[0:04] All right, we are coming to order for our October 7th regular council meeting, and
[0:09] as always, we're starting to pledge allegiance. All right, please, and Mary Anne,
[0:14] will you please lead us? I pledge allegiance to the fight of the United States of
[0:20] America and to the Republic for which it stands, my nation under God, indivisible
[0:27] with liberty and justice for all.
[0:32] All right.
[0:35] Roll call. We have Councilperson James, Vice Mayor Pacheco, Councilperson Graham,
[0:40] Councilperson Caseman, and myself, the mayor. All 5 of us present and accounted for.
[0:46] Uh, we have 1 vacancy and is Jim participating remotely? Is he dialed in? Right there,
[0:52] yeah. Jim, can you hear us?
[1:01] Jim, can you hear us? I can
[1:07] All right. Welcome to the meeting. Yes, I got. All right.
[1:14] Um, So, uh, that, that does it for the roll call. We do have a quorum, um, action
[1:19] item, um, we have, uh, an applicant for our vacancy from Sean Lloyd's resignation,
[1:27] and, uh, I believe Trey is here tonight. Yes, and, and, and he is, I can tell he's
[1:33] just raring to get. So, uh, is there a motion? Yeah, I move that the Round Hill Town
[1:40] Council appoint Trey Worth to fill the unexpired term of Councilmember Sean Lloyd.
[1:47] A special election is scheduled for November 2, 2027. Have to put that that far away.
[1:56] After which the newly elected town council members will qualify for the office.
[2:04] Is there a second? Is it really not until 2027? Yes, that's the next general election.
[2:10] You just missed the deadline to get into this 10, OK. All right. So that was moved
[2:15] by um uh Councilperson Graham and seconded by Vice Mayor Pacheco. The motion is to
[2:20] appoint Trey Worth to the unexpired term of Sean Lloyd. Is there any discussions?
[2:26] All right, this is a voice code. Paula James, I, Isaac Pacheco, I, Mary and Graham,
[2:31] I, Beth Caseman, I. Jim, how do you vote?
[2:37] I
[2:39] Uh, Jim Walker, I, sorry, I didn't know that I could vote on, on live.
[2:46] You can vote. All right then, uh, unanimously and Trey Worth is hereby appointed.
[2:58] I'd like to invite you to come up to the table just getting the rest of the meeting.
[3:02] You won't be able to vote for the remainder of the meeting because you haven't yet
[3:05] been sworn. We have his son. Um, oh, the caucus is next.
[3:11] I have to do that first, right, before you, Mr. May, I'm on your time. You do that
[3:16] whenever you want. No, no, we'll, we'll let him participate. So let's go ahead with
[3:20] the oath ceremony, OK.
[3:25] It's really interesting because he's my, my neighbor that is so I I would get we
[3:30] share a driveway. You might be hard on me. Are you tough on me? No, no, not at all.
[3:36] There's no words that I don't know how to read, right? No, no. All you have to do
[3:40] is repeat after me. Let's see. So we've got 3 copies of the oath, one for the town
[3:44] clerk, one for Trey, and one for myself to take back. But before we do that, Say
[3:50] a few words. Uh, Mr. Mayor, town council members, thank you for having me tonight.
[3:55] Uh, very much appreciate what you all do. It makes our town run. I live here. I very
[3:59] much appreciate it, so I thank you. Gary sent me with a few words, right?
[4:06] Uh, dear Trey, thank you for seeking and accepting an opportunity to serve the town
[4:10] of Round Hill. Your work and commitment to your role on the town council will contribute
[4:14] to the success and sustainability of this wonderful community in Western Loudon.
[4:19] I was preparing to attend the town council meeting and personally administrator,
[4:23] administer your oath. Uh, but one of my dedicated deputy clerks, Mike Amos, advised
[4:29] that you are his neighbor and a good friend. Given the connection you both share,
[4:33] I'm delighted that Mike can administer your oath of office. As a resident of Brownville,
[4:38] I know that Mike is honored to have this professional privilege. I am. As a former
[4:42] resident of Hamilton, I'm quite fond of the Western Loudon. Uh, so never hesitate
[4:46] to reach out if I can assist you while you serve your capacity of, uh, town of Round
[4:52] Hill Councilman.
[4:55] So now, Can you please raise your right hand.
[5:01] I, Trey Worth, Trey Worth, do you solemnly swear, do you solemnly swear that I will
[5:05] support the Constitution of the United States, that I will support the Constitution
[5:09] of the United States and the Constitution of the Commonwealth of Virginia, and the
[5:12] Constitution of the Commonwealth of Virginia, and that I will faithfully and impartially
[5:17] and impartially discharge all the duties incumbent upon me. Discharge all the duties
[5:24] incumbent upon me. Discharge all the duties incumbent upon me as a member of the
[5:28] Round Hill Town Council, as a member of the Round Hill Town Council, according to
[5:32] the best of my ability, according to the best of my ability. So help me God. So help
[5:35] me God. All right, very good.
[5:41] They signed in 555. All 3, all 3.
[5:56] I
[6:00] You know, gorilla, yes. It's hard sometimes, you know, you use the blackboard over
[6:06] that.
[6:14] And then if we could get my, yeah, I've got one for you. OK, I've got one for the
[6:19] town. Thank you, and I've got one for me.
[6:25] Say neighbors.
[6:30] You
[6:32] All right, thanks, Mike. Thank you, council members, Mr. Mayor. Thank you. Mike.
[6:36] I'll be back to my seat and be quiet. Thank you, Mike. All right, now I said, yeah,
[6:42] thank you everybody. Now you can participate and Trey, if you want the floor, I'll
[6:46] give you a chance to make the opening remarks if you want to, but you're no pressure.
[6:49] There will be council comments at the end of the evening. Uh, no comments right now.
[6:53] I just appreciate everybody and the opportunity for this. Thank you so much. All
[6:58] right, welcome aboard. Thank you. All right, we're gonna dive right into it. We got
[7:02] a presentation now, Hayman Lane well exploration.
[7:07] Peter's joining us. Hi Peter. Hey, good afternoon.
[7:12] Can you hear me OK? Yes sir. Yes, yeah. Hi. Hi. Good evening. Good evening, council
[7:17] members, Mr. Mayor, um, everybody, all staff, nice, nice to be with everybody this
[7:22] evening, um. I'm trying to share my screen. Oh, I can send you a.
[7:40] You can try now.
[7:46] Are you able to see my slides here? Yes, yes.
[7:53] I'm on this in presentation mode here. You have this via email as well, yeah, OK.
[8:00] It will be on the um packet. Good. Um, well, good evening, everybody. Uh, uh, Harry
[8:08] and Melissa asked me to come this evening to provide an update on the activities
[8:12] we've been working on. Um, I, I thought, uh, for the benefit of those that may not
[8:17] be as familiar, just take a quick step backwards to talk about how we arrived at
[8:22] where we're at, where we're at, and what we're doing currently. Um, so before you
[8:26] is a map, obviously of town, um, in the red dots that are around the town and within
[8:33] town are the existing water supply wells that serve the town, such as the 21 NA wells
[8:38] to the north, well D we put in a couple of years ago, 719, 22A, etc. and, um,
[8:47] Uh, Stone Lee Wells off to the west, um. The other areas highlighted around here
[8:54] are properties where we've done some exploration and Looked at a variety of opportunities
[9:00] to develop to develop, uh, the goal here is to develop a new water supply well or
[9:04] wells for the town to, to supplement the existing system and creates more redundancy.
[9:09] That's what we're, that's our big picture goal here. And um we've looked at a few
[9:14] options including, um, you know, the yellow highlighted properties on here. I won't
[9:18] go into each one. We've done some exploration on those. There's some targets developed.
[9:26] Uh, there's been a host of efforts in each of those, you know, has its place in the
[9:30] exploration program. Uh, we met with the town council and reviewed a detailed plan
[9:37] in 2025. In the summary that came out of that 2025 presentation and discussion with
[9:43] the town council was, these are the bulleted items that we could take action on,
[9:48] and we ultimately decided to move forward with one of these in earnest, uh, which
[9:52] made good sense, but just wanted to kind of highlight these so we all kind of remember
[9:57] where we were and then kind of where we're going. At the time, we talked about possibly
[10:02] developing well C to the north, that, that has some work associated with it, possibly
[10:07] well Simpson's Creek, Simpson's Creek, um, a well that's an existing well that we'll
[10:12] talk about some more tonight. Beaman Lane is a property that's owned by the town
[10:17] just on the west side of Slear Lake that present, presents some great opportunity
[10:22] for developing a new source of supply. That's what our discussion will be about here
[10:26] the rest of this evening. And then, uh, the other ones that we highlighted at that
[10:31] time were possibly pursuing something on Yaton Lane, town-owned property, possibly
[10:37] formulating a first right of refusal with the Hornings to develop water on their
[10:40] property. Um, and then the last one was really to just try to work on these items
[10:45] and others in parallel. But for good reason to put the, put the town's efforts in,
[10:50] in, uh, dollars in one place and try to check one of these off and see if we can
[10:55] get a, a new, an asset for the town on town-owned property, we've been focusing our
[11:01] effort on the Hayman Lane property. Um, so what have we done out there? And I'm gonna
[11:07] flip back and forth. Uh, after we were given the directive to proceed out there,
[11:12] we had, we had developed, um, not developed, but we, we had conducted some geophysical
[11:17] surveys on this property. Those are the blue lines here, and those resulted in identifying
[11:22] two new test wells called R&D T1 and R&D T2. Just for folks that haven't seen these
[11:28] profiles before, this is an electrical resistivity profile. It's a, it's kind of
[11:33] an image of the subsurface of the ground. We're looking for fractured rock. So, T1
[11:38] is a target that we're after. It looked like a good break in the rock. So we permitted
[11:43] these through the state health department, the local health department. Um, that
[11:47] process took several months. It was really very challenging and, and drawn out for
[11:53] a variety of reasons, but nonetheless, we received the permits. The town created
[11:58] access out to these for the drill rigs. That was a that was a really significant
[12:02] process. Um T1 came in at 18 gallons a minute, not, not the highest yielding well
[12:10] we're looking for, um. And, and provides us the, the information that um
[12:20] For those that haven't been in discussions, well, Simpsons Creek is a well that was
[12:23] drilled in the late 1980s. It's a 200+ gallon a minute well. It's never been hooked
[12:28] up for some concerns about contamination, some concerns about its location, variety
[12:34] of things. But this well is coming into foresight today because we have treatment
[12:38] technologies. The town has an existing treatment. Um, there may be more treatment
[12:44] available in the future. And the town now owns this parcel. They didn't previously
[12:48] own that. So, You know, things look different in today's world than they did previously,
[12:53] uh, when you got a 200 gallon minute well sitting here close to your system, um.
[12:58] So we're able to use this, you know, T1 wasn't as favorable as we want, but we're
[13:02] able to use that as leverage to go back to the health department and say, OK, you
[13:06] know, we, we, we sort of didn't succeed here, but the value of these other wells
[13:11] is coming forward, and we really need your support, uh, and, and backing to, to move
[13:17] forward with these. We did not drill T2 to date, um, simply because we considered
[13:23] a less favorable target. And, um, given the successes at T1, we didn't want to invest
[13:29] any of the town's dollars there. It can always be drilled in the future if you wanted
[13:33] to. But we just, based upon everything we've learned and where we're at, we didn't
[13:38] think that was the best use of um resources at this time. Uh, well, 27A, you may
[13:46] recall from our discussion back in 2025, had a bunch of junk in it. We found some,
[13:50] we tried to run a video camera down there. There were sticks and all kinds of, uh,
[13:55] stuff down in there. So you couldn't really do anything with it. While the drill
[13:57] rig was on site. We flushed this well out. We cleaned it out, and the airlift yield,
[14:02] that's the measurement from the drill rig at the time of drilling, was 80 to 100
[14:07] gallons a minute. So really quite favorable. That's very good, um. So where we're
[14:14] at today is um We proceeded in the background to contact the state health department
[14:20] and say, OK, health department, we really need to move forward with 27A and Simpsons
[14:26] Creek A for the town. You know, these are assets that they have, they're on town
[14:30] property. Um, we need to get a site of site approval for these. And, and really,
[14:36] it's a renewal of a very old permit from The 1980s. Originally, these wells were
[14:41] drilled by developers for public water supply. Um, they've just been sitting for
[14:47] a very long time. Uh, after numerous conversations with the state health department,
[14:53] they've been very receptive to this. And as a matter of fact, came out, uh, I think
[14:57] it's just about 2 weeks ago now. Uh, we got the, the county health department out
[15:01] there in parallel with them. The conversations and meetings have all been had. I'm
[15:07] told that the permits are forthcoming. I contacted them today and asked if we could,
[15:12] if they could help me. obtain those so I could tell you tonight that I had them,
[15:17] but unfortunately, that fell on deaf ears. Um. I'm just waiting for the paperwork.
[15:24] I believe that we're on the edge of receiving well site approval letters for 27A
[15:30] in Simpson's Creek A, which would really be pretty um great in today's landscape
[15:36] of approving wells and locations. It's a, it's a real challenge, but we had the leverage
[15:40] of Um, the, the T1 situation and where they are on town property, I think has provided
[15:48] a lot of, um, you know, good, uh, support for that case. Um, so what do we need to
[15:56] do with these wells once we get our approval letter? Um, I just wanted to, this is
[16:02] a summary table we looked at previously. I well see on here, we don't talk about
[16:06] that, but Simpsons Creek A well, the depth of this total depth of this well is 500
[16:13] ft 503 ft deep. There are multiple water-bearing zones in this well. Some of the
[16:17] water is quite deep, which we like, down to 200 and 300 ft. Uh, the airlift yield
[16:22] at that time in 1988 was 217 gallons a minute and 27A. Um, although a good well has
[16:30] a shallower fracture zone at 100 ft, but it will provide value, um, it does have
[16:36] a, a, a deeper zone, but these two wells, we kind of, right now, our vision is that
[16:41] they'll work together, um, on and off, but you know, we'll have to get through the
[16:46] process.
[16:48] Yeah The steps that are needed to go forward once the Well, the first step is to
[16:55] finalize the permitting process with the, the state health department and the county
[16:59] health department. I'm hoping that that will be concluded here very soon. Uh, well,
[17:05] Simpson's Creek A is very old. The casings deteriorated. It's not usable in its current
[17:10] state. It needs to be re-drilled and reconstructed. So there's a, there's a drilling
[17:16] process there that needs to be gone through. Um, we would suggest running some borehole
[17:21] geophysics down that well to understand where the fractures are, to help us determine
[17:25] exactly where to move around that well with the rig. Um, there's limited availability
[17:29] of space because of the steep slopes there. But we'll need some site preparation
[17:34] work there from the town and then ultimately some well drilling. Then Assuming that
[17:41] moves forward and the well is constructed favorably, um, You'll be ready to move
[17:46] into a pumping test program and full water quality sampling to, you know, work towards
[17:52] permitting this um for usage, you know, through the state health department and the
[17:56] county. Um, and that's kind of the second two bullets is the pumping test. And we'll
[18:01] have to make a decision once we get through the drilling, if we want to go with both
[18:05] wells or one well. Um, and I don't think we're gonna clearly know the answer to that
[18:09] until we get through that drilling process. Um, But right now, I thought, Jamie and
[18:15] I have talked about this, Jamie Emery and I have talked about this extensively. We
[18:18] believe probably the, the two wells make sense to go forward with, but we will have
[18:23] that discussion with you, um, once we have all the information, then move forward
[18:28] with the hydra study. Um, so as far as the cost of this, we believe that we have
[18:34] an existing budget with you that had a series of line items. There's production wells
[18:38] in there and test well drilling and, uh, pumping tests. We, we think that there's
[18:42] probably enough money in there to cover most of what we just chatted about. Once
[18:46] I get the letter from the health department, we can nail down the budget more closely.
[18:50] But, um, There were some tasks in there that haven't been utilized, we would suggest
[18:55] reallocating those to this and, you know, try to get these wells over the finish
[18:59] line. So you have a source there on town property that you can hopefully use going
[19:05] forward. And we, we do recommend continuing to try to allocate some, you know, dollars
[19:12] annually to, to keep going with the groundwater exploration on these, some of these
[19:16] other sites just because as we know it, it only gets harder going, going forward.
[19:22] Um, went through that pretty quickly, but that's what I had for this evening. I,
[19:26] I have backup information if there's something you wanna discuss or I have a couple,
[19:32] I have a couple of questions for you, Peter. Yeah, sure, you talked about how technology
[19:36] has advanced and how we have treatment options now to make the best use for the Simpsons
[19:41] Creek, um, well, if that one is a high producing well, I imagine there would be some
[19:45] type of infrastructure investment that's attached to that as well. Or were we talking
[19:50] about like running that through Goose Creek and then our existing treatment facilities
[19:54] would be enough for it, or Westlake. OK. Yeah, so I, I don't want to completely,
[20:01] this is not my, uh, Keith. I wish Keith was on. Keith Lane is on this evening, but
[20:04] what conceptually what we have talked about is, uh, my understanding is you have
[20:08] a raw water line out, um, just on the main, main line here. So you could get the
[20:12] water. It's a short run from whatever well we're using here out to your raw water
[20:16] line, and that would head to your treatment plant that you have currently. And my
[20:21] understanding is you have iron and manganese treatment. You had MTBE treatment. MTBE
[20:27] was an issue out here in the past, but we tested this well two years ago, we didn't
[20:32] see any MTBE, um, and I know in your other well, it's diminished over time. Correct
[20:38] me if I'm, I'm sorry, go ahead. Pardon me, we detected PAS in this well, um. And
[20:46] if I'm not mistaken, I believe you guys are moving towards PFAST treatment. So I
[20:52] think that's what Keith talked about previously. So if you need treatment on this,
[20:56] PFAST would be the concern. So you'd have to knock back. And, and again, this would
[21:00] be a, a really a key question, um, but typically what you need to do is get the iron
[21:04] and manganese back and then treat for the PFAST. Um, but the true levels of whatever,
[21:10] whatever the PFAST is or is not in this well, so we had 27A was non-detected for
[21:14] PFAST. There were several parameters in Simpson's Creek A, um, but that's at a low
[21:20] pumping rate. We don't know what it's gonna be at the full capacity until we run
[21:24] the tests. The other is just a clarification. What would preclude us exploring both
[21:29] of these wells if we know that they produce at similar rates to what you all have
[21:33] seen with the uh the airlift?
[21:37] Uh Interference between them. There's interference drawdown, so one well might communicate
[21:43] with the other. Even, even with interference, I think you're gonna want both of these
[21:48] wells because right now the quality does look different and you may have a blending
[21:52] opportunity here to, to reduce any, um, constituents of concern by blending the water.
[21:58] That's a common practice. And you also have other wells, you know, if you bring this
[22:02] over to your treatment plant, um, that's something you'd have to have like uh Keith
[22:05] or somebody to look at closely, um. But you know, when you have assets like these
[22:12] on town owned property, it's anything you can do to bring these forward to to us
[22:17] makes good sense. Thanks. You answer my questions. Um, Peter, that chart that you,
[22:24] uh, showed a little while ago. Could, could you send that to
[22:32] Of Melissa so that it can be, yeah, that one, the table, yeah, absolutely, yeah,
[22:37] I, I think usually we send in the slides after these presentations. Happy to do that.
[22:42] Thank you. Yeah, and this, uh, the 1st 3, the top part of this is one of our previous
[22:47] reports. The bottom well is the one we just drilled and we just tacked it on to,
[22:51] excuse me, um, summarize the, the drilling of that well.
[22:58] OK, thank you. You're welcome, Marianne.
[23:02] I'm gonna ask a slightly unrelated question that Peter's not gonna be able to answer,
[23:06] but I'm gonna put it to the town manager. The topic has come up in the past about
[23:11] converting Hayman Lane to a public street. Is this potentially represent an opportunity
[23:17] for us to reapproach the homeowners and see if there's consensus, whether they would
[23:22] be willing to sign over to a public street that that might facilitate some of the
[23:27] construction and easement work if we just had a right of way dedication. We've been
[23:32] talking to him already kind of preliminary that because if we do put a well there,
[23:36] if we are using the road regularly every day. That there'll be some opportunity for
[23:40] road improvement. We shouldn't say what, right? That's the carrot, you know, the
[23:44] carrot is if you guys do the right of way dedication, make it easier for us to develop
[23:47] as well. We'll turn it into a public street and we'll keep it, you know, in better
[23:52] condition, and then they're currently able to. That's kind of how we've been massaging
[23:56] our, um, regular visit there lately was we had actually walked through people's yards.
[24:02] To get to the well and we've the one you were like, well, you know this, this was
[24:06] successful this, there's uh opportunity there for a mutual beneficial, um, opportunity.
[24:10] So yeah, but we, we would need them to dedicate the right of way. I understand. Yeah,
[24:14] so, so they would have to kind of all be in. Um, so I think if that, if, if, if they
[24:20] know that road maintenance and shoveling snow is that is happening, they'll, I'm
[24:25] sure they'll be excited. Yeah, so just maybe some some targeted outreach, some communication
[24:30] with the residents there and just sort of assess the mood. How many houses are down
[24:35] that road? 3. It's like 88 more than you would think, right? It looks tiny from,
[24:42] it looks tiny from, but the thing is, it's like, um, we visit Wells every day, 365
[24:46] days a year, so we have to be maintaining it, shoveling it, um, versus. We could
[24:53] go years without missing the site before now. Mhm. OK, me and Harry, we're gonna
[24:59] thanks. Really just see is there an opportunity. I don't think we don't require it
[25:04] to make this project happen. It's just it could be a nice opportunity to get to your
[25:08] it was all a long term, yeah.
[25:13] Thank you, Peter. We really appreciate it. Yeah, thanks, Peter. Thank you. Yeah,
[25:16] you're welcome. We should, you know, we just got to get over the permitting here
[25:19] and then we can talk in earnest about making the rest of it happen. Thank you very
[25:26] much, Peter. Welcome. Have a good evening. Thank you. Hi. All right. Um, and now
[25:33] we have esteemed guests from the Ohio County Sheriff's Office. I'd like to give them
[25:37] the opportunity to have, have the floor. I think the topic is e-bikes and this updated
[25:41] traffic safety information. You're, you're doing,
[25:50] I love you. Appreciate you guys. Um, so I know you guys have some of the pamphlets
[25:55] here for these. I brought in another stack. So you guys keep a bunch in stock. So
[25:58] I'll give that to you. And then we also had these made up recently. If you guys want
[26:02] to take one of these and pass them around. It's kind of a summary difference between
[26:06] um e-bikes, mopeds, and motorcycles. Oh, I think I got this 10, this is good. Before
[26:10] I dive too much down this rabbit hole, is there any specific questions that you guys
[26:14] have regarding e-bikes application enforcement, anything along those lines that I
[26:20] can answer upfront? Here's a question. So I have a middle schooler over in Percyville
[26:26] Middle School. I think I remember the PE teachers saying that you all are doing training
[26:31] of middle schoolers at some point this year on e-bike safety. Is that something I'm
[26:36] remembering correctly? Yes, so we tend to coordinate on a semi-regular basis with
[26:40] the, with LCPS, the public school system, as far as their bike safety days go. They
[26:44] tend to reach out to, um, to me or, um, Deputy Gerbin, the traffic deputy. He intends
[26:49] to do a lot of the bike stuff within, uh, our district. Um, I haven't had anybody
[26:55] reach out to me recently. Um, so if they are wanting to do one, I'd be more than
[26:59] happy to come to the school and set something up so we can have one. Before it gets
[27:04] too cold out. So, so currently there aren't regularly scheduled trainings in the
[27:10] school system in Loudoun County around this issue, correct? OK, OK. Is there discussion
[27:15] of having such because it's the kids themselves that, um, are often pushing the limits
[27:22] between, so, so, uh, that is one of, I mean, we can handle this from a regulatory
[27:30] and, you know, town perspective, but As we've all discussed, there's Rules you can
[27:36] put in place and and education but without the kids themselves knowing what the limits
[27:42] are and having those limits set by both town and parents um well that in lies the
[27:48] the biggest crux of the whole issue with these e-bikes fundamentally is it's, it's
[27:52] less so an issue of enforcement and more so an issue of education in a lot of circumstances
[27:58] because what we've seen is, um, these parents don't really know what they're getting
[28:04] their kids. a lot of cases, they don't know the class of e-bike they're getting them.
[28:07] They don't know if it's an e-bike or a moped or an e-dirt bike. They're just the
[28:11] kids are coming to them and saying, hey, this is what we want to get because all
[28:13] my friends have them. And so they're buying them for them, not really understanding
[28:17] the scope and the requirements that go along with them. Um, as far as going back
[28:22] on with the schools, um, most of those are going to have to be coordinated from the
[28:26] schools initially. Um, we can do some outreach with them to try and facilitate setting
[28:30] them up more regularly, but I don't think we have anything that Progressing that
[28:35] I'm aware of as far as like a regular and consistent schedule on, on the e-bike education
[28:40] side. So, um,
[28:45] Should they be driving on the sidewalks or the road? So it depends, um, and I hate
[28:51] to give that answer, but the way e-bikes work is they have the same accessibility
[28:57] and operational ability as a regular bicycle does being operated on the highway.
[29:02] So the uh uh cyclists, like a competitive cyclist or someone who just uses it for
[29:07] exercise, they're obligated to follow all the major traffic rules like a vehicle
[29:11] is when they're operating a bike on the roadway. That same thing applies to e-bikes.
[29:15] There's no, there's no specific laws in place saying that an e-bike can't be on a
[29:21] road. Much in the same way, there's certain areas that say you can't have any form
[29:25] of bicycle on a sidewalk whatsoever. It just kind of depends on the community and
[29:30] the laws they have in place and the regulations they have in place for um location
[29:34] by location. If that makes sense and answers that. Yeah, the bicycles, um, e-bikes,
[29:41] they can be on the sidewalks and on the streets. Um, there's 3 classes of them. So
[29:44] they're, they're going to be regulated. Uh, um, as far as regulations, but as far
[29:49] as like access to the streets and sidewalks, they can be on both. Are you all running
[29:53] into issues where there's a pretty gray line between what these classes are, because
[29:57] I see like one-wheeled, uh, unicycles that go 40 miles an hour and skateboards that
[30:02] people can control with a remote that goes 30 miles an hour. So it's like. It's all
[30:06] over the place a little bit with these things. Before I came to Louder actually,
[30:11] I worked for the town of Herndon, and we had 22, individuals that lived in Reston
[30:15] and commuted into Herndon, and one of them had a longboard that he would ride, but
[30:19] he rode on the WNOD, um, so his wasn't as much of an issue. But then we had another
[30:22] gentleman. He had one of those motorized unicycles, and he would, he would come into
[30:27] town and go to his work and he'd go home and he just follow the traffic law sites
[30:31] as if he were a bicycle. So. Um, oh, you would do it in the road. Yes, ma'am, yep,
[30:37] um, as far as the, the differentiation between the classes. Um, they're pretty structured.
[30:44] Since 2021, there's been a set standard that manufacturers have to maintain as far
[30:49] as labeling of the bikes and including all the class information on them. All, you
[30:54] know, all e-bikes are required to be under a certain wattage, 750 watts. Anything
[30:58] over that, it can push it either into an electric moped or into an electric dirt
[31:03] bike. Um, and that there's a top speed that's regulated on those as well by class,
[31:08] as well as the, the, the type of Um, acceleration that it used. Class 1 and class
[31:12] 2 are both pedal assisted, meaning the only way that that bike, the only way that
[31:16] that motor is engaged is if the subject, the riders actively pedaling. But a class
[31:20] 2 has a throttle, um, like a moped or a dirt bike or, or one of some other form of
[31:25] electronically assisted device. There's actually in the, the unicycles, the one wheels,
[31:30] those type of things actually fall into a slightly separate category. If you look
[31:33] through the um the laws that the state has on the books and our county ordinance
[31:38] forum. So there's like 4 separate Categories now and then you have the classes of
[31:43] e-bikes within those because I think that like e-bike is an oversimplification of
[31:48] the issue because what we're seeing is kids on motorized vehicles going really fast
[31:52] and a lot of times in roadways and ultimately it's a safety issue, right? We don't
[31:56] want them to get hit by one of these horse trailers coming out of a new cut and then
[32:00] have a tragedy on our hands like we've seen. Thankfully, out here on the West End,
[32:03] we have not seen a significant increase in um e-bike complaints coming to the sheriff's
[32:08] office. It's less than 1% in the last quarter. Um, where we're seeing it the most
[32:12] is more heavily populated congested areas. Ashburn, I think, has a 44% increase in
[32:17] complaints and Sterling is behind them at almost 30%. It's like 26 or 27%. Um, and
[32:24] so obviously, that's where we're seeing a lot of these issues more is in those, those
[32:27] more densely semi-urban populated areas as opposed to out here. Um, we do get complaints
[32:32] somewhat regularly for them on the WOD and it's usually just people driving too fast
[32:36] and someone will call it in. Um, but those are, those are harder to find because
[32:40] we, you have to be kind of in the area when they come out the door to take any sort
[32:44] of enforcement. Um, I know myself and one The other deputies that Spike certified,
[32:48] we got a complaint that came in and we hit the WOD and we rode all the way from Personville
[32:53] down to 9 and back just looking for people on them and we didn't have any problems
[32:57] that day we were out. So it's really hard to find those because you got to be there
[33:01] when it happens. So did you have a question for me? Well, I'm just saying the pictures
[33:06] here are a little, in my opinion, misleading just Because you're not seeing a lot
[33:09] of those type of e-bikes, you're seeing the ones that really look like little motorcycles,
[33:14] right? So there are less than more than likely those are electric dirt bikes. I,
[33:19] I would, I've seen the ones you talk about. We had a, we had an incident with personal
[33:23] PDR park in front of the store, which ones are they? We had a couple of kids on them
[33:28] at Percival at one of the schools. After an event and we walk up and it's clearly
[33:32] a dirt bike like there's no pedals it's got a throttle system it's got a key, but
[33:36] it's electric it's not gas so, so that then they fall in the moped category. No,
[33:41] they fall in well, and this is where it gets gray because it's like you got to look
[33:45] at the wattage on the on the bike itself whether because an e-motorcycle has to be
[33:49] above. 1500 watts. So there's like this weird gray area where between 750 and 1500,
[33:55] well, is it an e-dirt bike? Is it an e-bike? Is it a moped? So there's kind of a
[34:00] weird area in that space that's Again, if, if we get somebody that's online, it looks
[34:05] like it, we can go through and, you know, figure out, check the label and see what
[34:08] it's what it's categorized as that opens up whether we have enforcement action as
[34:13] far as it needing to be registered and needing to have lights and needing to have
[34:15] a helmet, things like that. So do most of those dirt bikes need to be registered?
[34:19] Yes, yes, OK, any dirt bike that's ridden on. The highway has to be registered title
[34:24] and insured just like a standard motorcycle does. Um, I'm sure we've all seen people
[34:28] who own dirt bikes that have them appropriately registered and they ride them around.
[34:32] Um, it's the same parallel as those. It's just a different style of motorcycle. Do
[34:37] they need a driver's license too? Yes, and it has to have a motorcycle endorsement.
[34:41] The only exception to that is going to be using them on private property. So if they're
[34:44] out here in the hills, you know, their buddies's property riding around, obviously,
[34:47] you don't have to have it for that. But if they're on the roadway operating on the
[34:50] highway, then they have to have a motorcycle endorsement and a valid license. So
[34:54] and that separates it different from mopeds, because mopeds, you don't have to have
[34:57] a license to drive, but you can't have a suspended status, and you have to take a
[35:00] moped course. So There's layers of this that just add complexity, and it doesn't
[35:06] help that every time we turn around there's a new e-bike coming out or new electronically
[35:11] propelled device that these kids are riding around on because I've seen, I've seen,
[35:14] um, like a scooter thing. They just stand on it and then they, it looks like a, I
[35:19] guess, um, skateboard with a handle. Yes, yeah, we see a lot of those. They're very
[35:22] popular because they're a lot, um. They're very easy to ride. They're easy to learn.
[35:27] They're not as expensive as a standard e-bike is. You can get them for 80 to 150
[35:31] bucks, and depending on where you get them from, yeah, um, and they're the kids love
[35:36] them, and that's, that's the biggest. The biggest downside to all this is the kids
[35:40] love these things. Um, and the unfortunate side of that is they're not having the
[35:45] education like you were pointing out to, to understand that, OK, you can write these
[35:49] and you can ride these, and these can be a great tool for you to get to school or
[35:52] around town, ride around with your friends. But at the end of the day, you have to
[35:55] be understanding of the rules that are in place for their safety. On top of everything
[36:01] else, the traffic, yes, it gets them out of the house or something, yeah, yeah, I,
[36:06] I, I mean, and I get it out here too, like we want the kids to be out. and doing
[36:10] stuff and not in front of screens. I, I just want them to be safe too. And I assume
[36:14] that like no matter how licensed you are, and if you follow these, you're not supposed
[36:17] to be doing wheelies down the middle of the road regardless of what that would fall
[36:22] under a type of reckless behavior, um, because you're, you're posing inherent risk
[36:26] to yourself and others and other vehicles and riders on the roadway. So there's an
[36:30] articulation for recklessness in that behavior. Um, same thing with like we get a
[36:33] call for all time from people when we're doing donuts, you know, it's, yeah, we've
[36:37] all done it. Yeah, it's cool, but at the end of the day, it's, it's reckless in nature,
[36:40] right? So that's, that, that's where it ties back into the education side of things.
[36:44] So what are you guys saying that's successful in like mitigating this? Like, are
[36:47] you not going to give kids tickets and that's gonna sink in? Like how, how are you
[36:51] seeing success in this right now? I think it ties back to education, and this is
[36:56] somewhat unfortunate, but I think also the, the The real world examples of what happens
[37:02] when you don't, I think are a little bit more unfortunately impactful. Because if
[37:07] they're, if their friend's on an e-bike and gets waffled, it's not like it's, it
[37:11] causes a pretty big impact for walking. Um, and it's, it's, we had a case in Sterling
[37:18] a few months ago now where uh uh we had a juvenile driver of a car hit an adult rider
[37:24] on an e-bike who ran a stop sign and wasn't paying attention. So like the shock factor
[37:29] in that for that kid I'm sure will probably keep him off the e-bike forever. But
[37:35] there's, it all ties back to educating as much as we can because I'm sure you guys
[37:39] are all familiar like trying to teach kids anything nowadays is extremely difficult
[37:43] and and get it to stick and get them to actually apply. I had two teenagers, right,
[37:47] so you know exactly what I'm talking about, right? Like, oh Dad, you don't know what
[37:51] I'm talking about. We're just out here riding around. Well, yes and no. So, um, there's
[37:56] a couple other things that, that each class deals into as far as like helmet requirements,
[38:01] um, a class 3 e-bike because it tops out at almost 30 miles an hour. Those ones you're
[38:06] required to be, you're, you, if you're under 15, you have to be riding with an adult.
[38:12] Now, how is that enforceable? Like, oh, that kid looks like he's 14. I'm not, I'm
[38:17] not getting into that, you know, kind of a trick bag of dealing with that stuff.
[38:21] But, you know, at the end of the day, the enforcement side of things, particularly
[38:26] with juveniles, is somewhat less effective than education and particularly education
[38:31] of their parents. Um, because we see that on the court side with, with juveniles
[38:34] for, for a lot of things. Um, is there anything that towns or municipalities are
[38:38] doing on the code side that's like reinforcing the work that you all are doing from
[38:42] the enforcement side to like be synergistic. So like, hey, if we had this code, it
[38:46] helps us to do our job better and keep the, you know, kids safe. The, the county
[38:50] has the helmet. That's all on the county side, yeah. So as far as the, the, the ordinances
[38:54] go, that, that'd be on the county side, um, I, I think as Deputy Phelps said, the
[38:58] enforcement, um, follows the education, and if there's a bike that's been modified
[39:04] and it's going 35 miles per over or 35 MPH, it's a motorcycle. It's, it's a motor.
[39:10] Vehicle, so, um, they should be licensed, right? You can't license a 12 year old,
[39:16] a 13-year-old, or 14-year-old, but the parents, the key to this is the parents being
[39:19] involved in knowing what their kids have because ultimately if they're allowing their
[39:23] kid on, on a, on a, on a motorized vehicle that's called an e-bike that's going 35,
[39:29] 40 MPH, they're allowing the kid. To drive a motorized vehicle, right? And so there,
[39:34] there is, uh, um, statutory enforcement on that, um, in, in regard to that, allowing
[39:40] an unlicensed person to drive, right? So the, the key here is first education, making
[39:44] sure everyone's aware, um, and then enforcement does follow in some circumstances,
[39:49] but, um, uh, we want people to be safe. First and foremost, and the parents to be
[39:54] aware of what their kids are driving. Because we're not seeing anything as far as
[39:58] like adults or people who have been cycling for a long time who do opt to get an
[40:02] e-bike or an e-motorcycle. We're not seeing an issue with those people, right? It's,
[40:05] it's almost exclusively with the, the juvenile and young adult population that isn't
[40:10] thinking about, you know, Oh, I can get my e-bike towed because I'm riding it without
[40:15] a motorcycle endorsement or without a helmet or, you know, being underneath, right?
[40:19] They're not thinking about anything, right? So they're thinking about getting to
[40:21] a friend's house, get in the park or going home, right? It's, it's, it's, it's, so
[40:25] it's, it's again, it's like all thing, it's like all tools, right? They serve a purpose
[40:28] and they're good if used under the right circumstances, but we just have to try and
[40:31] figure out Getting enough outreach and education with the families in order to try
[40:37] and get these kids to understand the scope of what they're doing and, and how impactful
[40:41] it can be if they're not writing correctly and appropriately. So.
[40:46] So you guys help with uh uh pushing out the information sharing with those linked
[40:50] to the sheriff's office website where there's all that is broken down as we both
[40:55] explained. So the more you guys can assist with with helping push that out for the
[40:59] education aspect is appreciated. And if there's ever any more of those you guys need,
[41:02] just let me know. I can bring them in. We have a plethora of them. Um, we have some
[41:05] more of the yard signs and stuff, um, up at our PIO office so I can snag some and
[41:09] bring some down, um, if you guys want to hand them out to whoever wants to put them
[41:12] up, and I can follow up with both Harmony and Bloombridge Middle. I, I do think that
[41:17] education in the schools is going to be really critical. I mean, our kids don't know
[41:22] that if they're going 35 miles an hour, they're far more likely to be killed in an
[41:27] accident than if they were going 20. And they also, even if they don't own any bike,
[41:32] they're. Their friend owns an e-bike and or a or a motorcycle or a moped or whatever
[41:38] it is and they're getting on it because it's super cool and they can go really fast
[41:42] and so I'm if they have one but when they get one yeah thank you yeah absolutely
[41:48] any other questions from anybody about this um. I have a question. Yes, if, well,
[41:55] I don't live here, but we see the same kind of kids ride by all the time. Do you
[41:58] know where they lived? Are we allowed to say there's a kid that lives in that house
[42:03] that comes out right here? Would you go knock on their door? Yeah, probably no, I
[42:06] don't think it's too much. I think it just kind of depends, um, on the deputy that
[42:10] gets dispatched to. how they're going to handle it. Um, it's, it's something where
[42:16] If it's a continuing complaint and it's starting to become an issue, whether that's
[42:19] an issue with traffic or pedestrians or, or just general safety, um, it's never a
[42:24] problem to say, hey, this kid lives, this is where we think he lives, this is the
[42:27] issue that we're seeing, you know, if, if, especially if it's somebody that we can
[42:31] develop a good relationship with, with the parents and address it like, hey, listen.
[42:35] Your kid's not in trouble here. We're not trying to jam anybody up or have anybody
[42:38] up. But these are some things that are being told to us about what what's being seen
[42:42] in town. And we're trying to get ahead of any possible injuries, um, or any accidents
[42:48] that, that your kid may receive as a result of not understanding kind of the scope
[42:53] of what he's doing on. And that has been working here. Uh, one of your guys that
[42:57] sits on the corner over here, uh, has developed a really good relationship with one
[43:01] of the kids in our neighborhood who was riding all the time, was never wearing a
[43:03] helmet, was bombing down the hill, and now he wears his helmet. He'd learned how
[43:07] to signal now when he's just because you guys are talking to him and it's like, Hey
[43:11] buddy, you gotta have that helmet on your head. So it's like there's some incremental
[43:15] steps to safety. So yeah, appreciate it. Yeah, for sure. Thank you for coming. Yeah,
[43:20] definitely.
[43:22] Oh thank you. Thank you. Thank you. All right, well, you guys, it's been a pleasure.
[43:25] Um, obviously you can reach out to me if you guys need anything else or anything
[43:28] at all. I'm just up the road and be more than happy to help out. So thank you very
[43:31] much. Thank you.
[43:34] Thank you.
[43:37] I have a really easy start. Next up is public comment. Anyone from the public wishes
[43:44] to address the council at this time? If we have some
[43:50] Anybody online? Yeah, my leisures, OK. I will close public comment then and we will
[43:58] uh have the uh agenda. I move that the meeting agenda be adopted as presented. 2.
[44:05] All right. So moved by Vice Mayor Pacheco, seconded by Councilor Preston Graham.
[44:08] Any discussion of the agenda?
[44:12] All right, hearing none. Paula, Paula Genzai. You don't have to vote tonight. You
[44:19] can vote tonight. You can sworn. You swore in, so you couldn't tell you were sworn.
[44:24] I didn't realize you were getting sworn tonight as well. OK, got you.
[44:32] All right. Agenda is approved and milestone first vote. I want to say Harry a lot
[44:40] of things around to make sure that the swearing could be tonight. Yeah, I wasn't
[44:44] expecting that at all, so I apologize for the confusion, but I didn't expect that
[44:48] you'd be able to get sworn tonight. Harry's magical. I didn't realize how connected
[44:51] you were. Oh, you didn't ask Jim. You know a guy. I know, we know a guy. I
[45:00] all right.
[45:03] He's friends with my chicken. All right, it's been disapproved. 60 and uh disclosures.
[45:09] Does anybody have any disclosures for the account? on items that may be on the agenda
[45:13] tonight.
[45:16] All right. Hearing no disclosures, we'll move to approval of the minutes. First,
[45:20] we only got one set tonight, September 16th. Are there any corrections to September
[45:25] 16th? They have been edited, yes. I do have one additional change that I caught earlier
[45:31] today, and that's line 22, uh, to add Logan's um title which is planning and GIS
[45:38] intern. No, his title This title from the from which meaning?
[45:46] This is the September 16th title is um. Infrastructure and asset technician. He's
[45:53] no longer an intern. OK, I'll get that from you. Sorry.
[46:00] All right. Other than clarifying Logan's And there was also an edit made that's been
[46:07] That's reflected in what the council is looking at tonight. OK, then we don't need
[46:10] to call that out. Any corrections from the council?
[46:16] All right then, is, is there a motion to adopt the minutes with the one correction
[46:21] to Logan's title? So moved. Is there a second? Second. All right, moved by Vice Mayor
[46:26] Pacheco, seconded by Councilperson Caseman. Motions to adopt the September 16th minutes
[46:31] with the correction noted in the discussion. Any discussion of that motion? Hearing
[46:38] none. Paula, Paula, James, I. Trey Worth, I, I, I, I, Jim. Hi
[46:47] Just so you know, Trey Paula, cer certain votes are required to be voice votes where
[46:52] you have to say your name before you vote. I just say other ones you don't. Paula,
[46:58] it likes to just do it always. OK. You, you can choose your own style if you don't
[47:03] have to do your own thing. I will call for a voice vote when you have to actually
[47:08] voice your name before you vote, but it's up to you entirely. This is my personality,
[47:13] you know, once we get to. All right. Motion carries and minutes are approved. Next
[47:17] item on the agenda, we have two business items. First is a financial report which
[47:21] was gonna be presented tonight, I believe, which we have handouts.
[47:27] It is our first,
[47:30] yeah, um. Cooper's gonna be my backup. So, um, caveat, this is our first, so it's
[47:38] a child mind. It's a, it's modeled off of first of those. Um, I'm gonna run through
[47:43] it and then there's gonna be some background to add to it that's separate. So the
[47:48] separate part will be down at the bottom talking about committed funds, but I wanna
[47:52] talk about that separately, go through the financial report and then talk. So, this
[47:56] is as of August 31st, our financial standing. Um, that date is because we close the
[48:03] books out, we get it straight in September. So, your next meeting you'll see as of
[48:08] September, end of September and then going forward. To me it's all about trends for
[48:13] the council. This isn't the audit, this isn't the official books. This is more for
[48:18] you to see overall where we're standing in a snapshot in time. So whatever the date
[48:22] is, this is a snapshot, um.
[48:27] There's two lines. We have one checking account and as of that day, August 31st,
[48:33] we had $155,000 in the bank account. Um, if you look down to, uh, where it says negative
[48:40] for utility fund, that was just because at that moment we had just paid something
[48:43] that day. So if you look the next day, it would look different. Um, so also the utility
[48:50] fund and the general fund are in one checking account. So it's just a ledger, yeah,
[48:55] it's, there's 100,000 155 in the bank. It just happened it said negative 339, um.
[49:03] Moving on, the, the Virginia investment pool is um
[49:10] Where we have our, um, it's a liquid fund. It's not in the long term 3 to 5 year
[49:16] fund or it's where we can pull it down within 24 hours. The interest rate at that
[49:21] time was 3.8185. Um, and our earnings per month for the month of August was 5700.
[49:29] Um We've talked about moving the investments into longer term, but we have to get
[49:36] through the audit, the rate study, and kind of understand where our projects are
[49:39] before we commit them, because once we commit them, it has, we have to know we're
[49:41] not gonna touch it for this is super helpful for that though. I like that. Thank
[49:45] you. So yeah, if anybody has comments, we're gonna keep improving upon it, but we
[49:49] felt like this at least gets the conversation started, um, so does that committed
[49:54] include some of the reserves that were talked about in financial policy or not?
[50:00] OK, that is a long term question that I'm still trying to learn. I'm gonna, I'm gonna
[50:04] go over the committee list separately after I get the rest of the report. We can,
[50:07] we can sneak up on this one. I, I, I've had Bobby explain to you about 10 times and
[50:12] I'm still confused. Um, meals tax revenue, um, this is.
[50:20] Uh, meal tax based on July revenues collected in August and there's no comparison
[50:27] because we were not collecting last year, OK, so there's no change to, um, which
[50:33] one is on the 2nd, is it on the 2nd? It's right here up at the top compared to the
[50:39] previous year. OK, thank you. So, um, now if you add up two months of collections,
[50:46] that's $9,366 and the budget was about $45,000. So at this point we're on track and
[50:53] that doesn't include two more restaurants opening up this fiscal year. Um, so who
[50:58] knows where we'll end up. Sales tax, again. Um I told staff not to worry about
[51:06] the actual date or when the bills come. It's just more snapshots. We're just looking
[51:10] at what we collect. It, um, As of August for sales tax and how we are
[51:18] tracking um so far in the budget. Um, So, as you can see, we've already
[51:26] collected more than the previous year. I, I think I told um Cathy going forward I
[51:31] just want to show what was collected in that in that month and not try to there's
[51:36] a weirdness about the two months explain sales tax. You did it how much longer after
[51:41] so it's, it's 2 months in arrears and so because it's distributed to the county and
[51:47] then has to come to us because from the state to the county then the assistance so
[51:52] it. You're really looking way better, yeah, so, but once it gets, we get the pattern
[51:57] rolling, it, it'll. It'll be easier to track. It would because I mean the money that
[52:02] we're booking in June was, was accrued in April or May. Yeah, OK, so that's
[52:10] why this was August. We, we collected this money in August. But it was 14 months
[52:16] prior. So ultimately this will be normalized where whatever we're seeing we just
[52:20] understand is that monthly exactly what I, yeah, so I actually had wanted to just
[52:24] say August so that this wasn't confusing. We'll work on it. I tend to prefer the
[52:28] cash method, but the auditors keep telling us that telling me that's wrong. Well,
[52:33] this is so I, I claimed this document. Bobby has the audit. I have the monthly report.
[52:37] Um, what I told staff was the goal of this report is. You just wanna know how the
[52:43] economy is doing. This is just a feel, a feel-good thing, you know, um, it's ultimately
[52:48] a good thing, but how's the meals tax going? Oh, there must be something going in
[52:51] the economy because it's down from last year. What's going on with our restaurants?
[52:55] We reach out to our restaurants, ask if they need anything. Sales tax going down
[52:59] because the economy is changing. As we go into budget, we need to reconsider, um,
[53:04] to raise real estate tax. Um, business license is more difficult because it's once
[53:10] a year. We collect only. Well, there's always new businesses, but our big time is
[53:15] March. That's when business licenses are due. Um, some do trickle in over time, like
[53:20] today we had a new contractor had to apply for a business license. Uh, so that's
[53:24] why it's, it's, it's, you'll see more after March for business license. Can I ask
[53:30] you what, um, is this the first year that we, I thought last year we had, um, um,
[53:35] meal tax, meal tax, meal tax originally meal tax officially started January 2026.
[53:42] You voted on it, but then we had you started in January, but why isn't there January
[53:47] numbers for the previous year? Oh, because it's July. You didn't put it down. Oh
[53:52] yeah. Um So, utility bills, uh, this is easier to explain.
[54:01] So we bill every month and um Compared to the budget, we're on track. One of the
[54:07] things to notice is active accounts. Why does it say 98% active accounts? If you
[54:12] have Um, maybe you're taking an extended leave in Africa for a year for work and
[54:18] you don't need your water and we'll turn it off. Your, your account now is inactive,
[54:22] but you'd still eventually pay a maintenance fee, a minimum maintenance fee, but
[54:26] it's not an active account, so it's harder to track like usage, um, because you're
[54:31] not gonna be using that 140 gallons a day.
[54:35] Um, so overall, we, um, We do really good with collections lately, because it's really
[54:43] on top of it. I think we have very few payment plans. Um, and ever since we started
[54:49] going to Neptune 360 having that real time telling people they have a leak. We don't
[54:55] really get requests for leak adjustments either because like right away we're telling
[54:58] you we see something weird so can we add um availabilities to one of these reports?
[55:03] Yeah, thank you.
[55:11] I can comment that it works very good. I got a report yesterday actually, and I only
[55:16] see my kids half the time because they're with my ex and so they take long showers
[55:20] because they're teenagers and their long showers prompt that. Um, did you set a threshold
[55:25] it triggered as a leak, but I was like, what's going on? I looked around the house,
[55:31] nothing was, you know, and I, and I looked at the time because it's specific in the
[55:35] time and it was their showers. So I will be discussing.
[55:41] Big brother's watching you. That's right. They go on deaf ears. Um, it's really exciting
[55:47] to see that 2 360 coming to fruition because before it was bills were every other
[55:53] month and you only knew when the bill came through and then you get sicker shock
[55:57] which you had a week for almost six weeks so. So going back, Zoom have questions
[56:04] on this. If you have ways to approve it or questions, we, we'll keep making it pretty,
[56:07] but we wanted to start with the low bar. That's, you did it the right. You want to
[56:11] start simple, something you know you can maintain, and then you got to keep us from
[56:15] making it more complicated. That was my instruction to staff. So thank you for noticing,
[56:19] um. The next part of my conversation is, is kind of a combination of talking about
[56:24] the financial report, kicking off the strategic retreat, talking about the loan,
[56:28] talking about where we are with capital projects. I made a cheat sheet here. It's
[56:33] the long sheet, and you also have the original um utility budget. Bear with me while
[56:37] I explain this because it's a little complicated. Um, what I was trying to capture
[56:42] was When you look at the utility budget, you know, you will appropriate money in
[56:50] a given fiscal year. Maybe the project doesn't. We only have one of those forms,
[56:53] by the way. We have, we have this one. We don't have that one. That's fine. You don't
[56:56] need to see it, but it's complicated. If you had this, it actually make it worse.
[56:59] But when you, when you adopt the budget. Um, you're appropriating money thinking
[57:04] that project's gonna get done that year or that it's gonna cost that much money and
[57:09] some, and then we've learned that it takes 2 years for VO to approve a water line
[57:13] and it rolls over or When we first initiated a project like the chlorination at Stoneleigh,
[57:20] we thought it was gonna cost 320, now it's gonna cost 600, because as you go through
[57:24] 30%, 60%, 90% design, the costs go up. So let's put the budget aside for a second
[57:29] and just focus on what the town has already committed to, be it a signed contract,
[57:35] you've put it in writing to the federal government for a key FOS application, or
[57:39] you've already committed to it by strategic vote or how we've already had conversations.
[57:45] So, I'm going to show you what money is committed this fiscal year before July 1
[57:52] and why staff is recommending a loan now to get all this work done. So the first
[57:58] thing on the list is the Ermont Water Line construction. This is new money. This
[58:03] is not money being spent. This is not appropriate. This is money, you know, this
[58:06] is what we think right now we have to spend $850,000 to build the Ermont Water Line.
[58:12] We're preparing to go to bid. Construction will happen in the spring.
[58:17] The construction started to happen before the Evening Star Water tank rehab. Next
[58:23] on the list is 117,000. That's the remaining amount of money that needs to be spent
[58:28] to rehab the Evening Star tank. That will happen after the Erm water line. So in
[58:35] actuality, it's probably gonna happen in September, September 27th, which is fiscal
[58:39] year 28, but I'm still showing it to you because it's money that's gonna be spent
[58:43] in the next year. Yeah.
[58:48] Um, just clarify, we have fully sent all the previous loan. Yeah, don't worry about
[58:53] that. OK, so, OK, go with me on this. So I'm sorry Melissa, just pause that 117 is
[59:01] that to finish the end the rehab, the whole rehab, the painting, OK, the painting's
[59:07] already paid for. This is, this is trying to catch, uh, sorry. So the inside the
[59:13] tank has to be painted. We have already prepaid for that years ago, but we couldn't
[59:18] pull the trigger because the tank has to be turned off and drained. We couldn't turn
[59:22] it off and drain it till the Airmont tank was built, so it drove the conversation.
[59:28] So now that it's constructed we can prepare to do the rehab. The missing piece is
[59:32] the water line in between because it's undersized and under the highway. So the goal
[59:36] is to build the new water line first, then turn on the tank. OK, so bear with me
[59:43] on this. I've looked at this like. So this is only money that we have already committed
[59:50] to spend in the next 18, I'll say 18 months to be gracious, but mostly this year.
[59:55] Um, Eveningstar Water Treatment Plant Engineering. The town has signed a contract
[1:00:00] for $343,000 to engineer the Eveningstar Water Treatment Plant. That is a signed
[1:00:06] contract, so I put that in the committed bucket. Um, this doesn't include the fact
[1:00:11] that the county has given us money for, uh, 3.5 for engineering. We in a town still
[1:00:18] have to spend 1.1 on construction, give or take, because we really don't have the
[1:00:22] final number. This number could change since we're just starting engineering. You
[1:00:27] will see a preliminary ending report in the next bit of time that could have a higher
[1:00:31] or lower number, but we're targeting right now 4.6.
[1:00:38] So, just put in the back of your mind 1.1 million is a future cost in the next three
[1:00:43] years that we haven't yet decided how to pay for. There is An application traveling
[1:00:49] through Congress that we put in for 700,000, but we have no sense of when that's
[1:00:55] going to be approved. So we don't even show that.
[1:01:00] We talked to Peter tonight and he was talking about how we still have remaining money
[1:01:03] left over in the contract we signed for EGGI to study the wells. So it's about, I
[1:01:08] think it's 75,000 is the remaining amount. I have to check. But it's a contract we
[1:01:12] signed to have EGGI find us a well. So it's committed because we signed it, so it's
[1:01:18] money to be spent this year. Then after that, if you look into the future, I kind
[1:01:25] of arbitrarily put 1.5 for FY 30. It's, you'll have to decide during the strategic
[1:01:30] retreat when you want to actually build the wealth. Where, where do you put the 1.5
[1:01:35] in the next 5 to 10 years?
[1:01:38] Stoney well coordination system upgrade, Trey, that's important because that's a
[1:01:42] safety issue right now. Staff are going into these vaults that are very tight under
[1:01:46] 150 PSI pressure to do their work on the wells, and the coordination is only treated
[1:01:52] at one well. And it kind of cycles floods through, but when that well is off, so
[1:01:57] it's not being chlorinated. This project will connect all the wells, travel to the
[1:02:02] existing building there, treat it for chlorine. Staff will not have to go into the
[1:02:07] vault because all the work will be done in the house. So it's, it's half safety,
[1:02:11] half health. We had budgeted 320 3 years ago. The the final numbers came in
[1:02:18] 90% ready to go to bed. It's at 6:30. So how do we reduce that delta in the future,
[1:02:26] right? Like between what they tell us it might cost and what it ultimately costs
[1:02:29] because it ends up being meaningless when it's that much different. Yeah, along the
[1:02:33] way, I think this is something that um could have been fixed along the way at 30,
[1:02:37] 60, 90. They usually do give you like Shelby with Southern Greenway we knew it was
[1:02:43] traveling through this just was uh. I'll blame myself that I didn't catch it sooner.
[1:02:49] I, I just think it would help, especially when we're looking at these big long lists
[1:02:52] of numbers that will, how do we budget this? How do we put this there? I'm like,
[1:02:56] OK, that's gonna be about 250. That makes sense to me, but then it ends up being
[1:02:59] 800. Like it's just a whole scale different. Yeah, so originally I, I show in the
[1:03:04] budget that I put, um. It's only I put in a lower number at 144 and this is here
[1:03:10] I put 400. I was surprised with the 620, but I understand. We'll probably do a better
[1:03:16] job alone. 30 include the 2:30. No, I think it's already the
[1:03:24] new number. Oh, I wrote 230 is the more. So in the budget you have 400. So the staff
[1:03:30] will have to come back to you with the budget amendment for that when it's time to
[1:03:33] spend the money. We'll have to erase that. Um, and Melissa, is this, are these kinds
[1:03:38] of increases just as a result of I mean, obviously there's just inflation and things
[1:03:44] along those lines. They're discovering new things as they engineer the project or
[1:03:49] or begin to explore it, but are we standardly setting in, you know, not to exceed
[1:03:55] clauses or clauses, and what can we be doing? So we have a, not to, this one's a
[1:04:02] complicated one because it's not like other projects. It originally was under Keith
[1:04:05] laying under Keaton Ports, and he originally was only going to widen the bolt. So
[1:04:11] you still have to go into the vault. You still have the coordination problem. That
[1:04:15] original number came from the 2023 rape study where we just put a bogey in. It actually
[1:04:20] had not been engineered. There was no PER. Yes, OK. So one of the things that we've
[1:04:26] implemented now that we didn't do before was guesses. We really were doing back in
[1:04:30] the nap. It was like you go to Keith Lane and say how much we go, uh, and literally
[1:04:35] go this number. Bowman. Only gives you numbers with a preliminary engineering report.
[1:04:42] That shows the cost and it will say FY 26 numbers FY 27 FY 28. It will show escalation.
[1:04:50] So it's just a matter of changing how we do business. So yes, we were guessing now
[1:04:54] we don't guess anymore. This was one of the last we're still guessing. Well,
[1:05:00] we should clarify that. Sorry, I apologize. We have somebody else guessing right
[1:05:04] now. No, we need to have more and more informed guessing. It goes from like literally
[1:05:08] like that Keith Keith Blaine would literally give me a, a. A sheet of paper with
[1:05:13] a little budget. Bowman gives me a 10 page report with pictures and numbers and a
[1:05:18] chart. Yeah, but they also they charge to predict the future remaining. I am trying
[1:05:24] to use more paper to predict more of this. Yeah, what's the difference in charging
[1:05:28] though that napkin, how much would that cost? $20 and the other one costs $10,000.
[1:05:33] And there's a difference in the estimates too, because we're paying for paying for
[1:05:37] the estimates. Yeah, we're paying for the estimates and they're different prices
[1:05:40] too, right? That's very true, right. So just to clarify for myself, um, so these
[1:05:46] numbers are accounting or including the county grant for Evening Star.
[1:05:54] It, it will, will this, the only thing on here is the engineering, right? You got,
[1:05:59] I see for Union Star you got 340 and then 1.1, but in the comment. You say county
[1:06:04] grant for 33.5. So that's why I was trying to focus on what we're spending in the
[1:06:09] blue column. So the total cost of Evening Star plan will be 4.6. That's a guess,
[1:06:15] 4.6. The county has um obligated 3. 5 Now did they, is that already approved or is
[1:06:23] that just it's in the budget it's in the it's approved well. So that one's approved.
[1:06:28] That one's they've already voted on it. And are we getting that in all at once, or
[1:06:32] are we getting that spread over 3 years? 3 years. It's engineering half half. OK,
[1:06:38] and using the estimate of 4.6, that means it's with 1.1. OK. The engineering probably
[1:06:45] will get wrapped up and get reimbursed to us. And then what are we planning to submit
[1:06:50] to them this coming spring? So I think it's still gonna be under the old regime.
[1:06:55] What are we, what are we asking for this round? So this round you're only on currently
[1:06:59] as of August you can only ask for existing projects. They just approved that now.
[1:07:04] You'd be literally turning around six weeks later and saying, Can I have more? OK,
[1:07:07] so basically we're just gonna say, please follow through on your previous promise.
[1:07:11] The 3.5% is in the budget. OK, but we're not gonna, we're gonna ask them to fund
[1:07:14] their current, their current plan. Yes, but we're not gonna come in. We're not coming
[1:07:18] back because in our request we said we're paying for our portion. We said we're paying
[1:07:22] for 20%. Well, I didn't mean for eating. I just meant in general. Then we have some
[1:07:25] other ideas. Well, Southern Greenway is something that we're reading so right now
[1:07:28] we're asking for Southern Greenway. OK, that's what I want to clarify. So but they
[1:07:31] might have some money for that. So the CIP funding request is on every other year
[1:07:35] cycle of. I need more. It's funny. Water transportation. Here's, here's the answer
[1:07:41] to your question. The county is so used to engineering projects costing more every
[1:07:45] year. Every other year is, OK, how much more did it cost? What's the amendment that
[1:07:49] you need, and not a new project. So we actually had a meeting yesterday. We had a
[1:07:55] meeting with the county yesterday because they wanted to know why Southern Greenway
[1:07:58] costs so much more, and Shelby had to go through line by line and explain, Well,
[1:08:02] we're building a retaining wall. We're going under the bridge. We're going under
[1:08:05] the highway. Everybody mark your calendar. Tuesday is when it's going to Loudon County
[1:08:11] Finance Committee. If you want to speak during public comment for the Southern Greenway,
[1:08:14] that's when you do it. Next Tuesday, this coming up Tuesday. Yes, I will be coming
[1:08:19] back from BML, so I will miss it. But last time I waited till 11:30 p.m. and they
[1:08:23] never got a chance to talk. So I would recommend talking public comment, not wait
[1:08:27] for the agenda to come. So you're saying next this coming Tuesday. They've already
[1:08:32] given us money though for the Southern Greenway, haven't they? Yes, this is additional.
[1:08:37] How much have they given 2. 30. We're asking for 1.3. 2.3.
[1:08:45] OK. And is that in committee or is that in the board finance committee Tuesday. Finance
[1:08:50] Committee Tuesday. OK. So anybody who would like to speak out in favor of this other
[1:08:53] greenway, you couldn't speak during. Cooper will check how it works. Well, you have
[1:08:57] to, you, well, I actually, I've never spoken to committee. I've always spoken. I
[1:09:01] don't know if you can or can't. I don't think, I don't think you're allowed. I don't
[1:09:04] think you take public comment. Is it, is it an open session or not? Yeah, I will
[1:09:08] find out. It has to be open session. Oh, it is open session. I sat there before,
[1:09:11] but they don't, they don't take that. I take comment. I'll check. We will find out.
[1:09:16] I can just sit there and glower or smile, depending on our growing sign, smile. be
[1:09:22] there to answer questions, but you know if they have any, I feel confident, to be
[1:09:27] honest, if you want to go and see how it works, if you don't go, I'm sure it's fine
[1:09:30] because we spoke to, do you remember Mark Hoffman? So Mark Hoffman was assigned to
[1:09:36] us yesterday to find out why it costs more, and we went through the entire thing
[1:09:39] because he's the one speaking on our behalf on Tuesday. So he helped us build meetings.
[1:09:45] He's really good, yeah. He laughed about his daughter being one. Both our daughters
[1:09:51] were one when we started the V Street project. Yeah, you can go and make facial expression.
[1:09:57] It'd be interesting to see the process if if it's open. That's neat. So how it works
[1:10:01] is Everybody's made funding requests and the finance team review it and that um it's
[1:10:07] more difficult for the water sewer projects because The Eastern Island supervisors
[1:10:12] going, why are you? This one should be pretty easy because it's, it's transportation,
[1:10:16] so. OK Where was it? We're going through the stoneleigh chlorination so
[1:10:24] cost more and I apologize, but um I'll do 11. It's been a long day, Isaac, um,
[1:10:32] about the difference in money. We'll find a way to better track it along the way.
[1:10:37] Why is it so much more, you know, than the budget? OK, because again it was an estimate.
[1:10:43] It was an estimate. And so what happens is We have to put in the CIP plan at least
[1:10:49] a placeholder. At the same time, you're paying for the engineering to to fully flush
[1:10:53] it out. And so it just depends on When I did the numbers along the way.
[1:11:01] We'll make sure that we do a better job going forward. All right, so, um, you're,
[1:11:06] you're asking the council to Essentially authorized to start seeking a loan. You,
[1:11:12] you had a number in mind for the loan. Well, let me finish getting you haven't gone
[1:11:17] through everything,
[1:11:19] so this is just, I'm just hold off on the loan for a second. That's a separate. So
[1:11:23] 50,000 for the truck, 84,000 into your remaining. This is educational. As a reminder,
[1:11:28] you only authorized 30% design of this donate pressure zone. So we have about 84,000
[1:11:35] left on that contract. And then during the strategic retreat, the council has to
[1:11:40] decide when you're going to pull the trigger on full design so that we can then take
[1:11:44] that full design and carry that through to ask for the 2.5 million. I thought we
[1:11:50] were going to be taking this initial amount. I just said that yeah, yeah, you have
[1:11:54] to you have to make. So the, so the, my point is that if you have to vote on, do
[1:12:00] you want to take 30%, 60%, 90%, You have to, what does your application package look
[1:12:07] like to take to the county because the more shovel ready it is, It It's um
[1:12:15] it carries more weight but with this one in particular it's the county's input that
[1:12:19] we need more than than our. Skin in the game for it. So this one is a long term.
[1:12:25] It's not your typical CIP project because it's it's educational, it's storytelling.
[1:12:31] It's, it's not gonna be we need to start calling it the stonely ticking time system
[1:12:36] like give it a like I wanted to avoid that term, but do we have an engineering report
[1:12:44] from Bowman right now. They're doing it right now. That's the 30%.
[1:12:52] So Bowman's doing like 6 capital projects for us right now. So, um, so.
[1:13:00] OK. We have to be cautious how we talk about the Sony project because we have to
[1:13:07] separate it from the county's overall goal to help us with the utility system and
[1:13:13] you don't want them to think. That this is your next. You learn how to keep it separate
[1:13:19] like, yes, we need help overall with repair replacement and funding and projects
[1:13:23] still needs its own special entity over here because otherwise that will become your
[1:13:27] next big chunk. I think that can be part of the upcoming retreat because I think
[1:13:30] we need to have a longer discussion about how to frame that and how to discuss it
[1:13:34] with the county because we keep coming back to it, but I, I don't disagree with you.
[1:13:37] I'm just saying like that's a longer discussion. I think we're gonna, I think we're
[1:13:40] going to be coming in with a big ask for the county for that one, and we need to,
[1:13:43] they don't want a special tax district. For it because that's the only other way
[1:13:47] it's going to be possible to even start to chop away at the cost for that. So yeah,
[1:13:51] and so I love still did it. It works. It's a special way to do it, but that's nice
[1:13:56] conversation. That's why I don't want to spend half a million designing something
[1:14:00] that we're not going to pay the construction cost on here, here. So we need to like.
[1:14:06] We need to sort of lay it out. We're putting up 83 this year to sort of flesh it
[1:14:10] out, the concept plan, understand the scope of the problem. But at that point, I
[1:14:15] think we need to have a strong conversation with the county about what, what does
[1:14:19] the county think is the way forward if we, if, if they take their time on this Western
[1:14:25] lab and water study, it'll be not just this year, it'll probably be the year after
[1:14:30] coming spring. They'll still be under the old system. And so if, if this year is
[1:14:35] gonna be the trail, then maybe next year we're coming around and we're gonna make
[1:14:41] our ask for Stoneleigh at that point. So to, to, to, to let you know how the the
[1:14:45] plan currently is at the
[1:14:49] It kind of wants to put in the FY 29 budget, which is gonna be drafted next summer.
[1:14:55] The results of the race study or the the study that and our right their study, not
[1:15:01] ours so I will have to feel out the county because from the county's angle they're
[1:15:05] gonna be like, well, we gave you 5 for the water tower, 4 for Evening Star, and then
[1:15:11] 3. I, I understand all of this that Stoney is a whole separate thing and I think
[1:15:16] it needs to be I was like I don't see us asking next summer. I, I, well yeah, the
[1:15:22] county is gonna be just as. next summer as they are right now. Um, but for the purpose
[1:15:27] of the strike $84,000 is what we owe today. $84,000 is all we're spending today.
[1:15:32] Um, $100,000 to do the new water line in Hill Circle that is committed. The contract
[1:15:38] signed. The construction team is mobilizing, um, so that is a going forward project,
[1:15:44] yeah. So let me go on down to the PFOS, the two PFOS treatment projects, it's in
[1:15:49] red. The construction's in red to show. We've applied for it. If they say no, you
[1:15:56] have to decide what you want to do next. So is the grant going to pay for the engineering
[1:16:00] or just the construction? The engineer, the construction, the engineering is the
[1:16:05] committed part we're paying for in our application. We said we'd pay for these two
[1:16:09] numbers. OK, so we said we would pay. It was like. 10% or 15% and then they they
[1:16:14] would pay the construction cost. Are we fronting that engineering cost or are we
[1:16:20] waiting to hear back on the grant? We're fronting it to make it go faster, make what
[1:16:24] go faster the process because we have to be done by 29. We will, we're, we're starting
[1:16:29] engineering. Yeah, I, I think we need to have, I mean, we talked about this some
[1:16:34] with Shelby last time, um, I think it was Shelby that we talked about Bowman, Bowman,
[1:16:39] that's right, sorry, um,
[1:16:43] I think we should talk about this during the strategic planning session. Because,
[1:16:48] um, Even a year ago, that 2029 date was something that was moving to the right. I
[1:16:55] know it hasn't officially moved to the right yet, but it was in motion to the right.
[1:16:59] And so I think other localities are planning for 2031 now. So I want to kind of understand
[1:17:06] Should we be still planning for 2029 or should we be planning for 2031? So I'll give
[1:17:09] my three second opinion right now is that if everyone across the country is trying
[1:17:13] to be P5 settlings, the equipment to do the work is going to be on backorder or out
[1:17:18] of order or you want to be the first orders and to prove that you need. You're, you're
[1:17:25] asking for an extension. It's, it's not that they're moving the date, it's the ability
[1:17:29] to ask for an extension. So we won't know until 2029 if we got approved for the extension.
[1:17:34] So we have to show progress that we're moving towards it. So we could be six months
[1:17:40] behind schedule, 9 months behind schedule, and they would give us grace, but we can't
[1:17:44] be like, well, we didn't start because we didn't know, so. I, I, the other thing
[1:17:49] about the 718 project is it's also solving the issue about the well in the backyard.
[1:17:55] So it's a twofold project, um. But that is my opinion. That grant, just as a reminder,
[1:18:03] uh, we'll find out in December. Is that right? OK. That was the same question. When
[1:18:09] do we know about that? Federal state Grants are a little more political when they
[1:18:16] have they have programs. I don't know, but we have a good chance. So Hooper's helping
[1:18:21] make a running list of things for the retreat that we'll be talking about. Speaking
[1:18:26] of things to discuss earlier treat the west, the uh the the water line under the
[1:18:30] lake, um, we're, we've we're moving forward on permitting, engineering, acquisition,
[1:18:36] but not construction because the council has pushed pause on it. But for the purposes
[1:18:40] of the rate study, we have to pick a year that you're going to pull the trigger on
[1:18:44] it so we can plan for it. So it is something you could include in the loan because
[1:18:50] the loan can be a 3-year loan. So it doesn't have to be something you're gonna do
[1:18:53] this year, next year, the following year, but right now I don't know where to put
[1:18:57] it in the CIP. So do we have enough other projects that would, we could use to justify
[1:19:02] the loan? Yeah, it's everything in that first column. So yeah, so yeah, I'd say let's,
[1:19:06] let's not, let's not commit to it on the loan package loan application if we're not
[1:19:11] sure about it. If we have other things we can use to justify the loan, right? And
[1:19:14] so the order of operations, so. Um, OK, let's pause for a second. This number here,
[1:19:20] the, the last part is the loan payment, and that is $500,000. The check has already
[1:19:26] been cut. It, it's already been sent in the mail, but as of this report, as of August
[1:19:33] 30 person hadn't been cut. Does that make sense? So that number is $500,000 less.
[1:19:38] So, um, that's where the 3 point, if you look at the sheet over here for overall
[1:19:42] building status, it says that 3 point. 3,065,000 is committed. That matches the chart
[1:19:50] I just showed you.
[1:19:54] On the bottom. Yeah. So Our preliminary off the bat request for the
[1:20:02] loan is mine's that loan payment so the the new line would be 500,000 be 2. Um
[1:20:10] And on the general fund side, that is committed general fund projects that you would
[1:20:14] see on the general fund approved budget. That includes propers and the remaining
[1:20:18] portion of um the transportation proper as well. We can go over that later. But the
[1:20:24] focus of the utility conversation is It all is layered. It's talking about the financial
[1:20:29] report, what's committed, what's committed to pay cash this year. The council's interested
[1:20:34] in a loan. We don't have to pay cash. I had a meeting with Davenport, Kyle from Davenport
[1:20:39] on Monday to discuss our chances for a loan, and he said that the loan last time
[1:20:45] went smoothly because we were going through the rate study. Uh, who was here for
[1:20:50] that. It was like the budget was being improved, the rates were being improved, the
[1:20:54] rates were being improved all at the same time. So our package to uh perspective
[1:20:59] banks made this look very, um, appealing, you know, we have a plan in place, we have
[1:21:04] a way to pay for it. So he said that he wants to, he recommends we wait for the rate
[1:21:10] study. To be completed and the audit to be completed, so that's about December. And
[1:21:15] then they can look at helping us in January, February get the loan. It takes about
[1:21:19] 60 days, which lines up perfectly with um Largely Ermont, Wyoming, but he's he's
[1:21:26] Thinking bank placement we're not looking at uh the revolving water condor or any
[1:21:30] other things like that. I didn't want to do the snap again, so I have to meet with
[1:21:33] them again, um, but I just got preliminary, you know, he just said we have to look
[1:21:37] creditworthy and As a refresher, what can you give a definition of the snap loan?
[1:21:45] Is it, is it have certain requirements, or is it state like that? It was a very simple
[1:21:49] process. It was just we had a list of utility projects and if we decided not to do
[1:21:54] one of those, we just had to send it nothing. We're gonna do this project instead,
[1:21:58] and we had 3 years to spend the money or we lost the interest accrued. So they give
[1:22:03] us the money. It goes to the bank. We make interest. We can keep the interest, maybe
[1:22:07] spend it within 3 years. OK, thanks.
[1:22:11] So, Melissa, with the rate study, and I know that's a whole separate conversation,
[1:22:16] but we just had a mini conversation about Stoneleigh. Is that having, so those potential
[1:22:24] costs that we hope the county will cover. Are those being incorporated into the rate
[1:22:31] study as part of our conversation that's a strategic um you know since she brought
[1:22:38] up the rate study, um, at the last meeting. Uh, Scott requested an update for him
[1:22:45] on how far the race study is going. So have you had that update? No, no, no, but
[1:22:53] I hadn't had an opportunity. I just asked for a meeting to get caught up and so,
[1:22:57] so this conversation is what's holding up the race study, this, this decision, because
[1:23:01] I can't make these. I can, I can give them bogeys. I can give them guesses, but I
[1:23:06] feel more comfortable with a little more. I mean, a rating model can have scenarios
[1:23:10] in it. You can have a scenario that has 1.5 and one has 2.5 and one that has 4. So
[1:23:16] the, the question they're asking is what is your 5 year CIP? What's your 10 year
[1:23:20] CIP now to be. To be upfront and say, well, there's a chance we might pay cash.
[1:23:28] In 10 years, 2.5%, you know, it, there's a model that shows that versus we have the
[1:23:33] county pay for it, so we can't assume the county's gonna give us the money. So you
[1:23:37] have, but you have to, but there's also a model where like we talked about, there's
[1:23:41] a special tax district where, and it's not coming out of the broad consumer base
[1:23:46] to pay for and a good rate model will have unspecified in it and we can just say,
[1:23:50] well, it's part of the unspecified, so it helps. All I'm saying is that I would feel
[1:23:56] better if I can give bogeys like I did here, you know, I'm just kind of place where
[1:24:00] I think it would be. And so getting feedback from your helps when I give it to the,
[1:24:05] the Lake City people about, well, we wanna, we do want to move forward on the lake
[1:24:08] to lake water line or we don't want to move forward on the lake to lake water line.
[1:24:12] Yeah, I just, I don't think that the council will have the information. To make that
[1:24:18] sort of decision. Even after, even at the strategic planning session, we're really,
[1:24:24] we're really setting up a conversation that's gonna be When the rape model comes
[1:24:29] up. And they say, well, here's your 20% scenario, and here's your 10% scenario, and
[1:24:34] here's what you're giving up for each scenario. That's when we will have a better
[1:24:39] conversation. Yeah, but here, nor there, I still have to submit everything to the,
[1:24:43] the, the rate study people. I've already, you know, I'm already having those conversations.
[1:24:46] I just wanna make sure that we have this conversation again at the retreat where
[1:24:50] I don't feel like I'm telling you what to do and you're telling me what you wanna
[1:24:52] do. Yeah, I mean, a good rate study will have scenarios, and, and to me the, the
[1:24:57] CIP list. I think what we can do in the strategic plan section is help you rank them
[1:25:06] and so that, so that you know, OK, well I've got this dotted line that's moving up
[1:25:10] the bottom of the CIP list and you know, well, if you put the line here that it's
[1:25:15] this much of a rate increase, you put the line here and it's this much of a rate
[1:25:18] increase and hopefully the rate model will allow us to do this sorts of scenarios
[1:25:22] once it's ready. So one of the questions is what are your CIP lists is gonna be paid
[1:25:26] for by a loan. So I'm just gonna use the list that I am gonna recommend. I think,
[1:25:30] I think you should, I mean, that's just part of our financial plan. Our fiscal policy
[1:25:34] right now is to fund long term capital improvements with loans. And so I, I think
[1:25:39] it's perfectly normal to say, look, we're gonna pursue a bank placement in January
[1:25:43] even if we don't know whether it's a 1 million or a 3 million, um, you know, that
[1:25:49] will sort of play out during the rate study. Um, but I think we've got too much capital
[1:25:55] that we've already committed to that we pretty much have to be playing alone. So
[1:26:00] yeah, it's, it's a busy time for Scott because that is a great story. We should move
[1:26:06] in.
[1:26:08] I'm sure we will all be informed. It's going to require intensive discussion. They're,
[1:26:16] they're only, there's, there's nothing to be talked about race right now because
[1:26:18] all they're doing is collecting data, so they have a long wish list. There's like,
[1:26:22] where's our data and I'm like, I'm trying to get it to you. That's what's happening.
[1:26:25] So, um, to Scott's point, are, are we talking about incorporating these sort of different
[1:26:29] scenarios? Yeah, that's because I, I think it would actually be informative and useful
[1:26:34] to have the what if, uh, the town had to pay out of the utility coffer for this massive
[1:26:40] CIP project because I think that would create political will to moving, you know,
[1:26:46] that forward. So that logic, that's why it's important to have your CIP show that
[1:26:49] you are paying cash for it. So it does get and then that's how the potential reimbursement
[1:26:55] of some of that stuff. Well, I was gonna say is that's how the water tower came to
[1:26:58] us because we put the water tower in as we were paying for it. It produced we were
[1:27:03] gonna build it regardless, right? It produced a rate that drew attention. The county
[1:27:06] came and said, what's going on? So yeah, so we, we were building that water tower
[1:27:10] and you also have to remember that the county's kicking off their exact same study
[1:27:13] in December to look at the exact same things, the exact same scenario, so. We will
[1:27:19] be telling them, hey, we have to go with Stoneleigh, and they're gonna have to put
[1:27:21] that into their mind. So it is a wild time to be here because I was telling staff,
[1:27:27] I was like, I've got the audit, the rate study, the county study, the bank loan study.
[1:27:36] And the budget is coming around a bit. You're going to be very knowledgeable about
[1:27:41] all of this. It's all in my head. So anyway, so I, I'm not gonna give you this every
[1:27:48] time, but I wanted to unders I, to me, I'm not an auditor. I don't understand a lot
[1:27:53] of things about fund balance and trial balance, but I wanted the committed number
[1:27:57] because that meant the most to me so that you don't see, you know, $4 million in
[1:28:02] the bank and think you're $4 million in the bank because you've already committed
[1:28:04] to $3 million. So, um, I hope this is helpful. But just, just for the
[1:28:12] council's reference, I, I've been going back and looking at the 2023 study to kind
[1:28:16] of see what were the assumptions we made back in 2023 about debt placements and everything
[1:28:22] else, just to see how this matches up. Now, back then, we didn't know that the county
[1:28:26] was going to be so kind as to pay for the, the water tower, or the Union Star Treatment
[1:28:31] Plant. So we had set the rates, um, assuming that we were going to have to borrow
[1:28:38] for the water tower. And then borrow for the Easy Star Treatment plant. Now, we'd
[1:28:45] also ended up You know, having some other capital costs kind of blow up in there.
[1:28:50] But that was a nice You know, bonus there, even with those two projects paid for,
[1:28:56] we still were assuming that there would be an additional loan. Um, coming up in 2029,
[1:29:03] so about a year later than what we're talking about here for another 2.5 million.
[1:29:07] So we, we kind of knew that, you know, so, um, I do think we're probably running
[1:29:13] a little hotter than the rate study assumed, um, but that's, I think mostly gonna
[1:29:17] be in the operating costs and then just the CIP costs that we just saw keep going
[1:29:21] up. Yeah, and I mean, the P5 project didn't exist then. Yeah, And, and, uh, of course
[1:29:27] we need to see what our reserve levels are like relative to the policy, but it'll
[1:29:31] be very interesting, I think when they get their first rate model out, you know,
[1:29:36] what's, what's the number that makes it close, and that's when we'll really start
[1:29:39] talking about capital because we'll just start to make, they have to make decisions
[1:29:43] about, OK, are these nice to haves or are these must-haves? Yeah, I, I can't in any
[1:29:47] way like say how I feel about finishing the across the lake line until I know like
[1:29:51] what that's gonna translate into like rates wise and there's only. There's probably
[1:29:57] only 3. Smaller capital projects that are gonna be new and everything else. It's
[1:30:04] just continue moving around. Um, and they're critical. They're not, they're not one
[1:30:07] of these, they're must do. Yeah, but it'd be nice. I mean, we've, we've been spending
[1:30:12] 2 to $3 million a year on capital for the last 3 or 4 years, you know, I, I don't
[1:30:16] mind a little lull after we finish. I'm, I'm happy to make this little list and go,
[1:30:20] look at that. I'll have a break in 2030. Well, we can focus on the Southern collector
[1:30:28] and the North Southern Trail and the and the Northern Greenway. This is why I'm not
[1:30:31] going anywhere. I constantly have things to do here. Everything is a new day. Yeah,
[1:30:35] we try to get all our links in with the county before they change their process,
[1:30:39] or if it's changed. Um, I will say that somebody had him in the county whose name
[1:30:45] was me was like, once I finish this study with the Western towns, I'm retiring, so.
[1:30:51] Um, so, uh, we're good with the, we happy with the finance report. Are we on the
[1:30:56] right track? It's more data. I appreciate that, yeah, um. Man, I was so happy about
[1:31:03] that. Now I look at the next subject on the. You're moving to a different part of
[1:31:08] my brain now.
[1:31:12] All right. So yes, the next topic is the conference of plan update. I saw we had
[1:31:16] a staff memo on that. Um, did you want to talk through it? Give me a second. Um,
[1:31:22] can I say, so while you're gathering your thoughts, I really appreciated the sort
[1:31:26] of all the hedging that you did in that because I understand why you're tailoring
[1:31:32] this so very carefully, the language in there. So I read through it and thank you.
[1:31:36] I, I, the scope, the narrowing the scope is what I appreciated. I have worked on
[1:31:40] it for a while. I apologize. I had it in my hands earlier this year and it just kept
[1:31:44] and keeps other people from, um, focusing. So strangely, me and Bedford's on the
[1:31:51] original comprehensive plan in 2017, and here we are today. I can't believe we're
[1:31:54] at the 10 year mark. Um, So it was the direction of counsel to go back to the, the
[1:32:01] comprehensive plan and do um You know, go through and cross out projects have been
[1:32:06] completed, change dates, update data, um, no, no massive change to the document,
[1:32:12] just a cleanup and a revisit. Uh, we went back through a staff and tried to add in
[1:32:19] some language that talked about what to do if there's an actual policy change that
[1:32:24] needs to be changed. A policy that needs to be where you want to change. So we call
[1:32:29] that an amendment. So think of the con my approach is this Think of it as the conference
[1:32:33] of plan like the zoning ordinance. You don't just go and delete a line or add a line
[1:32:37] in the zoning ordinance. You actually have to propose a who, what, when, why. You
[1:32:40] call it amendment. It's an official change to the, the document. So our recommendation
[1:32:45] is that we go through the cognitive plan, same concept, do an overall cleanup, refresher,
[1:32:51] new maps, new data. Things have changed in 10 years. But if there's a policy that
[1:32:55] really gets to all of you that you really feel is important to do you want to change,
[1:32:58] talk about it, defend it, explain it. So, um, The key things
[1:33:06] are time-specific references like within 5 years by 2020, tables, figures, statistics,
[1:33:12] projects that we planned to do that we completed, studies that we talked about and
[1:33:17] we finished like we put the Appalachian Trail Community 10 years ago. Um, references
[1:33:23] to organizations, uh, goals, strategies, factual statements, and longer development.
[1:33:29] Things that um don't Requiring amendment right now is aspirational goals I've been
[1:33:36] achieved, uh, policies and growth plan, housing, transportation. That's at this point,
[1:33:39] that is your policy. If you want to change it, talk about it and explain why, um.
[1:33:44] Anything uh historical? And statements about community values and identity. We spent
[1:33:49] a long time doing community outreach. We did surveys, and community meetings. I don't
[1:33:55] see anything that's changed in the community's output 10 years up to the day. Um,
[1:33:59] but if there's something that you'd like to talk to the community, we can do a survey.
[1:34:03] Uh, I, I don't think we should plan a survey unless, unless, uh, you know, there's
[1:34:08] a strong sentiment for it. Maybe that's something we can talk about during the planning
[1:34:11] session next, next time is, is, do we want to do a survey? And if we do, I think
[1:34:17] we should have some focus to goal for that survey, right? And just let's just throw
[1:34:20] stuff out there. Yeah, I would recommend not to do a survey because I'm proud of
[1:34:23] all the work we did, but it was a bit more. I just put it out there because I felt
[1:34:26] bad saying. No, I, I think, I think that's, that should be on the agenda for the
[1:34:31] just as a question to the council, but in a long form meeting like that to just kick
[1:34:36] it around and see whether we all agree with you or whether a member of the council
[1:34:39] strongly disagrees with you, but I don't want to have that debate tonight. Let's
[1:34:42] have that debate in that long meeting. So you, you were, if I read it correctly,
[1:34:48] the staff is going to give us all copies of the existing plan in November. I give
[1:34:55] it to you now. It's on the website, but um. So You're gonna get my bearings. So,
[1:35:03] We as staff are very busy right now. We're, we, we cannot give 3 years to a comprehensive
[1:35:08] plan amendment update. We want to be clean, methodical, organized, fair, but
[1:35:16] I, I love the compliment. I wish I could do it all the time. It's great. It's my
[1:35:18] favorite thing. Um, but, uh, I'm proud of the work. I was there to write it. I remember
[1:35:25] all the work that went into it. It feels like it was yesterday. A lot of it's still
[1:35:28] very relevant. And so I don't think it's like aged badly at all. I think it's aged
[1:35:33] pretty well. And so, you know, I, I like to think of this as this is a review, not
[1:35:38] a revision. And that's what I put in my memo was that the best part about this process
[1:35:42] is to pat yourself on the back and show what you've accomplished at the same time
[1:35:47] review your goals and your. To do list, you know, what were we thinking about? Why
[1:35:50] are we thinking about that? There are things out there that I'd love to see come
[1:35:54] true, but we just haven't had the time and where do we put that on the priority list.
[1:35:58] Yeah, and I wouldn't mind if like if there's an output from this that says, look,
[1:36:00] here are the things that met the criteria of a, of a, of a review, you know, of a
[1:36:05] review right now. These are the things that the must fixes, the things that We know
[1:36:08] we have to change outdated maps, like you said, things like that, like a change log
[1:36:12] that you get when you update an app, like here's the things that we updated. And
[1:36:15] if the planning commission or the staff or a council member has some things that
[1:36:19] they think, oh, if we were doing a revision of comp plan, I really wish we could
[1:36:25] go and take a hard look at this one chapter or this area, this policy. I'm not opposed
[1:36:29] to like the planning commission or the council having just a little, you know, addendum.
[1:36:34] Of items to make sure we cover in the next comprehensive plan review and just sort
[1:36:39] of put it off to the side and say, look, these are the things that we didn't do during
[1:36:41] this update, but we've identified as things that require further study. And just
[1:36:47] like, I don't want to like forget anything we we look at during this review process.
[1:36:51] I just don't want to have it be, I don't want to hold the whole thing hostage to
[1:36:55] getting it perfect all over again. And, and that's in here. I'm sorry it's a long
[1:36:59] memo. Talks about we don't need to improve the language or make it sound better,
[1:37:04] you know, if we don't scope creep by chain. Yeah, I said, I don't want to forget
[1:37:10] anything important that comes up as part of this review process, but I do want to
[1:37:13] say, well, if we're gonna really like tear into a chapter, let's kind of just queue
[1:37:18] that up for a future more comprehensive review of it, um, and I promise to stay away
[1:37:24] from commas.
[1:37:28] I brought you all another funny story about the comp plan. I had it all the way down
[1:37:31] to the end. It was, it was perfect. I was 9 months pregnant with Lincoln. He was
[1:37:35] coming in like 2 weeks. I was like, I'm gonna get this thing out of planning commission
[1:37:40] to council, the town council, and I, I took it to planning commission ready to go,
[1:37:44] and they delayed it. And so I had to have Lincoln and Mary Anne carried the comp
[1:37:49] plan through the summer. Until I returned. To this day, I don't know what was deleted
[1:37:54] while I was on maternity leave, but I trust Mary I did it completely.
[1:37:59] I think my thing about squirrels or birdhouses was deleted. But um all right well
[1:38:05] I have a question. Is it this is the first time in 10 years that we're reviewing
[1:38:09] it, or was it at a 5 year mark that we looked at it too? So we've looked at it a
[1:38:13] couple of times. We did the Western BLA amendment and we also did the commercial
[1:38:18] district here amendment. So at any time you can do an amendment to the document,
[1:38:22] which is why I'm reminding you that there is a policy for amending your. So think
[1:38:26] about it in your head like that when you take out a policy, is it on a 5 year review
[1:38:30] cycle or a 10 year review cycle? Well, we didn't do anything before this. This is
[1:38:33] we're setting a piece now, so 10. It's, it's, you're, you're legally required to
[1:38:39] at least look at it every 5 years and talk about updating it and make decisions you
[1:38:43] want to update it, OK. So for timeline of staff review first, when are you thinking,
[1:38:50] and I think it might have been November is when we'll get so I actually was just
[1:38:56] working backwards and to be honest, what I really want is that you have completed
[1:39:00] and adopted it at least 6 weeks before the election. Because I don't want it to feel
[1:39:05] like you've just done something and there might be a whole new council next year.
[1:39:09] I'm not saying, you know what I'm saying like, like I want it to be plenty of times
[1:39:11] that this council is the one reviewing it because I've been there before where people
[1:39:15] feel uncomfortable as the election is approaching, then people start to go, oh, maybe
[1:39:20] we'll just put it off until after the election so that person gets a chance to review
[1:39:24] it. So I was just trying to get into like September to be done. I think it was a
[1:39:30] good schedule. Just giving the planning permission 6 months is a good amount of time.
[1:39:35] I think that's a serious effort. And in there it talks about doing a work session
[1:39:38] with the council halfway through and along the way you all receive copies so you
[1:39:43] can come to me if you have a question. It, it, I don't want to feel like you waited
[1:39:46] till they were done and then looked at it, just feel like it's a living document,
[1:39:50] so you stay ahead and not feel like you're catching up. We're looking forward to
[1:39:55] it. Speaking of, should we talk about the town council reps of the planning commission?
[1:40:05] I'm certainly open to that discussion. Do you want to get off of it? No, I, I, I,
[1:40:12] I'm just a liaison now. Uh, are you wanting to continue to stay on I'll continue
[1:40:17] and I, I, you know, I. Actually like this project to, to take a look and I think
[1:40:23] I'll be able to learn a lot from it and be helpful, OK, and actually look at it from
[1:40:28] maybe from somebody that hasn't looked at it really much before. So, so, um, so then
[1:40:34] it sounds like there should be a motion to appoint Trey Worth as the planning, the
[1:40:38] town council representative of the planning commission. Maureen, is there any specific
[1:40:41] verbiage we have to do with this? OK. OK, well then, I, I move that, uh, Trey Worth
[1:40:46] be the, uh, Round Hill Town Council's representative to the Round Hill Planning Commission.
[1:40:51] Second. All right, it was, uh, uh, moved by Vice Mayor Pacheco and seconded by Councilperson
[1:40:58] Graham. I'm, I'm not hearing any of the nominations, so I think we can probably just
[1:41:02] go to discussion. Is there any discussion of this before we vote? Can he vote on
[1:41:07] the council? I mean, on the planning commission, he'll be, he'll even though he's
[1:41:11] just a representative. I understand too. That's how it's always been. Yeah. Oh, it's
[1:41:15] always been. My call was the planning commission, yeah, before, yeah, and it should
[1:41:21] be a recorded voice clip. Yes, OK, so, but you already, yes, I knew that.
[1:41:28] OK, well then we'll proceed to a vote, so please. You can abstain if you want. Abstain,
[1:41:36] uh, Isaac Pacheco. I, Mary and Graham. All right, Beth Caseman, I, Jed. Good all
[1:41:42] fair. All right. All right, Trey, you're back on the planning commission and the
[1:41:48] town council. Um, would you like me to bring this back after the retreat, or did
[1:41:56] you wanna act on it tonight?
[1:41:59] Does the council have any issues or concerns with what has been presented tonight
[1:42:02] as far as the process for the for the comp review and the schedule? No, I, I thought
[1:42:07] it was good. Um, are we talking about it at the retreat though? Well, I think it
[1:42:12] will just come up and if there, I don't, I don't, I don't see anything. I think I
[1:42:16] have a good feel that everyone likes the plans presented and not to really veer off
[1:42:19] of it right now. Yeah, I think unless I think it might come up only if we find there's
[1:42:25] other priorities for the planning commission that we identified during the retreat,
[1:42:29] and it's just be a matter of, well, what do we want the planning commission to work
[1:42:32] on first. But this seems like something that should be a priority anyway for the
[1:42:36] planning commission. Staff just ask for support from the council. So that means the
[1:42:41] planning commission don't. To, to, to be, be nice to the nice to the staff and not
[1:42:48] become like, you know, two meetings a month for you, you know,
[1:42:53] that's why I like the 6 month period because it, it lets it so that look, you can
[1:42:57] still do this with once a month meetings. You don't have to worry about doing twice
[1:43:00] a month if you get the full 6 months. So, but mostly the only thing I've noticed
[1:43:05] and maybe that we can talk about at the retreat is when we sang in that memo, we
[1:43:08] talked about like the vision of the town. Isn't changing at all. Maybe we can just
[1:43:13] review that and just make sure that that's very accurate because I think that will
[1:43:18] then kick the whole look at the entire thing to make sure that everybody agrees that
[1:43:24] that's still on track. Yeah, and, and it's not saying the vision can't change during
[1:43:29] the process, but it's. Yes, it was a bold thing to say. I apologize. The vision can
[1:43:34] change. I, I can't stop you guys from changing your vision. Well, just, uh, just
[1:43:37] plan on having this, uh, uh, agenda item for the planning for the strategic planning
[1:43:42] session. And it doesn't be a long one, but just, uh, an overview pulled from the
[1:43:47] conference of plan, as well as the current strategic planning document, just sort
[1:43:51] of a general overview that we can just review that. OK. Sorry, I was going to say
[1:43:58] no cough. Um All right, so it's only 500 pages straight if you want to read it.
[1:44:06] It's actually a very compelling read, I will say. Hey, I just had a record. I scrolled
[1:44:13] through it already, about half of it. OK, yeah, we'll get you printed copies so it's
[1:44:16] easier. All right, so there is a motion to, uh, refer this to the planning commission
[1:44:21] that the staff is in the has in the memo in the staff memo. Let's go ahead and go
[1:44:26] through that. Do they have to vote on the, the resolution or the sorry. To adopt
[1:44:32] resolution to revert it. Yes, OK. I move that the Round Hill Town Council adopt resolution
[1:44:39] number 2026-05 authorizing and referring the review and update of the 2017
[1:44:46] Round Hill Comprehensive Plan. To the planning commission and town staff consistent
[1:44:53] with the scope, guiding principles, and schedule outlined in the staff report and
[1:44:59] attachment one with the goal of completing the town council public hearing by September
[1:45:05] 15, 2027. All right, is there a second to that motion? 2nd. All right, discussion
[1:45:13] of the motion to essentially ask the planning commission and staff to go forth on
[1:45:16] what we just discussed.
[1:45:20] All right, this is a voice code. Paul James I Trey Worth I Isaac Pacheco I Mary Anne
[1:45:26] Grammar Beth Caseman I Jim, Jim Mulber. All right.
[1:45:34] Thank you. OK, I'm just trying to clear the plate. Part of all the implementation.
[1:45:41] I want to point that out too just Taking the time to look at those projects in there
[1:45:45] and kind of put them on a 10 year, a future 10-year plan. OK, next is Updates. So
[1:45:53] we got the project update um from Harriet, and utilities or any other utility project
[1:46:00] updates we need.
[1:46:04] The Hill High Circles moving forward, but no, nothing outside of that. OK, so the
[1:46:10] office is open for counsel. Does counsel have any questions on the CIP projects update
[1:46:15] that was sent out? Yeah, no, I mean, I'll see Harry's report was really good. Yeah,
[1:46:21] we're doing, we're kicking off a new project now is doing an electric assessment
[1:46:25] of the entire system. We brought in, um, electricians that work for Tyler Wiesberg,
[1:46:31] a boat. Engineer to kind of go through and review our system to look for any um issues
[1:46:36] that came out in the optic report from two years ago. I had one question and maybe
[1:46:41] it wasn't utility. It was on your report. Um, someone turned us down on a bid. It
[1:46:44] was Dominion Paving or something like that you had said. I don't remember. Your report
[1:46:50] said you had sent out two bids. Is that related to that or is that something else?
[1:46:57] OK. All right. This is, um, it's been a project we've been having for the last 2
[1:47:01] years to review that original panic report and form an actual capital project to
[1:47:05] implement the recommendations. OK, thanks. And anything else we also find. And then,
[1:47:11] uh, Southern Greenway, is there any updates? Um, I saw that the engineering is moving
[1:47:16] forward, so we had a meeting, I guess I had a meeting with the county to discuss
[1:47:20] the funding request and go over the plans and Uh, talk about the next
[1:47:28] step of acquiring easements, and we don't see issues. There's so few easements, so
[1:47:35] it goes along. Any questions from the council on the Southern Greenway or the town,
[1:47:41] uh, manager's weekly report? No, I just want to compliment all members of the staff.
[1:47:48] The weekly reports, um, have been very, very thorough and great reads, and I look
[1:47:53] forward to looking at them every week, so. It makes these meetings go much more efficiently.
[1:47:59] I have fun trying to figure out who this person is.
[1:48:06] It makes it hellever bigger, Mary. My big plans, however, we've got like 6 departments.
[1:48:11] We do. It's actually just one. All right, um, then I'm gonna go ahead and proceed
[1:48:17] to council comments. Paula, did you have anything? I had just a few things. Um, is
[1:48:21] it possible to put everyone on the website? Like, I went onto the website a couple
[1:48:25] of weeks ago and, and not all the employees are on there listed. We can work on that.
[1:48:29] I just was curious, um. The, um, you guys hosted a quarterly town managers and county
[1:48:36] administrator meeting. How did it go? Was it good? Was it all of them, like all town
[1:48:40] 5, there's 5 town managers.
[1:48:44] Yes. There's 5 town managers for the county administrator that comes. Um, I'm now
[1:48:49] the senior town manager of Loudon County. Are you really? Well, because everybody
[1:48:54] else is interim, so. Me and Jason from Lovisville, so I, I felt powerful because
[1:49:01] of what the middle guy, the middle girl's intro first was intro.
[1:49:06] We he's retired, right? Somebody's retired, although we, you know, me and Keith was
[1:49:11] my original boss in Lovett school, so it's kind of ironic for him to be the interim,
[1:49:14] and I'm one, and, uh, and Jason's been with Loisville for 5 years, so you win. I
[1:49:21] win the prize. I'm gonna stop right now in the peak of my career. You're too young.
[1:49:25] I'm the only female in the country, but, um, no, it's a good, we always use this
[1:49:29] opportunity to compare notes and kind of. Get the kindness here to listen to us as
[1:49:33] a combined unit for projects that we need. Oh, that's fine, um. So, I was just a
[1:49:40] little confused about, you were, you stated that Bowman was um coordinating with
[1:49:46] Fugue to as their, to see if they did the work. Why is Bowman in charge of, of Fugue's
[1:49:51] work with the pad and the um Because of the engineer, it's part of closing out any
[1:49:56] project that the engineer helped design. They come back and check to see if the work's
[1:49:59] done because we're not qualified to, to check to compare the plans to some on the
[1:50:04] ground. So the same thing with all of our capital projects. There's always an engineer
[1:50:08] who comes out and closes it out before we accept it. Oh, OK, OK. That makes sense.
[1:50:12] Um, and the other thing was on the reservoir apparently the, the AMT Engineering
[1:50:18] Company was, they gave us an annual dam inspection report and then now they're going
[1:50:22] over a dam break study report so they give us two reports, yeah, it's part of um.
[1:50:29] Will we see any of the reports? I can give them to you, but when you own a dam, you
[1:50:33] actually have to submit a great study that you've analyzed what would happen if you're
[1:50:38] great and you file that with the state, OK. It's something we should have done decades
[1:50:43] ago.
[1:50:45] But we weren't regularly. We, it wasn't a dance. It was a dance. It wasn't a beat.
[1:50:52] It wasn't. We fell under the wirecar and we drew attention to ourselves. Oh well,
[1:50:57] uh, that's why I had thought. Thank you for the clarification. Which is great. OK,
[1:51:01] I, I just wanna thank Melissa, um, for going over like over 3 hours. I think we were
[1:51:06] together 3 hours, um, as an overview, which is very helpful. And then Beth and I
[1:51:11] went on a utilities tour yesterday. Was that yesterday? Um, yeah. Um, which, which
[1:51:18] was really helpful because, you know, kind of getting me up to speed, but to really
[1:51:24] take a look at the maps and, and all the well, so I appreciate the time that just
[1:51:28] to get me up to speed there already, um. I just, just a quick question with state
[1:51:34] you hired Stacy, right? Um, what, what is her responsibility as far as like communication
[1:51:41] or, or social media or anything? Is that part of her job description? It's a new
[1:51:45] part of we've, we've created a new position, well, not position, a new responsibility,
[1:51:50] which is, um, just paying attention to the, the PR, and I think that's your job.
[1:51:55] Your job is to pay attention to how Facebook looks, how the website looks, um, you
[1:52:00] and I talked about doing like 2 posts a week, um, working on a newsletter so that
[1:52:06] we have a finished product to give to Kim. Um, part of it also is the PR to the customers.
[1:52:12] So when there is a waterline break, she'll be the person to make sure that we immediately
[1:52:16] post something on Facebook. When it's done, post on Facebook, um, but it's, it's
[1:52:22] something that we're working kind of in reverse from the council's direction to do
[1:52:26] more PR. So we're open to suggestions, but we have a little budget, you know, we
[1:52:31] could send out postcards. We talked about Logan doing videos about your grease and
[1:52:36] your system. But um it's something we're working on so it's the first step in that
[1:52:41] direction actually assigning somebody to that task and um yeah it's exciting and
[1:52:47] uh as a reminder everybody she's taking over some of the billing administrator's
[1:52:51] responsibilities so that because Kim got promoted to be more of a number 2 to Steve
[1:52:55] and take on some of the big projects like maintenance inventory, um. Sleep sleep
[1:53:02] management things like that. So is she, uh, working 40 hours.
[1:53:12] She was here 40 hours this week. OK, but, um, is, uh, Donna is not 40 hours for 3
[1:53:19] years. Oh, OK, yeah. And with Stacey, but Hooper's not. Hooper is only 2 days. Well,
[1:53:27] 2.5. Well, I'm giving you a little once she graduates, so, so Hooper's almost done
[1:53:30] her degree. She's gonna graduate in December and then we get her for 3 days. I still
[1:53:35] volunteer, um, but with Stacey, um, to your point, Councilor North. Um, over time,
[1:53:42] um, she's gonna be looking into other avenues of social media, um, you know, kind
[1:53:46] of checking with some of the other jurisdictions. I know that of course releases
[1:53:50] Nextdoor and some of these other outlets, um, so yes, if you have any, um, recommendations,
[1:53:56] ideas, um, I'll be working with them on a policy. We do wanna have a social media
[1:54:00] policy, um, that's very important, but if you have any ideas or, or outlets that
[1:54:05] you're interested in the town pursuing, I have lots, yeah. And also it's, it's internal
[1:54:12] communication as well. One of the things I told her is to work on is figuring out
[1:54:15] calendar, how to manage your calendar, so we all know where everybody is and what
[1:54:18] we're doing and things like that. Thank you. And lastly, is there, is there anywhere
[1:54:25] that talks about my responsibility as that rep to, uh, at that rep to the planning
[1:54:29] commission? It means you are a planning commissioner, yeah, and then you report back
[1:54:34] during council meetings. I did have a little chat with you about that, but I didn't.
[1:54:38] There's nothing written that I can just kind of wing it. It's an honorary wing it,
[1:54:42] but you're a member of both bodies, full voting member of both bodies, OK. Isaac
[1:54:46] will train you.
[1:54:49] We enjoy it very euphemistically. He's gonna cry. Oh yes, yes. Keep them on fast.
[1:54:56] I'm curious because I've not heard about it for a long time and I know the ball's
[1:54:58] in the county's court, but do we have any sense about when they're gonna do what
[1:55:04] they said they're gonna do with the Main Street? Oh, that's like a long update. I'll
[1:55:08] find out. Oh, don't put that there. I, I'm not asking for, for follow up. I was just
[1:55:15] curious if there had been any, any feedback regarding that. It's, but it's out of
[1:55:18] our hands, right? The county has it. I just, just keep it no further, no further
[1:55:23] questions. Yeah.
[1:55:28] Thank you. That was it. I have two things. One, I think. You know, come
[1:55:35] Arbor Day, we should plant a tree in memorial of Anne Thomas, um, I like that idea
[1:55:43] and invite, uh, her daughter to come, you know, and maybe she has suggestions of
[1:55:50] what type of tree. Um, and then secondly, I'm not sure whether, uh, Jim Mulfair can
[1:55:58] add anything to this or not, but I either drive, well, I drive past the train
[1:56:06] station regularly, and, uh, the train station is an important landmark to
[1:56:14] the town, and
[1:56:18] It's going to need painting, I think. Um, now, I understand that they have
[1:56:25] severe, uh, Utility issues inside the building, so there's a lot that
[1:56:33] needs to be done to it, but I would hate to see the train station. Deteriorate. Is
[1:56:41] it on the historic register? Is it like a historic register building? Is it someone's
[1:56:45] house? Yes, it's private, but the homeowners are living in Italy right now. Oh,
[1:56:53] so. I just, you know, I would like to see maybe the town do something to encourage
[1:57:01] or actually, you know, paint the building just so it doesn't deteriorate.
[1:57:09] You know, to the point where You know it It falls down or has to be taken down,
[1:57:18] so it's just I pass that on.
[1:57:23] Do you have a way to contact the owners yourself? I think Donna Weiss and I could.
[1:57:30] Reach out as a private citizen. Yeah, I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll see what I can do in
[1:57:36] the next month.
[1:57:39] It's the other 10, I, I forgot one thing I wanted to give you all a shout out for
[1:57:44] the beautiful banners, the fall banners. It looked really nice. That was a nice fruition
[1:57:49] of that project. It looked really good. Sorry, OK, that's all I have. OK. I like
[1:57:54] Trey wanted to thank Steve and the rest of the utility staff for an excellent tour.
[1:58:00] It was actually really helpful to see, so we did a deep dive on the wastewater treatment
[1:58:05] plant and saw all of the buildings at the wastewater treatment plant. He took us
[1:58:08] up top to see the tanks, um, and then we did a tour of the town, um, all the town
[1:58:14] facilities, but You know, we've had a lot of discussion. Steve came to us about inventory
[1:58:20] and how important it was to have some sort of tracking system. You really see that,
[1:58:24] and of course we approved it, but you see that firsthand when you go physically into
[1:58:29] those buildings and you see how much inventory and tracking. There is, um, it's,
[1:58:37] I think it's really helpful to go and see the work that the utility staff were doing
[1:58:41] every day and as we were going through town just passing each of the town parks,
[1:58:46] uh, which wasn't an official part of our tour, but of course you observed that our
[1:58:50] utility staff are also doing double time to mow and to put out the lovely barrier
[1:58:58] that Steve built himself around to mask the porta potty in Neil's Polson Park. And
[1:59:04] you know, Niels Poolsen looks great. Um, is that what it is? Yeah, there's a green
[1:59:10] structure that looks very non-imposing and blends beautifully, and it's covering
[1:59:15] up a porta potty in the park, um, and the shade structures are up, and I, it just
[1:59:21] reminded me how much we as a town have done. In recent years, um, with our little
[1:59:28] engine that could to make a park system in Round Hill, uh, that didn't, that didn't
[1:59:34] exist before, um, and so I just wanted to thank you all for taking the time to do
[1:59:39] the tour, um, the, the trailer, I had never seen the new offices over there, they
[1:59:45] looked great, um. And I, I just, it was very impressive. So thank you and thank the
[1:59:53] staff for us. Yeah, we definitely increased our professionalism by like 35% this
[1:59:57] year between hiring Buber, Steve, and the trailer. Well, some of the new staff were
[2:00:03] there. Some of the existing award-winning statewide award-winning utility staff were
[2:00:07] there. So I, it was very, it was very impressive, um, and a big, lots of big steps
[2:00:13] forward. When did you see that, um, so. That's one place with two of our operators
[2:00:19] won Best operator of the year this this past year. Yeah, we met her and Ashley was
[2:00:23] there when we were doing our tour and my newest fire, Owen was there, yep, um, and
[2:00:28] we haven't had a chance to really pat ourselves on the back about Nels Fulton Park
[2:00:32] because I was meaning to send you like a nice pretty report, but, um. We were able
[2:00:37] to get the new water fountain in, the porta potty, the shade structures, um, we got
[2:00:43] new mulch under the trees, so it was really exciting to get kind of like a, a refresh
[2:00:47] and that. Park this year so. Mhm. It looks great. Mhm. OK, Jim.
[2:00:58] Uh, I'll abstain due to technical difficulties. Um, I'll speak for Jim. I spent time
[2:01:04] with Jim's wife today. Jim's wife invited me to come to, uh, her school to interview
[2:01:10] the students as if I was hiring them to be operators or anything they want to be,
[2:01:15] but I tried to get them to be operators. Um, every time a kid said science or math,
[2:01:19] I said, Here's my card. I'm for a tour. Starting to be young at 13, but yeah, I wanted
[2:01:25] to thank Jim for letting me go for having Jim invite me. So that was exciting.
[2:01:33] OK. Um, I don't have much to report because, uh, I already gave you my report in
[2:01:38] the last whole meeting, last meeting, and so we haven't met again yet. Um, but, uh,
[2:01:43] and I don't have a whole lot of other things on my plate. So I'll just say it's just
[2:01:47] been a very productive summer for the staff, even though we took August off, it doesn't
[2:01:51] seem like the staff did. And, uh, so I just want to say kudos. So, um,
[2:02:00] someone gonna take us out. Yeah, I have a motion. I move that the Round Hill Town
[2:02:03] Council recess its open meeting and convene a closed session to discuss and consider
[2:02:08] the acquisition of real property interests for public utility purposes where discussion
[2:02:12] in an open meeting would adversely affect the town's bargaining position or negotiation
[2:02:16] strategy. As authorized by Virginia Code Section 2.2-3711 Alpha 3, the town administrator,
[2:02:24] town attorney, and risk project manager invited to attend. And is, uh, Rick, or is,
[2:02:29] uh, sorry, Jim Mulfair gonna be phoned in on this? Yeah, I'll try to dial him in.
[2:02:33] OK, great. That's the motion. 2nd All right, so moved by uh Vice Mayor Pacheco, seconded
[2:02:41] by Councilperson Graham, and to have a closed session to discuss real estate matters.
[2:02:46] Any discussion in motion. All right. Voice code. Paula James I Trey Wars I, Isaac
[2:02:52] Pacheco. I Miriam Graham.
[2:02:56] Jen, how do you vote?
[2:02:59] All right, we're now in closed session. We're gonna take a brief recess.
[2:03:05] Hi Mike, thanks for Trey Worth. Isaac Pacheco. Hi Maria Graham. Hi Beth Caseman.
[2:03:12] Hi, uh, Jim, uh, all right, we're back in open session. I move that the Round Hill
[2:03:17] Town Council certify that while in closed session, only those matters that were identified
[2:03:21] in the motion to convene the closed session were discussed.
[2:03:25] Is there a 2nd. All right, this is moved by Vice Mayor Pacheco, seconded by Councilperson
[2:03:31] James. The vote is to certify that we were good. Paul James, I Trey Worth, I,
[2:03:38] Isaac Pacheco, I, Mary and Graham on Casement, I. Jim,
[2:03:45] all right. Hearing nothing more to Trevor meeting adjourned.