City Council

Remote Winooski City Council Meeting Tuesday, January 19, 2021 at 6 PM • Attend online: https://zoom.us/j/92948589950 • Attend by phone: 1 646 558 8656 • Webinar ID: 929 4858 9950 • Watch live or recorded via Town Meeting TV • View our Remote Meeting Procedures and Public comment Request from at winooskivt.gov or call 802 655 6410 I. Call to Order II. Pledge of Allegiance III. Agenda Review IV. Public Comment V. Consent Agenda a. Approval: City Council Minutes of 1/11/21 b. Approval: Accounts Payable Warrant as of 1/15/2021 and Payroll Warrant for period 12/27/2020 – 01/09/2021 VI. Council Reports VII. City Updates VIII. Regular Items a. Approval: FY20 Annual Audit Presentation – A Aldieri b. Discussion: FY21 Q2 Budget Status Report – A Anastasia-Hill c. Approval: Town Meeting Day Outreach and Voting – C Barrett d. Approval: Burlington Airport Memorandum of Understanding – K Lott e. Discussion: FY22 Budget – J Baker f. Approval: Chittenden County Regional Planning (CCRPC FY22 Annual Work Plan (UPWP) Application Request – J Rauscher g. Discussion: 2020-2021 Policy Priorities and Strategies Recovery Plan Report-out #5 – J Baker IX. Executive Session a. Executive Session Pursuant to 1 V.S.A. §313 (2) the negotiation of real estate purchase or lease options related to 17 Abenaki Way X. Adjourn Mayor Kristine Lott - klott@winooskivt.gov Councilor Hal Colston - hcolston@winooskivt.gov Councilor Jim Duncan - jduncan@winooskivt.gov Councilor Amy Lafayette - alafayette@winooskivt.gov Councilor Mike Myers - mmyers@winooskivt.gov Jessie Baker, City Manager - jbaker@winooskivt.gov  MINUTES The Mayor called the meeting to order at 6:00 p.m. Councilor Colston led the Pledge of Allegiance. Members Present Mayor: Kristin Lott Councilors: Hal Colston, James Duncan, Amy Lafayette, Michael Myers Officers Present: Jessie Baker, City Manager; Carol Barrett, City Clerk; Janet Brouard, Sr. Asst. City Clerk; Angela Aldieri, Finance Director; Heather Carrington, Economic Development Officer; Jon Rauscher, Public Works Director; Rick Hebert, Police Chief, John Audy, Fire Chief; Ray Coffey, Community Service Director; Paul Sarne, Communications Coordinator; Alex Anastasi-Hill, City Treasurer Others Present: Eli Harrington, Steven Berbeco, David Weissberger, Josh Quinn, RHR Smith & Company III. Agenda Review – None IV. Public Comment Mr. Harrington wanted to thank you for the guidance. We had good discussion with folks, talked to businesses downtown on Saturday. We look forward to speaking with you next Monday. Again, I appreciate the time and guidance. V. Consent Agenda MOTION by Councilor Lafayette seconded by Councilor Myers to approve the consent agenda as presented. Voted and passed 4-0. VI. Council Reports Councilor Colston said he just learned today that our charter change proposal has come out of Legislative Council, so we have the rough draft. We will have final draft later this week after they have had a chance to proof read it and make sure everything is lined up as we intended. I will be sharing it with the leadership team and we will go forward. Councilor Duncan - None Councilor Myers – Would like to give a shout-out to Public Works for a job well done this past weekend with all the snow. Councilor Lafayette – said she attended the Safe and Healthy Connected commission meeting last week. We had a great presentation from Kate Olson, of the Winooski Mutual Aid Group; she highlighted some of the work that this group does. Winooski Mutual Aid is all volunteer it has about eight folks total. They are taking a neighbor-to-neighbor approach for mutual aid. Their mission is to bridge the gap. They are also holding drives; they have re-distributed more than $10,000.00. In the future they will be launching (PUMA) Pop-Up Mutual Aid, they will hold events in neighborhoods, and bring resources to our neighbors. Councilor Lafayette also said the group is looking for a physical space to store the products that they are collecting and re-distributing. Mayor Lott – said the Finance Commission met and they reviewed a reserve policy. The Commission is going through a list of policies. I brought them the update from a previous discussion about next steps of the master plan. They like the idea of the updates that I give them. They are also supportive of the work plan and potential equity training. I also attended the Planning Commission meeting and we discussed our land use regulations around accessory dwelling units. There was a state mandated change that we need to update our regulations to address. They also discussed making other changes potentially in our regulations. VII. City Updates The City Manager gave the following updates • COVID Update o Our Lady of Providence - 55 Cases, 6 deaths – No changes since 01/11 epi update. Current outbreak resolution date 02/01/2021 (if no additional cases are identified). o For the week ending January 16th, we had 19 new Winooski cases. This is down from 48, 39, and 31 over the last month. Thank you to residents who are making this difference. o Testing daily for the foreseeable future and at least through January. Next week these hours will shift allowing for more evening hours. We will publicize that at the end of the week so has not to create confusion. ▪ At the OCC ▪ 5 to 8 on Mondays. 9 to 3 all other days including Saturday and Sunday. ▪ Daily – can sign up at the VDH website or walk in. All information is on our webpage ▪ All materials are translated and there will be translators on site. o Shifting focus to advocate specifically for vaccinations and understand what that will look like in our community. o The most important thing you can do is: ▪ Not spend time with anyone outside of your immediate household ▪ Wear a mask when in the presence of others ▪ Socially distance ▪ Wash your hands • Petitions – 1 received today by deadline. Voters are being verified. • Consent to be on the ballot – due 1/25 at 5:00pm  o Mayor and two-two year Council terms o 3 School Trustees – 3 year, 2 year, 1 year • Equity Director o 21 candidates. We will be conducting interviews in the next month. Phoebe has done a number of stakeholder interviews to understand what our community partners are looking for in this position. • 355 Main Street – Demolition will start in March. Until then Nate Dagesse has donated it to the FD for training. This is especially important during COVID VIII. Regular Items a. Approval: FY20 Annual Audit Presentation – A Aldieri Ms. Aldieri said the City Council approved the engagement of RHR Smith & Company to conduct an audit of the fiscal year 2020 financial statements on April 6, 2020. The preliminary fieldwork was conducted in April and full fieldwork occurred the week of October 19th. Staff completed and submitted financial statements to the auditors for review on November 24th. Final audit reports were received on December 18th. Mr. Quinn gave his analysis of the audit. We did our test work in the spring and then we were there in the fall, where we looked at all of your FY20 activity. Different various funds, TIF audit as well, which is a requirement of the State. Mr. Quinn highlighted the balance sheet, General Fund, TIF Fund, Community Development Loan Fun, Revenue and Expenditures. He also went over the Water Sewer Fund, long-term assets and long-term debt. He has no concern about the debt schedule and special revenue funds. He also stated that they do a management letter, but we did not have any comments, which is a rare thing. The City is very lucky to have Angela. Councilor Colston wanted to share the appreciation for the team we have. The Mayor said for a few years we have had solid outcomes and incrementally getting better. We are in good hands in Winooski. She also thanked Josh and his firm. The City Manager also thanked Josh and his colleagues and so many thanks to Angela. All credit to her for keeping the City’s financial health strong and putting good systems into place. MOTION by Councilor Myers seconded by Councilor Colston to approve the FY20 Annual Audit as presented. Voted and passed 4-0. b. Discussion: FY21 Q2 Budget Status Report – A Anastasi-Hill Mr. Anastasi-Hill presented the FY21 Q2 Treasurer’s financial report to the Mayor and Council c. Approval: Town Meeting Day Outreach and Voting – C Barrett The City Manager said there is a great deal of discussion happening around Town Meeting Day 2021 and voting options. We are recommending that we stay as consistent as possible with past town meeting day efforts i.e. not change the date, not change many of our processes for consistency for residents. We are also recommending a post card be mailed out to every household. The goal is twofold; one is to get information out to those who may not be registered in Winooski, giving them the information about how to register, also making it clear that non- citizens cannot vote yet on Town Meeting Day and giving clear instructions on how you can request a ballot. The City Manager said if we solely mail ballots out to every registered voter, there is a very narrow window when we will have the ballots to send out the then need to return as opposed to post cards that we can get out much faster. We are requesting direction from the Council on how best to move forward. We are recommending a direct mailing to every address in the City to clearly communicate options. This would enable us to get out information for those registered to vote and those not registered to vote. The following voting options are: Who Can Vote? How to Register to Vote? What will be on the ballot? Discussion ensued concerning whether to mail out ballots to every registered voter or post cards to every household. Councilor Duncan and Councilor Lafayette were undecided whether to mail ballots to every registered voter. Councilor Duncan said if we were to mail out the post cards it has to be clear and easy. MOTION by Councilor Myers seconded by Councilor Colston to approve the recommendations from staff to mail out post cards to every household in the City as presented. Voted and passed 4-0. d. Approval: Burlington Airport Memorandum of Understanding – K Lott The Mayor said for 2 years she has been working with the Mayor Weinberger of Burlington and Helen Riehle, Chair of So Burlington focusing on committing all three of our Cities working collaboratively into the future and supportive of our shared goals related to the airport. My predecessor Mayor Leonard when was in place started this agreement. Last March we were very close to bringing this to our Councils for signature right before the shutdown. We are bringing it back and the So Burlington Council has already approved this, Burlington is taking it up either tonight or next Monday. There are some key commitments in this agreement. This will formalize the collaborative relationship across our Cities. This also commits us to being more communicative and transparent and So Burlington and the airport leadership will provide us with regular updates on the noise capability progress and other airport operations. The final commitment was for Burlington to pursue a charter change for Winooski to have a seat on the Airport Commission and that is moving forward and will be on Burlington’s ballot. The Mayor is recommending we sign this agreement. Councilor Myers asked the Mayor if she had a sense of how Burlington Councilors are reacting to putting this on their ballot. The Mayor said she thinks they unanimously supported it. e. Discussion: FY22 Budget – J Baker The City Manager said on December 7th you received the FY22 proposed budget from me. Over the last month, you have received presentations from the City’s Leadership Team. Per State Statute, you must approve the FY22 budget and amount to be raised by property taxes no later than January 25th. The City Manager said there was one request for additional information, the Thrive Program and Stars so that is provided to you tonight. The Mayor acknowledged through these budget presentations, I haven’t heard a lot of questions. I think this is indicative of good communication between us and staff and bringing us a budget that reflects and what we shared as values. Councilor Duncan thanked the City staff and Dept. Heads and the Council. f. Approval: Chittenden County Regional Planning (CCRPC FY22 Annual Work Plan (UPWP) Application Request – J Rauscher Mr. Rauscher said during this Summer and Fall we received a number of requests to review potential excessive vehicle speeds on local streets and make necessary physical improvement to limit speeding. The City does not have a traffic calming policy that formally addresses how we review, evaluate and possibly implement improvements to reduce vehicle speeds. In coordination with the CCRPC, it was recommended that the City apply for a UPWP grant to support this effort. Mr. Rauscher said based on CCRPC recommended budget of $50,000 the City would have at 20% match of $10,000.00. There was some discussion concerning this item. MOTION by Councilor Myers seconded by Councilor Duncan to authorize the Public Works Director to submit a UPWP application for the preparation of a traffic calming policy as presented. Voted and passed 4-0. g. Discussion: 2020-2021 Policy Priorities and Strategies Recovery Plan Report-out #5 – J Baker The City Manager said since 2017, the Council and Leadership Team have come together on an annual basis to establish a shared list of priorities (a work plan) for achieving the City’s Strategic Vision priorities. Given the Covid-19 pandemic we currently face, the reduced staffing levels, and the financial uncertainty, you adopted a 2020 Recovery Plan in July 2020 and discussed continuing this through this Fiscal year in December. This if the fifth report-out on that Plan and updates are in red. See attached. I wanted to call to your attention to the RFP for a citywide re-appraisal on next week’s agenda. IX. Executive Session a. Executive Session Pursuant to 1 V.S.A. §313 (2) the negotiation of real estate purchase or lease options related to 17 Abenaki Way MOTION by Councilor Myers seconded by Councilor Colston to go into Executive Session at 7:15 to discuss 1 V.S.A. §313 (2) the negotiation of real estate purchase or lease options related to 17 Abenaki Way as presented. Voted and passed 4-0. MOTION by Councilor Myers seconded by Councilor Duncan to invite City Manager Jessie Baker and Heather Carrington, Economic Development Director into Executive Session as presented. Voted and passed 4-0. X. Adjourn MOTION by Councilor Myers seconded by Councilor Colston to adjourn meeting at 7:49 p.m. Voted and passed 4-0. ATTEST:_______________________ City Clerk