• are ready. And our first item of business is a discussion of the Arts and Humanities Council's proposal for the artist banner program. So we have two representatives of arts and humanities. Would you like to come to approach those two microphones?
• is all this is all stuff that we've already submitted. About UC. Yeah. Just just in case you forgot or didn't have it with you.
• Should we just start talking?
• Introduce yourselves for the audience.
• Yes.
• co chair
• of the Arts and Humanities Committee.
• committee.
• Council. I'm sorry. Council. Advisory council. Advisory council. Yes. Yes. To be precise.
So we have submitted the proposal that's in front of you, the Crocus artist banner expansion project.
• And so we were hoping that we would get an approval to go ahead
• with
• the second phase of this project.
• We were very happy
• to see how well received the first phase was.
• The banners are beautiful. I think we can all agree on that. And
• the placement of the banners turned out to be
• able
• And
• is one
• the the limiting factor was not the number of artists here.
• It was getting
• really good photographs of them so that the images would
• look good when they were rendered so that they would be all fuzzy and
• ill defined and unattractive.
• So you have them up there, but
• that's
• And
• these are these are the 12 people that we
where we can use. There will be some more in the future, but it's beginning to dwindle,
• not because of the artist, but because of finding really good images.
• Apropos
• continue in that vein
• where we have the images together
• in a block
• and to
• go up as soon as we can as soon as can be managed.
• As soon as they're finished, which should
We don't we don't really know. That's really up to the board and the village manager. But we When we say as soon as it can be managed, we mean you as well as us. So the original 10
• committee budget
• for last year. So I'm wondering if
• if
• do you have money in your budget for this year that would be paying for the banners, or would we be needing to allocate funds for this project?
• That's my question to the village manager.
• council has
• planned for the remainder of the year. Okay.
• You wanna just give me one minute? Sure. Sure. Tell you exactly how much budget remains.
• And then what was the
• the village board originally allocated $7,500
• this year for arts and humanities.
• So and I know that there have been a couple of concerts
• that have taken place so far this year.
• yeah.
• arts and humanities committee paid for the first
• Okay. And then how much are they per
• poster?
• Yeah. I think that's right. Yeah. Okay.
• So depending on depending on the budget for your the two remaining concerts,
• you might there might be enough funds in there to
• cover the to cover the cost of that. Right. The $2,400.
Yeah. And then in in terms plan that. The only thing is then that we will not then be able to do any of the other initiatives in the market. And
• do you want to stall everything else out?
We're just having a conversation, Valerie, to understand kind of where this budget would come from if we have to allocate more funds or if you have it already in your budget.
• So my question is in terms of the
• the
• location of where you'd like the 22 banners to go in the village, has the committee talked about that and have a proposal?
• So that there's a continuum of those
• banners.
• And that's where they'll have the greatest impact. I
• the number of poles there.
• there are no existing
• Veteran. Veterans banners there. Because I when we talk about this, I know the veterans banners are exactly where people requested to have them.
Yes. People people can request if they you know, a lot of people request in front of their house, right, where the veteran lived. Mhmm.
• I I don't I don't remember if there are any specifically on that stretch of maple. We have to Yep. Check that. The the veterans banners come down as of
They'll be coming down shortly. Yeah. The so veterans banners come down today and then don't go back up again until Memorial Day. So there's a window of time where, you know, we would be free of veterans banners where the these banner the artist banners could hang.
• Is the committee's vision to have them up all year or just for a limited time? So I think we would like to have them up as long as possible.
• if if the new banners already
• when
• idea was to have them on a post road between Mabel and Grand.
• You know, that was Going up into the upper village. That was the original idea. Yeah. An age. Like,
• age. So
• almost
• if they
• if
• there was a conflict,
• then we would then just Maple Street.
Yeah. I think I think if the if the goal is to have them up for as long as possible, then Maple Street is the best way to accomplish that. Yeah.
• Regardless,
• we take we take the banners down in the winter months.
• Even, you know, any banners come down during the winter months just to preserve them for, you know, as long as possible because the winds usually in the winter do a number on the on the banners. Uh-huh. So,
• you know, generally, like, our veterans banners go up in May. They come down after Veterans Day.
• Then the holiday banners will go up for the month of December until, like, the January,
• and then those come down. And then we have we usually have a, you know, four month window, right, from, like, mid January to mid May where we don't have
• generally, we don't have banners. So
• veg I'm sorry. The artist banners up in
• Would I would say probably if you know, again, we want we want to avoid having them up in the winter. So probably, like, March
• if, you know Okay. If things go well. Okay. You know?
So they could be up at the same time as veterans banners are up because we're trying to make it so they're not They're not in conflict. Correct. Yes. Conflict. Yeah. Okay. But it's not in conflict. Of the hardest banners or the veterans banners, they can be up at the same time. Yeah. That's also part of They can mix a little bit so long as there is
• the sense when you're driving or you're walking along that you see them wanna they mix now. I mean, usually, there's a veteran banner that's in the midst of the of the artist banners. Yeah. I think I think there is one on Maple Street that's Yeah. One or two, I think, at in either in either end of the spectrum.
• tomorrow what the budget is, where we are, you know, if because it doesn't it sounds like it'll be close.
Well, I mean, it's really it's really up to the board. I mean, if you want to depending on I don't know what exactly the other initiatives are that the Arts and Humanities Council is working on. But if you wanted to allocate
• additional funds towards them, we you know, they would have to come out of your contingency
• in the budget.
Initiatives that the arts and humanities community has done? A lot of things that are in levels of flux.
• to put on.
• Things like the drum circle, like, we do those. Yeah. I've talked to a painting that's like Clonair.
• We have some we have some that are that
• are Yeah.
• That are really
• already planned to Copeland
• event, which
• That's one of the consequences. Yeah. That that that's gonna cost a bit of money. And then the other one is the Women's
• History
• Well, they're paying for the Yes. For the music. For the concert. They're paying not paying for music. The music part. That's right. They're paying for all but 200. Yeah. So that so that could be Do you have I'm sorry to interrupt. Do you have
• you know, we could encumber the funds? And then that way, we'll know Sure. Yeah. If you could provide that, then we'll we can encumber the funds so that it's reserved for that purpose. Okay. And then, you know, maybe See what's left. See what's left. Exactly. Sure. Yeah. The the only thing is for the music in terms of music, the number of performers is not yet set.
You're working with Yes. We can give you a range. That would be great. Yeah. Yeah.
• So
• the the committee council for for the project overall, but in in this latest iteration for your selection of artists, really,
• really wonderful.
• I happen to have a a special fondness
• for character actors,
• And there's no greater character actor than Faye Vayner. She was in between movies and TV, she was in, you know, over a 100 productions over thirty, forty years, including
• playing
• Thomas Edison's
• mother in my one of my favorite movies, Young Tom Edison, which I first watched when I was 12. And I and I said, well, I never realized Tom Thomas Edison used to be a kid. You know? And but she she does a a magnificent job. And and she played a lot of mothers, a lot of aunts, but she was also
• beautiful young actress in in how to live in twenties and thirties. So it's I had no idea she lived in Brooklyn. I thought that was amazing. So two two additional points I wanted to make is
• that when you add what you're proposing to do now with what you've already done, that's over 20, maybe 25 altogether.
• The first was 11, and this is 12. Yeah. So that's like, you know, in the mid-20s,
• that's almost a destination,
• you know, for people around
• the
• region to come and see. And we've been talking, and I think we'll be, we're going to be bringing on some more communication staff assistance by contract.
• And maybe when
• that happens, we can work with them on promoting this a little bit.
• Hey, come see
• the Groton artist's walk on Maple and beyond. And then secondly,
• we've all been working with this new
• we've
• to get
• they've done most of the work, but our businesses have formed their own organization.
• It's called the ABC, the Association of Business es and the program.
• And I know they'll be very excited
• about this as a potential draw for their businesses.
• Maybe they're
• going to have, you know, usually monthly meetings. So maybe in the
So, I mean, are prepared at the same manner as our veterans banners, right? They're printed as one offs, right?
• Yes.
• Okay.
• All right. So that I just want to throw that out there as one option is if the board is unwilling to do a,
• you know, appropriation out of contingency,
• these could be produced on a prorated basis. A part
• of the list could be done this year or what's
• left in this fiscal year.
• And then the remainder could be addressed in the following
• we'll
• to able
• make
• I don't know what the cost is, but the amount of time and energy and effort and work
• and cost that goes into making these.
• It just looks like a stack of Yeah. Drawings right now. This is a lot of meaning. That's a lot of work. Care. For sure. Dogs are no And it really isn't you know, it really wouldn't be that much more money for us to allocate. Like Right. Right. So you we've got, like, $1,900
• on these 12, then you'd have 1,900 for the concerts.
• If you had need to spend another thousand dollars, something along those lines between now and May, we can find that money.
Well, we just need to get our hands our arms around what the what the cost is. So Sure. If we can get
• we'd send you
• Okay. We'll pull we'll pull everything together, and we can prepare a little memo for the board. And how much do we have left? I'm sorry. It's it's approximately $4,300.
• Yeah. 300. Okay.
you. Safe on this effort. Thank you. Have a good night. They are beautiful. Take care. You too.
• Your bud.
• Okay.
• On to our next item of business, which
• is an update on the Con Edison Reyes case settlement and the conclusion,
• at least for now,
• of the community choice aggregation program.
• the village has been participating
• in a municipal consortium with approximately
• 39 other
• municipalities municipalities in in the the county to
• protest the
• potential increases in the Con Edison rates for the next three years.
• Con Edison filed their rates with the New York State Public Service Commission
• earlier this year,
• and,
• you know, the rates that were proposed were,
• in the Board's view, excessive, right? The original proposed electric rate increase
• was 13.4%
• over a three year period,
• and the gas
• natural gas proposed
• rate increase
• was
• 19% over a three year period.
• And so
• through our advocacy, not only ourselves but the Westchester County and everybody else who has been involved in this process,
• the
• electric rate increase
• was
• reduced to 2.8%
• under the settlement,
• and the gas rate increase was reduced to 2%
• under the settlement. Over a three year period? No. That's, sorry, that's the annual. Annual. That's the first year increase. Yeah. And so
• sorry. So the agreement spans January 1 through 2026
• through 12/31/2028.
• And so the 2.8% and the 2% were for the first year.
• And then
• there are similar annual increases of approximately 2.8% in electric and 2% in gas in the second and third years.
• Also key to note is that
• we did get a number of concessions from Con Edison
• involving
• addressing longstanding
• issues and improving communication and transparency
• within
• billing and
• the
• relationship between
• Con Edison in Westchester and Con Edison in New York City.
• Con Edison has agreed to have annual Westchester capital investment meetings.
• They'll meet annually to review capital plan projects
• and, importantly, to compare their investment levels in Westchester versus New York City. Because as we learned through this process,
• they are vastly
• more
• they're spending vast amounts more in New York City investments compared to Westchester County.
• The meetings will also address storm preparedness, double pole removal, street lighting, and the impact of data centers on the local bridge,
• will be very interesting to learn about.
• They're also committing to undertaking an underground versus overhead cost analysis.
• As
• we know, most
• power in Westchester County is provided through overhead lines.
• Most power in New York City is provided through underground
• networking. Right? And so,
• you know, our the research that was done through this consortium
• found
• that
• the maintenance cost for
• the radio system, which is what they call the overhead,
• is much less than the maintenance cost for the underground system.
• And so, yep, we're both paying the same amounts, right? There's just one rate.
• So
• they've agreed to undertake this cost analysis
• to help determine whether any cross subsidization
• exists between regions,
• and this will be shared prior to the company's next rate filing. So we would get that data at some point in 2028.
• So
• proposed increase was in electric? Yes.
• and then the gas was 19%.
• have
• and
• working together on this at very reasonable cost through
• Yeah. Hiring both an attorney and an economist, you know, as it really roll up their sleeves and and become part of the, you know, the PSC process.
Yeah. I'll just read the quote from our special counsel who represented us. While the reductions do not go as far as we had proposed, they are a substantial move in the name of affordability and the requirements for more disclosure
• transparency
• on capital projects and the cost of overhead versus underground systems are major gains for our county.
• This outcome reflects how much can be accomplished when Westchester's municipalities stand together for our common goal.
• So and just to what trustee Simon said,
• you know, Westchester has 45 municipalities. The ones that didn't participate are mostly in the NYSEG territory,
• so they're not covered by condoms.
Manager, you just, you know, mentioned just in case this comes up in anyone's conversation with the
• just the the distinction that we ended up with in terms of whether whether or not
• clarification
• is that
• we are not
• supporting
• this. We have we're not supporting this to the settlement terms. We've agreed not to contest
• the settlement terms, which obviously is a a difference. Right? You know, we're not filing statements of support. We've just agreed not to oppose.
• Okay.
So that is that is an important And the point there is that we're not the only party to this, and the Public Service Commission has the final authority on this and therefore could make additional changes. I
• come out and actually opposed the the settlement.
• Yes. Because they were not they were not a part of our consortium.
• So,
• yeah, that but we we our group has agreed to not
• not oppose. Okay. Yeah.
• Okay. Okay. So that so that is on the rate case settlement. And then we did receive the news late last week that
• the Westchester Power Community Choice Aggregation Program, CCA,
• will be sunsetting at the November.
• There
• have been some changes in the regulations
• provided by the Public Service Commission, which also governs
• these
• ESCOs
• and community choice aggregation.
• And
• Westchester Power
• and Sustainable Westchester
• have been
• working to meet those goals of communication
• and
• providing opt out information
• to residents.
• And,
• you know, I guess at the end of the day, when they were approaching their deadlines, they determined that they were not going to be able to
• meet those meet those new regulations.
• And so
• they were originally looking to
• just take a pause on the program and hopefully restart it at some point in 2026.
• You may remember that that happened a couple of years ago where we went for a couple of months without the CCA
• and because of the situation in Ukraine,
• and then they
• restarted the program.
• However, with these new regulations,
• no pause was allowed,
• and
• the PSC would have required them to basically
• start over as if it was a brand new program, and that was not considered viable
• in their
• opinion.
• So they are moving forward with a sunsetting of the program,
• and
• everybody who is enrolled will be getting a letter in the mail informing them of
• this change and that starting in December,
• your supplier will once again default to condensate.
• So
• and we do have some information on this posted on the CCA page on the website, and we've gotten some additional information
• from Westchester Power, I think it just came today, actually,
• so that we can share it on social media and,
• you know, just spread the word so that people are aware of this upcoming
• change.
• We've been part of the CCA for how long?
• We joined in 2018.
• Is that correct?
• Yes. Yeah.
• So I think the program originally started in 2015.
• Sustainable Westchester, Westchester Power was the first
• group to join when
• it started.
• yeah, they were still growing. I think Yonkers had just recently
• joined them, which was obviously a big, you know, with the amount of customers they have. Mhmm. So
• yep.
• topic
• Okay. Which is on the IMAs.
• Yeah. So this it was actually a nice little
• walk down memory lane here going through all the different things that we have done
• over the years because it really does
• showcase
• how
• well
• the municipalities
• in our immediate vicinity here really do work together.
• I mean, it really
• is a
• great framework.
• And so,
• you know, just some of just, you know, going through this,
• the village of Buchanan, this is actually a
• new agreement just for this year where we've agreed to provide dog control services to Buchanan so that they,
• you know, don't
• have to take on that cost.
• And, you know, they pay us a modest amount.
• And, you know, so far,
• we've had the agreement, I think, for five months, and we haven't had to go there once so far. So, you know, I think it's a pretty good agreement for both of us.
• The town of Portland, we, you know, have a long standing agreement to provide
• fire and EMS to the
• Mount Airy Quaker Bridge Fire District.
• And we more recently, we've established a cannabis tax sharing agreement with the town.
• The town of Ossining, again, for many years,
• we have agreed to provide the snow removal and electrical maintenance on their portion of the crossening walkway along Route 9,
• and that fee goes up every year based on a percentage scale.
• Last year, we formalized our relationship with the library.
• You know, the village
• and the library have had a very interesting
• relationship over the
• years where, you know, way back when, the village used to just give a contribution to the library every year of of, like, a $100,000.
• It was a budgeted amount, and then,
• you know, that
• stopped a number of years ago.
• And
• we have
• continued to work with the library in various ways. But every when those agreements stopped,
• when the funding stopped right? We used to have an agreement with them to provide the funding. But then when those agreements when the funding funding stopped, stopped, those those agreements agreements stopped, but we still continued to pry provide the services in some in some ways.
• And so
• we recently formalized
• our
• relationship with them because we still plow their parking lot during snow.
• We handle their sewer maintenance and needed street sweeping
• for the parking lot and then use of facilities.
• And that goes both ways because
• we
• we use their facilities. They use our facilities.
• And so we have a very good relationship in that regard.
• host of our bike share program. Yes. They were very eager to do that and
• worked very well with everyone involved. Great.
• nonroutine labor costs. So, like, if, you know, for example, when we had to clean out the, I believe, what are called seepage pits from the sewers in their parking lot, right, that was nonroutine.
• So
they reimbursed the cost of So the agreement we have with them spells out what the routine
• maintenance
• anything that we are anything that the library is calling us in for special
would be a non routine. Right. But so how would we so based on the agreement Yep. It it says, how are we how are we determining what's special?
It's basically anything. So the the library is not village property. Right? So we're not required to provide any
• labor to the library. So it's anything that
• needs to be anything that they would call upon us for, which is not it's not much. Right? I mean, so far since we've had this agreement, the only thing that we've had to do there was this clean out of the seepage pits because,
• you know, for the library to have to rent a machine and pay for labor and, you know, they it's it's easier for them to just
• have us do it and then reimburse us. So do we give them an estimate of what we think that project is gonna cost? Yeah. So it's that's spelled out. Correct.
• That's spelled out in the agreement. So they would what what it says basically,
• I'll paraphrase, But,
• you know, the library director is supposed to reach out to the superintendent or the general foreman and say, I need this done, and then they come up with a a cost estimate.
• And then the the library director approves it, and then the work is done, and then we invoice the library. And then,
• you know, that's how we get paid.
• Yeah.
• Okay. With the school district,
• we have an IMA with the school district for the use and maintenance of firefighters' fields.
• That
• of the problem. Okay. Yeah. And so that falls outside this? Yeah. Because that really was wouldn't that that was an agreement that the library had with
• proto comments. Right? So that was have a move line because it doesn't have it. Yeah. Correct. Yeah. That was it's not a true, like, intramunicipal
• agreement.
• Okay. So the school district,
• we have an agreement with for firefighters field.
• They use that as kind of like their home field for girls softball. And so
• they basically assist with maintenance during that season of the at the field,
• And they've also purchased equipment for the field
• during
• as part of this agreement. So they've, like it says here, they've purchased a tarp. They've purchased a scoreboard.
• They have
• field with some of those some of those items.
• Mid Hudson Ambulance District.
• Village
• Well, I mean, so I think
• that's a conversation that we have here. Right? I mean, we I have
• started a dialogue dialogue with the school district on
• developing
• an IMA much like we have done with the library
• because
• I think it's important
• not only for
• protection, right, to
• protect the village.
• And
• it's just for
• it's important to have for continuity. Right? Because not not all of us will be here forever.
• And, you know, things like with the with the library. Right? There was an agreement, and then all of a sudden the agreement stopped, but the people just kept doing things. And then it's like, you know, I I come in ten years later, and I'm like, why are we plowing the snow at the library parking lot? Right? It's not our property. Yeah. So
And, like, the example of, like, CT day camp, for example. Yes. So our recreation department runs a day camp at
in our school district. Yes. So right now, we don't have an agreement with them. There's no no. I mean, like At all? The rec the rec department would fill out, like, facility use form much like much like you know?
Like, if someone wanted to rent the pavilion Correct. Something similar. Yes. Okay. So there's not
Yeah. But, I mean, it's you know, our use of the school buildings are are much more intense than,
• you know, just having a party at Sunnosco. Right? Yeah. So
• is that our insurance that's covering our programming in their building?
So, yeah, normally, we would provide a certificate of insurance naming the school district as an additional insurer. Got it. Yeah.
• So, like, we get that now for the school district's use of firefighters field.
• You know, there's other things as well. Right? As trustee was mentioning about the police,
• we also
• pick up the garbage at the school district, right, the garbage and the recycling. And so that's a service. They do field maintenance in addition to firefighters field. They help with maintenance on other fields in the village. So there are a lot of
• ways that we partner together,
• and
• I think it's important that we spell those out.
• And, you know, there could be things that are happening that I'm not naming right now because I'm not exactly aware of them. Right? So it's important to, I think, have this conversation and flesh out what all of those,
• you
• cooperations are.
• Yeah. I just so so I just very recently I I had this meeting with the school district about two weeks ago where I brought this up,
• and I told the school district that we would be having this conversation tonight.
• And so, you know, I didn't want to proceed down that path without
• knowing that the board was in support of
• that.
• So, you know, if if we're
• in agreement that we should move down that path, then I'll continue that
• conversation with
• Yes, I support that, and I want to make it my view is that, at least for the time being, we should look at or memorializing
• current actual practices.
• And if there's going to be substantive changes, we have, you know, an expiration date on this agreement and then we look for, you know,
• we can do it as that expiration date approaches rather than try to simultaneously
• memorialize and renegotiate
• practices that aren't necessarily even,
• you know, only hastily defined, again,
• that are more by tradition than agreement.
Yeah. And I think that kind of goes to the other municipalities too, right? Like the town of Portland.
• So the only formal agreement that we have in place is the fire and EMS services.
Yeah. This I mean, this it's a trustee Simon's point. I tried to keep everything on one page here. Got it. Yeah. So, like, we also I know we You can wear equipment.
• And We share equipment with the town.
• We also we also have
• you know, the town serves as purchasing director or purchasing agent for both the
• both villages,
• Portland
• Croton and Buchanan. So, like, we can the town does a bid, and we're able to
• use that piggyback off that bid. Yeah. So,
• yeah, we we do have some more minor agreements that I didn't spell out in this document. But,
• Live forever. Yeah. But is there anything that we're doing with the town of Cortland Cortland that you feel like we should also be putting on? That's a very good question. I can think
• putting those agreements agreements into place.
• IMAs,
• I believe by state law, they're limited to five year
• terms. The town
• does their agreements annually. So every year we have to approve them. So they are you know, they make the changes as things as things happen. So I think our agreements with the town are pretty
• Oh, By far. That's And we do that annually. Annually. Yes. Yeah.
• just rounding out the the list here.
• We have the Mid Hudson Ambulance District, which is
• a special district that is the town
• of Newcastle and Ossining as well as the village of Ossining. So we contract with them to provide EMTs to court and EMS.
• And
• with Westchester County, we have numerous IMAs.
• They they cover Westchester County provides a lot of
• services. So it has to do with 9911,
• the employee assistance program, the county fire rain firing range,
• food scrap recycling, land records, mutual aid for the fire employees, organic waste recycling, youth employment.
• We also have one for solid waste, which isn't on here. There's a lot of
• of IMAs in the county.
• And then lastly, we have a snow and ice agreement with the New York State DOT
• to cover the two main state roads that are in the village that DPW is responsible for
• we are paid a set amount every year. Mhmm. And then depending on the severity of the winter,
• they
• do, like, a final reimbursement.
• They have a a formula that they work out. And so, you know, generally, we get somewhere in the area of like $25,000
• a year from the state. And then, you know, depending on the severity, we'll get,
• you know, more.
• see if there's anything else we can
• that we need to do with the town, and then I'll continue the conversations with the school district. So can we put a time frame around? Like, because it feels like in all the other
• well, at least we have
• on here. Yeah. District, there's even if it's things that are not it feels like the next step of this is
• a conversation specifically about
• the
• way that the village is engaging with the school district,
• based
• on the number of dumpsters that you
• So we are charging the school district? No. We don't. But I'm saying for the customers that we do, don't it's not based off their tonnage. We base it off of the number of dumpsters. There's a lot of additional information regarding the school district that would be helpful while we're having this conversation to understand
• so that we can understand what we're doing with the school district the same way we're doing with all these other events. Well, yeah. I believe that's I mean, we're just starting this conversation now. Right? I mean, that's what we're
• we're in the fact finding portion of this
• conversation, I think.
• fact finding
of this is? Yeah. I mean, would like to we meet with the school district every three months. So I would like to by the time, you know, by the time we have our next meeting, I would like to have some sort of draft
• ready
• to to review with them.
• So our next meeting
• is
• January. Yes.
• So
• yeah.
• questions?
• it's premature, but with the idea of having,
• again, I think the best approach is to try to actually memorialize the current practice before we make substantive changes.
• And to that end, I'm open to the idea of having a
• shorter than perhaps normal
• contract length there just so that it can get done rather than negotiate while we memorialize,
• which means that this probably will be months and months and months while we're not doing this thing. So do you think it make is possible to have it, you know,
• hypothetically terminate on, like, July 1, so shortly after the conclusion school year so we can
• codify or memorialize and then I mean then negotiate.
We can have the agreement be however long we want it to be. Right? It's it's But in terms of the process of drafting and ratification,
it would be possible to have it. Well, I think it depends on the content of what that is gonna look like. Once in January, once we have this list, then we'll
• I think it
• I I wanna understand what that looks like, exactly what we're
• Yeah. My what very
• minor point.
• I
• very
• think
• And this kind of just outlines the board's
• concerns with regards to
• the
• over taxation of our
• emergency resources down at the Harmon Yards. Right? It's
• they get called quite a bit there. There was a day
• last week. I forget exactly which day it was, but there was they were called there three separate times, right, including for a serious medical
• incident.
• So,
• you know, it it's it's a lot for our volunteers to have
• such a large facility that they are basically
the only ones responding to. Yeah. And when they're getting there, the feedback we're getting from the departments is, you know, this is this is happening about four or five times a month. They're being called.
• 28
• of the time, it they're calls between midnight and 8AM for our volunteers to get out of bed, to go to the yard,
• only to discover that the
• private security guard banning the yard doesn't know where the call is coming from. So then they need to drive around the yard, try to find out where the call is coming from, and it could be a fault. Generally, it's a false alarm. Thank goodness.
• But then they need to figure out kind of where it is and how to turn it off. So, I mean, it is they're we're losing valuable time, and I what really concerns me is
• the fact that
• we could have a major incident there. They have many employees.
• So we wanna make sure that when we're called,
• our time is being used
• efficiently
• by the MTA.
• appreciate the idea of focusing on this one important issue
• rather than a laundry list.
• Have a laundry list. We do have a laundry list. And we will get to all of our laundry eventually. But I think this is a priority, and I think it'll help them focus
• on
• a potential solution
• with
• us presenting this to them
• one at a time.
• Manager, could you just for those who are listening or maybe reading, could you just identify
• mister Booter's role? Sure. He's the director of government affairs. Okay. Yeah. So and I think a letter like this always is an opportunity for them to sort of try
• to resolve this or get us to the point where we can make some progress at this level. We could always escalate
• and try to take it to to some others as well. But I'm sure that,
• you know, we'll get a good response from him, and and hopefully, we get some action. And I did have a conversation with Assemblywoman Levenburg about this,
• in full support of us sending this memo
• and, you know, supporting us in whatever way we needed.
• Have we sent something like this before?
• This is the first
I'm not aware of a memo like this. I know that these conversations have happened in the past, but as
• trustee Nicholson and trustee Simon said, you know, I think it's important that this be pulled out from the kind of broader issues
• that exist with the MTA because I think,
• you know, it gets the consensus of the board that this is the priority in terms of both public safety, the potential for
• an incident there not to be responded to appropriately
• because of miscommunication
• and also to alleviate the burden on our first responders.
• Yeah. And it's just possible. Yeah. We're here. You know, look, we're here. Our agencies are here to protect everyone in the village, and that includes
• the MTAs, employees,
• and customers.
• But at the same time, like,
• everyone
• has an obligation to limit the demands that they place on our first responders.
• And, you know, right now, that's happening here.
• key factors here is that
• there used to be a fire brigade at the Right?
• So
• And that was disbanded.
• Correct.
• Oh, what?
• Yeah.
• I
• don't I don't know the exact year that it it took place. I'd have to find that out. But re recently. Recently.
• I would say within the within the ten years, it was disbanded. I don't know exactly when we could find that out. But,
• you know, there there was and the the fire brigade was made up of volunteers
• who work at Metro North. Right? So they were they were employees of Metro North who volunteered in their home communities but would then
• volunteer
• at work as well.
• So,
• you know, they would they would be able to communicate with the department
• and,
• you know, if there were if there were minor things, they could be handled
• without needing our
• response.
• So
• chief Dinkler, did he feel like this was an adequate
• call?
• The number of what we're calling out is sort of the priorities?
Yes. When I when I spoke to the chief, he said that this was their number one priority. Okay. Yeah. Trying to address
• the the number of falls and the and the situation that they find themselves in when they get to the call. Yeah. Yeah.
• I
• hear. I know.
• Okay.
• So
approve, or do you want me to just send this? Or I think we can approve I think we can do it here tonight. I don't it
• needs to.
• Okay. Yeah.
move to adopt this memo. Second. Motion by trustee Nicholson, second by trustee Simon. All in favor? Aye. Aye. Thank you.
• This was a very interesting
• couple of months reviewing
• the
• study that was undertaken by our consultant, AKRF.
• They evaluated
• the conditions in the parking lot.
• ACRF was retained
• to
• evaluate the existing flooding and the future flooding conditions
• in the parking lot, identify alternatives to mitigate the risk, and then propose a recommendation
• to advance to the next level.
• So,
• you know, they came on-site,
• evaluated the conditions both in non flood and flood scenarios.
• They reviewed historical photos that we have taken over the past couple of years showing the different conditions.
• And they also undertook
• some sort of
• topographic
• satellite that was able to show
• the level of settling that has occurred in the past fifteen years, was pretty neat.
• So, you know, this first table here
• shows
• a number of recent flood events that have taken place since 2022.
• You can see that the largest
• one
• took place in
• January
• 2024
• where we had over
• three feet of water
• in
• some areas.
• The flood event right before Christmas in 2022 was also pretty significant.
• So these are some of the photos
• that were taken
• that show the extent of flooding.
• AQRF
• came on-site in September 2024 where we had a a nuisance flooding event. There was about 48 inches of water,
• and that's our that's these photos here.
• As I mentioned, they used this
• technology
• known as LiDAR
• that evaluated
• the settling at the site.
• You know, they've calculated that the parking lot has
• lowered by about point eight feet
• since
• 2009,
• which is pretty significant. They
• the data shows that the rate of substance
• in
• lot I
• was up to 37 millimeters a year
• from 2016 to 2018, 34 millimeters a year 2018
• to 2021,
• and twenty twenty
• twenty four millimeters a year from 2021 to 2024.
• So it seems like the level of settling is
• decreasing,
• which is good,
• but we don't know
• if or when that will stop. Right? There's no way to predict that.
• So they are they're saying
• yeah. So they're projecting that approximately
• 1.2
• feet of settling has occurred over this fifteen year period.
• Oh, I'm I
• from 2009
• to 2019,
• it was point eight feet that settled. And then from 2009 to 2024,
• it's now 1.2 feet.
• So
And just going back to the maintenance that we've done on the parking lot in the past, how many feet did we add
to it when we did that maintenance? I believe that it was raised I I don't remember the exact number, but it was raised fairly significantly.
• I mean, they put a lot of
• sediment
• Yeah. In the in the
• So because it would it would flood even more often than it does now.
• You know, anytime there was anytime there was even a minor increase in the tide, it would it would flood.
• So
• Well and so at the time,
• it was a huge disruption.
• Oh, yes. And
• And so
• Okay.
• The September event
• showed that about 149
• parking spaces
• were impacted
• based off of the level of flooding.
• What this is showing here,
• the
• MHHW,
• right, which is the mean
• high
• mean higher high water
• mark,
• and then the LIMWA
• is the FEMA limit of moderate wave action. So what these are showing is just basically
• what your average high tide
• will be. Right? So
• existing right now, our average high tide
• We're
• going
• us
• showed that we had to had to take some action.
• This
• graphic here, this just shows the areas
• based off the sea level rise, what areas would
• be impacted, right?
• Unsurprisingly,
• it's the areas nearest the
• shoreline.
• So
• what can we do? Right? What are our alternatives?
• So
• option one, which they have
• kindly nicknamed the do nothing option,
• right, is basically we just hope for the best,
• and we deal with the
• flooding as it comes. Right? Well, we
• try to get the word out and deploy signs and barriers as needed.
• And,
• you know, we would just basically use the weather forecast to to make decisions on what we have to do.
• be exploring other ways
• commuters are creatures of heaven. I've spent
• Jeff spent Yes. They are. Fifteen years commuting. Right? He had a parking spot. Yep. I drove to the parking lot. His car was not there. I was very confused. But
• I I do think that
• you can always be finding different and more creative ways to be you have the channels. You I
• I just I think there is an opportunity to be reminding people because every time there is
• a storm coming and we're all getting alerts on our phones phones and however else we get the weather and all this other stuff and you're emailing them, inevitably But we don't just we I mean, we do many more than we do we alert them much more ways than just email.
• No. Absolutely. I'm just saying, I think that there are always
• able
• to text them. So, I mean, we've done that. Inevitably, when there is flooding, there are people whose cars are there. I'm just I think there's always there's always room for improvement. I'm not criticizing
what we're doing. I'm No. I I would normally agree with you, but I don't agree in this case. I think that we
• communicate with people. I mean, we send emails. We do social media. We text them. We put out message boards.
• We put up signage.
• I mean, we've painted the lines,
• physically painted the lines.
• We have
• communicated
• as
• well as we possibly could.
• And we've even we've tried we've tried other methods. Right? We've tried to barricade the parking lot. We've tried to caution tape off the parking lot. People drive through it. People move the barricades because, as trustee Slipham was saying, people are creatures of habit. And it doesn't matter.
• They know exactly what time they have to leave the house so that they can park in their parking spot and walk across the parking lot and get to the train. And that's what they do every day for fifteen years, thirty years, whatever it's been.
• And it doesn't matter. I mean, I've been down there, and I've told people as they're parking their car, you are parking in a flood zone. Your car is going to flood when you come home. And they're like, that's the chance they'll have to take, and they just walk to the train. So I mean, it's you unless you've seen it yourself, you wouldn't believe it. But this is what I'm saying is that I really don't think that there are ways that we could communicate better to them.
• So
• right. So option two, raise the parking lot with Phil. This is what we did in 2009.
• And
• this was an extremely disruptive
• project.
• And it's obviously something that
• did not work for what we need to do. Right? I mean, we've already as we've seen in fifteen years, we saw significant settling,
• and the issues that we tried to fix in 2009
• have come back. And they really the first major
• flood event happened in 2022.
• So we really only got
• twelve to thirteen years out of this solution.
• So,
• you know, this was not
• what I considered to be the preferred
• alternative.
• Option three, which we did choose
• as the preferred
• alternative,
• is the knee wall. Right? So this is a sea wall
• that is on average approximately two feet high and has a total length of approximately 1,200 feet.
• The knee wall would terminate along the areas that are equal to the
• extent of
• flooding.
• Right? So it would basically go from
• the back of section I all along the shoreline
• to a certain point in
• Section G where the parking lot raises
• little bit.
• This this wall would keep the water from coming in, which is great,
• but it also prevents the water from leaving. So
• in coordination with the wall, we would need to install
• a pump system so
• that, you know, like the situation we had a couple of weeks ago where we had that very unfortunate
• timed rainstorm
• that came at the time of high tide.
• You know, as you saw, there's when the tide reaches a certain level, there's no way for the water to leave the parking lot because the drain pipes are filled with the the tidewater coming in. So if we had a pump system in place, the pumps would be able to pump the water
• over the seawall
• and out into the
• into the sound. I
• folks did a magnificent job on this. There's so much information
• and analysis packed into five short pages. It's just just great.
• I originally thought, oh, knee wall, because it's it's the height of your knee. Yeah. What
• if that's not right? And so it's the way that the wall is articulated,
• kind of like a knee, and it's on your legs. So you need it's that it's like Yeah. It's got it's it's it's like
• you know, it goes on top of what's there already. So it's not it's not like it would actually just be two feet high. Right? It's two feet on top of the the ground level that's there. Explain, but they they also use that phrase for the inside of of what a roof looks like, you know, the way it's Yeah. Like that and whatnot. So it's it's I think it's it's the right it's certainly the right solution. Are there some examples of where this has been employed in other places that similarly suffer from flooding that we could take a look at or get some information about? I mean, it's a pretty unique
• because this sounds like a major.
where are do one of these seawalls exist? Exist that we could Yeah. I mean, it or not, we actually have a seawall already in Kern Landing. Right? I mean, we have a similar type wall.
• It's made out of it's made out of stone there rather than metal sheeting.
• But, actually, that's a good point. I just
• remembered.
• We have a metal sheeting type wall at the yacht club that
• is set up to protect
• the
• bulkhead.
• So I think there might be a similar one on
• behalf of the base side. Could very well be. Yes. So, I mean, I could ask them to I
didn't didn't mean mean in in the the village. I meant, like, is there another place where there was a similar problem? Maybe not in a train station parking lot. Yeah. There's gotta be some this is what they're suggesting. There's gotta be an example of where
Yep. I can ask them to give yeah. I was just giving you examples that people would be familiar with, but I can ask them to give
• us some
• more
• but
• there's it is a substantial
• sum, but there is at least a decent
• grant opportunity for Yes. A portion of
• You know, this cost approach is $7,000,000
• for this
• preferred alternative.
• We're going to obviously be looking at some grant funding opportunities
• for this
• we'll
• do
• Separate that. Letter.
• They have their own
• flooding issues that they have to contend with along the Hudson Line. And so all of their mitigation funding is being used for their own
• initiatives,
• which, again, will benefit
• keeping the trains running,
• but it doesn't help us in our specifics. So
• instead of
• you know, because I I guess I'd like to understand kind of the return on investment. Right? If we're gonna invest $7,000,000
• in this, you know, what what how many parking spaces are we protecting?
• How much is the annual volume off of those parking spaces?
• And when will we make our money back sub for $7,000,000,
• and will be will it be before or after 2080?
• But I'd like to see sort of the return on investment for that $7,000,000.
• The other piece I'd like to understand is, like, does it make sense to build a
• elevated parking garage
• in the dry areas of the
• parking lot that we know will remain dry.
• So we capture more parking spots
• that are at safer elevations
• Mhmm.
• In instead of trying to, like, fight the
• fight mother nature and global warming at the same time. You know, is there an opportunity to maybe increase our parking where it's drier
• by adding an elevated
• I think that I don't have a number on that, but I think it would cost more than this, the parking $7,000,000? Yes.
• You know, we did talk about that option with them, but they didn't include it in
• their list of alternatives.
• But it was something that and it may actually be in here. I don't know.
• Yes, it is in here. So this is right, this is what we looked at, right? So there was basically
• marsh. Yeah. And then
• this area here, right, you see the parking garage, five stories.
• And then
• it's got a first Floor elevation of nine feet. So, I mean, it should be good for,
• you know, quite a while. And
• then you would still be able to, you know, use this other,
• you know, other area for parking or other purposes.
• be quite costly. Yeah.
• Mean, is Two and a half times. I would say this is in the you know, you're 10,000,000 plus. You
• we
• you can't predict with certainty grant funding, but just looking at the funding source that
• the county helped us with on Brook Street, that was a a $50.50
• Yes. Grant. And so, you know, we'd probably
• go to that same source and then hope to, you know, get some good
good good support support from from them. Them. Well, I guess the other piece with the parking garage, again, going back to, like, trying to do a cost analysis of, like, if we would it does the 950
• spaces.
• Right? So, like, all of a sudden,
• I a
500 spaces in it, so to speak. So you'd basically be doubling. But we're not in a position where we need to double our spaces. Was going to say is we'd have the spaces, but would we have the demand? Yeah. With regards to the construction cost, I think a big question also is
• project management. I mean, you're looking at the estimates here, you're seeing that 40% of it
you know, we're including 40% contingency here, which is Which not is a very high high contingency,
• And
• do you think we have the in house capacity to do project management on this, or is this something that would have to outsourced?
• In which case, I think that that 40% kind of is necessary.
• If it isn't, then I do think that there's the possibility that it comes in, you know, significantly under that. I mean, I think in terms of the
knowledge of the staff to do this, I think we have it, right? I mean, I think in Yeah. Terms So I agree with that. The question is bandwidth. Correct. Budget just has to be done in the context of the larger capital budget. Well, that's exactly right. I mean, as we go through the budgeting process, right, I mean, we have to identify the you know, the Board as a group needs to identify what its priorities
• are in terms
• allocating
• the staff time. Right? So,
• you know, there are a lot of projects out there that
• we can do, right, for, you know, the Harmon Firehouse. Right? I mean, doing it with our staff saved a considerable sum of money, right? The original
• estimate that came from the architect was $2,800,000
• right? And it's going to be around, you know, dollars 1,500,000.0.
• So,
• thought on the grant question.
• Based on what we have from AKRF
• and
• I know there's additional
• backup material,
• when would you and our our grant
• our grant person feel it's appropriate to approach the county? We've already done so. Okay. Yeah. So, I actually, I have an email today from
Valerie that I have to provide her some additional information so that she can go back to the county.
• And,
• you know, we're going to continue the conversations with them to you see what know, I don't know if they have a max if they have a cap on their funding.
• So, you know, they may fund 50% up to a certain dollar amount. Right? I don't know what that we have to find that out. The
• that our Brook Street project was approved,
• there was a long range of flood control projects. Oh, okay. Many of them larger.
• So that's helpful. That's great. But I think I guess you've answered my question in the sense that
• we'll have a good read on that,
• you know, way before we need to make any Oh, yes.
I'm waiting I should have by the end of this month or maybe early next month a proposal from AKRF
• to
• proceed to the next step,
• right, which is basically getting us to, like, you know, their portion of getting us to,
• like, the construction documents, like getting ready. If we wanted to put this project out to bid, right, so they would are providing a proposal to take us the next phase of this process because we're going to need those design documents
• to actually
• get these grants, right? So that was what we did with Brook Street, right? We under we hired an engineering firm to develop the plans for Brook Street, and then we were able to use that information to obtain the grant.
• Sorry.
Sorry. Back to my parking garage. Oh, sorry. Sorry. One more one more question. So from MTA,
• do we have any sense of
• what their projections are from a ridership perspective of how much it's going to grow over the next twenty, thirty years? Like, I'm sure that in their master plan, they must have that data because the population is gonna grow
• north of here. Right? Our infrastructure is
• very dependent on the train line. So
• we don't have the demand right now, but thirty years from now,
• are they forecasting we could,
• and then that would be a revenue source that could potentially
Yeah. I mean, I think there's a lot of I mean, I always think in the back of my head, what
• happens in ten years if we no longer
• have people driving to the train station? What
• if cars kind of fades out? No. I mean I I don't wanna get, like, a dull, like, you know Self driving cars. One way. You know? Greater possibility
• is there was there oh, there's a development going out of Oh,
okay. Downtown down you know, near Commerce Street. Happening. So and that is a main thoroughfare to the train station. So I think those
• the development that's happening in Yorktown is going to
• Yeah. I mean, I just it's just one of those things that keeps me up at night, you know, as I deal with our budget. I mean, when we're looking at, you know, talking about 2,080, there's a lot of contingency there. I mean, they're
Waymo is being used widely in the Southwest, basically, without restriction at this point
• and is being piloted in New York City now for, you know, self driving taxi service. So,
• you know, I remember ten years ago, people would say, you know, you don't know what's gonna happen with these self driving cars. And
• at the time, it seemed far off, but it's becoming increasingly concrete.
• And I also just wanna, you know, highlight the possibility here of,
• you know, our own development intentionally of transportation alternatives.
• Now
• we've not received a response to the circuit application.
• For those who remember,
• the circuit which manages the free
• electric shuttle bus in the state of New Rochelle and a number of other micro transit options in other communities
• with the village's encouragement and support,
• put in an application for another
• free electric shuttle bus for our village
• to the New York State DOT.
• That was, I think, this point, literally a year ago. It was September '24. Yeah. Exactly. Without
• without a decision from DOT, and I suspect well,
• I won't speculate on the causes for the delay there. But,
• you know, we'll see what happens. But there's also even if it wasn't in this round, I think that's a worthwhile concept and one that hopefully will get funded at some point, and that could also be used to trim
• our demand in the parking lot
• on the resident side, which has other benefits. Right? Which is to say, fewer resident spaces means more nonresident
• demand, especially,
• is the daily which produces the most revenue per space. Yes. Anyway,
• that's a little further down the road. I think that the key thing the the most immediate thing is what trustee Nicholson has outlined, which is,
you know, kind of expected revenue versus expected expense for this. Yeah. That's a good we can we can try to put something like that together.
• just I I think sequencing is the real key here in project management. I mean,
• is just my own initial view and impression on this, but, you know, we've talked about a few other,
• you know, incipient
• infrastructure projects in the village. I would say that, honestly, the Brook Street is high a higher priority.
• I would say we have not mentioned this, but it is a major one, and it's been out there for a long time now. I can't believe it's I think it's been, like, four years,
• which would be or three years,
• which would be the Half Moon Bay Bridge replacement. What
• is the status of our
• congressionally directed spending on that? How much
• August
• the August next year. Okay. So
• we we're on track for that. We are on track. So this is the funding secured for us by former congressman Mondaire Jones. But those are
• you know, because that there is a timeline attached to that, I think that's also a higher priority in just Brook Street because, you know, there's
• it affects residences and the viability of an entire neighborhood.
• Know,
• flooding, occasional
• flooding in a parking lot is suboptimal.
• Know, flooding in a residential area is unacceptable, really. Yeah. And, I mean,
• Half Moon Bay Bridge, that's obviously specialized stuff that's not going to No. No. No. That's not going be done by our
• guys.
• You know, Brook Street will depend on what
• the capacity is.
• But, yeah, we have to you know, that's a project that wasn't
• included in our
• capital plan
• up until this point because,
• you know, we weren't
• privy to the funding that was available.
• So that's going to be that will be a new addition to our capital plan when we
• come,
• you know, develop our budget. And so
• it's just in keeping with our debt policy and
• trying to, you know, reduce our costs over time, that's going to eat up a significant amount of
• our potential capital projects. So just something to keep in mind as we move forward.
that we're looking into our options here. Yes. I mean, we certainly know it's an issue that's affecting our Yeah. And I mean, just just to point out. Right? I mean, this we've been looking at this for quite a while. Right? I mean, this was included the funding for this study was included in our capital
• budget last year.
• And this report
• came in July.
• So it's just been we've been working on it behind the scenes because there's a lot of
• intricate
• calculations
• and discussions, you know, trying to figure out number. It's a lot of work that's going on with AKRF to prepare this
• document for us. But this is also just to
• let everybody know, you know, this information is available on our projects page
• under the resiliency category. So you can
• you know, if you wanted to look at this proposal, it's you know, it's on our sorry, if you wanted to look at this
• study,
• it's available on the agenda. And then there's some background information
• on
• the project page website.
• I would think that
• further down the road, our resiliency efforts should probably
• march north
• we get this one Yes. Under our
• We
• you know, Senaska is would be next on the on the list to to try to Study. Yeah. I mean, that is go that will hopefully be an easier
• one to tackle.
• It's better with me. You know,
• because there's really you know, thankfully,
• the
• designers of that property,
• you know, built it knowing that it would be,
• you know, occasionally flooded. Yeah. So
• I think that that one will
• be an easier project to accomplish because it probably it needs some riprap.
• It needs some
• a
• a
• water.
• It's be continued,
• just I
• think that other communities who are part of the consortium have sent something out, and I think that
• I don't think that a lot of other people are subscribed to other communities.
• You know? Yeah. I mean people know what the situation is because it's gonna it's in the news.
• that we can put out.
• Okay.
And for CCA, I think it makes sense to have an item in the December newsletter on that. Again, that's kind of more of a
• real absence of action because people will just be
• getting their con Ed, you know, whatever.
• Alright. We proceed to
• advisory boards and committees.
• maybe,
• where
• we
• went over what the guidelines were. But there were some
• No, no. Go ahead. I'm sorry. Okay. Thought you were going say something. No.
• You know, there were some outstanding items
• that we just wanted to get or I just wanted to get clarification
• on before
• we
• approach the organizational meeting.
• You know, one of the main
• discussion items before was
• the
• having more than having a resident serve on more than one
• committee.
• You know, there was a recommendation that was put in these guidelines
• that, you know, residents may only serve on one
• committee at a time, and then
• they could serve as a liaison to another committee. Like, you know, if somebody was on the zoning board, they could serve as a liaison to the planning board. Right? You know, something like that. But they would only be an official member of one committee at a time.
• You know, there was some
• discussions at the last our last meeting when we talked about this. I think one proposal that was brought up was maybe adopting this, but having a
• date in the future where it takes effect?
• at the end of their term.
• Right? So I'm Sally Jones,
• committee, and I'm on the police advisory committee. So when my RAC term expires,
• assuming that they're not,
• you know, the same, when their RACs term expires,
• they would need to make a choice.
Right? I wouldn't I wouldn't end someone's term in the middle of their term. Don't need to make a choice now. I think to have somebody serving on two committees,
• it's taking the spot of
• you know, and I don't know what the volume of people coming in. I we shouldn't I think we should give people a choice now. I I don't know what the terms look like. Maybe
• Somewhere like three year terms. Well, right. But I don't know where everybody is in their term. Like, all those are gonna
I would be in favor of just setting a date because I think if you because nor as you've identified that there are different term lengths, and then you have the issue of, like, well, this person, you know, it's it's too much administratively
• for the staff to keep track
• December?
• year, basically. Yeah.
adopting it now, but you're saying it's not gonna take effect. So it basically gives people That would be my suggestion. Make their choice. A year to make their choice. Or other I mean, we're we're talking about three people, but but we're talk we're either talking about three people or maybe three people or three spots where residents
• all means are open to everybody in the village. You could still go. You just aren't and you could participate in the same way. You're just officially opening up a spot for one of your neighbors. I I don't I think there's no downside to doing it sooner rather than later, except
• to the handful of people who are gonna be asked to make a decision.
• But I don't maybe and maybe it was originally done because we couldn't find enough people to fill the
• 100% factual basis for this, but some of the committees
• don't have a limit on how many people they can have on them. Like, for example, the BikePed committee.
• Right? There's no there's no limit on their membership. So, like, if somebody was on a committee already and said, hey. Can I join BikePed?
• I mean, I think it was kinda like, you know, okay. Because there's there's if if 10 people wanted to come and join BikePed, there's nothing that prevents you from
• you
• don't you don't want a 22 person committee. But But
• I've just I was just using that as an example. Yeah. I I understand your point. I just don't think I I don't it's not gonna be impacting impacting that that many people.
• You know, it's not like we have
• Okay.
It seems like on the website, we've got term limits on some of the committees, like the advisory board and the visual environment.
• Those folks have terms, but the bike ped people don't have terms. I think That's incorrect. And then the arts and humanities has terms. So I think we could also, like So
and that's I mean, that's What's the I think if it doesn't have a stated term, it's understood to be annual. Was that a mistake? No. It's so some of the it it's basically how the committees were formulated. Right? So some of our committees, we don't have they were never actually created by resolution.
• Right? They just kind of exist.
• So,
• like, bike ped and sustainability,
• as far as I can find, there was never a resolution,
• like, formally
• or length Creating them? Length of terms. Yeah. Or length of terms. Correct. So some yeah. In some cases, they may have been created,
• but they don't have
• terms
• established.
• Yeah. So, like,
• since I've been here,
• the committees or councils that we've created,
• they all have a set number of members, and they have set terms. But these committees that, you know, have existed for, you know, ten, twenty years,
• you know, they do not have
• they don't all have terms
• or limits.
• And so
Well, then we should definitely add to the guidelines. If a committee doesn't have
• terms established in its resolution, then all terms should be understood to be annual.
I feel like that's easier than trying to create new resolutions for all of the preexisting committees. And I think I we didn't I didn't add it into the original draft of this, which is now months old. But I because I don't think I realized that with the case.
I think I thought there was something that we put together, trustee Nicholson. Maybe is that on the the document you made? I don't know if that's on the document.
• Yeah. I mean, I think the only the
• terms
• are bike ped and sustainability.
The other piece sorry. Like, the other we should really go committee by committee. Like, I I maybe not tonight. I don't know. But,
• you know, because we've got on the on the website, we've got a housing task force. Right? Like
• It's it's not it was never sun it was never sunset by the board. So But, like, folks on that committee, like yes. We should go committee by committee and be like, what's the deal with this committee, which is what my spreadsheet
• has.
I mean, we can we we could probably run through it right now. It's not it wouldn't we don't have that many. We can
I don't I mean, these terms aren't staggered. Everybody is turning over. Right. Right. Right. And that's And that's not advisory
• board for visual advisory boards. Everybody
• we're trying to correct that. We had a we had a similar situation on the water control commission
• where, you know It wasn't a criticism. It was just No. No. I know. I'm just saying there's there's been a lot of office committee. There's been a lot of issues where things were not
• properly
• documented or whatever. Yeah. And so you had situations like that where, you know, on the statutory boards,
• there are five year terms and you have five members. Every year, one member's term is supposed to be up. Right? So that there's always
• just one person turning over. But whatever happened with the WCC,
• you had a year where three people were
• up all at once.
• But couldn't couldn't somebody be filling
instead of it being their term, is it possible that they could just be filling the vacancy that was created? So Yeah. But they should still expire at like, if somebody resigned after three years,
when you get appointed, you just fill you're filling the remainder of the would still expire two years from then Yes. Not five years from But that's the way it should have been, but it could very well be a situation where somebody filled the vacancy and then they were marked down as having a five year term. Yeah. So
• but in any regard, we fixed it on the WCC. So Okay. So let's start at the top. So the advisory
• currently has one, two, three, four, five
the the the has has a vacancy right now. Yes. Yes. So five members is is the max that it should have. Sorry. Yep. Okay.
• Yeah. And so, you know, the v actually a vacancy. Yeah. There is a vacancy on the BEV.
• And
• I believe the the section of the code that deals with the BEV kinda gives guidelines as to who is supposed to be appointed
• to it. Right? It's supposed to be
• all members of the board shall be village residents and shall be qualified by reason of training
• other other and
• the
and And then, you know, how much teeth this committee right. Because I know this committee has talked about,
• you know, they're an advisory committee on the visual environment to essentially the planning board. Or the village engineer depending on who's the approval authority. Right. Yeah.
• And then the
• it's somewhat subjective
• based on that committee
• Yes. Their aesthetics
• Yes. And their recommendations as I I know I sit on that as liaison.
• So
• there there was conversation,
• like, a year or two ago to kind of firm up what the guidelines
• should look like Yes. To make it a little bit less subjective. And they made they made
• Like a lookbook. Yes.
• Yes.
You know, this is a section of the code that was that still remains on our list of general code updates. Mhmm. Right? And
• the former chair and I
• of the VEB
• made it as far as,
• like, going through this and making potential
• edits. Mhmm. But it never I still have that.
• To
• then
• update this section. I believe this section dates to
• 1979.
• So Okay.
• Then
• the next one is arts and humanities.
• Yep.
• So this one, the board of trustees created this via resolution
• Yep.
• In 2019.
• We
amended this so that nonvillage residents could sit on this committee. We've had a we've had a number of amendments. We went from
• I think it originally was going to be it was supposed to be seven members, and then it went to nine members, and then now it's at 11 members.
• And, yeah, we also we also
• allowed there to be
• I think you can have I I forget what the percentage is. You can have a certain number of
nonresidence. I mean, I think the structure of this committee is actually with the number of events and
• initiatives that they've undertaken.
• I think that's more is this is one of those instances where more is
• And term the and there are terms on this committee.
Two year terms. And two year terms for a build visual visual environment. Okay. Bike
• is the next one. So it was created to advise the mayor and the board of trustees on matters related to walking and biking in our village. We envision a village where our roads are safe and inviting.
• We endeavor to preserve our historic network.
• So this particular committee
• was created by board resolution.
• Their advisory,
• they currently have
• and
• There are currently
• eight
• there are eight appointed members of, the year.
term if we had haven't stated that we have terms. I mean, you know, it's it's up to you if you wanna make it a one year term. It's just it's
• This committee is pretty loose. Yeah. I I think you could very easily yeah. If you have eight people,
• I mean, you could do two year terms. Or if you wanted to if you wanted harder to have continuity if the term is only one year. It is. And and it's just it's it's a lot it's a lot more work for the staff when it's one year terms because,
• you know, when people are up for reappointment, we have to make sure that all their trainings are done and that they're, you know, responsive.
• At the at the same time, it's reappointment that gives us the ability to insist on training.
• Well, yes and no. But we also now have the guidelines.
Yeah. Did you just mean is it annual? It's only when you're reaffected? No. It's annual, but it but it makes it easier to get people to us. Yeah. So we should have made this resolution
to say that it's two year terms. Yeah. I don't I I have I don't even know if there is a resolution. I know it's what it says there, but I really don't know if there is one or not for that. But
• It goes back. If there is one, it goes back. Yeah. Well, yeah, we have to we have to look for that.
• But, yeah, you could if you wanted to, I don't know if,
• you know, eight is a good number. You could make it
• nine you could have to say the committee has nine members,
• and each would have three you know, there'd be a three year term so that three people get
• appointed each year.
• Mhmm.
• I mean, yeah.
Yeah. Okay. So Okay. So that's good. Yeah. I think we should create a resolution. Like, should we create a resolution? I wrote a DACA.
• CAC. So this one's a little bit easier because it was created by the code. Yes.
• It's also in New York state law that we have this committee. The yeah. The the code is based off of the state law. You're not required to have it. Okay.
• You're not required to have it, but when you have it, there are certain functions that go with it. Got it.
• CAC is
• seven, I believe.
• Oh,
• sorry.
• Is nine?
• Yes.
• It's like nine. You're right. It's nine. There's a there's a current vacancy,
• and they are two year terms.
• speak
• Yeah. I mean, I don't think more opportunities for people to Yeah. I think it's really it's really a decision for the board. Like, ethically speaking, I don't think it you know, there's not there's no issue there
• because it's like, it's not like an employee employer relationship.
But Yeah. I mean, I wasn't saying ethically. I was just saying in terms of trying to
• you know? And, again, all of these meetings are open to
• yes.
Contributions is I would say so. Yeah. And I did want to make that link back to the January.
• Do
we want to because I know this has come up in the past. Do we wanna talk about the future of
• this committee
• at this point?
• The way I've always thought of it is it finished when it gave its report, and, occasionally, the coaches are brought back to provide color
• commentary and or context to the report when the court has questions.
So we can I mean, we can put a resolution on next week just to sunset it? Yeah. That's fine.
• Oh, sure. Yeah. Absolutely.
• using it sort of as a charter. Well, I think you could just put a notice that said that the
committee was sunset on such and such date. Yeah. I mean, the page we could still leave the page. Yeah. But it will just be removed from the committee dropdown.
• And we'll put we can put the report on the general on the village documents
• portal.
So if it's not gonna live under the boards and and committees committees dropdown, dropdown, then then where where would would it? It? It
would just be if people searched like they were on our search page and they I mean, we don't list inactive committees don't get listed. Still have the archives.
• Yeah. I mean, that's
• somewhere.
No. That's what I'm saying. The report will live on the general village documents
• page. Yeah. That's that's my thing. That's Yeah.
• But if people if people by leaving the page active but not linked
• little is,
• a
• more
• I think it should have a freestanding little little
• not like it's going to be easily
• different than a totally
• I you know, this an unlinked two page.
I think it needs to be more than just searchable. I think it has to have a link from an existing page. Okay. If we could just this is a little Okay. Too
• So IDEA was created by resolution.
Yes. And they are they are one year terms. One year oh, one year terms for them. Yeah. I think I mean and this is something we could look at as well because when this committee was created,
• we set it up with one year terms because we really didn't know
• how it was going how long it was going to last. Right? It was it was a new venture. Yeah. So we set it up with one year terms.
• If we wanted to amend that resolution
• to give them more stability and and give them longer terms, I mean, we could
Yeah. And, I mean, again, this is one. We set this each one is was set up differently, which is always fun. We set this up as saying that it had should have no fewer than three residents. So we didn't give Oh. We didn't give an upper limit. We only gave a lower limit,
• and
• they get twelve month periods following.
You know? No. Fewer than three residents, so they could have seven nonresidents.
• three residents and
• you know?
• There's 10 members total. No. There's no women. We don't even know 30 members. 30 of them. Right. Yeah. So, you know, if you're going to if you're if you're wanting to
• if you're wanting to to lengthen their terms
• Okay. It would be a good idea, I think, to put Also create a number. You know, again, if we're if we're making we're making b p c nine members Yep. We should You know, do you wanna make them and then do, again, three year terms for them? Either nine or 11. Right? I mean, arts and humanities is 11. Should we make this one eleven too? Because it is a programming.
That was I mean, I was waiting to enough for you guys to talk about the student
• Yeah. Let's keep keep rolling. Alright. So we will update ideas. I'm sorry. So what do we wanna do for ideas? Do you wanna say
• nine or eleven?
Yeah. Yeah. Because, I mean, also Nine years ago. Just we were notified just today that apparently one of them has resigned.
• So
• Yeah. Yeah. So there it's not like
• you wouldn't be limiting.
• It wouldn't happen to be removing somebody because there is vacancy now Okay. On this committee. So And everyone's up for And everybody's up for appointment anyway. So Okay. Alright. So we'll do nine members at three years.
• Fire council is not is is sort of what it is. Yeah. That's that's That's right. The members are set in staple on that.
• On the boards of.
• Yes.
• Yeah.
• I mean, that's
• that's a discussion that we could have. You know, this
• the fire council kind of operated on their own, and then we had, you know, the
• the issues, right, the investigation that was done by the state. And then they kind of opened themselves up a little bit more public, which was appreciated.
• So, like, now we get their minutes, and we post their minutes on our on our website.
• But
• they don't have they don't have a committee page.
• So, I mean, we could
• I mean, if it's a committee, committee, it it seems seems like like it's It's a it's a hybrid. On that. It's you you wouldn't really. Right? That's the thing. It's I wouldn't be looking for it necessarily. But
• You know, it's a the fire so the board right? This board, the village board, serves as the board of fire commissioners
• because we don't have a separate established
• board of fire commissioners.
• So but because state law recognizes that the village board is busy with lots of other things than running a fire department. Right? It allows your
• some of your powers get devolved onto this
• fire council.
• So and then that's basically, each company
• in the fire department elects
• two
• wardens, right,
• to represent their company's interests at the fire council.
• So there are,
• what, 10?
• Is that right? Yeah. There's 10 wardens plus the chiefs. So there's 13 members
• total on the fire council.
• So there's your little lesson in. So is it a village? Well,
• it is in the sense that it
it performs village business, right? I mean, So then I think we should list it on the But it's also it's not a village committee. Well, at the
• getting too into the weeds, perhaps we have it as a link to the pay on the boards Boards and and committees page, but it just links to wherever
• the minutes are stored because,
• you know, we're not going to maintain kind of like a
• There is actually a fire council page on the fire department. Oh, so just link to that directory? Yeah.
• We could link to that page.
• Oh, look at that. So
• yeah. It it it that's why I was saying it's it's kind of a unique situation because it does perform some village business,
• but it's not like any of the others in that you don't actually appoint the people that serve
• you know, like, in the guidelines was asking the chairs to provide the minutes. Yes.
Are we gonna go back to that? Because that's We can. But I think that was pretty much decided. So
• starting
• in December. Yeah.
• do have some other comments on the guidelines. So Oh, okay. Well, let's keep this going.
• of
• the idea committee.
• It's
• a
• link off of the idea.
• Because it's not a separate committee. Right? It's a subcommittee. Subcommittee.
• Like the trails.
• I don't know. It's news and announcements. There was news and announcements for each section.
• They are just like the trials committee.
• a there's a page.
• their events get a I mean, they do a lot of events, so they appear on the idea community's page when they do it.
Oh, that okay. Maybe that maybe it's changed this. Like I was gonna say, I thought they had a page. Oh, yeah. Here's what they did. Pull down from the idea.
• Yeah. Well oh, you know what? The other thing, you know not on the boards and committees page. No. And you know what, Len? You actually just you refreshed my memory a little bit. So the Lorraine hand they they have their own
• website. Yes. Right? Like, they
• bought a domain.
• So, like, if you type in lhcoalition.org,
• it will bring you to that page. Yeah. I think the reason it's not
• you know, they they
Wait. But that's what you type in, and it points to a page on our website? Correct.
• it's I wouldn't say it's not uncommon.
• It's not without precedent. Sustainability had that for a while. I think they got
• tired of doing that. But, yeah, it points back to the village web page. It's because boards and committees are not supposed to maintain their own online
• presence, and they don't.
• think
• that there was some disagreement
• between
• the leadership of the coalition and the committee,
• and they didn't necessarily want to be linked together.
• To be educated,
I think. Yeah. All right. Well, that's a conversation that needs to happen. But there couple of different
• outcomes. One is by itself in reports and committees. Well, but they didn't have an
• enabling resolution. Right. Like, gave it.
And then, I mean, I don't think there's an appetite on the board to create them as a separate committee. I think they they want
• I think they need to stay as a subcommittee.
So Okay. But so how would somebody find them on the website? Like, in my head, if I knew that there was a Lorraine Kinsbury event and I wanted to go to the website and find it. I mean, I guess maybe I would just Google it, but it feels like it should Well, if there was an event, it would be on the calendar. Right? If
• And, you know, again, when they put out all their publicity, like, when they do their flyers or do their
• whatever it might be, you know, they refer people to the LH coalition
• Yeah. Link. Right? That's what they use. They
• appropriation.
• it would make sense to have it on the idea page, and we can talk to to them and and do that. But I think the vast majority of people
• are just going to Google and typing it. Like, if they're looking for Lorraine Hansberry,
• that's probably what they're doing.
• I don't think anybody I don't think people are really going to the website and, like,
• looking at our committee list and saying, you know, where is Lorraine Hansberry? Or even they do that, then they're just gonna go to Google and and
• Does kinda make sense. Yeah. You wouldn't wanna reappoint someone and then have to Right. But you only get a year. Yeah. So you don't have to kick anybody out right now. But if somebody's up this year,
Yeah. And, I mean, that's ultimately, it's a very small universe of people. Yeah. No. I'm just saying it's ultimately up to the mayor and the board. Right? Because the board will vote on the appointments.
• So
• memo around alternates
yet. We'll have that will be on the we have I have them. It will it's gonna be on the agenda for next week. Okay. So
• yeah.
• So this was
• created by board resolution.
Many members are on this committee? And do they have term limits? So it's a yeah. It's a three year term, and it's seven? Yeah. It's five to seven members. Right now
• There are five right now? Yeah. I was gonna say it looks like there's two vacancies.
• There's seven members tops.
we don't think that seems too long. Is it? No. That was we we set that. Oh, I thought police advisory, like, did that came from No. There was a tax recommendation?
Yeah. I mean, we were required. It was part of the it was part of the police reform
• plan. We had a task force as part of that plan, and then the committee kinda grew out of the the task force. But the
the terms and the membership was set by us. Okay. So I I would I would suggest that we go to make
• amendments of that to make it a two year term. Three years seems like
• too long
• for
• I mean, three years seems too long. Everything
Well, regardless of what both said, it sounds like people want it to be two year terms. Yeah. I mean, you want it to be I mean, I thought the idea I mean, that's I think we didn't want anything I thought we didn't want anything to be one year. We just didn't want to put two. Two. It's like the right amount. Okay.
• that's fine. It could be two.
• So, I mean,
• I mean,
• the VEB was also three year terms.
And RAC, which we haven't gotten to yet, that's Well, that's perfectly symbolic of the VEB's
• middle space between,
• you know, the other statutory committees and then pure classic
• committee. I
• having nine
• members,
• right, with three year terms, it's
• more
• evenly evenly spaced rather than having
• two year terms where yeah.
• So
• that's why that's why I thought we were doing nine members at three years apiece so that every That's not.
not gonna You lie. Said that because that's why I asked. Yeah. Exactly. I every you know, it's three it's three members every year. You know? And then
that's why I thought we had agreed on that. Okay. But the police advisory only has seven members. Mhmm. And so they, I guess, could be They could be two year terms.
• Yes. And the visual environment is five members,
• are three year terms.
Count them to the two. But if they're already three and the others are gonna be three, I don't really see the need to
• trim off a year. I mean, I think they're
I don't have strong feelings about it, but I also Well, would somebody why do we have maintenance doing it? Like, it does, you know, does somebody not work with it to three years? Is that why we have to do vacancies on that? There
• I don't wanna say I'm not asking for specific No. No. No. What I could say is it's not the case that that no. That there were some people that,
• you know, basically wind down their commitment, and we need to re notice and collect applicant.
• That's a pretty recent development.
So okay. So what do we wanna do with PAC? Do wanna just leave it the way it is?
• that's
• of more that's bit thing.
• A provisions for a rec commission.
• Mhmm. And I think this is kind of based loosely off of that, but it's not the same thing as a rec commission because that has certain
• powers that an RAC does not have. So that's what I mean. So it's kind of based loosely. Way it's on the spot.
• I'm just I'm just saying it's not so it's not exactly So we don't so we don't have a set number of members for that committee?
• Well, that's we we do. I think that's, like, the terms and the members seem to be based off of the state, like, the rec commission
• because we don't have anything
• like, we don't have any resolution that says that it should be seven members with three year terms. Okay. But the state law says that, the but state law refers to rec commissions,
not But this has been I mean, RAC's been around Yep. Twenty years. Oh, no. Think it's closer to, like using perhaps the catch word of the evening, maybe we should memorialize it with the resolution. Yeah. Agreed. And, I mean, we should send the draft to RAC.
• We don't have to change anything of as to what they how they operate. Right. We just I knew I was three
• created by board resolution.
Yeah. Again, I don't think that there really was one that did great one. Yeah. I mean, unless I don't know, I don't know if you remember. That word chartered.
• But,
• I mean, we could certainly ask the chair of this committee who would most likely who was there. Right? And he would remember.
• But,
• yeah, in my in my search, I did not find anything.
• created by Village Code.
• Yeah. That's also that's a.
• And that's again, those are
• all the positions on that committee are set by the code.
• So you need to have
• you have representation from the WCC, the planning board, and the board of trustees.
• So
• That's on which one? The Waterfront Advisory Committee.
• You finished the same?
• Yes. Yes.
• think that's our matrix.
• I reiterate support for having having an explicit provision for the
• limitation of one committee per person as, you know, January and or December, however you want to phrase it.
• On the board of education liaisons,
• I would just say that,
• you know, absent the explicit
• approval or agreement arrangement, something like that,
• that, you know, representatives from other
• entities,
• you know, participate as members of the general public would? I mean, I think that's basically been the theory in practice.
• What's that? I'm sorry. What's that? Oh, the guidelines.
• The Municipal Advisory Committee. Okay.
• So talking
• from the bullets from 2.1.
• Well, I was saying that, you know,
• let's call them representatives from other
• public institution.
• This is not exact phrasing, but the concept I'm trying to explain, it should be treated as
• members of the general public absent,
• you know, some existing agreement or authorization by the manager of board.
• Well, like, they had a formalized process for it, which is so
• that was why I
• And,
• you know, I don't think that, you know, we need to have it be hyper formalized where you're like an ambassador submitting your credentials. It's just
members of the public can attend. And Yeah. The language could be That's what you're saying. But that's not what it that's not what's happening right now. Right? There are certain committees that their board of education members
• are serving as board of education members,
• not as current presidents. I don't think like, that's an action that's being taken by the board of education. Yeah. That's my point. It's not like No. It's not. So the idea committee, for example, they, like, have a a member of the board of education
• invited to that committee. Right? They have a space for that person, and they're not on the list of people that are on the committee.
But at their reorganization meeting, they assigned a board member, the liaison to The board of ed did that.
• on our committee's
invitation. Oh, wow. That's I think that's it says that's not allowed. Right? But yeah. So That's cool. What I'm I am saying it that what I'm saying what I'm trying to clarify here is to say that that is the basis on what absent an agreement, you know, that's the basis on which they interact. So if people want to come and observe and report back
• and even provide their opinion on behalf of the school board, they're welcome. But it's not they're not a member of the committee,
absent some Well, in the school board's eyes, they are a member. They're calling them a Well, no. Guess they're Well, Well, no, because think about our own liaison roles here with
I mean, I think for trustee transparent when you look here. When you look, it's like, oh, I I see this. Well, I think I think for a good example would be the library. Right? So, like, the the mayor appoints yourself as the liaison to the library board, but I don't think if I went on the library's website, you're not listed as a Fair. Yeah.
• So I think that's probably it's something like that. Right? Like, the board can say, alright,
• board member. You're gonna go be our liaison to the idea committee. But it doesn't really it doesn't hold any standing
• in our
• view.
So the only two committees that we have liaisons from the board of ed are, like, Ed and the idea committee.
• we don't never found formal business. Yeah. I think I don't know if if that's all the board of ed has
• done.
• they
• may have committees that
• I'm not looking for anyone.
• But there we may have committee meeting. We may have they may have a committee that we it would make sense
• the periodic meeting.
Well, the students, I think we would just call them youth members, and I don't think that, you know, we should just have a provision for youth members, which I don't think of them as representing the student body in it
• per se.
• You know, they're not delegates
from the student government or anything like that. Right. No. They're not. But I but right at the moment, we don't have a formalized process for how it happens.
Opportunities on maybe we ask the chairs, do you are you interested in a student member if you are?
• this is a separate discussion, but I would propose just making them an intern to the committee rather than implying that they're you know, rather maybe even rather than calling them a youth member, just make them a committee intern. But but, like, the point would be to open up the opportunity. Yeah. Right now, it's happening because
knows there's an opportunity for their kid, whether it's on a committee they're involved in or not. So this would be a more No. I I think that makes sense. But I I think that the value of having it be an internship is that it,
• you know,
• the lives of students are very dynamic. They're a lot you know, like, four years
• four years ago, I was in the same spot. Four years ago for a student, it's a totally different life. You know what I mean? Anyway
• kids are looking to be involved, but they're also looking for some leadership roles to put on their college application. So it's going to serve both roles. I think I think if
you know? And this probably would be another discussion. But it would want the student members to look the process for a student member to look different than your process for a regular committee member. Right? You probably wouldn't want them to, like you know, they're not gonna have a voting role on the committee. They're not going to
• It shouldn't be held to the same attendance rules. Yeah. And also their their term, I think, because trustee and I talked about this a little bit. Right? You would think their term should match up with the school year. Right? So they should be appointed in September and run through June. Right. Right? So I think, I mean, I think Erica Fiorini was the one who reached out. So Yeah.
• Yeah. Think that was right. Yeah. So,
• Yeah. Because many of many of our committees
• would there there would be students interested in in participating.
• Yeah.
• And you guys started that conversation at the We did. Yeah. So and we said we were gonna have a discussion at a work session, and now we have. So
• busy. You're trying to update it. Let me
• I'll see if there's any sort of
• any other municipalities have kind of adopted something in regards to student
• excuse me, student members,
• and we can go from there.
• Consistent. There are some boards that elect their own chairs, and then there are some boards that are appointed by the mayor.
• electing, it's really
• is someone gonna be good enough to volunteer to do this? I mean, right? That's that's the struggle. Well,
I mean, chair is important, but the secretary is almost more important in some ways.
• think we should make it clear
• so so this neatly dovetails where with my my other addition for this, which was to say that the chairs and or yeah, the chairsco
• chairs should be the primary point of contact
• between the village administration and the committees because,
• obviously, it'll happen now and again where
• rank and file committee member reaches out, but we definitely have the too many cooks scenario has come up in the past where there's a project and multiple people are helping,
• and they're definitely trying to help, but at a certain point, it becomes
• people may end up working at cross purposes,
• and
• I don't need to belabor the point.
• But I think that we just add in as part of that, it is the chair's responsibility to ensure that, you know, minutes and other records of activity are transmitted to manager.
• However, they're able to do that either through, you know, a secretary or
• No. Exactly. But I think
Yeah. I mean, I guess you're right. It doesn't have to be but somebody should take the minutes. It doesn't have to be a second. Like,
the sustainability committee chair does the minutes and the agendas and all of that.
• Yeah.
• Probably would not have it in any other way.
• All
• right. So we will
• put this together.
• Now do you want to
• adopt this in advance of the organizational meeting? No. Think adopted at the I think we adopted at the organizational meeting. Okay.
• Speaking of the organizational meeting What a nice segue. Yeah. Yes. Our
• annual policies and rules of procedure.
• See. Which one do we start with first? Social media.
• Okay.
• Our social media policy,
• we made a small change in
• 2022,
• I believe,
• in regards to the community calendar. But other than that, it has stayed largely the same since it was originally adopted in 2019.
• Yeah. Okay. Sorry. I love when
• Microsoft Word does this because I had a Redline version, but then you upload it, and it doesn't upload the Redline version, which I didn't realize. So that's unfortunate. But
• I think I I think I remember what some of the changes were.
• Are you in a different view mode? I
• don't know. But this is
This is the is the We were all engaged to this. The fine. We got This is government
• at the granular level. So,
I mean, you know, it was very minor changes, you know, like changing the name of Twitter to X, right? And then
• the one main change was about the moderation of posts,
• which we've changed to now talk about public comments on social media accounts.
• And basically,
• the proposal here is that
• we no longer allow comments
• on our public
• accounts.
• You know, when So you shut them off or you delete them? Nope. We turn them we turn off the ability to comment.
• when the policy was first adopted right in 2019,
• the discussion was that that was what we wanted to do.
• The
• algorithm or whatever you want to call it at the time did not allow pages to turn off comments.
• Now pages have the ability to do that.
• And so,
• you know, just as
• this year has shown us, there, you know, our social media has
• a lot of activity. It has a lot of followers, which is great. It's a great way to get the message out, and that's its primary purpose, right, is to broadcast information to residents and visitors.
• But we can also be inundated
• with
• comments. And our general policy is that we don't respond to anything. And so, you know, people sometimes
• leave questions You don't respond to anything on social media. At all, regardless of what the topic We is, don't respond on social media. We want people to contact us through other channels.
You know I think a big part of that, just to provide some additional context going back to the original adoption, was that it was not the expectation that we would have the staffing to monitor our social media continuously.
• Right. And that if there was a real, you know, inquiry that people should reach out to the staff directly. Yeah. And I think that layered on top of that, I mean, this was already an issue back when this was first adopted. But
• I think it's only gotten worse with time,
• which is the level of conflict that can exist in the comment sections to pick one, you know, some unfortunate examples
• is,
• you know, with the flag updates.
• You know, we follow the US flag code,
• and
• the flag has been lowered at the direction of the president and governor, and people will have strong opinions about whether or not it should have been done for that individual,
• and they will have
• extensive
• extensive discussions. And that's just
this you're we are looking at this to adopt it to then make that change? Yes. Okay. Because right now, the comments are open. Correct. Because policy allows it. So this we're proposing that when we adopt the policy in December at the organizational meeting.
Right? Going forward. Correct. So then you're just right now, that is, like, pinned to the top of social media. But I I
• prominent in several cases. Yeah.
• You know, even with comments being turned off, and again, the whole point of turning them off is so that we can be consistent because Yeah. For all those reasons.
• But people can still
• comment in a grander sense because they can still share the post. The posts aren't locked. So if you see the, you know, if you have a very strong opinion about, you know, something that's happening, you can share the thing and then say, I can't I do not support this thing. Right? Because yeah. Yes. But it will be shared on your personal page, which is where it should be if you wanna have a conversation. It be shared to a community
• a group also. But it's being shared by the individual and not by the
• Thanks.
• Know? Because you don't always. Yes.
• But, I mean, if I had some you know,
• when our social media presence was smaller,
• I was able I when I was doing it back in the day, right, I was able to actually engage with people, and I could answer questions. Like, if you go back on our social media six or seven years ago, like, if somebody commented saying, you know,
• what day is my garbage being picked up? Right? I could have the I had the time to, like, respond to them and say, hi. Your garbage will be picked up on Tuesday. Right? You know? But we don't have the time to do that anymore. And,
• you know, especially when
• some of the comments are so, you know,
• vitriolic. Right? I mean, we don't wanna be in the situation where we're responding to some people and not responding to others. It's not a good use of staff time. Exactly. And there are other ways to get the answers other than Or and and like we were alluding to before, even if it's not a question, to the extent that the comment
• is that when you get the hot topic issue,
• right,
• when the algorithm realizes that this is a popular post, it just amplifies it. Right? And then we get more comments. Going back to what trustee was slipping about the point of social media. The point of social media
• audience for advertisements,
• and there that's why it elevates yeah. I I know you know. I know. But that, like but,
• you know, that doesn't encourage, like, quality
• content or engagement. But social
• media does exist, so we have to use it to communicate.
• And I think we just have to strike a balance.
As long as people, you know, we should manage the expectation of what the that there will be no responses as long as we hear about that, then it's fine. Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, you know,
if people can still message there's I don't think there's a way to turn off messages to the page. Right? So, like, if people really feel the need to
• send us something, right, through the private messenger function,
you know But what you could do is set up an automated reply to We have that. Right? So Yeah. We have we said it says something along the lines It's of not a reliable way to get an answer from the village. You don't want somebody to ask what is they might consider a pressing question and assume they're gonna get an answer. Yeah. No. I forget I forget what exactly it says. Well It says something like It may have been changed, but I actually have my correspondence with the page going back to when we first adopted the policy.
And I wrote, this is a test, and this is thank you for your message. Please note that this account is not monitored twenty four seven. If this is an emergency, please contact the police at 911.
• Otherwise, we will soon respond as soon as practical. It may have been updated. I think that's it may say that it probably says the same thing. You should probably have the general email. Yeah.
• Like, if people send us private messages asking questions,
• like, we can respond as time permits.
• But as long we can as long as it's clear that, again, it's not
• you know, it shouldn't be used for pressing
• questions.
• So
• okay. So
• that that was the that was the big change on social media.
• And then, again, probably
• my
• Okay.
• So
• for the board meetings,
• because the planning board is switching their dates again, we're I'm proposing that the board goes back to the first and third Wednesdays
• of the month.
• You'll you'll never know the difference. Yeah. I mean, we meet we meet on the third most of the time anyway. Right? So
• so and then we have work sessions on the fourth.
• Now
• something that I have suggested in the past, which I will suggest again to the board for consideration,
• is that if you wanted to
• move your work sessions to before your board meetings,
• I think that that would be
• a better use of everyone's time.
• I know the mayor does not agree with me. You mean on the same night? On the same night. We've had now that we've implemented the consent agenda and we have shortened our meetings,
• you know, I think if you had a work session from six to seven and you had a board meeting from seven to eight,
• you're you know, it's not that bad. And you would get one of your Wednesday nights back because you don't like being here twice
• a month.
• So
• I don't know. It's just a suggestion.
• You know? I I I thought it was good. A lot of other places do it that way where they have work sessions before their board meetings. So
I mean, this is obviously A modest proposal. We run it as an experiment in the summer. Yeah. That's nice. Say it again. I said the modest proposals, we use run it as an experiment in the summer.
Oh, that's a good idea. Yeah. What I've seen other places do is the the work session
• is for the following meeting. So you're always having a staggered meeting. So you're you're doing the work session for the meeting. It's gonna be overnight. And
that way, you've you're not putting the debate from that. Oh, yeah. No. You you you yeah. You should not do that. And sometimes work session agendas
Well, we knew this one was gonna be long. This we knew that we knew this was gonna be long. I'm not talking about any particular But
• I like the idea of trying that during the summer and reducing our load. Yeah. Well, and that's I've I I didn't put us to back up the the meeting schedule because we didn't know how the conversation was gonna go. But I am proposing in the summer
• that we only
• have
• one meeting in August.
• So it would just be there would be a special bill only meeting,
• and then we would just have a one board meeting, and we wouldn't have a work session. So, I mean, we could try it in
• August. We could try it in July too. Precedent to do this in in other municipalities?
A lot of a lot of places Yeah. Do it this way. Summer recess. I would just add that we would have to
• adopt
• an ironclad rule that we can't change that if we do it. Yeah. I
• There there's places every lots of places do it different ways. Right? You know? I I think the town of Portland has three work sessions and one board meeting a month.
• I the village of Tuckahoe just has one board meeting. That's it a month. Yep.
• I know Pleasantville does work session board meeting,
• and I think Barnett with Matter does the same thing. Right? Work session board meeting? Yep. Yeah. So, I mean, places do it differently. And then, you know, you have some places that do them separate like we do. Yep. I think so. Yeah. If on that model, just going with, you know, the first the first Wednesday in August as the meeting and
• know that,
• you know, we're not meeting again until until right after Labor Day or right before the family.
• the past two years, we have
• reduced our meeting schedule in the summer, and it hasn't
• I don't think it's really had a negative effect on anything. So I
think, you know, rather than having to change the schedule midyear, we might as well just plan for that. Yeah. And I think when I say families, I think it's good for the entire families and the entire community. Many of whom,
• you know, business before the board here are interested to know that that Yeah. They won't miss anything. And that's protected time. Yeah. Yes.
• In the quorum section,
• I just added a sentence saying board members that anticipate being absent from a meeting should notify the village manager as soon as practical
• just so that
• we can plan.
• You know? It's it's just basically making sure that we have a quorum. Right? So
• trustee Nicholson would like to be here all night long.
• So, I mean, listen,
• the technology is installed.
• We have the Zoom camera. Right? It's the black camera in the back of the room.
• The first
• of two shipments came today for the new cameras for the TV station. Yeah.
• So, hopefully, by the end of the year, all the new technology will be installed in here,
• and our
• problems will abate themselves. Yeah. Wait. So does that mean
• We
• we have it, though. We have that. We have the video conference.
Yeah. So the channel I mean, the times we've done it, right, over the past, you know, when people have been sick or needed to we've needed to met notice that we were going on Zoom.
• We've had a handful more viewers
• than,
• you know,
than are in in the audience here. Yeah. I mean, it gives it gives people It gives people an opportunity. An an opportunity. Opportunity. Now the flip side of that is that
• the technology can be unreliable. Yeah. Right? And so if people are,
• you know, trying to and, I mean, that that's not just Zoom. That can be the TV also. Right? So if people are watching at home and then something happens,
• you know,
• that's they miss their opportunity to comment. Right? So
• if they really want to comment, the best thing is to actually come Actually be here. Or submit it in writing. I
am you know, I really do see it as an emergency measure or a contingency measure. I think it is very, very suboptimal,
• not least of which is because of our own capacity and staffing issues. I think that, you know, you can't rely on them. It is
• you know, it's not something for the manager to administer. You have to have someone to administer it. Well, I think that suggesting they would all be on work? Yeah.
I mean, my the other thing is when we had an assistant village manager who was able to attend meetings,
• she was able to run those meetings. Right? And I think that it is a bit of a loss
• in our process that there's not someone here dealing with the technical
• side, and you're deal needing to deal with that. So I don't know if we can make that happen with your staffing. But, I mean, I do think that you shouldn't be managing tech.
• I would love to hand all my tech off. Right. I mean, I I I don't think that that what we've been living through for the past few months has not been great either. Like, when Emily was here, it was it was really helpful that she was able to manage
• any tech issues that would come up, and I hope it wasn't you.
• But I think from a transparency
• perspective,
• you know, be people being able to comment on a Zoom, people being able to
• you know,
• we also are we also have issues with,
• as my mother will attest to, the challenge with the the cable station. Right? So we can only do the livestream,
• and people can't watch us on cable anymore. And that's Oh, we're back we're back now on here. Are we back on now? Okay. Yes. Yeah. Great. But if we were Zoom, we would be able to be on Facebook as well.
Well, we had the Facebook conversation, and I think the decision was not to streamline it to Facebook.
• Yes. And we have that conversation about six months from here.
• that
• we
• get the new tech installed and see how it
• functions,
• right? And then maybe we could
• is
• have to worry about, you know, the sound suddenly cutting out or, you know, the cameras just deciding not to work one night. Right? Right.
• Then that alleviates a lot of the concerns, at least on my end. You know, obviously, if the board members have their own philosophical
• concerns, that's different. But mine are technical.
Yeah. Yeah. Alright. And, you know, the standard is just real. When I when I just participated in the county legislature
• a few weeks ago,
• you know, it's
• you register
• I registered
Alright. Well, I think it does make sense to wait for the new tech to deploy, and then we can revisit.
Well, I'm saying I I'm saying in the rules of procedure, I didn't have any other
• changes. So,
• I mean, I don't know if if people wanted to
• if there was anything else you wanted to discuss in here.
• You know, I think this doesn't necessarily require a change in the
• rules of procedure, but I have spoken with some of you,
• maybe not all of you, but I have spoken with some of you about
• having a resolution
• that will memorialize
• the action that we're taking correspondence.
• So
• that way there's there's no confusion as to
• right? Like, we get if we get a letter requesting us to do something. Right? We have authorized
Yeah. Or or it could just say we've received you know, be it resolved then Can you explain what you're talking about? Because I don't think you and I spoke about it. Sure. So on the on the we we've moved correspondence into the consent agenda now. So when you make the motion to approve the agenda or to approve the items on the consent agenda, it could be construed as you approving of everything that's on the correspondence section,
• and that's not necessarily the case. Sometimes items on correspondence are just being filed for the record. Right? You're not agreeing to take the action Okay. That's being requested. So that's what it would say. Like, the it would just be a sorry. It would just be a a one line resolution, you know, be it resolved
• you know, now be it resolved that the board of trustees takes the following actions on correspondence that, you know, letter from the Arts and Humanities Council is filed for the record. Letter from the Little League asking to hold their parade is approved. Right? You know? And then we just spell it out in resolution. So
it's just it's just for for clarity purposes and and so that people will understand what is considered correspondence.
Right? Sort of gets Well, that's a whole other whole other thing. Right? Yeah. It's like, what do we what do we you you get a lot of correspondence. It's really up to your
• discretion
• as to what goes in onto the board agendas.
• and that's a that was a great topic to bring up because I would like to hear from the board. You know, we I do. I get a lot of
• emails. Right? And, I mean, you could look back in old minutes and, you know,
• when
• Rick Herbeck was manager. Right? I think he must have put every letter that he received. But it's a lot harder in the day for people, right, to send letters than now people can just, you know, copy and paste an email and and click send. Right? You know? Whereas people had to actually take some effort to mail a letter. Mhmm. So, I mean, I don't think we necessarily wanna put every single email
• that we get addressed
• to the board on the on correspondence.
• sort of answered my question. Right? Because then you're making a judgment call about what substance is given up. I know. I'm doing that now. Right? So Right. But I mean Yeah. So I don't know Well, under the rules of procedure, the mayor and the manager make the agenda. And I think that
I I think it's has to be qualitative, and then it has to be a judgment end of day.
• do
• that's not
Just something just something to find out about those letters if you don't put it on.
• Like, whatever road issues you're talking about, how would how would we know that you've got letters about a road issue?
Well, I guess it's, you know, it's that was probably a poor example because some most of those are yeah.
• Well, I don't know. A lot of them were addressed to me directly, so it wasn't technically correspondence to the board.
• So
Think that I think that's an excellent point, trustee slip, and I think the manager's report is what a way to address some of these other correspondents that maybe doesn't
rise to the. The only issue with that is your report comes at the end. So if you bring something up at the end that we didn't know about, I mean, of course, we can respond to it, but it sort of is
• creating a
I mean, we also we've talked about adjusting the order of business on the agenda also. Know, I mean, is it beneficial to move the reports to the beginning of the meeting when people are actually here
• versus doing them at the very end? We would trust the report. Yeah.
• And my report, right? So, you know.
I mean, I think if your report is going to start to contain more substantive things such as a summary of the correspondence that you were seeing,
• then it could be helpful to us to know that upfront,
• which is different than us, you know, wherever our reports consist of the truth. Right? Well,
yes, I think I I think that the trustee report should remain at the end. I am open to the concept of moving the manager's reports earlier in the meeting.
• Manager,
• mean
• We don't have to make a decision tonight. Let's just leave that idea out there and I don't I listen. I don't particularly
us to hear it and and for also for the community to hear it. Yeah. You know, especially if somebody reached out to you and you're acknowledging it at the meeting event. It might it might be good to it. That's gonna be a little more gratifying. It might be good to put it right after public comment. That's what I was gonna say. Yeah. Because then, you know, if mister Riley asks me a question in public comment, I can address it right then. Yeah. Mean, they were to talk about this because I don't want that stuff to get married.
• Yep.
• Okay. So, I mean, we can make that change. Wanna make that change? I mean, I I don't think it's true.
• Okay. Give it a try. Yeah. Exactly. If it doesn't if it doesn't work, we can always change it back.
• Anything else?