A discussion of town-owned parcels of land was focused primarily on parcels that are vacant and have the potential to be built upon, be they parking lots or watersheds. The board asked the planning department to continue their investigation of land that might be sold, conserved, or developed.
Windham and Windsor Housing Trust closed out a grant, and the board heard from a number of departments about their FY27 budget requests.
Preliminaries
FYI, I plan to cover public participation, the consent agenda, and the first two agenda items – the WWHT grant and the vacanland inventory. The rest are departmental budget requests, which you can read about in the backup materials.
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They start late. : )
6:21 pm
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Amanda Ellis-Thurber wants to move their recent bag decision to Jan 6th…
Peter Case – what are we rescinding?
Amanda – our tiered pricing system we voted in could cost staff time and…
Degray – point of order – can’t discuss this, it is a yes or no up or down vote…
Liz – Amanda is explaining what she proposed.
Attorney Bob F.- it is a vote to reconsider…at your next meeting.
Liz – this is to reconsider then we will reconsider on Jan 6th.
Peter – I don’t know what is going on right now.
Oscar – adding the extra amount to the bag fees.
Peter – ahh, okay…
4-1 with Isaac against, via Zoom.
John Potter – you have the HR fund budget and Finance budget – I’m asking if we can combine them into one topic… the presentation combines them. (Yes)
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Chair Elizabeth McLoughlin – a couple of things. Just from the pedestrian pint of view. There are people walking dogs, delivering packages, etc. Be careful. They can’t be seen. I got a letter from a middle school student who wants to discuss a civil war monument at the Prospect Hill cemetery, so I reached out to historians and we are going to address the situation. We’ll see where that brings us.
Town Manager John Potter – great news. $1.7 million disaster recovery grant for a bridge replacement. Thanks Brian Bannon. The Library is having a community conversation with state legislators. Petitions for town officers and elections are available at the town clerks office. March 3rd are town elections and RTM is Sat May 21st. Carol Columbe is retiring from parking enforcement after 33 years of service. We wish her the best.
Oscar Heller – the mini fiction contest ended and the first round of judging has a first round selection – winners announced later.
Isaac Evans-Frantz – thanks to all department houses. Sprit Houses at the Boys and Girls Club Saturday 2-6 pm.
Liz – my daughter Mary made those houses.
Peter Cases – happy hanukah !
Isaac Evans-Frantz – I may have given the impression that my concerns weren’t addressed by the town manager, but they were.
Public
Ivan H – Nov 18, we all witnessed something pretty remarkable in its unusualness and irregularity. Before a selectboard that has tried out restricting participation – clocks, sign up sheets… a member of the police force showed up, presented a slideshow that had the police logo, announced he was speaking as a member of the public with no time limit…
Liz – is this a public attack?
Ivan – it is addressing an irregularity. A police officer was not reigned in by the selectboard. He yelled…
Liz – I didn’t hear that.
Ivan – I’m sure you are fully endorsing it.
Liz – alright what’s next?
Ken F. – The time the library gave their presentation I wasn’t able to say what I wanted to say – I want to endorse everything the Library wants. hey are a big part of the community. And they are important for democracy. I’d like the selectboard to invest in the Library. Also, human services budget and entities help those who need assistance and that’s a really good thing.
Oscar – are we at 2 or 3 minutes today?
Liz – we are at 2 because I want to get out of here before 11.
Oscar – let’s revisit next time.
Liz – May-be…
Dick D – I’m hoping we have the easement along RT 142? You are nodding yes? And where do we stand getting an auditor? How do we stand in the 2025 budget. And I commend the fire department for lights. I saw them up again this year. Nice to see.
Potter – I have not been updated on the easement
Bob – F – we don’t have it yet. It took a long time to get to the right person and we did that and it is under review. We have the right person, but it isn’t a high priority. I’ll follow up.
Potter – we did a second RFP for auditors and that was due early this month and not sure on the responses. Sally?
Sally Nix – it was due Nov 30. Haven’t heard that we received any. There is a phase two to the process.
Liz – Bonnie will do a pre-audit to be confirmed by an auditor?
Potter – that might help get them… she can do a lot of the work.
Liz – and her reputation will help.
Potter – that’s the hope.
Consent Agenda
A. Windham Regional Commission Brownfields Coalition Assessment Grant – Authorize becoming a Coalition Partner
B. India Masala House – Approve First and Third Class Liquor License
C. Circle K – Approve Tobacco License and Tobacco Substitute Endorsement Permit
D. Waste Zero – Approve Contract
E. Municipal Investment Fund Participation – Approve
Isaac – item D – approving that contract. In light of the motion to reconsider the cost of the trash bags, doesn’t that put into question that contract?
Potter – the contract is for the services and the bags cost to the town. Cost to the customer is a separate question.
so consented , 5-0
Final Public Hearing for VCDP Scattered Site Grant for WWHT
Liz – the Final Public Hearing for VCDP Scattered Site Grant for WWHT
Bruce Whitney, WWHT – good evening. I’m the director of home ownership. This is the final hearing for the scattered site grant – federal block grant money pays and the town is the host community and you sub grant it to us. I was hear months ago with the public hearing to do the grant for the continuation of the program. This is the final hearing to close the grant for this year – we go through three year cycles. The loan fund is 25 years old. Brattleboro has done it since 2014. Thanks.
Liz – let me formally open a public hearing…
Peter – can you just start from the top…
Bruce – another anniversary – Jerry Freeman is celebrating 25 years employment with the program – BAAH program outside our bailiwick. You have the brief report. Accomplishments include housing repair loans, housing counseling, advocacy, house buying education. The results are 93 projects across 2 counties. Brattleboro – 24 residences and 364k of loan fund. 26% of the 93 projects, and 12% of the 2 county population. Housing counseling to 64.
Liz – thanks for this good work that you do. It helps people get into homes and stay in their homes. Housing stability is very important.
Isaac – ditto, thank you.
Liz – the silence indicates support. I close the hearing…
Town-Owned Land Inventory
Potter – the board asked to check in at town owned land and housing opportunities and whether and what we should own.
Liz – this was discussed in our retreat. (audio feedback problem)
Sue Fillion, Planning Director – I’m trying to stop the feedback…
Potter – we’re really not
Sue – it is not muting… it’s never happened. I’ll send the link to Seth.
Potter – sorry about this. WE aren’t looking for a motion, but any feedback you have would be useful
(hah – feedback!)
Sue – as John mentioned, there was a question of town owned land. We looked at this before but what has been prepared now, up on the town website, is an interactive map of all the town owned properties. Click on a colored parcel and a pop up box has information – zoning district, acreage, assessed value, etc., if there are buildings . From there, we categorized them into three categories – in use (a fair amount going on there at the site, such as the parks, Commons, Crowell Lot, Cemeteries, Library,… not a lot of extra land to be developed as is, in use.) Partial category is the parking lots (in use but could be something else…), town properties – the rec and parks dept has benches and tiny spaces. Final category is vacant. This map doesn’t contain the environmental constraints – steep slopes, wetlands, etc. But desktop wise, you can see where they are. So, this is our judgement on the categories. It doesn’t mean anything is necessarily buildable. There are vacant properties that have steep cliffs.. but could be another use. Our opinion is most properties are leftovers. Not that valuable. Not that buildable. There are some opportunities and some parcels could be good – like Kettle Pond near the high school. Town owns Wilson Woods sub development land, near the salt shed. Could be some permitting issues but we could dig into that more. Another part – the downtown parking lots. In 2022, the town put out an RFQ for developers that might have a development on the Harris Lot – off Harris St near Gibson Aiken Lot. We had some proposals and we selected M&S to do some predevelopment work. The project fell apart but could be resurrected potentially. We’re happy to go around the map and answer questions. Parcels in the watershed area by the reservoir – Gulf Road. We’d like to know what your goals are so we can deliver you something more actionable.
Liz – thans. John or Bob, I don’t want to the board to do anything to jeopardize any future real estate deal. Any protected speech?
Bob F – if you identify parcels to convey or sell, you could hire a relator, do sealed bids, put responses in the paper, for 30 days then accept the bid. Those are the two ways. Sometimes the town ends up with a tax sale… sometime you just want to get rid of it.
Liz – we can give guidance to go forward and it won’t…
Bob – you aren’t negotiating a contract…
Amanda – a conservation easement – is that the same process?
Bob – it could be. You put out your conditions.
Amanda – I love the map, chart, and report. There is a lot of depth to it. I will look again and again. It is such a big conversation and we are just taking it in right now. Future meetings about structure….
Oscar – if we go back to the idea of development, what do the models look like. What do we do if we want to encourage development.
Sue – many towns are doing the RFQ route. It’s pretty popular. Housing costs are high and land costs are high, and developers are looking for partnership or assuring. They can do predevelopment. The state has The CHIP program that we are eager to learn more about – tax increment financing on a project by project basis.
Peter – some plots… I’m not interest in doing things where we are already parking cars. Sunset Lake – 32 acres of land? What.. one idea I had was to sell off land, put it in the rainy day fund. Return it to the tax base for more tax revenue. If all these parcels that are salable and useable, what’s the acres on the other one? 32 and 43? Alright Okay. So. Would be nice with housing costs being high, if there was a developer interested in, could that be developed?
Sue – that’s the level we’d go to next. The 42 aces has some wetlands on it. The 32 acres is far from any roads. It’ll be expensive. Is it worth it? Does it serve watershed protection purposes?
Peter – do we have a number of what returning these plots to the grand list mean in tax revenue. For me, that’s the goal. If we can get a decent amount, and then get the tax revenue. It is an easy transition of the most difficult sort.
Sue – we could add up the assessed values. We’d probably make less. This is where guidance would help – want us to do the vacant ones?
Peter -great..
Amanda – the watershed can be sought after by conservation organization – could mean dollars to the town if not ideal for building and not generating taxes. Maybe not more domiciles. High density is the most environmentally friendly way to build.
Isaac – if we can take action to restore our reserves and protects the environment and increases affordable housing stock, that would be ideal. Financial health and expanded housing goals met!
Liz – I want to recognize that Steven and Sue have brought out a process and next steps, all laid out here. We all want to see more housing. The Harris parking lot site was an RFQ and is buildable. It’s a winner, so the parking… I’m sure Steven and Sue have ways to relocate parking or create new. It can be done. While we aren’t taking a vote, we want these next steps to be taken. We want you to use your best judgment as to what can be realized.
Peter – anything that’s tops us toward building up the coffers and the tax base. Do we need a town meeting to okay sales of parcels of land?
Bob F – no – if you give 30 days notice without objection. You can always elect to take these sales to a town meeting. The parking lot might be a bigger issue to take to a town meeting.
Liz – do we need to give any other guidance?
Oscar – we’ll look to you for recommendations…
Fric – I’d echo what Amanda said about high density building. The parcels we purchased to protect the watershed, I’d imagine. Certainly there are advantages to leaving them alone. Chucnks like that in the middle of nowhere, let the other critters of town enjoy those areas.
Dick D – I would hope a couple things. I’d hope that we’d put this building. I’m an advocate of getting out of this since the 90s and wanted the town to buy the Holstein building. I’d not have the Harmony Lot on this list. It is the heartbeat of downtown. It doesn’t have a whole lot of seating but is essential to the vitality of downtown. If you took it away, you’d send a bad message to the public. Any properties suitable for housing, I’d ask that the purchase and sale agreement has it being developed in a short period of time and not sit on it. That should be a goal – make sure they get developed.
Liz – I agree. Harmony Lot is complicated.
Peter Case – I agree about Harmony Lot and time restrict projects.
Liz – we are negotiating about this building as well, a long term strategy.
Potter – if you have thoughts on any parcels, we’ll put that into what we bring back.
Fric – Dick brought up this building. I have yet to hear a good reason to do the extraordinary expense of changing town halls at this time. We have a host of buildings serving us well with shared parking. Someday explain it to me…
Liz – thank you very much…
Over and out
I’m done now. The rest of the meeting is budget related departmental requests, which are outlined in the backup materials. They’ll also discuss anything major again in the future. This isn’t the last we’ll hear of anything big, so… I’m taking a break.