Town Council - Regular Meeting

Sure. I'd

like to call to order the work session uh for December 9th. Uh I'd like to start with the pledge of allegiance. Uh to the flag of the republic for which it stands. We're going to uh Billy Varner, Bill Varner um who was our code enforcement officer had to uh go out on an emergency call here moment a few moments ago or a little while ago. So, we're going to change the order. We're going to take the water and sewer rate discussion and move that up first and we'll uh do the code enforcement when Billy can return. So, uh Anthony or you or Jamie, who's going to take the lead on this?

I mean, I can start from this end and I will uh just uh sit back and listen and if I have anything to say, I will. You guys want to go first? Yeah, we can just go around this way. Just go around that way. If anybody has anything, we can bring it up. Whoever has a proposal. No water. Oh, yeah. Go ahead. You want me to go first? Okay. Hold going around this way. So, Gloria has something.

So, all all I have are questions. Um, and I I think to to decide on a rate structure, we would need to know the size of our system and what would be needed to service that system. Um, we would need to know our true operational costs and we would need to know um how our different rate structures impact the payers

and I would also be interested in why we decide on one rate structure versus another. I didn't make uh a proposal because I don't have the answers to all those questions. So, I was just wondering if we were going to get the answers to those questions. I think a lot of that's in the report that I saw. It shows the operating expenses and it has a bill impact chart so you can see how it affects the different tiers.

So what I saw I I don't have a real good idea on the salaries that [snorts] are servicing the system. I don't know how big the system is and I that might be because I didn't read the draft report but I don't know. Have we received a final report?

Does the draft have the information about how big our system is? The infrastructure. Yeah. The the infrastructure beneath how many lines of pipes, how how large is our system? And um I think we would need to know I think last time we were here we talked about comparing other municipalities of our size and understanding who service you know how many people serviced their system and then the last question I would have is if we are moving salaries are we saying that those people do not ever work on this system because if that's true it should be true. So, I don't know if anybody else has been getting these um they're going to my junk box emails about a billing service, but if we're going to say that Sumelia or Dan or um or anybody that's servicing the billing part of this utility structure is not ever working on this, then who is? and what is what is that taking from? Those are my questions. Um I really don't know why we would talk about rates before we had the answers to those questions, but I'm here to listen. That was one of the things I wanted to know at first too was the um about the salaries because that was a big part of our discussion and that's why I asked to do the time study but it it uh it became apparent that that was more challenging than we thought at first and um so I kept the public works salaries the same like I didn't take any of their salaries out because they do work on the system

but I don't agree with the town staff salaries being in there. Um, so I completely took those out. Um, I think I don't remember the exact percentages, but it was a little over 200,000 I think for the staff salaries. Um, so I took that out and um I tried to benefit the most amount of users but with my proposal. Uh, so the the biggest percent decrease was about 5%. So it wasn't drastic, but that's the best we can do with um trying to maintain a self- sustaining system. Um so if you look at the bill impact chart, it starts at zero and then it kind of dips down for like the between 6,000 gallons and um like 30,000 gallons. You get about 5% discount and then it starts trickling back up. But nobody sees more than like a five to 10% um increase until you get above like 250,000 gallons, but it's still not drastic.

Right. So, I appreciate what you were trying to do there. I would just say that it's based on a house of cards if we don't have the answers to the questions that I just asked. Anybody else have any questions on my proposal?

Anything else, John? Uh yeah, I'll just say that um you know, we've been I I and uh the mayor has been involved and other people um in past councils been looking at this issue for a long time and um so uh I'll just say that my stance is fairly concrete. It's been the same for years. Um, but really what we're looking at is we need to decide what the expenses are going to be and then we need to come up with a um a revenue stream that covers the expenses. Um, in my mind, I I agree with um with what John said. I I I don't really agree with splitting salaries, especially the uh office staff salaries. Um and so that would affect the um expenditures. And um as far as on the revenue side, I've always thought that [clears throat] um the fairest way to do rates is just a flat rate. Um and everybody pays the same rate and we don't pick any winners and losers with tiers or fixed rates or anything like that. And um we just based on um historical data of usage uh we use that information to set a flat rate across the board for everyone. Um a rate that covers the expenditures.

Thanks Dan. I have to say um I have not looked at Eric's uh proposal on a flat rate but I don't know what that would make everybody's bill but a gallon of water is a gallon of water is what that's a very simple very simple you know um and I don't know if that is something that we could look at It's would make this work be a lot simpler for everybody. Uh I I think um it's not just about us in today, but it's in for future councils also. Eric and mayor have both been here and and have already gone down this road. So, so I'd say that we should consider his input on that because he's already lived this once. Um, as far as a [clears throat] complicated Excel spreadsheet that we've all been working on, [laughter] I uh I have um things that'll help me in determining it. And it's just a a predictable and stability and a principle for our utility rates. It should have a stable structure, even adjustments, no pre-programmed flips, advanced communication, and guard rails against volatility. We should have whatever our structure is, whatever the

increases, if we do tiers, it's all there's a formula for it. Not because we're saying this person should pay more or that person should pay less. It should we shouldn't focus on what we're trying to achieve, but we should focus it on what's a healthy approach mathematically and and fair governance. Thank you.

Okay. Um, I have I have like a narrative story that I'll tell that kind of like uh describes my my proposal. Um, I wish I could have provided this to everybody, but I literally was typing the last pieces of it uh while I was driving back. So, uh, I just I was out of town for Thanksgiving and couldn't catch up. But, um, I do I do agree that there's like every scenario should be ran through. Uh, like we should test out every scenario to see what what really drives the best benefit. Um but but I have seven points. So I'm going to go try to go through these as as quickly as possible. First uh we have to again as a council recognize that the town had voted and and collectively we're a no growth no new capital connections but we want to fully sustain the system. I think everybody concurs with that. Um so because of that we have to then evaluate how do we maintain a system without growth and uh how uh and no new capital connections and how do we make sure that we can budget to that and how do we ensure that when you go to turn the water on or when you go to flush the toilet uh you can do so and that ties back to the conversations of of uh access. So I've really taken the approach of looking at the water and sewer system as as two points. One is access to the system. You turn the faucet on, the water comes out, you flush the toilet, your your uh bios go down. Uh the second point is actual uh usage, right? That's the the water coming out, you're taking a shower, you're you know, you're doing your dishes, you're doing your laundry, uh etc. Um I will say that my proposal uh in the current structure keeps the the rates the the way they are today. Um and and I have some math behind why why I say that, but um one of the realities that we have to remember is that we're three years removed from the first fixed fees increases and we're two years removed from when the announcement of the the 48% increase um uh that was

there. So uh as you as I talk, you'll hear that the differentiation of my proposal comes down to the variable fixed fees. Um, I would be intrigued with like a one tier, but uh, I went with a multi-tiered approach because I tried my I really did try my hardest to capture essences of each council member from all the conversations that we've had here. Uh, it won't be perfect. I'm sure I'll piss somebody off, but that's okay. Uh, uh, so we'll get into it from there. Um, with the fixed fees in place, we we I took a look at uh, the 48% increases that occurred in uh, uh, they were announced in 2024. They took effect in uh fiscal year 2025. So, uh last year, right? Yeah. Um so, yes. Um what I would comment on those is I I I again I I've always said that I don't think that the need to increase the rates have were wrong. I think that the approach was excessive. I think the approach was abrupt and and I don't think it was communicated at all why like there was no real communications plan. Uh and because of that it had a lot of people freaking out on what is going on? Why did my rates just go through the roof in the last uh you know my bill used to be like 200 something and it's reaching 500 something. I mean that's huge significant increases. Um, so, uh, and I will provide this to the the council, but basically I took a an approach of like how can what can we realistically reduce and roll back portions of that 48% that still maintains a viable uh uh revenue in income versus our our uh our expenses. So, um, I'll just list them off real quick. Uh, the logic here was just try to get down to the best that I I I felt was was the most effective for the town. So tier one was a 50% reduction, two was uh 40, three was 30, and tier four was 25%. When we get into the sewer rates, those are obviously the

sewer costs are way higher. So you can't just do 50%. That's a it's a significant amount. Um so those those tie in reduction would be tier one 20%, tier 2, 18, 15, and then 10. uh and and I did try to target because there was a goal or at least a sense of a goal to have some focus on water consumption and usage consumption. So uh the the highest decrease was uh in in the lower user tiers where a majority of our our residents do live. Uh I will caveat though that we have a higher population of uh second homes. So tier one was a real big challenge for me like how do I how do I approach giving a like a higher quality usage. You know there was discussions here about rolling in those costs into the fixed fees. Uh when I did the math it just it just wasn't math and like we would we would have to increase the rates on the other tiers significantly to make up uh to make up for that. Um my fourth point is that I would recommend that we also do a multi-year freeze on the rates. the rates can sustain for multiple years based off of the math between new gen and and where we're trying to project to go. So, we could do probably like a three-year uh uh variable rate freeze and that would give us the opportunity to do a lot of the assessments and really get after some of the com the questions like if we're going to do I don't necessarily agree with the long-term people study. I think we got to figure out what that looks like without wasting a lot of time. But you know how we want to approach that gives us some breathing room uh while still maintaining a stable uh uh long-term approach to our system. Um fifth I I think we need to talk about timing expectations and communications. So we already have a 20% reduction in the current rates in the system that is funded through the year. Um we need to do some testing. Uh Tyler Technologies when we talked about it earlier in the year is not the most uh the greatest system in in the world. just when we

tried to do the 20% reduction, we had we had to go talk to their data scientists to create a model to then test it and it took a few weeks to, you know, a month or two uh to get that back and then for us to validate it. So, um I I think since we've already uh absorbed the 20% reduction, we should just funnel that through to the rest of the year. The fiscal year ends one July. We're already going to go into the budgeting cycle anyways here. Laura, you were calling it out uh like we need to be thinking about this in February. We're already going to start budgeting. um there's no real point of rolling back a budget that's already there when we're just going to start budgeting again. Um and it keeps that in there. Um I did also look at uh administrative costs. So my the plan reduces the the people costs as I've been calling them to 254,000 down from the 6 uh 81,000. Uh that number is about 37% of what's currently in there. Um, I I've been pretty adamant that I don't disagree that there needs to be people costs in there. I just don't know what they are and we haven't been able to truly validate them. I think there's a lot of assumptions. I think there's a lot of I thinks. Uh, and it's not to negate the public works. It's not to negate the staff or anybody's uh, work that they do. It's just nobody's been able to come in and say this is this is where it's at. So, uh, I think we need to have some due diligence on there. And I think the approach to do that due diligence is still being figured out. uh the 254 I reached out to Dan, our treasurer, and said like what's a realistic number that we probably need to be at to make sure that we don't overburden the general fund uh and not uh overburden uh the utility the utility fund. So I tried to find a compromise uh there because we have other expenses coming with the water park and and a whole bunch of other stuff. Um the next point is I took in the consideration of expanding the the tiers. So, you know, instead of uh currently we're at 0 to 4, 4 to 8, 8 to 15, and then 15 plus, they would they

could change this into 0 to 6, 6 to 21, 21 to 36, and 36 plus uh to try and to try and capture um some of the larger families uh in those earlier tiers. Um I think that gives, you know, more breathing room uh without penalizing uh the larger families. Um and then the seventh thing is that there is you know the the proposal here does create a little bit of revenue overage uh to ensure that if like you know if we have some flu fluctuations uh in revenue we're not uh caught. Uh but also then to create a utility assistance fund uh that would help uh families who are in need. uh you know how right now we have a payment plan that you can come in here and and request assistance but you know how can we uh maybe help those who are truly in need uh you know through certain times so uh in short uh no growth shared infrastructure and stability uh measured and responsible reduction from the 48%s uh I will provide this it's I try to be transparent as defensible like I can explain the math and the logic behind everything uh I treated families and businesses uh on equal uh footings and then talking about uh a rate freeze for three years and a pathway to help those in need.

Thank you. [clears throat] I appreciate all the hard work that you've been doing. So, we need to find I guess what we have consensus on as a group for the most part. It sounds like we're pretty much lined up with the the tiers as far as the gallons go and everything. The only discrepancy I heard was like the the salary part of it. For some reason, I came up with um a lower like number than you did. You said you talked to Dan, so we'll we'll talk that.

I think the people number can just it really like there's there's no real way to get to a solid like you have to have it. It's really I try to find a compromise. Uh there is a discrepancy in our rates though. Your rates are not nearly like like you see a significant spike. uh you get I think your your rates start jumping uh around 100,000 it is the break even point. Yeah, but the rates are higher than the current like requirement and we have we we don't need that. Yeah, I think that's probably why my numbers are off is because we have two different salary numbers. So I'll have to talk with you later and rerun it. Well, your salaries Yeah, if your salaries are lower then you need to make it up.

I left public works in there. That's pretty much all. That's the only salary that I left in there. What's the five-year revenue um based on both of your proposals? Yeah. If you if you use that rate structure and you get to the fifth year, how much money does the town bring back in? Uh I only looked at uh the first year and it was around break even point. Pretty good. The first year it's a surplus of 54,000, but that was to account for fluctuations and the uh the the program to help anybody in need.

And then and then so then the the following years uh it will fluctuate because we have debt services that will go away and then we'll add new debt services uh based off the projections from new gen of of new debt services we would take on. So it will fluctuate uh up and down but over over five years probably closer to a half a million. actually like I do like his proposal. I think I just got like I probably just put some in the report wrong honestly, but I don't think we're like that far off. It sounds like a lot of our ideas kind of line up. Is it is it okay to reference the draft at all during this meeting? Because I just wanted before I said anything that I saw from New to talk about.

Yeah, I think it's fine to reference it.

Okay. So, with new gen their five years came up to about 2 million. But they were looking at 1460 for the highest tier. Um, which is a lot to just start off at, especially if we're looking at what we're going to be paying out ourselves. Um, and our area businesses and people who tend to use more water, I think that's pretty high. But if we can land at least close to halfway there, I still think that's a win. Um, so I would ask that if we look at it and we really look at those numbers, we need to know what we want to hit, what's our target, and then we can take it from there. So if we can get as close as we can to at least a million or half of that from what New Gen put out for the 2 million, then we'll be looking good enough with enough revenue to keep moving forward. But that also gives us an actionable goal to say, okay, if we can at least tain obtain somewhere close between 700 to a million, then we're doing good as far as revenue coming back in. And then we can see if we can keep those rates somewhere at least the highest at no more than 10 to start off with and then look at a feasible way to incrementally deal with inflation after that because really if they didn't do it that way and incrementally went up then we would be ended up hitting those numbers instead of just all at one time with no formula then going forward we can have a formula in place. But I think what you guys did is good work you know. So if we if we have those attainable goals in place and we make sure our revenue is good and we have an actual revenue number we want to hit, then we can go ahead and wrap this up and do something else.

And and every tier would see a reduction. So when I was looking at the the tiers, um I'm sorry I'm not like super excited. I'm just tired from work today. But uh every tier saw a a decent reduction like in the water rates. Uh the most expensive tier is still less than the current lowest tier. uh close in in the sewer rates with the exception of tier four uh which is which is higher than than some of the previous year or the current tiers. So, I'm going to just ask some questions I pretty much know the answer to just so we all kind of yay nay if we're in agreeing. And uh so we are saying that the fixed fee structure of $150 $100 for water and or $100 for sewer, $50 for water. The same balance that our bill is currently at. That's the consensus that we're sort of [snorts] looking at in the models. It looked like the models were all in that

right now we have that price minus 20% is what? We're We're not I I I'm not uh So, are you wanting to extend the 20% or or do you want to So, what I think we should do is rates with the 20% add a tier to our business class.

Okay. So, you are Okay. So, let's just So, we're talking fixed fee just right now. Not We'll get to that. So, fixed fee right now. We're saying that without the 20% discount, I don't think we can continue to put that in. If we want to, we can discuss that. But right now, our fixed fee is $150 total. That's $100 for the sewer and $50. Is that generally what we're agreeing to? Nothing defined. Just in general, is that what we're agreeing? Based on the proposal right now, with what I've heard, I have no problem with that.

Myself? Yeah. Okay. So, now on our tier structure, we're looking at and and I have to say I I didn't look at a single price tier. So, that's something that we could revisit on just a singular uh tiered, but the our current bill where it has tiers, I think there's one, two, three, four, and they're different rates. the the lower the tier, the lower the volume. And as it goes up, it increases. Right now, a gallon of water, if it goes to a business or if it goes to a residential, is the same. And it's the same. I heard Lori say you want to have commercial tiers, correct? So, we can revisit we can revisit that, but I'm just trying to see right now, are we looking to have a four tier structure or one tier structure? We can have an asterric next to a a secondary tier. We'll get that person over there to pay more a tier, but I'm not sure. I like the thinking of that. But right now, we're looking at a gallons's usage. I think Jamie, his proposal really looked to cover a large amount of of people. I thought it was a little too ambitious to be honest. I'm I'm surprised we he was able to get his numbers to look that way. So, I'm cautious of it, you know, but he's run them. We've talked about it and I and I I trust that he's he's done the work on it. So, I I I like the tiered volume structure that he has in place for the

gallons. Everybody uh has had notice that the the the rates that they're currently at. We're just shaving a few dollars off. We're not putting overinflated salaries inside of the utility bill, but just right now, are we looking at the tiered structure similar to what we have it right now? Mine mine was pretty much the same as Jamie's. Okay. It was off by 3,000 gallons at the second tier. But yeah,

I will pose one question and I do agree with the tiered structure. However, we have three pricing signals that impact residential customers and only one that impacts some of our higher users who profit from their water. that in particular I don't find appropriate logically from the usage standpoint and the impact of the system and I also don't find it logical based on need to use type of situations water and sewer is a is a necessity so um

I would

I'd like that address and and I would als also emphasize the fact that if we are not accurately accounting for the cost of running this system and we're either misrepresenting our operating costs and putting them in the general fund or we're taking the general fund and we're augmenting the system. Either way, your everyday taxpayers are impacted because every single dollar that you misrepresent or move and don't charge somebody that maybe should be charged for it is a dollar that isn't used for them either for their services or for a project they they need for safety, for enjoyment, um or

dollar. So with that the tax revenue you're speaking of, which is we're in a whole different conversation now. Are we speaking property tax? Are we speaking income tax? What pro what category of of revenue are we speaking of of of the citizens not being represented? So the general fund is broken up. So this is a completely different subject that is detourred from this. But we can discuss that later on. But right now we're discussing this if we we want to get into on budget cycle to discuss different revenues to make sure that property taxes and income taxes aren't affected this. We can do that. There's many different revenue streams that this town receives.

So we're just staying on this topic though,

right? So on this topic, my belief I've been consistent in my campaign. have been consistent on this dis is that this should be an enterprise fund that is self- sustaining and the reason is is because it's critical infrastructure. It is infrastructure that you cannot ignore that cannot fail and it is the most expensive thing that a municipality is going to run. And so if we continue to augment it with the general fund, the general fund might not even be able to keep up. It's we really if if we do the citizens one favor it would be to make this fund what it should be which is a enterprise self- sustaining accurately reflected fund. It would be a huge service to everyone if we did that. Um we will not be doing that if we're misrepresenting costs. And I think everybody that's trying to work these numbers is finding out that the costs are higher than anybody wants them to be. And nobody wants to make anybody pay more. But that's one of the hard decisions that we have to make up here. We have to make decisions that are responsible and they don't always make people happy. Everybody wants a reality that is best for them. Everybody wants to pay less. I mean, that's the reality. Nobody wants to pay more. That's that's never going to happen. But if the system requires it, I think we need to get it as close as we can and have a plan to make sure that we are working towards that because I watched over the last couple years, millions of dollars

being misrepresented, millions of dollars transferring out of the general fund to this fund. And I don't know that I and we're talking about it right now. We don't even know how much it really costs. And so I thought that was what New Genen was going to help us understand. We're up here a year later. We still don't understand it. And I think we should before we make these decisions.

So let me I just want to chime in real quick. So um like I I'm I'm going to throw back to you and say like I've come up here many times and broken down the numbers about how the revenue I mean it's revenues versus expenses, right? That's this this the simplicity of it is is you know if we're if we're under our expenses we're we're negative and if we're over we're positive and so we're trying to hit the fine line of of revenues and expenses close as possible while giving us some flexibility to operate you know because there's going to be differences but uh I I what I would ask for you is like come in here and help explain where you're seeing this misappropriation and miscalculations because when I ran the numbers and We worked it with the treasurer and we worked it with new gen and we've worked it like across the board. The message is the story is is there. It's in the like the numbers don't lie. The story is there. Oftent times when you're talking about, you know, borrowing from the general fund, it's because for years we didn't do a lot of capital improvement projects. So they budgeted a half a million or or you know 400 grand in the utility funds. They didn't use it. I went back into a different fund and then three years later, years of that and then it gets pulled over. Uh and because because at the end of the day, what I've always come back to and said is there's this conversation around how this town is losing and hemorrhaging funds, but we have a surplus of 20 plus million dollar sitting in the bank. And you do not generate a surplus when you're hemorrhaging funds. Now, now I know what you're going to say. You're going to say, "But we haven't executed capital projects." But we have a we had a surplus of a half a million dollars this year with an enormous amount of capital project funding built into the budget this year. Next year, we're going to pull 12, you know, millions of dollars out to put a down payment on the water park, you know, there. So, and we're still sitting very nice when it comes to

our funds. and we're still looking at generating excess income when it comes to revenue to ensure that we're not putting ourselves in a position to do this. So, I I I think when you say we're up here and our responsibility is to make the hard decisions, uh I I don't think we can just toss out uh that it's hard when you got to come in here with the the numbers like show me where it's not because the numbers are in here on that that that Excel spreadsheet. It talks all of OM expenses. It talks the assumptions. It shows you a bill impact chart. It allows you to see what the impact's going to be on the users. Uh, you know, you just got to go in there and play with it and look at all the data. Is it confusing? Sure. But but to say that it's not available is different than saying I'm struggling to consume it. That's a different narrative. And if that's the point, then then sure, we need to do something about that. But to say that no information and here we are a year later that is that is not an accurate statement.

So what well it kind of is because we don't know how big our system is. We do know how big our system is. We cost to maintain it. I mean we also look at the expenses. We also have heard that it is a struggle and if it becomes much bigger that we would need to add people. Uh I also know that a lot of our staff is double and triple hated but until until Hold on. Until the town administrator comes to the council and says, "I need an increase in my budget to hire additional people." We are making assumptions and trying to build assumptions in for future years into current rate structures. That's not how we should be budgeting. That's not that's not good budgeting practices. I agree. I don't

the town but the town administrator has not come to us and said, "I need four new people on public works. I need two new people on staff to do this." And the moment Similia does, then I'm 100% on board with addressing those needs. But but we continue to say that there's a shortage in people and we then then put it into the request to say that we need to budget for additional people and where they'll go and then in our 2027 budget we would do it. But but we're right now we're talking about it as if it's factual and and no request has come in.

That that's not my complaint. My complaint is that we don't have that information. [laughter] So, we we did just hear somebody from our staff say that that maintenance can be a struggle with the number that we have. Um, I did watch the majority of our ARPA money that could have been used for anything at all spent on the utility fund. I don't believe that was included in the utility fund budget in past years. That wasn't this council, but that was a different council. That was a couple million dollars. Um, if you have a surplus because you don't get the projects that you say you're going to get done, I don't consider that a surplus. That's that's that's an issue with either um you know either you don't have the staffing to push those projects through or you're not doing them for some other reason.

Our proposals don't take any public works out.

I I'm going to I'm going to I'm going to recognize Dan. I I have to say I spent a quite a bit of time [clears throat] factchecking and and tracing down information both before this council was elected and while this council was elected before I took DAS I spent nine months traing payroll down who if you want to the hypothetical pointing fingers of where that millions of dollars I and show you it wasn't from any wrongdoing except for maybe the past administration paying the employees an gross amount of money. It it wasn't any wrongdoing for people here. It's no big conspiracies theory, but I can show you the numbers of how much the past administrator got paid last year. It's pretty it's pretty embarrassing that the people that previously sat up here spoke so highly of somebody they paid over $500,000 in 2024. That right there is a big answer to what we're looking at.

So I I don't think that's really part of this discussion. This discussion is about us looking at what we're going to have as rates and the structure and and and the volume amount that goes forward. not about I heard this and I heard that. I think that these this part of the discussion can be something that we can do when we're out of work session amongst each other before we get back up here again. I think when we get here, we should have proposals, talk numbers, say what we want to do, what the plan is going forward after the work is done so we won't get off tags like this. Eric?

Yeah. Um, I actually want to just say a couple things I think that might bring some progress to this process. Um, we're really talking about two separate discussions and two separate issues and we should tackle them separately, not at the same time because it gets confusing and people go off of the subject and then we're talk, you know, things get lost. The two subjects are we need to the first thing we need to do is come to a consensus on the expenditures in the fund. Correct. Period. Right.

We have to come to a consensus as a body what the expenses are going to be first and we should do that by itself and not consider anything else when we're doing that. and then we can talk about the formula to how how to generate the revenue to meet those expenditures in a separate discussion. I fully agree. We have consensus on the expenses leave public works. And the

the biggest thing that I see because I agree with what you've just said, Eric, is that you with all of the proposals, some view it as an enterprise fund and some do not. But if you don't come to a consensus, that's whether you view it as an enterprise fund or not is going to determine how much money you need to operate it. So you all need to decide or come to a consensus or an agreement that you're going to move forward in one direction or the other because proposal to you're not comparing apples to apples otherwise. You're comparing apples to oranges and it's diff difficult to make a decision from there.

Yeah. I propose that the next maybe for the next work session we put something on there that we we're going to discuss. We're going to discuss and try to come to a consensus on the expenditures in the fund. What expenditures are do we as a as a body believe should be in there? What's that total number going to be? And that's it. We don't talk about anything else other than that. And then a work session once we once we resolve that another work session we talk about the rates the formula of how to generate the revenue to meet the expenditures that we already agreed upon. That makes sense. And that way we perfect sense.

All right. And I I would request that staff's support to know what we should be um funding to operate our system. the staff recommendation.

Yes. And I think last time we were here in a work session or it might have even been a meeting, we talked about um finding out from other municipality mun municipalities of our size what it takes for them to operate it and just kind of understanding where we're at in regards to that because I think um from what we've been told the WSSC number of people would be much greater than the number of people operating our system currently. Yes. Okay. Right.

And the previous council put something out or administration that the utility fund needs to be self- sustaining to be eligible for certain grants. Can we look into that and just verify that? I think that's part of the discussion too.

I add one asked to that as well. Can we look at the 20 five fiscal year budget and see if we're what we would be potentially changing just a little bit of understanding of why the recommendation would now would be different than what we approved in 2025. So just a reconciliation uh there um sorry 26 my bad. Yeah, 26. So, yeah, because I I'm I'm assuming it's probably going to be pretty close to what's in there because that's what we recommended. But, uh, just whatever the changes in any recommendation, just some some understanding of the why.

Exactly. So, we're we're back to the salary conversation. [laughter] major expenses, your salaries, right?

You did. I I think we just live in this uh if you just Google a vicious cycle, that's what we we currently live and operate in with this subject. So, we're out of it now because we just spent 45 minutes on this. What's next? [clears throat] I think

yeah, thank you for summarizing so well, Anthony. Appreciate that. Uh, Bill Varner is here. So, uh, if you would like to come up and give us information on code enforcement, we appreciate it. Thanks, Billy. Welcome. Before you get start started, Billy, just want to preface it by you all were given a memo that was informed by the information that was shared from Billy um as well as the current town code and you were provided a copy of the code enforcement code um for your reference. Um the biggest thing that I wanted to highlight is that our this is an area that you might need to be considering. we will need more staff support around because right now there's no proactive code enforcement and Billy is a shared service. So he does code enforcement in addition to all of his other public works responsibilities which is um very taxing and he he did that to he volunteered to do that um and I'm appreciate appreciative of it. Um but that's just something that you all need to be mindful of as we go into the next budget cycle.

Yes. If if anybody has any questions about anything, well, you can do your opening statement now. [laughter] Would you like me to read it? Sure. Or or just just summarize whatever.

So, just uh missions of code force. I'm sure everybody has read everything um the uh process of what I do and h how it's done and everything. Um, and I'd like to offer any one of you if you'd like to sit down one-on-one, I can actually walk you through it so you understand it better. Um, it's I didn't think it was going to be so complicated when I volunteered for it. I was told it was like maybe four hours a week and it's like I get like five five or six complaints a week. So, it's I could be in the middle of a water leak and I'm got to jump out and go look at something. So, a lot of times it's something, a lot of times it's not. So,

and many of the complaints, not many thankfully, knock on wood, not many of the complaints, but some of them will end up in court and so he has to be available to um respond to that as well. Correct. Um what I will just mention to everyone um as a little bit of an alleyoop to you Billy is that right now the way that the process works is town residents call in what they perceive to be code violations and then Billy goes and investigates it. Right? So, it's a a mixture of people calling in concerns and if public works is out in the field and they observe something, there could be um code violations that arise from that as well. So, that's just something that's important for you all to know. There's no one driving around right now like you know checking proactively. Most of it is reactive um based off of the calls or complaints that we receive at town hall. Are the calls typically neighbor to neighbor or are they like tenant to landlord or

most the majority of them are neighbor to neighbor? Really [laughter] fun. I mean is it any I'm sorry. Is there anything that you want to let us know that you think we should know that could help you or like you know? Um no I'm fine right now. I mean, I'm just just if there's anything I'm doing wrong, let me know. Except for those days when you just irritated, but but you but you're good. Like, you don't feel like you need more people or

I'm I'm good right now. I mean, if if as long as Similia and Bruce think I'm doing a good job, I'm happy with that. Um, we brought this to the work session [clears throat] because just for awareness or you seeking some changes

in response to a request by Councilwoman Black Welder to have more understanding of how our code enforcement process worked and for us to make sure that we have the code report included in the town administrator's report on Billy's behalf working with him for almost 20 You'll see documentation of a lot of things, but that doesn't capture what I see. Like we normally have powwow in the morning and Billy's on the phone with residents. He tries to resolve everything at the lowest level. So a lot of things are reported. You may not see in a report because he's called them or he's knocked on a door, left a door. Hey, can you do X, Y, and Z? Oh, I can when so and so. Okay, give you a timeline work. I've seen him go out of his way to work with the citizens, right? The goal is not to end up in court. So you may see so much in paperwork, but what you don't see is the hours that I've seen. I'm like, Billy, get off the phone with whoever that is. We got to go x, y, and z. So, and I commend them for that because the goal is to to remedy it, right? And then you have to kind of be a counselor to neighbors and then you hear about everything that's happened over 20 years and you so I'm just saying it's not a easily approached job. You have to have a good demeanor and ultimately he tries to solve it at the lowest level. Now, on the other hand, when it goes to where we end up in court, it's an extremely long process. You've got paperwork, fill out this, do this. Did you send a certified? Did you send this? Did they pick it up? Did they didn't? You're 18 months before you go to court. So, when the neighbors complain or you may hear certain things in the public, I can tell you we're on it, but the process can be a long time if you end up in court. That's all.

So, just a quick question for you both. When when something does happen that's worth being reported and that we know about, does it end up under the public works or do we get that information anyway or do we need to have a separate thing from you all the time and make it more tedious even if it's smaller things that's not worth reporting? I'll let you guys answer that. As far as a report goes, yeah, I mean I I can I can make sure there's a report here for the council every on council meetings,

right? But my my question is this. If you have things that happen and you talk to somebody over the phone and it's over with, like what things are worth reporting, what do we definitively need to get from you separately that can't go into public works or something else? Like what if, as far as you're concerned, what I want to do is make sure it's not a tedious thing and have you have another thing to do and it's just somebody called and said something and then I went and it wasn't true and then you got to write it out for us cuz I'm not going to read it. Yeah, I'm I'm not going to write that out.

Right. Okay. So So the thing is is if there's a way that we can do this where it's not as tedious because you have such a workload and there's only specific things that are of importance for us to know, then that's cool. We can figure that out. But as far as you giving us a report every month and it's just, you know, the wind blew the wrong way, you know, right? We just killing paper for unless it's an initial case that I I had started then everything else is kind of by the wayside. I mean it's not, you know, if it's something I'm not putting in concate. I'm not going to report it. Yeah. I guess it's up to you guys how you all want to do it, but I just don't want to make it tedious.

Any one of you are welcome to to sit down with me and I'll I'll show you everything how it works and so you understand it better. I will say that my main concerns revolve around the tenant to landlord situations. And I do know firsthand of multiple situations where a tenants's residence is not being cared for by the landlord. Those are code enforcement issues. And I'm just wondering how that is handled in our town. if if a tenants's complaining about, you know, things not being done, um they can come to us and we can actually send an inspector in there to check things out.

Okay. So, that's that's the kind of thing that I would expect on a report. And then um you know, it's good to know what people are noticing or complaining about. It it gives us a good idea because on this issue, I'm blind. I don't know what people are are concerned about. Please set up a meeting with Lori. What's that? Set up a meeting with Lori. Absolutely. I would [laughter] be happy to meet with you. Can I ask a question um regarding So, um like code enforcement goes out, you find a violation. Um, what's the time for the the owner to rectify or is it dependent on

what it is? I mean, if it's something like car with dead tags, I'll give you 30 days. Get it out of here.

Would it be helpful for that to be because I when I look in the code right now on what's provided, it it talks about a fine, but it doesn't give an explicit you must fix it by X date. And and it it makes me think of um uh when I was campaigning, there was a house that I walked into uh and because the resident was like, "Hey, come check this out. You want to see what you should fix?" And I walked in and there was literally black mold coming from every aspect of the ceiling. And I walked right out and I was and they had been living in that for a long time. And it was an interesting conversation. I know it's been rectified because I know the new tenants there. I followed up with them. um like I told them to call the town, but I you know like as I think through and I look at the code um the only way to solve sometimes those challenges with the tenants and I actually think about the houses back here the the gentleman talked about sparking light uh you know outlets and and that kind of stuff like how do we force them but it's not written from what I was what I've been reading it's there's nothing explicitly forcing a timeline other than and I don't know but but I I've also been up here preaching that I'm a big believer in not overindexing on it as well. So, I'm looking for maybe that's a conversation we have offline too because I'd be looking for some guidance on best practices as well.

I don't want to speak for Billy or Smelia, but so just to be clear, code enforcement, town code enforcement is drive down the street violations. If you start asking staff to go into tenant renter relationships, that's that's under the tenant sign up for agreement. That's that's a whole different ballgame. Billy's not going around to complaints where someone says they're have mold in their house, right? Because that would be never ending and that's a relationship between the tenant. That's why we have the rental program. Um, and I just want to throw that out there because that that would never end and that can just I think that's why we have the rental program. Correct. So that's under inspection a different thing. I just want to be clear about that.

So then let me follow up with that. If if that would be under the rental program, then I would say, do we need to, you know, I know we're looking into aspects of that. Do we need to rethink our rental program? Because if we have a habitual violator of said program who continues to provide an unsafe environment, uh like for example that that house, why would we continue to issue a rental license for that property if they can't maintain a a safe environment? I think it was on page like 40 of that draft. I sent you didn't read it.

Summarized. all of those things as far as um rental programs. Uh there's been a lot of work done. So that is I'll reach out get y'all's feedback as that comes, but it's it's taking shape. That is not your lane in any way, shape, or form. Um it it's something that I'll have you and Jay weigh in on. Uh I probably have some things we can discuss. um probably offline or whatever. Just kind of some checks and balances in regards to code enforcement. Sure, we can go from there. But uh yeah, if you uh need any staff or anything,

but yeah, I I think a good neighbor approach sounds like that's what you're trying to do with your job. So, thank you. Yes. Thank you. All right. I'm a little bit confused though because I am under the understanding that buildings are the responsibility of the code enforcement officer. So is that incorrect?

No, it's not incorrect. But when you get into specific tenant landlord, it becomes a little bit more tedious and we're not currently staffed to support that. So right now when someone applies for a renters's license, the town has contracted with an inspector who goes out and inspects the unit. And so we do have a a level of oversight from that perspective. But my understanding is that short of someone feeling empowered to call the town and say, "Hey, there's this issue." the town doesn't typically get a lot of of the complaints um that are happening within individual units. And my my experience has been we don't actually get called in until they take it to court if they decide to take it to court and then that's when it becomes apparent.

Okay. Well, I I I would like to continue this offline. Yeah, absolutely. Good lead into our next topic, Fishing Creek. I thought I would do that. [laughter] Would you like for me to go to the next topic? All right. We'll talk about Fishing Creek discussion and updates and it is uh Sumeilia. Okay. [laughter] So, um as well, thank you, Billy. Thank you, Billy.

Thank you. Um, as you all are aware, um, with the the Fishing Creek fire or the 2025 fire has further underscored the ongoing issues, um, that the residents in that live in Fishing Creek, Courtyards of Fishing Creek, have been experiencing. Um, so we've [clears throat] really been taking time to figure out how we can support uh, improvements as a town. um from the perspectives that make sense for the town to do. So um there's a number of different ways we've been looking at it. First was the impacted residents. So those who directly lived in 3955 who were displaced. There were 13 households that were displaced representative of 25 people. Um as of Friday, 10 of the households have been they found alternative homes. So they were staying at um the Rod and Rail. uh but they now have 10 of those households have homes. Uh the last time I spoke with um the county about it, they were working on solutions for the remaining three. So that conversation happened last Friday. So by um next week I should have an update on where things are now with the fundraising efforts that we did in partnership with Bayside Baptist. sending everyone through their portal. Um roughly $30,000 was raised and that money is all meant to go towards helping with the security deposits and like first month's rent that would be due for the um impacted individuals so they could get into new homes. Um and the fundraising effort has now shifted to Calvert Family Advocates and so they are the ones who are um collecting uh any donations that

people want to give or the there's still a lot of um product and uh donations at the community center because Bayside was working in partnership with the community center and uh the community businesses really came together to make sure that the families were supported while they were staying at Rod and Realel and that is inclusive of the Rod andreal staff who had a separate um collection for donation of gift cards for the families that they would distribute amongst the families that were staying with them. The town also received gift cards for anyone who wanted to donate gift cards and we would give them to the county and the county would determine how they wanted to distribute them, place them in envelopes and then we would hold the envelopes here for the families to come and pick them up. So it was a really fullcourt press to make sure that the families were supported on the front end because that's the biggest thing was making sure that they all had homes. Now that we have um we're nearing the point where everyone is in a new home, um the next opportunity for the town becomes figuring out how we can uh advocate legislatively to make sure that we can address the ongoing issues that remain at the the housing development. So that's what shifts us into code and policy. So, um, we pulled all of the make we first wanted to make sure that all of the rental licenses were there and up to date. Um, we found some what look it looks like compliance, but I'm not sure that it actually isn't. So, we have to run through it with a fine tooth comb. Right? So, for example, if you look at 3955, which was the building that burned down, you see a list of um 10 units that have licenses. But if you don't have the visibility to know that there's actually 15 units in there, then you wouldn't know that there are five

that don't have licenses. Now, the building is burned down now, but this is just representative of what could be happening at each of the units. And so, we actually have to go through that with the fine tooth comb because it appears that they're complying, but when you actually look deeper, the there's a question of if they're truly complying. um of the licenses that um [clears throat] exist for 3955 uh there were no failures if you were to pull the the inspection report. So the issues that are that are prevalent um or prevailing we're I'm not sure where those issues are coming from but they're not being caught on the inspection report. I have not yet received the fire marshall's report for the cause of the fire and I know that the reported cause of fire for the last time that this happened was cigarette, right? So, it's easy to look at it and say this the building the property has issues and that's why it burned down that but it doesn't always mean that that was truly positive. there might just be a correlation. And so I want to be very cautious that we're not making those like statements or accusations until we have the full report. Um, but we're but until we receive that, we're making sure that all of our all of our ducks are in a row regarding the documentation that we need to have for the programs that exist now and how it aligns with our code. Um, so the next thing is legislative. So, I reached out to uh Maryland Municipal League to ask them what the best practices are and what we need to do um to support the repeated safety issues that are at a a development that is considered low-income housing because that takes it into a different category, right? Um and so they gave me a whole

list of of um things that we should be looking at and evaluating and so we're working through that as staff. Um, aside from that, we I received a call last week from the governor's office and so they are aware of what happened and um they have asked for me to put together a number of documents so they can better understand the situation and also figure out how they can better support us moving forward. So that's what's happening legislatively. The other thing to note is that um this particular uh residence receives money from HUD and DHC and so there's a federal level of inspection that's supposed to be occurring but also there's a federal level of support that we're supposed to be receiving for these homes. So, uh, when I spoke with the county about this, the current plan is that in sometime early in the new year, we'll sit down with DHCD to figure out what specifically needs to happen um, from from their perspective. And that'll be critical because while like we are we have to make sure that we're holding up our end of the bargain to make sure we're looking out for our residents, but there are other stakeholders who are responsible for making sure that things go well for the people who live there. And so that's what we intend to make sure happens that we're all coordinated when it comes to the P. So we've talked about what happened for the people who were living in 3955 which was the affected building, but there are still people who live there now, right? And and our concern is also making sure that the town's doing what we can to support them as well. So um Jay met with the fire department. they've come up with two pretty lowcost solutions. And so drafting that up in a memo, you'll see

that um what the town is suggesting be done, they are truly like low cost. Um and so there are many different ways we can advocate for the resources to come, whether it's from the county or um the state or federal to address the issues that currently exist. in my understanding from the conversations that I've had with the governor's um intergovernmental affairs team is that there are grants that these whoever owns the unit could be applying to and they just haven't. So if they need support in doing that, um I personally would be more than happy to help them figure out how to do that because it's it doesn't take very much to make the other buildings safer. Um, so that's our approach there and Jay, if you want to speak to the sophets uh replacement or the installation of the attic fire suppression systems. Just in a nutshell, I think you captured it perfectly. Being firsthand witness to the first fire, you know, two fatalities secondhand. There's some in my mind some simple right now solutions we can do um to help put the fire out, help. So I have engaged with the fire departments. I call them simple things. Maybe they're not, but I think we can make something happen quickly because we all know this can be a long drawn out process while we have residents living under the same condition right now.

Thank you, Jay. And then lastly is how to support the residents that live there in terms of their own like advocating for themselves. So really giving them the tools they need to be able to advocate um with their management property management company which they seem to have difficult times with. And so there are uh plans underway to have conversations with a number of them who've reached out. Um Adrienne is one who said she would she would be willing to take the lead on that. But letting them know that we can put together a workshop with DHCD in the county where they come and let them know like this is how you do attend an advisory committee. This is how you put this together to advocate for yourself because there's strength in numbers. Um and so that is the plan right now. I I would if anyone is listening I would say please get renters's insurance at the very least immediately um because it's relatively inexpensive and it but it makes a world of difference um because the families that had renters's insurance had a level of um they just had they were less burdened. It's your home burning down is difficult regardless. But if you know you can replace it because you have a renters's insurance policy, you're not as stressed as someone who doesn't who's lost everything and doesn't know how they're going to replace it. So renters's insurance is critical um just as a a renter. So that's the that's the general rundown. We're really trying to do a full court press on all of the things because it's multiple levels and layers when it comes to ensuring safety for the people who live there. Any questions?

I appreciate all the work you're doing. That's agree. Sounds like I know they felt like they got a lot of uh assistance. I could tell the day of that they felt like taken care of that day and it's good to see that we're continuing that. Right. This this room was the first place they landed after the fire was right in here. I have a question.

Go ahead, Eric. Um, [clears throat] so I have a personal relationship with uh one of the families that was affected and um we had them over this week um for some uh to help them uh with some things. and uh they shared with me that uh they are one of the families that do that have not decided or have not found uh somewhere to go yet. Yeah. And um there's you know there's a daughter that's schoolaged

and um the the options that they're giving to stay that they've been given to stay in the same program would require them to remove to move to um Prince Frederick. Yeah.

And um they really don't want to do that because she has all her friends here and you know she's she's she's in uh middle school um and they love the town. They want to stay here. So um [clears throat] is there do we have any ideas of some pathway that could help them stay here? I believe I know who you're referring to and so I would have to follow up with the county to see what solutions they've come up with. I know that the they were offered two solutions um but none of them felt like they were the appropriate solutions for them. And so it does put them in a little bit of a more challenging situation because from the management company standpoint, they've offered them two solutions. Um, and if they're going to refuse them, then they were two insufficient solutions. So one required them to move to like Prince Frederick, so they would have to remove their school age children. The other was um a solution that was if it's the same family I'm thinking of it was solution close by still in the beaches but only for four months right and so it's like you're it's not really stable um and then they would be back in this situation but with less support in four months and so um if it's the family if that's the same family um I just have to follow up with the county because they were working actively um in my notes it was reflected that they didn't have a DSS voucher and so part of what was being done was trying to get the paperwork in so they would have the appropriate vouchers which would give them additional support.

Okay, thanks for your work.

Hi Silia. Um so a lot of the items you touched on um some of the items you touched on um have been things that I've been looking and thinking of. Uh, one of the items as far as uh the licensing numbers and licensing system, I've have a proposed licensing system that has a built-in quality control for us to be able to track when a license falls off or something like that. So, um, it like I said uh last month, you know, I put a fair amount of work into creating and I've had some subcommittee members help with that, too. So, it's it's it's something that we're quickly before Christmas and and it's uh it's taking shape. So, there's that. Um but yeah, if you could keep me looped in on the update, I I'd appreciate it.

Yeah. So, right now, just so you're all aware, um I'll have a conversation tomorrow with a rep from a company that does licensing. Um because we're looking for a software that doesn't just do rental license but also code enforcement like there's where it's a multi-layered um or multi-levelled system that can actually take care of a number of things that we don't currently have an adequate solution for. So, I have a conversation set up for that tomorrow. And then another group, the at the one that we met at MML, Diversified um technologies, will meet um for their demo next early next year in January.

Um quick question. Has the property owner looked to to resolve any of these on their own and then look for reimburse I know. I'm I'm going to ask though and look for reimbursement through grants or anything like that or are they only looking to be um provide safety when uh I don't mean this in a slanderous way, but provide safety when they're reimbursed through taxpayer dollars. I think that's a fair question. I don't have an answer for it, but we can talk more offline about some of the information that I've received regarding Okay. Thank you. else got any questions? All right, we'll move on to the next. I'm sorry.

I just thank Smelia for her work. She's very thorough and I can tell she's been on this. Thank you. Agreed. [clears throat] All right. Uh, next item four, slow bike discussion. Lori, I believe this is in your work. Yeah. So, this is just coming back from uh the last time I brought it and I'll just keep bringing it fast till we can get it right.

Um, so I know uh Alyssa, you weren't at the work session when we talked about our highlevel goals for this um this policy. And the idea is we we don't want to really get into um a lot of issues where we're playing gotcha on the boardwalk with bikes and and things like that. I I don't know that that the policy could be that enforceable. I understand that, you know, you have if you're going to put a law on the books, it has to be something that could potentially be enforceable. But I know of nobody that's out, you know, gauging this. So, what our committee was hoping for was a way to change the policy, which currently is banning bikes on the bayfront park, boardwalk. I think they're calling it boardwalk park in the code. Um, and changing that to just allowing bicycles. So, whatever the easiest way to do that is um is what we're looking for. And so, I I did look into what you provided and um you know, I thought maybe we would just have to change the language, but when I started looking at the whereas statements, it points to transportation articles. without you can ignore the I was trying to give you

Yeah.

Yeah. that that that sounds more like what we're looking for than like you know timing bells and spacing bells and [laughter] but so what you gave me in the first place was more right robust to be sort of this um about what was going to happen to make sure So, so if that's if if you want to go simple, simple's easy.

Simple's great. If if what the town wants is to say yes, people can ride their bikes on the on the boardwalk. Um, and right that you can do that. People do that. Okay, I'm good for that. Okay, that that sounds great. That's what we're looking for. I did take some of your language and incorporate it in this. If you think this is simple and simple enough and not

problematic in any way, then we can go with this. If you have a recommendation that's very simple or simpler, um I would love to see that. And um one thing that I do want to draw to everybody's attention is is right now there are hours on Boardwalk Park and they're from 6:00 to 9. So, I did put a clause in there that allowed for um riding a bicycle or walking on that boardwalk as a form of transportation beyond those hours because people use it to go home from work. People walk out and see the moon. PE, you know, um so I would like you to look at that statement.

After 9 is what you're Yeah. Why don't we just get rid of the hours of operation? I mean, why don't we just get rid of hours of operation? Are we saying that you're only allowed to walk certain times? Like, it's kind of silly to have hours of operation. Yeah. Let's just just how we can get rid of the bicycles. Let's just get rid of hours of operation. So, I would be from doing that except for the fact that um I wonder if you would run into a problem where somebody might have a little fun with that one and go out there and just really whoop it up on the boardwalk. I know we have a noise. So,

boardwalk is open all hours of operation. People go out there, watch the moon, people walk at night. I don't think it's that much issue on the beach, too. We got to if we going to talk about changing things, we got to figure out why things happened in the first place. We just talked about that about doing our due diligence. So, let's see what the purpose was to put it there. Let's also talk to our law enforcement people to think if it's a good idea to have it open because if anything happens there, they're going to have to be the ones that deal with that. So, let's think it through first cuz also the fine is not $100 anymore, which means you can also whoop it up and just pay for it because now it's 50 instead of 20. You didn't read that yet, Eric. So, those are the things that we got to look at. As far as I'm concerned, it's cool. I think 50 is way better than 20. I don't want to dig my skateboard out there. I just come with 100 bucks. You

got to have pneumatic wheels, though. No, I don't. I single just pay the [laughter] please look at what I put. I um I I put a clause that I think would allow the transportation aspect of it but not loitering. If you could look at that and let me know if that makes any sense at all. Um loitering I will just I haven't seen what you wrote. Loitering ordinances are difficult and are frequently unconstitutional. I'm not going to comment on it just without any but um but I will look at it and I will tell you if

there's a way to do it. I think you might find that it's difficult to split that baby. Um but we'll look at it. As far as the bicycles go, it's super simple. You just strike the word bicycle from 196-20 as the things that are prohibited there and you're done. I know there were requests about these pneumatic wheels. So if forgoing that I prohibit um like scooters with nat pneumatic wheels. I think that was part of the discussion. All of right now everything else is banned.

We wanted to allow scooters as long as they had uh airfield wheels care about scooters no more. the bikes and $50. I'm interested in your recommendation now that you understand the high level guidance, keep it simple, and I I agree with Dan. We should be able to walk the boardwalk after hours somehow.

Um, do we want to talk about that real quick right now? The hours don't want to talk. So, so if we do nothing, the hours on that boardwalk are 6:00 to 9 and nothing else. That means out why it is, maybe talk to law enforcement and then we can talk. So, we want to do maybe a little proactive reach out before we sit up here and talk about something, right? Okay. And brought up a good point um about that about the hours before we started this meeting um just thinking about one event, fireworks. People People going out after 9:00 to see the fireworks all the time.

That'd be a good place to smoke weed, too. Awesome. Out there. Nice night. 3:00 in the morning. My point is that, you know, it's already happening, right? People are already jogging at 5:30 in the morning for sure. People are already It's not being enforced. Um, do we want to enforce it? I'm sure we don't want to enforce it on the 4th of July when people want to go out there and, you know, get a good look at the fireworks the 3rd of July or the 5th of July, right? People also light fireworks on July 3rd. That's illegal.

I think what I would ask for is anything that alarms you or bothers you, could you just provide a recommendation for it? and outside of what you um suggest, then we'll keep it as it's written outside of what you suggest. Does that work? I will make some recommendations to you. You can come back to me and say, "Uh uh." Well, if you're keeping it simple, I probably won't say, "Uh-uh." libertarian.

Uh yeah, I was going to say the only question I had is in section D it talks about the bike bicyclist is presumed to have been operating but then it doesn't like if they hit if somebody steps out and hits the bicyclist the bicyclist gets fined. Um that would just be my question on that wording there. And then the other one, if if you do want to go a route that's not listing out a million things and then saying only this versus that, you could just say not any non-neumatic uh I don't know things. So

So if you're just going simple and eliminating All right. Um, let's uh let's move on to the next item on the agenda, which is a closed session. Oh, Christmas lights. I'm sorry. I'm getting ahead. I'm getting ahead of this. I'm ready to go home and crash. That's what Well, in his defense, he was still putting Christmas lights up today. Today, my house, man, we got four minutes.

All right. So,

we have Christmas displays through town. There's a few areas that could use uh some uh there's a few projects that's been delayed. One of them, the sidewalk, town hall, some sophet, a few little projects. If we look throughout town, uh there could be some little receptacles, some chaseways, so there's pathways and not tripping hazards in highly uh like throughout town hall, different parks and stuff like that. I've talked to Jay about it. Uh talked to the uh electrician that does the the lights. They had some decent suggestions. I just wanted to um let everybody know I talked about it and finally wanted to reach out to Jay and kind of see some of the highlighted areas uh while they're up. So when we bring up sort of uh the proposed project and they're not up, you'll see what we're talking about. That's about it. And would Jay have anything

before we go to that? So um that's a good discussion point for you guys to consider for the upcoming budget cycle. Um what we have you all will have to determine for today is that there are some identified um projects that less who um windmill farms who does our lights and displays. He does work alongside um wires inc uh for the electrical portion of it but there are some displays right now that are at a point where they are going into the space of being like disrepair. um and because there's electrical aspects to it, it then becomes dangerous. So the the reason why we're bringing up this up now is that um in January there is a discount on lights. And so it's like a 30% discount. And so when you're talking about these displays, they're like

a lot of money, $12,000 regularly some of them. So to be able to get a 30% discount on them is pretty substantial. The other thing that's important to know that Les has um shared with us is that if we are repairing an existing display, uh the company that we work with for our displays will give us 80%. It'll they'll charge us 80% and then we get if we do it by January, we get an additional 30% off that 80% charge to fix the display. So or rebuild or rebuild it.

Rebuild it. Yeah. So, um he's I Les has identified um a number of uh issues that have that need immediate um fixing uh and also this opportunity that being able to take advantage of the the timing of January to be able to purchase those. But that would require uh roughly an increase of $60,000. So, I can give you the rundown of what each individual display is if you would like to know. Um, we've priced out I had less provide me with what it would cost for us to outsource the work and what it would cost for him to take care of it. Um, and sometimes it's as big of a discount as like 50% discount if he does it in-house. There are some things that it's cheaper to just have outsource because they're tedious and you need a different rig to be able to adjust those. And so, I have that list. Um, it's the train, the vintage crabs, vintage anchors, jumping rockfish, animated rock fish, and then this would also include the addition of a gathering tree, which it would be an a new thing that the town doesn't have, but it brings a visual interest point during the day because most of our lights you only are able to take advantage of when it's dark. Um, but a gathering tree would be a a feature in central town that would allow people to get holiday cheer during the day. So,

yeah. Uh, I there's a few other suggestions that I have too. It I don't know. Um, if we could do we have to do a bud budget amendment for that that whatever we need to do that's a money well spent that be able to be voted on this month. Well, that's why I brought it before you now. So, if you guys are okay with that, I'd like to do a little more though that just so we have a little flexibility if we wanted to add a few more things if if that's possible. We don't have to spend it, but it'd be nice. I like crystal like this. They're ready to vote on it next week. The January.

So, I will um work with Dan because there's already going to be um a midcycle uh budget amendment adjustment. And so if you all are aligned with it and you can vote to be aligned with it in December, then Dan can include that um in the full package of uh budget modification that he has that he's presenting in January and we will be good to go. I will say I have my eye on a train. Okay. [laughter] Well, I've got the Moscow design book in my office. I didn't look into the pricing. interested in train prices. Okay.

Is capturing the discounts in January. Okay. Is that part of the uh Didn't the car take one out on 260? That's actually insurance claim. But I do agree with the the problem is we always go through Christmas and of course all their discounts are after right after Christmas then we go into our budget cycle. So it this is a perfect way to capture the discounts. Best way to do Yeah. I mean we stand that was a separate instance though just for clarification. insurance is paying that minus $1,000 deductible and we we just get a whole lot more bang for the bucks if we do it this way. And we have the flexibility of doing that.

All right. Do you know are they doing the the good quality lights? Because I have also talked to Mike from Wires Inc. and he's he's a big big proponent that we use uh terrible lights uh replacement bulbs in the last handful of years. Would these be the good ones, not the Amazon ones? Correct. And there and there is there's also other levels of um for instance. No, no, there is a significant from Mike. There is every bulk different. The lifespan's different. The hues different. And this includes uh got an hour speech on it. Mike schooled me.

It is. It is true. I mean those lights what a lot of people don't realize they're they're down for 11 months of the year. They're in the heat of the summer. There's a lot to it. And when they're out there on 260 and all these roads when they spread that salt and the state trucks so they're I mean salt and electricity just don't mix. So, the new lights come with washers, dialectric grease. I'm making sure at least we're trying to make sure that we spend up front and they'll last longer. Yeah, if we could Yeah. I don't know if we're Do we need a suggest amount? I mean, I'd like it probably more than 60. You can with me whatever amount you'd like. All right. Is 73.

One one question. Just one question. Uh, procedurally, Alyssa, um, does a budget amendment need, um, a period of, uh, um, to be out in the public for 30 days or whatever.

Double check your your code. your recollection is you don't have any specific requirements for ordinance for in terms of their additional publication. um you know you have the um supermajority requirement on a budget amendment but as you have pointed out math works out that that's case so Um [laughter]

for the rail trail. Is that what you're saying? Where the the train? That would be beautiful. I'd love that. Oh, yeah. the two lights I mentioned to you just past Fast Stop and the last one on the left going down toward the rod and rail. Okay. Okay. You know, we could try to get Hallmark to start filming some movies down here. I think that's a great idea. My wife was saying the money there. Chris Martinez gonna be the leading [laughter]

All of those with the snow scenes and everything else that are on the Hallmark channel, they're all shot in Los Angeles. Anthony does movies. He can do the same. Bruce worked for NPR for 100 years issues you have in Oh, it was only about 50. North can they can afford you MC? You did pretty good. I don't see any of additional notice beyond what you

right. So, but ordinarily we we introduce it one month and then the following month we vote on it. So, meaning that we couldn't vote on it until January. You could do it. Right. Right. And it's an emergency [clears throat] if we're going to save a lot of money. Right. But we do have the agreement from the vendor that they would honor the prices when we would be able to pay it, right? And so if you vote, it's going to be introduced next week for December. You would vote in January. Okay. And then that's fine for it's the third week in January. So there's still another week and some change that we could I just wanted to make sure that we all understood that timeline.

Yeah. option has to be. So, you could if it came to that have a special meeting. Yeah. But it sounds like we don't need to do that. Sounds like it. Okay. Great. All right. Anything else for the public meeting? Is there a motion to go into the close session? Motion to go to close session. Second. Second it. All in favor? I I opposed. The eyes have it. Uh we'll take a threem minute break and we'll meet in the conference room. And before you know,

right before we go, in addition to the members of the council, uh we need Wayne, Alyssa, Smelia, and Sharon uh for the for the uh close session. And thank you all for being here. Good to see you. Great to catch up. Merry Christmas.