Meeting Minutes
Town of LeicesterSelectboard Meeting Minutes Monday, August 20, 2012*Unapproved*** See subsequent minutes for any changes Members Present: Diane Benware, Ken Young, Tom Barker, Ron Fiske, Brad Lawes Others Present: Arlan Pidgeon, Julie Delphia, Kate Briggs, Sandra Trombley, Secretary Call to Order: Meeting called to order at 6:30 p.m. by Chair, followed by the Pledge of Allegiance. Review of Agenda: Agenda reviewed. Approval of August 6, 2012 Minutes: Motion by Tom to accept the minutes of August 6, 2012 as written. Second by Brad. All in favor. So approved. Review/Authorization to pay bills: Bills making their rounds for signatures. Reports from Town Officials, Committees: Zoning Administrator: Kate reported the deadline for the next round of Municipal Planning Grants is September 28th. We know we need to update our zoning regulations and things in our Town Plan that will require things to be put in and definitions. There are various levels of funding. Anything over $8,000 has to be matched by the town. Kate reported that they would like to just go for the $8,000 and we would write our own grant application and some portion of the funds be used for technical review by an attorney of the changes we made. We are not going to totally redo our regs, but fix the things we think are not clear and add a few things that need to be added. We probably have various alternatives on the technical review of this. For Adam Lougee at Regional Planning to do it, it would be $90 per hour. Kate will also call VLCT. She wants to see what they would charge. Jim Barlow, Senior Staff Attorney would be good, as well. Kate asked for the Board’s permission to go forward. Kate plans to have a draft of the grant for the Planning Commission meeting on September 12th. Diane asked what the costs will be. Julie stated that they will need to print lots of them because we give a lot out, where the Town Plan, we don’t. So, there will be printing costs. Kate is not sure how many technical review hours will be needed. Kate is donating her time. Ron is donating his time. Julie will donate “some” time, but cannot commit to donating the amount of time that she did for the Town Plan. No one thinks that there will be anywhere near as much time involved as the Town Plan or the complexity. Mainly, text. Julie recommended a six month time period for grants in the future. The Board approved Kate applying for the Municipal Planning Grant for $8,000. Kate gave some information on the property north of the store. There have been complaints. Kate has had complaints about the fill that has been brought in. There is nothing in our zoning regulations that says you can’t be doing this. The store is a commercial operation. They insist that what they are doing is a home-based occupation. Kate doesn’t know what it is that they are doing. That is one of the things that needs to be addressed in the zoning regs. A home-based occupation if very narrowly defined as something that only takes 1/3 of living space, done by somebody who lives there and customarily is done in residential neighborhoods. None of the stuff is really under home-based. It is outside of home-based occupation, it’s more than that. It’s hard to target one if we don’t target all. Junk is not addressed in zoning and we have an ordinance we don’t have a mechanism to enforce. Noise is also not covered in zoning. Kate reported that the ZBA upheld her denial of Jeff Smith’s application to build the boat house. Chris Bray: Chris introduced himself. He lives in New Haven. He served four sessions in the Vermont House representing New Haven to Bridport. He is running for the Addison County Senate seat. He wanted to introduce himself to each Selectboard as a gesture of respect and to get to know the people. He handed out a bio to the Board. Julie asked about the changes in the laws about confidentiality of tax credits. Chris did not have enough information. Julie and Chris discussed the change in the law and information outside the meeting. Town Foreman: Arlan reported they cut the brush on the north side of the bridge, graded the Shackett Road, worked down at the cemetery on the north side. Arlan thinks there is more that could be done at the cemetery to level out, cut off any roots and smooth out to plant grass. Ken will donate the mulch. D&F will be paving tomorrow, August 21st. Tom Roberts reported we will get $99,146.40 for the grant to put toward the paving project. The total for the grant is $123,933. Tom feels comfortable for us to proceed. We will be paving just what the grant was written for. Gary will invoice us and wait to be paid. Town Clerk/Treasurer: Board agreed to pay the Moderator $75 for the joint Salisbury/Leicester Meeting. Salisbury paid their half, $37.50. Julie reported that delinquent taxes are at $48,261. Money has been coming in. Julie asked about the vendor permit for the hot dog stand. There are state requirements for this. Julie has all the information for the right of way letter. It is not going out with tax bills. Lister: Jim couldn’t come tonight. Julie reported that NEMRIC needs to do their proposal. Health Officer: None Animal Control Officer: None Cemetery Committee: None NEW BUSINESS: Setting Tax Rate: See Later Julie had a request from a 9th grader to shoot a film at the old school house. Tom thought we needed more information from the young lady and to ask her to come and meet with the Board. Motion by Tom to authorize Treasurer to pay bills as written. Second by Ken. All in favor. So approved. Tom reported that he replaced the lock at the Recycle Center. Tom would like keys. He also replaced the snaps for the recycling sign. OLD BUSINESS: Draft Drug Disciplinary Policy: Draft Drug and Alcohol Policy: Julie has copies of other town policies; Cornwall, Johnson, Williston, Brandon and Proctor. Policies tabled for tonight and they will have a special meeting on September 10th just to work on these policies. Julie will have a draft prepared for review. Town Shed: Calvin Loven has 7 acres of land on Maple Run Road for sale. Ken will contact Calvin to let him know the Town is not interested. Gerry Cummings is firm on no sub-division and asking $250,000. Diane will call and say “no thank you” unless it is subdivided. Motion by Tom to authorize Chair to contact Cummings and state that the Town would help informally on subdivision paperwork. Second by Ron. All in favor. So approved. Roadside Mowing: Ken met with Lem about the roadside mowing. Lem was trying to get started early to try to get the poison parsnip before going to seed. There is one more day to finish. The Board said ok to do. Lem knows we are not doing a third cut. Next year we need to be more specific. Motion by Ron to go into Executive Session at 8:15 p.m. to discuss personnel and legal matter. Second by Ken. All in favor. So approved. Motion by Tom to come out of Executive Session at 8:52 p.m. Second by Brad. Passed unanimously. Motion by Ron to authorize Lister James Russo to represent the Town at the hearing with PVR on Thursday, August 30, 2012. Passed unanimously. Setting the Tax Rate:Town needs to raise $179,536 in taxes, highway costs are $201,721 plus $20,000 for paving, Veteran's Exemptions of $2,133.Motion by Tom to set the homestead tax rate at $1.5473, non-residential rate at $1.5735. Second by Brad. Passed unanimously.Motion by Tom to adjourn at 9:13 p.m. Second by Ron. Passed unanimously. NEXT MEETING TUESDAY, SEPT 4, 2012 due to Monday Labor Day holiday. Respectfully submitted, Sandra L. Trombley, Secretary