[0:02] Okay, we need to exit from non-public.

[0:06] So moved second. Lemme pull up the,

[0:15] we need to seal the, I'll make the mo motion.

[0:18] Motion made to seal the minutes of by.

[0:21] Oh, just do it separate. Yeah.

[0:24] Sorry about that everyone. Motion to be even done.

[0:27] Public made by Councilor. Foot

[0:30] Second.

[0:31] Second one by Councilor Mills has to be Roll call vote.

[0:34] Councilor Mills. Yes. Councilor Healy. Yes.

[0:37] Councilor Spencer,

[0:38] are you line Councilor Chase?

[0:43] Yes. Councilor Flood? Yes. Councilor Foot?

[0:48] Yes. Motion passes or vice chair votes? Yes.

[0:53] Motion passes. Six zero.

[0:56] I make a motion to seal the minutes indefinitely

[0:59] because it's determined that divulge

[1:01] of this information would likely

[1:04] adversely affect the reputation

[1:05] of any person other than a member of this board.

[1:08] Second. Seconded by Councilor Foote. Any discussion?

[1:13] All those in favor. Councilor Mills?

[1:15] Aye. Councilor Healy? Yes. Councilor Chase? Yes.

[1:20] Councilor Flood? Yes. Councilor Foot? Yes. Vice Chair votes?

[1:24] Yes. And is Councilwoman Spencer on line?

[1:29] I am. I'm here now and vote yes.

[1:31] Thank you. Motion passes.

[1:33] 6 0 7 0 7 0.

[1:38] Sorry about that. I'm new at this.

[1:42] Alright, now we've done the basic housekeeping.

[1:44] Welcome to tonight's town Council meeting

[1:48] and I'll call the role Councilor Chase.

[1:52] Good evening, councilor Flood. Good evening, councilor Foot.

[1:56] Good evening, Councilor Mills.

[1:58] Good evening, councilor Healy.

[2:00] Good evening, councilor Chair Spencer.

[2:05] Good evening. Vice Chair.

[2:07] Says hello Councilor Chase,

[2:10] if you could lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance.

[2:15] I pledge allegiance To the flag

[2:17] of the United States of America

[2:19] and to the Republic for which stands, one Nation under God,

[2:23] indivisible, with Liberty Justice for all.

[2:27] I forgot to point out that we have

[2:32] the exit to the rear of the building.

[2:33] There is also an a ED if needed at the back of the room.

[2:36] Hopefully none of those are needed.

[2:38] There is also an emergency exit over here.

[2:44] Do I have a motion to open the public forum? So

[2:47] Moved. Second. That.

[2:49] Moved by Councilor Foot. Seconded by Councilor Mills.

[2:53] All roll call will be Councilor Mills. Yes.

[2:56] Councillor Healy. Yes. Councilor Chase? Yes.

[3:01] Councilor Fled. Yes. Councilor Foot? Yes.

[3:06] Chairperson Spencer?

[3:10] Yes. Vice Chair Votes? Yes.

[3:13] Public hearing is now open. Seven zero

[3:36] David, there we go.

[3:38] Is that mic on? There we go.

[3:40] David Procher 26 Milt Moore Road.

[3:44] Last Tuesday was the primary, as I'm sure you're all aware

[3:49] and we had someone out in the parking lot

[3:52] handing out pamphlets.

[3:55] I was previously under the assumption that

[3:57] that was against the rules

[4:00] and we got a lot of complaints from a lot of people.

[4:05] I was standing, you know, where candidates and

[4:08] and supporters are supposed to stand as defined by the

[4:12] the town moderator.

[4:14] And even just there walking by, I had a lot

[4:17] of people complaining about getting

[4:19] handed pamphlets in the parking lot.

[4:21] And I don't want to start an arms race where everyone thinks

[4:24] that they have to be out in the parking lot

[4:26] and by the designated zone.

[4:29] And we end up with, you know, a pinger

[4:33] and parking lot completely covered in unnecessary pamphlets

[4:36] that are just littering everything.

[4:39] So if you guys would please look into that

[4:42] and see what can be done

[4:43] before November, that would be great.

[4:46] Have a nice day.

[4:48] Thank you.

[4:58] Hello. How you guys doing? And I'm Charlie Buzzell.

[5:03] I live on number eight Eastgate Road

[5:06] and I just wanna let you guys know

[5:11] September 20th, they're gonna honor my grandmother

[5:16] and put up a Trio Central Station at 2:00 PM

[5:21] I just wanna let you guys know. Thank you.

[5:24] And that's Hattie Durgan, correct? Huh?

[5:26] That's Hattie Durgan, yep. Okay.

[5:29] Yep. Thank you.

[5:37] Anybody else coming up to speak?

[5:46] I,

[5:56] Craig

[5:56] Cunningham Hunter Drive.

[5:58] So last week the Town Council was asked

[6:01] to make a school district department

[6:03] to make the school district a department of the town by way

[6:06] of a charter amendment.

[6:08] In 2015, the Town Council disregarded provisions in the town

[6:13] charter after unilateral really deciding

[6:16] to defund the police department, public works,

[6:18] the fire department, other municipal functions.

[6:21] Members of the community were forced to raise money to go

[6:24] to court, to force the town council

[6:27] to uphold the provisions in the charter.

[6:29] The town council used tax dollars to defend themselves.

[6:34] When they lost, they appealed

[6:36] and we had to raise funds once again.

[6:38] For that reason, I would never agree to having the

[6:42] town take over the school department In 2018,

[6:47] representative Trip

[6:48] and then Representative Ello attempted

[6:51] to get an emergency amendment attached

[6:53] to a Senate energy bill

[6:55] that upon passage would've incorporated the school

[6:58] department into the municipal government.

[7:01] When a large contingent

[7:02] of concerned citizens voiced opposition at a Senate hearing,

[7:05] the Senate president realized

[7:07] that these two were pulling shenanigans

[7:09] and immediately withdrew the amendment.

[7:13] Last week, Mrs. Leon cited increased efficiency

[7:17] as the driver behind the proposed charter amendment.

[7:20] She failed to cite any savings, projections

[7:22] or costs associated with the implementation representative,

[7:27] love Representative Trip

[7:28] and Mr. Church cited high costs in the need

[7:32] for a tax cap last winter.

[7:35] Any one of these people could have easily put a tax cap

[7:38] warrant article on the school ballot

[7:40] by following a remarkably uncomplicated process.

[7:44] It's outlined in chapter 32, section five.

[7:48] They failed to follow the process.

[7:51] There's another uncomplicated process in RSA Section 49 B

[7:56] that citizens can follow by working with the town clerk

[8:00] to put a charter amendment on the march ballot.

[8:02] So far they failed to initiate that process.

[8:06] There's also a straightforward process that

[8:09] with a hundred signatures they could have come to you

[8:12] to request a feasibility study be completed

[8:15] on bringing the school department in under the town charter.

[8:19] Apparently they failed to consider that process.

[8:21] They're requesting drastic changes from our town government.

[8:26] They haven't provided a financial analysis.

[8:28] There's been no legal or regulatory analysis.

[8:31] They haven't proposed any language. This is ludicrous.

[8:38] Anyone using even a little bit

[8:39] of critical thinking would question whether this is sincere

[8:42] effort or if this is simply a scheme

[8:45] to circumvent the three-fifths requirement in the statute

[8:48] to enact the school tax cap.

[8:50] This might just be another flavor of shenanigans.

[8:56] I've analyzed more than 15 years of school funding data.

[8:59] My analysis has provided me we I need to stop.

[9:04] Yes. Is there a motion to extend? Motion to extend.

[9:08] I'll second. Second. By Councilor Healy.

[9:10] Roll call vote is required. Councilor Mills? Yes.

[9:14] Councilor Huey. Yes. Councilor Chase? Yes. Councilor Flood.

[9:19] Yes. Councilor Foot? Yes. Councilor Spencer.

[9:25] Sorry for all the roll call votes. Yes.

[9:28] Chair votes. Yes. I've analyzed more than 15 years

[9:32] of school funding data.

[9:34] My analysis has

[9:35] provided me with objective data to demonstrate

[9:38] that the state reps in this town have harmed property

[9:41] taxpayers by millions of dollars through their votes.

[9:44] It might be possible to improve the accountability

[9:47] of our state reps if they were assigned

[9:49] to smaller districts.

[9:51] There's a process in RSA chapter 6 62 A for citizens

[9:55] to petition the town council

[9:57] to form a redistricting commission

[9:59] and then form legislative districts within the community.

[10:03] I'm following that process.

[10:04] I'm not seeking your approval or your assistance.

[10:08] I hope that you'll ask others who want

[10:10] to initiate changes in our town government

[10:12] to do the same. Thank you.

[10:15] Thank you.

[10:31] Good evening. Brian Ello six Rollin Street.

[10:35] My understanding is the council will be talking with

[10:40] Services, Talking with the school district

[10:46] about HB 1331.

[10:48] And let's be clear, HB 1331.

[10:52] No one's asking this town council

[10:53] to make a decision whether you feel

[10:55] that the schools should go underneath the town.

[10:58] The premise of the bill is to let the people

[11:03] of Derry make the decision.

[11:07] I don't care if you vote yes or no, I really don't.

[11:10] But to deny the people the right to have a say is wrong.

[11:15] And I'm glad Mr. Cunningham brought up 2015

[11:17] because I led that charge.

[11:19] I was one of people that led that charge.

[11:21] And the reason why people were angry was

[11:24] because they did not let the people have a choice.

[11:30] Secondly, I found out that there is a lawsuit

[11:34] at the state currently now

[11:37] that will probably get ironed out

[11:39] at the beginning of the year.

[11:40] And that lawsuit would overturn Claremont.

[11:45] If that is successful, that would mean the town would have

[11:50] to come up with $21 million.

[11:52] Plus the taxpayers,

[11:56] we all know what's coming down the pike in two short months.

[12:00] Okay. $10 million increase or $8 million increase actually.

[12:05] So if that gets overturned

[12:07] and this council does not let the people have a choice

[12:11] to vote in March, they're gonna come

[12:14] and they're gonna be very angry.

[12:17] So I would recommend that when you have

[12:20] that discussion, think about it.

[12:22] It's not about whether you want

[12:25] the the schools to be under the town.

[12:26] It's the question is, is do you want the people

[12:29] to have a say Thank you.

[12:37] Do I have anybody else coming up?

[12:49] Well

[12:55] Good evening.

[12:56] Oops. Good evening. Can you hear me alright?

[13:01] Oh, Richard, trip 44 Winter Road.

[13:05] Well I have some good news for you tonight.

[13:08] Not anything that is gonna get people upset.

[13:12] Anyhow, I attend most

[13:16] of the school board meetings

[13:18] and at the last meeting they talked about

[13:22] they're gonna have a facility tour

[13:26] and I waited till they posted the notice.

[13:31] But anyhow, on the 17th at four o'clock,

[13:38] the tour is gonna start at South Range School

[13:43] and from there it's gonna go to Gilbert h Grinnell,

[13:49] Ernest Barka,

[13:53] these new SAU building, which is what used

[13:58] to be Dairy Village

[14:02] And, And then

[14:07] West Running Brook in East Area Memorial.

[14:11] So if you're interested in what

[14:17] the second year of the school renovation has done

[14:21] to the schools and what they look like

[14:24] and what improvements have been made, like I said,

[14:27] show up at four o'clock at

[14:30] South Range and I'll be there.

[14:33] So we can, we can make a tour with the school board

[14:36] and the citizens can see

[14:38] what's what's going on in the schools.

[14:40] Thank you.

[14:53] Thank you. Erica Leon, 84 Shado Road.

[14:56] I just wanted to bring up some clarity on one of the things

[15:00] that Mr. Cunningham said.

[15:01] The town of Derry has a cooperative school district.

[15:04] It was the first cooperative school

[15:05] district formed in the state.

[15:07] When additional laws were passed about the process

[15:11] for cooperative school districts, we sort of got bundled in

[15:14] with everybody else because we had had 13 different

[15:17] districts within the town of Derry that ended up having

[15:19] to come together so that we could build Hood Middle School

[15:22] and just so we could do those processes.

[15:25] So as the first cooperative school district,

[15:28] we actually were created by the state, not by the town.

[15:31] And the only way to make any change

[15:33] to the school district was

[15:34] by getting permission from the legislature.

[15:36] So House Bill 1331 was required to do that,

[15:40] to give the people of dairy, any voice into

[15:43] how the Dairy Cooperative School District is administered.

[15:46] You know, obviously the ball will be in your court

[15:49] or in the people's court to figure out

[15:50] what the process is going forward.

[15:52] But without that law passing, there would've been no way

[15:56] for the people of Derry to make a choice about

[15:57] how the schools would be managed.

[15:59] So thank you.

[16:14] Hi, Jenna Paradise on Hubbard Hill Road.

[16:16] I'm here today with my election worker hat on.

[16:21] I wanted to speak to what somebody came up earlier

[16:25] and mentioned was the electioneering at the last election.

[16:30] I've been a an election worker

[16:32] for going on about 10 years in this town.

[16:35] And I don't think I had ever heard

[16:37] or seen about people coming in being harassed so much

[16:40] by somebody out in the parking lot.

[16:43] From my understanding there was some sort of loophole

[16:46] that allowed him to be out there.

[16:49] But I heard from several people coming in

[16:51] that he was pushing the pamphlets

[16:54] and if people said that they did not vote for that party,

[16:57] that he was swearing at them, he was also telling people

[17:00] to leave them in the polls, which is illegal.

[17:03] And it also added a little bit more work for us.

[17:06] But that is besides the point.

[17:07] We had to do a constant sweep of the polls

[17:09] and we found many of the pamphlets being left in there.

[17:15] And from my understanding there is New Hampshire statutes

[17:19] that are just going to read to you on electioneering.

[17:22] And I'm hoping that the town

[17:23] of Derry can do something about this

[17:26] town shall have, hold on.

[17:28] I don't have my readers. I'm getting old

[17:30] town shall have the bill.

[17:31] The power to make bylaws regulating the distribution

[17:34] of campaign materials or electioneering

[17:36] or any activity which affects the safety, welfare,

[17:39] and rights of voters at any election held

[17:42] for any purpose in such town.

[17:44] Such power shall not extend to the display of printed

[17:47] or written matter attached

[17:48] to any legally parked motor vehicle.

[17:50] Nor shall such power extend

[17:52] to activities conducted wholly on private property so as

[17:55] to not interfere with people approaching

[17:57] or entering a polling place.

[17:59] And I definitely think that what this gentleman was doing

[18:02] was interfering with people entering the polling place.

[18:06] Even though it was a little bit beyond the gauntlet,

[18:08] it was still in the Pinkerton parking lot

[18:10] and that was the main parking lot

[18:12] and the main entrance for people to come into.

[18:14] So I'm hoping that we can put something on the books

[18:17] before the next election in no, in November there's going

[18:20] to be quite a bit more people coming in

[18:24] and I hope that we can do something to prevent this.

[18:29] As a side note, I really think that if you are going

[18:32] to be voting, that you should come in as an educated voter

[18:36] and not have to rely on somebody handing you a cheat sheet

[18:40] to know who you need to vote for.

[18:42] Thank you.

[18:50] Good evening counsel. Michael Ann, 84 Sdo Road.

[18:54] Relative to the voting, I can see why so many

[18:56] of our students graduate with the inability to read

[18:59] what happened at Pinkerton,

[19:01] which is private property was 100% lawful.

[19:06] There were people who called the Attorney General

[19:08] of New Hampshire, who I think knows the law better than

[19:11] anyone else who has been up here.

[19:12] Nothing illegal happened.

[19:14] Yes, it was electioneering on private property.

[19:18] This town council, in addition to having an illegal meeting

[19:22] at the voting booths after that.

[19:24] Right? You had a quorum there. A quorum was assembled there.

[19:27] That's unlawful. Absolutely.

[19:30] The behavior some of you have exhibited online,

[19:34] far exceeded anything that gentleman did out there.

[19:36] Handing out cards, the language used up here,

[19:40] used online by some of these counselors

[19:42] to affect votes was absolutely deplorable.

[19:46] Same stuff about myself, my family. Absolutely untrue.

[19:49] It's disgusting if people won an election year, whether it's

[19:53] for conservatives, communists, Nazis,

[19:55] whatever you want, feel free.

[19:57] Some of us believe in freedom

[19:59] and if you want to tarnish us, call us horrible names.

[20:02] That's a shame.

[20:11] Mr. Chair, we're seeing none rise online. Motion

[20:13] To close the public hearing. Second

[20:16] Motion made to close the public hearing

[20:17] by Councilor Mills.

[20:19] Seconded by Councilor Foot. Councilor Chase? Yes.

[20:23] Councilor Flood. Yes. Councilor Foot? Yes. Councilor Mills.

[20:28] Yes. Councilor Healy. Yes. Councilor Spencer?

[20:33] Yes. And the chair votes? Yes.

[20:36] Public hearing is closed.

[20:42] Moving on to the consent agenda

[20:46] item 26 dash 84 to prove the minutes

[20:49] of the September 1st, 2026 meeting

[20:52] item 26 dash 84 85.

[20:56] Resolution number 2026 dash 0 5 2 To accept a Bureau

[21:01] of Justice Assistance grant for law enforcement equipment,

[21:04] please see attached a staff report

[21:06] and resolution number 2026 on it.

[21:10] But a public hearing will be scheduled

[21:12] for October 6th, 2026.

[21:16] Resolution 26 dash 86,

[21:19] resolution 2026 dash 0 5 4 to approve covenants

[21:23] and commercial industrial tax relief application

[21:26] for 12 a street.

[21:28] A public hearing is required

[21:29] and it'll be scheduled on October 6th, 2020 sixth.

[21:34] On motion on the consent agenda.

[21:36] So move second.

[21:38] Moved by Councilor Mills. Seconded by Councilor Foot.

[21:41] Councilor Chase? Yes. Councilor Flood. Yes. Councilor Foot?

[21:45] Yes. Councilor Mills. Yes. Councillor Healy. Yes.

[21:49] Councillor Spencer?

[21:51] Yes. And chair votes? Yes. Consent Agenda passes.

[21:57] Chair's report. First person is

[22:00] our town clerk, Tina Guilford.

[22:04] She'll be presenting on the state primary.

[22:22] Good evening counselors.

[22:27] So we had our primary, last Tuesday

[22:29] we had 4,903 voters.

[22:33] So it was well within the estimate that I had given you.

[22:40] We had 2,523 Republicans,

[22:44] 2,380 Democrats ballots.

[22:48] So that's kind of the breakdown.

[22:52] Results are available on the

[22:56] town website if anybody wants to look at those.

[23:00] I do wanna issue thank yous

[23:02] to the Town council for all your support.

[23:08] I do wanna address one comment

[23:09] that was made require it is a requirement per the

[23:12] New Hampshire Con New Hampshire constitution that a quorum

[23:16] of the counsel be present.

[23:19] And it is something that the Attorney

[23:21] General's office inspects.

[23:22] It's on their checklist. So four

[23:25] of you were there a good portion of the day.

[23:27] Three of you had pro Temes.

[23:30] Thank you Counselor Foote Mills and Healy for your pro tems.

[23:36] So we did have for a good portion of the day,

[23:41] seven counselors present, which is great.

[23:45] And the attorney general's office does look for that.

[23:48] And you are all introduced

[23:49] to the inspector from the Attorney General's office

[23:52] as were your protos.

[23:54] So I thank you. I'd like

[23:57] to thank my fellow election officials, our town moderator,

[24:01] Dave Nelson for another late night.

[24:05] Our supervisors of the checklist

[24:08] doing a great job registering over 140 voters.

[24:13] I'd like to thank dairy police and dairy fire.

[24:16] I know they're in the room for all your support

[24:20] and we're gearing up for November now.

[24:25] I'd like to thank everybody here at Town hall.

[24:28] I do know that when it's election time, Tina kind

[24:31] of takes over lots of spaces and the assessing department

[24:34] and the tax department, they just kind of smile and nod

[24:37] and they don't complain.

[24:39] And I really appreciate that support.

[24:41] I appreciate the town administrator support

[24:45] finance department.

[24:46] This is a team effort. We cannot do this by ourselves.

[24:52] And I want to thank our poll workers.

[24:55] We had almost a hundred people

[24:58] that we hired for the primary.

[25:02] I'd especially like to thank the ones

[25:03] who actually volunteered their time.

[25:05] And we actually had one poll worker

[25:07] who worked the polls open to close entirely

[25:09] as a volunteer and did not get paid.

[25:12] So again, I thank them for their volunteerism

[25:16] and I want to thank our voters who came out to vote.

[25:21] We had over 200 ballots that had

[25:23] to be fully hand counted due to over votes.

[25:27] I say this again as a friendly reminder.

[25:29] Our state rep race is a vote 10,

[25:32] even though we're in district 13, you don't get to vote

[25:35] for 13, you vote for 10.

[25:39] Some people had some issues with that last Tuesday we had

[25:44] just shy of a thousand write-ins.

[25:47] They are again available on the town website.

[25:52] I, I really don't understand.

[25:54] I really don't understand the ones who fill the bubble

[25:56] and then don't write anything at all.

[25:59] It is a lot of time for every, you know, for us

[26:01] to put eyeballs on all of those,

[26:03] which is why we are there till almost 2:00 AM

[26:08] Our supervisors of the checklist will be having their next

[26:10] session on September 29th.

[26:14] That means that all the people

[26:17] that have come in since the primary

[26:19] and there have been quite a few, we had another,

[26:21] quite a few people today changing their party affiliation

[26:24] 'cause they were in the wrong party.

[26:26] So those changes will take effect on the 29th.

[26:29] So I advise everyone, not that party matters in November,

[26:33] but that on the 30th you start checking online,

[26:37] check a party affiliation, make sure you're in the party

[26:39] that you're in because the presidential primary will be

[26:43] coming in January, 2028.

[26:45] And I would love to see a primary

[26:46] where our poll workers are not screamed at

[26:49] because you're in the wrong party.

[26:53] It, it is disappointing.

[26:55] And I do understand that the cutoff will probably be at the

[26:59] end of September, beginning of October

[27:01] and you're not thinking about anything about the

[27:05] presidential primary in 2027.

[27:06] So just while it's in your brain now,

[27:09] make sure you're in the party

[27:10] that you wanna be in Graphic.

[27:20] Go to presentation. So while Owen puts up the

[27:25] graphic, we're gonna move to

[27:28] the state general election

[27:31] November 3rd at Pinkerton Academy.

[27:32] 7:00 AM to 8:00 PM The

[27:37] bypass will be closed.

[27:39] We will be posting videos that the fire department made

[27:42] for us in 2024 for the traffic patterns so

[27:45] that everybody knows which way to go.

[27:49] There will be signs up around town reminding people.

[27:55] I am really hopeful that it will go as well

[27:57] as it did in 2024.

[27:59] 'cause I didn't get a lot of complaints in 2024.

[28:03] I did get a lot of complaints about the primary

[28:05] that just passed last Tuesday.

[28:09] Most of them centered on the election hearing.

[28:12] So you'll be hearing more from me on that.

[28:16] But in the future.

[28:19] Anyway, that is what I have

[28:25] and if you have any questions, I'd be happy to answer them.

[28:32] Any questions? No questions. Just a comment.

[28:35] I just wanna thank our town clerk

[28:37] for another very successful election in all our election

[28:40] officials that worked that day

[28:43] and also on the lead up to elections.

[28:46] Not a lot of people know all the work that goes in

[28:48] with the machine testing, the tabulator testing,

[28:51] counting the ballots, absentees

[28:53] and all, all that work leading up to that day.

[28:57] So it's not just on that day, it's all the, the lead up

[29:01] and the, the late day on election.

[29:05] I ran into Tina at two 30 in the morning

[29:07] as she was finishing up. So

[29:10] Yes, we, we met at the Darry police station.

[29:13] He was turning in his results.

[29:14] I was turning mine so they could be

[29:16] delivered to the state police to go

[29:17] Talk. And what time was that again?

[29:19] It was about two 40 or so in the morning.

[29:24] Yeah, it was late.

[29:26] And then I went home and took a hot shower

[29:28] and I was back in this building sometime

[29:31] between 7, 7 30 in the morning.

[29:35] I know that Concor Spencer has some comments.

[29:42] Thank you. Yeah, I just, I just wanna echo off of what a,

[29:45] what Tina said and,

[29:46] and everybody's already kind of heard this election workers,

[29:50] I, I wanna point out that Tina worked really hard along

[29:53] with our moderator Dave Nelson

[29:55] and our printed tapes of our results.

[29:57] So all the results that came

[29:58] through a ballot machine were posted within the hour

[30:02] of the polls closing.

[30:04] You always know you're gonna have some hand counts.

[30:06] We did have some confusion with 13 versus 10, so

[30:09] that caused a little extra.

[30:11] But almost a thousand write-ins.

[30:14] I'm frankly frustrated.

[30:16] We have people come almost every week that like

[30:18] to complain about wasting of money

[30:20] and taxpayer money being used.

[30:22] The taxpayers caused a waste of money on Tuesday.

[30:25] When you write in names,

[30:26] I would never take away somebody's right

[30:28] to have a write in vote.

[30:30] However, if you vote for somebody who is a cartoon character

[30:35] dead or does not live in the town, district or state

[30:39] and is not eligible for the race,

[30:41] you are wasting taxpayer money.

[30:44] The town clerk has to stay there and all of the team

[30:47] and has to stay.

[30:48] You paid fire, you paid police, you paid election workers

[30:52] to stay for hours after the elections closed

[30:57] because of write-ins that were not valid votes.

[31:00] So I encourage people that think they, if you think you have

[31:03] to fill something in, you don't.

[31:05] And I encourage the people that vote for

[31:08] absolutely invalid people

[31:10] or cartoon characters, which are a lot to think about

[31:13] that next time you do it that each one of those ads time

[31:17] that hand counts have to happen.

[31:18] Reconciliations have to happen to make sure we we see it

[31:22] and then read it and that people have to stay

[31:25] and get paid while that happens.

[31:27] And that is costing taxpayers money.

[31:30] And that's all I have to say. Well actually no,

[31:31] I will also say thank you to all those people

[31:34] that stayed late and did all that and that's all.

[31:36] Thank you.

[31:40] I do have two comments.

[31:43] I'm a stipend so I don't get paid to be there

[31:46] to be here in this building at 5:00 AM and

[31:49] and to not get home until almost three.

[31:51] Yeah, no I didn't get paid anything extra.

[31:55] And I will also say we need more poll workers.

[32:00] So if you're someone who likes to write in these things,

[32:04] I challenge you to sign up and come work

[32:07] and count at the end of the night, come join us

[32:11] so you can see what it's like.

[32:17] Any other comments? I just have one is you already stole

[32:21] my thunder on write in votes.

[32:22] But thank you for your hard work

[32:25] and also thanks to the public works in Pinkerton.

[32:29] Staff would help clean up when the election was over.

[32:33] Everybody works hard for this to make this actually yes,

[32:37] there were some hiccups but it was a very smooth

[32:40] day logistically.

[32:42] So thank you for organizing it.

[32:44] Thank you to the moderator Dave Nelson

[32:48] for organizing everything.

[32:50] And again,

[32:51] if you really wanna understand democracy, go work the polls.

[32:55] And I don't mean by holding signs,

[32:56] I mean actually go physically in there and

[33:00] and assist the voters count the ballots.

[33:06] Thank you.

[33:17] Next item on the chairman's report is an appointment

[33:20] to the Dairy conservation com commission

[33:24] and I nominate Linda Comy

[33:27] to the Dairy Conservation Commission as a member with a term

[33:29] to expire on March 31st, 2028.

[33:33] Second that Seconded by Councilor Mills.

[33:35] Do I have any discussion? Nope. Councilor Chase? Yes.

[33:40] Councilor Flood. Yes. Councilor Foot? Yes. Councilor Mills?

[33:45] Yes. Councilor Healey? Yes. Councilor Spencer?

[33:50] Yes. And the chair votes? Yes.

[33:53] When did Cons Conrad is appointed by vote of seven to zero.

[33:59] Couple of other announcements, just to reiterate,

[34:03] Charlie Buzzle, Hattie Ergen was a huge supporter

[34:07] of East Area

[34:08] and dairy firefighters throughout her entire life.

[34:14] And it is nice to see

[34:15] that the fire department will be honored hearing her

[34:19] by planting a tree on September 20th.

[34:23] If you want more information,

[34:24] please contact the fire department or check their website

[34:26] and give you the schedule of events.

[34:30] The next thing is just want to congratulate our own

[34:34] counselor, Doug Flood his,

[34:39] the charity that he helped found the Jason R Flood Memorial

[34:43] Pizza Stock or Pizza.

[34:45] Yeah. Pizza Stock. A charity to help

[34:50] educate people about mental health

[34:52] and suicide prevention, particularly with teenagers

[34:55] through music and counseling, has been recognized

[34:58] by the Greater Dairy One

[35:00] and Dairy Chamber of Commerce as Charity of the year.

[35:04] So congratulations.

[35:06] Daniel, your

[35:07] or your wife, Daniel Flood as who's the president?

[35:11] Vice President Mike

[35:14] Caras.

[35:15] Mike Caras, treasurer Lee Madero.

[35:18] Secretary Craig Cunningham. And members of the board.

[35:22] Jennifer Besson Cuthbert, Gina Cino, Steve Dino

[35:27] and Josh Tubbs.

[35:28] And again, thank you Doug for founding it.

[35:30] Thank you.

[35:39] Last issue is regarding House Bill 1331.

[35:43] The DER Town Council has heard the requests

[35:46] and comments on House Bill 31

[35:49] and of those that spoke at the last meeting in this meeting.

[35:53] So we have asked the TA to gather facts

[35:56] and information on this complex issue so

[35:59] that we may act in an informed and appropriate manner

[36:02] and do our due diligence.

[36:04] In the meantime, we ask everyone to be patient. Thank you.

[36:09] Now we'll move to the Todd Administrator's report.

[36:13] Good evening. I've got a couple of items to share tonight.

[36:17] The Dairy Police Department recognizes

[36:19] that effective leadership is one

[36:20] of the most critical components

[36:21] of a professional law organization.

[36:24] And investing in leadership development ensures

[36:26] that supervisors and command staff possess the knowledge,

[36:29] skills and abilities to lead personnel manage complex

[36:32] organization challenges

[36:34] and provide the highest level of service to the community.

[36:38] Several members of the department have attended training

[36:42] through the FBI,

[36:43] law Enforcement Executive Development Association,

[36:46] also known as lda

[36:48] and Chief George Filia is here this evening with some guests

[36:53] to present an award tonight

[36:55] to the department and individuals.

[36:57] So George,

[37:01] Thank you Mike.

[37:02] Thank you Thomas. I wanted to highlight what I consider

[37:05] to be a pretty significant milestone achievement

[37:09] by our command staff.

[37:11] One of the things that, do you have a slide there

[37:15] for oh one? Yep,

[37:17] We're bringing that up right now.

[37:18] Thank you Chief. One of the things, the first things

[37:22] that previous town administrator Dave Karen asked

[37:25] of me when he hired me as Chief 42, excuse me,

[37:28] four years ago, was

[37:29] that I developed a leadership succession planning plan to

[37:33] that end the town engaged with attorney Eric Daigle,

[37:35] the Daigle Law Group, and to assist us with that task.

[37:39] One of the chief recommendations by attorney Daigle made at

[37:42] that time was to increase the level of supervisory command

[37:45] and executive development development training offered

[37:48] to our current and future leaders.

[37:51] We had long been involved with the FBI,

[37:53] law Enforcement Executive Development Association

[37:57] and were aware that they offered some of the best training

[38:00] this country has to offer.

[38:02] In fact, FBI leader offers a trilogy of classes entitled

[38:06] Supervisory Leadership Institute,

[38:08] command Leadership Institute,

[38:10] and the Executive Leadership Institute.

[38:14] Each week long course is designed to prepare an officer

[38:16] to be successful from the rank of sergeant right up

[38:19] to the rank of chief with a fair degree of pride.

[38:23] I appear this evening with our entire command staff,

[38:26] including all five lieutenants, both captains

[38:30] and each of us have completed the trilogy of classes

[38:32] and individually earned the FBI lead a Trilogy Award.

[38:37] This accomplishment makes the DER Police Department eligible

[38:40] for an agency award.

[38:43] I'm pleased to introduce the Chief Operations Officer

[38:45] for the FBI leader, Michael Robinson Senior

[38:48] for a presentation to the department.

[38:51] Thank you. Chief

[38:55] Town Council.

[38:56] Greetings Town Manager Administrator. Yep.

[39:00] Greetings to you as well.

[39:01] Mr. Fowler, chief fii, thank you

[39:04] for having us here this evening.

[39:06] First of all, good evening everyone.

[39:08] As chief has stated, my name is Michael Robinson.

[39:11] I'm the Chief Operating Officer for FBI lita. FBI.

[39:15] Lita is an organization

[39:17] that does law enforcement leadership

[39:19] training across the world.

[39:21] Each year. For the last couple

[39:23] of years we've trained about 20,000

[39:26] law enforcement professionals across the United States

[39:29] as well as in foreign countries as well on leadership.

[39:34] And there are very few departments

[39:38] that will show the level of dedication

[39:42] that this department here has shown in Derry New Hampshire.

[39:47] They've shown a commitment to investing in their personnel.

[39:51] Thank you. Town Council

[39:53] or whoever handles the budget to support that effort

[39:56] because we know it's not a singular issue.

[40:00] It takes the whole town

[40:01] to actually support departments when they're

[40:05] pursuing something such as the FBI Leader A Trilogy Award,

[40:10] as the chief has stated, the Trilogy Award goes to agencies

[40:14] who have made the commitment to ensure that each member

[40:18] of their executive team, specifically members

[40:21] of their command staff, have completed our flagship program.

[40:26] And the flag flagship program for us,

[40:29] and it has been for quite some time,

[40:31] is our supervisory leadership course,

[40:33] which talks about everything you need to make sure

[40:36] that individuals are aware of

[40:38] and understand the perspective of the first line supervisor.

[40:42] Then there's a Command Leadership Institute

[40:45] where we focus on those that are in the command ranks

[40:48] and those individuals who assist the chief in running

[40:52] that department and they gain a perspective at that level.

[40:56] And then there's the Executive Leadership Institute.

[40:59] Those individuals learn this perspective of the chief

[41:03] and they get a clear understanding

[41:04] that the chief has the answer to a lot of people,

[41:07] including many individuals in this room as well as the town

[41:11] that you guys serve as well.

[41:13] So it's quite an honor for us to be here.

[41:16] I came in a little early because we're actually holding a

[41:19] class up in Beau New Hampshire this week.

[41:22] So I got a chance to meet

[41:24] and talk with individuals who were in that class.

[41:26] We do about 700 classes a year

[41:31] and this year only three departments in the state

[41:35] of New Hampshire achieved the FBI lead a agency Trilogy

[41:39] Award thus far since we've started

[41:42] issuing the agency Trilogy Award

[41:45] for police departments across the country.

[41:47] There've only been six now in the state of New Hampshire

[41:51] and your department is one of them of course.

[41:54] And there've only been 303 across the country.

[41:59] And keep in mind there are about 18,000 police departments

[42:03] in the United States of America

[42:05] and your department is one of those

[42:07] who achieved the FBI lead a Trilogy Award.

[42:11] So on behalf of our executive director, Jacque Patis,

[42:15] as well as our president of our organization,

[42:18] Mr. Christopher Workman, it is quite the honor

[42:23] to present tonight the FBI Lita Agency Trilogy Award

[42:28] to Chief Oli as well as your amazing command staff.

[42:33] So congratulations chief very much. Awesome.

[42:35] You're quite welcome.

[42:41] Hopefully We can get some,

[42:43] Some pictures here with the,

[42:45] with the team here if that's okay.

[42:48] Absolutely. Alright. We had

[42:54] warned him that we'd be taking pictures anyways. That's

[42:58] A pretty Neat slide.

[43:38] If it's okay, I know I blessed it with the chief,

[43:41] but we do have things that we provide individuals

[43:44] for supporting these departments across the country.

[43:46] They're called challenge coins for those

[43:48] who may have served in the United States military, as I did

[43:51] as well, we'd like to make sure that some

[43:54] of your key personnel get some of these tonight.

[43:58] So I'd like to provide one from the town administrator.

[44:00] Thank you. As well as all of your council members as well.

[44:04] And thank you guys for supporting such an

[44:07] amazing department here.

[44:08] And I understand since Miss

[44:11] isn't here, I'll just need the, yeah. Alright. Done.

[44:14] I'll make certain that you get it. Thank you. Quite

[44:16] Welcome sir.

[44:18] Thank you sir. Thank you.

[44:20] Well it's an appropriate shape for you Doug. Thank you.

[44:23] Absolutely. Oh yeah. Mr.

[44:27] Chairman, if you'll allow me 30 more seconds. Absolutely.

[44:31] I just, I think, think it's important

[44:32] to recognize each officer individually.

[44:36] I want to recognize

[44:37] and you can stand, the officers can stand up.

[44:39] Some of 'em already are. Lieutenant Pat Dawson,

[44:42] patrol division Lieutenant 14 year service to the top.

[44:46] Thank you Lieutenant.

[44:52] Lieutenant Jared Knox, patrol division Lieutenant 16 years

[44:57] of service, total law enforcement.

[44:58] 14 to the town of dairy. Thank you.

[45:03] Lieutenant Chris Talbot, 22 years of service.

[45:07] Presently our investigative services bureau commander.

[45:10] Thank you Lieutenant.

[45:15] Lieutenant Ryan O'Rourke, 19 years of service patrol

[45:20] bureau Lieutenant, thank you for your service.

[45:27] Sean O'Donohue, our administrative services bureau

[45:30] commander, Lieutenant O'Donohue 18.

[45:32] I'm nearly 19 years of service. Thank you.

[45:34] Lieutenant Captain

[45:39] Dave Micha, our support services division

[45:43] commander, 19 years of service.

[45:44] Thank you Captain. And Captain John Breen,

[45:49] our operations division commander, 29 years service.

[45:53] Thank you. Thank you very much.

[45:56] If we could do one more picture, maybe with the six

[45:59] of us and everybody else

[46:01] Certainly.

[46:02] And yes.

[46:04] Great. You want

[46:22] you guys behind us with us?

[46:24] Yes.

[47:00] Make a

[47:32] thank you for having Congratulations.

[47:37] Congratulations.

[47:48] Congratulations. I stepped behind Jack, Mr. Chair.

[47:52] I just got to say I'm a little disappointed that

[47:54] with all these great opportunities veteran photographers

[47:57] took the chance to say, say police,

[48:01] Come on.

[48:02] Yeah, yeah.

[48:06] Thank you Chief fii

[48:07] and all the work that your staff has done.

[48:17] Yeah. Alright, we'll continue. Alright,

[48:20] So I have a couple of other items

[48:22] of interest for the community.

[48:25] On September 1st, town council

[48:27] or members had attended a ribbon cutting at

[48:30] the town's landfill.

[48:32] And that was to commemorate a, the opening

[48:35] of our solar panel field

[48:37] that has a 25 year power purchase agreement lease

[48:41] with Encore Renewable Energy.

[48:43] Some of the stats that are important

[48:45] to talk about is the town is purchasing electricity at

[48:48] 6.50 cents per kilowatt hour as compared

[48:50] to the Eversource default rate

[48:52] of 14 cents just over 14 cents per kilowatt hour

[48:56] as of August 1st.

[48:58] The net zero task force was instrumental in working

[49:02] through the proposals

[49:03] and we finally have tangible electricity production

[49:06] for order of magnitude.

[49:08] The solar array will generate approximately 4.2 million

[49:12] kilowatt hours of electricity annually, some

[49:15] of which will be consumed at the wastewater treatment plant.

[49:17] And then the other product will be distributed into the grid

[49:22] and the town would be receiving net metering credits.

[49:25] So we are projecting over the 25 year period at a minimum

[49:30] of $4 million of averted cost, whether when you compare to

[49:33] what the default rate is for electricity.

[49:36] So I'll continue to update the council one at some point

[49:41] as we go into the winter.

[49:42] We are gonna talk a little bit about fuel costs and,

[49:46] and what those may or may not be for impacts to the budget.

[49:49] We were expecting diesel and heating

[49:51] oil and things of that nature.

[49:53] We made some projections.

[49:54] So we'll talk about that a little bit.

[49:55] But I did want to note that our solar project is online

[49:59] and currently generating electricity.

[50:03] On a related note, the town also recently signed a

[50:06] consultant agreement with Freedom Logistics to initiate the

[50:10] electricity aggregation, also known

[50:13] as Community Power Effort.

[50:15] This endeavor's gonna kick off with pricing in early 2027,

[50:19] which will be offered to all residential parties in the

[50:21] Eversource, Unitil, and Liberty franchise area.

[50:24] The goal of this program would be

[50:26] to offer electricity supply at a lower rate

[50:28] than the default utility.

[50:29] So this is for everybody in the community.

[50:32] So we talked about a few years ago putting community power

[50:37] into place where perhaps if there's a higher rate from ever

[50:40] source at 14 cents, our buying power combined would allow us

[50:44] to potentially be somewhat less expensive than that.

[50:47] So we're gonna be pricing that

[50:49] and that would be something we'll roll out some information

[50:51] in, in hopes that we can save, you know, again, all

[50:54] of our residents, some money on their electricity bills.

[50:58] And then lastly, just as a query for the council

[51:03] setting up meetings, you have the 22nd,

[51:06] you're gonna be meeting with the school board

[51:08] for a workshop at five 30.

[51:11] You have regular town council meetings on October 6th

[51:14] and October 20th.

[51:15] And then November 3rd is the general election day

[51:19] that would align with your regular meeting scheduled dates.

[51:23] So just let me know if you, if you have some thoughts,

[51:26] I'm assuming that you want to postpone

[51:28] and not hold a meeting that day,

[51:30] but if you wanna just meet November 17th as the only meeting

[51:34] of the month, that could be accommodated on the normal

[51:37] third Tuesday of the month.

[51:38] But we can talk about that at the next meeting

[51:41] and make sure we let the viewers know if

[51:44] we are having a meeting or not.

[51:45] On November 3rd, they're not having

[51:47] a meeting, they can't I know.

[51:48] Understood. And I just wanna put that out there for,

[51:51] for full transparency.

[51:52] And that's all I have. Do we have any questions

[51:55] for the town administrator?

[52:00] Councilor Spencer?

[52:03] I don't have a question, but I would just,

[52:05] on the community power item, I would just like

[52:10] to give a shout, kind of a shout out

[52:12] and thank you to the net zero commission.

[52:14] They've been really working on this and,

[52:16] and working with the town administrator and,

[52:18] and others to see this come through and,

[52:21] and have been really behind this effort.

[52:23] So I just wanna give them a congratulations

[52:25] to hopefully helping their neighbors save some money.

[52:28] Do we have any plan on how we're going

[52:30] to notify all the residents?

[52:31] Yes, absolutely. So there will be a,

[52:34] a public meeting at some point, probably either in December

[52:38] or January of 2027 to outline the plan

[52:41] and then mailers go out to each one of the individual

[52:44] 11,000 properties that would be eligible for this.

[52:47] Although it may be a little less 'cause we're not gonna be

[52:48] going into the New Hampshire co-op area,

[52:50] but each homeowner is given

[52:53] an opportunity to review the plans.

[52:55] You do have options if you want something

[52:57] that's a little bit more green

[52:58] or you pay generally more for that,

[53:00] but we'll be distributing and discussing it.

[53:02] The idea would be to have the pricing available

[53:06] for some time in April around that timeframe, 2027,

[53:09] and people would be automatically opting into the program.

[53:13] It would be an opt-out option if you

[53:15] don't want to be part of it.

[53:16] This is, you know, community-wide.

[53:18] So this is being done in many other communities

[53:20] around the state and we just didn't launch it

[53:23] because the timing in 2023 and 2024 was not advantageous.

[53:27] So we're at that stage now where we think it is.

[53:36] So, you know, other comments, we might as well move on

[53:39] to the public hearings.

[53:43] We have ordinance 2026 dash 0 0 3

[53:47] to amend chapter one 19

[53:49] of the General Code Hawkers Pedalers Itinerant vendors

[53:53] Police Chief FII will be presenting.

[54:05] Thank you. Thank you counselors.

[54:07] I appeared this evening to talk a little bit about

[54:09] Chapter one 19 in our Town Code Hawkes

[54:13] and peddlers in Itinerant Bend Town Ordinance.

[54:16] I noticed short while ago that

[54:21] the ordinance needed some revision

[54:22] because there are some state statutes

[54:24] that have since been repealed

[54:25] and are referenced in our ordinance.

[54:30] So I'll just go quickly through that.

[54:32] It's, it's really housekeeping measures more than changes

[54:35] to the ordinance with the exception of price increase

[54:40] for the permit fee itself.

[54:43] The ordinance chap refers

[54:45] to chapter RSA chapter three 20 and 3 21.

[54:47] Both of those were repealed in 2023.

[54:51] Those citations can are no longer valid within the document

[54:54] and need to be removed.

[54:56] And we wanted to correct what I perceived as a

[55:00] deficiency in the permit fee.

[55:03] We were last, it was last set at $50 per year.

[55:07] And I did some investigation

[55:09] and found that we should be in the $150 a year range

[55:14] for, to align with our other communities around us.

[55:17] And that would of course increase,

[55:19] generate increased revenue, specifically Section 1 19 3.

[55:23] We remove the,

[55:25] the New Hampshire RSA Chapter 3 21 license requirement.

[55:28] We renumber the sections

[55:30] accordingly to maintain consistent ordinance structure

[55:32] in section one 19 dash five.

[55:34] We remove the phrase pursuant to 3 21 3 in reference

[55:38] to hawkers and peddlers as defined in 3 21

[55:42] as those RSAs were repealed Also,

[55:45] section one 19 and one 10.

[55:47] These are housekeeping measures as

[55:49] I I indicated we would add as amended.

[55:53] September 15th, 2026 if you elect

[55:56] to make that change this evening.

[55:58] In, in section 1 19 10 at effective date language.

[56:02] This article takes effect January 14th, 2021

[56:05] and as amended September 15th, 2026, excuse me,

[56:11] the current Hawkins and Pist fee license.

[56:14] Permit fee is $50, as you can see,

[56:19] excuse me, Manchester's $150 a year.

[56:22] Nash was a hundred. Portsmouth is two 50.

[56:24] Keen is 150 Rochester's a hundred.

[56:27] I thought that we should be at 150.

[56:29] Now at current this year, we,

[56:33] we've issued 24 licenses since April.

[56:36] That would generate, we did generate $1,200

[56:39] with $150 fee, we would've generated 3,600.

[56:43] So we'll triple that revenue.

[56:46] There's no negative fiscal impact to the budget.

[56:48] The fee increased from 50 to 150,

[56:50] we'll generate increased revenues to the town.

[56:52] So that's a positive. The council is asked

[56:55] to consider those amendments to the

[56:57] chapter one 19 this evening.

[57:00] I'm here to I, I'll be happy

[57:01] to answer any questions that anyone might have.

[57:04] Moved up public hearing. Second.

[57:08] Motion to open the public hearing made by Councilor Foot.

[57:11] Seconded by Councilor Healey. Councilor Chase? Yes.

[57:14] Councilor Flood. Yes. Councilor Foot? Yes. Councilor Mills?

[57:17] Yes. Councilor Healy. Yes. Consul LER Spencer?

[57:21] Yes. Chair votes? Yes. Let's open the public hearing.

[57:34] David Preventer 26 Milmore Road.

[57:37] You mentioned that you suspect that the

[57:40] income would be tripled.

[57:42] So you think that there'd be a hundred percent conversion

[57:44] rate from people paying the $50 a year to the $150

[57:47] That yeah, that, that, that is assumption based

[57:49] on a hundred percent conversion.

[57:50] Okay, so you don't think that any

[57:51] that number would be too high for anybody

[57:53] to just say Nah, no. It's not worth it?

[57:56] No. I, I talk, I spoke with other law enforcement agencies

[57:59] that try charge a much higher rate than we do

[58:01] and they saw no significant drop in the application.

[58:05] Okay. Just wanted to make sure that was considered. Okay.

[58:07] Thank you. Anybody else Rising

[58:12] Mr. Chair? Seeing none

[58:13] Rise online.

[58:14] Move to close. Second.

[58:16] Motion to close a public hearing by Councilor Foot.

[58:18] Seconded by Councilor Mills. Councilor Chase? Yes.

[58:21] Councilor Flood? Yes. Councilor Foot?

[58:24] Yes. Councilor Mills? Yes. Councilor Healy?

[58:27] Yes. Councilor Spencer?

[58:30] Yes. Chair votes? Yes. Public hearing is closed.

[58:34] Do we have any questions for the police Chief

[58:39] Mr.

[58:40] Chair? Seeing no further questions.

[58:40] Oh, I just want, sorry.

[58:44] Councilor Spencer, do you have any?

[58:47] No, And I just have one.

[58:51] I had asked this to the town administrator

[58:54] because I wasn't certain exactly what a Hawker pet

[58:57] or an itinerant vendor is

[58:58] because my first thought was, oh,

[59:00] are we raising the fee on the people

[59:01] that open the farmer's market?

[59:03] He says, no, that's not the case.

[59:04] No. So quite often we have people that go to door

[59:09] to door selling door and window products

[59:12] or siding, things like that.

[59:13] And they, they, they canvas a neighborhood.

[59:15] Those folks have to be licensed under this ordinance.

[59:19] All right. So that if, so that allows a person,

[59:21] if they have a stranger knocking on the door

[59:23] and says, Hey, I'm selling new pro windows,

[59:25] that they can contact the police then

[59:27] and verify that that's a licensed vendor.

[59:30] Absolutely. All right. Thank you

[59:33] Mr.

[59:34] Chair. Single no further questions. I move.

[59:36] The ordinance number 2026 dash zero three

[59:41] will amend Chapter one 19 of the general code

[59:44] offers peddlers

[59:45] and itinerant vendors, whereas Section 5.1

[59:49] of the town charter designates the town council

[59:52] As the governing and legislative body of the town.

[59:55] And pursuant to Section 6.1, the council shall legislate

[1:00:00] by ordinance and whereas there is a need

[1:00:03] to amend chapter one 19, hawkers, peddlers

[1:00:06] and itinerant vendors governing the issuance

[1:00:09] of associated permits.

[1:00:10] And whereas chart changes have been made to state law

[1:00:14] and the town ordinance requires several amendments

[1:00:17] to remove references to appealed state statues.

[1:00:20] And now therefore, the town of Derry Ordains.

[1:00:24] That chapter one 19 of the General Code Hawkers peddlers

[1:00:28] and itinerant vendors be amended by removing references

[1:00:32] to repealed state statues RSA 3 21

[1:00:37] and RSA 3 21 3

[1:00:40] and amending the license fee to $150 per year.

[1:00:44] This ordinance shall take effect 30 days after its adoption.

[1:00:49] Second motion made by Councilor Mill.

[1:00:53] Seconded by Councilor Healy. Do we have any discussion?

[1:00:57] Councilor Spencer? Nope. All right. Seeing no discussion.

[1:01:02] Councilor Chase? Yes. Councilor Flood? Yes. Councilor Foot?

[1:01:06] Yes. Councilor Mills? Yes. Councilor Healy. Yes.

[1:01:11] Councilor Spencer? Yes. Chair votes? Yes. Motion passes.

[1:01:16] Seven zero. Moving on to 26 78.

[1:01:23] Resolution 2026 dash 0 5 0 to accept the 2026

[1:01:28] Community Wildfire Protection Plan.

[1:01:31] Beth Carver.

[1:01:36] Thank you. And if you could introduce yourself, Mr.

[1:01:38] Nwi, I'd appreciate it. Yes. Hello everyone.

[1:01:43] John Neely. I work for the State of New Hampshire

[1:01:45] as a community Wildfire mitigation Coordinator. Thank you.

[1:01:49] Awesome. Thank you.

[1:01:51] So we are here to introduce the plan

[1:01:55] and its recommendations to reduce wildfire risk in dairy.

[1:02:00] So we'll start with why create A-C-W-P-P in the first place?

[1:02:04] So dairy actually faces a higher wildfire risk than 96%

[1:02:09] of other communities in New Hampshire.

[1:02:12] And wildfires in dairy are generally small, but human caused

[1:02:16] and they're frequent and can become structural fires.

[1:02:21] So the CWPP looks at all kinds of things,

[1:02:23] looks at vegetation, weather, topography,

[1:02:26] infrastructure access,

[1:02:27] and a lot more in order to make recommendations so

[1:02:31] that we can reduce the risk of a fire before it starts.

[1:02:36] So what is A-C-W-P-P?

[1:02:39] It's a collaborative effort between the state members

[1:02:43] of local government

[1:02:46] and to assess like what the risk is

[1:02:50] and prioritize what actions we can take

[1:02:53] and then to act on those.

[1:02:56] And we have a list of actions

[1:03:00] and it's going to benefit dairy

[1:03:02] because it provides in-depth recommendations that you all

[1:03:08] and other town officials can take on actionable steps

[1:03:12] to lower our wildfire risk.

[1:03:14] And importantly, secure federal funding.

[1:03:16] So having A-C-W-P-P in place is a benefit when it comes

[1:03:21] to applying for these community Wildfire defense grants,

[1:03:25] but it also provides just simple actionable steps

[1:03:28] that residents can take to make their homes

[1:03:31] and neighborhoods more resilient to wildfire.

[1:03:36] So after we did all that analysis, we came up

[1:03:41] with four goals and 17 actions that are

[1:03:45] inside the CWPP

[1:03:49] and the those main four goals.

[1:03:53] So we'll use the best available science

[1:03:55] and information to identify present, to identify present

[1:04:00] and future vulnerabilities to wildfire within dairy.

[1:04:04] We'll provide residents and land managers information

[1:04:07] and tools to reduce wildfire risk

[1:04:09] and structural ignitability on their lands.

[1:04:12] Address ways to improve wildfire response

[1:04:15] with training equipment and technology

[1:04:18] and identify ways to improve communication

[1:04:21] and participation among town officials, residents,

[1:04:24] and stakeholders regarding wildfire risk reduction in dairy.

[1:04:30] So that's all for our presentation.

[1:04:33] And now if you have any questions

[1:04:34] for us, we'd be happy to answer.

[1:04:37] I'll open up first to the public hearing. Moved second.

[1:04:42] Moved by Councilor Foot, second by Councilor Mills.

[1:04:44] Councilor Chase? Yes. Councilor Flood? Yes. Councilor Foot?

[1:04:48] Yes. Councilor Mills? Yes. Councilor Healy?

[1:04:51] Yes. Councilor Spencer?

[1:04:53] Yes. Chair votes yes to open the public hearing.

[1:04:57] Do we have anybody coming up?

[1:04:58] Ah, actually John, if you could just step back for a second

[1:05:03] to allow members of the public Thank you.

[1:05:09] Thank you. Erica Leon, 84 Shanita Road I,

[1:05:13] I learned about this community wildfire protection plan

[1:05:17] And I did have some email discussions

[1:05:20] with Chief Farrow about this

[1:05:21] and the development of the plan On August 14th.

[1:05:24] I had asked for more details,

[1:05:26] but he said at that point that it was a draft form

[1:05:29] and it was not available for dissemination.

[1:05:32] Looking through the 111 page document, my parcels that

[1:05:36] around my, my family are called out by name

[1:05:39] and I am concerned that as landowners

[1:05:42] who were flagged in this process, we were not part

[1:05:45] of the process of discussing this, especially given

[1:05:48] that I had reached out to the chief trying

[1:05:50] to get information on this plan.

[1:05:53] But secondarily, beyond the fact that we have land

[1:05:56] that we are managing, we are conserving

[1:05:58] and we're reducing the wildfire risk on.

[1:06:01] I have other questions

[1:06:02] and concerns that'll impact far more

[1:06:04] people in the town of dairy.

[1:06:06] I grew up in a high, high wildfire area

[1:06:08] and my brother has now had to cut all

[1:06:10] of the vegetation basically on his property.

[1:06:14] Looking at the defensible zones that are listed in here,

[1:06:17] I would like to know whether

[1:06:18] or not this plan means that people of dairy will have

[1:06:21] to cut down trees that are providing shade to their home

[1:06:24] because of the potential wildfire risk.

[1:06:27] Because this looks like the same plan

[1:06:28] that's used in Southern California and Southern California

[1:06:33] and Dairy New Hampshire have very,

[1:06:34] very different fire risks.

[1:06:36] So I'd like to know whether

[1:06:37] or not people are going to be told to cut down their trees

[1:06:40] so that they don't have shade.

[1:06:42] What other changes they'll need to do if people will be able

[1:06:45] to continue to build with wood cladding on their homes

[1:06:48] with trees close by.

[1:06:49] Or if we are going

[1:06:50] to be pushing people into different structural choices in

[1:06:54] order to face federal chase federal dollars.

[1:06:57] Now I appreciate that we're trying to deal

[1:06:58] with wildfire risks, but I'm just trying to make sure

[1:07:01] that the glove actually fits in this

[1:07:03] and that what we are doing is something

[1:07:04] that addresses the needs of dairy as opposed

[1:07:06] to flying in California style policies.

[1:07:09] So I would like to know about the impact for people.

[1:07:12] So thank you. Yeah.

[1:07:16] Anybody else coming up to speak?

[1:07:24] Good evening, Michael.

[1:07:26] A on 84 CDO road

[1:07:28] also is appear in the community wildlife protection plan.

[1:07:34] First, kudos to the people that put this together

[1:07:38] to put science up there.

[1:07:39] I think that's actually very important

[1:07:41] where the fire science is based.

[1:07:44] For the record, I'm not a fire scientist.

[1:07:46] I have read fire science

[1:07:48] and I'm curious why so much

[1:07:49] of the fire science is not based on the geography

[1:07:53] of New England For convenience.

[1:07:57] I have a couple numbers here that may be of interest

[1:07:59] to the council as well

[1:08:00] as interested members of the community.

[1:08:04] New Hampshire. Yes, we're number one in poverty,

[1:08:06] which is gonna come up relative to fire risk in a minute.

[1:08:10] We're the second most forested state in the entire country.

[1:08:13] We're second only to Maine.

[1:08:15] If you look at the actual fire risk of wildfires

[1:08:18] to the state, if I told you that only 150 acres less than

[1:08:23] that burned last year statewide, would you be surprised

[1:08:27] less than 150 acres?

[1:08:29] We are one of the least fire prone states in the entire

[1:08:32] country in the field of medicine.

[1:08:36] There are little lies, big lies

[1:08:38] and statistics on this report.

[1:08:41] And I understand how federal grants work.

[1:08:43] I've written many myself

[1:08:44] and received many for different types of research.

[1:08:47] 90 dairy is 96% more likely

[1:08:51] to burn than the rest of the state.

[1:08:53] That is true, that is absolutely true.

[1:08:57] However, if you look at the overall risk

[1:08:59] for the entire state, it is super small

[1:09:02] and a huge portion of a very small number is still a very

[1:09:04] small number contained within here.

[1:09:07] If you look the committee I,

[1:09:09] I again give kudos 25 years of data in here.

[1:09:13] Look how much wildfire has actually burned in dairy.

[1:09:17] I'm just trying to build the understand what the need is for

[1:09:21] such restrictions that are are being suggested in here.

[1:09:27] I apologize, I was only able

[1:09:29] to access this today despite trying to get this

[1:09:31] before page 24.

[1:09:35] If you look 25 years, a quarter of a century, quarter

[1:09:39] of a century, less than a hundred acres burned in dairy,

[1:09:42] less than a hundred acres in a quar

[1:09:44] in a quarter of a century.

[1:09:46] It's absolutely amazing.

[1:09:48] While wildfires are a big number in dairy,

[1:09:52] if you look at the size of the fires,

[1:09:54] we don't stand out from the rest of the state.

[1:09:57] Yes, we've had higher incidents.

[1:09:58] We also are the fourth biggest population in the state.

[1:10:02] These things go hand in hand.

[1:10:04] If you look at the population,

[1:10:06] this is not mentioned in there other than briefly in

[1:10:09] demographics I mentioned we are number one

[1:10:12] and lowest poverty in the whole country.

[1:10:13] By far, by far poverty

[1:10:17] and fire risk are directly correlated.

[1:10:19] There are actually book chapters written

[1:10:21] on this, which are pretty amazing.

[1:10:25] Finally, it it on this leading end, if you look all

[1:10:28] around us, all of the states in New England

[1:10:30] that surround us are all top 10 lowest fire risk,

[1:10:35] which offers some opportunities for us

[1:10:37] at no cost to taxpayers.

[1:10:40] Just going through this report,

[1:10:42] I made several notes on here, several.

[1:10:45] I would urge the council

[1:10:48] and this com committee to take with strong caution.

[1:10:52] The rationale for this,

[1:10:54] the Palisades fire in Southern California.

[1:10:58] My wife mentioned the biomes of California

[1:11:02] and New Hampshire have nothing in common.

[1:11:04] Whether you look at southern New California

[1:11:08] or you look at Northern California,

[1:11:09] the biomes have absolutely nothing in common.

[1:11:13] Are there softwoods and hardwoods between them? Sure.

[1:11:15] If you want to get down to that,

[1:11:16] if you look at the understory structure,

[1:11:18] the soil composition, the actual fuel that's there to burn,

[1:11:23] they are very different.

[1:11:25] And I might add California, Oregon

[1:11:27] and Washington enacted a ban

[1:11:31] on sustainable forestry in 1991.

[1:11:34] They are now the most at risk states

[1:11:36] of having large wildfires elsewhere.

[1:11:39] Contained in this document are

[1:11:43] perhaps true at very small local level.

[1:11:47] If you look at the national level, by far the biggest risk

[1:11:50] of wildfires on public land.

[1:11:52] New Hampshire in this report says 65% home ownership.

[1:11:57] If you discount the fact that 14% of the states owned

[1:12:00] by the federal government, if you will,

[1:12:02] with the white national forest, home ownership is a percent

[1:12:05] of land and the state increases significantly.

[1:12:08] The risk for wildfires is actually lowest on private land.

[1:12:12] And I think that's important to mention.

[1:12:16] There's a lot, there's a lot in here to digest

[1:12:18] and I think a lot is being left on the table,

[1:12:24] that the fire department's gonna come out

[1:12:26] and identify invasive species trees.

[1:12:30] Hey, that's to be commended.

[1:12:33] I'm gonna call out the state representatives

[1:12:35] because there was a bill put in last year

[1:12:36] to restrict homeowners

[1:12:38] or force homeowners to label Japanese, not weed

[1:12:42] before they, they sold their home.

[1:12:44] I asked state legislators across party lines,

[1:12:48] almost no one could identify what it was.

[1:12:50] Is this really gonna help us fight fires?

[1:12:52] There are already private organizations.

[1:12:55] There's an ash organization literally for ash trees

[1:12:58] that have come and climbed ash trees on

[1:13:00] our property to get the seeds from.

[1:13:02] There's an American chestnut society

[1:13:04] that is very active here in New Hampshire.

[1:13:06] We actually have an American native chestnut on our property

[1:13:10] that is guarded by many trail cameras.

[1:13:13] We've had tree, other trees cut down on the property.

[1:13:15] That's a jewel that we have.

[1:13:17] These are all called out in the report.

[1:13:18] Is this really gonna reduce a almost non-existent fire risk?

[1:13:24] There are many other resources

[1:13:27] that are already working on this

[1:13:28] that it would cost the town council,

[1:13:31] it would cost this committee absolutely nothing.

[1:13:33] Eversource, where high power lines are

[1:13:36] mentioned as a fire risk.

[1:13:38] Eversource has been doing an amazing job

[1:13:41] and for the Conservation

[1:13:42] Commission, I've been working with them.

[1:13:44] I can put you in contact with their vegetation managers.

[1:13:47] All three of 'em, from the regional manager

[1:13:49] to the two local ones.

[1:13:50] They have done an amazing job, not only battling all kinds

[1:13:53] of invasive species, preserving native species,

[1:13:56] they have been harassed when accidents happen.

[1:13:58] They're acutely aware of fire risk

[1:14:01] and have done a lot, not only on our property,

[1:14:03] to help mitigate fire risk, to allow me

[1:14:05] to do work on our property

[1:14:07] to restore native plants at the same time

[1:14:10] as reducing fire risk.

[1:14:14] I, I think this is a, i i I will be so bold as

[1:14:17] to say if anyone in this town has done more for conservation

[1:14:21] to reduce fire risk on their own land in the last six years

[1:14:24] in the Leon family and our friends stand up

[1:14:28] and say, I don't think anyone else has.

[1:14:30] With that said on here,

[1:14:33] an assessment was made of properties.

[1:14:35] This was supposedly completed last year.

[1:14:39] I haven't seen anyone on our trail cameras.

[1:14:43] The entire property has trail cameras all over it.

[1:14:45] The fire department or anyone from this

[1:14:47] committee's been to our property.

[1:14:49] You've called it out. I'd love to know.

[1:14:51] I I would've welcomed it. I would've given you a tour.

[1:14:53] Do you wanna walk? Do you wanna ride in the four by four?

[1:14:55] Be happy to give you a tour.

[1:14:57] There's information being reported as complete in there

[1:15:00] that hasn't even been looked at, hasn't even been looked at,

[1:15:03] that this is unfair to the residents of dairy.

[1:15:06] Not just myself, but the people

[1:15:07] that aren't even aware that they're on here.

[1:15:10] That this is absolutely amazing.

[1:15:13] If I can just briefly, I will be done in a minute.

[1:15:17] Made notes throughout this.

[1:15:24] I went over the one 50.

[1:15:28] I think there's some fire reduction

[1:15:29] with the paper that was printed here.

[1:15:34] I would just draw the council's attention as well.

[1:15:36] These fire maps, they look pretty,

[1:15:39] but do these really mean anything?

[1:15:40] Do, do we have such great risk that we need

[1:15:45] so many different maps?

[1:15:48] I think everyone wants the fire department trained

[1:15:50] to be able to respond to wildfires.

[1:15:52] New Hampshire is unique. This is called out national data.

[1:15:56] We have a rather dense population,

[1:15:57] even though we're considered semi-rural, earth suburban,

[1:16:01] however you want to word it.

[1:16:03] Access to land from public roads is almost unprecedented,

[1:16:08] even in New England, Massachusetts has beat us in

[1:16:13] that only by a little.

[1:16:14] And they don't have anything to show as far as

[1:16:17] less fire destroyed.

[1:16:19] This Again,

[1:16:24] I mentioned Eversource is a key stakeholder.

[1:16:27] I would encourage you to please reach out to them.

[1:16:29] They have done a lot. They have spent a lot of money.

[1:16:31] It actually impacts all of our electrical bills,

[1:16:34] but they have done a lot to reduce the fire risk

[1:16:38] English range, which borders our property was listed as one

[1:16:41] of the high risk areas where a fire had burned before.

[1:16:45] Again, if anyone on the town council,

[1:16:46] anyone from the community wants to please get ahold of us,

[1:16:50] I'll give you a tour of the property

[1:16:51] and show you we've found to reduce fire risk

[1:16:52] and I hope other people will not follow in

[1:16:54] California's footsteps.

[1:17:02] The last are the recommendations here,

[1:17:03] and if I can, lemme just find these on here.

[1:17:07] So I mentioned this was page 84,

[1:17:11] the first one, absolutely not complete.

[1:17:13] You guys haven't been to the lands

[1:17:14] unless you just pulled this from satellite data.

[1:17:17] It's, it's absolutely not complete there.

[1:17:26] Disease outbreaks. Okay,

[1:17:28] and then there are recommendations here at the end.

[1:17:36] Are you almost done Mr.

[1:17:37] I'm almost done. Action plans. I'll leave it at this.

[1:17:42] Please contact other stakeholders, especially landowners

[1:17:46] who may not be aware that their names

[1:17:48] appear on this document.

[1:17:52] I would hope he hope that this council members

[1:17:55] of this committee would also lobby your state government

[1:17:58] to eliminate useless prohibitions that make land management

[1:18:02] with fire prevention, fire mitigation, much more difficult.

[1:18:07] That would include the production of burning

[1:18:10] to produce something called biochar.

[1:18:12] If you're an organic farmer, you've probably heard of it.

[1:18:14] If not, it's made by burning large pieces

[1:18:17] and controlling the way they burn

[1:18:18] and eliminating the only one in the nation,

[1:18:21] the useless five inch rule.

[1:18:24] And please ensure that recommendations are based on reality,

[1:18:28] not just grant availability.

[1:18:30] If there's questions, I'm happy to take 'em.

[1:18:35] Thank you.

[1:18:38] Do we have any other people rising for the public hearing?

[1:18:57] Good evening, Richard Trip 44 Winter Road.

[1:19:01] The first thing I wanna say is,

[1:19:02] I hope you're not voting on this tonight.

[1:19:06] It appears to me that there's a lot of questions

[1:19:08] that haven't been answered.

[1:19:10] You know, I'd like to know.

[1:19:12] You know, usually with a grant there comes some strings,

[1:19:16] you know, so what exactly does the town of dairy have to do

[1:19:20] to, you know, benefit from this grant?

[1:19:23] You know, is it they're gonna be further inspections

[1:19:28] of people's property, you know, telling them that they,

[1:19:30] like Mr.

[1:19:32] Land said that in order to qualify for this

[1:19:36] wildfire protection plan, you have

[1:19:38] to cut down trees or whatever.

[1:19:40] You know, I, I too would like a copy of this plan,

[1:19:45] you know, so that I can take a look at it.

[1:19:46] But you know,

[1:19:48] I would probably have a lot more questions if I had a copy

[1:19:51] of the plan, but I don't.

[1:19:52] So once again, I hope you are not intending

[1:19:55] to take any action on this tonight.

[1:20:09] Once again, I'm David Procher, 26 Milmore Road.

[1:20:12] Hi Beth, how are you today? Great, how are you?

[1:20:14] How long have you and the conservation

[1:20:16] Commission been working on this plan?

[1:20:18] For about a year.

[1:20:21] The process started in March of 2025

[1:20:26] and then really got ramped up about this time last year.

[1:20:29] Okay. So you think in that year you've done your

[1:20:30] due dig diligence?

[1:20:32] I think that there is still a lot to do,

[1:20:37] but the point of the plan is to get that process started

[1:20:42] and some of the actions in the plan are, you know,

[1:20:46] it's the work to be done.

[1:20:47] Okay, thank you. Yeah, I'm pretty sure that you

[1:20:50] Were Yes.

[1:20:51] Due diligence. Indeed. Yes.

[1:20:52] Yeah, the Mr. Leon just spent, oh God, what was it,

[1:20:57] 12 minutes talking about his various

[1:20:58] grievances with this plan.

[1:21:00] The Conservation Commission worked hard

[1:21:03] and they do their job well.

[1:21:05] So if Beth says it's good, I I agree with her. Thank you.

[1:21:17] Hello, my name is Colton 19 Meadowbrook Road.

[1:21:22] I actually, what's your full name, sir? Oh, Colton Rady.

[1:21:24] Thank you. Could you spell your last name?

[1:21:26] R-A-T-E-Y. Thank you.

[1:21:28] This is my first time to a meeting like this.

[1:21:30] I just moved here. I didn't know what to expect.

[1:21:34] I came here specifically for this wildfire protection plan.

[1:21:37] It sounded interesting. I also haven't seen the document.

[1:21:42] I kind of came here expecting

[1:21:44] to have a little more information on the specifics of it.

[1:21:49] So I, I mean, I would also like to read the plan.

[1:21:52] I will say though, just in general,

[1:21:54] we all experienced a couple months ago

[1:21:56] the wildfires in Canada.

[1:21:58] The sky was hazy and orange

[1:22:01] and hard to breathe for people with asthma.

[1:22:03] It was very scary. I think we definitely should have a plan

[1:22:07] and I want to thank everyone who worked hard on that plan.

[1:22:11] It is much appreciated.

[1:22:13] Thank you.

[1:22:18] Anybody else coming up,

[1:22:21] Mr.

[1:22:22] Chair? We're seeing none rise online.

[1:22:25] All right, thank you. What's close of public hearing?

[1:22:27] Move to close. Second. Councilor Chase? Yes.

[1:22:32] Councilor Flood? Yes. Councilor Foot? Yes. Councilor Mills?

[1:22:37] Yes. Councilor Healy? Yes. Councilor Spencer?

[1:22:42] Yes. Chair votes yes to close the public hearing.

[1:22:46] Beth and John, do you have any other comments?

[1:22:52] I do. I would like to address some of the comments,

[1:22:56] the questions that were,

[1:22:57] that were voiced in, the comments that were made.

[1:23:01] So first of all, I just want to make sure

[1:23:03] that the public is aware that nobody is going to be asked

[1:23:06] to cut down trees and that that would be counterproductive.

[1:23:10] Right. The so healthy, healthy green trees are helping

[1:23:14] to prevent wildfire actually,

[1:23:16] because the shade that they provide when, when trees die

[1:23:20] and they're no longer providing that shade, then the duff

[1:23:23] underneath can become dry and easy more flammable.

[1:23:27] So certainly nobody is going to be asked to cut down trees

[1:23:31] or be prevented from using wood cladding

[1:23:34] or whatever they want to use on their homes.

[1:23:37] And that, let's see

[1:23:44] that while, yeah, so the number of acres burned

[1:23:49] was mentioned and I, you know, in 25 years

[1:23:52] and we just want to make it known that

[1:23:56] that still takes resources, right.

[1:23:57] So the idea is that

[1:24:00] our fire department's resources are not being used putting

[1:24:04] out these, you know, these wildfires or mulch fires

[1:24:08] or things that are human cause that can be preventable.

[1:24:12] And that's kind of one of the main goals of this plan.

[1:24:16] And I also just wanna make sure that the public is aware

[1:24:19] that we were not looking at data from California,

[1:24:22] nor are we looking at, at the topography

[1:24:27] of New Hampshire.

[1:24:28] Like it's from California.

[1:24:30] So John did very extensive analysis

[1:24:35] of data that is from a data in New Hampshire

[1:24:40] and very specific to our town.

[1:24:42] And we broke the town into multiple zones so

[1:24:45] that we could look specifically at those zones.

[1:24:50] And then the properties of Mr.

[1:24:55] Ms. Leon being called out by name, well I don't think

[1:24:59] that they were personally called out by name,

[1:25:01] but their properties may have been.

[1:25:05] And that is again, part of the process of

[1:25:08] what this community wildfire protection plan is, is

[1:25:11] to identify, you know, those properties

[1:25:15] and through, you know, the actions in this plan

[1:25:20] to analyze them, the, the properties

[1:25:24] that we analyzed were a few conservation properties

[1:25:27] that we were able to within the time

[1:25:29] that we were creating those as sort of a baseline of

[1:25:32] what we are working towards with this.

[1:25:39] Let's see.

[1:25:42] So if I understand this plan is more of a strategic plan

[1:25:45] to identify goals and how to move forward.

[1:25:49] Yes, it is a working document.

[1:25:51] Thank you for that clarification. Yeah, yeah.

[1:25:56] It's not meant to just be a plan,

[1:25:59] close the book and sit on a shelf.

[1:26:01] It's meant to be a framework to provide the process

[1:26:06] that is an ongoing process of preventing wildfire

[1:26:09] because preventing wildfire isn't really something

[1:26:12] that you can just close the book on and say we did it.

[1:26:15] It's, it's an ongoing, it's an ongoing process

[1:26:20] and I also just wanna make sure that the public knows that

[1:26:24] nobody is going to be coming onto their property

[1:26:26] to inspect it if they are not consenting to that.

[1:26:31] And that if they would like to consent to that.

[1:26:33] There is a program called Firewise Communities

[1:26:36] and that is called out in the plan.

[1:26:39] And one of the goals of the plan is to, is

[1:26:43] to do neighborhood assessments within the framework

[1:26:46] of this Firewise communities program

[1:26:49] to help homeowners take an active role in reducing the

[1:26:54] wildfire risk in their neighborhoods.

[1:26:58] I think that was based on my notes. You were,

[1:27:01] Hey John, if you could just introduce yourself a little

[1:27:03] bit more and your background.

[1:27:05] Yeah, so I retired from the

[1:27:10] US Forest Service a couple years ago

[1:27:12] and began working part-time with the state of New Hampshire

[1:27:16] in the Forests and Lands division.

[1:27:19] Mostly helping towns that have questions

[1:27:22] or concerns about wildfire

[1:27:24] and wildfire risk, helping them look strategically

[1:27:28] and critically at what they have in their land base.

[1:27:34] I believe last winter we held a kind

[1:27:39] of a rollout of the CWPP, I think here where we talked about

[1:27:44] the plan that we were developing for dairy.

[1:27:47] And part of that was talking about some of the changes

[1:27:51] that we're seeing our state and our region.

[1:27:54] We're seeing things like rising temperatures

[1:27:58] reduced snowpack in the winter

[1:28:02] that helps dry our fuels out

[1:28:04] and make them more available to burn in the spring

[1:28:08] and our spring fire season.

[1:28:10] We're also seeing a lot of new insects

[1:28:13] and diseases, particularly defoliating insects

[1:28:17] that remove leaves that create that cool shaded

[1:28:23] understory that resists fire spread.

[1:28:26] So we're seeing some of these new conditions in our state

[1:28:31] and much like the hazard mitigation plans that began

[1:28:36] when we started seeing the problematic flooding a long time

[1:28:39] ago, you know, we think

[1:28:43] that fires might become more of an issue on our state

[1:28:48] as we move into the future.

[1:28:51] And so it's great to work with proactive towns like dairy

[1:28:55] that want to kind of look critically at what's going on

[1:28:59] in your land base.

[1:29:01] And as Beth mentioned,

[1:29:06] the recommendations in the CWPP are recommendations.

[1:29:12] We're not gonna be going on anybody's property

[1:29:15] where we're not invited.

[1:29:16] We're not gonna be telling anyone to cut their trees down.

[1:29:21] We are going to tailor any fire projects

[1:29:27] to things that we work with the landowner

[1:29:30] that is interested in in working on it.

[1:29:33] And there are things that apply

[1:29:38] to New Hampshire that work well

[1:29:40] and have been proven to work well.

[1:29:43] And we also, in some of our

[1:29:48] field trips we did notice you do have some

[1:29:53] species, some stands of trees, particularly pitch pine,

[1:29:58] red pine and some oak species that do carry fire

[1:30:03] that are, are fire adapted and fire prone tree species.

[1:30:09] So it's good to know where those areas are in your town.

[1:30:11] It's good to know where those areas lie in relation to

[1:30:15] human values and we made some suggestions of ways

[1:30:20] to reduce the wildfire risk in some of those areas

[1:30:23] that are more likely

[1:30:25] to burn actively if if a fire did occur in them.

[1:30:35] Any questions?

[1:30:37] I have a couple of other items to add to this.

[1:30:41] I, I agree wholeheartedly with John's comment about

[1:30:45] when we had flooding in the Public Works department,

[1:30:47] mother's Day flood among others,

[1:30:49] and that forced us to look as a town across the board

[1:30:54] to see how we could mitigate future flooding incidences.

[1:30:58] So forced us to look at culvert capacities, forced us

[1:31:02] to look at low lying areas, could we facilitate fortify?

[1:31:07] These were all public pieces of infrastructure,

[1:31:09] but it got us to think about some

[1:31:11] of the areas in the future.

[1:31:12] We couldn't all take care of the items

[1:31:14] that were being suggested,

[1:31:16] but it was a matter of having a list

[1:31:18] of recommendations and, and working forward.

[1:31:20] And I think that that's what this plan is.

[1:31:21] It's your baseline to look forward at things

[1:31:24] that are potentially going to be issues

[1:31:26] and you want to take a look at that as

[1:31:29] resources are are available.

[1:31:31] Second item I wanted to talk about,

[1:31:33] this is more procedural item.

[1:31:36] This particular plan was posted two separate times.

[1:31:40] So you had your consent reading

[1:31:42] for the September 1st agenda, so

[1:31:45] before the holiday weekend, I'm sorry,

[1:31:47] before we went into the end of August.

[1:31:50] That was posted as part

[1:31:51] of your consent reading on September 1st.

[1:31:54] You made that as a public hearing for tonight.

[1:31:57] And then again for tonight's meeting under the town council

[1:32:01] agenda, you can go in and click on that.

[1:32:03] So the full, it's 111 page PDF plan

[1:32:08] was made available on that line.

[1:32:10] So I just want to put that out there just

[1:32:12] to dispel any concerns in that area.

[1:32:21] Councilor Mills? Yes, there's just a couple

[1:32:22] of three things I wanted to indicate as far

[1:32:27] as taxpayers are concerned, there was apps,

[1:32:29] there's no fiscal impact to this

[1:32:33] and there are no grants being applied for whatsoever

[1:32:39] as far as I, I was happy to hear

[1:32:41] that there's a relatively small amount of burned acreage

[1:32:45] and, and brush fires and forest fires here in New Hampshire.

[1:32:49] And I think that's mostly due to the due diligence

[1:32:51] of our entire state

[1:32:53] and local fire departments keeping it that low.

[1:32:56] And that should be a matter of

[1:33:00] congratulatory rather than a something punitive.

[1:33:03] And I guess my third thing is this is,

[1:33:05] this is not a punitive document at all.

[1:33:08] This is prevention

[1:33:10] and I will be making this resolution and voting forth.

[1:33:17] Councilor Chase, I'd also like

[1:33:18] to make one thing also clear.

[1:33:20] This is, as Councilor Webb spoken,

[1:33:23] this is a not a regulatory document.

[1:33:27] There will be no ordinances being put forth

[1:33:29] through the council that will force any landowner

[1:33:32] to do anything that he does not want to with his property.

[1:33:37] So just clarification for the at home.

[1:33:39] So it's, it's a guideline essentially

[1:33:41] and it can be changed, amended attitude, deleted,

[1:33:43] subtracted from all that ongoing basis.

[1:33:46] Yes. With, so just for clarification,

[1:33:51] I just have a, a couple comments

[1:33:53] because I was involved in this

[1:33:55] and I want to thank Beth for also reigning in my own A DHD

[1:34:00] and my own experience from 33 years

[1:34:02] of looking at fires here in town

[1:34:05] and having gone to structure fires

[1:34:08] that created multi-arm brush fires and vice versa.

[1:34:14] So I look at, I look at it from a different perspective

[1:34:18] because I don't look at it from the California perspective,

[1:34:21] these big massive fires of the fires that we're having up in

[1:34:26] Colorado, stuff, much different floor and fauna.

[1:34:28] We don't have the creo containing fuels

[1:34:32] that are in other parts of the country.

[1:34:34] But having seen such simple things

[1:34:36] as a person tossing a cigarette off a deck, get

[1:34:40] tossed into mulch

[1:34:41] and have their house burned down,

[1:34:42] which we've had on more than one occasions have a pretty

[1:34:46] good understanding how a little bit of wind

[1:34:49] in a small brush fire can impact a house.

[1:34:53] And that's what we're really looking at with this plan is

[1:34:57] how people can mitigate

[1:35:01] and help maybe prevent in their own yards

[1:35:04] and their own things

[1:35:05] and the resources that they can have to reach that stuff.

[1:35:08] Because we are looking at a changing biome in this state.

[1:35:13] Mr. Neely who has experience with Western wildfires

[1:35:18] pointed out that we're dealing with drought, insect disease,

[1:35:23] ash bore, if you've walked in some of the woods,

[1:35:25] you can see some of the damages that they bring down

[1:35:28] and these trees bring down.

[1:35:30] We also looked at,

[1:35:33] and I walked through, it was very informative, a lot

[1:35:37] of the conservation lands that we

[1:35:39] as the town council are the ultimate stewards

[1:35:41] for in this community.

[1:35:43] And got to see the fire species that are occurring

[1:35:47] in these conservation lands that the only way these stands

[1:35:51] of trees pitch pine in particular

[1:35:55] are there is

[1:35:56] because there was a significant fire in the past on those

[1:36:00] conservation lands.

[1:36:04] New Hampshire has had a history of some of this stuff

[1:36:06] and this is a proactive document to help guide people

[1:36:10] to use as a resource.

[1:36:11] It's not perfect, it shouldn't be

[1:36:16] because if it was a perfect document

[1:36:18] then we wouldn't have a problem.

[1:36:21] We need, we need documents

[1:36:23] and to have discussions like this without,

[1:36:27] and I have all the faith in Beth Carver

[1:36:31] and Val

[1:36:34] and all the other people

[1:36:35] that work very hard in this document.

[1:36:38] And it like our hazardous mitigation band plan,

[1:36:43] which it is based on, it looks at

[1:36:48] how we can educate homeowners

[1:36:50] and the different tools that we can use.

[1:36:52] And if I remember right, the properties that you identify

[1:36:56] by name are because they're large property owners

[1:36:58] with large tracks of land.

[1:37:00] Correct. Yeah.

[1:37:02] So looking at again, risk assessment tools.

[1:37:06] So I want to thank Beth

[1:37:09] and John for their hard work.

[1:37:12] It's not a perfect document,

[1:37:16] but it shouldn't be Mr.

[1:37:20] Chair,

[1:37:23] How often do we anticipate that this document's going

[1:37:27] to be reviewed for any changes?

[1:37:29] I did just pull it up.

[1:37:32] I know one of the people that spoke during public,

[1:37:35] the public hearing had questioned

[1:37:36] that their name being in the document

[1:37:38] and when you start tying names to to parcels

[1:37:42] and those people move and the documents now 10 years old,

[1:37:46] how is that gonna be addressed?

[1:37:48] Or is the document gonna be be reviewed every

[1:37:50] year, every couple years?

[1:37:53] Because I did notice throughout the document

[1:37:55] that parcel IDs did have individuals

[1:37:58] that currently own the property tied to it.

[1:38:03] I would suggest that it goes sort of similar

[1:38:07] to the hazard mitigation plan like five, five years.

[1:38:12] It does say that it's a living document

[1:38:15] and so if you get something that changes

[1:38:20] in your town, say a wind event, another

[1:38:24] insect and disease that changes your fuels,

[1:38:27] then you do have the option to move earlier and,

[1:38:32] but I would, I would say trying to align it

[1:38:35] with a hazard mitigation plan on a five year basis.

[1:38:38] Okay. Thank you Mr. Chair. Seeing no further? Nope.

[1:38:45] Thank you Mr. Chair. So I,

[1:38:50] Sorry, sorry.

[1:38:52] So sounds like some people saying they haven't seen this

[1:38:55] document or there's some, a lot of questions

[1:38:57] and it seems that there might be some ambi

[1:38:59] ambiguity with some people.

[1:39:00] So I think just to be prudent due,

[1:39:05] due diligence, I think maybe I'll make the motion

[1:39:07] to table this until October 20th.

[1:39:09] It's not gonna, Alright,

[1:39:13] any discussion on the motion?

[1:39:16] I just have one comment. I'm gonna agree

[1:39:18] with the motion to table.

[1:39:20] I think this is a, a great document,

[1:39:22] but I think to alleviate the public concerns,

[1:39:24] it'll allow them time to look at it

[1:39:26] and if they do have pertinent comments to please email you.

[1:39:31] And again, you're the people that have worked it

[1:39:34] and offered it and I will have full faith in

[1:39:36] how you develop it

[1:39:39] And just follow up with that Mr.

[1:39:40] Chair. And I do support the document as is,

[1:39:42] but I, I'm just trying to be fair and,

[1:39:44] and due process for everybody out there.

[1:39:47] So I just think that's the reason for my motion. Yeah.

[1:39:51] Any other discussion? Just for, for clarification,

[1:39:54] when we bring it back up, it won't be a public hearing

[1:39:57] or will we have a public hearing?

[1:40:01] So I think procedurally we'll have to decide if, if

[1:40:04] anything has been substantively changed.

[1:40:07] I think you have to reopen that as a public hearing.

[1:40:11] So I think that's just something we have to be mindful.

[1:40:14] If it there's no changes, then you're coming back up

[1:40:17] as a tabled manner on the 20th.

[1:40:19] So perhaps procedurally then is for Beth to notify you

[1:40:24] by our October 6th meeting?

[1:40:27] Yes. That if there are substantive changes,

[1:40:31] then we can put a public hearing as part

[1:40:34] of bring it back forth.

[1:40:36] Yeah. Okay.

[1:40:38] Right. And I think that would just answer a lot

[1:40:40] of questions for anyone at home or,

[1:40:41] or even staff does anything they wanna double check

[1:40:45] or amend or whatnot.

[1:40:46] Just give everyone the benefit of doubt and,

[1:40:48] and not rush it through if we don't have

[1:40:50] to. Thank you Mr. Chair.

[1:40:53] Any other comments? Okay. Councilor Chase? Yes.

[1:40:57] Councilor Flood? Yes. Councilor Foot? Yes. Councilor Mills?

[1:41:01] Yes. Councilor Healey? Yes. Councillor Spencer?

[1:41:06] Yes. Chair votes yes to table this

[1:41:08] to the October 20th meeting.

[1:41:11] Thank you. Thank You. Thank you Beth. Thank you John.

[1:41:24] New business. Just double checking. Yep.

[1:41:28] We're onto new business and working at 26 86.

[1:41:32] Resolution 2026 dash 0 5 1 to direct the tax collector not

[1:41:36] to execute certain deeds.

[1:41:37] Tax collector Stacey Bevo presenting.

[1:41:47] Good evening. So I am here this evening

[1:41:51] regarding a tax deed.

[1:41:54] I began the process tax deed process in August.

[1:41:57] Currently there are 30 parcels

[1:41:59] for which I am requesting deed waivers for various reasons

[1:42:02] as previously provided, we will continue to work diligently

[1:42:06] to reduce these numbers.

[1:42:08] Thank you.

[1:42:13] Any questions? Nope.

[1:42:16] Just to point out how the, the work

[1:42:18] that the tax collector does

[1:42:20] when it was first put on the agenda,

[1:42:21] how many items were on it?

[1:42:24] 37. 37. And how many are on today?

[1:42:27] 30. So in the, just in the past week

[1:42:30] or so, you've been able to reduce that number by seven?

[1:42:35] Yes. So thank you for your hard work on that.

[1:42:37] Thank you.

[1:42:42] Do you No other discussion.

[1:42:44] Do we need a public hearing on this?

[1:42:46] No, no, no new business.

[1:42:48] Mr. Chair. Seeing no other questions

[1:42:50] or concerns, I move resolution number 2026 dash five one

[1:42:55] to direct the tax collector not

[1:42:57] to execute certain tax deeds, whereas Section 5.1

[1:43:01] of the Town Charter establishes the town council

[1:43:04] as the legislative and governing body of the town.

[1:43:07] And whereas RSA 80 76 sets forth the procedure

[1:43:11] for conveying tax deeded properties to the town.

[1:43:15] And whereas pursuant to RSA 80 76 sections two

[1:43:19] and two A, the governing body may refuse

[1:43:22] to accept a deed on certain properties

[1:43:25] whenever in its judgment, acceptance

[1:43:27] and ownership of those properties would subject the

[1:43:30] municipality to undesirable obligations or liability risks.

[1:43:35] And whereas the town is identified properties eligible

[1:43:38] for tax deed,

[1:43:39] however, acceptance

[1:43:41] of ownership would not be in the town's best interest.

[1:43:44] Now therefore, be it resolved

[1:43:46] that the tax collector is hereby directed not

[1:43:49] to execute a tax deed

[1:43:50] as set forth on the attached list pursuant

[1:43:53] to RSA 80 76.

[1:43:56] Section three. The Town Council may

[1:43:59] revisit this decision at any time

[1:44:02] and may later direct the tax collector to issue a deed

[1:44:04] for the property subject to this directive.

[1:44:07] This resolution shall take

[1:44:09] effect immediately upon its passage.

[1:44:12] Second,

[1:44:15] A motion made by Councilor

[1:44:16] Mills seconded by Councilor Foot.

[1:44:17] Do we have any discussion on it? See none. Councillor Chase?

[1:44:20] Yes. Councilor Flood? Yes. Councilor Foot? Yes.

[1:44:24] Council Councilor Mills? Yes. Councilor Healy? Yes.

[1:44:28] Councilor Spencer? Yes. Chair votes Yes.

[1:44:32] Measure passes. Seven zero. Moving on to Thank you.

[1:44:36] Thank you. Sorry.

[1:44:39] Moving on to new business 26 dash 88.

[1:44:41] Resolution 2026 dash 0 5 3

[1:44:43] to authorize an interagency agreement

[1:44:45] for Justice Assistant Grant with Rockingham County, please.

[1:44:50] Chief fii presenting.

[1:44:52] Good evening again. Again, counsel.

[1:44:55] This evening I want to talk about

[1:44:57] the 2026 Justice Assistance Grant program.

[1:45:01] It's a two step process

[1:45:02] as it has been in many years in the past.

[1:45:05] First, we need to execute an inter-local agreement

[1:45:07] between the town of DER and Rockingham County.

[1:45:10] They will be the fiscal agent for this grant.

[1:45:13] We were recently advised

[1:45:14] that the 2026 Justice Assistance Grant program was open

[1:45:18] and that the town of Dairy was in line to receive an award

[1:45:21] of $14,341.

[1:45:25] Since Rockingham County is the fiscal agent,

[1:45:28] they charge a 7% administrative fee to be the agent

[1:45:32] and they will receive $1,003 of that total,

[1:45:36] which will mean the Town of Dairy will see a net total

[1:45:39] of $13,338 from that grant.

[1:45:44] Just by way of introduction, our plan this year is

[1:45:47] to utilize those funds to replace

[1:45:50] expired ballistic plates that we carry in our cruisers.

[1:45:55] These are rifle rated plates versus the typical body armor

[1:45:59] that our officers wear, which protect against handgun

[1:46:02] caliber ammunition.

[1:46:03] Typically, we would propose

[1:46:07] to buy 12 sets of, of that, those plates and carriers.

[1:46:13] You will see this again more fully,

[1:46:15] the plan more fully on October 6th at a public hearing.

[1:46:20] Captain Micho will be be

[1:46:21] before you that evening to present the plan.

[1:46:24] All we're looking for tonight is to get your permission

[1:46:29] to execute the agreement with Rockham County.

[1:46:32] I'm happy to answer questions.

[1:46:34] Any questions? Seeing none, Mr.

[1:46:39] Chair, I move resolution number

[1:46:41] 20 26 0 5 3

[1:46:44] to authorize an interagency agreement with Rockingham County

[1:46:48] for the US Bureau of Justice Assistance grant

[1:46:52] for law enforcement equipment.

[1:46:53] Whereas Section nine period 15 of the Town Charter

[1:46:58] authorizes the Town Council to accept grant funding

[1:47:01] and whereas the Town Council has long recognized the need

[1:47:04] to keep up with technological advances

[1:47:06] for emergency services

[1:47:08] and whereas Rockingham County has received a Bureau

[1:47:11] of Justice Assistance grant in the federal FY 26 budget

[1:47:16] and whereas the town of Dairy qualifies as a subrecipient

[1:47:20] for signing by signing an inter-agency agreement.

[1:47:23] Now therefore be it resolved in counsel

[1:47:26] that the town administrator is hereby authorized

[1:47:29] to sign the Inter-Agency Agreement with Rockingham County

[1:47:33] as a prerequisite to receive US Bureau

[1:47:35] of Justice Assistance grant funds.

[1:47:38] This resolution shall take effect

[1:47:40] immediately upon its passage.

[1:47:42] Second Motion made by Councilor Mills,

[1:47:45] seconded by Councilor Foot.

[1:47:47] Any discussion on the motion? Councilor Chase? Yes.

[1:47:52] Councilor Flood? Yes. Councilor Foot? Yes. Councilor Mills?

[1:47:57] Yes. Councilor Healy? Yes. Councilor Spencer?

[1:48:01] Yes. And the chair votes? Yes.

[1:48:05] Resolution passes seven zero.

[1:48:07] Moving on to councilor comments and liaison reports.

[1:48:10] Do you have any Councilor Spencer?

[1:48:14] I do. Just wanna, I just wanna commend, I I, it continues

[1:48:18] to impress me how much our departments and, and individuals

[1:48:23] and working for the town.

[1:48:25] Just they, they're constantly improving professionally

[1:48:30] and I just think that we're a standout and,

[1:48:33] and they set an example for other towns

[1:48:35] between our police this evening, our town clerk last month

[1:48:38] that, or a couple months ago.

[1:48:40] We just, it seems there's always somebody

[1:48:42] or some department really looking to advance

[1:48:44] and do better for, for the community.

[1:48:47] And I just wanna thank them for that and acknowledge that.

[1:48:50] I think we're, we're pretty special in that

[1:48:54] Second that Any other councilor comments this evening?

[1:49:00] I disagree very wholeheartedly with Councilor Spencer.

[1:49:06] I have none this evening. So

[1:49:09] My favorite motion.

[1:49:10] Motion to adjourn please.

[1:49:12] Second. Motion to adjourn made by Councilor Mill.

[1:49:15] Second and by Councilor Flood. Councilor Chase? Yes.

[1:49:20] Councilor Flood? Yes. Councilor Flood? Yes. Councilor Mills?

[1:49:24] Yes. Councilor Healy. Yes. Councillor Spencer?

[1:49:28] Yes. Chair votes Yes. Meeting adjourned.

[1:49:31] Thank you everyone. I.

Town Council - 09/15/26

Agenda

Transcript