Minutes of the Regular Meeting of the Greater Barre Services Study Committee
Date: November 8, 2001; 6:30 p.m.
Place: Aldrich Library Community Meeting Room
Present: Richard Fitzgerald, Bill Chase, Mark Reaves, Carl Rogers, Alex McHenry, Barry Driscoll, Dawna Attig,
Deb Martin, Mary Welch, Deb Sartelle, Charles Fantoni
The meeting was called to order at 6:30pm by Barry Driscoll, Chairman. At this time, we have no quorum. There were a few changes to the minutes: Paul Simonetta was left off the attendance list and the third sentence, of the third paragraph, of the third section, was changed to, "Our focus is not whether two departments would benefit by additional cooperation." The corrections were noted.
Richard was to bring in the mission of the committee but was not able to; however, Dawna had found a copy of the ballot question.
Bill Chase arrived at 6:45 pm and we now had a quorum.
Barry opened the meeting with the agenda:
1. Acceptance of Minutes
The first item on the Agenda is the acceptance of the minutes from October 11th meeting with a few corrections. Move to accept the revisions. Have a motion and a second with no further discussion. Approval with all ayes.
4The minutes of 10/11/01 were accepted.
2. Reports from the subcommittees: Administrative, Public Safety, Sewer/Water, Parks/Playgrounds, Cemeteries, and Highways
Going around the table is terms of the various sub-committees and what progress they have made. Barry had
accidentally consolidated Police and Fire/Rescue into Public Safety, when in fact we had actually split them out
into separate committees. Use what is in the 10/11/01 minutes.
Administrative. (Dawna Attig, Bill Chase, Glenda Nye)
Dawna reports: At this time Bill and Dawna had met with Richard and Carl each once. The main objective to
the meetings were to question both men on areas where there is no cooperation, but could better be served if
there was and secondly on areas where the two have cooperation but could work better than they currently do.
There is some agreement in some areas such as:
Upcoming Bill, Dawna and Glenda need to interview department heads. A couple of our questions had to defer to Department Heads that currently work together, such as:
Barry Driscoll wanted to know if these positions are currently existing. Both the City and Town have people performing some of these tasks, but either as a part-time employee or as collateral duty. However, neither has ;a Grant Officer or Data Processing/IT person.
Discussion about performance measurement was saved for Department heads. When this subcommittee gets to
department heads, the immediate goal will be to get an overview of what they felt was working currently and what could be a cooperative effort that isn’t now.
Police. ( Alex McHenry, Larry Johnson, Mark Reeves)
No meeting at this time.
Fire Rescue. (Mark Bernier, Dan Bellavance, Deb Sartelle)
Pulling together the meeting.
Water/Sewer. (Charles Fantoni, Guy Isabelle, Mary Welch)
Did a windshield tour of various water system locations. There are seven water systems. There were several studies done on consolidation, but were shot down on each occasion by the voters. Dealing with all different people and all their different ideas on how to run the water systems and maintain their own independence.
Carl gave more info Thygsson and Birch(?) are private and isolated. The others are truly fire districts. Websterville and Graniteville want to remain independent. BarreTown and East Barre will be connected. BarreTown cooperates with Graniteville. Further discussion on fire, sewer and water runoff.
Parks/Recreation/Cemeteries/Special Services. (Joan Corrigan, Deb Martin, Gordon Booth)
Cannot find Gordon Booth and Joan had a prior commitment. Have not set up anything yet.
Highway. (Paul Simonetta, Wayne Pelkey, Barry Driscoll)
Wayne in Florida. Paul and Barry have played Telephone tag. They have tried to meet with Reggie from the City. Week after next hope to have a meeting set.
3. Other Business
No other Business.
4. Round the Table
Deb Sartelle-Trying to get going.
Mary Welch-amazed at how much Charlie knows about water.
Dawna-glad we are as far along as we are.
Barry-wanted to be further.
Carl-There’s a slow down so might be a good time now to do interviews.
Next meeting is December 13.
Motion to adjourn and seconded. Meeting adjourned at 7:50pm.