Minutes of the Regular Meeting of the Greater Barre Services Study Committee
Date: December 13, 2001; 6:30 p.m.
Place: Aldrich Library Community Meeting Room
Present: Barry Driscoll, Dawna Attig, Alex McHenry, Doug Farnham, Gordon Booth, Wayne Pelkey, Charles Fantoni, Chip Castle, Joan Carrigan, Dan Bellavance, Martin Provost, Alex Brodeur, Carl Rogers, Larry Johnson, Glenda Nye, David Delcore
The meeting was called to order at 6:35pm by Barry Driscoll, Chairman. At this time, we have no quorum. Barry opened the meeting with the agenda:
Since there was no quorum at the start, we began with Agenda item #2:
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.
Administrative. (Dawna Attig, Bill Chase, Glenda Nye)
Dawna reports: There is no report.
Police. ( Alex McHenry, Larry Johnson, Mark Reeves)
Alex reports: His committee met with both Police Chiefs. Many good suggestions were made, (e.g. sharing shifts). City has one of Juvenile, Narcotics and White Collar crime officers, but the Town does not. City and Town are now looking for a new firing range. They are working on a joint place. The two departments seem to work well together. A problem with merging could be the unions. They have different unions.
They do share housing facilities. Barre Town has a temporary holding facility. Barre City has an official holding facility. What about Retirement System? They did not get into that. Is there a follow-up planned? Alex would like one. Wants to ask Whipple if he wants to go on record with merging. What does he think would be the benefits, e.g. cost savings? Or, would it shift costs?
Fire/Rescue/Ambulance. (Mark Bernier, Dan Bellavance, Deb Sartelle)
Only just set up a meeting with the Barre City Fire Chief. He is very open to meeting. They will try to get together over the next ten days. Hope to meet at least a couple of times before the next meeting.
Water/Sewer. (Charles Fantoni, Guy Isabelle, Mary Welch)
Charles Fantoni reports: Went to the Water Treatment plant at Barre City. Mostly how Operation and how sewer works. Any other meetings planned? They are to meet with personnel next, regarding financial issues. They want to make sure that they do not have any other questions on Operations by the other Team members.
Consolidation could be on the engineering services. That could be a recommendation.
Parks/Recreation/Cemeteries/Special Services. (Joan Corrigan, Deb Martin, Gordon Booth)
Joan Corrigan reports: They interviewed the directors from both, the City and the Town. Both lack volunteers. Barre Town uses BOR & Pool. We each have our own parks. Thinks that prison inmates could do grounds work instead of Union. Both communities need a Grant Writer. Both would like a joint pool (indoor)/Civic Center. Both directors are on the same wavelength. Both are receptive to Barre City taking over for Barre Town. Barre Town indicated that it would be very little work to merge. Need to do something to keep kids off the street. The kids would not even know the difference if they were merged. If they could have a wish list, they would work together to get a Civic Center.
Nothing to share on cemetaries. Town has four cemetaries. When a keeper retires do we have to hire someone new or just consolidate? There is no room to eliminate and not enough people to volunteer.
Special Services does leaf pick up and Christmas Tree pick up. There is a need for the service. Town has nice place on Holden Road for clean fill, but the City has none.
Highway. (Paul Simonetta, Wayne Pelkey, Barry Driscoll)
Barry Driscoll reports: Meeting with Paul Simonetta. Both met with Harry Abare and Reggie. Have plans to meet with Steve Blonden and Pete. Informally, there is a good relationship between the City and Town. Reg said moving to a lot more reconstruction. Town has paving packages. City and Town jointly bidding. Both try to piggyback onto State Contract.
Discussed City garage. City does what it needs to get it out of flood plane. City set up like a traditional public works department, but Town is different. There appears to be a timing issue on sharing plans for summer projects.
One idea was to get an intern to share. Possibly get a joint capital budget for highways. City does not have an equipment fund. Does have a fund for equipment rotation.
Some of the purchasing is different, e.g. Town buys in bulk and City buys as needed. And, the State does not make it easy to use their contracts.
3. Discussion about logistics RE: staff testimony
When do sub-committees want to give report and have City and Town Officials come in? For example, could a sub-committee be ready by February. Have a comparative report ready to go out with minutes.
Tentative dates would be:
Admin – not ready before March
Police – February
Fire/Rescue – April
Sewer/Water – May
Parks/recreation/cemeteries/special services – January
Highways – June
4. Other Business
No other Business.
5. Round the Table
There were various comments. As there is a quorum now, Dawna pointed out that the 11/08/01 minutes were not accepted yet.
1. Acceptance of Minutes
Finally, Agenda item #1. Move to accept the Minutes. Have a motion and a second with no further discussion. Approval with all ayes.
4 The minutes of 11/08/01 were accepted.
6. Adjournment
Next meeting is January 10, 2002.
Motion to adjourn and seconded and no further discussion.
4 Meeting adjourned at 7:50pm.