical models don't go there at all .And so this is gonna be a chance to kind of integrate those two stories and talk about memory on lots and lots of different levels.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Aliceheimer_s_at_MMCTV_-_An_Interview_with_Dana_Walrath.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Aliceheimer_s_at_MMCTV_-_An_Interview_with_Dana_Walrath.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Aliceheimer_s_at_MMCTV_-_An_Interview_with_Dana_Walrath.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/king_cotton/king_cotton.mp3", "text": "Cotton is king.But there was a day when few people believed that cotton would have as many uses as it does in today's world.Cotton has been known for many hundreds of years, but it was not usable on a large scale, until the beginning of the 19th century.In 1781, a New England farm boy, named Eli Whitney, was beginning to make a name for himself as a manufacturer of hatpins for ladies bonnets.A few years later young Eli set his fingers to a harder task, getting the seeds out of cotton.For thousands of years, the only way to separate cotton seeds from cotton fibers, had been to pull out the seeds by hand.A slow, costly, tedious task.In ten days, Whitney developed a model of a machine that was to revolutionize the cotton industry, The cotton gin was a simple device, but it took the seeds out of cotton.And that was what the south had been waiting for.Some of the Southern states voted Whitney a royalty for his invention.But he had to spend most of his money to defend his rights and marketing the new cotton gin.Those who had started to immigrate from the south in search of a better opportunity, learned of the new machine and took new hope.The value of cotton land troubled overnight.All over the world, the impact of this simple invention was felt almost immediately.Eli Whitney put together a few boards and rollers, and gave the world a giant industry.Cotton was king.Never before had anyone removed seeds from cotton so quickly and easily, and surely.Never had anyone dreamed that a machine could do so much.Here was an invention that did in a few minutes, the work that took a Pioneer's family a whole evening to do by hand, as they sat around the fire.Here in a small wooden box was all that was needed to demonstrate the value of cotton as a world crop.The principles employed and Whitney's first machine, have been retained in the modern cotton gin.Inside the gin, the cotton falls through the hopper and hits a grid where it comes into the path of revolving teeth.The teeth grab the fibers and pull them through the narrow openings of the grid.The seeds are larger than the openings, they can't pass through.They fall to the floor.The fibers are swept off the revolving saw teeth, and out of the gin.The modern gin seems much different, certainly much larger than the experimental gins of Whitney's day.But the real difference lies not in the principal used to take out the seeds, but in the fact that new machinery has been added to clean the cotton, and carry a large amount of cotton through the gin.It is here in the generator, that all the work in the cotton fields comes to a focus.All the time and labor extended by the Southern cotton farmer, reaches its climax in the two great products of the cotton world, cotton fibers and cotton seeds.The valuable seeds emerged from the gin, fall into a trough, and are drawn away by suction.The seeds are still not entirely free from cotton.They're covered with a light fuzz, known as cotton linters.Linters removed from the seeds in the later operation, are used in many basic cotton products of great importance.The seeds are likewise store houses of the wealth of the south.Each year brings new uses.Cotton seeds for various oils, for tar, phonograph records, cosmetics and foods.Today more than three score products are made from cotton seed.So that the cotton can be handled conveniently, it must be made more compact and tied into a package or bale.As the gin cotton collects, it is mechanically packed until enough has accumulated to make a 500 pound pack.The heavy pressure, which is then applied, produces good bales that are compact and uniform in size.Almost completely covered with sturdy bagging.Ironed bans wrapped tightly around the bale, make sure king cotton can travel securely, if need be, to the ends of the earth.On the cotton plantations today, modern science and modern farm machinery play an important part.Work that formerly required days or weeks of sweating toil, is now handled with ease and efficiency in a very short time.Early in the year, plause, drawn by light, but powerful modern tractors, break the soil to a depth of three to eight inches.Preparing acres of land quickly and easily, for the good crops of cotton to come.After the danger of frost is over, and the land has been warmed by the spring sun, up to the minute multiple row planning machines moved swiftly over the fields.A far cry from the once common and laborious method of dropping the seed by hand.All through the growing season, modern cultivators roll through the fields of cotton plants, destroying weeds and grass, loosening the soil to let in air, allowing water to penetrate to the roots of the growing plants.Today's science, as well as modern engineering, has entered the cotton industry.And along with science come the trained men of modern agriculture.Men who have studied cotton for years in the laboratory, in state experimental stations and in the field.These experts know the characteristics of the climate.And the many kinds of cotton growing soil in the vast region of the south.They know the peculiarities of the numerous varieties of cotton plants.They have found new fertilizers that get better yields from average lands.New ways for farmers to grow better quality cotton, with longer, tougher fibers.Scientific research in all these fields goes hand in hand with the big job of protecting cotton from its enemies.From diseases of the cotton plant.From dreaded insect pests.Foremost among the ravaging insects, is the Mexican Boll Weevil.Which first crossed the Rio Grande into Texas in 1892, and has since spread over nearly all of the American cotton belt.If not controlled, the Boll Weevil can wipe out millions of acres of cotton in a single year.Controlling the spread of this insect, by dusting fields from the air is the most spectacular and frequently the most successful method.Before the plants are fully developed, just as soon as the Weevil begins to appear on the squares or brackets that protect the immature flower, the modern farmer enlists the aid of the most modern methods in his attack.In a matter of minutes, the dust, poisonous to the Boll Weevil, spreads in long white plumes, over acres of cotton.The up-to-date way of finding this most stubborn invader of king cotton's domain.As a result of careful and scientific cotton farming today, the United States supplies the world with almost one half of all the cotton it consumes.From thousands of fields come millions of bales.The product of hundreds of thousands of men.Product of the soil of the south.Product of science, and American invention.Product of America.In the fall of each year, the coasts of the Atlantic and the Pacific, on the Gulf of Mexico, on the banks of the Mississippi, king cotton starts it's journey to the ports of the world.King cotton, ruler of the huge industry at home and abroad.Cotton for the spindles of the world.World progress calls to cotton for textiles, Cotton for clothing, cotton for fabrics.Yes, but for more than that, much more.The world calls for cotton for many unseen uses in virtually every industry.Surprising for instance, is the tremendously important role that cotton plays in the manufacture of tires for modern automobiles.Everybody thinks of them as rubber tires, but it would be just as correct, if these nomadic cushions were called cotton tires.Or actually 50%, of all the material that goes into the making of an automobile tire, is cotton.Long before the tire assumes it's familiar shape, yard upon yard of tough cotton fibers have been spun and twisted into cords, then woven and distilled tougher fabrics.Fabrics that ensure a long life, and resistance to wear.Compounded rubber, heated to just the exact temperature, is then blended with the cotton fabric.Coding yet, until together the materials form a kind of rubberized cloth.This exacting operation, where in cotton and rubber each become part of a new fabric is called calendaring.And the materials are prepared with the greatest precision.Rubber, compounds, and cotton.And the tire begins to take form.On the building drum, great care is taken to ensure the exact position of the cords and the rubberized fabric.It is cut on the bias to give greater strength.Then another layer, another apply.But at this time the cords must be at right angles to the first layer.So again, it is cut on the bias.Thus, additional reinforcement, unseen protection is built into the tire with cotton.After several layers have been carefully placed, the pliers are trimmed and molded under the watchful eyes and skilled hands of men who are masters at their trade.The raw tire expertly constructed is next placed in a steel mold that not only gives it the tread design, but a complete curing as well under terrific heat and tremendous pressure balkanization takes place.The tire is toughing to a final degree indifferent now to heat, to cold, to all the elements.It has emerged, ready to take its place to play its important part of furnishing comfort on the wheels of a modern motor car rubber compounds cotton.Again, cotton for comfort.This time for comfort inside the motor car layer upon layer of thick fluffy cotton blankets are formed into deep, soft paddings for the luxurious league, comfortable seats, king cotton, modern science has developed hundreds of new uses for cotton within the past few years.For instance, when scientifically treated with special gases and liquids, cotton can be transformed into beautiful, durable and valuable plastics today.Plastics made from cotton are used to make the sparkling striking interior appointments in the up-to-date automobile plastics for the steering wheel horn button, the gear ship controlled beauty, to be sure, but a very practical beauty, a handsome gift of cotton cotton makes still another valuable contribution to appearance and the motoring age again, through the magic of science of chemistry, cotton yields, a treasure called cellulose cellulose to form a basic element in modern lacquer, a lacquer that is even more weather resistant than the metal it coats and protects the short linters of cotton contained cellulose in its purest form.First, the oil is removed from the cotton linters.Then the fibers are washed mixed with chemicals and stirred, stirred and heated, heated, and cooled.Then mixed again with Still more chemicals.At last, the solution is ready to receive the pure rich pigments that are mixed in rotating drums.Cotton becomes lacquer, a beautifully glossy and rugged product built to stand up under every adverse condition.Not many years ago, it took six full Tejas weeks to apply the 22 coats of paints and varnishes that were required to properly surface the automobile body.But here again, science, science, and cotton have United to simplify this by producing lacquer that is faster drying, longer lasting, smoother, harder, and more durable and easier to apply with this matchless product of cotton and chemicals, skilled Workman create the brilliant magnificence that is the protective surface coating for the motor car.Up today.Here is cotton cotton for splendor.Another of the contributions king cotton makes to the motor industry cotton for the modern motorist cotton in the fabric of the upholstery cotton in the plastic parts, cotton, and the glossy lighter cotton and the rolling tires, comfort luxury and durability.Cotton but in the great universities and technical laboratories of the south diligence scientists continued to experiment to hunt, to search and to research for steel.New uses for king cotton each day, new discoveries are made and yet this is only the beginning science and cotton making possible.The building of vast new industries challenging the unknown discovering making revolutionary improvements in the working and living conditions of our day.Approximately 50 pounds of cotton in various forms are used in creating the modern motorcar cotton for beauty, comfort and durability.Today, cotton serves mankind's retail markets in more than 10,000 different forms, cotton for fountain pens and steering wheels, cotton for fishing, tackle them tires, cotton for artificial sponges, cotton for shoes, cotton for lockers, cotton for airplanes caught worthy to be called king, truly a service of mankind.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/king_cotton.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/king_cotton.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/king_cotton.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/Fishfrom1945_2/Fishfrom1945_2.mp3", "text": "Might've been a lot of worse, at that.But the spirit of adventure is unquenched.The crew of her fishing smack brings news of giant octopus nearby.Can't afford to miss a chance to photograph one of this elephant spiders of the ocean floor.The diver is going to try and locate the octopus and pose him for the camera.The ocean floor is a dream world.Silent, dark, mystic, unreal.Lonely beyond words.A beauty that haunts one.A majesty all its own.Inhabited by strange, weird creatures like this great sea anemone, so named because it looks like the windflower.You've seen little ones on the rocks at low tide, long tentacles like the petals of a lovely flower.But when touched, they close up into a compact ball.Like the giant ray, it lives by scooping in its prey and sucking it to pieces.Now watch how quickly the fish that our boys throw down is enclosed in that living sepulcher.But the study period is rudely interrupted.The cameraman, ever on the watch, sees a great hammerhead shark circling above, too close behind the diver for safety.Must get him up and destroy the menace so everybody takes a hand.Well, this shark business is getting on their nerves.They spoil all the fun.The shark family takes many queer forms.The hammerhead is about the strangest and one of the most dangerous.The barb and heavy line don't do the trick fast enough, so the captain puts a few slugs of lead into him.But even that doesn't stop a shark unless, by chance, it happens to sever the spinal column.Well, alright, diver.We've got him out of the way.Let's go.You know, this diver's rig isn't the easiest thing in the world to handle.Moving isn't hard but progress is retarded like a slow-motion picture because of the water resistance.In this submerged world, queer, unreal lights play across the ocean floor.Strange fish peer out of unexpected corners.Forests of gently undulating seaweed.Gaudy shells, which, at the touch of the diver's foot, become animate and scuttle away.The camera can look so much farther afield.Merciful powers, what's this eerie shape?There it is!Look out!Octopus!The crawling, irresistible, slimy, death-dealing monster of the sea floor.And he's behind the diver!There's no phone in his helmet, his power under warning.What a chance he takes!Good man, make him see!Oh, strange, indeed, are the wonders of the eight great, immensely powerful arms, each with its two rows of deadly suckers.Ooh, look out!That slithering death is right on you!He'll crush your bones into jelly!Look out, boy!Look out!Quick, now.Quick!The helmet and boots are too heavy.Get out of them!Get out of there!Oh, thank goodness.Oh...Well, let's call this fella names, too.He deserves to be sworn at.You old cephalopod, that's you!Octopus punctivus, accent on the punk.Say, that was a close call.Three days out from Acapulco, dragged offshore by a good tug.Refitted, restocked, everybody happy and raring to go.The only thing that couldn't be replaced was a diver's rake.That's probably decorating the parlor of some mermaid by now.Hello.There's something that looks interesting.Huh, interesting, I should say it is.Big news.What the newspaper man would call a whale of a story.This is a real whale.One hundred and twenty feet long.Whales are strange creatures.Mammals, originally land animals.There she blows!They're warm-blooded, breathing air by lungs, having babies, not eggs, and nursing them with milk.Their greatest enemy is the swordfish, a monster mackerel.And there goes one now, straight for the whale's vulnerable belly he goes.Through ages of poking into other peoples' business, this fella's nose has lengthened out until, in big fish, it attains a length of five or six feet.Sharp enough to drive straight through the bight of a small .What a schnoz.What a schnoz!The swordfish is, without doubt, the gamest fish that swims the ocean.He goes after whales like a terrier after a ball.It's instinct, of course.Often, a swordfish will charge a ship and drive his snout into the flanking until it breaks shorn off.Imagine what it must do to a fish, even one with so tough a hide as the whale.What a fight.What a fight!The swordfish has all the advantage of quicker turning, sharper weapons.The whale's only defense is his mighty tail.One clean blow with that two-ton sledge and even this terrific stabber would be put out of commission.But the swordfish rolled with the punch.Now, they spar for a moment at long range.And back goes the old stabber.Caesar's ghost, what a battle!Threw him clean out of the ocean!Friends, no one has ever been lucky enough to photograph any such quite as this before.But the race is not always to the swift, nor is the battle always to the strong.Remember David and Goliath.Oh, this is terrible!Leviathan in range.Dangerously wounded.Well, there can be only one end to this fight.Our boys decide to put the gallant old monster out of his misery, for this attack might go on for days.Remember, this whale weighs not less than 120 tons.There's a lot of him to die.This is risky work.Takes nerve to go in under those terrifically slapping tails and put a harpoon into the poor, old, beaten monster.But they're going to do it.Now, zam!This new irritation sends the giant off on a new tack.Up he comes and out he goes!Look out for sharks, boy!Poor old whale.What a tragedy of the sea.How many time this happens, no one will ever know.There isn't always a camera so handy to record the battle.And even when our boys have captured the whale, the villain still pursued her.They signal a commercial whaler way off to leeward, as there's no hope of salvaging the valuable oils and fats of the huge windfall.They tell her to come a-running before the prize collapses and sinks.Once the breathing ceases, the huge body can no longer stay afloat.The whaler's fish captain gets ready his harpoon gun.A Svend Foyn gun, invented by a Scandinavian of that name.Come on, men, come on.Get it over with.The poor devil's dying.The same old story.We must be cruel only to be kind.Now, !And all the while they're towing in the gigantic captive, the harpy is still battening on his entrails.This Christmas present is worth at least $3,000 to the whaler.Now get the air line out, boys.Pump in the air.Don't let him sink now.Ooh, look at those great, gaping wounds, made by that demon of a swordfish.Fish from hell, that's what you are.You certainly had a lot of nerve tackling the big, strong feller.Six hundred pounds against 240,000.Now they're pumping him full of air.Ooh, what a mess you made of it, you...But the boys say, \"We'll give you a break, Mr. Schnozzle.We're going out and get you.Get you with a rod and reel\".That oughtta be some sport.Yes sir, when you talk about thrills, this game of fighting the monster swordfish with a rod and line certainly takes the pennant.I say, watch.We're going to show you a most unusual camera shot.It's like a fish eye view of things.Now look underneath the boat and see the propeller in action.Now, anybody who hasn't a firm grip on his emotions had better not look anymore, for something's going to happen around here and I don't mean maybe.There he goes.You old boys who can remember the thrill that came when first you felt a tug at the cork on your line in the old mill pond when a six-ounce perch grabbed your worm...Maybe you can picture this thrill.Six hundred pounds or so of the fightingest, maddest fish that ever snapped a hook is out there on the end of that slapping line.But the reel's singing its protest.Bring him up, bring him up!Bring him up!Reel him, reel him!If he doubles on that line, you'll lose him!Wrists of iron are certainly needed for this work.Great catfish, what a leap!Whoa, another mad leap!Take up the slack.Take it up, take it up quick, now!Up he goes again!Don't let him trick you, mister.Don't let him trick you.Now, what a mighty surge that was, to carry a quarter of a ton of fish clear out of the water!When I say the swordfish was game, now it's settled down into a battle of wits.How would you like to run a handbook on this event?The fish knows that his only chance is to leap and turn in the air and crank afoul of the line so that he can double back on it and snap it off.How does he know it?Well, how does he know how to swim in the first place?Instinct.The primal instinct of all created things.Self-preservation.There he goes again!Impossible, you say?Well, there it is.The camera can't lie.But he's a desperate thing.A black-hearted scoundrel, of course, but you've got to hand it to him for the fighting spirit.Yes, sir, this is a real battle.Oh, !That leap surpasses them all.And to think that this little, trifling line is expected to control such a stupendous battering ram as the swordfish has proved himself to be.It's just one desperate leap after another.And each time, the human adversary must be on his hold, ready to reel in, to slack off, to play this brute as you would a mountain trout.But he's got to end sometime.He's bound to tire himself out at that rate.It looks to me as if he's just about shot his bolt now.Steadily, slowly, patiently, but relentlessly, the captor is bringing the floundering demon closer and closer to the boat.Ah, this is going to be something else again, boys.It's all well enough to hook him and play him in close but what kind of man is this who thinks he can gaff this demon?Don't lose him, feller.Don't lose him!Dig in your toes, boy.Get your heels under a seat.Stick to him, boy.Stick to him!Slip stick it over, now heave away!Oh, oh, oh.Afraid you're going clean out of your class, old chap.Now you've got him again.Put a twitch on his nose.Ride him, cowboy!Run him up by his heels.Schnoz or no schnoz, no durn fish that ever swum can get the best of me!Whoopee!And that is that.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Fishfrom1945_2.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Fishfrom1945_2.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Fishfrom1945_2.ctm"} {"audio_filepath": "scp_commands/Communit1959/Communit1959.mp3", "text": "Once, the land seemed inexhaustible, the whole vast sweep of the American continent, 3 million square miles of the richest land on earth.A land of quiet main streets, rolling farm lands, plains, forests and mountains.A land with elbow room, with unlimited space for our towns, our cities and our people to grow.But within a single generation, we have learned a hard lesson, that the land is a limited resource.Just as the air can be polluted, water supplies wasted, so our land can be dissipated and despoiled.Today, the land surrounding our metropolitan areas is being swallowed up at the rate of 1 million acres a year by factories, shopping centers, highways, housing developments, and more housing developments.How did it happen in the span of a single generation?What can be done to reverse the tide and preserve the land?How did it happen?Let's examine the typical metropolitan area of the 1920s, just a generation ago.Here at the heart of the city, a concentration of shops, business offices, hotels, apartments, factories.Farther out, pleasant, middle income, residential areas.Rapid transit lines fanning out in a half dozen directions to the city limits.A few miles beyond, a ring of sleepy little towns that housed local tradespeople and upper-income businessmen from the city.Each suburban town had its own government, its own community services.There was no overall planning agency for the area.No one foresaw the need for such an agency.Neither the city nor its satellites prepared for change because none of them expected change, not even when the family car arrived on the American scene in a big way, bringing new homes, new families to the suburban fringe.Depression halted that first tenant of expansion throughout the 1930s and World War Two brought housing construction to a standstill for first half of the 1940s.Then they came back from the war, 15 million G.I.s clamoring for new homes and a piece of land in the country.Almost overnight, suburbia was born.A half million homes sprang up around the country in 1946.Nearly a million in 1947.A million in 1948.Still more in 1949, 1950.The empty farm lands, the quiet towns and villages surrounding the city found themselves in the midst of a roaring housing boom, new developments on every hand.Some well-planned, well-designed, blending naturally into the terrain.Some seemed to have been thrown together in monotonous rows as the project builders raced to keep up with the demand for more and more homes.Where the families moved, the trade and service facilities followed, and the factories moved with them.Land costs soared everywhere.The old rule of thumb that land represents 10% of the cost of house and lot went by the boards.The ratio climbed to 15%.In some places to 20% and more squeezing hard on the limited budgets of home buyers and the builders moved farther and farther out in search of good development land, bypassed expensive or difficult terrain leaving undeveloped islands behind them.Wherever the new subdivisions went, they created problems for the unprepared communities of the new suburbia.More taxes for more and more schools, roads, sewer and water lines, more of everything to service the swelling population.The hard-pressed communities, finding themselves in a new environment of metropolitanization, looked for a remedy in their only weapon, control of the land through zoning and subdivision ordinances, throwing up, in effect, a Chinese Wall of restrictive regulations to halt or slow down the incoming tide of new housing.Zoning laws originally designed to police the use of land were contrived to raise higher and higher the minimum size of lots, to prevent the building of the lower cost homes that were most desperately needed to keep the invaders on the other side of the wall.The combination of genuine financial need and the desire to preserve a country-like atmosphere, not to become citified, together with a certain amount of snobbery led to a shifting of payment for many community services from the municipality to the new home buyer, through the subdivision developer.Larger lots, wider streets, waste where conservation is needed.Up goes to the cost of local government paid by the new home buyer and all taxpayers.Where do we go from here?Is the extension of the urban sprawl that now besets our metropolitan centers the best, or even the only means of proceeding?Or are there more intelligent, more effective means of channeling and guiding the immense new increases in population all forecasts say will surely occur.To illustrate the magnitude of the problem, if the New York metropolitan area continues to grow at present rates and under present large lot zoning regulations, by 1985, all the land within 50 miles will be built up.The United States population now stands at 185 million.In just five years, it will reach 200 million.Today, more than 60% of our people live in urbanized areas and an estimated 90% of future growth will take place in those same metropolitan areas.So perhaps it is time to pause and take stock, to look ahead to the needs of the future, to consider new approaches to the use of our land, perhaps to re-examine some discarded concepts.The picture is not entirely black.There are stirrings of hope in many areas where thoughtful planners, architects, builders, developers, are at work on the problems of the land.Cooperation is growing among the varied elements of our metropolitan areas.The National Association of Home Builders and the Urban Land Institute have joined forces to study land planning concepts and new ideas that could be applied to residential use of land to see what can be done to preserve the values of a country-like atmosphere while accommodating necessary growth in an effective development pattern.Government and private groups concerned with the problem have lent their support.The study has produced scores of ideas, but no final answers except to demonstrate the need for more and more research, but already it has spotlighted major areas that show promise for the future, that merit further exploration.One such area is the large-scale planned unit development where the basic planning unit is the integrated community instead of the individual lot.Here, the development of a given area is planned from the very beginning as a balanced community.Detached homes, townhouses, high-rise apartments, shopping centers, schools, parks, and play areas.The planned unit development provides for variety in design, in building densities, in family income levels, in family sizes.It meets overall zoning requirements.Individual lots are not straitjacketed into rigid sizes.Another is the cluster method.Here, the homes are grouped close together around access courts, leaving the remainder of the tract in its natural state.Here again, the developer and planner are concerned with overall density rather than individual lot sizes.The cluster offers relief from the familiar monotony of the standard tract development, makes possible economies through concentration of utilities and street improvements.The cluster permits the use of rough, wooded terrain that often could not be developed conventionally.Wooded and park areas are preserved for community use.Still another approach to better land use might be found in the townhouse.Nothing really new here.It's the old row house that fell into disfavor years ago because poor designed, ill-planned grouping made it a monotonous eyesore on our city streets but ingenuity, imagination and skilled design can restore dignity and attractiveness to the townhouse.Service features on the street side, living areas and terraces opening on a fenced yard or garden or a common open space in the rear.Economical, effective use of the land.There are many ways to use the land in better fashion than we have.Better uses of the cul-de-sac to break up the rigid subdivision pattern.Separate pedestrian and auto traffic.Loop streets and circular streets.But the Chinese Wall remains.The new concepts and innovations demand for their success a new kind of thinking in our zoning boards.Greater flexibility, a recognition of the need for diversified communities.They demand vastly improved subdivision regulations that will meet the actual needs of the land and the people, that will relate the kind cost of land improvements to the building sites and their intended use.New methods of land usage may be more attractive than the old practices that have wasted so much of our land.In the planner's eye, they may be essential, but what of the costs?Are they within our reach?Detailed research is needed into the comparative costs of new and conventional methods in terms of street frontage, water and sewer lines, maintenance of municipal services.And what of the legal problems that inevitably accompany change?The innovator who seeks a new use for the land is often caught in a maze of local complexities that can frustrate his every move.Overall reform of our land use practices demands a thorough legal analysis to determine the best procedures for resolving such questions as the use of easements, maintenance of common areas, frontage on non-dedicated streets and many, many others.Finally, there must be public acceptance of new ideas in the marketplace.The planner's brightest dream must come to nothing if it meets with public rejection.Broad market research is essential to measure the degree of acceptance for variations from the traditional pattern of community development, to determine local and regional preferences.Planning alone is not the final answer to the crisis of our land but without wise and far-sighted planning, there can be no answers.How wisely or wastefully we use the heritage of our land is not solely the responsibility of the planner, the developer, the builder, the community official.It is a responsibility of all of us who are the American community.In many places across the country, individual builders, architects, planners are putting the new ideas to work pioneering better uses of the land but we have made only a beginning.Our research must be broadened and deepened.It must reach into new and untried areas.The effort will be costly and it will require the active and continuing participation of all elements of the community.But in the end, all will benefit.In better homes, better communities, a better America as our heritage to the future.", "tokens_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/tokens/Communit1959.ctm", "words_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/words/Communit1959.ctm", "segments_level_ctm_filepath": "output_nfa_segment_split/ctm/segments/Communit1959.ctm"}