Town Council - Regular Meeting

All right, good evening.

I'm going to open up the Windsor Town Council meeting. It is 7.30, and we have all our councillors present except for the mayor. Mayor Newshet Black-Burke sends her regrets. She will not be here this evening. And so I will call on Councillor Pelkey for the prayer or reflection and the Pledge of Allegiance.

Thank you, Madam Deputy Mayor. Dear Lord, thank you for this gathering. We ask for your wisdom, your guidance, and above all, your mercy in keeping this meeting fruitful and as short as possible.

Thank you.

Thank you. We have no proclamations or awards, so now we will go into public communications. The town council welcomes and values public comment. We ask that all speakers conduct themselves with civility and respect. Please do not refer to any other speakers by name or use derogatory, inflammatory, or disrespectful language when expressing your views. Please note that this portion of the meeting is for the council to listen to the public's input. The council does not respond to questions or engage in discussion during public comment. Your comments will be received and considered as part of the public record. Thank you for your participation and for helping to maintain a respectful and productive meeting environment. So we are now on to public communications. If anyone from the public would like to address the council, you'll be given three minutes to speak. Please state your name and address. Those of you in the audience, you will see Councillor Armstrong hold up a yellow card when you have a minute left and a red card when you have 30 seconds left. And I will now turn this over to the moderator, Scott Colby, Assistant Town Manager.

Thank you, Madam Deputy Mayor. If there's anyone from the public who would like to address the council, you may do so by raising your hand on your computer by selecting the Participants icon on the Zoom menu bar and then clicking Raise Hand or by dialing star 9 on your phone. You'll be given three minutes to speak. Please state your name and address when you are called on. You'll be prompted that you are now unmuted. For those dialing in by phone, once prompted, you will then press star 6 to unmute. For clear communication, we ask that you do not place the call on speakerphone. We do have one individual with their hand raised. To our first caller, you are now unmuted.

Hello, this is James Chabot-Weingart, 20 Tiffany Drive. I am asking the Town Council to direct the Department of Public Works to cover or otherwise disable the ALPR cameras that we have ended the contract of until they are removed, disabled, covered, obscured in some way. We, my family and my neighbors, won't be able to feel safe traveling the streets. We don't have any confidence in Flock in particular's ability to keep the cameras off. They've shown that they are willing to lie to other towns and cities across the US. And we also don't want any of this kind of surveillance any ALPRs or anything like that, regardless of what company they're from. Thank you very much. Have a good day.

Thank you.

At this time, we have no other virtual attendees with their hand raised.

All right. Anybody from the public in the room, please come up, state your name and address, and you'll have three minutes.

Good evening. Michelle Vanelli, 1152 Paquannock Avenue. Regarding the proposed waterside apartment conversion, my thinking is this. Too much, too fast, without time to digest the ramifications of such an apartment explosion once fully occupied. My taxpayer concern, are we creating a financial headache for ourselves by approving the waterside? Currently, we've got founders and SOCDEV apartments under construction and can't even figure out the impact on the traffic flow. Combine that with other constructions such as Pequana Commons, plus is Great Pond Village even done with their behemoth apartment phases? Lord knows what else I'm unaware of. I'm thinking until all these builds are completed and occupied, we're dealing with too many unknown variables regarding new tenants. We can estimate the number of occupants, but we can't estimate ages. Are they the majority children or senior citizens? We can't know until leases are signed. That will be an indication what will strain our schools, our state mandated special ed needs, our senior services, plus our police, fire, and ambulance services. It also raises the very important question At what point does it become necessary to have a paid fire and ambulance company? Funding those comes at enormous expense. Also, another consideration, at what point do we have an apartment glut? After all, Windsor isn't the only town on steroids with apartment construction. Yes, developers and the town get free government money and state abatements, as long as what's built has a percentage of low-income apartments. So far, I think Windsor's done well in this area, so let's not blow it now by being greedy and irresponsible approving yet another build when we haven't had time to figure out and absorb what's coming with our current anticipated population explosion. Better to say no to Waterside and walk away from free money, even if it means Waterside remains empty. Finish what we've started, get it occupied so when you formulate next year's budget for voter approval, you won't be asking for the sky and the moon. Doing so would only raise angst amongst taxpayers and result in referendums. Keep in mind we're still reeling from the final phasing of re-evaluation. Free money is never really free. Sometimes it makes sense to accept, other times not. At this juncture, I'm not convinced Waterside is a win for our town. Thank you.

Anyone else from the public? All right, then I will bring public communications and petitions to a close and go to communications from council members. Tonight I'm going to call on Councilor Naim because it's her birthday, so she gets to go first.

Thank you so much for calling that out. I appreciate it. It always feels nicer to turn a year older and more wiser, I hope. I just want to congratulate all the students that are back to school. I hope their school year has kicked off well. Lots of activities going on. Um, it still feels like summer. So please be careful. Kids are still out. I know I was driving over and the sun had not fully set yet. So, so lots of kiddos out on our streets. So please be mindful and watchful for them. Um, We also had a really, really great session last week around economic development. Town manager and our economic development director, Patrick, did a fantastic job talking about what economic development means here in town, what the different impacts are, how it works. I highly recommend anyone that was not able to attend to please go and watch the recording. Check out the deck that was attached. It's all available on our website. It kind of lays out how we do different abatements. Right now, I think in the last 10 plus years, we've had about 11, I believe, commercial properties over 10 years that have gotten abatements. So not every commercial property gets those. There's also some information shared there around number of students per apartment buildings. The town manager can correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe it was Windsor Station that had only two students in all of the apartments that were there. But overall, I thought it was a very fantastic event, put together a lot of information, a lot of important information that I know there's been a lot of conversation around. appreciate the counselors that were in attendance and for anyone that was not, highly recommend that you check that out and I will continue to bring that up over the course of the year as we go into budget season because I think that's going to be a good foundation for what we do. That is it for me. Thank you. Thank you.

Counselor Durant.

Good evening, y'all. I did too go to Peter's and Patrick's economic development workshop and I thought it was very, very interesting particularly for me, because a lot of that was new information. So I appreciate that. Other than that, I thought it was a beautiful day. I sat outside on my patio and watched the hummingbirds come and go and thought about the future. Anyway, I'm happy to be here, and I'm glad all is well tonight, and I'll be happy to continue on. Thank you.

Thank you. Councillor King.

Thank you, Deputy Mayor. Not much from me other than happy birthday to Councillor Naim. I'm very excited. And I'll serenade you, but not in public because that's not appropriate. And just to grant you the wish of a very quick and speedy meeting, but also congratulations to the kids starting school.

Councillor Elleveld. Thank you. Oh, I'm sorry. Go ahead. We're out of order today. It's all right.

We're about half a round below.

We're going to move it around a bit.

Happy birthday to Councillor Naim. I will grant one wish, which you probably don't even realize you have, and that is you don't want to hear me sing. If my niece were watching, she'd sit there, put her hands over her head, and shake her head no.

I don't know. I think you and Counselor King doing a duet would be great. She's got a wish. I could make a lot of money monetizing that.

What was the name of that guy who... Made a lot of money singing a song really badly on one of those shows, you know what I mean? Anyways, busy summer. Hopefully everyone had a good time. We're coming into the fall, lots of activities, Chili Fest in October. There's the MSGO bike ride this coming Saturday. The Rotary Club is doing a food packaging project the following Saturday, the 19th. Always looking for volunteers. So everyone should keep an eye out for the kids. They're going back and forth to school, some of them on bikes and or walking. Keep an eye out for them, especially as the days start getting shorter. And hopefully everyone had a great summer. Thank you, ma'am.

Thank you. Counselor Pelkey. My apologies.

Thank you, Deputy Mayor. Just keep it relatively short. Congrats to everybody on a new and successful start to a school year. It's always nice as a former teacher to see things go smoothly as far as I was made aware. Middle of last month, we had the Windsor Volunteer Fire Department had their charity softball game out at the high school. That was a couple fields worth of fun. The mayor wasn't here to recreate her wonderful first pitch. But needless to say, she did open it up with a nice strike. So that was a good day for everybody who went out. And there were folks out in the community who came out and watched and cheered and just had a good day doing that. So that was great to see. I am looking forward to a lot of the events. I know Councilor Elveld mentioned a couple. One is Nightmare on Broad Street. And just a reminder to folks that that date is not on Halloween itself. It'll actually be on the weeknight, but I don't wanna give an exact date right now, only because weather can happen, but it's real close to Halloween, but just keep an eye on what may happen with the weather for those days. But take a look, and that'll also prompt you to see what else is going on in Windsor. I think there's some saying there's a lot to do in Windsor, so just go to the town website and you can find the information. There's a lot out there, thanks.

Or the catalog. Thank you.

Councilor Armstrong. Thank you, Deputy Mayor. Good evening to everyone. I just want to say that there's so much, as we already said, going on in Windsor. As I always come to Windsor, there's always the restaurants, the shopping, and then meeting one another, especially at the Bean. And I also want to say to watch out for the kids. Congratulations to those returning to the school. I have seen some of the students, and they're so happy to go back to school. So that's a good thing and a good gesture for our town. And remember, health is wealth, so take care of yourselves. And enjoy the rest of the summer, because fall is around the corner.

Thank you. Thank you.

Councillor Gluck-Huffman.

Thank you, Madam Deputy Mayor. I think we've all said everything. One thing I do want to mention on Councillor Elleville and a couple other councillors, With the kids going back to school, I've noticed some people trying to cut around buses. Please be careful. Please wait till the bus tickets the kids. Also, I've noticed a lot of speeding in other areas and cutting back and forth, and especially down Day Hill Road the other day. So I'm asking people just to slow down, take your time. And Public Works, just thank you again for all the work that you do here in town.

Thank you. And I just want to add, thank you very much for everybody who came out for public comment. On both issues, we are actually in discussion around those two things. So that's good news. So hopefully more to come on that. And then I guess just have a great evening. So we'll move on. Tonight we have a report from appointed boards and commissions. We have the Board of Education. Secretary Zotter is here.

All right, good evening, councillors. It's been a fun few weeks, maybe for the adults, less so for the kids, but I think everyone's getting along okay. We kicked off the school year, actually before school started on August 26th, where we had our convonation. Really, really great morning, and I heard a teacher that came from Alabama said that they have attended many convocations and none have ever been as fun as the one that we put on in Windsor. So Dr. Haiti definitely tries to balance the professional development that they have for the teachers, but starting really to keep everyone focused on the vision for Windsor. So Mayor Neuchat Black-Burke was there, Ayanna Taylor was there, town manager was there as well. gave a lovely speech that had lots of laughs involved too, so thank you for attending. We had speeches from our paraeducator of the year, Sam Dukes, and our educator of the year, Joe Oblong. I wish we had them taped because they were phenomenal. Really, really great morning. And again, special guest, Mr. Taylor, who was actually Dr. Hady's math teacher when she came to the States and started in Alabama and the whole concept of find the genius in every child stemmed from him telling her that she was a genius when that was the last thing she felt like and it has carried her to where she is now as the superintendent of schools in Windsor. We also had our block party on August 27th. It is always a great time. Dr. Michael Mallory does a phenomenal job working with our civic organizations, our sports teams, and then additionally our sponsors, so Amazon. niagara water were there the kids received free backpacks and free school supplies for as long as uh supplies lasted they had free ice cream i mean we're all in it for the ice cream right so um it was a really great time we did open the 20 26 27 school year on september 1st We have the Calling All Windsor Men event. So it's always great seeing a lot of the men in our community cheering the kids on as they walk into the school buildings. I know especially for the elementary school kids, that's really great. Our third graders and our kindergartners, right, when they come into a warm welcome and a lot of applause. So we thank everyone who attended that. And then we also had the central office administration touring the schools and you know, obviously making sure that everything was running smoothly, which it was. Dr. Haiti, I think might have visited every class, literally every classroom in those first four days of school. So in heels, no less. So she, puts us all to shame sometimes. I do want to say that we, you know, we have talked about it a couple of times, but we did implement our district-wide personal electronics policy. This expands beyond cell phones too, right? So this is, we're talking about our Apple watches, we're talking about personal use computers. It's now mandatory that every student uses a Chromebook that is supplied by the school, unless otherwise, articulated in their IEPs or 504s. So obviously we have some students that might have diabetic monitors that require their cell phone to monitor. That obviously is an exception. We might have students that have English language learners that require an iPad throughout the day with special programming on it. So it is case by case basis, but the vast majority it is away for the day. I can tell you for sure, I know that there were multiple phones eliminated from the high school the first week of school, but the great news is is that the number kept going down as the days went on. So kids are catching on to the fact that this is gonna be an enforced policy. And hopefully we're seeing a lot more engagement from our students, less chaos during passing time with everyone trying to check their phone and really just trying to keep an engaged school district. Um, I did want to talk a little bit about our enrollment data. Um, we're remaining steady at around 3,098. I do want to call out that we have seen a little bit of a decline that's related directly to renewed effort to more accurate, accurately verify student residency, right? So this is something year over year, every school district goes through. Um, we have, you know, between Dr. Haiti and her staff have come up with a really great program to ensure that the students that are going to Windsor are the students that are supposed to be in Windsor. So we have about a little over 1,000 in Windsor High School, 708 in Sage Park, 391 in JFK, 292 in Clover, 340 in OE, and 298 kids in Paquannock School. Another thing that I wanted to make sure that we talked a little bit more specifically about was the offerings that Windsor High School has for advanced placement and college education course experiences. So Windsor High School does offer 25 advanced placement and 30 early college education experience courses. This is phenomenal. This enables students to go into their freshman year of college with a decent amount of credits under their belt. They've added some new courses this year, Engineering I and II, Architecture and Interior Design II, Ceramics III, American History 1100, History 1501. I will have student enrollment numbers for you next month for those courses, just so I can let you know how many people are partaking in those, because that is important, and again, another amazing offering from Windsor Public Schools. Um, also some updates on the aquatic elementary school playground. The rebuild is in progress. The damage playscape has been removed and the playground has been cleared. It was safely reopened as of august 31st. The new playscape has been ordered and we're hoping to have that completed by mid november. So really expedient work happening there. So the kiddos will have a playground to be enjoying. But in the meantime, they've gotten very clever with how to keep kids out there and engaged. They've got these really cool stepping stones. They're creating obstacle courses. They got a whole bunch of chalk so they can write on the blacktop. So really, again, just not having that larger playscape is not preventing them from and making sure that the kids have a lot of really fun time when they get outside in nature. Leanna Jorgensen started her permanent chief of academics and pupil services position. Always wanna say Dr. Hady holds coffee talks multiple times during the year. The next one is September 16th from 6 p.m. to 7 p.m. in L.P. Wilson. This is a great opportunity for parents or the community if you have direct questions for Dr. Hady or wanna know what's happening in the district, something that might not be mentioned at a board meeting or might not be mentioned in the town reports, definitely go. She is very accommodating, really willing to answer any questions the public may have. So definitely encourage people to take advantage of that time with her. And then the first Board of Ed meeting will be next week, September 15th at 7 p.m. in the boardroom at the L.P. Wilson Community Center.

Thank you. Questions for Secretary Zahner? There's one quick question. Go ahead.

Ms. Sautter, quick question on the class enrollment for the high school. How many students are required for those classes for them to move forward? I know you don't have the numbers yet, but what would be the expectation of the numbers?

I don't have the numbers, but there's usually at least 15 from what I have heard. I think for some of these advanced placement and college experience courses, that number may be slightly lower. So don't quote me on that, but they would definitely not have a class that didn't have at least a dozen students in it. Thank you. But again, I will make sure next meeting that you all have those enrollment numbers. Thank you very much. Thank you. Councillor Durant, you had a question?

Yeah, I just had a quick one. Maybe it's just so you can teach me something. What is meant by the, I'm sorry, I had it right here, away for the day procedure?

So that is, so as you all know, the state of Connecticut didn't pass an official policy through law stating that kids couldn't have their cell phones. So the Connecticut Association of Boards of Education made a recommendation which was bell-to-bell removal of phones. So they can bring their cell phones to school, but they need to stay in a locker all day long. But they can have them when school is over, especially for those that have extracurriculars outside of school. This was a policy or a procedure that was in place for the middle school, and it has transitioned to the high school and to the elementary schools as well. So that's what we're calling away for the day. And again, it's not just cell phones. It is the Apple Watches. It is any sort of electronic device that is not run by the schools. It doesn't have that GoGuardian technology on it.

Okay, thank you.

Any other questions? Councilor Ellevelle.

Thank you. Last month a question was asked, and don't know if you had the answer, which is approximately how much money is supposed to be raised through the pay-for-play?

Yes, I do. Do you mind if I? Please do. Thank you. I knew I brought this. You had the away for a day. The day is done. But yes, I do have that. Do, do, do, do, do, do, do. because I have a number in my head and I just want to make sure that I am accurate, right? So they expect $70,425 to come from the pay-to-play. Now, the other areas where they are expecting money is they did increase price of admission for, like, the events for the games. They reduced event day staffing. So we're gonna make sure that we have facility staff that are going to be assigned to be making sure that the grounds are safe. They're going to be leveraging existing administrators, so a portion of that event supervision is going to be administrative, our administrators monitoring. They are going to be charging a minimal fee for other sports that they haven't in the past, like volleyball and swimming games. They have discontinued the contracted strength and conditioning provider, so that's responsibility is going to go back to the coaches, which is where it was originally before they brought those, um, those folks in. Um, and that is a lot of where they're expecting to make up some of the additional costs outside of the pay to play.

All right. Thanks very much.

Thank you so much for getting that information. Anybody else have any other questions? Thank you so much, Secretary Zahner. Have a wonderful evening. I hope it's short for you. And happy birthday, Councilor Knight. We're hoping the same. All right, and now we have the town manager's report. Mr. Souza.

Thank you, Deputy Mayor. So just want to remind everyone here this evening as well as in the community that this Friday evening will be the commemoration of the 25th anniversary of the September 11th events. We'll be hosting our... walk of light remembrance here on Town Green. It will start at 6 o'clock. There will be a brief ceremony at 6, but the luminary bags will be placed on the Town Green up until 9 o'clock. And so we encourage everyone to stop by, if not for the 6 o'clock ceremony, then certainly after until 9 o'clock. So that is there. There is a lot of things happening in Windsor, and at the risk of leaving out a number of them, I'm gonna list a few here, because I do think there's some great traditions here that the community, just a reminder. So the Freedom Trail Run, which is an annual event, will be September 19th, and that's bright and early at 5.30 a.m., and it starts at Archer Memorial AM EZ E Zion Church. And so that will visit six Freedom Trail sites along the 3.9 mile route. So we've got that event coming up this Saturday on the 12th. The Conservation Commission is sponsoring a free e-cycle event so you can recycle all of your electronic devices. And that will be behind Town Hall here from 9 o'clock in the morning until noon. And I'd also like to point out that if they aren't able to make it this Saturday, the town's transfer station also has electronic recycling. When they're open, they're regular hours, and so I encourage folks to go to the town's website to learn more about the transfer station and the electronic recycling that we offer there for free. excuse me, Saturday the 19th, so you got time to plan. The Windsor Lions Club will be hosting a community tag sale on Saturday the 19th from eight until two. And so all those proceeds go to all the great things that the Lions Club supports, including Camp Rising Sun, which is a summer program for children with cancer. wanted to let the community know that the town council had previously approved a bridge repair and replacement project. And so those bridges have been, pedestrian bridges have been, are in fabrication. And so later in October into November that project will start. Just as a reminder, bridges at Custer Park, the Wilson Gateway Park and Stroh Park will be completely replaced. And each of those bridges will take roughly five days to remove and to replace. And so I'm looking to get that started in the early part of October. And if everything goes according to plan, they should be completed around the first week of November. The bridge at Sharshen Park, as well as one of the bridges here at the Windsor Center Trail will be undergoing repairs. Each of these bridges will be out of service for varying lengths of time based on the type and scope of the repairs. The Windsor Center Trail bridge is the larger of the two and will be unusable, unfortunately, for up to a month. That's a significant amount of work that will be there and given the span over the wetlands, there's a significant amount of of consideration that has to go into that planning. We will be confirming the project timing and work schedule and when we have that confirmed in the next few weeks we will notify the immediate property owners as well as the general public for those schedules. A few more items that I have here. Wanted to make sure folks knew that our fantastic Windsor Fife and Drum Corps will have their annual muster. It was nice to listen to them practice this evening prior to the meeting. And so that will be this Saturday the 12th from 11 until roughly 2 p.m. on the town green. This is a longstanding event that attracts fife and drum corps from across the region. And so that's always a fun event. And then also on Saturday on another portion of the town green will be the Eco Monarch Festival. And that's brought to us by First Town Downtown with sponsorship support through Windsor Federal. And there will be all sorts of different educational boosts, artisans, and family fun activities. So all sorts of things happening as usual in the fall season here in town. Two other items. As some of you may have read our recent online story concerning conditions at the main library, I wanted to provide some information for that. There were issues indeed this summer with the building's air conditioning system. The mechanical failure of a pump within that system resulted in water leaking onto a portion of the program area. It was not a roof leak. It was related to the air conditioning system not operating properly. That AC system was repaired and has been operating for the remainder of the summer. I will note that there's two compressors within that system, and one of those compressors is out of service, but the other is operating and the system does operate. They're also in the lower level of the building near the portion of the foundation that was constructed in 1777 as part of the Mather House. There was an apparent groundwater issue earlier this summer due to high water table. This is something that has happened periodically over the years, and anyone that knows that has an old house You can chase groundwater many places that it comes through, um, you know, through, through the, um, foundations. So, um, staff continue to troubleshoot that. Um, but this is a, uh, this is a very, um, not a regular occurrence. Um, also the council. previously authorized the Building Commission to initiate an engineering assessment for not only the building roof, but also the HVAC system and the building's, I'll say building envelope, mainly the windows condition assessment. That draft report with suggested options has recently been presented to the PBC, and the PBC had follow-up questions for the engineering firm, and so that final report is expected in the next several weeks or so for further review for the Public Building Commission. In our multi-year CIP, there is allocated funds for potential HVAC work in FY20, so the summer of 27, as well as roof replacements on the docket currently for FY28 funding. So that's an update on the library. And lastly, I wanted to give a big thank you to Paul Goldberg. Paul is a longtime fire administrator. Paul retired last week after 27 years in that position. Not only did he strengthen the volunteer fire department, but also helped out many, many departments over the years. He essentially was a utility infielder, like you often refer to in baseball. He had many roles, including being an integral player in upgrading and managing our emergency communications and radio systems. He was our lead emergency management and preparedness manager for many years. He also worked to achieve savings through negotiating town-wide cell phone and printer contracts. He managed our self-tower land leases. So we have a number of land leases where we have leased out space for communications companies to go on to the communication towers. And so that brings in well over $270,000 a year and Paul has been instrumental in maintaining those contracts and following through. So thank you very much to Mr. Goldberg. His smile and good nature will certainly be missed here at Town Hall, but his positive contributions will continue to be felt not only in the fire department but across the organization and community. So thank you very much, Paul. With that, I can take any questions that you may have, councillors.

Thank you, Mr. Souza. Questions for Mr. Souza? All right, wow, all right. Thank you, Mr. Souza. So now we have reports of standing committees. I can tell you there is nothing from the Town Improvement Committee other than we have a meeting on September 30th. Anything from personnel? Anything from Health and Safety? Health and Safety will be meeting on September 17th. Okay, great, thank you. There are no ordinances. There's no unfinished business? That's okay.

Oh, I'm sorry.

Anything on finance?

We are aiming for a meeting at the end of this month.

Thank you. I apologize. I just keep skipping people and things. I appreciate it. You're doing it for me so we can get done early. All right. Item 12A. Do I have a motion?

I move that the job descriptions for the position of library director and lending services manager be approved as presented. Second. Mr. Sousa.

Thank you very much. I'm going to invite up, um, our human resources manager, Sophia Castellanos. And I'm not sure if Mr. Colby is going to join her, but I think Sophia can handle this 1000%. Thank you.

Okay. Good evening, madam deputy mayor and members of the town council tonight. I'm presenting two updated job descriptions for your consideration, the library director and the lending services manager. As part of our standard practice, when a position becomes vacant, we review the job description to make sure the responsibilities, qualifications, and requirements continue to reflect the town's current needs. With the upcoming retirement of both the library director and lending services manager, Human Resources worked with the department director and the incumbents to review both positions. For the library director, we identified several areas where updates were appropriate. The revisions better reflect the director's current responsibilities related to the library's facilities, and incorporate changes that have occurred over the years. Updates were also made to the general purpose, essential duties and responsibilities, and minimum qualifications section to more accurately describe the position as it is now. For the lending services manager, the review found that no significant changes to the duties or requirements were necessary. The updates are primarily minor revisions to bring the description into the town's current format and terminology. Importantly, there are no changes to the existing pay grades, The library director will remain in grade 10, and the lending services manager will remain in grade 6. There's also no financial impact.

I'd be happy to answer any questions. Thank you. Counselors, any questions? Counselor Elevelt.

I'm just curious. Under special requirements, originally there was a must-pass background check, and now it's been crossed out?

We don't. incorporate that piece such as part of our standard practice. We've taken that out of the job descriptions.

So standard practice is all employees have to pass a background check. Okay, that's it. Thank you.

Thank you. Any other questions? All right. Thank you very much. Thank you. All right.

Call the vote. Yes.

I'm sorry. Do you want to call the vote? You're moving on. My bad. All in favor to approve the amendments for the library director and lending services manager job descriptions? Aye. Aye. Any opposed? All right. Motion passes 9-0. 8-0. 8-0. Sorry. Thank you so much. Math is not my best. All right.

May I have a motion for item 12B? I move that the town manager is authorized to submit an application to the Connecticut Department of Economic and Community Development for the Youth Violence Prevention Grant and further authorized to expend funds in the amount of $15,000 for the purpose of implementing youth violence prevention initiatives. Second. Mr. Souza.

I am going to ask Paul Norris, our Director of Recreation and Leisure Services, to join us, and he has no choice but to come up to the table.

Deputy Mayor, councillors. The town of Windsor for the past four years, I believe, has been receiving this grant from the Department of Community and Economic Development for the program. The goal of the YSB is pretty simple, provide a safe place for our young people to be and then nurture them with a support system that can help them grow and develop. And this is kind of what this grant does. So how we use this grant is to create safe spaces for folks. So we allow free access into the teen center, 330 Windsor Avenue, every night, all year long. So part of this grant pays for that. As well as, we also allow or free purchase of a youth swim pass that happens during the summer months. To give you an idea of the numbers that we're talking about, in an entire calendar year, we will have about 6,300 check-ins at the teen center, which is about 5,300 a month, which is a really good number. And then we also sell... even though they're free, about 700 youth swim passes every year that this grant also pays for. The other things that this grant pays for is it provides for a small amount of materials and supplies for programs revolving around youth violence protection for kids at 330 Windsor Avenue, and then we have to entertain them. So it also pays for the YouTube subscription for the year at 330 Windsor Avenue. So that's what this grant does and we're here to ask that you continue to give the town manager permission to apply for the grant and then use the funding appropriately.

Thank you. Councilor Naim.

Thank you so much. Just a quick question. So I'm assuming this grant, in addition to other funding sources, covers all those numbers that you have, not this grant solely, right?

This grant solely provides for the free admission into the teen center. And this grant solely provides for the free swim passes.

You said 5,000 a month on the teen center.

Yep. So of the 15,000, approximately $6,400 goes towards the teen center pass, and then 7,000 goes towards the youth swim passes. Now, I know where your math is going on this. So while we sell 700 swim passes to youth, this grant only covers a portion of that amount.

So that's what I meant by multiple funding sources.

Yeah, I saw the calculator going in.

Yeah, I was like, if it's that cheap, I gotta leave it sort of in business.

Yes.

Any other questions, councillors? All right, thank you. So, all in favor of the acceptance of the grant for $15,000 from DECD? Aye. Any opposition? Motion passes 8-0. All right. Motion for item 12C.

I move to authorize the acceptance and expenditure of a grant from the State of Connecticut Department of Children and Family in the amount of $13,000 for expenses related to providing support and enhancements to the Juvenile Review Board.

Second. I mean, I'm sorry, Mr. Seuss. Second.

So Paul will present this as well.

Oh, okay. So this grant was unexpected. We have received it for about three years and it was supposed to be not funded in this fiscal year. We did receive word that indeed there's enough money in the state that we can support this program. What this grant money is really supposed to do is help us switch from the old JRB mindset, Juvenile Review Board, which really is about kids got in trouble, they sat around a table with maybe some police officers, and then we tried to figure out why they stole that candy or did some graffiti, and then we sent them out to pick up litter. And the feeling was, well, what did they learn? So this grant is to help us move forward into a new model, and that new model is youth diversion teams, where we actually try to get to the root cause of why, I'm gonna use the word kids act up, I apologize. So why is this youngster stealing that candy? Is it because he doesn't have any lunch money? Is it because he's seeking attention? So what we do is put together a team of social workers Some police officers, there's members from the school district and other individuals that sit around the table. We do a full assessment with the family because we need to figure out what's going on internally in that home as well as other family members. So what this grant does is... Well, the way we've used it in the past is to pay for case management work as well as to allow registrations for particular clubs or programs. So let's say we've identified that this child is acting up. between 2.30 and 6 or 6.30 and 8 because they're home alone, we've figured out, well, okay, let's put this youngster in a program. So what we'll do is pay for the youngster and the family to participate in either an after-school program or WIBL or take a swim lesson, a school year swim lesson. So that's part of what this grant does. Moving forward, we started to realize that we're having gaps in our administrative success of the way we run the youth diversion teams. We seem to have, in our case, managers are part-time employees. So we tend to have a lot of turnover. And as you know, when you have a lot of turnover, things get tough. misplaced, files are not complete, we gotta find files, we gotta retreat files. So what we're looking at with this year is of that $13,000 grant, six of it will help us, will purchase a online program, case management program, where every child is put into the program, the police officers have access, the Board of Ed can choose to have access if they want, but at least everything we have about that child and that family is now in a secure place. online in the cloud and not sitting in a drawer or in a folder or someone's desk or they take it home and all that kind. So that's what we're doing with this. The other part of the grant is to continue to provide those structural services like how do we keep this youngster engaged? How do we provide the youth development tools for this youngster to learn how to behave in public? and how to socialize in an environment that is conducive to a community. So, for example, we will offer what's known as cupcake chat or decorating program. Now, while the kids are making cupcakes and decorating the cupcakes, we actually have an employee that is bringing up topics that the children can, or the youth, I shouldn't say children, sorry, that youth can participate in learn, develop, learn from each other, get suggestions on how to deal with situations, maybe anger management and so forth. So that's where the state has requested that we push this program, and I'm very proud to say our staff has kind of been doing this for a while, but now this funding actually helps us continue the path The last thing that this grant also does, anyone that joins the youth diversion team, we provide them with training. So the Connecticut Youth Services Association, they actually have online training where our folks can go on and participate in this three-tier program. And it's been so successful that now we have recreation staff, including summer camp staff, that participate in that training because they work work with youth also. So that's a nutshell of what this program is, and I'm here tonight to ask you to allow the town manager to do what he does best. Thank you.

Thank you.

Councilors, go ahead, Councilor Naim. For the youth service bearer, what age ranges do we cover?

We've broadened the age range. So now we're going as early as 10 years old up through high school, 17. We try to cut it off at 17. The reason why we started to go earlier, like we did in the old days, we're trying to figure out if we capture that fifth grade, sixth grader, then it just make things a little easier when they get into eighth grade and ninth grade.

Any reason we don't go past 17, knowing that there might be youth that are maybe not in any kind of continued education?

We've had that discussion, but unfortunately we had to make some choices. But along with that, we do offer programs and open basketball at 330 Windsor Avenue that goes up to the age of 24. Okay.

I just ask about that because I know there's a lot of both funding but a lot of support for Opportunity Youth, which I believe is 16 to 24. So this could open more doors. Thank you.

Thank you. Any other questions, Councillors? Councillor Armstrong.

I hear you saying the grant is for services, offering services. Does this also include personnel?

This grant, this year, no.

So it only includes the services that you're going to offer.

Exactly. But let me throw a little piece into that. This grant will pay for an instructor, like a contract instructor that we bring in to do nutrition, to do anger management. We have someone coming in that is going to do a girl's hair thing. Okay.

Okay, that was my thought, because if you're offering these services, I just thought there should be someone in particular to teach or offer these services. Thank you.

Thank you, Deputy Mayor.

Councillor Glock-Huffman. Mr. Norris, thank you.

Really, just for public knowledge, so this program, which has been explained to us, sounds wonderful. Make it more efficient, make your job and everybody on staff much easier and better keep track of the students and the kids and the young children. So this program... the software development program that you're putting in, there's a set cost to it. Is there any other extending costs that could come back in the future that we need to be concerned about?

Not necessarily to us, unless we were to continue hiring contractual instructors. And then at that point, we would look into future budgets, fiscal year 28, 29, and so forth, where we would look for either adjusting general fund user fees or other types of financial assistance that we get throughout the time. Perfect.

Thank you so much.

Any other questions?

Go ahead. I do have one more. Thank you, Deputy Mayor. You were saying these services, so where are they offered and how do people apply for these services?

So they would go through the JRB program, so if they, I'm messing up already, through the youth diversion program, and they're actually referred to the program by the school district, by the police department, or family or social services. So they would call the YSB staff, say we have a youngster that needs a little bit of help, we would contact the family and whoever referred, get some background, interview, the youth figure out what's going on, interview the entire family, and then at that point determine where to best place the child in what program. And the programs could be anywhere. It could be a program at Northwest Park, it could be at 330 Windsor Avenue, WIBL is all over town, swim lessons are at the high school. So it really depends on what we see is alike of the child and also what timeframe that we're looking to best capsulate their involvement.

More so like a diversion program.

I'm sorry?

More so like a diversion program.

Yes, exactly.

Okay. Thank you. No problem.

Any other questions, counselors? All right. All in favor of the motion? Aye. Aye. Any against? Any abstentions? Motion passes 8-0-0. Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you. All right, have a good evening. Thank you. Thank you. We have no resignations and appointments. Do I have a motion for the minutes?

We do have two resignations.

Oh, we have two resignations.

I'm sorry.

I apologize. No, it's okay. We're hiding. Sorry. I move the town council accept the resignation of Rachel Cusano from the Fair Rent Commission. and accept the resignation of Noel, and I'm going to mispronounce this, so I really apologize, Osweke from the Insurance Commission. Second.

The motion's been made and seconded. All in favor? Aye. Any against? Any no? And any abstentions?

Motion passes 8-0-0. All right.

Now may I have a motion for the minutes of the person, for the minutes.

I move to approve the minutes of the August 3rd, 2026 regular town council meeting.

Second.

All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Any abstentions? Motion passes 8-0-0. All right, and we are now on to public communications and petitions. If anyone from the public would like to address the council, you'll be given three minutes to speak. Please state your name and address, and I will turn this over to the moderator, Scott Colby, Assistant Town Manager.

Thank you, Madam Deputy Mayor. If there is anyone from the public who is virtual this evening and would like to address the council, you may do so by raising your hand on your computer by selecting the participant's icon. on the Zoom menu bar and then clicking raise hand or by dialing star nine on your phone. You'll be given three minutes to speak. Please state your name and address. When you are called on, you'll be prompted that you are now unmuted. For those dialing in by phone, once prompted, you will then press star six to unmute. For clear communication, we ask that you do not place a call on speakerphone. At this time, we have no virtual attendees with their hand raised.

Thank you. Anybody in the chambers for a public comment?

Good thing Bill's not here.

All right. Seeing none, we'll move on. We have no executive session, so I may have a motion to adjourn. So moved. Second. All in favor? Aye. Opposition? All right. Meeting's adjourned.