Board of Trustees

Village of Walden Board of Trustees Regular Meeting September 17, 2024 Mayor Ramos called the regular meeting of the Village of Walden Board of Trustees to order at 6:30pm. On roll call the following were: Mayor: Present: Deputy Mayor Chris Batson Trustees Ralph Garrison Jr Kristi Hall Bill Taylor Becky Pearson Liz Kyle Absent: John Ramos Ralph Garrison Jr Also Present: John Revella, Village Manager Marisa Kraus, Village Clerk Dave Donovan, Village Attorney Executive Session – Personal History of Particular Employee Trustee Hall made a motion to enter into executive session to discuss personal history of a particular employee. Seconded by Trustee Taylor. All ayes. Motion carried. Reconvene Trustee Hall made a motion to reconvene he regular meeting of the Board of Trustees. Seconded by Trustee Kyle. All ayes. Motion carried. Village Manager’s Report  Went over a few purchase orders and rehab loans. Got them signed, have another one signed today and a new one that came in today as well  Rec Coordinator is getting ready for the fall decorations and programs for Harvest Fest  DPW Superintendent has been working on his projects to get ready for winter  We've been checking on the project on Walker St with the engineer. There are a few concerns from residents. Trying to address those as they come up. The contractor has been pretty flexible with helping address those issues  They started on South Street today as well  Went over invoices and billing with water and sewer and garbage. Answered some resident complaints about issues with their bills, concerns about when they get their new meters. They got updated bills because their meters were lacking  New full-time Policeman hired. Should be on the shifts this week and he'll be here for next meeting to be introduced  We received one bid in and reviewed the other capital projects to make sure the bids are going to be back in time 1   Reviewed some matters with the Comprehensive Planning Committee  Covered for time off for the DPW Super  I had a meeting with the PBA and special counsel regarding the 12 hour shifts for the Police Department. We're about in the position to bring that to the board  Went over the quotes for Spectrum and Frontier. That's on the agenda tonight  Went over some insurance invoices with the Finance Department and Hunter Insurance  Rec Department has outdoor soccer started. Teen center and after school programs going well. Indoor pickle ball. There’s additional programs that's begun at the Community Center. A lot more to come as well.  Building Department issued 26 new permits, 18 violations, 4 stop work orders, 5 CO reports, 15 fire and safety inspections and had another court proceeding, has been assisting with Zoning and Planning Board  Clerk's been updating Facebook, website, as things come up, going over FOILs, handicap requests, looking at zoom options and processing permits, minutes  Finance Department’s going over things with Edmunds, invoices, billings, journal entries, vouchers and online billing  Public works. The Sewer Department has been pressing sludge, trying to keep operations going as our capital projects get into motion. We're waiting for some equipment before they can get started on the 1st project down there. Water Department conducted 29 mark outs, 13 meters replaced, 24 endpoints and also had daily inspections and 1 closing. Also got some quotes for street lighting. There's an update requirement from NYSEG that's on the agenda as well. They've been stump grinding as time allows, sidewalk repairs, tree replacements, flushing, jetting and basin repairs as well.  Police Department on patrol. We're almost fully staffed. They're still getting applications. The new list should be out shortly that we can start with. There were 21 traffic stops, 17 parking tickets, 3 mvas, 9 arrests and 254 blotters. Trustee Pearson: Walker Street. I know there was some water in people's houses. Did that get taken care of? Manager Revella: Water in people's houses? I didn't hear that. There was someone who had a sewer back up at one of the properties, but that was a sewer issue. It’s private. Trustee Pearson: The sidewalks are done now? I went up there on Sunday. They weren't in yet on the right side. Manager Revella: They finished the last driveway today, on the right side. The sidewalks are done. They still have to pave. Trustee Pearson: What's going on with the comptroller? Still have the comptroller coming here or not coming here? If it's done, do we have a report? Manager Revella: No, they stopped coming. Trustee Pearson: No report? Manager Revella: No. 2 Trustee Pearson: Will we get one? Manager Revella: Yes. Trustee Pearson: Orange County Transit update. I didn't see anything in my packet. Do we have anything? Manager Revella: Nothing. I don't think there's any response. Attorney Donovan: As was discussed at the last meeting, I did contact their attorney after the meeting, I asked if they were still on for October to start construction. He indicated he would contact his client. Get back to me. I have not heard anything. Trustee Taylor: The shortage staffing and the PD. Does hiring this additional officer, is that going to help out at all here? Manager Revella: We have one left to be fully staffed. Trustee Taylor: You anticipate that staffing issue will go away on the PD's report? Manager Revella: Yes. Once we get that last one in. Trustee Taylor: Any candidates? Manager Revella: The new list should be out shortly. Trustee Pearson: Don't we have somebody out on 207c? Manager Revella: Yes. Trustee Pearson: So we can't fill that position until they’re gone. We'll always have a position open. Won't be fully staffed if we have one guy out. Manager Revella: No, we cannot. But we'll be fully staffed. For a 12-hour shift, we won't be fully staffed. But we didn't go there yet. Right now we'll be fully staffed. Trustee Taylor: The Parking Enforcement Officer out on patrol. Does that mean he's riding around? Manager Revella: Or he's walking around. He can drive around, but he's been walking. Foot patrol. Deputy Mayor Batson: There's a note on here for the Building Department North Montgomery St. Several interested parties. Are these interested parties interested in purchasing that and paying for the demolition of it or are they waiting on us to take action? Manager Revella: No, they're not. Approval of September 3, 2024 Minutes Trustee Pearson made a motion to approve the September 3, 2024 minutes. Seconded by Trustee Kyle. 4 ayes. 1 abstention (Trustee Hall). Motion carried. Public Comment 3 None Park Use – Alcohol Waiver – Castillo-Rivera Trustee Pearson made a motion to approve the Park Use Request – Alcohol Waiver for October 6, 2024. Seconded by Trustee Taylor. All ayes. Motion carried. All ayes Park Use – Alcohol Waiver – Gragert & McLellan Trustee Kyle made a motion to approve the Park Use Request – Alcohol Waiver for November 30, 2024. Seconded by Trustee Taylor. All ayes. Motion carried. Park Use – Alcohol Waiver - Depew Trustee Hall made a motion to approve the Park Use Request – Alcohol Waiver for October 11, 2024. Seconded by Trustee Kyle. All ayes. Motion carried. Veteran’s Day Ceremony Request Trustee Hall made a motion to approve Veteran’s Day Ceremony Request for November 10, 2024. Seconded by Trustee Kyle. 4 ayes. 1 abstention (Trustee Pearson). Motion carried. Discussion – Parking Meters Manager Revella: I know that the Mayor and Deputy Mayor went around to talk to businesses. There were some others that may have gone around. I also got another e-mail from one of the same businesses they went to, that had the opposite response and I sent to them so they could disseminate. I'm not sure if anybody wants to speak to that. Deputy Mayor Batson: I'm more than happy to since John and I did walk around. I think we got to 11 out of the 15-16 businesses. All 11 were in overwhelming favor of sticking to what we have now. None of them felt that the parking was an issue. Some of them did have some good things that I would like to discuss. I don't know if it's now, I can at least say it now and maybe we can discuss it more. But just to address the issue, parking meters, there was no one in favor of parking meters, nor did any of the businesses that we spoke to felt like that the street parking slowed down or inhibited their business. They still did have some good feedback for us on it. But again, we went to 11 separate businesses, none of them in favor of parking meters. Some of the feedback that they gave us, which I thought was good, is that would it be possible to issue a small amount of employee parking passes to make those particular folks exempt from being ticketed, which I think is a fair discussion to perhaps have at some point. I don't know that it's for tonight but something there and then the other piece that came up quite a bit and this also came up through the business council. We may want to consider looking at the size and location of signs for the municipal lots. I think that's just a suggestion. Perhaps we could benchmark that and some others, but a lot of the parking discussion focused around the fact that the local businesses felt comfortable with the residents of Walden's ability to find parking. But they felt like the parking may be not the best for being able to capture the traffic that passersby. They see a place. They think it's interesting. They quickly look. It's too complicated to park. Or perhaps there is no parking on the street at that moment. However, if they were aware as a passerby. Large municipal lots, maybe they would take the opportunity to look at that. I think those are 2 things that I would like to discuss in the future, is it possible to create some sort of exemption for local businesses from being ticketed for parking too long. Some of the examples were, I have to get out and I have to move my car every 2 hours. I might be in the middle of a discussion with the customer. I don't think that's what we intended with having a parking person and I lived here for 15 years. I am aware of the municipal lots. But I do understand their requests around the visibility of municipal lots. I think we can leave it up to us to decide if parking meters or some sort of kiosk we want to pursue. It does not sound like the local businesses are in favor of this. 4 Trustee Taylor: What about the Oak Street parking lot? Are we going to address that? Manager Revella: Making it timed parking instead of 24-hour parking? Trustee Taylor: Yes. We've got disabled vehicles still in there. Is that municipal parking or is it turned into tenant parking there? Manager Revella: If you want to change the timing of the lot to the same as Orchard, that's possible. Have all 3 lots have the same rules. It makes sense. If that’s what the board is in favor of. Trustee Pearson: When you were just talking about parking, that could be employee parking down there instead of the municipal lot and they can walk up to the Main Street. It's not very far to go from Oak Street to Main. Manager Revella: I'm just not sure. The newspaper said something about Millspaugh. That it was in favor of. I never said that. Trustee Kyle: I still think that the passes should be a thing, because if we just designated it as employee parking to where there wasn't a time limit, we would run into the same issue with the disabled vehicles staying there for extended periods of time. Manager Revella: No, we would tow it. Trustee Kyle: That's why I said we would still need to specify employee parking. Some sort of permit. Otherwise, if we don't have a time limit in that lot, we're right back where we started with the vehicles. Deputy Mayor Batson: I think both of these things need to happen. We do need to put in rules for the Oak Street parking lot. Trustee Taylor: Chris, I have one question. You hit 11 businesses. Any idea how many employee parking spots we're talking? I know in the past and John; you can correct me if I'm wrong. The owners were looking for somewhere in the vicinity of 60-70 parking spots for their employees. Deputy Mayor Batson: If I had to do the math off the top of my head and this is just a guess, which I hate to do, I think that number seems very high. I do know that one business can have as many as 10 people on at once. The rest are about 2 or 3, only of which 1 seems to be parking up front of there. I would put the number closer to 20, which is still substantial. Trustee Taylor: Yeah, I think that's something that has to be really considered if we're going down this road. We got to be really careful there. Manager Revella: I'm concerned about it. I was actually just speaking with Dave. If I own my business, then I have 1 employee, but I have 20 customers. You have 10 employees, usually 2 customers. Now you're taking up all my customer spots because you don't need them. That's not fair. Trustee Taylor: I think it needs to be looked at before we make any kind of decision. Trustee Pearson: I think it's fine the way it is right now. 5 Manager Revella: The only thing I would think you guys should talk about that people brought up is that if you wanted to change timed parking at Oak Street or Maple Street. Maybe you want to consider I don't know. Deputy Mayor Batson: Can we take it away as homework then for us to consider for the next meeting to consider timed parking or parking changes to Oak Street parking? Trustee Hall: Can we push it to the following meeting? Next meeting, it looks like there's quite a bit of that. Deputy Mayor Batson: That's second meeting in October. Manager Revella: October 15th. Deputy Mayor Batson: As it stands, we are not going to move forward with parking meters. Are we comfortable tabling the discussion on parking meters? That's not something we want to pursue. Instead, we want to look at timed parking Oak Street and Maple Street, potentially continue to discuss employee passes, working passes, some solution there and signage. Signage is something that we definitely want to take a look at, but can we get a plan before we go forward with signage? I don't want to make a motion or anything, that we just get better signage. Look for examples of what other locations have that have better municipal signage or what that potentially looks like. Audited Voucher Policy Deputy Mayor Batson: This is a change of policy that Trustee Taylor put forward. We were sent a red line version of that. I believe the objective is to vote on that and potentially put that in place this evening. Trustee Taylor: The red line items, I got those pieces of information from the Finance Department and the objective of the policy is to 1, give us the ability to still audit any and all purchase orders and vouchers, to make that process a little bit more streamlined in the sense that those things can be done at our leisure, at home or wherever you want to review them. If you want to come down here and still do the review, that's fine, but the auditing list or the bill list that they can produce will give you the same information as the vouchers you’re looking at when you initial normally. Trustee Pearson: But we still come in to sign here, physically sign. 4 people at least have to sign. Trustee Taylor: A majority of the board. Looking ahead, if we had 5 trustees 5 years from now, instead of the 7, the majority obviously would be 3. If for some reason the board exploded into 9 Trustees, then the majority would be 5. That's the reason that we went that route. There are certain things on the last page is, really you're signing that you have looked at the electronic vouchers that were sent to you in a spreadsheet. How many pages that could be? It could be 15-20 pages. I'm not sure. And when we sign here, it would simply be saying, yep, just like we're doing when we go in the office now and sign the bills. Trustee Pearson: So, I can sign online, is what you're telling me. I'm going to be able to sign online. Trustee Taylor: No, unless we go DocuSign. That is another option, but what this does is it provides a mechanism for all the bills that have been reviewed and signed. Our signatures on this final sheet will be present at the board meeting. You will have had the opportunity to look at the electronic e-mail that was sent to you and look at those line items. If a particular 1 caused concern. It is available here, just like it is now. You can come down and take a look at that. If there's an 6 amount or a bill that you have a question about. But the idea is that when we have our board meeting, we're signing here that we've looked at them electronically and/or you looked at the hard copies. That's what your signature represents. What that does is it makes it a little bit easier for accounts payable. They're not hunting down Trustees. We don't have stacks of bills sitting in there that need 1 signature, 4 signatures, 2 signatures. It makes their job a whole lot easier, and it puts us in the 21st century. Start taking advantage of that. That was the intent where all I did was take the policy that Dave generated. Attorney Donovan: I put it together for Goshen for a number of years. The red lines that Bill put in were additions, most of which, as he said, suggested by finance. I have no issues from a legal point of view. Understand New York State Village Law just requires the Board of Trustees shall audit claims. There is actually no requirement for a voucher to be signed. It is what I would describe as best practice. Every municipality that I work for requires that. I asked a couple of Treasurers, I may have mentioned this before. 1 at the Village of Goshen that I've dealt with about 15 years where she came with the requirement for a voucher to be signed by Trustees. Her answer was the similar answer that Bill heard. That's the way it was always done. Hence the idea as to institute a policy which backs up how we order claims. The policy is fine from a legal point of view. Trustee Taylor: That's really the goal, because right now we don't have a policy that delineates how we're doing the process. It also provides a mechanism, if you were to get a new employee in the Finance Department. What do they need to do? How do they need to handle it? They've got a policy that we can refer them to and life goes on. And anybody that's ever been an auditor or been audited, the response, that's always how we've done it. Never flies. Trustee Pearson: I want clarification because I'm seeing your red line. I'm seeing all that we're going to get an electronic copy of it when Marisa sends that to us. So, we do not have to come here and sign these bills. Trustee Taylor: It’s up to you. Trustee Pearson: If you don't have 4 signatures, where am I getting 4 signatures from? Manager Revella: Cover sheet. Trustee Pearson: This sheet is going to be emailed to me. Manager Revella: No, that sheet’s going to be here. Trustee Taylor: You're going to sign this at the board meeting. Trustee Pearson: I just have to sign that sitting here at this table. Trustee Taylor: When the motion is made to approve all the bills, you've already done that. What you're going to get emailed to you electronically is a listing of all the PO's and vouchers. Trustee Pearson: There'll be no more PO’s in the office. Trustee Taylor: They will be at your disposal if you need it. Trustee Pearson: I can sign that sheet. I like to look at all that. Trustee Taylor: Yes, you can. 7 Deputy Mayor Batson: It does not exempt us from the responsibility of auditing them. Simply streamlines it. Trustee Pearson: I have a question about the exemptions. Medical, dental, workers comp, Aflac. Those can be mailed out at anytime without our signature. Utility bills, cable, Internet, electric, cellular phone all gets done as well. Manager Revella: Contractual. Attorney Donovan: That's authorized by section 5-24, Subdivision 6 for the New York State Village Law. You adopt that policy, you're authorized by law to do that. Trustee Pearson: Credit cards. Credit cards are something that people are buying gas on, they're buying equipment down at the hardware store. That we don't want to look at that stuff? We are fine? Attorney Donovan: Don't look at me. I'm just saying that in order to avoid a finance charge that may need to be paid in a timely fashion. If you're not comfortable with it, understand this is the board’s policy. Trustee Pearson: If we're doing this every 2 weeks, you'll get a credit card bill once a month, so you should be covered, correct? Deputy Mayor Batson: We still need to audit. Trustee Pearson: I agree you need audit, but you're exempting that. That can be paid without our signature. Manager Revella: Under village law right now? Absolutely. Attorney Donovan: It’s not necessarily on the list, but you could do that if you want to. If you don't want to, you don’t have to. Trustee Pearson: I think I want to know what's going on with the credit card before it’s paid. I’d like to see who’s buying what, where it’s coming from. Trustee Kyle: It'll have a finance charge if it's paid after the due date, so I feel like we can definitely like look into it. Trustee Pearson: We have a meeting every 2 weeks. Trustee Kyle: We have had meetings that have gotten cancelled. Trustee Hall: But you still come in and sign the bills. Trustee Kyle: Like he was saying, that document got signed like at the board meeting. I agree that it should be looked over. I just wouldn't want the credit card bill to then have a finance charge that it didn’t need to have. Trustee Pearson: Have we had credit card bills that have finance charges on them or have we been up to date on them anyway? I would feel comfortable with the credit card thing not be exempt. 8 Trustee Hall: We would still need to look at the bills and go over them, right? I don't understand what the point of this is if we still have to look at them and sign. Manager Revella: You're going to get an electronic copy of what's being ordered. All that material is going to come to you to review. Hopefully, to get you to go through everything faster. If you want to come in and review certain things, you can pull certain things to be reviewed. Other things, it doesn't take much logic to say, obviously I don't need to review that one, but maybe some other ones you do. That's what it's supposed to help you do. Trustee Pearson: The pile of bills will not be in there any longer? Manager Revella: Yes, they will, absolutely. Trustee Taylor: What you're going to get electronically is, as it says on the second sheet, is purchase order listing report. That report gives you all of the same information that you're looking at with that stapled voucher that's sitting in the office right now. Trustee Hall: But you can't compare the amount to the bills, right? Unless you go in there and actually look at it. Trustee Taylor: No, it'll be there. Trustee Hall: You're going to have a copy of the Frontier bill in there. So, if I have a question, I want to make sure $300 here matches this $300 here. Trustee Taylor: Yes, that listing report will tell you the final figure for that bill. If you saw a Frontier bill that was $5000, you might want to take a look at that one and you'll have the ability to do that. Trustee Hall: Honestly, I wasn't here last meeting, so I didn't see that and I didn't look at it in the emails yet. Trustee Pearson: We don't have to do it tonight. We can wait. It's a great plan. I think it's very good. I'm not disputing it. I'm just concerned about the credit card thing. Why would that be an exception? That's all. Trustee Taylor: How are we paying those bills now? Manager Revella: As we get them. We get the statement in, we pay it. There's some things that are paid by credit card through online which is set up through the Finance Office. It could be any department but if they have to order from Amazon, we do it through the system up here. It could be for any department. Trustee Kyle made a motion to adopt the Audited Voucher Policy. Seconded by Trustee Taylor. Manager Revella: Did you want to remove the credit card thing first? Trustee Pearson: I would like to remove the credit card thing, but I don't know how anybody feels about that. Trustee Taylor: I'm fine. Trustee Kyle: I don't mind the credit card being on there if we're able to review it. 9 Trustee Kyle made a motion to amend the motion to adopt the Audited Voucher Policy without the credit card provision. Seconded by Trustee Taylor. 4 ayes. 1 abstention (Trustee Hall). Motion carried. NYSEG Lighting Contract Manager Revella: NYSEG, in their infinite wisdom, says they will no longer assist us with changing the bulbs on our ornamental street lights that we were required to go to LEDs and have to be certain type and size and we don't really have a choice. Attorney Donovan: Is there an actual contract? I don't know if I've seen a contract. A whole bunch of emails where they say they're only responsible for bulbs and something else which is not included in the LED's, because the LED is a unit. What they're saying is, apparently Fred can't get the replacement, they don’t make it anymore. So, got to convert to LED and NYSEG says great, but we don't maintain those. I don’t know, how many lights is that? Manager Revella: A lot. All the new developments have them. Berwick, Beazer section. I think there's a few in Walden Estates as well. Northgate. There’s a few. Attorney Donovan: But it does seem like it's a little bit of a standoff because you have some lights that are out, that need to be replaced. NYSEG is saying that you have to replace them with LED's. And once you do that, we're out. Trustee Pearson: We have this from last meeting from the DPW Supervisor, explaining a little bit more that we can have a choice, it sounds like. *Read report into minutes* Manager Revella: According to NYSEG, they won't do that other option anymore. That's what the emails are saying from NYSEG. Attorney Donovan: There's an e-mail from Fred that says they're discontinuing. Unless I’m reading it incorrectly. Manager Revella: No, that’s correct. Attorney Donovan: I think it's dated information. That's sounds like the e-mail I have from June 6th from a Melissa Anney(?) from NYSEG and then Freddy took the lamp head off and brought to local distributor and was told that lamp head is discontinued. Trustee Pearson: There are not 2 options. We have 1 option, to do our own thing. Manager Revella: LED. Correct. Trustee Pearson: And we have to maintain our own light post. Manager Revella: Correct. Trustee Pearson: 78 of them. Manager Revella: At least. Attorney Donovan: The email says 78. 10 Trustee Pearson: Do we know the cost of that? Manager Revella: No. It's going to be a lot. Hopefully, we don't have lights go out all day, but you know as they go out. It's going to be costly. Trustee Pearson: How often do you have to replace those LED lights? Manager Revella: We don't know yet because we really haven't been using them for too long. Trustee Pearson: We've done LED's on some of them already. But that was okay. NYSEG still okay with those? Manager Revella: Just on the green lamps. Different bulb. They don’t maintain them. Trustee Pearson: The ones that we replaced, we're still responsible for them. Did we know that at that time? Manager Revella: We knew that they were not going to be replacing anything and that we were likely not going to have the option anymore. Trustee Pearson: So then we replaced them knowing that we had to maintain them at that time. Manager Revella: They didn't give us a choice at that time either. I'm letting the board know because the board has to be aware of it. You have to be made aware of it so that you know this is an issue going forward. It's going to be something in the budget we have to prepare for and I don't want to be the 1 to say I made this decision when we really don't have one. Deputy Mayor Batson: It is not budgeted for our current. Manager Revella: No. Attorney Donovan: But you don't have to buy all 78. Manager Revella: No, please don't. But it's on the horizon. Trustee Pearson: We don't have a contract because they're not going to be doing anything but this anyway. Manager Revella: The things are discontinued now. Trustee Pearson: The only thing that we have a contract with is them giving us energy. So, it doesn't matter that we don't have a contract with them because they're not doing that. Manager Revella: They’re not going to do any work anyway. Deputy Mayor Batson: I can quickly and easily, concisely reiterate that there are 78 lights out there that NYSEG is no longer going to support. We're responsible for their maintenance. However, they are LED and none of them is burnt out, yet so we don't have a cost impact on it. Manager Revella: We have some that are out, right now. Attorney Donovan: Of the 78, they don't all need to be converted to LED's tomorrow. We’re going 11 to, I assume, convert them as they burn out. Trustee Pearson: Our guys can do that? Manager Revella: No. An electrician. There's a conversion and everything else to do on the electric there. Village Phone System Quotes Manager Revella: This is a cost savings. We're getting updated phones, updated Internet service, for less money than we pay now. Trustee Pearson: It looks good, too good to be true. Manager Revella: I don't know. Spectrum really has a lot of the wiring now in place and the maintenance in place so they can handle the load. Trustee Pearson: Until next year, when they raise the rates by double because that's what they do. Manager Revella: That's why we get a franchise agreement. Trustee Hall: They have to wait 3 years. This is a 3-year term. Manager Revella: Franchise agreements 10 years. We should be able to control rates for 10 years. Trustee Pearson: For 10 years, we should be, is that we are going to? Manager Revella: Nope. We don't have that authority. That's New York State Public Service Commission. Trustee Pearson: We don't have to have that written in a proposal of how long we’d have these rates for? Manager Revella: I don't know how long they can guarantee them for. Deputy Mayor Batson: What prompted this? Manager Revella: We haven't been able to get much service from Frontier, our current provider, on our phones. If you notice, calling into certain phones, you'll get the wrong person because if they want a tech to come out and fix it, it's $220 an hour. Just to change phone line or voicemail over. It's ridiculous. They wouldn't even come out the last time we asked them. Trustee Pearson: What's the price to come out and fix this stuff if there’s an issue? I didn’t see it in here. Manager Revella: It’s not a service contract. It’s a purchase contract. Trustee Pearson: Do we then have to have a service contract on top of that? Manager Revella: For Internet, no. That's part of our monthly fee. For phones, they said no, it's part of our monthly fee. Deputy Mayor Batson: I just want to make sure I understand the last page; this is a 1 time $4000 12 purchase with a recurring $1,187.00. Do you have any idea how much we pay per month now? Manager Revella: The proposal was a little over $1500 a month under the new one. Does not include the call recording which we have on Spectrum. Deputy Mayor Batson: It's a $350 a month savings. Manager Revella: Correct. Plus, call recording. Deputy Mayor Batson: $350 a month savings plus an additional recording service but at a cost of $4000. So, it would take us almost 11-ish months to recoup that. Manager Revella: But the other company would also have an installation. Trustee Pearson: Does this include all departments? Manager Revella: All phones. Trustee Pearson: Police Department, DPW, Parks, everything. Trustee Hall: You don't know what the installation charge would be on the other one? Manager Revella: On Frontier, no. I know there is one. I don't think I saw an exact number on theirs, but I know that they weren't servicing and that was an issue for us. And just so you know, Spectrum was willing to waive some fees on installation for us and has already. Trustee Taylor: Was Frontier not just bought out by Verizon? Manager Revella: I don't know if that's part of the issue where they haven't done anything for us in the past. Trustee Taylor: I don't know if it affects us entering into this or not. Just throwing it out there. Trustee Pearson: What is call recording? Manager Revella: When you call a place and you want to record the call, there's a feature where you can record what the conversation is. Trustee Pearson: If somebody's calling you on the phone and somebody's yelling, you can just hit that button. It'll record the whole thing. But that's not included in the price. Manager Revella: It's included in Spectrum. It's not included in Frontier. Deputy Mayor Batson: From a legal perspective, will we need to change any messages around that? Typically, if you call somebody it says this call may be recorded. Manager Revella: Yeah, intro. Trustee Pearson: What's the setup time frame and all of that? How long would that take to do? Manager Revella: They need to put the work order in to give a time frame. I know that they are coming on Thursday to get the Internet into sewer plant because we need it and it's a savings. 13 Beside this. They don't even have lines there. They're putting them in for free. Trustee Pearson: Do we have an end date to a plan that we have now? Manager Revella: Our contract’s expired now. I don’ think we have renewal pending. Trustee Pearson: We're just getting phone service without a contract or something. That's what you're saying? Manager Revella: We have an out clause. It's an auto renewal. We'll just have to do the out clause and move on. I believe there’s a notice period. I'll make sure that Dave looks over the notice provision before we do that. Just so you know, Spectrum did say that they’re going to waive the $4000 installation fee. That’s on their quote. Got in writing from them. Trustee Hall: Is there a time frame that Spectrum can come in and do this? Manager Revella: They're just waiting for the go ahead to get it installed and they already have crews coming this week on Thursday to do some work. As soon as we get the go ahead, they'll get everything going as soon as possible. Trustee Pearson: After 3 years, you have to renew. Do you have to get a whole new contract? Manager Revella: This isn't contractual. It's not a contract, it's a 3-year estimate for billing purposes, for budget. There's no contract we could change anytime. Deputy Mayor Batson: Across the course of this non-contract, it's a $12,600 savings to us. If we average out of $350 per month savings. Hopefully is enough to pay for our lights. Trustee Taylor made a motion to approve the Spectrum Quote. Seconded by Trustee Kyle. All ayes. Motion carried. Review of Bid – Wooster Grove and Gym Roof Trustee Hall made a motion to accept and award bid to LP Builders for the Wooster Grove Gym Roof in the amount of $150k. Seconded by Trustee Taylor. All ayes. Motion carried. Public Comment Brenda Adams: Thank you for approving the Veteran's Day Ceremony. That's number one. Something with your Spectrum contract, which I was just sitting here listening to you and because I've been thinking about switching to Spectrum myself. I did some research. I don't know how your emails are set up here in the village, but Spectrum only gives you 60 days after disconnecting from Spectrum Internet to keep your emails. So, if you're going to put emails through Spectrum in any way, that's that HVC.RR whatever, you only get to keep it 60 days. They tell you how to make sure you back them up just in case. Manager Revella: We all use G-Suite and Gmail. We don't use Spectrum anymore. We used to. We stopped partially because of that reason. Brenda Adams: The other thing that I want to mention and I just want to put this on the record, because the Manager and I had talked about this, came sort of out of the comp plan conversation, the crosswalk between Orchard Street and Wallkill Valley Federal Savings and Loan. When you come up Ulster and you make the left to get on to Main Street, you're merging with traffic and then that walkway is right on top of you. So many people feel that they're safe because they're in the 14 walkway, when they come from the bank side. They cut between 2 cars waiting for the red light at that point, and they're right out there on top of you. I've had a couple of people come real close. I'm not going that fast, so I'm able to stop. But you never know when somebody can't stop. I had asked the Manager because it came up that there was money from New York State Safe School. Kristen O'Donnell let us in on the secret that it doesn't work for that so if we could put a sign up. 1 of those sandwich signs, John, I don't know which one Kristen sent a picture of, but just something to warn people, like make them realize that somebody could be popping out between 2 cars there to cross over. We're so conditioned that we don't think. When I was little it was check both ways before you cross the street. Now you cross the street and hope you don't get hit and they, you know, that's entitlement. If we could get that sooner than later so no one gets hurt. Trustee Pearson: John, we used to have those in the road. Do we still have them? Manager Revella: In the center line. They were firmly affixed. They end up getting wrecked. They were screwed into the pavement. Brenda Adams: I don't know if I saw them in Montgomery or in Goshen. Trustee Pearson: Some of them have them and they can take them up and put them down in heavy traffic times. Brenda Adams: I saw an awful lot in Goshen. I was only passing through. I'm just really worried and I don't want to be the one to hit somebody. Trustee Pearson: The one over by the Rail Trail, when I'm coming out that way sometimes on a Sunday, there's lots of people crossing from Woosters Grove over that way, and cars are just flying down that street. They're not paying attention to people. If we can, that'd be great to see if we could get something back again. Thank you, Brenda. Brenda Adams: I'm just worried about somebody. I guess it's because I came so close that I’m just worried. Payment of Audited Bills Trustee Pearson made a motion to approve payment of audited bills. Seconded by Trustee Taylor. All ayes. Motion carried. Miscellaneous Comments from the Board of Trustees Trustee Pearson: Can we put on for the next meeting noise ordinance law, please? So, we can discuss if we need to change it or do something? For large parties and pull up the law and maybe get that sent to us. I know we've had people talk about it. I think we should at least look at it again and if we change it, we do. If we don't change it, we don't, but I think we should bring it up. Trustee Pearson made a motion to add the noise ordinance on to the next meeting’s agenda for discussion. Seconded by Trustee Hall. All ayes. Motion carried. Trustee Pearson: Crosswalk. Great idea, Brenda. Thank you, John, we're going to look at that, right? Manager Revella: Yes. Trustee Taylor: I had the honor and the privilege of attending the 9/11 ceremony at the Walden Firehouse and it was a beautiful ceremony, well organized, and it was, in fact, an honor and a 15 privilege to be there on that day. I thank Trustee Hall for being a part of that promotion and it was probably the best part of that week. Trustee Hall: It was a good ceremony. It was a great spot. We had beautiful weather. Next year I will go live on the department page. I saw Billy there and just assumed that I shouldn’t have assumed. I didn't set it up. So, I will do that next year. We've heard great comments. Thank everybody for coming. We'll be back there next year. I look forward to Harvest Fest. Hopefully there's good group that comes out. Hopefully we get good weather for that. The department will have the Fire Safety trailer down there. I believe, Liz said we were going to set up more towards the school, so we'll be out there with that. Deputy Mayor Batson: I did provide you a QR code for the Harvest Fest. We had discussed about being there. I just want to check from a legal perspective, there's no issue with us putting out a small survey about how the village is doing, collecting data. Attorney Donovan: Absolutely not. Deputy Mayor Batson: The surveys created, I would love your feedback on that, but it's 10 questions. You can sign a QR code. That was the ask for it. I'll send the information over to Liz, perhaps pretty it up. I still think we may not have actually asked the folks at Harvest Fest. Manager Revella: Yes, you did. Deputy Mayor Batson: Perfect. Then we hope to see everyone there and we can adjourn this meeting. Trustee Taylor: I have one more quick one. Sorry, I pulled a Becky. Dave, can you reach out to OCT one more time and say hey, we're curious. That's all. We're not holding them to any other standard than anybody else have dealt with, but we'd still like to know where they're at. Attorney Donovan: No problem at all. Executive Session – Attorney/Client Session to Discuss Sidewalks on Oak St, Police Matter and the Employment History of a Particular Person Trustee Pearson made a motion to enter into executive session for Attorney/Client session to discuss sidewalks on Oak St, Police Matter and the employment history of a particular person. Seconded by Trustee Taylor. All ayes. Motion carried. Reconvene Trustee Taylor made a motion to reconvene the regular meeting of the Board of Trustees. Seconded by Trustee Pearson. All ayes. Motion carried. 16  Village of Walden Board of Trustees Regular Meeting September 17, 2024 Motions & Resolutions Executive Session – Personal History of Particular Employee Trustee Hall made a motion to enter into executive session to discuss personal history of a particular employee. Seconded by Trustee Taylor. All ayes. Motion carried. Reconvene Trustee Hall made a motion to reconvene the regular meeting of the Board of Trustees. Seconded by Trustee Kyle. All ayes. Motion carried. Approval of September 3, 2024 Minutes Trustee Pearson made a motion to approve the September 3, 2024 minutes. Seconded by Trustee Kyle. 4 ayes. 1 abstention (Trustee Hall). Motion carried. Park Use – Alcohol Waiver – Castillo-Rivera Trustee Pearson made a motion to approve the Park Use Request – Alcohol Waiver for October 6, 2024. Seconded by Trustee Taylor. All ayes. Motion carried. All ayes Park Use – Alcohol Waiver – Gragert & McLellan Trustee Kyle made a motion to approve the Park Use Request – Alcohol Waiver for November 30, 2024. Seconded by Trustee Taylor. All ayes. Motion carried. Park Use – Alcohol Waiver - Depew Trustee Hall made a motion to approve the Park Use Request – Alcohol Waiver for October 11, 2024. Seconded by Trustee Kyle. All ayes. Motion carried. Veteran’s Day Ceremony Request Trustee Hall made a motion to approve Veteran’s Day Ceremony Request for November 10, 2024. Seconded by Trustee Kyle. 4 ayes. 1 abstention (Trustee Pearson). Motion carried. Audited Voucher Policy Trustee Kyle made a motion to adopt the Audited Voucher Policy. Seconded by Trustee Taylor. Trustee Kyle made a motion to amend the motion to adopt the Audited Voucher Policy without the credit card provision. Seconded by Trustee Taylor. 4 ayes. 1 abstention(Trustee Hall). Motion carried. Village Phone System Quotes Trustee Taylor made a motion to approve the Spectrum Quote. Seconded by Trustee Kyle. All ayes. Motion carried. Review of Bid – Wooster Grove and Gym Roof Trustee Hall made a motion to accept and award bid to LP Builders for the Wooster Grove Gym Roof in the amount of $150k. Seconded by Trustee Taylor. All ayes. Motion carried. Payment of Audited Bills Trustee Pearson made a motion to approve payment of audited bills. Seconded by Trustee Taylor. All ayes. Motion carried. 17 Agenda Item - Noise Ordinance Discussion Trustee Pearson made a motion to add the noise ordinance on to the next meeting’s agenda for discussion. Seconded by Trustee Hall. All ayes. Motion carried. Executive Session – Attorney/Client Session to Discuss Sidewalks on Oak St, Police Matter and the Employment History of a Particular Person Trustee Pearson made a motion to enter into executive session for Attorney/Client session to discuss sidewalks on Oak St, Police Matter and the employment history of a particular person. Seconded by Trustee Taylor. All ayes. Motion carried. Reconvene Trustee Taylor made a motion to reconvene the regular meeting of the Board of Trustees. Seconded by Trustee Pearson. All ayes. Motion carried. 18