Town Board - workshop

Okay, good evening, everyone. Oh, sorry. Good evening, I'd like to call the town of Rochester town board August workshop meeting to order. You could all stand for the pledge to the flag. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. So today we have Deputy Town Clerk, Christina Ferrara filling in. Can you do the roll call for us? Councilwoman Coleman?

Here.

Councilwoman Smith?

Here.

Charlotte, are you here? I'm here. Councilman Wynn, you're in as supervisor now. I am here. So tonight is our monthly workshop meeting agenda. I'm just going to do a brief overview of the meeting before we do the acceptance of the agenda. The workshop meeting is the meeting where the town does our work. So we try to keep resolutions to our business meeting and discussion to our workshop meeting. So that's why there's a long list of discussion items for the town board to work through. Tonight, we also have guests from the Stone Ridge Library joining us at the top of the meeting, followed by public hearings. And with that, the first item on the agenda is the acceptance of the agenda. And I'll make the motion that the town of Rochester town board accepts the agenda as prepared by the town supervisor.

Second.

Any discussion? All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Abstain? Motion carries.

No amendments.

Okay. So to kick us off, I've invited at the board's request, Gabrielle Esposito from the Stone Ridge Library to join us at the table and you may join us too. Oh, cool. All right. This, tonight I'm trying something that was suggested to me where I'm going to introduce items so that we know what the item on the agenda is, the public can follow along, the board knows what we're doing. So I'm just going to give a brief overview. So I, the town supervisor, requested earlier in the year that the Stone Ridge Library consider a proposal for offering non-limited library memberships. And that sort of kicked off a conversation about our original agreement and how old it was and how it hadn't been revisited with any iterations of the budget for the Stone Ridge Library, which is a its own taxing district in the town of Marble Town. So we had an initial conversation and then an initial proposal where the Stone Ridge Library proposed, and I'm just summarizing this, that the town increase our taxpayer-funded contribution that is approximately $15,000 in our current budget to $40,000 to achieve the non-limited library membership amount. What we do each year is we have 230, yeah, 238 memberships that are attached to the contribution that we make, but it is tax dollars. So the town board discuss this at our last meeting, so we did have a conversation about this at our last meeting and requested that we think about additional proposals being put on the table, since we know it's going to be a hard budget year and that increase. of $25,000 might not be possible. And as I explained, it could be possible that it could end on the cutting room floor at the end of October, which by that time, you're also set with your budget. So we wanted to make sure we try to come to a workable understanding before that time. And then the board also requested that we have people from the Stone Ridge Library present to kind of talk us through and have a conversation. As an aside, I will also be having conversations with the Ellenville library that was also requested of the board, and so we will. That i'm not sure how that conversation will go but i'm just for the public and the board that is also happening. The documents that I shared with the backup with the board where the original proposal and so tonight we're going to hear from you guys about what you're thinking now. And then we'll open up a discussion with questions and maybe some more suggestions from the board. So I will pass the floor to you.

That sounds good. Awesome. Thank you so much for having me. I really appreciate it. And for being so open to having this conversation. As Erin said, I'm Gabrielle Sposito. I am the director of the Stone Ridge Library and have been for about a year and a half. This is our board treasurer, Mr. Pusico. And I think we're bringing this proposal to light, not because the partnership failed, but we're bringing it because the partnership has succeeded, right? Lots of town of Rochester people are using our library. And we want to make sure that we can continue meeting that demand for years to come. So for a little context, I think that it will surprise nobody that we kind of began kicking around some questions as we built our 2027 budget. And we began looking more closely at the town of Rochester memberships and we kind of started with a simple question of how are Rochester residents using our library. And that led to several other questions of which resources are they using the most and what does that usage look like compared to our overall patron base. And most importantly, how many Rochester residents are actually receiving library service. And at first, the answer seemed kind of straightforward. So we knew that the town of Rochester was paying for 238 memberships. We also had records indicating that at least 33 additional Rochester residents had purchased individual memberships. So based on that information we had available, we initially believed that we were serving approximately 278 Rochester residents. But because I'm a librarian and I tend to double check my work, I asked the Mid-Hudson Library System to help us look at the data from another angle. And Mid-Hudson provided us with a number of patron records coded as Town of Rochester, and that number was significantly higher than 271. We discovered that we were actually providing library service to 604 Rochester patrons. That discovery prompted us to take a much deeper look at how the Rochester memberships were being reported and how those memberships translated into individual library users. And I think that one of the most important things that we discovered is that a membership and an individual are not necessarily the same thing, but we're perhaps being used interchangeably in our language. So the 238 memberships purchased by the town of Rochester were being treated as family memberships. So, for example, if John Smith is the primary member, his partner might be reported as one A and his children as one B, one C and one D. So in that example alone, one membership provides library access to five individual people. So there is sound reasoning behind the library's decision to structure the memberships this way. Marble Town residents and in fact, anyone using a Mid-Hudson library card can link patrons of their household to a library card. And more importantly, creating individual patron records gives each person their own library card and therefore their own library account, which helps perfect individual privacy and allows us to provide service more appropriately. However, there were some unintended effects of this treating the memberships this way. So in 2026 alone, 119 additional individuals were added to the 238 memberships purchased by the town. So under our existing prorated membership structure, those individuals represented approximately $6,307 in membership revenue that the library could have collected had we treated the memberships a little bit differently. We also then identified 139 Rochester patron records that had either originated at another library or had been incorrectly coded and were therefore the fees were not collected there as well. So that made it more difficult for us to accurately understand Rochester's usage in the past and reinforce the need to clean up the data and look at the overall picture rather than relying on the membership count alone. And then we also identified 75 student memberships, which have been and always will continue to be free. So the important takeaway for us is not any one individual number. It is that our original membership count significantly underestimated the number of Rochester residents that were actually receiving library service. and therefore need to be fiscally supported in some kind of way. The library is not in the business of making money, right? That's our whole thing. And our purpose is to provide access to information, materials, technology programs, and other resources to the community. But of course, those resources have a cost. And as stewards of public funds, we have a responsibility to understand what it costs to provide those services and make sure our funding structure is sustainable. So after reviewing our membership data, our usage and our costs and the level of support provided by Marble Town residents, we believe that $90 is a fair annual estimate for a membership or a household for library service. That number closely aligns with what a typical Marble Town household contributes annually through the library tax levy. Importantly, we are not proposing that Rochester residents individually pay for $90 for a library card. In fact, we support the idea of the unlimited memberships through the town's agreement. It's the fairest approach because they provide equitable access to Rochester residents and eliminate the economic barrier for someone who might otherwise arrive too late in the year to obtain one of the memberships covered by the town's payment. But if we're going to offer unlimited memberships, the cost of serving those additional users needs to be offset somewhere. And so the library cannot sustainably absorb an unlimited number of additional memberships without corresponding support. So how we arrived at the $40,000. So we currently have 527 Town of Rochester memberships reported outside of the student memberships and at an estimated value of $90 each that represents approximately $47,000 in library service. A $40,000 annual agreement represents the equivalent of approximately 445 memberships at $90 each. In other words, the library is already proposing to absorb the equivalent of approximately 82 memberships in addition to continuing to provide the free library memberships for students. So that's our proposal. And we kind of believe it's equitable and sustainable. And yeah, I threw a lot at you. So please let me know if you have any questions. Yeah.

I have one. In terms of service of the 600 or whatever individual patrons from the town of Rochester, that includes students and the currently paid members?

Correct. So 527 is the number of subtracted from the student membership. So it's 75 paid memberships would be not very good at math on the dot, but I think it rests around. Well, we press around that 270. Yeah.

And in terms of the cost where you came up with $90 per person or HAB-Masyn Moyer- patron is that the total cost of operations by the number divided by the number of patrons.

HAB-Masyn Moyer- If you go both ways so like if we look at. HAB-Masyn Moyer- The marble town tax levy and divide that by our total number of memberships you get $96. HAB-Masyn Moyer- sale. How many memberships do we have? 3,700 in households?

Actual memberships, cards issues.

Yeah, actual cards issues is 3,700. So, I mean, actual users, you know, 3,700 goes into our tax levy of $357, comes up at $96 per card, if you will.

But the tax levy isn't divided by it. It is not. It is not. So, right.

So then if I do it by the average tax levy, it comes up to around $90. So if we asked our tax assessor, what's the average tax? The house in our district is assessed at $298,000. If I go through our tax roll and look at the special library district tax for every house around $298,000, $92, $94, it's around $90. The numbers kind of, that number kind of seemed to Jill in by looking at it more than one way, it comes up around that.

And then we drill down to see what the actual cost, the direct cost of services for. So, you're inviting an evenly read by number of patrons. Some patrons are there 20 times a week and other patrons are there once a year. Have you done any analysis of the actual. Cost for patron no, no, no, no.

That would be also remember, just so you know, like Mid-Hudson Library, how many books you take out, how much you use the library. It's kind of a privacy thing. We're not allowed to see that. The only thing we can really see is how much use people use of Libby, which is for e-books and Hoople. Just to clarify one of the things Gabrielle was saying, once a card is coded to Stone Ridge Library, we are assessed that cost. So anybody who has a Stone Ridge library card and uses Hoopla or uses Libby, we get a bill. monthly from hoopla a direct cost about two dollars each use and libby depending on the books you use and whether we have to take more books but that's but we can see that direct usage how much people patrons are taking out physical sources that we can't we can't see that that's a privacy two more questions aside from rochester and marble town what other towns No, student library cards can be anybody who uses Rondout Valley School District. So that could be more. But now Rosendale has their own library. You know, Olive has their own library. You know, so the only agreement we have, the only other town is Rochester.

Right off the other side. Yeah, that's fine. Thank you. I mean, also, I want to thank you for your service with the libraries. It's very fun to be a part of the community.

Yeah, I know the issue for me is not when I'm supporting libraries. I'm very supportive of libraries. I think they're fantastic. We do everything we can to protect them. and funding environment, everyone is individually is talented. So do you know how many actual residents there are in Marble Town? I know there's 3,700 memberships. Do you know? About 5,000. Yes. 5,200. And there's about 7,700 in Marble Town. And so that's 357. That's the total of the

That was last year's tax levy. That is not our total budget. Our total budget includes the income from Rochester. And then we have a foundation in the Stonebridge Library Foundation provides about 10% of our budget.

Is the budget public?

Yep. It's on the website. So our budget's around 470, I think last year's 474. If you look, our budget is a little light. I mean, Ellenville is around a million. Crazy. And their population is the same as more of town.

And Ellenville is not part of the Mid-Hudson Library?

No, it's part of the Ramapo Cat Scale. So we don't actually have data for, because they use two different systems that have to respect their patron's privacy laws. So we don't have access to how many Town of Rochester patrons Ellenville serves versus our library.

And they may not even track it since they do an unlimited thing. And we, we have, they may track it. Yeah. It must be coded somehow. Part of the coding problem for us is the whole zip code thing. Like Accord, Accord is more, some Accord addresses are Marble Town. Some High Falls addresses are in Rochester, but are in Marble. We all have this issue. I live in Marble Town and I have a Kingston mailing address. So, you know, it's, we all, that's part of the, problem that happened there, you know, that's hard to, you know, we're working on processes to clean that up, you know, but it's difficult, you know, is what it is. That's why being unlimited would be helpful to us too, you know, a little bit, you know, administratively, you know.

I remember what my other question was, which is you mentioned that There were some Rochester patrons who were coded from other towns? Yes. What did you mean by that?

So that was due to clerical errors at other libraries. Perhaps other libraries weren't necessarily aware of the agreement. Or like we said, we know the town lines get a little fuzzy, right? So if there wasn't any double checking or things like that. It just comes down to human error, basically.

Basically, people went into other Mid-Hudson libraries and went to the Rosendale Library and said, I live in Marble Town, can I have a card? And they showed their accurate address and they got a card and it was coded to our town. But it shouldn't have been, because you could get a card for our library at another Mid-Hudson library. And that's where that... And so those, you know, people issuing those cards may not have been as educated in the agreement we have or, you know, they should have really just said, no, you have to go to Stonebridge and get the cards. You can't get it here.

It's totally clear. Yeah. Exactly.

Exactly.

No one's ever confused. Right. I'm being serious.

Yeah, we understand.

Yeah. Do you know, so your only sources of revenue are the foundation, our contribution, and the taxes.

And some of these are small book library, free book library.

And you haven't had any changes in terms of revenue based off of changes in the federal or state level. There's no other money to save.

No, we actually get very little state aid from the state.

Less than a thousand.

How do you know approximately like over the last five years, what the average increase was year on year in terms of the budget?

I think it's one, not necessarily widely, but I don't know if we have an average in mind.

I don't know that you can average the five years. Major jumps or anything that have been going on. Because I know like with the electronic records or the electronic services, there's additional costs there. I'm just curious.

We have... we've asked for substantial increases in the last two years to kind of make up for the years where we were only doing 2% increases.

But 2% is what you generally have been doing.

They had been doing for a while. And in the last two years, we've had to increase that and exceed the 2%.

Do you think that that trend will continue? It has to. Is that like a 4%, 5%?

Not necessarily.

Not necessarily. How many libraries are in the Mid-Hudson Library? So there's 66 libraries, which are they all in Ulster?

No, they're spread out through, let me see, Green, Putnam, Ulster, Dutchess, and I'm forgetting one. But they're sold in, yeah. No? No. No, Columbia. Thank you. Yes.

Patrons can get access to both.

And one of the things, so you understand for like a resident of Rochester is because Ellenville's library is a different library system than we are. If you hold a card from both, if you're an e-reader and you go on to Libby, anybody who's an e-reader here would know you go on to Libby. you can now search the catalog and borrow from either Mid-Hudson Library's collection or Ramaphos collection. You have twice the collections to search from. So if you're an e-reader, you want multiple credit cards. Library cards from two different systems.

There's a, there's a get your item faster. You can borrow more.

You can borrow more materials. You've got a much bigger pool to borrow from.

We get it. Yeah, we get it.

And so, and a lot of the users who come to from Rochester, like they know that, you know, like that's why they're more, they're bigger users because they're seeking that out. You know, I don't want to say they all are, but I mean, I'm saying I wouldn't either. You know, it's a fact. What are the differences between the two systems?

It's truly, I believe, legislation where everything is. I don't know the whole answer.

But I mean, they're just fully different systems. You know, they have a collections and they pay for certain online sources. And MidHudson has a separate set of collections. And as a cardholder for both of those, you can tap both. You know, that's why libraries now, you know, like we're quick to, you know, make sure people aren't holding a card for too long and using our online sources, you know, or even our, you know, that more specifically, because there's more specific costs associated with the e-resources. There's specific monthly bills that hit our desk.

But that's based on usage. And it's based on usage. Yeah. No, just based on actual use.

So the difference between the two sources that we're talking about. So Hoopla is a cost per sort model. So Stone Ridge currently has a cap where it's a $2 maximum on items that can be borrowed. But every time somebody borrows an item, we're charged those $2. And I think we have 90 users on Hoopla. It doesn't sound like too much, but it certainly adds up over the month. I think our average cost is around $450 to $500 a month for Hoopla alone. And then for Libby or Overdrive, as it's also called, we know that e-books are more expensive. I don't think that's surprising to everyone. An e-book alone costs $40 and an e-audiobook can cost 70 plus. There's no regulation on the pricing for e-books. that model. So, you know, the more users that we have, the more people putting on holds, the more we are required to contribute to that collection, right? So if, you know, there are seven plus holds on a copy, the Stone Ridge Library has to purchase like three copies of that or something like that to ensure that that item is getting to patrons quickly. So it does put a financial a financial, uh, obligation on the library. Um, so.

That $40 is one time.

That's just for one usage. Um, and they do have like lifespans and that's just 40, $40, but they, they range in all sorts of prices for eBooks. I've seen a James Patterson book for like $75. And because it's James Patterson, they have to purchase a lot of them. So it does add up over time based on who says, yeah, well, it's cheaper to buy it in paperback, but, um, The comparison is the cost of a physical book, which rests around $25 and has a long lifespan.

Yeah, only one person can read an e-book at a time.

I'm also a little concerned about HAB-Jacques Juilland, The optimist my mom expert perspective and the expenses yeah so we're slightly larger listen to larger to in terms of area so it's not not necessarily will get tomorrow, which is separate topic. HAB-Jacques Juilland, But I mean let's assume we even match the numbers that 3,700 numbers. going to suddenly explode. And then next year, the budget needs to...

It would certainly be that if we were to say, you know, agree $40,000 unlimited, Rochester could use it, there would be some sort of clause in the agreement that this is reassessed after two years. You know, like, has it been that our usage has gone crazy and now we have to rein it back in or talk to you about additional costs? Perhaps, I don't know. I mean, a part of me feels like the most motivated users or who really want to use the library are already, you know, and maybe I feel like in the first year there might be like a little rush on people. We keep the memberships limited to one year. A typical Marble Town membership is a three-year card. We would keep it one year, the first two years at least, you know, just to see, okay, the first year, a whole bunch of people are going to come through. We're assuming, right? They all get a card. Then it needs to be renewed the second year. You just have to come and renew it. Still unlimited, right? We'll see how many renew. I'm going to guess fewer will because they'll be like, I never really used that card. We never got there. Was it worth whatever? maybe they don't renew or the usage doesn't really change. We'd probably check the usage on Hoopla and Overdrive to compare. If it is massively different, we'll probably be sitting here again in two years talking about it. But I think that would be part of the agreement because we would be going into it as kind of a... We want more users. The town of Rochester residents, they're very... generous. They're valued members of our library community. And that would be great if it could be the way we're envisioning it. We have to be fiscally responsible and put a review on it in two years.

Yeah. And I just, I wouldn't want to, you know, clamp that. that budget bomb, you know, a couple of years down the road. And the other thing is, you know, if we did want to go to unlimited, I personally, this is coming from someone whose mother worked in library systems and loved library systems, I would want people to know about it. I'd want the town to be advocating for it, pushing for it, and driving people with those accounts. And then, so, I mean, it's a shame that that's the way it works, where the more you use it, the more expensive it gets.

The e-collection for a physical collection, you know, it's... But I really look at this, this model is kind of a good faith I've been starting off point, we choose to move forward with it with these conversations. And we recognize that it's a, you know, significant increase and we certainly don't want to minimize that but just to open up the dialogue and have this conversation.

But it's also a, it's a good deal.

Yeah.

I mean, you know, you're talking about, you know, 5,000 residents of Marble Town are funding it to a much greater extent. And you're getting in at a much lower cost.

I mean, sometimes the papers show up to our meetings. So, you know, I get reported on.

Yeah.

But I mean, I'm putting the bill for Rochester. Yeah, no, I get what you're saying. Just completely outside the realm. But it might be interesting if we could set up like a satellite location where maybe books could be like brought into town because it is hard to get there for some people. So maybe we could become part of like a satellite thing to get physical copies for people. Yeah, I just, I think I'd love to figure out how to do this. I think, you know, To me, I'd be worried about this big of a jump. So I'd be curious if we could do things like appropriate for it and then, you know, maybe do a tiering system where it's like, okay, if we hit this amount of numbers and up to 45,000, I think budget, you know, from a budget perspective, that would be hard to do because we have to collect the money front. But I guess one last thing, somewhere you mentioned established membership requirements. Is that just Yeah, that would be the new require if we did the yeah but it's it's not it doesn't get into like your second home over there like if you own property or rent in the town of Rochester is that we can establish it's.

yeah yeah so you. I would have to double check the believe that Hudson has has guidance on this. But I believe if you own property here and rent and can prove your residency here, then you can receive a card. I'd have to double check that.

Even if you own land and it is your official address, you can get a library card. Okay. Sorry. Sorry. You did it. No.

Thank you, first of all, for coming here. I'm very sorry. This is me and my daughter are members. Well, awesome. Thank you. I've been since I was younger. So sorry. I was trying to take notes. Okay, first, is there a difference between someone having just a digital library membership and a physical one with you guys? Is there a difference in pricing and what charge residents for that?

No, so with the Town of Rochester membership, you get access to our digital and physical collection. We just found as we were kind of sifting through, and perhaps this is really just because we're able to look at those digital metrics, that hoopla and that overdrive, that there was a very high usage from Town of Rochester members specifically. But for the physical collection overall, we found that over the course of three years, Town of Rochester patrons amounted for 22% of our physical collection circulation. So they are coming to the library, but we just you know they i think that they in our most recent poll of data just from this year uh town of rochester memberships accounted for 33 percent of our uh libby usage and 10 of our users um so they're definitely coming and using using um what we what we some libraries do differentiate it is possible that we could say

Okay, big town of Rochester can have unlimited physical and not use of digital.

That is a possibility. We could possibly do like where we have an unlimited number of physical memberships, but we only pay for the majority of our funding goes towards online access since we do have such a scarcely distant area. And that might also be back or forth if I don't realize Ellenville has the online system or something like that. So, okay, cool. That was one. That was a possibility. Great. Okay. Thank you. Yes. Yeah, that's where I was going. I was like, I know I'm mostly glad to follow or go visit a person. I don't almost ever use your guys online access or if it could be like, you know, vice versa. It's like, you know, differentiate that. Other question, is it only round out Valley students? You guys give free memberships to you, not SUNY Ulster as well. You guys don't have an agreement with the college at all for them to have access.

That's a great question, actually.

It's a Midwestern library policy. It's not our policy. That's their policy. It's not even our policy. we would we won't want it to remain yeah for students we would i mean like yeah we agree with us yeah i just wasn't sure if that would also be your student numbers or if it was just under like a high schooler like you know younger yes that data pulled was was everybody uh 18 and younger yes that's it yeah that's why i was trying to see if there was any adult uh student as you know ages um and i'm also I just wanted to confirm, you said it was about $475,000 is your full budget typically with your foundation and both townships? I just wanted to make sure I wrote down that.

$475,000 around was your full budget? I mean, I think, let me just read it to you. I mean, I have it right here. I had it open. I had it open. I was just trying to read it. Logged in. So our 2006, 26 budget is 440. And our 2027, we're still, we've already said, done our, we're talking to this other town and we're not sure what that number is going to be, so.

Yeah, I understand. Great, thank you. Oh, and then to piggyback off of Michael's satellite, Potential, um, I'm a release on and also run a Bell Rotary club and I used to run the Rhonda Valley food pantry and work with you guys very closely. The shared work we've done together in the past. um but we have a little library at the town park and i know you guys used to donate like surplus donated children's books to the food pantry and that's totally something the rotary club can just like we'd be happy to come and look at the books to fill our little library we already have at the parks um and just for town board wise i can inquire about us like putting one in other areas of town or maybe the other park entrance or something like that for us to have them more you know around the area so um just as a step, an easy one that I know we can easily get into to having some more library access. And I think, yeah, I think that that's, oh, and are you going to do a library sale again? Have you guys brought them back?

Not the library, but it's just a little bookshop.

Some people bemoan it. But it's harder to get as many people as were needed to put it on.

Yes, yeah, the volunteerism is hard to keep going in the mid-times. Yes, me and my cousin went every year and we used to sit and wait for you guys to prep the ribbon and let everyone in and watch everyone else race. So I had a couple of questions that came up. One is when...

Do you have the same budget calendar that we do? So you're on the traditional fiscal year?

What's your- Oh, we do have a fiscal year budget. Our budget vote is in September. Oh, okay. So we have a budget vote September 15th. It's already been, we've already set our tax levy. We've already set that amount and that's being noticed in the Daily Freeman tomorrow. Yeah, and other public, you know, whatever our newspapers of record are and our vote will be on the 15th.

Okay. So that is, you've already had the public hearing on that, or do you not have a public hearing?

We have the board meetings that we, that we adopt that, that tax levy are open to the public. I see.

So you already voted on that?

We have already voted on the tax levy. And is this the tax levy?

What? $357,000. That was the tax levy for last year.

I can give you the tax levy for this year. Give me one second. I'm on your Wi-Fi here. $393,355. And actually last year you guys paid us $16,560. Okay. Not $15,000. You paid us $16,565. Okay.

I think just to jump in, part of the reason for our ask is that it was 15,000 for so long. I don't know the approximate number, but our board president has been serving for 10 years or so. And during his time with us, the increases to the Rochester's asking is a recent development, but it would save 15,000 for quite a long time.

And then they started- raising it the same percentage whatever our we were going to our taxpayers for we raised it by the same percentage and then we sent the request and you guys made it yeah and that was that that's how it's been working the last like two or three years so you're at over a 10 increase of your tax rate yeah

How much of the budget relates to capital expenditures? I know you've done a lot. Very little.

Our foundation has been very generous. So like the parking lot you saw this year was 44,000. I think the library paid 10,000. The foundation paid 33,000. The foundation provides about $45,000 a year in funding to the library. As in addition to other pass-throughs, dedicated gifts, the foundation has a full, not full, a part-time paid staffer. It is well supported by many Town of Rochester residents and other residents of Marble Town and a relationship we value and would love to grow. I'm also the treasurer of that organization. And that group does pay for most of the capital projects at the library. And those bigger things. Or it helps us write grants to get those things and do things like that. The foundation is... does most of that you know in fact it provides us 10 of our operating expenses and ideally as a foundation board member if i wore that hat i'd say i'd love to see that reduced and the taxpayers pay for the standard operations and the foundation just be funding capital expenditures and special programming a satellite office in rochester you know something like that and that the full operations be paid by the taxpayers or the other users, that to me would be ideal, right? I mean, not ideal, but like fair, you know.

And that's the goal of all nonprofits. Exactly. You want to know that your operationals are done and so everything else is supposed to keep, you know, AC for you to figure out what else.

All the other things.

I had another question. So just to confirm,

the Rochester members, there's no differentiation between any of the services offered. So any of the perks, like the museum thing, you have a membership, you, okay.

Yeah, you can get access to everything that we have and then whatever the 66 libraries in our system get as well.

And that's by choice. I mean, it could change if you wanted to differentiate. Could change, but right now it just, no, no.

You had another question?

Yeah, I had two. So one was kind of by your online users. One again, do you guys know how much you guys like for a full year are spending on both of them? And you don't have to give me that number now, but I'm like wondering like if you guys have an estimate about like how much you're spending for membership from them or membership or like, you know, if for the whole year, like if it's like, you know, 50,000 is what we're spending for both programs all combined to kind of try to figure out a digital program. Only, you know, membership amount. That would make sense.

Yeah, I don't, I can't speak on what the number would be just looking at town or Rochester usage alone. But because of our, the high usage on our Libby, we're required to purchase over $11,000 off appeal loan. um and that's uh from from the consortium you know to be a contributing member of the midhudson library system to to you know do that um and then uh i don't know if the probably about five or six thousand more yeah exactly play around 17 to 20 000 yeah it's been purple for eight for the whole usage like i don't have it broken out by

No, no, no, that's fine. I was just looking to try to average myself to see a number. I'm just looking at the non-print media.

Yes.

And then my other question is, with this talking kind of reverse of a satellite, if we had any organizations or any boards that we could

space or anything you guys do have some rooms and clubs and local chapters and things that meet there is that an option for any of our local organizations ever so we're open to the book but on a very limited basis one programming room um but we're looking to add some additional yes no i know yeah that is a goal the foundation do to add more programming space i mean that's a big goal for us but we're not there yet but it is a big goal for us it is a premium if people need it

Yeah, or we've, you know, same with, like, I know you guys have top time and, like, story time that's down there. Like, if we were to find people who are willing, like, volunteers from our time and would do one in the top room, is that something that we could also potentially do?

We could talk to our children's programmer about it.

Yeah, I know that it's not, like, you know, hard answers. No, no.

When we were here for the community conversations, my children's programmer was the one taking notes. She was like, we have to get out to the town of Rochester. We have to do something. Yeah, very important. Yeah.

Do you have contingency funds?

We have, yes, probably about $40,000 there for, you know, and then the foundation has more resources. And they're generous.

And your budget numbers for this year, you're budgeting what we normally contribute. So if we were to do anything related to this, that would be additional funds that you're not currently accounting for?

If you only went up by 10% for the 16,000 that you currently paid, we would be hurting a little bit. It would be tight for us. We're looking, yeah.

Yes, but you have this number that you're proposing is currently in the numbers you're going to follow this? Yes. Okay.

So with that, I think I'd like to set some action items either, you know, I think what we, I do not, I don't think that we will be able to increase that budget line this year by $25,000. I'm just already thinking about so many things, so many things. But I do feel personally like the case that you've made for the original agreement we had and the costs, I do think that an adjustment needs to be made because that to me is what would be equitable. But I think we need to have some, you know, more gradual approach or have a way of subsidizing, you know, have a split where members are paying and we're paying or something like that. But I want to... I think it might be helpful for the board to weigh in a little bit now, because I don't want to have you leave. And I will probably talk about it a little bit more too. But our budget, real budget work happens in October. So, you know, that's when our final decisions are made or at the end of October and early November. So I guess I wanted to hear if the board feels like, you have a sense of where you're at in terms of what you think we'd want to tentatively be able to do and then see what could work for you with that. Can I just ask one more question?

Do you guys know what you would change your sliding scale to with the thought process of the 90 per family membership that you guys charge for once we hit that number? Do you guys have that number for us at all? A lot of this time.

No, I mean, obviously less than, we could not do the unlimited for much less than the four. We couldn't do one. We just couldn't. Yeah. We just can't do that. So then the question would be, what would be the number of memberships and what would be the unit price? I mean, right now, if you do 238 times 90, that's what? 27. Is about 27,000 21,420 21,420 so that would be, but then we would we would on our end have to type type in our coding and controls that the 238 was really 238 And then the paid memberships after that right now, I think they started like 55, 53 in January. And then there's slight, you know, as the year goes on, they get less and less each month because it's only one year calendar year membership. So it reduces as the year goes on, but we get fewer sales like this time of year, very few people are coming in. Um, that number would probably also have to rise, but there's not a lot of willingness on our board to go up to the full 90, because we feel like there's a little, like we want some people, you know, like if they're paying, yeah, like.

Is this number, like the 53 right now, is that just like not increased while you increased, you know, what you were charging the town for? And like, it's just been 53 for a long time.

We could bring that to our board. I mean, that's something that has to go to our board to vote on and discuss. I mean, that's something they would have to discuss. How, and could it be something you reimburse us up to another so many paid? I don't know. I don't know. Those are ideas you guys.

Yeah.

But that's something would have to go to our board and you would all have to vote on. But their possibility or having different types of memberships is a possibility. You know, you could do unlimited physical and I don't know, but not online, but not online for it. You don't know. That's a possibility.

Yeah, I personally like the idea of more offering free for the digital that's more accessible to all the residents. Now that we connected broadband across the like, you know, everyone has access to the internet now all of our rooms.

So for the most part, so, um, they already have that through Ellenville? Don't they already have that through Ellenville?

If they are signed up at Edlinville, which is closer to what happens now. If it's online. So that's what I think we chart for people to physically choose for physical memberships of whichever library they're closer to. And then the digital ones that they can still access from their homes because we do have a large public transportation issue in town also to be able to access it if you don't have your own car. Yeah. that would really make it more equitable to all of our residents are ourselves so that's why i'm like reverse end of it like like you said i think that the numbers make the numbers um I think we would be less likely to do unlimited. No, but I was paying for so many online accesses. That's what the town would provide for, I'm saying, for all type of it. We would pay for the digital side of it, and then maybe residents, if they want to be able to go and check out physical copies, pay for whatever the physical, to be able to have physical access would be.

I think the only snag is, and I'm using the precedent of Union Vale membership. So when the township failed to come to the agreement with all the libraries, what happened is the town of Union Vale patrons only had access to physical collections, not digital, which leads me to believe that it might not be possible to ensure that, yeah, patrons are only using digital sources versus our physical collection. I believe that that's why that kind of agreement was struck with them. physical versus the digital. But I have to double check with our system.

The $53, that's only there by Rochester, right? Because everyone involved.

Yes, because they're outside of our taxing district.

I mean, another concern that I think pretty much everyone on the board expressed is, you know, we want those, the current accounts to go to people that most need them. And we're not even sure that we guarantee that because there's a certain privilege to be able to go down and line up again the account. And I'm wondering if people, If there are Rochester residents who were more aware and had the means, if like a higher or a tiered system, say like, you know, if you can support at this level, if you can give it this level, you know, it's $100. And maybe that would also be a way to help with revenue, you know, people who are

We had to test that.

Yeah, and if they're aware, like, oh, yeah, this is something we want to make sure we support for people that can or need more affordable libraries. I'm just trying to think of ways that we could help offset those costs at Joan's point. I mean, you're basically saying to be supportive at the current level, we already are talking about like $21,000, $22,000. And then an additional 20,000 on top of that, though. I think we've been certainly looking at increasing the level to cover our current users, but we're really going to have to see. There's so many factors of their retirement. So, right. Yeah.

Yeah, we're about an hour in on this conversation, so I don't want to keep you guys longer.

As a reference, I looked at how much would be Ellenville in 2004 and $10,000. So I don't know. So just I presume it would be more than the same amount if we had the same transaction.

I don't know if there's a correlation between the amount paid to Ellenville versus...

So there's a little bit of history that town board at a certain point decided to stop paying the Stone Ridge Library. And they were still paying Ellenville. And then it reverted back. And I don't want to go there. That's not going to be the case. I think it's both an equity for, you know, all of our taxpayers are paying a very small amount, but they're all paying into what we contribute. And I think we want to make sure that it's fair for our residents and also fair for the taxpayers in Marble Town who are putting the majority of the bill. But I do feel that the consensus is we don't feel like it would be fiscally responsible for us to go up to the 40,000 this budget year. So I think we should think about ways to cover the costs in a way that is more reflective of your budget and how we might be able to think about adjusting the membership so that more people are served in a way. And I think on the table would be like subsidizing memberships rather than offering free ones. Or, you know, that kind of thing, or just keeping the same arrangement, but buckling it down tighter and just paying more for those same. So I think something along those lines is what we're.

Just a quick note, anything that would involve like some sort of means testing as to like need, and we have no way of doing it. Sure. Yeah. Yeah. There's no way for us to. So that. would have to come either through the town. Like, I don't know how that... Or our system.

Or we could do a lottery that the town administer.

I'm just throwing it out there that we could not do that.

The other thing that concerns me is you mentioned that some of our residents might have memberships in both Allenville and Barnetville.

That's not unusual. That is very common. When Allenville has...

I know, but if the patron has unlimited use of Ellenville, and they're also taking on the limited number of memberships that we have for Stone Ridge. That's a good question.

Yes, that's a great question.

And crowding out somebody who might not have an Ellenville dollar membership building My, uh, approximate to just don't.

Yeah. That's a fair point.

Fair point.

Because that was kind of what I was thinking when you were saying before is that they're using online. They have access to online resources, unlimited already. Just by getting it out.

Yes, but it's not the same collection.

It's a good collection.

I mean, it's not like, okay, so they could get.

But it's online. You have provided residents with online resources.

Yeah, that would be also complicated to enforce. But I think we've gotten sufficiently into the weeds. And do you have enough knowing where we're at?

To come up with an alternate proposal. Okay. That you could consider for your, we'll get you in September after our September board meeting, which meets the third week of September, we should be able to come up with an alternate proposal. And then you would have that at hand to consider during your October budget.

Okay. And I will plug in for the tentative budget, the kind of number that we've been. circling around okay awesome thank you all so so much thank you nice conversation okay so good night thank you so our next steps on that is we will receive a um proposal from the Stone Ridge Library and then the tentative budget, I will probably budget in to start $25,000 as our placeholder because we don't, I don't want to go less than what we think I want to go. $25,000? Yeah.

I've been doing math this whole time. Okay, so...

um i think that's all we're talking about it um if we do do a prorated if we budget 25 000 from us or if we keep if we retain the 529

memberships that we currently have with them this year and we have them be prorated to $30 a family a membership a household for the whole year for the memberships that would make up $15,900 and yeah pretty much almost get us there which I think like speaking for a family that makes under $100,000 a year with a child and a house and a mortgage and everything else like I would be okay with paying like myself paying $30 like I can work that out in a budget compared to like trying to figure out $30 a month. You know what I mean? And especially if it's something where I get prorated throughout the year. I don't go to the library every month with my daughter, but I definitely go more in the summer and the winter months. So if I were to start my membership later, they'd prorate it also.

I like the idea of subsidizing memberships personally.

Yeah, we don't have to do that exact number, but just to give us an idea of where we would be looking for membership.

Any further thoughts? All right. So with that, um, tearing through this agenda, tearing through, um, I am, we're moving on to the public hearing portion. Um, we can do the official seeker at a later date, but the zoning amendment is type two, um, under seeker. Um, So I just wanted to state that because it was in all the referrals that I did. Just to open the public hearings, I wanted to give a little bit of context. I'm not sure if anyone is here to speak on them, but I think context is helpful. So the public hearings for the food truck legislation that we had scheduled for August 13th was improperly noticed. And at our last meeting I took that as an opportunity to present a modified draft of the permit process because i'd already had lots of conversations about some some hardships that that original draft. And that new version is what got noticed and what we're considering tonight. So that's a shorter version. So one version got put out for August 13th and then another version got put out for August 27th. So I just want to reiterate that that is the August 27th version is version two is what we are considering for the permit process. So the proposal to add food trucks to our zoning code was born out of an issue that arose from this specific use not being explicitly named in our zoning code. That happens. But right now what's happening is applications are now being classified as a use not contemplated. which has a process outlined in our zoning code. And that means in our zoning code that we have to consider that use, as whether or not it is allowed in the zoning district. And in order to consider it, we have to hold a public hearing. And if after we hold a public hearing, we say that it is allowed, then that use has to proceed as a special use permit for the planning board. So we decided that that administratively was a burden for something that I don't think we think has a big in use impact on the town. So what we wanted to do instead of putting three separate applicants through that process, we determined that it would be a better use of time to simply add it to our zoning code and come up with a simple process for allowing food trucks. So what we are considering is allowing food trucks in our zoning code, which is what the first local law is. It just puts it in our code as defined and includes it in zoning districts. And then we just have a permit application that is administered simply by the building department. And our aim is that that permit be focused on safety. So both just traffic safety and parking and ensuring that the operator is legally permitted through the county. So those are the goals that we had. And those are the versions that we're considering. Now, we did have to re-refer these laws. So we will be holding the public hearings open after tonight. Um, and my recommendation is that after the public hearings tonight, we hold them open until our September 10th meeting. Um, and I will also be sharing with the board tonight, the initial referral response we got from the Ulster County planning board, which I think won't change, but it is on their next agenda because we did have to refer it to them with that. I would like to open the public hearing for local law X of 2026. So this is amending chapter 140 of the zoning code to include food trucks as an allowed use. Is there anyone here who'd like to speak on local law X?

Barbara? I answered everything you were saying about the whole thing with the not being in the code and having to do that. My concern is, is What restrictions are being put on the food trucks? They can appear all up and down 209. Like where, like that's my concern. Is it a restaurant that wants to have a food outside truck or a business wants to have, that's something different than all down 209, you got food truck. So that's my, just like, what is the restrictions going to be now in these food trucks? I understand the county health and all that. I'm sure you got all your ducks in a row on that, but my concern is where will they be?

Is there anyone else who would like to speak on Local Law X adding food trucks to the zone? Jerry?

Yeah, I'd like to just comment, and I'd actually like to leave my ability, I'm sure it's legal, that I can comment again when the final version is again determined. But for this evening, I'd just like to say that we... only have, to my knowledge, in checking some of the rules. Oh, by the way, I apologize, because I believe I'm the last member of the committee that spent two and a half years doing the zoning. And considering we spent four days on signs and fences, I can't believe we missed boot trucks, because I know we had at least one at the time. That being said, I also recall that particular vehicle was on 209 and there was a concern about the dangers of parking. So that is always, safety is something that I would absolutely be concerned about with any food truck in operation. However, having said that, I go right back to on July 4th through the 8th, in which I'm inclusively saying, we were without power. Many of the residents, in fact, from the 3rd found out were without power. And the nice thing about that particular vehicle that we're speaking of, that A&M hardware right now, that truck was operational because it is fully self-contained. And not only did myself, who was working as an official capacity worker with Central Hudson, but a number of the firefighters were able to get food rapidly and get right back to doing what we all did. So that's something to think about with having standard hours, if you will. The safety aspect there is it is absolutely off-street parking, being as it is a commercial establishment already. And Central Hudson also appreciated that, I can tell you, of the seven members that I worked with. So I simply put those things forward tonight as and other comments about there not being food trucks up and down our corridor. I couldn't agree with that more because of the safety aspect of that. So thank you.

Is there anyone else who would like to comment on Local Law X? So with that, I'll entertain a motion to hold the public hearing for Local Law X 2026 open until September 10th. 2026 . Any discussion? All in favor?

Aye.

Opposed? Abstain? Motion carries. So I'm not putting a time on that. I'm just saying that meeting that flexibility. So I am going to open the public hearing for local law Y of 2026. This is a local law that amends the code of the town of Rochester to establish regulations on the food truck permit process. So this is a standalone chapter of code that establishes the permit requirements. Is there anyone who would like to speak on Local Law Y of 2026? Do we have anyone told us? Hearing none, I will entertain a motion to hold the public hearing for Local Law Y of 2026 open until our September 10th business meeting.

Excuse me, Erin. I didn't get unmuted in time for the last one. New York State law requires that you put a time in your... Oh, I thought you said we could just do it for the meeting groups. Oh, I was saying you could do it at the next meeting, but you should have a time for the continuation.

Okay.

Sorry about that.

So we will amend the local law. Do we have to put a time for the meeting or the time to open the public hearing?

The time for the public hearing. And I mean... It's okay if it opens late. You can put it down for 6.30. Okay. And then you can put the second one down for immediately following the first.

All right. So we'll amend that. I'll entertain a motion to amend that last resolution to include 6.30. I like the motion. All in favor? Aye. Aye. Opposed? Abstain? Motion carries. So I'll entertain a motion. Did we do this one fully? No. No. Okay. So did we have a motion and a second though? Yeah.

Okay.

So we have a motion on the, oh, we no longer have a motion on the floor.

I'll make the motion to continue the public hearing for local law lie of 2026. Okay. Randall Difuntorum, City of Boulder OSMP, To be continuing until September 10 at 630 or to follow public hearing for a local law at some point places. Second, so.

Randall Difuntorum, City of Boulder OSMP, All in favor aye opposed abstain motion carries so. Randall Difuntorum, City of Boulder OSMP, It just wanted to. We received a comment back from Ulster County Planning Board. They are also going to be issuing a comment at their next meeting because we basically withdrew that and re-referred it. The two things that they wanted to make sure that we state that farm operations or farm operations in ag districts are exempt from any of the requirements of the code. that there wouldn't be anything that would conflict with what ag and markets allows them to do, they would be exempt from. So that was one. And then the other is their concern was mostly off street parking that It says, while the proposed statute requires off-street parking to accommodate customers, consideration should also be given to potential roadside parking generated by the uses. Where food trucks are located adjacent to public roadways, customer parking on roadway shoulders may create conflicts with traffic, pedestrians, emergency access, and sight distance, particularly along higher speed or constrained roadways. The law should therefore require that parking associated with food trucks occur within designated off-street parking areas and prohibit customer parking along adjacent roadway shoulders where necessary for public safety. Appropriate no parking signage or other traffic control measures should be installed where warranted subject to the review of the agency having jurisdiction over the roadway, which I agree with. I don't mean to call out a specific business, but the roadside parking at Cherries, which is not in our town, I have noticed is incredibly dangerous and I would hate to see that happening in our town. So, um, I, you know, I agree that we would want to make sure that it's clear that the parking must be accommodated on off street and not, um, overflow onto street parking since most, you know, we're looking at businesses that, um, are in the parcels in the business district. um okay so we are and then um attorney for the our attorney for the town uh made another suggestion which is that i had some language in there about the attorney's role in enforcing the law which admittedly i took what i wrote from another town and just didn't catch that it kind of didn't make sense. So we'll need to update that to say that any infractions can be prosecuted by an attorney selected by the town in case something comes to that.

That'll still be a minor change.

I think we have time to look at that and figure out what we think. Okay. I don't think we would need to re-refer that. All right. So now it is time for the public comment portion of our meeting where we allow the public to address the town board. We won't answer questions during this period. And we do encourage people to stick around if you are asking questions to the board because we may answer them during town board member time, though that's not a promise. We are also limiting comments to three minutes per person during this period. So with that, is there anyone, I'm just setting up my timer. I'm not doing something untoward on my phone. Is there anyone who would like to make a public comment tonight?

Barbara? I'm referring to, I'm sorry, Mr. Kendall left. Obviously we ran out to get your soup. The town of Rochester has a new municipal campus. So I just want to commend the board for being very proactive about thinking about the future here in our town. We had the opportunity many years ago to go over in Rosendale School, which was a faux pas on the part of the new government. And then we had an opportunity to go into the campus of State Time, And that was a faux pas on part of the town. So I just want to commend the board doing that. But I also referring to this because I remember years ago as a school teacher, they would report in the paper about projects we had, projects we wanted and put it in terms that the public could not understand. And all they heard was big numbers like Mr. Campbell put in here that, It could have cost between $3 and $5 million for this project. So Steve, being the good mathematician, went on and said a $3 million bond over 15 years, given that there's 7,000 people in this town, will cost $28.57 per year per person. So if it was a $5 million bond, it would cost $42.62 per person a year. So if you multiply $28, say, or even $30 times four people, that's $120. I will say to a woman, don't get your nails done that month. Don't get your hair done that month. So there's no way that our taxpayers do not afford what you're proposing. at this, this is what it would cost to have. So I just wanted to point that out because I was hoping he was gonna be here so that he could go in his article and put these figures to show and not raise in an election year, the height that we are spending money that we don't have. And it was interesting that I went from the last meeting, I wasn't here because I was attending another meeting and it was so surreal to come from one meeting that's talking about money and everything, and to walk in over here to hear you say that workplace compensation is going up $100,000 next year, and 16% in our health insurance is going up next year. So people have to understand this is not the same as it was many years ago, and it won't be. So we have to commend you for being proactive and setting the plan straight.

Thank you. Is there anyone else who would like to address the board tonight? Jared.

For both of the public comment and my official status here, just to advise and supervise it now and is very familiar with this. Tonight, there is a warning for a tornado warning up above us, but it comes under the status that we were just given about severe, severe thunderstorm in which tornado just south of Albany, I should say up to Albany from Athens and so forth. So I just accomplished my homework for our class that we're taking on weather. Thank you.

The TV, it came from Hardingburg, Southern Bend. So it's not that far.

All right. Is there anyone else who'd like to address the board tonight? So I will close the public comment portion of the meeting. Do any town board members have anything you want to bring up that's not on the agenda or answers to questions? I do.

I'd like to address Barbara's comment. The $3 to $5 million the total cost of the project. And one of the things that we're looking at in this initial stage is to find grant funding that would offset a significant portion of that cost. So the actual taxpayer aid portion of that estimated cost for the building.

I have one from since I wasn't here at the last meeting. I just wanted to give an update on the, for my ladies on ships for the Rotary Club who delivered all the three chairs that have been redone. Chair Mr. Frenino is sitting in the newly upholstered and refinished chairs that the club has been redoing this summer for us. We got rained out a couple of days when it's time for us to seal them with the poly coat. So it took a little bit longer than we anticipated, but we're very happy to have them here. and also our golf tournament that was scheduled for in august didn't get postponed until september 20th now so if there's anyone who wants to play and wasn't able to in august feel free to reach out to me we still have some team slots open and it should be a great fun day community and celebrating rotary and everything for them um the housing committee met and they did um send over some questions to me That's not on the special records, right? They were looking for clarity, and if they were able to do a ,, if they were allowed to do a town survey in the sense of housing, if the board would approve that for what type of housing you would be looking for, for different forms, similar to what they did two years ago during our consult with PAC. and also that they're also wondering if they could do if it's part of the survey um what people would like the uh rett or the grant and the ratt funding to be potentially used for in town or project ideas so kind of i think similar to what funding futures did with the service projects from that grant funding if they surveyed for it they'd send email around um with different options like which was sent to me. So I just wanted to make sure I brought that up for them in the meeting for us. Yes, that's all I had.

Yeah, the only thing quickly, I don't think the planning board got comments on the trip law. I know they discussed it in their meeting, so I encourage people to watch the meeting and I don't want to speak for them, but I think generally the sense that I got was they were so food trucks, making them easier for people to get permitting for. And they did have some other questions that were along the lines of, you know, how can we make this less of a burden on food truck operators? So I think they're still intending to get us something. But the fact that there were slight changes, I think they wanted to discuss the data separation elements. And I can reach out to them and make sure they're aware that they need to get us something.

Um, I just had the, that the Freeman article, the thing that I was concerned about when I saw the headline is, um, what we were discussing is applying for a non public, like a private grant that would help us do some planning work around the idea of building a significant um addition to the existing town hall and what that would cost and whether it was feasible so that we could know whether or not we could both use that product to apply for the grant funding that we were talking about which is a very heavy lift because these are big um programs that are have very specific applications for those grant programs and also would give us more information about whether we wanted to seek other options for addressing our infrastructure need, which is a great segue into our next agenda item. I also just, for the Housing Advisory Committee, Charlotte, I thought we could just answer their question about the survey directly. The one thing that they asked This is just kind of for the board. We don't need to approve it, but they'd asked if we could use some of the funds that we had put for the housing advisory committee for them to take a GIS training course for members. And I was a little bit unsure as to what that would do for their role as advising the town board on housing. Do you press to that?

It's not at their last day. I unfortunately have been labored to attend it. But I know I will leave the classes I read through that are at SUNY Ulster, if I'm not mistaken. I can respond to the emails and talk with them because there's also, if they're not seeking credit hours, there's differences in pricing if they're not looking for college credit for the courses you can just sit in on them most of the time for free especially if it's for another uh ev state agency of some sort um i had someone sit in on my classes last semester that's another reason i helped so um i can do some inquiry on that end for them and see exactly why i know um a lot of mapping has come up with the last consultant when like looking trying to do like a full town wide looking at all of our parcels and individual and our actual, like the housing map of town, if that makes sense. And zoning map wise, I think is what they're trying to hone in on to be able to identify, be able to identify and be able to use the data and manipulate it easier for the committee to be able to quickly look something up for themselves, except like trying to find it. Um, but I can get full of that, but that's just from how they've interacted with that. I assume that that's fine. one of the leading forces for it. But I can get some clarity for us. And I can also, I can reach out to some of my contacts and see what can work out.

Yeah, I'm generally very supportive of training. I just, when I first saw it, I was wondering how it would tie into advising the town board. It did also come up In the hazardous weather training that Jerry and I are attending this week that having being able to make your own GIS maps of your hazard zones for different. So not housing but be able to have internal resources to do mapping can be a good thing so. I'm not opposed to it. I just didn't pop out as like the obvious.

Yeah. I totally, when I first saw it, like the like subject, when I came through my nose, I was like, yes. And then read through and request. But I, yeah. So I'll reach back out to those, I think it's three members, right? That were looking to do that. So I'll reach back out to them and see if they're like, I didn't find out exactly what they want. Cause if they're not seeking credit, I can probably find a more economical way for us to get those credits for them to the job.

And then I feel, I think we can just respond to the survey idea. I had some thoughts about how it should be worded, but otherwise I have no issue with them doing any survey. I feel like that fits. I agree.

I think they did a very good job last time. We got like some good insights from our last heritage survey surveys. Right. So we can set up any time. I'm sorry. No.

Um, I, well, there's two surveys they're asking to do. So I, I definitely think the housing one is good. The, the RETT one, I'm a little bit wary of just because.

I might be mixing those up. Yeah.

Well, if they wanted to do it, I definitely think the housing one. No, no, but she mentioned the RETT one. And it's like, that's something that we still did, you know, proposal for and got grant money for. So I don't want to. I don't want to give the impression or have like a small sample size about what we should do because there's already kind of a clear path I've been designed about what that box for. So yes, housing is good, but if they're going to do a second survey about specific to that, I think we should talk about it.

You think the board should decide about what they do at Heritage Day?

I think the board, if they're gonna do a survey about grant funding that we got, we should kind of have a sense, it's not like a generic survey about housing in the County of Rochester. They should at least talk to you.

Yeah, what I was saying with, I had feedback that I think it shouldn't reference the RETT or hiring consultant, which I don't think is what they were proposing. they wanted it to be a really general thing. And I just wanted to make sure that we reinforce that.

Services that they'd like to see from the town really more than like what the funds are specifically being used for. But like in turn, what do they want to see from there really?

Kind of what the last service. Yes.

Yeah. Kind of like what the funding futures month where it's like, here's some potential projects. What do you think of these? Let's rank them. So that's kind of the thing I get from it. It's not like a hard and faster. They're like, this is what we want to do with our AT&T. Pick between these five.

See, I don't like that.

No, that's not what it is. And I don't think that's what it is. I know I'm saying I don't think that's what's happening. I think it's more like here are some ideas. What do you guys think of these ones? There's more to come.

So I would love for us to try to wrap up in an hour if possible. So I'm just giving us that. So for the capital plan, the long-term financial plan, I wanted to spend a few minutes and I'll keep an eye on the time with a, just a, not necessarily visioning, but I want the board to start thinking about five, 10 years down the line. What do we want to contemplate in this plan in a rough general idea so that I can build the bones of the, the framework for putting this together. This, I know this is just like a really quick initial discussion and I would love for us to spend more time on it, but I don't think it'll, I think it'll be more useful to do a quick sort of what do we want to make sure we contemplate and vision with that. And then when we have some actual numbers, because the majority of our financial plan, we actually have numbers we can plug in and just do projections. But it could be anywhere from, you know, we want to make sure that all of our constituents and staff have enough money room to, for us to offer services. So like, that's one way of saying it to that by in 10 years, we need the transfer station to be a completely different facility because of this condition of the canopy there or something. So I just thought we could go popcorn, one thing kind of idea wise and go keep going around the room. So we'll start with you, Zali.

We need to do something with the courthouse. Courthouse. It's a mess. The fiscal building is . The adjacent trainer is substandard. So there needs to be done about those facilities.

And so that is a multi-year project. So we need a short-term and a long-term plan. Charlotte? Putting you on the spot.

Transfer station, the shed, the bathroom. scale. Great. window or shed. The whole thing. Michael.

No.

No, one at a time.

Well, I think one thing we definitely need to do is come up with a plan for what reserve funds we want established, kind of a structure to that, so that we don't have major surprises, infrastructure buildings, high-cost equipment, things like that, and really make a plan so that we can start budgeting building reserves for those things. think the other thing that's come up a bunch of times and i think it was it's complex it's do we want to look long term at establishing a broader district or doing something to address a municipal water system particularly for you know some global areas and other things we could be doing particularly in the area for water and sewer

I think we need to do more planning around emergency services. So fire district is now, that's not in our, the fire district's not in our, but the currently the EMS is, and I have a feeling that the cost for that will continue to increase. And then additionally, our emergency response planning has costs associated with it. And there are costs associated with disasters that don't trigger any government funding. So thinking of establishing a way to handle those as an expenditure, and then as a revenue, I think we need to start looking at the funding opportunities for mitigation of those things.

Sorry.

We're going around.

We're just going to lightning round.

I know I'm having a little fun with you guys rather than letting somebody talk for.

I think we need to look at our physical plant in terms of office space allocation integration as far as. Ensuring that we have a collaborative space. More different departments to look young along.

Charlotte the barn hmm. But I want to keep a piece of the wood, which is all I recall, from upstairs where I was supposed to get it from. It was a hard job. Sorry, I don't think it was good. Thank you.

You wouldn't have used two in one shot.

I know. No, I just thought that was your personality.

I'm going to start talking. You know, it's not necessarily a long term financial plan, but I think. Continuing continuing to find. These opportunities, housing continues to come up as a. Issue in town, the pressures of development, so I think. Trying to find what resources and pushing. as far as we have it harder on some of the grant processes to figure out what to do to encourage affordable housing and make it possible for people to stay in town. I think we could focus on that next 10 years.

So I'm really into the day-to-day nitty gritty and the thing that has been missing from our budget process year after year after year is maintenance. So I want to see that we're maintaining our grounds. I want to see that we're maintaining our HVAC systems. I want to see that we're maintaining our planning. We don't plan for these. We haven't been planning for these things in a way that is predictable. We plan for them in a way that is reactive. And I think we need to start being more proactive Um, so I want to see that we, when we're putting this together and we're thinking about 10 years out, it's like, okay, you know, this system is X number of years old. The life expectancy of it is this, we need to plan to replace this specific thing, you know, in four years. Um, and I mean, you guys know this, but we're kind of out of the life expectancy of a lot of the things that the town owns. But I feel the same way about our zoning code too, and things that are more less visible, but from an operational standpoint, I think, having those things plotted will show us what some of the expenses are associated with it. Some of it might not cost a lot, but some of it, we want to say, well, do we want to hire a consultant for this? Do we want to try to do this in-house? And there's time versus money. And I think like for me doing this type of planning, you actually have to think through some of those things, even if you're not sure whether or not it's going to cost a significant amount or not. You guys want to go around one more time? Yeah. Yeah.

Sure. I think we need to spend some time evaluating and updating our IT systems to make them less manual, more user-friendly, search-worthy. And that means coordinating our multiple systems and figuring out the best way to configure them.

Charlotte? A vote change of playground in the park.

Okay. Michael?

I was going to say, recreation in general, spaces, opportunities for people to get together and feel like a community. I think Heritage Day is a fantastic event. I know a lot of work goes into it, but more of those types of activities and figuring out how to get people actually talking to one another and all feeling like they live in the same community.

Can I change mine? We can go around one more time. Yeah, the vote needs to change. I just want us to have a township. I want us to own something. don't have the jenny bell pie festival that was our thing we made like our own thing again but literally was talking about it today um oh i had a good one that i was thinking um

I had a really good one. It was really good. But the thing I was thinking about is priorities. Because I agree about recreation. But we've spent $500,000 on recreation outdoor spaces. And we need to be spending that amount of money in other places. So I think we'll need to make sure that we have our priorities in line in terms of like when it's time to invest in our infrastructure. So I think the other thing we haven't talked at all about is our highways, because that also should go into like infrastructure that is a huge expense.

I'm sorry, it was just our things, Erin.

HAB-Masyn Moyer- The highway budget is.

HAB-Masyn Moyer- yeah.

HAB-Masyn Moyer- But that we can't really have a 10 year plan without thinking about those. HAB-Masyn Moyer- wish I remembered the thing I was thinking about. HAB-Masyn Moyer- Anything else.

Is that enough? Isn't that enough?

We're done. Um, the clerk's office, I feel like talking about like what, like priorities wise, like I feel like that these like since black time on the board, like the clerk cuts a lot for the sake of like, is one of the most willing departments to cut stuff. So I do want to make sure that like, we can get as much support as we can in that side. I think that that's one of the ones that like has given up a lot more than we've got back in with our budgets and previous past few years. So that's the only one I want to make sure that kind of goes with the whole town building.

Well, I definitely think staffing projections and being thoughtful about that, because again, that's another place where we have been very Yeah. Reactive versus proactive where, you know, we're putting fires out instead of, and the inequity can happen when you make decisions in that way, where you spend down something that maybe it really in the long run would have been better to put it towards another department. So definitely think that's relevant. Yeah. So that's definitely not all of it, but Michael created like an initial template to start with that has regular operating expenditures that are a little bit more predictable. And then some of these will also be splitting out capital planning and capital improvement planning. And I think the next, I will, prepare that. Also encourage the board to read those documents I shared from the state comptroller about doing this work as a municipality. And then when I have the sort of bones of that plan together, we will come back and look at it and do some prioritization another year. So I think I want to get some kind of draft working so that we can look at it with our budget process this year.

Erin, it's the, what was it, 2019 building survey that we had done? Yes. Is that on the drive? It is. Yeah. And then I think, hold on, let me tell you. Hold on just a second.

So yeah, you should do, that gives a cost of bringing all of our buildings up to, you know, and that was done in 2021, I believe.

Okay.

So you need to add like a 3% escalation to that.

Yeah.

Well, I'm seeing four to six. I'll figure out what it is. But if you're looking at that, just keep in mind that you have about six years. Every year that we put those things in a budget, we're going to be adding an escalation to those costs. And it's significant. I mean, it is very significant, which is why at the time we discussed looking into replacing infrastructure versus repairing it because the consultants at the time said the cost of repairing this isn't worth it necessarily um so like in some cases you're going to get more out of replacing it than you would and that is in that report also um but yeah it's in i had it on a few agendas this year. So it should be. Yeah, I thought that I just wasn't sure. Oh, there we go. There's that vendor. Right now it's a thing now.

Jerry.

Well, we're shelter in place.

The meeting will continue till morale improves.

Thank you. Jerry, the town. Oh,

If internet goes out, I will send you all a memo about the executive session stuff.

We need to drive here.

Yeah, Mary. It's coming right here.

I was going to say, you'll be offended if you guys leave so you get home safely before it starts raining.

Jerry, will you tell me if you think we should adjourn the meeting?

So let's do it.

Is that all? No one has it in a building.

Or is that too late when, like, the alarm went off?

I don't know.

I don't know, man. Like, seriously.

HAB-Masyn Moyer- was literally on the way out.

HAB-Masyn Moyer- It looks like our warning for right here is 915. HAB-Masyn Moyer- All right. HAB-Masyn Moyer- Okay, so for our discussion items we received, to my knowledge, though I didn't confirm with our town clerk. We received two applications for the town board vacancy. What we discussed when we were issuing a request was that we would collect those applications and then schedule interviews and then sort of go from there. I think we talked about scheduling a special meeting for those interviews. So I wanted my, what I wanted to propose and you guys can, anything's on the table, but that the board tell me when you're available and then I will reach out to the applicants and then based on the Venn diagram of availability, I will schedule a meeting. Does that work or do you guys have? As long as it's not Friday. Yeah, Friday is not a great night. Okay.

So next week, September 10th? Yes. Immediately prior to the September 10th meeting?

What was that?

How about immediately prior to the September 10th?

I don't have an issue with that. I know we talked before. Okay. I would want to give at least 30 minutes.

So five? I'm fine with five.

Can we do five?

Yeah. Okay. I'll schedule that after I speak with the applicants. 5.30?

Okay. I'm not available.

Oh, not available. So is there a backup option? How long is it? i'm still. There. Following Thursday.

i'm not still.

there's our same he's not. I can also, we can also just do this offline. Yeah. Okay. We'll do it offline. Okay.

But we'll figure something out in the next few weeks. It's a special meeting. So you're able to schedule.

Yep. All right. This next agenda item is The ambulance improvement district contract requirements. I have this on the agenda at the request of Councilman Coleman. The town currently has not received any financial reports or the call logs that we were expecting that are required in our contract. At the last time that we released a payment for the Kerr-Hompson vendor, we waived the requirements as a sort of a one-time like. Yeah. And currently, this squad is still working on compiling their financial reports. We don't have a clear timeframe for when we might receive those. So the reason I have this on the agenda is I want to hear from the board what steps you would like to see us take at the current time, given the fact that we're still awaiting this. So yeah, we haven't received anything for this year. So we haven't received first or second quarter.

No, well, right. It was handwritten in the first quarter, right?

Yeah. We've made the payments. They've received two payments, but one is an initial payment, and then the second is based on first quarter, and then the third is based on second.

And the first quarter payment was after meeting with Representative Schmidt's squad and the ambulance advisory committee, and that was a request by the ambulance advisory committee. you know, support continuity of operations. And I think, you know, from my perspective, the board relies on that committee to advise us. And so, I mean, from my perspective, and his not speaking to the board, we are going to wait for them to get the documents that they feel is necessary and provide their advice on that. And so, I think, you know, I personally am on standby until we see documents that are required, or some version that gives us the sense that...

I mean, those documentary requirements will negotiate with the provider, and the provider will be confronted with it. It's kind of a...

It's a primal issue.

They did, they did say which they undertook to resolve. Yeah.

They did send us that, you know, they have a contract with an accountant that's working through the books. But the, the other longer term problem, it's looking at close to budget season. And in order to get a budget for our contribution, we need to have more information, as well as their anticipated revenues and expenditures for 2027. So It's a tough spot for us to be in without any data to really look at. As well as for the community. They're ready and willing to help where they can.

So then are we saying wait for the advice of the committee?

Well, I think at this point we're waiting until we see documentation and get that to the committee and then we can have subsequent conversations.

And has anyone reached out to the accountant or K pass or to the leadership and change?

Yeah, so that's what's going to be what I said that we should do.

Yeah, yeah. I reached out to the current chief.

Okay, but what you did is said, Hey, this is not I'm not criticizing you. But what you did was say, Hey, we need these documents. They said they were going to have them you followed up, they said, Oh, we don't have them. And then you shared that they don't have them. I think my thought is that I would like to reiterate the terms of the contract with them.

Yeah. And maybe with a reminder that we penalized this time this happened. And I think that was very nice to do. I think that You personally, like, you don't have to include this in the email, but, like, second time around, like, quote, once, you know, type of thing. Like, this is clearly a thing, an issue that we're going to have going on. So I want to make sure it gets out and out, too.

Yeah.

For the budget season is, I guess, what I'm concerned with with it.

Right. Me, too.

I don't want them to, like, I don't want to keep, I don't want to get another slap on the wrist for them to just do it again the year after this, you know. So I want us to make sure we're getting our

I mean, to give them, you know, kudos to them. They're responding to our needs and our calls. And it's wonderful. But they have represented that they would fix these financial reporting issues.

Right. And the reason why we want this is not simply to just be tough, but it's We have a duty to our taxpayers in the district. And these reporting requirements are for the health of the agency, the town, and the service. Because this isn't, you know, this is not a typical vendor. New York State does not require that. They do not say that EMS is an essential service. But it is, right?

That's a long-term planning issue too.

I agree, but I also don't want them to... Their service is essential and it's so important, but also us being able to report back to the taxpayers. We know what's going on and we're not blindsided by a headline article in the Freeman comptroller's office about an organization that we've been missing reports on for years. I think that it... I so value them and I so appreciate their service, but I also, I don't want this to be a pain in like a pain in their, the thorn in their side. I want it so that I can be like, no, they're good. Got all their paperwork. We're happy to release the funds to them. I don't want to have to, you know, sit here and be like, come on guys, where's your reports? Where's your follow-up? Over the last quarter, over and over every year. It just adds more to our plate that we don't, or whatever it is that we use on.

Yeah. And the, and the committee has offered to help where they can and, you know,

track things down and help with budgeting so yeah okay i'll i'll draft something up all right and then just to answer a question august 3rd was the the reporting deadline that has just passed okay So next, well, I was going to have a map, but I have been in a training for two days, and I tried to get everything done before that, and I did not get the map done. But I think I would like to, basically, we received a donation of fencing. We have someone. um, along with our dog control officer and some volunteers who can install it. Um, councilman Coleman and I looked at where we thought the best area for it is, um, it's approximately 800 feet of chain link fencing. And what we would, our proposal be to take it like narrowly on the, if you're looking at the count on the right side, um, and go out to where that little parking spot is, but not as far as the lamppost and go straight down. So we're not cutting into the yard area very much. It would be a longer run along that little road, longer and narrower. And it would be only accessible with a person. The dogs would be able to go out there on their own.

Even if they tried?

Well, some of them.

We have some skilled dogs in there. Yeah. The scapegoats. Yeah.

Yeah.

HAB-Masyn Moyer- I mean I that's not a well utilized it would change, you know there'd be a fence there but it's not like that portion of the park is that.

HAB-Masyn Moyer- Not that far down so you're talking about extending it from when you said the right you're talking about like looking at the highway department barn what's there so you're looking at moving towards the veterans park.

But when we were looking on the side to here.

Yeah, I was trying to get to 800 feet and that's only 600 feet. So, but yeah.

Well, we don't have 800 feet.

You only have 800 feet. We can put it on top. Yeah. So, so cutting it at the tree line back there. Yeah. Yeah.

No, we actually have a plan for that.

Yes, yes, yes. My only question is not really so much with the location of it, but would residents be able to come and let their dogs run? No, it's just for the impounded dogs.

Impounded dogs? Is that what you call it? Impounded like a dog? Yeah, the guests.

Is there just one run in there?

Well, what we're talking about is making it be one main yard, but then having a second area that's closed off for people to meet the dogs. Currently, we don't have an area, like a smaller area that they can be let out in. There's like a table section.

Which would be

Okay. So I'll, could I make a motion that the town of Rochester town board accepts? Did we already do this? If we didn't, I'll do it again.

We accepted the donation.

Oh, we did. Okay. Okay. So I questioned. Done. So then I'll make a motion that the town of Rochester town board, um, authorizes the, um, installation of the chain link fence, um, the overseen by the town supervisor, but for the use of the dog control officers kennel facility. Second.

Any additional costs? No, you said it was volunteer work.

There might be some, we might need to purchase some concrete. I just want to make sure. All right. All right. Any more discussion? All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Abstain? Motion carries. Did anyone read the memo from Dave Church regarding the battery energy storage system? So what do you have any takeaways from that? for how you want to move forward.

I mean, I had the initial reaction too. I'm like, this substation is frightening. It's a hard, it's a hard sell to put a large substation. I don't know. I think, I think the idea of, you know, looking at siting the existing solar operations is viable, but it's, I don't know.

Super limited.

Yeah, I mean, the transmission line runs right down Granite, just over here. And then all the distribution is what, 209, Sansonville, I can't remember if it was Whitfield, but it's like prime housing and prime farmland. So I think what ultimately we may, where we may end up is the smaller scale versions. If they're going to require a three-phase and or a substation for larger operation, I think we're going to be challenged to find an area that makes sense.

Okay. Charlotte, did you have anything?

No. So in terms of, you know, right now we have a moratorium and It doesn't sound like you want to make them banned, but make the way that they're allowed, like, pretty limited to what is appropriate and possible.

Yeah, I, yes, I don't mean that they, like, altogether banning them, because I think there's such a depending on the actual size of scale and what exact type of station it is you know storage station depends on how much of our actual resources they're pulling from so i think it's more like we need to just look at what districts we're putting them in and the regulations around them and inspection you know same thing with fire inspection like i like personally or folks that it's are we lacking more than inherently fire inspection mary lou on something We may work whatever time we want. We do more frequently than a year. We can be more strict than that. Right, but not less. Okay, that's what I thought. So yeah, I would like to see them done more because I know working at a local establishment that just had a fire caused by an electric vehicle garage, their batteries can't, the batteries don't know.

Yeah, it's a good point. I think they've made the point as well. I know the fire district has a lot of... Yeah, a lot of interest in ensuring that this is done properly, that there's the right mechanisms for detective protection, for the safety of volunteer firefighters. And so, yeah, they definitely, we should refer anything to the fire history, for sure, if it's referable to them.

That's OK. Yeah, I think that it's going. I think that we can get to, do you want me to see if I can find some like example zoning codes for us? We've got that.

We've got, basically, I just wanted to kind of give, Dave and Ava will draft it for us, but we can give the, just the okay on that direction. I don't know. I think we're coming up on it. So I need to, I've been meaning, but we have an extension. Yeah.

yeah i think that yeah i can go on the air of like more fire inspection and making sure that there's uh bulkier easements between neighboring properties that are residential or whatnot and then uh roadway like actual like curb cuts of uh parcel access i think is most important we're looking at regulating them good so we've got 15 minutes

HAB-Juliette Boone, So for the general refund policy here's there's one thing that I want to get the board's feedback. HAB-Juliette Boone, And you can't give me any other feedback it's not allowed no so as a recap. HAB-Juliette Boone, We don't have a refund policy there's nothing about refunds posted or non fundable fees posted anywhere so every time. A refund request is made if it falls outside of the month that it's taken. It comes to me and then I bring it to the town board. And I'm very tired of doing that. And I just want there to be something that's clear and in writing. And we can just pass that because all of our fees are I'm talking about building and planning and zoning. The way those are worded in the laws is that we set the fee schedule. So we can set this policy through resolution. The only fee that is non-refundable by our law is the short-term transient rental fee. That states clearly that it's non-refundable. Nothing else says that clearly so i'm similar to the what Kate what we passed for the pavilion, I want to do something that just enables staff to take care of those decisions. And so, one 100% refund if it's our fault. So. Okay. Two, if an application has come in and the fee has been paid, but no staff review has occurred, it should receive a 75% refund. And that covers all the administrative costs that go into everything leading up to the application fund. The question I have is the next one, which is if there's an unsubstantial amount of review, that they be given a 50% refund. And then if a review has started like a substantial review, then there's no refund at all. All refunds are audited by the town board. So you're still reviewing any refund still gets audited. My proposal would be that there is a form that the staff fills out and it goes with the voucher for that check that would get cut. And then I was thinking if we do like this unsubstantial, substantial idea that it would be with the department head of that department would have to sign off on that, what the staff is saying. So not an employee could tell their supervisor, this is how much I did. And then they would say whether or not they thought that was substantial.

Sounds reasonable.

Reasonable?

Yeah.

Okay, great. So I'll put that as a resolution for our next meeting. including the application. Okay, so the next one. So items F and I, I realized when I was preparing for the meeting, there are aspects of these that there are some aspects that I think are personnel issues that should be discussed in executive session. But I do want to share with you the non-executive session parts. So staff, some of our constables have come to me with a proposal to hold a peace officer academy. This is something that I believe the town board has to authorize because we authorize what they can do and they would be doing it as an agency. They'd be doing it as the town of Rochester. They can't, you can't offer that without it being registered and it would be registered as the town of Rochester. So I'm going to read, I received... I asked for a narrative, which I received from Constable Mark Smith today. So I was just going to read that. It's not very long. But it's also, I put it in with the documents. So the goal, this is his words I'm reading. The goal of offering this course is multifaceted. One is that we will be able to train our own officers. We know what they are trained in and what they're trained for and how they might react in a certain situation. Two, we show that the town of Rochester helps its neighbors in need. So that would be offering the course to other agencies that have a need to help train peace officers, such as like animal, control officer, there's like peace officers that aren't law police. Third, the amount of money the town will save will be at least three to 4,000 per constable. That's if the town is hiring our own constables and then putting them through the training versus paying for them to go through a training. Our core trainers are current members of the constabulary. These are trainers that have taught the military, anywhere from the military to federal government, both local and state agencies, overseas government, foreign military. We do have one instructor that is a weapons and defense tactics certified that has been instructing for years, which we will pay him $30 an hour. which they've identified that person. I have been able to work out the schedule as follows, Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays from 4 to 9 p.m. and Saturdays from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. This will take place at the Perhance and Akron First Aid Squad building, so not on town property. This will cost us approximately $1,600 for the entire eight-week course. We will not take up- I think they're saying that's for. Yeah.

For the chef.

Yeah. I, the squad is not charging. Apparently I have to confirm all this. Um, the charge for attendees that belong to other agencies will be 3000 for the course. The cost of the Academy will be offset by the students taking the course. So I think that $1,600 is for use of the squad building.

Then, um, What type of liability arises from that?

So the course has to first be accepted by DCJS. It can't be offered if they don't say that. And then the course has to be certified after it's given. So I don't know what other liability would come out.

I mean, I'd separate it into two issues. One is I think it's great to save money if we can offer those courses and training to our own constables. When we're taking third-party trainees, I'd be concerned about the liability issues.

I believe that falls on the instructor, not us.

I'm sure it might be our instructors.

Yeah, but that would fall on the instructors license. I think you should call her, but I'm still worth confirming.

I, I check with insurance.

Okay. Any other concerns?

I mean, I think the email is helpful. Initially, we had the list of required courses. And my understanding was that there would be more substantial proposal in terms of what we're expecting to do, what kind of the long-term benefits of this are, what the costs are. And some of that is . I don't know if we're grouping all of these discussions, but we had a number of things, tasers, body cameras, radios. There's a lot of additional costs that are coming up in terms of this department. I think I've met with our constables. I think they're incredibly dedicated. They're an amazing team and they're really committed to wanting to serve the community and do more. But I think for me, it's also important to understand, you know, as we talk about fiscal responsibility and budgets, like, what do the residents want out of this department? And how are we structuring this moving forward? And I think we also need to talk to other local law enforcement and see what damage, because we've talked about a lot, you know, what could be done, what should be done. You know, we should be talking to Ulster County sheriffs. We should be talking to state troopers and understand what the need is and planning for that because some of these long-term costs, you know, we're talking five-year leases for radios or for tasers, for Bobby cameras. You know, we're signing up a big commitment there, I think. The other thing I want to hear from residents about, and I've been clear in meetings in the past, I wanted to have a better understanding of what kind of support the constabulary was providing in town. We've received reports about neighbor-to-neighbor complaints. There's connections to elder care. I think those are great functions for that organization to serve. I've asked for more details about that and I haven't seen them up until this point. So before we start looking at what a strategy is for this organization and for this department moving forward, I would really like to, A, understand what the board envisions in this department, B, get a sense of what the residents want, because having a police force is expensive. that.

Can you put all of this into what you think the next step should be? We're not going to figure that out.

I would want to see more details and I know there's a time frame because they have 45 days. If we can get something more by meeting on the 10th and I don't know and I'm happy to sit down and talk to them about it and work with them on it.

But the question about Offering a training and long-term visioning.

I'm talking about getting more details about the trend, like getting a more clear what we're actually proposing to do that. Because I feel like we're talking about numbers and we'll make this much and we'll save this much. I would want to have a better understanding of that. Because if we do hire all these people, then we're going to have to get additional equipment for them. And I think, you know, that's what I'm not there on.

Well, we can hire two people.

With the current proposed equipment.

No, we have 10 slots.

I'm not talking from a civil service. I'm saying in terms of the proposals for tasers, body cameras, were additional officers included in those numbers?

No, no, no, no, no. So I guess what I'm hearing is the board, you don't feel comfortable authorizing this tonight. You feel like you need a higher level of detail and also want this liability question answered.

Yeah, certainly it sounds like Mary Lou is advising us to check on the liability. I haven't looked closely at the email. I didn't get a chance to look at that. So I'm willing to look at that and say like, okay, these are the additional things I would want to know.

Great. So for the next, does that work for everybody? Okay. For the next, um, the taser body camera proposal. So I don't, I think the body cameras from the axon is cost prohibitive and I don't want to go with that option. The tasers, we got confirmation that we can do, um, a smaller number and, um, that they can be checked out.

Smaller number of pieces or smaller number?

Smaller number of teasers. The last time you guys asked if we could do like a pool. So I think we just lost, we're losing work or internet. But we can have less.

Yes.

units but have a checkout system. Part of what you're paying for with this company is they manage the data storage through their system, which is attached to key cards. So you know whoever is using it and any data with the Taser. That's also true with their body cameras. But I think the cost of that was like way more than I thought it would be. So what we have is an updated proposal that has five plus the license. So everyone who's using one has to have a license. I feel personally like we have this information. I don't feel... comfortable making the decision on this tonight, but I wanted to see if the board had further information that you were looking for, or if you feel that this is reasonable and, you know, you would be willing to, you know, the contract amount is, it's on state bid and they gave us the bid. We're on the state contract with this board. Other one.

I had some questions that I can send you just to understand, like what, like the numbers weren't adding up for me. I was just wondering why this many, this license, not many of that license. So I can send you what those questions were.

So I can tell you, um, the.

There's been like professional and basic licenses, you know, it's like nine something.

Hmm. Is it bad?

It looks bad. It's getting worse. What looks bad? 9 o'clock again. It's going severe. 100%. 60 mile an hour winds.

Well, we shouldn't be out driving, right?

Shouldn't be. We have to drive, too. So if you're poison.

Isn't this an immersion? I was saying seer. I don't know. I didn't grow up in Kansas, ma'am. Well, here, there was a tornado when I was a kid. I don't know what. I just lay in a field, right? When it's coming, like, you get in a big field and lay down.

Do you want to check your resolution?

Or you lay in a ditch, something like that, so it jumps over you.

Yeah.

We have to at least do that.

Yeah.

Well, we can... I think we can... I think we should, we have to do some of these resolutions.

Let's do all the resolutions very quickly.

Okay. So we'll be able to block vote everything except for the first one. Okay. So I'll make the first one and then we'll block vote everything. So I'll make a motion that the Town of Rochester Town Board accepts the 8B HAB-Masyn Moyer- abstract in the following amounts so general fund. HAB-Masyn Moyer- General fund is. HAB-Masyn Moyer- Hold on just a second we had an amendment to it. HAB-Masyn Moyer- $56,036 and 60 cents. HAB-Masyn Moyer- um. HAB-Masyn Moyer- highway fund $50,000 50,000 $488 and 56 cents and escrow $820. HAB-Masyn Moyer- Any discussion on favor. HAB-Masyn Moyer- I. HAB-Masyn Moyer- opposed abstaining motion carries.

HAB-Masyn Moyer- I make a motion to block both resolutions be at. HAB-Masyn Moyer- Right. HAB-Masyn Moyer- Yes. Yep. Second.

Any discussion? All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Abstain? Motion carries. Welcome to our after school. So welcome for our after school leads.

Would you like me to just write you guys a memo updating you on all the litigation?

Yeah. Okay. I will do that. You think we should leave now or stay.

There's a new front coming right up the Olympus from the west, as you learn, east to east.

So do I have a motion to adjourn? Aye. So moved.

And the second? Second. All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Abstain? Does anybody?

Charlie? Yeah. Oh, we all said it.

Yeah.

And just before we leave, I just want to say happy birthday to Claire.

Oh, yeah.

Happy birthday, Katie. Happy birthday, Katie. Happy birthday.

You guys all be very, very careful, please.

Okay. Thank you, Marilyn.