Middlesex Town Meeting Solutions Committee
Meeting Minutes
December 4, 2007 

Present: Susan Clark, Tim Murphy, Ron Krauth, Chris Reilly, Lauri Scharf, Dave Shepard, Barb Whitchurch, Greg Whitchurch

1. Approval of Meeting Minutes from November 7th Meeting
Minutes from the November 7, 2007 meeting of the Town Meeting Solutions Committee (TMSC) were approved.

2. Town Facilities Planning
Susan reported on a recent Selectboard meeting that both she and Chris McVeigh from the Schoolboard attended. At this meeting Mr. McVeigh proposed moving Town Meeting to Rumney School. The Selectboard was divided on support for this proposal with most favoring keeping the meeting at Town Hall. Peter Hood suggested a non-binding advisory vote at Town Meeting in March to advise the Selectboard on where future Town Meetings should be held. The proposed facilities plan does have most public meetings, including Town Meeting, being held at Rumney. Informational meetings, like those held prior to the zoning vote, would likely be helpful prior to the voting on Town Meeting day for several significant Australian Ballot items (likely vote on a bond for the new firehouse and a new Town Plan).

The TMSC could assist the Selectboard with publicizing any informational meetings. A question was raised as to whether the facilities plan and Town Plan should be separate meetings or combined into one? It was felt that the topics could be combined but there should be two meetings, perhaps reversing the order of the topics at the two meetings. In addition, Tim suggested a Selectboard mailing that would summarize both articles to be voted on and a flyer advertising the informational meetings.

3. Technology Committee
Lauri has visited Onion River Community Access (ORCA) television about their potential assistance with a demonstration of attending Town Meeting from a remote location. They need to see the facilities at Town Hall before they can offer a firm commitment. The likely date for this visit is January 21st. Two technologies are possibilities, both including full video, probably at no cost to the town. Susan has briefly discussed this possibility with the Selectboard; Bill Callnan was hesitant to actually allow voting by this method and the board questioned how the video would work.

It was agreed to continue with planning to do a demonstration at the 2008 Town Meeting. Barb will write up a short description for the Middlesex Monthly.

4. Middlesex Operator’s Manual
Chris has checked with National Life and they have agreed to print the updated manual. Our requested specifications were a color cover and a black and white interior of up to 32 pages. It is likely that the whole manual can be in four color format. The contacts sheet will be printed separately as an insert by Capitol Copy. The following agreed to be fact checkers for the information to be included in the manual: Lauri, Barb and Dave.

Businesses could be added as an insert like the contacts page. Tim agreed to coordinate this.

5. Town Website
Tim reported that the updated draft Town Plan is not yet available for posting on the webpage. The Planning Commission currently has some handwritten meeting minutes that are apparently not ready for web posting. Tim also gave a visual demonstration of a new layout for the website that he has been working on.

Next Meeting: Thursday, January 22, 2008.


Minutes recorded by Dave Shepard