Washington Planning Board
Washington Planning Board
Working Meeting Minutes - DRAFT
April 29, 2016
0.0 Assembly: 9:00AM
0.1 Members present: Crandall, Kluk, Dulac, Schwartz and Williams
0.2 Alternates present: Hatch
0.3 Members and Alternates Absent: Terani and Russell
0.4 Visitors: None
Crandall opened the meeting at 9:00AM.
1.0 Minutes: April 12th meeting: Crandall spoke about the 2 sets of minutes, he thought he misread the Selectmen’s willingness to cooperate and he wanted to take out anything that might upset someone. Schwartz explained the changes that were made to the first paragraph. Hatch mentioned that our adjournment time was 10:47 am, not pm and that outside is one word. Schwartz will make the changes.
Crandall asked for our preference on the minutes. Dulac likes the redraft and asked about the statement of “the plan isn’t the plan” anymore and why more buildings are being included. He wonders if we need to bring the plan as a limited thing or go for a bigger plan. Kluk said people are hesitant because the current plan leaves buildings with no plan or idea how empty buildings would be utilized and the sequencing. Dulac thinks it is too broad. Williams said people have asked about these buildings and want to know what will happen to them, they think it is important. Hatch said that means taking on a bigger job but he feels it is responsible to do it and address the needs of the town. Williams said they lost votes because they couldn’t answer these questions. Kluk said that getting back to the minutes she has an uneasy feeling about changing them, we want to be transparent and not cross any boundaries of right-to-know. She spoke about Right-to-know and being careful about email conversations. Crandall said he didn’t want to come across as critical but in essence the minutes say the same thing. Williams motioned to go with the original version, Kluk seconded and 3 voted in favor with two against. The motion carried.
2.0 Review Mission/Objectives Statement:
Crandall said we have three versions of the statement to consider. Williams asked if Hatch and Dulac could explain their version to the board. Dulac said that when they started they put all the issues out on the table. Dulac made a list and wrote an objective statement and then Hatch improved on it. They didn’t talk about doing more than the two buildings and clearly wanted to make working with the Selectmen a key element, conveying that it is a group project. Hatch concurred and said it would be inappropriate not to take a holistic view of the buildings and their uses. We owe it to ourselves to recognize the historic buildings and their importance. Acknowledge their importance but serving the needs of the Town and employees. His concern is safety of the town employees, if something happens the we will all pay for it. He feels the bullet points are open to change but they hit the points of what the town is concerned with. Dulac thinks the objective statement leaves it open to more buildings. He said we are prisoners of our past and the question is whether you can get a warrant article passed. He wants us to think about what we can get passed and be careful that it could be a concept that is too big. Kluk says that looking at their statement she wants to see the charge and what are the deliverables and guidelines. She wants a more focused statement of what we are going to do, less vision and more of a task. We need to recommend that we identify resources and have less of a purely historical focus. Dulac thinks the idea of community involvement is important, the more objective our statement is the better. We need to be clear and concise. Williams wants to keep it short and Schwartz said we need somewhat of an action plan to sell it to the public. Kluk wants deliverables included and Williams thinks that can be incorporated. Crandall thinks the opening statement is the most important and wants to work on that. Dulac thinks the mission is not to develop a plan but to ensure we meet the needs of the Town. Crandall does not want to leave off the multi-year plan. Kluk asked if we are developing a plan or something else, more esoteric. Hatch feels that every word matters we don’t want to be stuck with an eye roller. He feels safe and efficient is important because the town can be sued if we aren’t meeting state and federal requirements. Kluk suggested we go with the first sentence and use bullet points after that. Several people had other suggestions and we decided to go with the mission statement up top then bullet pints as objectives and save the other bullet points as principles that we can adopt. Williams said the Selectmen may have some ideas to add. Hatch said we need to create a sense of urgency.
3.0 Review To-Do list:
Kluk said that she and Crandall had met to discuss coming up with a to-do list knowing that there is so much to get done in a short time. Williams reminded us that this is a joint effort and the Selectmen will want to be involved. Hatch suggested we look it over and decide who needs to do what. Crandall asked if we should schedule a weekly meeting, knowing we can decide that some weeks there is no reason to meet. We decided that Fridays are good for everyone and we will meet at 9AM.
4.0 Meeting schedule:
Our first meeting after the joint working meeting will be Friday, May 6 at 9AM, location to be discussed with the Selectmen.
5.0 Joint working meeting:
Crandall asked for thoughts on the joint working meeting, Monday, May 2nd at 9AM to noon at Camp Morgan Lodge. Schwartz said it is a listening meeting for us. Williams expects the Select Board will share the history of last year, MBAC and their thought process on the decision of what to go with for Town Meeting. We will have a discussion and questions can be answered. Then we can talk about the joint objective statement and take a look at the to-do list if there is time. Crandall asked if it is out of line for us to talk about the four points we want to cover? Williams asked Schwartz if she would send out the edited statement and to-do list to the entire group.
6.0 Adjournment: Time: 10:45 am
Motioned by Dulac, seconded by Kluk, all voted in favor.
Respectfully Submitted,
Nan Schwartz