Environmental Advisory Committee - Regular Meeting

Well, welcome everybody. I'd like to call to order the July 9th, 2025 EAC monthly meeting. Um, I know that John sent out a copy of the minutes to everybody. Uh, everybody received those minutes. Any changes, um, edits, objections to those minutes? Okay. Can we have a motion to approve them? I'll move. A second. I'll second. Okay. All in favor? I. Okay. Minutes are good. Um, public comment. Seeing we have none, we'll move on to project updates. Sustainability. I have good news there. We are having our first call with Penn State tomorrow. U, we are one of, I think, five communities or something, I believe. Um, you know, let me just go and take two seconds and tell you who we're joining in with, if I can bring that up. And Um, we are having a one o'clock call here, John, Melissa, myself. Um, and, um, you know, if we have some other people that will join us, um, from the township, but I don't really have it. I don't like because I'd have to break down these these uh these emails, but I think it's Eerie. Yeah. Eerie Harrisburg. Yeah. So, so they are going to um they're going to work on the last open item of the communitywide greenhouse gas inventory and they are going to also deliver us a local um action um um sustainability action plan. So um so it's just we're going to get an extra bonus with that. And um I know that we have three calls scheduled and the first one is tomorrow. So, uh that is the update on that. Um any questions on sustainability.

Okay, dear management. Um I guess the first thing I'll ask is I'm not sure if there's anything new, but but Ken can certainly jump in here, but uh John, you put out your message or Yeah, you put out your message in in the last McMail. Yeah, part one. Yeah. Is there are there any other messages to be uh that we're trying to craft uh right now? So that first message is the first three. Um there's going to be a longer article is basically all three combined that's coming out in the town prior which should be coming out by the end of the month hopefully. Okay. Optimistically. But there's going to be two more parts in McMail. Uh the second part is mostly going to be focused on pen actually with some of his expertise and you know remembering things with this plan. And then the third part is basically going to be saying, you know, like car crash problem ticks and here's sort of what we're thinking right now. Like you're going to have your statement in there that you read to town council with a couple quotes and Nick is going to have quote the end as well. So I've seen a little social media feedback which mostly positiveish. I'd say no one's pushed back which is a real fear obviously you know that can happen. Yeah. Yeah. and and Ken, thanks for all your you know the great input on that and the comments and the quotes and everything and your you know your experience and expertise. So that that looked really really good and talking with Janine I forwarded what what you produced there and just in her opinion she goes she doesn't think we're going to have uh any difficulty with public opinion. Okay, good. Good. Yeah, it's one of those things where it's like people don't want to ne some people they know it's necessary but they don't really like my wife but doesn't really want to don't tell me about it but I but I I clearly see the need for it that type of thing. So, you know, I think there's a lot of people in that category. But I'll also say I used to be in that category, but through the education that you get as you learn about the benefit

it has on the environment and the itself, you'll be able to change the minds of those people easily enough. Yeah. Because the people who are opposed to it truly care about the deer and don't realize the When we when we do those hike through the parks that between the two of us, we'll point out the lack of Yep. everything. Well, I now have three fonds in the pond taking a drink every day. So, I went from one to three. So, just hang out living in my backyard and then mom showed up and hanged out with a various mom. So, I I kind of want to follow up on this notion of deer fencing because it's something I'm planning on doing. Um but I think that question of you know right now right on on the edge of Potter Park if you go up the hill to the one private residence up there at one time they had deer fence up you know 8 foot and it's all in disrepair now so they for one reason or another decided not to keep it in place. So So two things about that for residents to be able to I put up deer fence. Yeah. And I I mean I we didn't have enough time to talk about it the last meeting. I know I know we're we're going off it, but but I I tried to stay true to the agenda, but um I think we have some time. We did a deer fence and we had a fencing company and they were the only ones that would do it and it's six feet high and I mean we sit and look at deer cuz I b I bought the park so we see deer all the time. They never approach that fence. They don't they don't attempt to jump over six feet. They don't. It's It's a good I mean, I can give you the name of that and it and it works and it's it's been effective for us. Yeah. I mean, you know, at this point, I mean, I've hired a company I can lock who's going to do a whole design for Oh, that's all three. It's a master plan and I said, you know, I need to lock in so that, you know, I can keep the deer

out. I I I'm like hell bent on I'm going to do that. Like, so they said, "Oh, you you need deer fence." I'd never heard the term. So, we talked about it and they said, "When you you abuted this, you know, the last time saying, "Well, no." Uh, but because it's a steep slope behind the house, if we put it up, they're saying they're just going to get in anyway. And you said that's not true with yours. So, I mean, I can try the six foot, but I really just want to, you know, try to keep them out. They literally live in my yard. Like can I I don't have the use of my yard. They're in my yard, you know, occupying it up to 10 to 12 of them. Sure. Well, I think one of the things that hit home for me is whenever Ken and I were having breakfast or another time that we were talking, he said, "Dear used to be so uncommon that they would actually you'd actually come out to North Park and see them in like a fencing area like you do in South Park with a buffalo. But now, but now, you know, I'll take a walk in the park and on the trails and I'll I'll see 15 20 time. And that's that's right there. The dog park up by the tennis court. That was the deer pit uh up until like 10 years ago. Yeah, that's great. 15 years ago. So, the other thing too is um we we walk on Irwin Road all the time and um so we I smelled, you know, like remember the year that I said, "Oh, somebody's dumping these deer." And we smelt it so bad, but there were there was no evidence of that. And so that was actual probably a natural um you know expiration of of animals or deer or whatever down in the woods. So you know whatever is happening um you know they were they're dying off there on their own or whatever that it is. So, well, it when we're picking up, you know, three times as many deer on our township roads, that's not including a lot of those deer get hit and they make it 50 yards back into the woods where they die.

Okay. I mean, my up my cabin every year in in you where where there's some logs or someplace where they can hide. Yeah. There'll be a dead deer there. Okay. Um, you know, that's they get hit on the road and they they make it off the road and so there's probably more deer that do that than than we actually picked up. Yeah. Yep. Okay. Let me ask one more question then I'll turn over you can if you want to say anything else about it. But um John, do we need to craft still craft a positive a a safety message and part of your next two messages? Do we still need to craft something that is safety oriented? Because if we do, I I think we ought to we we ought to account for the fact that you're not getting anything from Mark and we need to we need to figure out how we can get you that that assistance. At this point, I don't think we need to. Okay. Up until something changes in the program may require that, but right now we probably don't need anything additional. Okay. Okay. Good. And the the backup statement is always everything is done by Pennsylvania game law. Yeah. Okay. Anything else on that, Ken? The only thing, you know, jumping ahead is Janine's going to speak for us on September 30th. I probably need to get her in touch with John so that she knows what all the AV stuff is available for her. Yeah. And um so uh well we we'll talk about that in a second. Talk about that. So we'll come back to that. Okay. Anything else on deer management program? So I raised you for the fence because length about maybe you could talk about things like what our current laws allow

for protection. So it is a sixoot fence. You know, everybody believes that's sufficient for keeping deer out, you know. Yeah. Right. That's what I mean, Ken. Or if it's not, let's do some action. That's what I'm saying. Like, uh, I watched them go. There's a four foot fence right here. They're right here. I watch them go over it. Yeah. So, six foot. Six foot. If they want to get over, they can get over. But chances of that are not I mean, that's They're not going to want to do that. We'll put it that way. But I guess that's what I'm saying is, you know, hopefully when you guys are talking about this, you're going to include things that residents can do. I I mean I see this as the precursor to Oh, and by the way, you know, we want you all to plant trees, but Well, I mean, what what you're suggesting is that somebody's going to do that, but John is the one crafting the last two messages. So, it'll be up to him and John Schwen if they want to in they want to include ordinance information. So, we I don't think we have a that's not our call. It's your call. And it it's the reality is what we're trying to get to. The point is is that you don't have deer living in your backyard. Thank you. Yes. I mean, and that's the point you're making about what you can do, but I think part of it should be and as a resident can do these things, you know, certainly like not feed, you know, you could put fencing could be enforced particle maybe. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you got all the fonds. I mean, the challenge I always have is once those fawns are born in my yard, they're just for their lifetime. They're like, "This is my yard." So, well, the the the boys will move. That's

Yeah, I know. But it's like the I call it the deer daycare back there, you know. Anyway, but yeah, I I I can't be the only one who has this issue in my house. Okay, Joanna. Um, rain garden update. Yes. Um, so a couple of us went out. So it was me and Jeff and Ken and my husband and Beth Dutton joined us for the hackathon on June 21st. Um, we got a good chunk of the rain garden notweed cut down. Um there's still plenty of knotw weed elsewhere in the park, but within the rain garden that is cut down for um spraying in a few weeks, usually 6 to 8 weeks um after the cutting. Um I did get some push back from Beth Dutton when she did find out that we are spraying and that I knew that was going to be coming. I know that it is a controversial thing. Um, and then just for my own peace of mind, I then went to an event the next day, uh, with Wild Ones, um, which they do native plants in a lot of, and spoke to somebody who is like a Japanese notweed specialist there, and he was like, "Yeah, you can't do anything else but spray it. It's it is the first thing to come back after a volcano. It will survive everything." Um, so there is You can be conservative with the use of the spray. I wouldn't go wild with it. And I think that's the main thing is to make sure whoever is applying it does it correctly, but also I want to make sure that um procedures are followed correctly. So, I'm in touch with Brad through public works because it's one of

those things where I want them to learn a bit about how to do it and hopefully since I know that there's Japanese notweed in the other parks, make sure that we can start looking towards what will that look like to start reducing the notweed in other locations as well. Um, so, uh, that's where that is and so part of that will have to be public education and that kind of thing too. um which that just comes with all of this. Okay. Would we would we ever um sort of like you just said like expand this, you know, like okay this the canary in a coal mine if it works here then you know then it would work in some of the other public public parks like you said. Right. And would we ever say could we ever say well you have Japanese notweed in your on your property this is how you get rid of it. I mean, is that is that do we advertise that or do we sort of say or we is this is this another one where we don't really say much about it? Well, we've had discussions about this before. Um the township can mow it on the rightway and spray it, but that patch probably extends onto private property and that is up to that landowner what they do. I guess what I'm asking is would we ever do like a McMill tip that said, "Hey, have Japanese notweed. uh this is what we found to be you know you cut it down here and then you spray the hell out of it with this other stuff you know something like that I mean do you that's it's what all the all the conservies do on all their island land and everything this is this is the accepted treatment for how you do it okay and if you look back so when I had my mail tip about invasive species one of the things that I linked to within that was a um a booklet for identification and then treatment and disposal of different invasive species in there and it did have Japanese knotw weed within that because that is one of the things and it's the main thing we're taking care of in the rain garden but there's so many

other invasive species and some of them you do take care of with herbicides and some you don't have to some you can just rip out and then that's okay like um uh garlic mustard that's one if you just go through and you pull it out that will do the trick um so it depends on what everybody's dealing with. I I don't know how much I feel like a lot of homeowners aren't the ones who are having the problems with it. I feel like it's more in the locations because it likes areas along like they don't have roots. They need wet areas. Yeah. They have risoids, right? So, I I wonder if it's more like along the creeks. And if you have a backyard that backs up to it, maybe you've taken care of it, but Okay. I don't know. So, so, so it's more public property. It would be more something that would be better for us to understand the DPW to be educated on. I think so. I think that's one of them. And I think maybe better for that would be something like heaven is one. And then like as I said, garlic mustard is a big one that a lot of people I see have on their property and they don't realize it. Good. Still grass is taking over everything. Still grass. Yeah. And that that chemical I used, if you go through wall bark, it it only affects annual grasses. So, well, aren't we all going to go through wall park or you'll see. Okay. Any other questions on rain gardens? Oh, yeah. And right now it's beautiful. There's a lot of things that are blurred. So, wonderful. If you go over there, it's really right now. That's a great place to put small. I'm I'm become a big advocate of of milkeed because deer don't bother it and it has nice flowers on it and and um what's the other one that I have up at

my house. It produces the uh for hypertension. Uh, I'm going to forget the name, but I can't, you know, but there's a few things that I've found that you can plant that even at this point the deer won't eat because they're toxic for one reason or another. And that's very few things. That was at my house over the weekend. All right. Yeah, that was cool. Okay, next up is um tree perter Bernie um focus S here. So Don, do you want to give your up on I I mean so mine was I was trying to work with u the staff on kind of what I needed approvals on. So John's really been good about, you know, trying to carry that through. Yep. Yeah. Basically other John told me and I told Bernie that basically funding for that is approved. Uh any other you know donations or sponsorships that come through will be great and uh we are set to actually meet to discuss this further in July 27. Make sure everything's Yeah. Did I say that? Well, we're asking if it's okay. Okay. Yeah. Um yeah, that could work. Okay. 8:30 a.m. works works for you. You okay, Bernie? Is that what time? Um, that's what was suggested. Yeah. Um, yeah, if it's not, we can res we can reschedle, but that was the answer. They said, let's see if it wants to take that. Yeah, that could work. Just something to throw in, too. Um, wouldn't be that difficult to, you know, grow our own trees, you know. Um you know in grad school two of my roommates that's what the one was growing container type trees and then the other we were planting them on strip mines um

because it was so much quicker and easier to grow them in a greenhouse over the winter and then plant them in the spring outside. So that's something and that's something that that we can get has the potential to get involvement of the community as far as uh people picking the seeds and and planting and and all that kind of thing. That's down the road, but that that's that's not that's really not that big of a thing to do. But I have discussed that with Tree Pittsburgh. So they're out of room in their nursery. Yeah. It's not a big thing for us to do that. Well, what I've suggested is they could, you know, we could find land up this way and have a northern nursery, right? So that and yes, to your point, I would love to have it involved with what we're doing on, you know, replacing tree canopy. So, um, do you want to run point on making that kind of move along? Can talk with Brad and stuff. It's it's you know for 20 years I've grown chestnut trees indoor under light and then plant them. So it's cuz where are you thinking you would plant? Oh when they're small like that I mean it's that's how you reforest things is with this with those small trees like that. I agree. But just I'm saying do you have a sight in mind? You just kind of pointed that way that you got plenty of land right over here. Oh okay. We being the canvas. Yeah. Oh cool. That's fabulous. Talk to Brad. Okay. Anyway, but yeah, I mean that's been on my big list of things we could, you know, ultimately try to achieve. So that's great. Um uh so what Don was saying the approval was not just for the the funding for the tree tenders which so my plan on October 18th would be the tree tenders course and trying to recruit out of not only

the speaker series list and all the people said they'd be interested in attending but uh August September even October I'd like to in our newsletters and social media start promoting the three tender, you know, signups. And I know Joey and I said to you about can I you know can I work with you on by the time we put this out there uh is there a uh because the township's underwriting it do we do it as a underwritten program by the township for you know tree tenders who want to engage and are to do 10 hours to support our tree initiative over the next year. Um do something like that. Um or you know do we say um you know if you don't want to do the 10 hours you you know give 40 50 bucks for attending. So you know I just want to learn I I I'm not interested in supporting you know what you're all doing. I'm just willing to go put trees in my yard and take care of my trees. So I put that out there because to me it's about in principle how we approach the community. Did did you talk to Liz Spitz? So, I'm going to get to that. Um, but um, so because Liz spent uh, so tomorrow morning, I always have a standing Thursday meeting and everybody's always trying to give me that arburetita meeting on Thursday morning. So, um, I cancelled a medical appointment when my client with the standing meeting every Thursday, moved it to the afternoon. So, I'm going to go tomorrow morning to connect. Hopefully Liz is there tomorrow. She's she's there just about every weekend. I know. Hopefully it's not because this will be the only one I'll call. She was thinking you were a man. Oh, really? And when I I said, "Have you talked to Bernie yet?" And he she goes, "He hasn't called me yet." Well, because she said, "Show up at this meeting." And we'll talk there. And this

is like the 10th person who has said, "Show up at this meeting, including you." So, I feel like uh it must be 50 people sitting around talking about stuff. So, um, anyway, so that's my plan on how to connect is take a morning off. Can I let me back up a little bit because I'm I'm well trying to catch a thread here. So, so tomorrow you're meeting with Liz from Hampton and that is to discuss what? Well, she's been in charge of EAC and everything over there for many years. this is something she can help tell what programs are available um coordinate things with Hampton North Park and so forth. Okay, it's this well because they're giving up the tree cell. So this is like what we talked about in order to this tree cell that was it ordinary environment, right? So, they're not going to do it. And I guess Liz has taken it over. And so, part of that would be, you know, do we dovetail our activities with there's um, you know, on the tree sale. Okay. U, but the other approval we got was for the tree adoption. So, what I proposed was on the 18th. October 18th. Yeah. Not the 15th. No, I'm sorry. It's the 18th. I'm just looking at my notes, too, going like, why did I put the 15? Okay. So, it is Saturday, right? So, three tenders is going to run from 9 to 3. And my thought, um, we always talked about doing kind of a tree planting after. Um, but my request to the township through John was, could we also use the uh, public works building? The way Tree Pittsburgh does the tree adoption is they would bring us um, um, what what is it? No less than I'm trying to think of the volume of

trees. What is it? Just 40 trees. Um, no. Uh, what's the volume of trees? Say if they're 40 bucks and 4,000. So, 100 trees. I'm sorry. So um we'd have no less than 100 trees to give out and you know so we'd be developing that program for everybody go through tree tenders but we'd start the adoption in the public works building they'd get delivered the night before we'd keep them there and we'd set up to and again different to me those of us who may have already gone through the tree tenders would get out there in our early I ask because I think I'm thick here so so you you have an October fe October 18th tree tenders course, right? We we know that and it's here in public work, right? And we we know that there's a cost tree tenders is going to going to charge us and and and the township is going to underwrite that $5,800. Yeah. I mean, I'm still getting sponsors lined up. So, I've talked to Dukane Lights. I've talked to Lowe's. Um I've talked to Okay, let let me let me finish my thought if I can. So you're thinking that anybody who who who joins that will leave with a treat? Um yeah, ideally well only if they sign up for one. So there's going to be two different program. Think of them as two completely different things. One is who wants to learn about tree tenders for their own benefit or to support our tree program forward. Right? So that's and the question is there's an A and B there. A either they they get it for free or B they pay for it. That's it. Yeah. Okay. So it's a A and B. Okay. And then following that um separate event let's call it right unrelated but related. Um you know Macandless uh also is going to support a tree adoption event and allow a 100 people or 50

people at two trees. But let's say it's a hundred people in Macanist to um adopt a tree. So one tree, you know, out at public works garage. So you show up from 3 to 6, you pick up your tree, you know, we teach you, you know, the course on that's on some date that has not been chosen yet. That's on the 18th. That's also on the 18th. So the whole 18th would be we run from 9 to 6 a full day of all about trees. So he'd be learning about trees and would be handing out trees on behalf of McCandless. And the reason I wanted to get that $4,000 underwritten is I don't want that to be, you know, budget funds. I really want it to be, you know, funds that we develop. And you know, frankly, so my Duk came light from the last meeting to this meeting. Um, you know, I I was trying to solidify the adoption. And so I had told John like I couldn't get a meeting with them. So So I just obligated to pay the 4,000 on my own. So I gave a personal guarantee just so it could happen. And that's when John said it's okay. But in the meantime, I was working with Dukane Light and Lowe's on underwriting it. So, um, it's not a lot of funding. But, so what I said to Dukane Light, the tree adoption would be the kind of we'd position it this way, which is we had a lot of storms, we had a lot of tree loss, and we had a lot of power outages because of trees. So what Macandas is going to do going forward is handinhand with Dukane light we will teach you all where to put trees. So the adoption event would really be underwritten by them which is let's ascane light let us show you our planting guide of where you should put trees what trees should go where and what we are going to guide you to do. So it would be more Dukane lights

um you know program staff assisting us with getting the word out on you know where trees should go. So because we want to recanopy Macanless but we want to make sure that when trees fall they're not taking out power lines and in the meantime we try to convince Dukane light to stop taking out all of our trees. So yeah we we haven't won that war. So what where are the where are the decision points? What do we have to decide on like because you don't have enough money to do everything and you're going to need sponsorships which is unknown. So at this point what do we have to or not in this meeting but what should we be thinking about? Well that's why I I wanted so I I was concerned because I've been trying to get a meeting with staff to get approval to write state grants. There are state grants, significant funds available for tree plantings and the replacement of tree canopy. So, I know we missed the first two. Um, but that's what I want to be able to do is, you know, I can fill out the forms, but it's Macanless Township who has to be the one who So, ultimately, that's the meeting I still haven't gotten. And you know, as I said to you, like why I was trying to hurry up and get it done before the deadline, you know, to get them to be is at the meeting on the 21st at 8:30. Well, now it is, but we we miss two grant rounds. So, okay. Uh I mean, they rotate and they, you know, rule, but yeah, but I feel like uh that's why I had maybe a greater sense of urgency in addition to Tree Pittsburgh on the adoption. I had already guaranteed the uh the tree tenders and you had already gotten I think approval on the tree tenders underwriting uh but on the tree adoption was what I was also trying to get the approval for for funding. So okay they said they could take it out of is it a general fund that they're going to

underwrite. It's a $5,800 commitment that John said today that they would make and and then I guess the followup now my intention is to still get Dukane light Dukane light when they take somebody's tree down they give them 150 bucks to go replace it. So I mean part of my hope and the $40 is the trees we're getting from Tree Pittsburgh. So I again I hope to do a richer fuller program with Dukang Light um where they're getting more engaged and how to get appropriate trees in appropriate locations and you know see um about their ability to underwrite this. But Lowe's was excited about it too and as per Ken I mean Ken has suggested that I go visit the nurseries and you know when I have my next five minutes I'll do that. Um, but I happened to be at Lowe's the other night. Um, what a week ago buying, you know, something and, uh, I asked about the manager and I talked to them and they were pretty excited. So, they're looking for, um, because what I said to them is their nursery ideally, we could potentially even give coupons and work with them on which are the appropriate uh, trees or we make sure they get the right trees for, you know, the mechanis. So they're all about it. Plus all the all the things people need to plant trees now. They have part of their budgets for any of these change whether it's Giant Eagle, Target, whatever, they have money appropriated for public events because when I was a race director, that's what we always say is go around and get get money from them. So it's something that they want to do. They want to get their they want to get their name out there. No, I am aware. I mean I used to sell sponsorships for major outdoor events. So I this is kind of a you know it's just a matter of who how much and where

and again it's a lot of work to get it done. So um you know I have not you know done as much as I wanted because again work's just been killer. So taking this thing in small bites then um we you have the July 21st meeting. So 22nd meeting. Yeah. Um you you have the $5,800 from a candace. at the July 22nd meeting. After that, then then you'll know, I guess, then you'll just keep on working on your sponsorship. Yes. And this is all moving toward the October 18th. So, that's that's what we're all moving toward. Yeah. Well, that's one event, right? That's the what I would call the things we're going to do this year. Yeah. Um, right. But I but I I'd really love to just focus on making that right because anything else and my I don't have the bandwidth to think about Yeah. you know, well, so I will have ready to go and now that I know there's the meeting on the 22nd, I'll have what I'll call the fact sheet, how we can promote, how we can position, who's, you know, who's sponsoring up to that moment. Um, but I'm really targeting August 1st to be the roll out date to go public with a tree tender and a tree adoption. The tree adoption, by the way, Tree Pittsburgh will handle um, you know, getting people to sign up. Uh, and then they will check whether people are in McCandvas or not. Um, so they'll do it based on so we don't really have to do anything other than, you know, they'll show up and we can hand what I'm going for. Um, August 1st is your goal to start because we have to get this thing started to go like like you said, social media. Abby, how are we doing it? Are we doing it in a way that people can actually sign up? Is it civic wreck? Is it you know? No, it's not. It's through Tree Pittsburgh. Okay. Once again, let's be clear. I said we are not going to run programs. I am going to recruit organizations who do programs and they will run them so we don't have to. So,

so when we did the Tree Pittsburgh speaker here, um, it came through us, but the promotion, yeah, they promoted as well, but yeah, we're mechanless. Okay. But I promoted that. I mean, I put that on Next Door. I think you did, too. Put it on Facebook. I mean, I uh But it's going to go Do you want it on a Yeah. Did they? Yeah. Do you want it on the web page and everything? I mean, is John going to put on a web page like they do like pickle ball and all that kind of stuff? why I wanted a meeting, right, was to find out what they could or couldn't do, but it sounds like this is a burden, right? Like the requests are burdensome. Um, I don't think just making sure that they're all done, especially when money's involved. I think it's really what it is. That's why I was trying to get I think what it is is I I think what it is is that it's not it's not burdensome because we certainly get the support that we need on the roadside cleanup. I think it is focus. I think I think it is I think it is making sure because it's a municipality and and so you just have to hit the right person and get the right focus. So So I think if we focus them on the information that we want to get through be with me. I can't focus them and I'll just say it that way. I've been requesting for a while. I mean I appreciate John running point now to make sure things are being vetted but I if they won't communicate with me I can't do that. So, right. I mean, but John now as our staff member, he's now coordinating it and apparently scheduled this meeting at 8 a.m. Yeah. Yeah. I'm just saying direct. Okay. All right. We maybe your experience a little bit different. Okay. So, so focusing them I mean I run on municipality like I understand the role of a municipality and what they do as staff and how much better than I do I'm sure and how to interact with volunteers, authorities, boards, commissions, departments like I understand like what

that relationship would look like which is why I wanted a meeting to describe and discuss what a what was the approval process b and you directly asked for a meeting and didn't and didn't get back in May because I don't I'm not not sure there that's the consensus. So you emailed John S, right? And Diane and you and uh yeah and I it was following the volunteer event. So I said, "Hey, it's great we discussed all this stuff and you said you were excited to have a meeting. Let's do that." And then there was no meeting scheduled. So I pinged again and asked once again, "Did we meet to discuss this?" because I had things pending that needed to be decided on and yeah then and me it was cricket so that's whenever I reached out after our last meeting you know that's what I said is like how this work for you at this point that's probably safe bet because some questions I can definitely answer but certainly when it comes to funding I want to defer higher up no I know but I think even like me wanting to have this conversation with you about what is the process if nobody's talking to me about what I'm way then you know cuz I I do know what that there's an authority which I can and cannot do as a volunteer I I recognize where that line begins and ends and that's all I was trying to do was figure out with staff you know here's how far I'd taken it could I now get your authorization or approval to proceed or not that's all I was looking for because absent that I just had to start making commitments on my own and then not necessarily even in the name of the mythicality anymore just you know Bernie Lynch will do this right so that's why I think back there to say hey what do we do in the future if you want to CC a member of council i.e be me that sometimes helps. Okay. Broad things along with people. All right. So,

well then I will do that from now on. And yeah, because even on, you know, um doing the grants, I've discussed this before, there's a couple of grants at DCNR specifically for tree canopy um replacement. Um, so yeah, I mean I just think as these things are arising, I can't I I can fill out the application, but it's got to go in the municipality and and my question is what is the process of the municipality to do these things? So I still haven't had that meeting with anyone on staff to understand what it is that somebody may or may not want me to do in that regard. Sure. Okay, good. That that'll be on the agenda. Okay. So on the 22nd then after that then we need to start focusing um social media you know blah blah blah all this kind of stuff and then um and then getting people interested in this and educated on what we're trying to do. Okay. But again on signups like my hope is we can get that information more directly than you know the the uh the app that you were using last time. Can we No, just more like what we did for the talk. Yeah, we can probably do that, I think. Okay. Make it easy. Yeah. Or just even say sign up. If you really feel like showing up, just, you know, that's Okay, good. Uh, yeah, that's it. So, um, yeah, I mean, so it's it's a lot. So, so you know, as long as long as we're putting one foot in front of the other and we're talking to the right people and getting the right results, um I I think um and being focused, I think that is uh we're going to get there together. Well, that's why I'm only doing one day. You know, it's uh the 18th, it's a Saturday. All three activities for the balance of the year are going to head to that day. I I think that's I think that's the right approach.

Yeah. Okay. Any other questions for Bernie? I I have this on every meeting by the way which is you know uh so next Thursday I hope to have a tree meeting um and with a smaller planning group I don't know who uh you know is it the same folks who've been involved in the past you know Jeff you can and Joanna are you guys I can't can't attend next Thursday I know that already I might be able to I'll have to check Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Because I plan on inviting the wider group as well and you know even just the best way to do a lot of that stuff is because I don't have my calendar here and stuff is to email us and and an agenda and and and again place and time and yeah I'm I'm with you. I did have a medical event which I finally used our ambulance service. So, um, so yeah, I've had a couple of weeks of, you know, hasn't been the best. So, sorry. It's all right. I I'm better after a lot of drugs and ER stuff. It was a kidney stone just painful. Really bad. You know, it took what, two weeks and then after effect. So, anyway, so that derailed me just for the record of why I didn't get as much done this month. Okay. Um, good enough excuse. So, next is community outreach. So, John, you had mentioned um, uh, National Night Out. Yes. National Night Out. What night is that? That is Tuesday, August 5th from 5 to 8. EAC usually have a small table there typically. Yeah. Nothing extravagant, but it's Yeah. Just another way to get, you know, out. So, so let me um let me I mean, we're going to talk about community day. U

garden park, all that kind of stuff. I mean, these are opportunities I think um to advertise ourselves. And so I mean I'll So So should we I'll put it to the to the crowd. Should we have a table at National Night Out? People are available to help. Yeah. Yeah. There one last summer, I think. Right. Yeah. And I'll And I'll be there for sure. That's mostly kids, is it? That's all it is. Yeah. There's So there's August 5th. What is it? August 5th. Yeah. Like five o'clock. I forget. Yeah. Five. Yeah. It's a bunch of kids running around and it's fun. So, so it's, you know, it's just a way to just sort of say so that they have all I'll be. So, the answer I'll be there. I'll have my young tree um that says everything we do. And I'm gonna I'm gonna have the um the litter thing that says next litter pickup April 2026. just so people start thinking about it. Um, you know, and if anybody wants to also have some type of promotion uh that says, you know, this is what a rain garden is, this is what program is, all we're going to do and put on a table is that stuff. That'll work. Okay. So, I'll be there. Remember Matt did some type of game with the kids last year? Community day. They didn't do that. No, not a national night out. I don't I don't believe so. When is community night out rained out? I was gonna say it was rain last year. That's right. Yeah, it was. Yeah, it was horrible. Horribly rained out. You're right. You're right. That was a bummer. Okay. So, so um I think it's a good way just to say, you know, this is who we are. Um so we'll be there. Next thing is community day, which is September. Well, let's skip down. Guarded a park 9:00 a.m. to 100 p.m. Same thing. Table set up. Um, that one's not as kid. No, adults. Uh, some kids because they

like to get the ice cream and everything, but it's it's it's adults. And Ken and I were there last year and we had I think I spoke to Ken last year. Yeah. And and I think Melissa stopped by and I think Mark did and um and Bernie was there. Yes. With her family. And we probably had 10 I know you had more significant conversations because you know a lot more people. But I mean I had people come up and say, "Oh, who are you?" So it is a good opportunity to you know to sort of say who we are and so again um I'll be there. It's particular useful for the tree and rain gard advertising. Yes, it certainly is. So so thank you Melissa. So you know if you guys can prepare something that looks a little bit more um you know formal in a way of you know these are things that we're promoting that's a great day to do that. If you could commit to being there for an hour or something like that, that's a but even if they can't be there, whoever there should definitely be about this topic, but I'd like to see other people be there. So, I'm so Ken and I or you know, I'm not even sure Ken can be there. Um I don't, you know, I don't want to be the only guy from 9 to 1. I have it on my calendar. I thought it was 9 to 12, but I'll he usually there's Spence State ice cream to keep you happy. So, I know Ken will be there because of that ice cream. So I unfortunately a different commitment that day. So I would not be able to um the one that's on August 5th. Don't we need to do a look? We're not going to have another meeting before that. So you need to Yes, I I can help you on that. Good point. Okay. Okay. Good. Um so if anybody Well, let's put it this way. Good point, Ken. So I will have um you know, whatever I have to bring down. you guys will set up the the table and everything like that. So, we don't need to do anything. We I bring down a sign. It says EAC and then if anybody wants to bring anything down that's um you know that's that's material for their projects. Um please bring it down. Okay. If nothing else, we'll just we'll just

use our sunny dispositions. I probably that Okay. Got it. Okay. So then um let me just Oh, here. So, Melissa and Jeff, National Night Out. Um, you said 5 to 8 for that night. Yeah. Okay. Get there a little bit early to set up, right? What time do you think? Um, I'll be there at 4:30, I guess. Okay, good. Um, all right. So, then next is again Garden to Park. Um, I will be there. Ken, will you be there for that one? Yeah. Okay, good. So, Jeff and Ken Let's do and we need a pretty face there too. Okay, Nick. Um, everybody else, we will have another We will not have another meeting. So, so, um, if anybody wants to sort of How badly do you guys want to meet my childhood best friend? Um, she's in town. Oh, no. You don't just just bring me down. Something is just posting. I can bring you down. I'm going to stop by. I was going to bring them over anyways, but I wasn't going to just bring it down to the table. You don't have to be Ken and I will be there and we'll just, you know, it's it's fine. I was going to feed my nephew ice cream wall. Okay. I'm going to try to stop and and and trust me, there's not a lot that goes on there for us. So, if we just if more or less couple people standing there um material that people can ask about, that's all we need. That's all we need. It's not it's not a big deal. Okay. So, Garden Park will be able to fill that commitment, too. We've You'll definitely have a signup sheet for people as well for urban both events. We need that. It's a must. Yeah. For volunteers. Yeah. Yeah. I was going to have a signup sheet for Rainard volunteers. Yeah. Okay. We could just do generic and then send out the communication for every event. Yeah.

Okay. So, um get started with that. So, get me straight on that. So, so now I'm going to be down there and I'm going to say sign up for what? So, maybe maybe I can build a new signup sheet and we can have the columns they can mark if they're interested in training part of free waste pickup or anything. So, that way they can pick and choose what if you could do that. Okay. If you can set that up and email that to me and copy John. Yeah. And then then John can print out a couple copies, four copies or something like that. And then I can take them down to me. Yeah, that's great. Yeah. And that will feed right into our volunteer database because you have those drop downs right in there. So idea. Okay. Now now we're getting I will take care of that. Good. Yeah, that's that's awesome. Okay, so um National Night Out. So why don't we do it? Okay, it's by July 26. So then I'll have it for for Park and National Night Out. That's awesome. That's awesome. Okay. Um, community day is September 13th. So, what we'll do is we'll just throw, you know, we're going to have a table, but I don't know what we want to do. September 13th, but we don't know what we're going to do. So, why don't why don't we why don't we put that on next month's agenda this month? Yep. If I start doing some like research on like maybe snack activities if we want to do that kind of thing and if I want to have like maybe I don't know somebody with children. So I was thinking like Matt or Mark or one of them like Mark usually has a couple to them to see like is it fun? Did you is it tasty? Is it you know wasn't there like a candy warm game they did last year or talked about right? Was there something like that? Yeah. Brown up game. So they had something that Yeah, there there was something that they were doing that was fun. Was it the Was it like It was at the table. Does this go in the trash? Does this go

in the recycling? Didn't they? Yeah, that was mad at it. Like a Jeopardy type thing. Yeah. But your idea of researching fine cuz I Were you doing the I was at the table. You were at the table. Okay. Yeah, because I'm think Don was doing it or something. Don had some student volunteers assisting with and it was really popular, but it was back behind closer to the restrooms under the tree. And I just feel like you're using a lot of single use plastics with that. And also pudding is sticky. Like that's just as soon as I hear of like giving kids a cup of pudding and then walking around a hot parking lot for a while, that's so sticky. just they're not yours. They're not mine. I'm just I don't know. Yeah, you can brainstorm. We'll talk about it next month. Yes, we'll talk about it next month and see what I can come up with. Okay. Um so, we are good then on national night out. We're good then on Garden in the Park. Um we have a plan and um then moving on to um the deer call presentation, Ken, which is September 30th. September 30th, the Janine Flegel, she's the white tail biologist for the Game Commission, is going to come down and do a presentation. I'll introduce her. We'll be able to have questions and such. I think we can fit 118 here. And um I'm going to get Janine and and John together so she knows what uh AV equipment she has available to to use and stuff like that because I'm I'm sure she'll have some kind of PowerPoint thing to do. You putting it that you can put that many people. They said 118 in there. Yeah. Really? Yes. They're going to be standing room in there if it gets crowded. But yeah,

how many seats are in there today? So we have a lot more seats actually available behind that wooden thing. Sometimes they do have to set up a lot extra if they think there's something controversial happening. We can pack them in. Yeah. The the one meeting last you report had about that many people show up. But my big thing is, you know, getting the publicity out about this so that people will sign up, you know, through Library and and all of that. That's not my Billy Wick. I don't know what I'm doing in that area. So, do we need to sign up? Sign up would be best because then you know how many people are going to be there and that also gives you a chance to hook them into the volunteer thing. Okay. Okay. So, we need to start the thing. So, September 30th. Um, obviously we have two more meetings before then, but we need to start advertising this thing in August. You can even be advertising at least two events. That could be something that you have a flyer for just to show what's coming up. Mhm. And again, publicity for that is like um clueless. It's okay. I do think like our social media I mean you know again the relationship between staff versus volunteer social media like what should that look like? I mean everyone who has access to the town social media is a staff member. If volunteers want to help out and publicize in their own personal social media, that's always good too because we typically like the town's page is a member of like say Macandlas community forum. We pretty rarely post on there just because we don't want to we don't want to wait into potential arguments with people, but we have had success because Matt has posted in there, you've posted in there, you know. Yeah. So, I mean like any additional publicity is fine. Okay. But the town does do its own as well.

Does it pretty much go? We can give it to Abby and then she takes it and puts it out wherever. Yeah. I put it out. Abby puts out sometimes Diane put either or Yeah. Yeah. But his point is but there's certain things they don't do that you know maybe a member here can assist you with. Yeah. The forums. Yeah. The the Macan list. What is there two or three? There's like two. So community forum and um open discussion. Community forum is the bigger one right now. Really? Yeah. those websites, their Facebook groups and with our speaker series, we've always done that in conjunction with Northland Public Library and stuff, too. That's great. They also do a good job again. Again, on that. Well, okay. So, John, can you do we have any type of graphics that we can that we do we have any um historical graphics that we used in the past for a deer presentation that we can I'm going to go back and take a look and see what we did when we did the one thing in 2021. Yeah. I can't remember if we if I did something then or if we used what they put together because one of the things we did with the library, they had their graphic design, too. Yeah. Now we have a couple other people do graphic design inside the house. Aby's pretty good at it. I will say I've seen Abby do some very So I'll send an email tomorrow uh reminding you that that you know maybe we could put together something that looks like something I can post at our tables for these next two events that says upcoming event um dear management presentation September 30th. Uh be there you know watch for sign up on mc you know on on the theandas website. Yeah, that type of thing. So, are we giving it a cute name like Oh dear or any of my stupid ones? I had a list of whatever you choose. Oh,

don't don't let that phone when when we did the presentation back in 2011 on on on uh whatever that the computer thing we had 250 spaces all 250 taken and there was a backlog of people that wanted to get so should this be not just in person but on opportunity I don't you know like wait and see what the signup looks like. And then that's a good idea. We didn't see. No. Well, not if he got 250 plus on the last Well, that was in the middle of COVID, so people didn't have anything else to do, too. Yeah. I mean, that's easy to do to make something that was going to be an in-person, you know, especially if you're We've done an hybrid in there before, have we? Yeah. Yeah. So, that could be an easy thing to set up if you fill the room. You might not get as many people in person if you give that option as well though. So that's one potential negative too. Yeah. I mean, you know, I I know that date has never been I didn't want to say that, but you know, it sounds like it also could be, you know, super special. We're back doing CO. I don't know when we start again, but uh we could like we do here, we do use Zoom as a recording format. So it could be recorded and put onto our YouTube channel like we did last time as well because the video that still exists. Yeah, that works on YouTube. Janine, as long as Janine is fine with that, you need to get her. Okay, we can discuss that. I don't think she'll have any problem with that. Yeah, that's a great idea. I watched the one that you guys had. So I saw her present last time, the one you sent us, right? Can you send us a link? Well, somebody did, but yeah,

I thought it was informative. On YouTube, I was able to That's a That's a That's a great idea. It's a great idea. I don't other terrible possible names just throw out there. Stuck in a rut, bonding over wildlife, browsing for answers. These are not good. I love good pun. John, if if do you mind if I put you in charge of if anybody has ideas on all that stuff to run a terrible We can face. Yes. Don't put me in charge. John's in charge. You run it from Guess John's but he's good. Um, okay. Moving on then. Um, again, Birdtown, PA membership. I I'm I'm you know, that's a bigger discussion. We're we're addressing bird migration right now. I'm just going to table that again because I've got I've got slides and presentations, all that kind of stuff. I don't I don't want to be an inch deep and a mile wide. We've got bigger things that we're working on and I don't think that's that's one of them right now. So, um, let's move on. anything on um invasive species, education, expansion, joiner, don't have anything really new. I want to go through the parks before I have a good idea of what's going on within the town and then I h I've spoken to Abby about kind of some of my ideas, but nothing's I haven't had time to make anything concrete this month. Historically, we've talked about and have never gotten off the ground, and this is pre-aby of having a set of stewards for each park. basically is for Vestal. Um, but doing the same thing with Wall and with Potter and then with those stewards of doing it, you know, like they do in North Park, having an

education series for the stewards and them having responsibility for litter and invasives and things like that. And that that's long term that's what we would like to get to, but we're not there yet. But now we have Abby, so we can get volunteers and and so forth. So it's this is a time to start trying to recruit that for this time next year. Yeah. And even more than have Abby, we have a volunteer hub. So, you know, we might be able to find that person. That's that's a good point. But that's ideally what we what we would like is a handful of people that take ownership in the park and the trails and stuff and maintain them so that that's not falling back to Jack and I going out with a chainsaw and cutting trees down and stuff. U which we did last week, but uh and that's neither here nor there. Okay. Um the walk in the park is still scheduled for this Saturday. Mhm. What time and where? At 9:00 a.m. at park Potter. We going to all be able to park down there. Are we starting at the Potter Park? Um like the parking lot or are we going to go up to the I guess is it van driver? The new We're going to have We're going to have to We're meaning at the new part. The new park. Oh, no. No. Sorry. Old old old the old park. Okay. Then we walked down to the pond. Yeah, we're going to walk to the pond and then we're going to go up to the old and I would encourage you all to wear long pants because once we get past the lake it there is no more trail. Okay, good. So, there's kind of like a deer trail that they carved out there, but it's it's rough still. When Jack and I walked out, that's fairly rough. Yeah, it is. Okay. Um I think that um so I'll email now that we're definitely going to do this. I'll email and remind Abby tomorrow. I'll copy Jack.

Um, and I'll I'll copy Diane, too, cuz I think Dian's going to join us. And if there's not enough place to park down like near where the gate is, then we can park up at the top of the hill, then I can text the guy who owns the home there and be like, "Hey, there's going to be like a bunch of cars parked by your Okay. But when the boy scout or the Girl Scouts, Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts, I guess they're Boy Scouts came down. I mean, they they found room for all their cars and I was down there and Joe and Jack. Yeah, you can you there was room to make. You can probably get seven, eight cars down there. Yeah. So, I think we'll be okay. And then after that, um after that walk, um Nick, you would be available to if you come right back out the same driveway and you go a half a mile down a road, we'll go to the Phil site. That's you go to Phil site. ballpark and Brandt Trail. Whoever wants to stick around for a walk on 93 mile really nice trail. Yeah. And and walk that trail. Um they are, you know, you're more than welcome to do that. So happy and I would encourage I encourage it. So So um so Nick has, you know, graciously offered to stick around and do both of those and that'll be great. So the second one would be about what time? Depends on how long depends on how long we end up at Potter's. That can be that can be a fairly long walk. Actually, hour and a half. So, from 9 to say 10:30. Yeah. Ballpark. Yeah. We can text you as we're heading back to I was going to go. I was get my daughter and son-in-law and the baby to join us on the second one. Probably just give them a heads up as we're heading back then. You could you could probably text them when we're at the back to the car and then they can get to wall park by the time we get there. We're going to do wallpark from the top or from the bottom from the fill site. From the fill site, I always do it the other way around because it's uphill on the way out and

downhill on the way back. I've done both. I've I've I've parked at wall. I've parked at the north site. Just when people get tired, they much rather go downhill. Yeah. Yeah. True. Good logic. Mhm. Um it's going to be there. There'll actually be more parking at ballpark, too. Oh, there's there's not a ton of space to park at at the at the fill site. There's very limited. There's limited. So, yeah, let's meet at the wall park or park there, but we we ball fields are that out. That makes more sense. Yeah. Yeah. Okay, good. All right. Um, so we're doing that and I will again I will email tomorrow Jack Abby and Diane to remind them. Um, and then the uh junior EAC member discussion. Yeah, Melissa. Um, so Matt and I met up to talk about this last time. We had as a group decided it is worth pursuing. See if we get people who apply. Um, so we were sort of brainstorming just to make it a little bit more efficient. This year I've offered to help him be a mentor to this individual so he's not taking it all on by himself. It could be a lot. So we'll take it together. Um we were thinking of we need to right now the application is open and it is online but there's no close date listed on that application on the mechanism website. So we will have to get that edited to say a deadline. Um, speaking of the deadline, he and I were thinking if we close it out on August 22nd, that would work well. Um, school resumes on the 21st this year, so we'll be advertising for the next couple months. And then we would be able to do interviews the week of the 25th through 29th. Um, I have a vacation the week of Labor Day, which is what was throwing a little wrench in there for us to be able to approve of this member as a group at the September meeting and then take it to town hall so that they would be an

official member after. Okay. So, then the September meeting will be whatever that it is September September 10th. Okay. So, thank you. So, September 10th approval and then and then the council meeting is probably the next Monday, I'm thinking. No, probably the Monday after that. September. September. Technically September 8th. 8th. So it's before. Yeah. Yeah. The ETH. Okay. So, and then the 22nd. Okay. So, we would catch it on the 22nd then. Oh, good. Catch them on the 22nd. I guess unless unless the EIC can agree outside of a meeting environment, which I don't know if we're allowed to do. So, that's they need that has good that's Yeah. Okay. And then so then then we can then have them attend the October meeting. Yeah. Okay. Yep. Um Okay. You go with all that, John? Yeah. I was just going to make sure since I mentioned this before, there was one applicant for junior council was very environmentally oriented. Okay. So, I don't know if they would need to go through the whole process or not. Again, I wasn't sure if you we did want to do a full application process for this particular position. We were talking about still sending it out because I know we had people who might be interested from the roadside cleanup that we did. There were a bunch of students there who seemed like it might be something that they would do if they knew about it. That being said, we have no idea who would actually apply. Okay. So, it wouldn't hurt to share the information with that individual, too. I don't know if we could use their application from before or if it would have to be separate. Well, we can figure that out because we did an interview with them since they did it for junior counsel. Yeah, it's slightly different. But if you want to do an August 22nd deadline, we could start advertising probably this week or next week. And so with that, I did want to ask um what is the process for getting our information out? I guess going through you with Well, I mean, if there's is there anything extra you want to do with

So, thanks to we we need to add a date to the website. That's um easy enough. And then we were talking about depending what outlets you wanted to use. Yeah. Um social media posting then for us sending it out to the email list that we have. Um but to make it more formal I do know we have that EAC email address now. Right. Are we able to we can use that or yeah I can use my address because then it makes or or coming from you rather than coming from like one of our personal ones. it seems a little bit more official for something like this since we're going to be reaching out to some students as well. Um, and so then I figured we would just pull the names from everybody who was at the roadside cleanup event if you're okay if we send it to the rain garden individuals as well, unless you had any objections and same with the people with the tree um on your tree list for me. Any objections to sharing to them as well? No. Okay. Yes. I mean that's you know on that that I might have some recommendations of the people on the rain garden list that might be better than others. Um but we can definitely send it out to my contact who can reach all the Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts. Yeah, that would be amazing because we can share with them that this application is open through the 22nd and then we'll go from there. Um, so does that for I would probably send the email out and do the advert. I can give you that massive list then. I'll clean it up and send it your way end of this week maybe. Okay. Yeah. End of the weekend. Yeah. So early next week and then we can do um obviously through the events we'll be getting more names. Yeah. Opportunity to meet people especially at community day. Hopefully there will be some high school students there who might might be intrigued. Yeah. So, yeah, that's the thought process there. Um, any other input or ideas with the recruiting? You must be as wide as possible. That's

kind of what it sounds like. They have to be a town resident and they have to be an incoming junior or senior according to the restrictions. So the best way to capture those types of people or people who know those types of people. Yeah. But I think wide is good because last year we had very limited applicants. So that part of the concern. Yes. Okay. Okay. That's all I have. Very good. So I'll get that information to you this weekend, John. Okay. Sounds good. Great. Thank you. Um, next up is the uh the Bernie brought this discussion to the group last week or last month for the purple air sensor and um, John, do you have a actually yes, John S is also very enthusiastic about this and we just may end up buying it ourself as a town and installing it. You see one at Edgeworth and um, it was popular. it with the air quality. The county used to have like 20 different stations and then for whatever reason they cut it down to three, you know, one in in basically New Kensington where that power plant was. It's no longer there. One at the Coke plant and one at the uh where the bus is idle downtown. And the the American Lung Association thought it was great because it made our air bad so they could get more grant money. Um, I didn't think it was very representative of Alageney County Air when you measured error at those three spots and said that's what Alageney County Air was. But anyway, I was a minority on that. Yeah. But like this is what the world's looking like at the moment uh with, you know, everybody's individual, you know, monitors. So, we're much able much technologies come a long way that we can do this now.

Yeah. And like today was actually a really bad day. Um, and it kind of frustrates me that the weather forecasters don't really tell you that. Um, so I would love to, you know, when doing that, you know, maybe, you know, part of what we could promote is, you know, check uh check on purple airless, you know, monitor before you, you know, kind of do the open windows each day. Um, and you know, because and if you want, I mean, I could get a write up about, you know, good indoor air quality and what that means, but if you look, I mean, it's not bad right now. When I got in my convertible and put the top down, it was a 98, which is really high. It's u, you know, high for, but right now we're down to yellow. And, you know, sometimes the heat of the day will do it, but like there is Canadian error. And I do think, you know, again, as a EAC, the idea of like telling people um, you know, when to be aware. I don't know why the weather people, they're like, "Oh, tomorrow's going to be an orange day." And it's like, "No, it's actually going to be red and purple." You know, they I don't know what standard they're using, but, you know, they they're not consistent and they don't tell people often. Um, and they'll say people who have issues, you know, should look out. But anyway, I think it's just an important thing to get on people's radar because most people aren't aware. That could be a fun environmental tip. I think whenever that's set up Yeah. Yeah. And then Yes, that would be cool. guiding people to it and I mean I look at MC and you know I think I showed you all last time there's only one monitor and you know so now you'll be up top right in the north or central and but right now I'm the only one of the canless that's my house uh that's both my outdoor and indoor um

so I don't know if you guys are going to get outdoor and indoor um but I'll talk to him about it I think were thinking outdoor but I know but getting an indoor gets interesting for like you know it's informative is the best way to say I'll also say from the sustainability side depending if we ever wanted to talk about lead certification of the facility indoor does make a difference but yeah for overall community engagement it might not matter as much but I think doing indoor air quality research back in the 1980s Biggest thing is the turnover of the air in in the building. Yes. Like the old the old old buildings that turned over really quick. You didn't have problem with air pollution. Then they made things too tight. So you had a lot of y problems and so it's like one if turns over once an hour that seems to be the optimum. Yeah. But that's 1980 when I did that stuff. So no, but I mean I think those are uh important issues uh even for you know the employees who are in here to just become aware of what do you guys I do it all the time you know if when I cook my go up so there's just certain behaviors that you'll learn not to do like when you vacuum your numbers go up you know so yeah I think it's consciousness about that. Anyway, u but thanks for being willing to do that. That's excellent. Apparently, all we need is like an outlet s and a power our source and like Wi-Fi connection. So, you plug it in and Yeah. And it comes with a bracket to hang. So, but he he had one in his municipality before. That's what he said. Yeah. Really? Yeah. That's great.

Yeah. Is John gonna walk with us on Saturday? He's aware of the date. I don't know if he's probably remind Yeah, we'll just remind him. Hey, we're doing this on Saturday, too. Great to have him along. Yeah. Okay. Um Okay. Next up is um we'll need an August McMill tip. The historic August topics were e-waste and tree planting, don't feed wildlife, garden tips, invasive plants, and storm water. Okay. Well, storm clutter is a good one. Um drain drain um you know sewers and everything like that. Keeping them keeping them clean with all this rain. Well, I've seen it really clogged up. Yeah. So have I. That's an interesting one. Okay, so we did the um last week we did we did we we piggybacked off the Franklin Park one. Yeah, that worked out well. Okay, that was an easy one. That was that was a quick one. Why don't I Why don't I pull some stuff on You guys think the sword drain? I mean, because it's too, you know, we'll need we'll need to continue to, you know, promote the tree and the deer call and all that kind of stuff, but maybe um maybe we we take this opportunity to do this lighter one. Yeah, it's nice pause. Yeah, if you want to do the you know, like the deer in September and maybe the tree in October. There you go. you know, but yeah, I think uh storm water management and what people could do um storms having hunted out west and everything like that and like I familiar with when you get thunderstorms out there like you'll have a dry gully that's like 20 ft on the sides and there's no water in it and you have a thunderstorm and you're camping up Here you can hear

that water coming down and it's a 20ft wall. I mean it goes from dry to 20 ft. It's just it's incredible. Just incredible. Okay. So, I'll I'll put out something on that. Um we'll we'll move on that. Um okay. Uh report from town council. Nick, nothing really big at the moment. There were two meetings we held last month which some of you were at. One was for the um neighbors who live um next to Potter's Park. We wanted to gather their thoughts and hear their thoughts on you know what the park should be and what the new space should be. Then we had another uh public input meeting uh for the master parks plan just to hear that went very well more thoughts. We had a nice amount of people came out for it. So that's about it. and um and the uh the church on Peebles. Yes. Asking for an exemp that is resolved. Yes. Rule or whatever. Yes. So they're they're going to abide by the current code. Now just for clarification, when they're saying 65% that means when you have an acre of of timber, you have so many basal area of square feet of of timber. And when you're saying 60 a shelter wood cut would be cutting 65% of that. So having a 200 basil area that means you measure the diameter of the trees and and so forth. Um that's a pretty normal forest practice what they were doing. Um it's the the issue with this one here was is because of the deer intensity and not ending up like North Park with all barberry and stilt grass and all the invasives. And so what Jack was telling me they're going to when they all the tops they're going to basically concentrate them towards the middle

which impedes the deer being able to get in there and get out stuff and so trying to do the regeneration. So, they're gonna they're gonna they're going to top and and and leave other ones, but but make a bit of a bramble in there that they can't it's it's clear it. No, it's they're they're cutting about 65%. That's a normal practice that opens it up. And so then you have the seeds from the trees that are left behind to to fill in u since there's no understory around here. Um normally you wouldn't do that without there already being an existing understory. But that's just a that's just normal forest free practice. Okay. And so they pulled that and Okay. All right. Okay. That's it. Um Okay. Topics for next month's meeting. I have um we'll talk about community day September 13th. Uh we'll have um we'll have uh reviews from the Garden Park and National Night Out. Uh, we'll begin to discuss deer presentation advertising. Um, get a junior EAC update. Um, I'm going to throw Birdtown USA on there again. That poor poor thing. Um, but again, I I just want to say it for the record that um, you know, we are not John, can you bring up Can you bring up those links real quick? We're not going to discuss them, but um, let's just bring it up real quick so we can put it in people's minds. Okay, you got Yeah, that that was good. And then go just go down. Scroll down. That's a bird. Um, you don't. So, with municipal leaders, we engage and work together. Uh, restore habitat. So, you know, these are these are some of the things that they do. Uh, it is a small fee. I think it's $100 to join or something like that. But I but I need to

really find out what we're, you know, why why we're doing this and how we can be active in it as opposed to just saying we did it. And I didn't want to commit to being active in something when we're being really active in tree tree management and deer management and and you know all that type of stuff. If you look at the things that they do, I mean, they're all relevant to everything we're doing. Absolutely. Yeah. Absolutely. But not the cat thing, but we could get more into that. This is this is one of my my things with the deer overpopulation is is it reduces all the native flowering wild plants and stuff. So you have fewer song birds, fewer mice. Like you're you're exactly right, Bernie. So So it's almost like it's it's almost like it's all-encompassing. So this is Pine who just joined um the 74th B bird community in in January. They just joined. So, take a look at this because this is their website and they talk about this um and and that's great. And then it says upcoming environmental burden programs. They have things that are doing their goals. Okay. Go down a little bit further, John, because now they're talking about not just um you know, I don't think it says Bird Town. U maybe that is is that still just Bird Town stuff? Well, they're doing the lights out stuff. I mean, there's a whole listed. Yeah. So, so it's it's very robust. Yeah. And I didn't know that that we were ready for that level of that one until we until we get this other stuff going. It's just we're biting off more than we can say who who could champion this. Um we have a couple of folks on the here that are looking for things where on the committee or one of in the future. This is something I might be interested in taking on, but not right now. Yeah, I don't want I don't want to I don't want to lose focus on what's

really important for us. Okay, go down a little bit further, John, because I thought think what's now. Now, I have to tell you, this would be cool for our junior person. That's my first thought. No doubt about it. We have to find the right person. Now, it says accomplish goals. So, what this is telling me though, and it's not it's not necessarily the content. This is on the Pines's website, the municipal website. They have an EAC. Look, look at the the amount of information. I mean, should we be doing more um you know, as the EAC to and I and I know that we're already I mean, we're probably already the most vocal committee out there. I would say so, Nick. Um definitely. Yeah. I mean, andless or Oh, yeah. Yeah. We We demand the most We probably demand the most attention. We're the squeakiest wheel. There's no doubt. Committee. We're the party committee. Yeah. But but I mean I mean we could even be more. I mean look, you know, look at look at what they're doing in Pine. I mean this is this is this really is uh very allincclusive on on EAC information. So this is something to think about for 2026 statement right there include native and invasive regul. I saw this. So I'm like, whoa. Having a staff person. Um, he does things for the EAC in the same way you're parks person, right? Working for parks. I mean, we've talked about do we ever get an arborist or, you know, on a contract or a host of other things. Is there room for uh a staff person for these activities? Um, you know, like again, can we raise money for a staff person like that? very sympathetic to joint Schwint is very sympathetic to EAC's need. I would say that and and council as well. I would say necessarily be an EAC but more of a sustainability which is

I don't know if we have a role like that but that would be Senate over but it would help with the umbrella of sustain implemented we don't have it phrased that way but with the program that's starting this summer they might be able to start showcasing how it does all tie and then things we get a local action plan so let's just what what I'm saying I think is I you know this is a this is another big this is another big Bernie idea that, you know, let's get the hub, let's get the da, let's do this. This is a big idea for 2026, I think. And so, we can start to lean into this once we feel like we're on good footing with these things that we're working on right now. So, maybe it's a next step, another another maturation of of this committee is doing something like that with overarching, you know, maybe maybe it's not sustainability, but maybe it's maybe it's this type of bird thing. But sustainability, I mean, this is where I think, Jeff, like sustainability is all of it, right? It's Yeah, it's it's about human um health. Yeah. About No doubt about it. And we could tie it all together. We can whatever we want to call it, but we've got we've got good blueprints out there. We've got good I think we have things that we can build on. All of these programs are important to that platinum level. That's right. Like these are all doing these gets you having a permanent employee gets points, things like that. So, right. It it what it takes is what it takes is is it takes um it takes seven active members um because because five or six or whatever or you know, it takes everybody. It you know, it really really does. So, we just have to make sure that we're uh that we're not burning out the people that we that we have. So, um having said that, John, remind me again. So officer nominations are usually in those are in September. They're in September. Um but you're going to look into u you're going to ask John if he wants to sync those up with other dates for officer nominations and

other committees. Correct. Because he wants all the terms for all the committees are going to be calendar year going forward. Okay. So I want to see if they want to do that at least for officer nominations for Okay. So we do that annually. that will either be in September or that will be in January. Um but everybody needs to be thinking about eventually um you know is this the right um you know chair and and vice chair and do we you know that type of thing. So we'll eventually have to you know we'll speak to that and we'll we'll move forward on that. I'm I'm missing that. So they're going to switch um like I think my term ends at the end of August, right? Yeah. So all because of when EAC was founded, all the terms end August 31st. Uh but they're all actually going to end on December 31st. Well, whatever year whatever year you're in. Yeah. You let us know that. Yeah. So we can discuss that next. We could disc whatever you know. We could we can throw that on there and discuss that if that's changed at all. Okay. All right. So it's three four more months. I fully expect everybody to be fully engaged and and return to this group after uh you know even if they're expiring at the end of their term. I don't think that is my core expectations. Yeah, no one's expiring this year. I think next year. Yeah, it's Yeah, it's our next even years. Okay, with that um any other any other um thing additions for next month? Anything that I'm missing? Okay. Um, any other notes of this meeting? We've got two minutes or not. Okay. Looking forward to the walk. Yeah, really good. I still don't know how these places are. So, I will be completely You're going to see the hidden gem of this town like a pin on the map. So, yeah.

If everybody gets to the right spot. No. Okay. Don't take the Don't take a s Don't take a sedan. Take anything that's higher if you have it. I got rid of my truck now. If you need carpool, if you want to park at like Koala. Yeah. Or if you're going to park up the hill and then walk down, but you will bottom out. I was going to say they're four-wheel drive because you're saying they're not high enough. There's rots and it's it's in bad shape. It's all right. Yeah. Okay. So, can I have a um motion to adjurnn? to try the second please. All in favor? Very good. Another good one.