---
title: "Stamford Select Board — August 21, 2025 (Part 1 of 2)"
date: 2025-08-21
session: regular
part: 1 of 2
speaker_labels: 1 cluster(s) named from the roll call and that meeting's chair in the minutes, 1 named from roster attendance, 6 of 8 clusters unnamed
voice_ids: {"SPEAKER_00":13,"SPEAKER_01":90,"SPEAKER_02":15,"SPEAKER_03":2,"SPEAKER_04":1,"SPEAKER_05":10,"SPEAKER_06":9,"SPEAKER_08":3}
duration_min: 86
audio: https://drive.google.com/file/d/11PEZy-_ut9mvEsM6fhmWxmCXtRCK3iDm/view?usp=drive_link
audio_source: town drive
minutes: https://townofstamfordvermont.org/mediaItems/Sbd%20Minutes%208-21-25.pdf
minutes_pending: false
present: [Nancy L. Bushika, Douglas Wright, Michael G. Denault]
absent: [Kurt Gamari, John Dunn]
transcribed: 2026-09-04 (faster-whisper large-v3, CUDA; names corrected per data/name_fixes.json)
diarization: pyannote/speaker-diarization-3.1 (automated; cluster labels may over-split a single voice; unattributed paragraphs have no reliable speaker)
---

# Stamford Select Board — August 21, 2025 (Part 1 of 2)

**Session:** Regular · **Duration:** 86 min · [Audio](https://drive.google.com/file/d/11PEZy-_ut9mvEsM6fhmWxmCXtRCK3iDm/view?usp=drive_link) · [Minutes](https://townofstamfordvermont.org/mediaItems/Sbd%20Minutes%208-21-25.pdf)

**Present:** Nancy L. Bushika, Douglas Wright, Michael G. Denault
**Absent:** Kurt Gamari, John Dunn

---
**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Welcome to a meeting of the Stamford Select Board. If you have a matter to discuss that is not included on the agenda, you may do so by addressing the chairperson stating your name and address. You will notice that all our meetings are recorded, and this is to aid with the summarization of the minutes. Visitors are welcome, and we allow five minutes of comments per visitor and 15 minutes per topic. Discussions will be held in common, civilized manner, respectful of others. Select board members present are-

**Speaker 1:** Michael G. Denault.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Nancy Bushika.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Douglas Wright.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Lori, will there be any adding of items or removing items from tonight's agenda? No, I have nothing on it. I just have old business, so like the dog update, it's about that. Will there be any adjustments to the agenda? Such as changing the order of items. And Jeff is recording tonight's meeting for his YouTube video.

**Speaker 2:** Did you hear from John Dunn that he's coming? No, Kurt. Kurt called and said he couldn't come, but I have not heard from John. Okay.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Hearing of visitors.

**Speaker 3:** Oh, okay. Lisa. I'm here about planning commission stuff. We want to apply for the grant, for the municipal grant to either rewrite the town plan or the bylaws. We're not sure which. We want to- Okay. Name BCRC as the agent. And so I- Just- And you would pay for either one? Is that what it's- Yeah, we'd have to pick one of the two. And I guess if we work with BCRC, they will look at our town plan and our bylaws and see which one really needs the most work. Okay. Or the most help with. So we'd pick one with their help. Okay. I just sort of need a verbal agreement from the select board to go forward.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** So they-you don't have to vote. They're going to let you know. Yeah.

**Speaker 3:** Okay. Okay. Does the grant just need one? Doesn't one expire? At two years. The town plan expires at two years. So I'm thinking it probably in that way. But they also said our bylaws seemed out of date. So- Well, they're the ones- I know. I know that. So I sort of just need a verbal agreement from the board that we can kind of go forward. This is like September 1st is when they can start doing-this is the 22-page application and Callie can help us with it. There is a formal resolution page here for you to sign. But- Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. So now it's great when your dam's signed, but if I could just get a verbal agreement from now, she can start helping you with it. Yeah.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** You just want to reuse that- The board.

**Speaker 4:** Yeah.

**Speaker 3:** How much is the grant and is there any match? I don't know about that. I think it's 30,000. I'm not sure about any match stuff. And there's five or six towns that are applying for it and there's only three that get it, so it's about 50-50 if we'll get it, I guess. Can you sign-

**Speaker 5:** They were here. They had mentioned that at the meeting that I had with the district council.

**Speaker 6:** when they were here and i don't remember if it wasn't if you would let us know for sure because

**Speaker 7:** they have to go in your budget what do we have to do then so i just need a verbal okay to go

**Speaker 3:** forward from the board and then i can get you the papers and stuff and kelly can start helping fill stuff out the loan the grant because we can't put it into the first of september but

i think it's not working on it can you make a motion to motion second okay all in favor yes

**Speaker 5:** i don't know if you want to put it under old business or what it's got in regards to the sign and putting a new sign up or the old sign up i'm sorry you might be here as a visitor

**Speaker 8:** you're going to be a sign person yeah whatever you want go ahead all right whatever you want

**Speaker 5:** so sorry kind of um anyways the sign i got a hold of the the uh whitco i think you had mentioned whitco somebody else has mentioned whitco i finally got a hold of him um he came out here today with his cyber truck call me this morning said he can meet me out here at 11 got it right in the cyber truck too but it's a cyber truck that's uh elon musk the tesla they're nice oh my god amazing anyways um so he will put this sign up i talk the reason why i call him is so that he can get the sign up above the generator okay and so when he came out and he looked at it um he said it needs to be kind of safety he's on school blah blah blah so he's got a frame that he wants to manufacture to install it onto the building take that frame off no he's gonna that's gonna set right up there into this so it's gonna be a ledger you're familiar with it so it's a ledger but he's gonna make an iron thing so that this just pops right into it and so um with the cost he quoted us two today two costs uh one for putting up a new sign utilizing similarities to the church i showed him where the church is i'll show him that that sign and um so he can get a new sign that was what they and erected so he he quoted us 800 to install this with the frame and everything and it was basically i'll do this for 800 but if i can get this job too the sign so i said we'll quote it appropriately and so basically what it did it came in at 3500 to have the whole thing done and that's installing digging the holes concrete foundation the whole thing 3500 that out there is um i think he said i have the quote with me excuse me so that covers the town office library kind of sign well that's not what it's gonna i just want to make sure it's 3500 35 and 110 would cover both sides take the top off yeah right

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** so 800 for that one 2700 for that one make it install it dig the holes everything so you uh okay so the total is the design that that we picked out reports at stamford school

**Speaker 1:** town office library right double-sided uh actually laurie laurie yes and you he knows

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** the sizes and all that make sure it falls in the right because i don't want to want to see this No, it's not going to happen again.

**Speaker 3:** What dimensions? It's their business.

What are the dimensions? Big as can be.

**Speaker 5:** Billboard size. What's the size? So that's the quote. If we want to install it ourself, take off $5 or $510.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** What's the size for that sign?

What's the size?

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** The size for the sign that's going out by the road.

**Speaker 5:** That's going to be, I think it's like 3 by... I don't know what you guys decide on that. Anyways, I'm not sure. It's whatever his, I think it's 4 by 6 maybe? How big is the church? I don't know.

**Speaker 9:** Do you have a quote for this? Does it have a size on it?

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** We have a size that we have to follow in.

**Speaker 5:** Oh, I'm sorry, hold on a minute.

**Speaker 10:** It is 4 by 6. Yeah.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Because John, when he had the plan... Double size. He had it right to the max.

Double. So it's 4 at that time. That's only 24 square feet.

**Speaker 3:** You're going to need glasses.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** At that time. We found out we could go bigger after that. So 6 by 4 is about the biggest you can go. Oh, yeah.

**Speaker 3:** You have 64 square feet if you want. Now, because we went, we go by the state instead of our bylaws. Right. No, we go by our bylaws now. No, ours, well... Which follow the state. Right.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** But before that, we go by the state. Right. But before that, we go by the state. Right. But before that, we go by the state. Right. But before that, we go by the state.

**Speaker 3:** The bylaw now says we follow the state. It don't matter. That's what the bylaw says.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** I don't care. We're maybe...

**Speaker 3:** We've already voted on that size before.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Yeah. When John was here. I think this one is like 24 square feet. So, um, 2,700 for a 4 by 6 out there. Yes, ma'am. And we have 324 square feet. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay.

**Speaker 5:** Okay. Okay. Okay.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay.

Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay.

**Speaker 5:** Okay.

**Speaker 11:** Okay.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Okay.

**Speaker 5:** Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay.

**Speaker 12:** Okay.

**Speaker 13:** Okay.

Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Okay. 350 was donated for a new sign, so in the town report it says 741 dollars.

**Speaker 13:** That was left in the community?

**Speaker 14:** No.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** No, that's the column that donated the new donation.

It's been two years.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** That's what's in the account.

No, 341. But 350 were donations that people gave for having a new sign. So that would leave about 300 for there.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** And we'd have 350 for there. Pam?

**Speaker 9:** So I know no one wants to hear this, but the town, thousands and thousands of dollars of grant money, took it, used it to install a sign. Then took that sign and took it away. The people who gave us the grant money, they're just SOL out of thousands of dollars. Now? Now we're now going to ask the taxpayers to pay another 3500 dollars to get a new sign after all of this. Like, I object. You don't want to spend 50 bucks to do anything. You don't want to spend 50 bucks to mail out letters to people in town. But now we're going to spend thousands of dollars of the taxpayers money to replace a sign when we already had a sign. It's, first of all, it's stealing. I'm sorry, it's stealing. That money was stolen from the grant organizations. The town should be refunding that money to the grant organizations that gave it to us. Yes, yes, that's number one. Number two, I'm going on record as a taxpayer that I don't think the taxpayers should be asked to fund this sign.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** We didn't say anything yet how we're doing this.

**Speaker 15:** But we just know that it's wrong.

**Speaker 9:** The whole thing has been wrong since day one. And it is wrong. And it is wrong to expect the taxpayers to pay for this.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** You know, I mean, not to get in an argument, I disagree with you. I do agree with you that it's common sense wrong. I agree with that 100%. But legally, I don't agree with you. So legally, it's not stealing. I want to make sure that... I'm going on record that the selectmen didn't steal a thing. We got a grant. We had a committee. We put faith in the committee. The committee didn't do it to follow the procedure. We got the grant. The grant, whether you take it or you don't, whatever you spend it on, if someone was to burn that sign the next day, it would be gone, too. It's not the select board's fault that that sign... Well, to a point. The select board didn't follow through with the committee. But the committee... Well, we put faith in the committee and the people running that. They didn't follow through. They didn't do it right. We had one person in town that complained about it and it brought it up. It probably should have never happened. I never thought it should have happened. I agreed with Jim way back in day one that the state, we were exempt. We went down this path for three years now. Nobody would verify. Right. And we had some people who caused a lot of problems. We spent money on lawyers. We did do our due diligence. We did our due diligence after the fact.

**Speaker 9:** You just reminded me of that. So now we're paying for the sign.

**Speaker 16:** Sure.

**Speaker 9:** And also paying all the legal fees.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Sure. Let me finish.

**Speaker 17:** Because of this.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Yep. So, but the select board puts our faith in every committee, every board, every employee in this town. And we are not highway department. We are not planning board. We are not secretaries or clerks. Or maybe... We put our faith in that and, you know, maybe once in a while something went wrong. And I don't believe that if, you know, if you go back at the beginning and I don't really want to argue too much about it because I'm sick of the sign. I wanted it to stay up. I wanted the old sign to stay up. I wanted a new sign to stay up. And I want this sign to stay up. I never was against the sign ever. You know? Ever. I never complained about it. It doesn't matter. But when it comes to the payment now, yeah, it does suck that we did have a great deal of it. We did have a grant. They took it down. We do have that sign that we took the grant for. We still do have it. And we will be putting it up. That's good at least. While we're on that, I would like to know where the old sign was. We said something about someone, a private person was storing it. I don't think that we should do that. I think that should come back to the town. It should not be in a private person's hands unless they want to buy it from us for an antique or something. But, I mean, that's just a personal opinion. That's the sign that Daryl... That's the sign that Daryl... That's the sign that Daryl... That's the sign that Daryl... That's the sign that Daryl... That's the sign that... That's the sign that Daryl... That's the sign that Daryl... That's the sign that Daryl... It's because of his porque. Yes. Right.

**Speaker 18:** His because of his because of his...

**Speaker 13:** He's a historical survivor. He's a historical survivor. This has gone...

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** This is gone like a long time ago. I think it was Kurt said it was a good thing, it went bad. People had good intentions and it went bad over nothing. Now it's going to cost us, like you said, it's going to cost us $3,000. Yes. Yeah. minus the the donations whatever i had already said i'm going to donate money so it's probably going to be about 2 000 when we're all said and done

**Speaker 9:** what is the legal fees it's a lot of money and i sat on this board and we went back and forth we

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** go back and forth about gravel for the roads and all this stuff oh yeah i agree with you this wait really this is real i don't agree that this board um complains about spending fifty dollars i don't agree with that at all we've spent plenty of money five hundred thousand dollars for a fire truck so we don't we don't we we don't complain about fifty dollars but i don't agree with that but i do believe that this board is fiscally responsible and i do believe that there was a mistake when i guess every time we do something like this we have to follow through make sure it follows the bylaws and you know you read bylaws you know i bet you a thousand dollars or any person in here knows every one of them bylaws right now you know it's just the way it is you want to bat move that that's fine we'll bet and i bet you you can't even interpretate half the damn things right you know and then that's why we're doing it right so it's not about fighting about or arguing it's at the end of the day do we want a sign up i know you don't want as a taxpayer you don't want to pay for i know and you definitely have a personal feeling about this because you were involved in it so there's definitely there's emotions in it with you you're not a robot you have emotions it costs me

**Speaker 9:** a lot of money i mean a lot of money in my own pocket i understand that something now has to be

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** done over and i'm sorry and that's something you chose to do that's what they call donations that's like me going up and donating to the church and then the next day someone says oh we don't want it anymore the bishop comes and takes it away hey they just took a church away down here and her family started it how do you feel about that exactly not happy exactly so you know when we donate you have to let it go it's like giving your kid money let it go they're not paying you back you know so i know i i i feel for you i do i'm not

**Speaker 16:** mad at you i feel for i feel bad about the stupidity of this entire thing i agree but maybe

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** i've agreed right along with you about this stupidity maybe it won't happen yep so hopefully we learned a lesson it's expensive but we're going to learn a lesson and we're going to learn a lesson some lessons i understand that that you know every single time that there's a mistake when there's a mistake here you know we hear it but when there's good stuff we never hear it we you know it's like when i told dave when you're plowing the road you're going to hear the mistakes you'll never hear the good stuff that you know we we did make a mistake we should have followed up you were on the board we should have followed up right you should have followed up and said

**Speaker 9:** no but we should have said the bottom line is it was not the board's fault

**Speaker 16:** although the board was totally involved including myself i guess the board should have said we

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** better make sure we get a permit for that but i didn't believe we needed the permit okay but that's it that's all the stuff that we've done i agree i agree you know it's it's my moment to talk so

**Speaker 5:** i'm talking you know and i've been here two weeks i believe i don't believe that there was during the whole entire process i don't believe any one person was intended any ill will no it was the way it was interpreted no i i don't think so okay i don't think so i don't think he meant no it will he believed that things were this way and i agree with that okay there were certain certain people that didn't like the sign the news that's right well i don't know i'm just talking about the

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** process right but this when you don't like something and you dig defining the process was wrong that's it kind of vindictive but nevertheless at the end of the day we're at this point where we are now right right so you came up you said we got thirty five hundred dollars we want what seven seven fifty call a thousand i'll donate 250 right now right now i'll give it to you before i leave so there's 250. now now you got 250 that's a lot more than any taxpayer so so now what i'm just saying is okay now you got twenty five hundred dollars you gotta come up with and whatever we have available funds in our sweat board plan board whatever it takes we'll do it we'll figure it out you know and put it back the whole point is we don't have a sign that's sad it's sad we had to call the lawyer that sounds against that too but that's another not trying to run for a flag or by any means so that's

**Speaker 14:** you know it's just the way it is so if we accept this quote he's willing to start this week

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** yeah he's okay and who is this again

**Speaker 11:** w-h-i you have a copy of this quote it's not on here no it's not on here it's not on here it's not

**Speaker 5:** on here i got the other part of that for some reason the way he printed it out can i just ask

**Speaker 3:** though can we be certain we want it to be four by six before we go ahead because like maybe it's not the same thing i know but i mean is that is that a sufficient size i'm just saying what

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** size well what size is the church at the time we were told that's where we had to fall within it's it's about two you want to stretch it out it's like two square feet the church is 12 square feet

**Speaker 5:** it's two square feet i thought it was i think it's not the upper part yeah yeah if you cut off

that bumpy part it's 12 square feet but yeah it's 19 feet three by four yeah so let's go this bigger okay i don't still want it still before then i don't think that's a lot i give it i give it i feel your pain okay painful do you want it i understand no i do not so this quote doesn't say if it's the rectangle warning that showed him or if it's going to have the hump like

**Speaker 3:** the church this doesn't say what if it has the hump you have to include that whole section

**Speaker 5:** so i got i got his commitment today that i would work alongside of him to make sure and i would make sure that you were involved as well before any actual design is put on the

**Speaker 2:** cnc machine and it also doesn't say what it's made out of is it wood that weathers is it he's got several different composites i didn't say you gotta make sure yeah yeah i'm sure you use five double-sided monumental sign

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** i just want to go on record and saying that i like the new sign the big sign that's behind the generator i like the sign i like the idea that it will be mounted on the school but i i really don't like it mounted there without i just for safety reasons i'm just leery about it this building is 65 70 years old that scares me the sidings remember three years ago when they

**Speaker 9:** power washed the siding and the siding was falling apart i mean the signing is yeah they're not going

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** to screw it into the siding they're going to find stuff yeah yeah i'm scared i don't like that i'm not an engineer but i put signs up down in st stands into the cement right you know we did a brick you you know you do it right you engineer it you make sure you do that i did it on eagles street for my wife's store you have to have it if you have insurance for that i was going to

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** say too also before he starts uh make sure he gives the insurance to lori we've got the specifications that we need for that motion not yet not yet bill hold on still working on money

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** here don't push us okay so you know we're gonna have to find out what the material needs yeah i

**Speaker 5:** mean all that stuff has got to be yeah this was the gentleman just came today and we i brought him

**Speaker 10:** right in in here because i knew lori was inside and we talked yeah i mean personally i don't want

**Speaker 19:** to have to paint it every year or so no well we wanted you know we were in kind of an agreement

**Speaker 20:** that that plastic peels laminate stuff we didn't like but i think i've heard of this

**Speaker 2:** press it right into the sign it doesn't peel it doesn't fade becomes part of the sign so that really isn't a bad i mean i'm not a sign i know he's another

**Speaker 5:** another process that he was telling me about is they actually carved he has a cnc so it's carving it's all etched in yeah but can you get some yeah i don't know i i will as soon as you guys give me okay i'll call them and get all the details and if it's not all right i'll

**Speaker 10:** just make sure you guys are aware of it my i don't mind doing it i want it done right and i want to

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** make sure we know what where the money's coming from before we do it because if this guy does it

**Speaker 2:** and we go geez we just said it we don't have money before letting it just happen and then we have

**Speaker 21:** trouble right so we've got to make sure we have some money so 500 off of this if we install it

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** ourselves yeah that's but then you got to find somebody to install it yeah yeah okay okay um

**Speaker 5:** record to say that this is i have nothing to do with it i just took the ball and dribbled it down the court that's all

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** and again and i don't know this guy at all you know i don't never didn't meet him but john had a price that was a lot less for a sign but that was no installation right right it sounds like most of the prices for installing it right or no i'm sorry no it was 510 dollars okay okay so i don't know did didn't john have a

**Speaker 2:** they did and now the guy is a principal so it's kind of a better i mean personally

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** that for that for that amount of money and it's going to be there for the rest of my life i can do it in a second but you have to make sure we have the money we can take it out of

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** saltman's expense be done with it you know finish all the community money get rid of all that money

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** because of all this the rest are i don't really want to call there's too many but this this lack of knowledge that happened cost us almost that much money to to talk to a lawyer and said

**Speaker 5:** i'm not sure well that's one of those things were it was an expensive education yeah

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** okay and before we start the sign or anything please be in touch with pam because she said she would take care of the flowers currently where the sign is going and how and when i'm going to go I know there's thousands of dollars worth of plants in that bed,

and I want to make sure they're taken care of. I can't stand to see them just be trash.

**Speaker 5:** I actually want to do it today. Is there any way we can kind of add that landscape without messing it up in there?

Nope.

**Speaker 9:** The whole thing's got to be dug up. Everything's got to be done.

**Speaker 5:** I want you to start that, and I'll have an assignment for you.

**Speaker 9:** So there could be nothing worse than trying to dig those plants up right now because we are in a drought.

It is hot. It is not good.

**Speaker 9:** If I had it my way, we would not dig up those plants for another two weeks. And if it stays dry like this, even in two weeks, I'm going to have to be up here watering them and making the ground be not dry.

**Speaker 5:** I don't know how long this sign's going to take. We were, Bill and I were talking about getting this sign up before school started. That was our goal until we gave him the information about a new sign. And then he was all about, okay, well, I can give you a deal on this. Because this was the first of the $1,200.

So, I mean, he's got to run staging and stuff like that. He wants to do the one that's on the school first because that's where you can't be doing that once the kids are done. Right. Exactly.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** So, how far back from the original sign, where the flowers are, how far back are we now? Where we have to put the new one?

**Speaker 22:** We can put it in front of us.

**Speaker 2:** State Highway right away, right?

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** So, why are we putting that right back to where it was then if we can?

**Speaker 9:** Because, as far as the landscaping goes, the whole bed is now, instead of being parallel to the road, it's horizontal to the whole thing.

I got it. It's long now.

**Speaker 9:** Plus, all that land material was designed to go with a completely different sign. I'm just going to dig it up and try to make it work as best I can so we don't just throw away all the plants.

**Speaker 5:** Right. I understand that. I don't care where you put the sign. I wasn't involved with where we're putting the sign. We'll put the sign wherever you want.

**Speaker 9:** Well, you guys put the sign wherever you want.

Where it has to be. I'm just saying. Okay.

**Speaker 9:** All that material is set up for a different sign.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** No, I understand now. We're turning it so we can see it both ways.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** It seems like it should be right where the old, the first sign was, in the middle of the property, and back far enough.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Just make sure it goes in the right place. I don't care. You know, to be honest with you, it don't matter to me whether you've got a sign up with flowers or not, and it's nothing against your flowers. I'm not a flower guy. But, you know, they look great. They look great and all that, but I want to put a sign up so when people are driving by, they know what this is. I mean, we've always had people call and say, I don't know where you are. Right. So, but we want to make sure we don't have to move it again. Yeah. Because.

**Speaker 9:** Well, so, just, even though I was totally, 100% not involved in the whole sign process, I didn't get involved literally until it got installed, but I do know this, what I believe is, the reason that sign was put so close to the road was because they were trying to leave space in between the sign and the flagpole for something else, like a bench, or at one point they were even talking about a gazebo out there.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Like an assembly.

**Speaker 9:** So, so, so really, I don't want to complicate it too much, but before you just slap the sign in somewhere. Get it as close to the road as possible. You might want to think about what else might possibly be able to be done there, and that's what I don't think about that anymore.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** And we just got to make sure that it's, the site, both ways, coming out of the drive, or that way, coming out, that it doesn't block the site.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** It's got to be 25 feet from the center of the road. Right. It's not going to block it if you back-

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** And one other thing, I know you brought up before about permit, because the state owns the land. The land in front, they do not.

**Speaker 6:** The 1111 permit, yeah.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** They do not. We do not need a permit.

**Speaker 5:** Who said?

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Well, we looked at the state right away. The state didn't take any land in front of the school.

**Speaker 1:** No, we're talking about, so there was something brought up that there was-

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** That the state took the land in front of the school. They didn't.

**Speaker 5:** It's not, it's, the state did not take the land. The way it was presented, you're correct.

It was not taken. We do. We own the land. Correct. And it's an easement.

**Speaker 5:** It's sold for the state on most municipalities, they have an easement in front of their town hall so that they can store, or if an emergency comes up, state, federal government's got the right to put their stuff anywhere they want. That's what I was told. And so, now, this came from the main project guide for the whole state of Vermont. That's where the, where I got the information. Yeah.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** So- We searched records, land records, and the state did not take anything from the town other than drainage rights. Up that, over there.

**Speaker 5:** I'm just, I'm just telling you what he had mentioned. I told him that a certain person here in town had, had brought these claims forward and he said- Whose contact goes AOT. Yeah. It's that simple. It's that simple. Russell, come over and go. You're all set. Yep. That's exactly what I was just going to say.

So, he tried this- That's exactly what I was just going to say.

**Speaker 9:** With the original sign, not that it's necessarily going to work any better this time, but if I were you, I would get a couple of steaks and would mark the location of the sign, like, here's where it's going to be.

Mark it so people can look at it.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** They are in there.

It is in there, isn't it? I disagree.

**Speaker 5:** I disagree. Don't give them nothing, Art. Just, they're going to wake up one morning, the sign's going to be here, then they can complain. I can contact-

**Speaker 23:** And that worked out really well.

Thank you.

**Speaker 5:** Well, they're doing it. We have crossed our T's, right? And we've crossed and dotted our I's.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Yes. Thank you. Tell them where we can put it at. Yep. And then we'll move from there. Then we'll decide if that's what we like. If we have to come back a little better. And then, let's get back to the money of where we're going to get the money to buy it. We have money. We can use money.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** I make a motion that we clean out the community project funds account, close that out, use all their money. The rest come out of Selectmen's expenses. And if we over budget, I mean, if we're over, we're over. We've got to pay for it.

**Speaker 13:** Okay. Second. Somebody.

**Speaker 23:** Except that you still don't have an actual quote, right? Yeah, we do. 3510. Yeah, we do. But I thought you just said you don't even know what the material is.

**Speaker 5:** So, the material, it doesn't matter. We just have to sit down and design. We could use any one of the composites they have. Or anything. He doesn't have that, but he's not going to make it. He's going to charge us no more.

**Speaker 23:** Okay.

**Speaker 5:** It would be easier if he put it on his CNC and just bang, done.

Yeah. Well, he can show you everything. Yeah. Just Selectmen expenses, whatever expenses we get. I think probably the attorney might have come out with it last year. I don't know. Okay. So, we don't shortchange yours. So, I got no problem. But we need to ask.

**Speaker 23:** So. If we go over, we go. So. We got to spend. You're going to just hate this. I'm just going to bring it up.

Just. I'm sorry.

**Speaker 23:** So, we buy this sign, another few thousand dollars. We buy this sign and it says, Stamford School, account office, library. Presumably what it's going to say. And then, the school is no longer here.

Then, what's going to happen?

**Speaker 23:** Then, we're going to have a sign that says the school's here, but it's really not here. What do you think?

**Speaker 24:** Well, I just.

**Speaker 13:** There'll be a lot bigger problem if the school isn't here than what the sign says.

**Speaker 23:** I mean, I definitely, believe me, I understand that. Well. Same thing for the town office. We still have the sign.

**Speaker 5:** It's going to be going like this. Saw that popper. Unless, I'll have that conversation with him tomorrow or whenever. Well, if it's CNC routered in, it's going to be there. He can't. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. I'm just saying, if he doesn't CNC it , if we decide to do something different, You can let him do letters. or if we end up burning the vinyl into it. That's expensive. You can always go over it. Yeah.

You could actually, in theory, make it in three different rooms . Yeah. Stamford school. That's a good idea. So.

**Speaker 23:** I have a dumb question.

Stamford library. We're going 24 square foot. If we did this design.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** What did you say the max is now? 64. 음식. All kinds of rooms. So let's just say that 24 in a sign was, because she's saying, that's a good idea. If we had three different panels that went into this frame, and he could say, okay, this, the first letter is, I don't know, 8-inch it's called. 8-inch, 8-inch, 8-inch, comes out to be that 24. Yeah, I'm just saying, if we can, you know, look at, because we know what the other sign looks like, and we know what the old sign looked like. We could read both of them. So anything in that area of that sign, and if you divide it by three, and say, okay, 10, 10, 10 is 30 by, you know, 60 or whatever, I'm sure that material is not going to change that. The design is where all the numbers are.

**Speaker 5:** Maybe we could program a sign, a solid sign, and then raise it up for flowering. But reasons, make it a little bit higher than.

**Speaker 23:** I mean, you've got snow. Right.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Well, it has to be, like, there's limitations to it where we're putting it. But, you know, like you said, like the churches over there, we know we've already done a few signs here. So, you know, it's got to be high.

**Speaker 5:** I'm just saying that if you had the, you know, the regular, all the writing up here, and you would still have room to put add-ons on the bottom. Well, she's asking about subtraction, not add.

**Speaker 25:** I mean, do you think that that's, I don't think we'd ever have add-ons.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** I don't want to bring add-ons at this time.

**Speaker 23:** I mean, and also, it's going to be a little awkward anyway, because there's a, the, you know,

**Speaker 9:** it's not level, it goes away. So, you know, the front legs are going to be shorter than the legs towards the school. So, the bigger you make it, the more funky that's going to look.

**Speaker 5:** Yeah. Yeah. Well, that's where the flowers come in as well.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** I like the four by six.

**Speaker 5:** I do too. Okay.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** So, we made a motion. We seconded it. We're good.

Did you vote? I think we voted. We all said aye. Do it. Voted on the walk. I feel like I'm done.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Whoa, whoa, whoa. Whoa, whoa, whoa. I'm not saying I'm against it, but did we, we voted. Oh, did we vote? Whoa, whoa, whoa. Whoa. I'm sorry.

**Speaker 23:** I'm sorry.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Geez. Okay.

**Speaker 1:** You're slipping down.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** I wanted to get this.

**Speaker 2:** No, I seconded it.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** What are we voting on? Voting on.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Voting on.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Go ahead with the quote. Make sure that you check out the material. Dave's going to call the state and make sure that we're putting it in the right spot. Pam, are you saying that you're volunteering to do the landscaping? Is that an every year landscaping and keep up with it, or is that just this year? This year. Well, she don't know what she's doing next year. When the old sign was there, I offered to take care of it 100% in perpetuity.

I'm not doing that anymore.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** What perpetuity? What perpetuity? The old sign.

**Speaker 9:** Until I'm dead.

First one, second one, or this one? First one. I offered to do that with the old sign.

**Speaker 9:** That was before the fiasco, so I'm not really ready to commit to that.

**Speaker 16:** So you're bitter.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** You're bitter. I'm very pissed off about the whole entire thing. I'm sorry.

Me too.

**Speaker 9:** I will commit to digging up these plants. Just initially. And I will commit to replanting them, but you know, I don't know what's going to happen with the soil. I'm pretty sure that John Boll. Um, donated five yards of soil to make that bed out there. It's like a whole big production. I mean, it's a big production to do that over again. Believe me, it's not 10 minutes worth of work.

**Speaker 17:** I could donate some, some topsoil.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Um, so my question is again, are you going to do that?

**Speaker 9:** Yes, I'll do it.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** So my next thing would be is I'll do it.

**Speaker 9:** I'm not committing to buying any new plants.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** No, no, no. They live. They live.

**Speaker 9:** I will take what plants that I think are appropriate. That I can save, replant them and we'll go from there. And if they've lived in there, they don't, they don't. I wasn't even done with that bed yet. I still had plenty of good stuff to do.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Oh, so you still owe us some more volunteer time.

**Speaker 9:** Okay. So we're good.

**Speaker 17:** Like I don't, I, so no, seriously, seriously, listen, seriously, thank you.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Thank you for the past. I'm saying, I didn't, you know, I never think anybody. If I have to, so look at thank, seriously, thank you for that. That, that is important because that's what we need. Just like they just did this nine mile here. Thank you. Cause that's what we've been talking about. So thank you.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Everything looks nice the first year. And then after that.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Thank you.

**Speaker 26:** Well, that's because we have a lack of community that we need to, we need to address.

**Speaker 9:** Thank you. That's where I'm going to, that's where I'm going to.

Okay. Thank you. Thank you Pam.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Thanks Pam.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Jim and Pam, keep in touch. Thank you.

**Speaker 1:** All right.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Um, so now.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Kissing his ass over here.

Thank you. So we made the motion for the money. We're going to, you need another motion and move forward with a sign or you're all just in agreement.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Let's move forward. I think that's all we're talking about, so let's do it all. Yeah, we can't make money. We can't motion money. So motion to do the money. Because we're doing the sign. Do the sign too.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** All in favor.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Did you second? Thank you.

**Speaker 1:** Did you second it before?

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Well, I will second.

Did you second before? I will second. Okay.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Okay.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** All in favor. Aye. Aye. Done. Let's go.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Fifteen minutes, Maya.

Any other visitors for this? No.

**Speaker 27:** Not for the sign. How do you want Thomas Mazzuzzi among county roads? Can you spell that? N-A-V-Z-O-V-F-K-I. What's going on up on the high tension boards with all the pirating and all that? Oh, she's back.

**Speaker 9:** Hold on. Can I interrupt for two seconds? So I just walked outside and turned around and looked at the generator and to the right of the generator is there, there is a beautiful stone wall covered up by these horrendous, awful, giant yews. First of all, why are we covering up the beautiful stone wall with these horrible shrubs and why are we not just putting the sign in front of the beautiful stone wall instead of mounting it on the building? I'm just, I'll just put that out there before anyone makes any decisions. Okay. Because there, it seems like it's a perfect, it's kind of like none of us have seen that wall and.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** There was a, John did make a comment at one of the meetings that shrub, that shrub is too high growing into the roof. They're horrible.

**Speaker 9:** They're, they're horrible. They need to go away. I don't want to say anything. Yeah. Yeah, they're horrible.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** They're absolutely horrible. Yes. All those shrubs.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** We talked about cutting the shrubs, but we did not talk about all of them. All in favor.

**Speaker 21:** So.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** We are meeting. We are meeting with the school board.

**Speaker 15:** Oh, next week.

**Speaker 9:** So why don't you look, just stand out there, look at them, think about just taking them all away.

**Speaker 5:** They disappeared. And then potentially.

**Speaker 27:** No, we already talked to the school about it.

**Speaker 9:** Even if you weren't going to put the sign there, you should just take those shrubs out. Yeah. Yeah.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** We, we did talk to the school, the schools and families. But it's, you might want to just think about putting the sign there in front of the wall.

I don't know. I just, I'm just. Okay.

**Speaker 9:** Well, we did, we remember at the, uh, the other meetings. We would just be standing and they say, well, did they give us permission to take those things out?

Yes.

**Speaker 9:** That would be a lot easier than.

**Speaker 2:** It might be a good idea to cut it down.

**Speaker 9:** Well, maybe or maybe not. Remember, we'll all be seen. You have to have footings in.

**Speaker 2:** I'd have to go look. We'll all be seen.

**Speaker 9:** Well, we'll have to look. You guys should just really look at it. We'll take a look.

**Speaker 16:** Right.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** We will take a look. Yeah. Remember, Laurie, when we were at the joint meetings, we did talk about it in school. Did they say we can move the trees? Did, uh, John said he was going to go. I don't know. Whenever you have time.

**Speaker 2:** I don't remember that.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Yeah. He said something about the windows and the school said it was okay. Look at that. We haven't had it. We wanted to know about safety. That was their meeting. All right. So we'll have to look at it.

Well, we're going to meet with them next week. Yeah.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** So, so either way, we're going to cut that was not, there's nothing doing the sign.

**Speaker 5:** Well, we never made an option on buying signs. So that's might be where the sign goes. Well, we'll look.

**Speaker 13:** No, we'll put it there. How far can you see it from?

**Speaker 5:** I don't know. I, I, I don't. Yeah.

**Speaker 11:** The, the trees are on the way.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** We'll have to say that putting on the building and.

**Speaker 5:** Is there a window? Is there a windows on the other side of the trees? I think so.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** In front of the classroom. There's windows on the other.

Yeah.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** I don't know. We right now. I don't know. We're right now.

**Speaker 28:** We're going to go look at it anyway.

Right. Yeah. Right. Exactly. Let's move on. Okay. What do you want again? Well, well, how many road is it with a bit of partying going on up there? And now they're starting to burn the signs up there. They're stealing my pallets in my parking lot.

**Speaker 27:** I tell you that camera.

Yeah. No, I don't think I'll stay there. And I don't guarantee you'll never see him again if I catch him. Well, don't say that. Do you know? But anyway, I'll turn it on. Yeah. Yeah. So anyway. I'm going to get law enforcement.

**Speaker 27:** I know like the law enforcement comes here. They're going to charge a ton. No, no, they won't. Well, I thought whatever you call it. No, it's the sheriff's department.

**Speaker 29:** So they're not the state.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Don't call the sheriff. Call the state troopers for one. But if you call, I went down this road before. If you call it, that's not our. You have no permission to call law enforcement. So you can call 911. You can call the state troopers. If you call the sheriff's, the dime's on you.

**Speaker 27:** I've already talked to. Don't call the sheriff. I've talked to Fish and Game. And I've talked to the Forest Service. Because it's going to destroy. They're destroying things up there.

All right. That must have been brand new, right? Yeah.

**Speaker 30:** Okay. I totally agree with you. I read your your post there. And it's kind of sticks in my crotch because I'm up there a lot. It's a mess. One day last fall before the bad weather came, I was up walking there. And short version of the story. I see this big black truck go by. A couple of young guys in a mass place. And they were. Loaded with pallets. And I got the plate number. I posted it on one of the sites. I had the plate number. That was quite a while ago. But anyway, what happened? I posted it on one of our town social things there. And somebody responded and said, well, that's just kids going up there. And it doesn't do any harm. And I sent back what I'm worried about. You get a bunch of drunk kids up there. And you. They're having fighters. And you can see that. One of these days, the mountain's going to go up. So it's a safety factor as well.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** You don't know when it's happening.

It could be any. I think it's Friday the 7th at night. Well, state police were just up there with the fire department a week or two ago. Yeah, they were. They were.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** There was a fight.

**Speaker 30:** What happened was going back. I haven't finished what I was saying there. It was funny. After I posted it, I went back up there. And at that time, they took the pallets. But that's a while ago. And apparently, they were back to do what they were doing.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** If you do get a plate, let me know. Oh, yeah. I'll.

Yeah.

**Speaker 30:** Well, I said they went back up because. I will touch base.

I'm sorry. I will touch base with state troopers and tell them that there is a.

**Speaker 27:** No, I'm going to start fooling around a little more and find out if they can find out who it is.

**Speaker 31:** It was funny.

**Speaker 30:** When they were coming back along the road, and it was down on the high line, you could see him slow down and look.

**Speaker 32:** So after I posted it, like I said.

**Speaker 27:** Everybody's gone in the backwoods and had a couple beers and stuff.

**Speaker 30:** But when it starts to be the future. The garbage gets very bad up there. And you drive over that if you're not careful. You got nails there. You got glass. It's it's kind of. I heard also somebody got a key number or something.

That's David was saying. It must have been just recently. I went on a call three weeks ago. I didn't see it. It must be just in the last couple of weeks. No, that's going on.

**Speaker 30:** It's been there. It's been there for a while.

**Speaker 27:** I'm out there a couple of days a week.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Yeah.

**Speaker 27:** You need to stay. We're by it once a week. You get the wrong people coming along.

**Speaker 33:** You can't have the harvest.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** All right. Priorities. Priorities. Priorities. This is the one we have. Yeah. I'm guessing you're not going to see that. That'd be it for a while.

Yeah. So it'll probably end. But I will.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** They posted on social media. They're not that smart.

Yeah. Okay.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Thanks.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** That's it. All right. Moving on. Reading and approval of reference and orders. You weren't here. So we'll move that till the next meeting. Highway update. Dave. What's that?

**Speaker 27:** So we're opening up.

What are we updating? East row. East row. Okay. East row is now scheduled for September 4th. Okay. It was originally August 19th and that day. Okay. We've been working on the 2025 grant aid project on sports with Rowe. I just got a stone line that digits and regrade. And then call Jim Hunterson from the VCR. So he wasn't all that dumb. So he can do his part. And then I'm going to start on the 2026.

**Speaker 5:** Project, which is three more culverts.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** So I'm sportsman. I'm sportsman.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** What's left on this road? Chips. Just chip seal. Cause I went down here on a day. Oh crap. That's nice. That's pretty nice. Yeah.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Yeah.

**Speaker 5:** I got up to 80. No problem.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Too bad it doesn't stay cause it looks so nice. Yeah.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Well, I'll be able to work these. Yeah. So there's going to be complaints about. Yeah. I, I, well, I expect. I expect that, you know, the chip seal is not going to be, these roads are, so it's

nothing new. Right. They don't, they don't do the aprons.

**Speaker 5:** Not when you're just doing a shim and a chip seal. I mean, if we were doing an overlay, yes. I'm just wondering because I mean, wouldn't that kind of undermine areas and ruin the road right away? Well, it was only supposed to be an inch, inch chip seal. So yeah, it's not really, I mean, when you get into doing overlays, you got three inches,

you do the shouldering. You know, it's a whole different project and a whole lot more money.

**Speaker 5:** That's why we do these types of projects. It's a lot more economical.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** So Dave, on Sportsman, you'll have seven culverts installed when this is done and that should hold up for a while on Sportsman. That road should be.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Well, we're going to put in. That culvert should be good for a while.

I'm anticipating putting in for a better back roads grant for that other culvert that's an issue. For the big one. Correct. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Other than that. Okay. Yep. What else do you have?

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Uh, I mean, that's pretty much it where we've been saluting some washbirds here and there where we get a little bit of moisture to work with.

We did a bunch of work on this new branch and there's a little bit of mulling that all the first pass mulling's been done, but some of the, you know, the brush passes up on the

**Speaker 5:** class floor, we haven't really got to yet, but you know, that stuff's not as important

as getting stuff installed.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** And the garage doors are installed. They look good. Do you know when the van door will be installed? I don't. And we don't have the money for any of that. We've got to file the grant paperwork for it. And I think there's no, uh, what is the time of, and there's no match for any of that either.

**Speaker 2:** No match for that. It's a good, good grant. Yeah. I'm not sure about the timing. I'll have to check.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** The guy did a really good job installing the doors. He was extremely meticulous. Good.

**Speaker 2:** I'm very happy with him.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Who was that?

Uh, Bennington? Um, North, North County. Are you sure you overhead doors? Yeah, overhead doors. North County overhead doors? Yeah. What else do you have with roads? That's it.

**Speaker 2:** I had a citizen, a person from Risky Ranch Road call and say the roads looked great. They were phenomenal. He just really wanted to compliment our highway department for doing such a good job. Risky Ranch?

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Well, I stand corrected. Someone did say you did a good job. We did what we could with it, but we didn't. We had to replace, I want to say, five culverts up there. Yeah. So, and it's nice and ready to do a little ditch in where I needed it, where we could fit it in, you know. I had a little pep talk with them.

I said, no, try to take care of it, guys. Yeah. How is the Klondike now? Because that's, uh. Oh, beautiful.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** That's good. Klondike? Yeah. Actually, we're going to be up, after we've done with sports, I'm kind of going back up there and working on Klondike, doing some ditch work. We replaced the culvert before we moved. Even mowed along? We mowed the sides up there. Yes. I mean, it's as good of a class four road as your project. Yeah. Take a ride down Klondike, and when you get into Clarksburg, tell me which one's better. The one that came up today is definitely Klondike.

**Speaker 30:** Oh, it's awful, isn't it?

**Speaker 5:** You can feel the transition.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Exactly. And that's a regular road for them.

Yeah.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Well, it works, then. Clarksburg. Then when you get down on Blacktop and Clarksburg, it's worse. Holy crap. Yeah.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Anything else, Dave? We do have two or three applications for the labor position. I'd like to discuss them in an executive session, and then just see what we're going to do, and call them in for interviews, whatever. We'll discuss it and see what we want to do in an executive session. Anything else? Anything else on highway? Recycling. Lori, you gave us the update.

**Speaker 2:** So, I gave you a copy of the recycling update on the current recycling paperwork. We're going to go through pricing. The information will end October 31st. So, you'll want to prepare a new schedule starting November 1st. Be prepared maybe at the next meeting to make suggestions or changes.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** I would just like to highlight the part where it says, electronic waste is not accepted. So, people will not be bringing their computers and laptops and TVs because we just got a bill here for about $200.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** What?

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** $800, yeah. But some of that was the monitor, the printer, the keyboard, the TVs. They could all be free if you bring them to Reedsboro or Searsburg or Bennington.

**Speaker 13:** So, how did we get them?

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Somebody let them in. Or snuck them in. When somebody wasn't watching.

**Speaker 1:** Like a laptop or something like that.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Yep. Just put it in the minutes. Please bring those to a place that will accept them. Otherwise, we're paying for them.

**Speaker 5:** Isn't there a Bennington take and stuff? I mean, on a specific day of the month.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Those I think could go any time to Bennington. Not the household hazardous waste. Right. Electronics. Even Reedsboro will take them when they're open.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Why are we not accepting electronics in the form of the ones listed, but we're accepting appliances? Appliances. Some of those appliances we can scrap.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** They can go somewhere else. We could accept them if we had a place to store them.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Okay. But we don't.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** But it doesn't go in the same box? No. I think compared to this. Or I can look them over. I think we're okay.

Unfortunately, yeah. We just raised it. And we're still losing our service. You know, I understand that it's a service. I understand that they're not changing that. It probably helps to go up a little bit. At least every year.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Well, when we did go up. It wasn't a lot of money. But it was a lot of percent. If we went up a little bit every year. Nobody would even see it. We had one at $23. We had one at $21. I don't know how the heck it got to $21 instead of $21. Yeah.

**Speaker 5:** What's it on average? I mean, does anybody here use this? No. Use the recycling area? Yes. Or the whole thing? Is that what you use all the time?

**Speaker 30:** Recycling is weak.

**Speaker 1:** Recycling is trash.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** All your garbage goes to recycling. If you were going to throw away a refrigerator.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** It costs me $40.

**Speaker 21:** It's a lot cheaper to go somewhere else.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** $40. It costs a senior. Lori, it would cost $95. To get the punch cards. And then she brings all her recycling.

**Speaker 11:** That's for a year?

**Speaker 2:** You get 50 punches. So it's either $95. Or the senior rate is $40. And you get an access card. With 50 punches. So for every bag you bring. They punch a card. The more you recycle. The more you save. That's the incentive. And if you use up all the punches on your card. You come back and get another one. Some people make it through. With just the 50 punches. Some people come back and need a second or a third.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** And you also can bring your compost there.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Yeah. Not that we like it. But it's the law.

**Speaker 27:** Jeff.

I was just wondering. Just the recycling part. Of things. And never use the trash cart. Do we have any funding for that?

**Speaker 34:** Or is it just.

**Speaker 2:** Well you still have to buy the access card. For the $95. And then you just recycle it. So unless you're throwing out. Furniture or big items. It's not that expensive.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Well even at these prices. So I have a demolino. Dumpster down there. And he told me. The prices are for.

The items not allowed in the dumpster.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** So a mattress. And a refrigerator. And all of the numbers he gave me. Are much higher than these numbers. So if I had time. It would be better for me to get this. Go up here and dump them into this. I don't have time to do that. I have a dump sticker for North Adams. With a trailer. And I just don't have time. But that last time. I did regular demo from a house. And that was right around. It's a 6x12 trailer. And that was right around 300 something dollars. And I count my permit. That I have to pay for a year. And then that counts the time. It takes to go do it. These are good prices to make. Anybody that complains about this. There's nowhere you can go.

**Speaker 5:** I mean I pay like $30. For a tractor. Yeah. Every day. They take everything. I threw a big screen TV. And the guy. I asked the guy.

**Speaker 21:** Can I throw it in there?

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Yeah. But if you ask the owner.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Well you're not supposed to. They're not supposed to. Because if they come into Vermont.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** They're supposed to be offering recycling. So I had a trash guy. Down in North Adams. I won't mention the guy's name. He's out of business now. He doesn't do it anymore. One was at my house. And one was at the shop. And the one at the house. I had barrels. And I had two tenants. And he would take anything in a bag. If it wasn't in a bag. He wouldn't take it. So we had a little bicycle for the kids. We had a mop. Stuff. And he would just take them out. And he'd set them on the side. Pretty smart. And he would throw it all in. And he goes. What are you doing? I said I'm throwing all this away. Because you won't take it to the house. He goes well you're not supposed to throw it. I said that's the same trash right there. In front of me. It's the same truck. I can see it. It's my trash. And at the shop they would take everything. So all that recycling. Was a bunch of balls.

**Speaker 10:** I had a couch.

**Speaker 5:** The only thing they don't want to. I'd bust them up. Complete couches. No mattresses. And no tires. That's the only thing.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Tires you just keep stacking them up. Make a wall. Yeah it's a good deal. But I do think that we should look at it. Say. A percentage. Not a lot but. If we go up every year a little bit. It's better than going up.

**Speaker 1:** We went almost double than them.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** For the. Yeah. But the.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** I think it was like 40 bucks. I mean you can look at what we had. The reason taxes to offset it. And try to come up with something somewhere. It's crazy.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** But not everybody uses it either.

**Speaker 21:** Well that's the thing.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** When we talk about taxpayers.

I don't use this. I pay for it. I live on Main Road. I don't use the votes. I pay for it. That's what it is. Okay we will do this for our homework. Thank you Jim.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Meeting it's going to be September 11th. 6 o'clock here at the school. It's going to be. Just discussions. No motions. It's going to be a work session. So Lori if you can get everything out. That might be all boards. Correspondence. Update. Still on there. Put their names in the minutes again.

**Speaker 13:** Put them in the minutes.

**Speaker 8:** Go ahead.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Bob Riggs. Jamie Cusa. And Anthony Waters. And if they do not. Register or. They got the letter. The $50 fine. And the next step Luke will be sending tickets. So if you would let Luke know. Motion to proceed.

Here it is September. Do you know what kind of dog the Cusa dog is? What? What kind of dog does it say? Dachshund and a Labrador Retriever. Gone. And they have extra dogs.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Well call Lori. That's up on Tatro.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Patton's big house. Lori it seems like she got some calls already. Gee the dog died. But this is like the third notice. $50 makes you stand up and take notice. It's actually easy to call. $50. Okay. Yep if you let Luke know. Go ahead and proceed. Last meeting we talked about. Prettying up the. Prettying up the school yard. And flags and all that. And I did speak with the principal. She does have a new. US flag. That will be up for school. And there will be a Vermont flag coming. It's on order. And as far as. She said we haven't been doing that. But she's working on it. Well you can also.

**Speaker 30:** If you illuminate it too. So I don't know which side. Which she's working on.

There is one out there.

**Speaker 30:** But apparently. Of course it used to be fun to have the kids go out.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** And have a ceremony. And raise it.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** And fold it. Old business. Draft review. Draft employee policy handbook. Did we just move that after new business? Yeah. Good. What do we have for new business? I have school. Oh new business. The principal. Sent us all an email. And would like to invite. One or more of you to meet with. Her and the superintendent. On Tuesday the 26th. At 430. To walk the grounds of the Stamford school. They have several areas. Of concern on the property. And last years building evacuations. Highlighted opportunities. To improve our procedure. So. It is Tuesday the 26th. At 430. I'm not sure if I can make it.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** So if one of you.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** I'm not sure yet. The state police have identified several areas of concern. On the property.

**Speaker 13:** Somebody probably ought to tell Bob Briggs about that.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** You know.

**Speaker 21:** Can you send it to him?

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** We're meeting with him on the 11th. And they want to walk out on the 24th. Yeah. Tell us on the 11th. What we got to do. Maybe ask her if we can do it on the 11th. I mean we could have been there on the 11th. Yeah just ask her. Can't we just do a walk around at that time?

I don't know. Didn't she say some state officials are coming out? The principal. The superintendent.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** State police have identified. I haven't changed his schedule. I'm not sure if we can do it on the 11th. 9-11? Yeah if they want to go at 530. What's that?

**Speaker 2:** They want to do it before school starts.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Oh that's the 26th.

Oh I thought it was the 20th. That's August.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Next week.

Never mind. And that's all I have for new business.

**Speaker 2:** So.

I have new business.

**Speaker 2:** I've appointed Dean Kerfield. As assistant treasurer. It's working out very well. Everything's new. You'll probably want to talk about that in executive session. And firm the salary. Okay.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Okay. Employee policy handbook. We did another work session this week. We've gone through several updates. Much discussion with Dave, Mike, and us three. But. Everyone else is here to review this with us. So.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** What do you want to do? I'd like to have it like we talked about.

**Speaker 2:** There's a couple of parts that were cold.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Yeah. So I mean that's what I'm saying. If we want to do a final draft. And look at it again. I'm pleased. In getting rid of the contradictions that we had in there before. The repeating. Repeating that we had in there before. Like you said. It was just kind of added. But yeah. I have no problem with the small things that we mentioned. For change.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** I would.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** So if you want to do a final draft. And vote on it.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** That's fine. I think I'm done working on it too. We did two sessions at two hours a piece. So we have a full board. I'd like the full board to look at it. And be done with it.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Can you get a final draft that we can all agree on?

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Yes.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** So what whole.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** I think you had the per diem you were saying.

**Speaker 1:** Well.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Those are things that we were just going to look up definitions of.

**Speaker 2:** So when you talked about the per diem. I had added it into the paragraph that. We started talking about. And then when I went to insert it. It's like. It doesn't belong there. Maybe we just wanted to add a definition. And not really stick the word in there. But we're able to use it. If we need to. Yeah. That's what we were saying.

Because we wanted for all three.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** That all three terms. So.

**Speaker 2:** And we wanted to add that. So I put that into the beginning where the terms are. Okay. But the paragraph that brought it to our attention. Actually. Gives workers like. PTO time. And a per diem guy. Doesn't take PTO time. So when I went to stick it in. It didn't make sense.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** And that's been working out pretty easy anyways.

So we don't have to.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** We don't have to rock that boat. That very few times that we do that. Is with the same guy.

**Speaker 2:** I mean there were different ways. Of how you wanted to consider your overtime. After 8. After 40. Just saying holidays and weekends. Or just Sundays. Those are different options. That need to be ironed out. Okay. Can be just ready to go to approve. But there's a couple of things. That you guys need to hash out. And decide.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Lori's going to kill me. She's not going to talk to me now. That's okay. The overtime. It was brought up that perhaps the select board secretary. Should get overtime. Because Lori is both. And she does both. But she doesn't have to do both.

Correct. And I thought we decided that wasn't going to be. We took it out.

**Speaker 2:** Do we take it out?

**Speaker 22:** Or do we leave it in?

**Speaker 35:** We talked about it.

**Speaker 2:** I don't know. I had to go to the window a couple of times.

**Speaker 35:** So I missed bits and pieces.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Because I know we did say if someone else did it. Versus you doing it.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Because if someone else worked 40 hours. Or 48 hours. That's a lot of overtime.

**Speaker 21:** I mean that's a lot of work for a secretary.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Right.

So she's doing both jobs.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** If you hire someone just to do that one job. Which it wouldn't get anybody in. But you know how that works. It would be a separate job. Again. But it's a similar like job. In the same office. And it's beyond your normal working hours.

Right. But if somebody adds that in there. Right. So even on the top of page three.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** When the town clerk, treasurer and select board secretary positions. Are held by the same employee. The employee should be in the same position. To be paid overtime wages. At a rate of time and a half. So that could come out. We've got it in two places. Am I reading that right? Hourly overtime. Hourly wages will be paid.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** For select board secretary. We've got one again.

**Speaker 2:** It doesn't say select board secretary though.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Town clerk, treasurer and select board secretary.

**Speaker 35:** So that's already in there.

**Speaker 2:** I don't know if you want to just have that in as a position. Like if it's not me.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** It says by the same. When it's held by the same person. Overtime is available. When it's not. Therefore when it's not. We don't need to put that in there. When it's not, it's not.

You haven't met this criteria. It's not there. You're going to need to write it down. You're going to set the normal rate for it.

**Speaker 30:** That's how you come up with the time and a half rate.

**Speaker 36:** Are we just going to take this whole thing out?

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Are we taking them both out? Out for discussion. Select board secretary. That is already in that.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** So if we hired a person by themselves. I'd say no. How are they ever going to get overtime? I know.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Take that out.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** What did we say? An average meeting goes two hours. If you don't worry overtime. Then the select board should too.

**Speaker 2:** I'll talk forever. Take it out of three. Take it out of two.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Take it out of three. Take it out of there too.

**Speaker 13:** It's been fun, guys. But I'm going to pass on the editing. Have a good day. Take care, Bill.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Bill, that was me waiting for you the other day. You didn't even wait back. Your wife was driving up on your road. I was coming down with you. If she was driving, I was just. She was driving. Yeah, you were. Take care, Bill. I wouldn't pick it off this one. I'd just take it off this one. Because that is saying if it's held by the same person all three jobs, then she's eligible for overtime. The other one.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Okay. So every time that Lori works for us here on every other Thursday night, that's overtime time and a half. This is what we're saying.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** This is what we're saying we're going to vote on. Question vote.

**Speaker 21:** Okay.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** The only thing is, Lori, we've got select board secretary and select board associate. Okay. And assistant. All right.

**Speaker 30:** Should be the same.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Should be the same.

Yeah. So take out the assistant. Take out secretary one or the other, whatever you want.

**Speaker 30:** Take out assistant, put in secretary.

Okay.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** As you see.

**Speaker 37:** Take out assistant.

**Speaker 2:** Just take out. All right. From page six. So you're just moving them around.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Yeah. We've added those below the nine.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Three hours. The rest of the state of Vermont. School's closed. The state's closed. The state's closed. We've got to look at it. It is what it is. If it snows, things go. And Lori puts in her 40 hours, whether she does it at home or comes down here, she's putting in her 40 hours in there no matter what. It's just when the office is open. You've still got to do your job. You're still going to do the payroll for him and all that. You've got to do the work. It's like we were talking. When we go on vacation, all of us, when we come back, none of our job is done. It's still there. It's the way it is. The other thing is we're talking about maybe compensate. Maybe compensate. Maybe compensate.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Maybe compensate. Maybe compensate. Maybe compensate. For the road commissioner for being on duty. But that's not part of the employee handbook. That would be salary and executive section or something like that.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** I thought we already beat that up too. That Dave's like, don't worry about it. Am I right? When you were saying when you're on call, when do I start charging you? And bottom line is the town couldn't afford when you should be starting to charge us. I have on years. I have what I think is a fairly reasonable proposal. Remember we talked about maybe a bonus or something. I have a fairly reasonable proposal for you. We can discuss it. That's a whole separate issue.

So should that come out of this? It's not going to be part of the handbook? Top of page three. Yes.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Because that would be something that when the supervisor is hired, we would set a contract with the supervisor. And that would be his duties. Right now we have a supervisor. In eight years we have a new supervisor. I'm just using the number. I'm not pushing you out. It's been talked about. If we had a new supervisor, that doesn't necessarily mean we can give that same contract to the new. Right.

We can negotiate. So that part would not be in the employee handbook there. What are you taking off the handbook?

**Speaker 2:** Oh. Page three, the third paragraph. Yes.

Compensation on duty terms.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Commissioner will receive a stipend. We don't want it in there.

**Speaker 38:** Just here?

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Yes.

**Speaker 30:** Not here in the employee handbook.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** I see. That would be what we discuss.

**Speaker 39:** So if you give us a clean draft and have the...

**Speaker 2:** So then the only thing that are still or, or, or is how you want to look at the overtime. Everything else I think is just...

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** You can put it in, highlight what we're proposing the change would be. And then we can vote yea or nay on the changes. And that's it. Then we can go down to four different changes or five changes we have down there. And if three are passed, we'll know. And that's it. Go down to the next meeting. And we email it to all the selectmen.

**Speaker 1:** They have time to look at it.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Tell them to read this over very carefully.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** They're not going to be here. You can put it in a letter or something. They can also call. They're also... Nothing against the selectmen. They aren't here. I'm saying that we've kicked it down the road again. Two work sessions. During the day. I don't want to have to kick it down the road again. That's all.

It's not about what... They are here tonight. But I just want it to be...

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** I don't want to keep kicking it down the road.

**Speaker 2:** So you want to have kind of an almost final version ready to sign? Or do you want to be able to still see all these changes?

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Or, or, or. Or we can make the motion whether we sign it or not. We can sign it.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** We can make that motion.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** We don't have to sign it physically that way. Right.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** And then we can come in on our own time and sign it.

**Speaker 21:** Correct?

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** Once it's approved, it's approved whether we sign it or not. Right. We've done that before where we say, okay, we made the motion.

**Speaker 1:** We passed it.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** This is what we passed.

All business, any business. It's none of your business. I make a motion to go into executive session.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** I would, for personnel matter, and I would like Launrie and Dave... Let's do Launrie and Dave first.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** And then when Dave's done, he can go home. This is the second one. It's a litigation.

And the litigation, is there anything on that? No. Okay. All right.

**Nancy L. Bushika (Chair):** Thank you, Jeff.

**Michael G. Denault (inferred):** We should get shot.

Everything's shot. Holy crap. You're worse than your brother, eh? Be careful. You guys have a great night. Thank you, Jeff. I know. I want to...