Town Of Fairfax Selectboard Minutes
March 23, 2009

Selectboard Members present: Bill Ormerod, John Mitchell, Bob Horr, Charlie Swanson, and Randy DeVine

Staff Members present: Don Pigeon, Highway Foreman; Katrina Antonovich, Recreation Department

Public Present: Peg Stewart; Chris Santee, Fairfax News; Melissa Beerworth; Two BFA Students

1. Call to Order

Bob Horr, Chairperson, called the meeting to order at 7:01PM.

2. Items on the Agenda

A. Deb Woodward: Deb wanted to provide an update on the loan for the grader. People’s Trust can not guarantee the rate will be the same if we wait thirty (30) days. Deb will have all paperwork ready for Board signatures by next Monday, March 30th.

There was some discussion regarding the current rate of mileage reimbursement. John moved to approve the reimbursement effective today, Monday, March 23, 2009; rather than making it retroactive to January 1, 2009. Charlie seconded the motion. Discussion followed. Bill noted the employee policy states January 1st to December 31st, 2009. Randy suggested it be effective after the budget has passed. Bill motioned to have the rate take effect on January 1, 2009; Charlie seconded. Three voted in favor, one opposed and one abstained.

B. Don Pigeon: We need to work on a written easement for the Wheeler’s on Goose Pond Road for Don to work in the right-of-way to do some bank stabilization work. He currently has verbal permission from the owner. Bob will investigate locating an attorney to prepare an easement.

Furnace quit this weekend. Don had Arrow Equipment come to service and clean it. They will be sending us a letter certifying the furnace installation as requested by VLCT.

C. Randy: The engineer for the Steeple Market has the application for the sprinkler system and is in the process of completing it. Bob and Randy attended the DRB meeting. Because there were slight modifications to the footprint and addition of the sprinkler system in the basement storage area, the DRB would like a new letter. Skip drafted a letter to Pierre Menard regarding the Steeple Market and distributed it for review. Bob signed.

D. Katrina Antonovich: Katrina was approached by Youth Basketball about taking over the program. It will involve a lot more hours for her and storage of the equipment. She is in the process of investigating how other municipalities run their programs. Bob explained that we do not have a budget to support it. Bill suggested as far as storage goes, as with other youth sports programs, each coach store his/her own equipment. John requested a line item budget. Katrina will continue to investigate.

Katrina asked to hold Recreation Department meetings here in the Town Office. Once per month on Wednesdays would work best, but the conference room is not available on Wednesdays. She will coordinate with the DRB/PC to possibly hold her meetings at the same time in a different space in the building.

3. Minutes

A. Bill motioned to accept the minutes as written, Randy seconded, all voted in favor.

4. General Business

A. Selectboard Orders and Purchase Orders.

B. Skip sent a letter to Stitzel, Page & Fletcher stating he would be willing to go ahead and record the as-built easements without DRB approval on the Handy property.

C. The battery recycling program was discussed and we are moving forward with it.

D. Citizens for Fairfax Community minutes were briefly reviewed.

E. Suzanne sent bid requests for HHWD out to Environmental Products, Enpro, APT Environmental, and Good-Point Recycling.

F. Liquor license applications were presented for signature. Bill moved they be signed for Nan’s, Minors, Steeple Market, and Adam’s Quickstop. Charlie seconded the motion. All voted in favor.

G. VLCT Loss prevention issue regarding the requirement for GFI’s in the two bathrooms was discussed. An electrician will be coming in this week per Bob’s discussion with Jim Boomhover at BFA. Bill suggested putting a GFI breaker in the box downstairs.

H. The SWIP plan needs to be adopted. We need to schedule two public meetings and let the public know where the plan can be reviewed. We have pre-approval, this will give us our final approval. We should have the Planning Commission and DRB attend as well. Public meetings will be scheduled on April 13th and April 20th at 7:00 PM.

I. The Water Ordinance has been re-typed and will be reviewed during the April 13th meeting. Copies were made for all Board members to review prior to this meeting.

J. Deadline for Fairfax News is March 27th. Suzanne typed up a list of items to be included and the Board reviewed.

K. The Fire Department is soliciting for bids for a new fire truck – 12 requests were sent out, have received 3 bids to date.

L. The purchase order policy was discussed.

6. Other Business

A. Bill: He received a copy of the updated directory for the Town Elected and Appointed Officials from Stacy.

He discussed the Green-Up Day funding with Al Daniels. It was not included in this year’s budget but we will make sure it is included for next year’s budget.

He reported there was a Ways and Means Committee meeting to reduce expenditures on Tuesday. He was unable to attend but sent some suggestions to Carolyn. One was to do away with the two license requirements (standard and enhanced), reduce to one license to do away with duplication. Also in regard to healthcare; the Feds will be mandating an electronics claim filing system in 2012; we should also mandate this. Another suggestion was that the State increase investment in Medicaid program over the next two years. The last item was restructuring of law enforcement agencies.

We received our ranking for the water line project. We are 4th from the bottom out of 260+ projects. We got 33 points.

He was in touch with Gary and Carolyn regarding the stabilization on Goose Pond Road. State has not decided what they are going to do about payments to the Town.

B. Charlie: The Emergency Contact List had several errors on it.

C. John: He has signed up for an Introduction to Woodworking Class and would like to include this building on the tour.

D. Bob: Had a request regarding Richards Road. Will the Board authorize Bob and Don to sign a letter stating the access road to the Gaines-Miller Estate is not now and never has been a Town road. Charlie and Bill both expressed that they did not want to get involved in this. They were okay with signing a letter giving specific land marks per VTrans map.

7.Executive Session

A. Bill moved to enter executive session to discuss a personnel issue at 9:02 PM, Charlie seconded the motion. All voted in favor.

B. The Board exited Executive Session at 9:08 PM.

C. Bill moved to re-enter executive session to discuss legal matters at 9:09 PM, Charlie seconded the motion. All voted in favor.

D. The Board exited Executive Session at 9:22 PM.

8.Adjournment

Charlie motioned to adjourn, Bill seconded. Four votes in favor, zero against, one abstained. The meeting adjourned at 9:23 PM.

Respectfully submitted by Suzanne Lavallee,

Selectboard Administrative Assistant

Robert Horr, Selectboard Chairperson