The Brattleboro Selectboard discussed COVID-19, manholes, electricians, monthly finances, emergency management plans, roads & bridges, and the library’s Board of Trustees.
The virtual selectboard meeting is becoming more routine. Read on to see just how smooth everyone is now.
The Brattleboro Selectboard will hold a virtual regular meeting on Tuesday to discuss COVID-19, manholes, electricians, finances, emergency management , roads and bridges, and library trustees. You can signal your intention to discuss something else during the public participation part of the agenda.
Here are a few videos you might find useful. One is a good demonstration of washing hands. Paint is substituted for soap so you can watch how to best get it in all the right spots. Another is on exponential growth, which uses the virus as a jumping off point for a short math lesson. Our third video is a short visual explanation of how social distancing works to keep the number of cases down low enough so that hospitals don’t overflow. Our final video helps you determine the day of the week.
The Brattleboro Selectboard met virtually to discuss updates regarding COVID-19, staff furloughs, putting Representative Town Meeting on further hold, and other matters. Board members urged landlords to pause rents and banks to pause mortgage payments. And licensed electricians may be required for most rental properties repairs.
It wasn’t the smoothest technological feat, and it took a while to get things working semi-smoothly, but it sufficed.
We want to do something for the “essential” businesses remaining in operation. For any open business in the area: free advertising.
That’s right. For the duration of the stay-at-home and essential-work orders, we’ll give any open business that wants one a free ad. We’ll even make it for you. Just let us know what you’d like to tell people, and where you’d like the ad to link. It can take people directly to any page on your site.
The Brattleboro Selectboard held its first-ever virtual public special meeting. It’s also the first time the newly-configured board has taken up new business. They discussed… you guessed it… coronavirus, of course.
Notes from this historic meeting are below.
Here are the daily Vermont Department of Health COVID-19 Updates for April, 2020, as they are released. Also, surrounding county information for the Brattleboro area. Also, as of April 3, we’re including numbers from Brattleboro Memorial Hospital.
WHAT’S NEW TODAY:
-There will be a special Selectboard meeting this coming Thursday, April 2, at 6:15pm on GoToMeeting.
Meetings of Town boards, commissions, and committees will resume on a case-by-case basis. All will use the GoToMeeting platform for remote-only meetings (with no physical location) until after the COVID-19 emergency has passed.
-The State has advised the Town that we cannot temporarily suspend the pay-as-you-throw program.
– In keeping with the closure of all Town Recreation facilities and programs, the Recreation and Parks Department announces the cancellation of the following seasonal special events:
Here’s a bit of historical news from the Brattleboro Phoenix, January 3, 1919. Most of the print space around this time was spent on news of the war in Europe, but this tidbit highlights a local issue. It’s a story that suggests the influenza epidemic was winding down a bit in Brattleboro, but also gives some numbers and information for how it had progressed.
According to Amtrak, no Vermont service on the Vermonter, or Ethan Allen Express, until further notice:
“Vermonter (Washington – St. Albans): No service north of New Haven (Monday-Saturday) and no service on Sundays.
Ethan Allen Express (New York – Rutland, VT): No service north of Albany”
This Wednesday evening (tonight), Lise and I will be hosting our radio show, Bubblewrap, live on WVEW-LP 107.7 FM. You can listen in over the air, or stream the signal from www.wvew.org.
We won’t be violating any stay at home orders, either! We will be attempting to host our show from our home, send a stream of that signal to the station, and then have the station pick it up and broadcast it to you.
I almost forgot that we needed a new “Noticed” for the new season. This should be an interesting one. I expect some of these observations to change as time goes on.
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I noticed some people at St Michaels’ today loading up a truck. Looked like volunteers working to make some deliveries.
“WHAT IS NEW TODAY • Selectboard member Dave Schoales has resigned so that Selectboard member-elect Ian Goodnow can be appointed. This will allow the composition of the Selectboard to change in the manner decided by the voters at the same time when that transition normally would take place. The Town’s Charter states that “newly elected Selectboard members’ terms shall begin on the first Monday following the final adjournment of the annual Representative Town Meeting.” Due to the postponement of this year’s Representative Town Meeting, the commencement of Ian Goodnow’s service would have been delayed indefinitely. Instead, a special Selectboard meeting will be held soon so that the continuing 4 Selectboard members can appoint Ian Goodnow to fill the vacancy created by Dave Schoales’ resignation.”
Some of you may be new to working at home. Lise and I have been running our web design business like this for over 20 years, and it took some getting used to. Here are a few tips and tricks we’ve learned over the years:
Have a dedicated work area
If you can keep your work and play separate, it helps. Try to find a bit of space that can be for “work” so that you can get away from it later on.
The Town of Brattleboro has some excellent resources being compiled. Here are the links to the Town’s pages:
Town Updates
Resources for Businesses
Resources for Individuals and Families
The Brattleboro Selectboard held their regular meeting, but it was anything but “regular” Tuesday. Board members were absent. Those attending sat apart from one another (not quite 6 feet…). COVID-19 was influencing almost every article on the agenda. And Brattleboro’s Skatepark was approved to begin construction.
The COVID-19 update and discussion was the main item. Groundworks got an additional grant to begin construction on their new building, the town finance report looks good up until last week but may show deficits before the fiscal year is over, and Representative Town Meeting is postponed.
Strange times, eh? And such a quick, sudden shift for just about everything. Aside from whiplash, how are you holding up?
I find myself going back and forth between trying to continue some semblance of business as usual, and being in shock at how this is not business as usual at all.
Update: Not many people have asked for help here, but this has become a bit of a collection of useful information links, so we’re changing the title slightly.
From the Governor’s office:
“WHEREAS, since December 2019, Vermont has been working in close collaboration with the national Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and with the United States Health and Human Services Agency to monitor and plan for the potential for an outbreak of respiratory illness due to a novel coronavirus (a disease now known as COVID-19), in the United States; and
WHEREAS, this rapidly evolving global situation required the Governor to direct the Vermont Department of Health (VDH) to activate the Health Operations Center in February 2020 when VDH began to monitor and later, test Vermonters who may have been exposed to COVID-19; and
The Brattleboro Selectboard will approve a bid to begin construction of a skatepark at their next regular meeting. Yes, you read that right. The skatepark is finally going to be built.
There will be updates on COVID-19 from the Town Manager and a status update on Representative Town Meeting, a sewer rodder will be bought, Groundworks will get a $100,000 grant, the Windham Regional Commission will give an update, stormwater will be managed, and more. You can bring up other items not on the agenda during Public Participation.
