Danville Vermont             

                                                Minutes of Monthly Meeting

                            Danville Planning Commission

Attendees:    Mike Smith                            Absent:           Mitch Gordon

                        Jeff Frampton                                                Ginny Frye

                        Derek Fenby                                                                                      

                        Jim Ashley                          Guests:                Dave Coburn

                        Jeremy McMullen                                            Kellie Merrell                                                                                                               Scott Palmer

Start:               Meeting opened at 7:10 pm

Previous Minutes:

Read by the Clerk and accepted by the DPC as written.

Public Hearings:       

None scheduled.

New Business:

Special meeting was held 14 October 2003 with NVDA (Brian Hanson) to determine if the NVDA would be in a position to provide the DPC consulting help and assistance in collecting data and writing of the plan to meet a first draft by end of February 2004. This step was required as line items 4, 11 and 13 of the grant contracted the DPC with NVDA to provide those services. NVDA stated they were not in a position to provide the amount of time required due to current workloads and recommended we pursue a consultant.

Town has authorized the hiring of an interim consultant to help the DPC prepare a “Request for Proposal” to hire a consultant to coordinate and facilitate the first draft of the new town plan by the end of February 2004. Interim consultant will work with the DPC under an expenditure cap until the long-term consultant is contracted.

Draft “Request for Proposal” along with several consultant names recommended by the State Planning Office were given to Mert Leonard for mailing Monday 27 October 2003 with a response date of 7 November 2003 requested.

DPC reviewed the grant submission and determined how much money could be allocated to the hiring of a consultant. DPC town operating budget was also reviewed for balance of year.

Mert Leonard requested that the DPC authorize the purchase of a computer for use in developing maps for the town plan and support of the web site as per item 5 of the grant. DPC authorized up to $700.00.

Kellie Merrell and Scott Palmer responded to the advertisement in the Caledonia Record to fill the 2 open positions on the DPC. Candidates were interviewed and offered 1 year terms. Both accepted and were presented to the Selectboard for approval.

The Northstar Monthly (Terry Hoffer) was advised via telephone 24 October 2003 that the DPC would suspend publishing future articles until further notice.

Plan Preparation Update:

Copies of the current Town Plan were given to Kellie and Scott for their reference and review.

Interim consultant will digitize the current town plan and put it into a format that can be edited.

Target Dates: Edit current plan by 6 November 03, identify holes in the plan by 16 Dec 03, complete first draft by 28 Feb 04. Keep March 04 open for draft review. Final town plan to be certified by NVDA.

DPC members tasked to review their part of the current town plan by next meeting and edit out all information that was no longer pertinent. Upon completion of the edit process, DPC members were to identify what was missing from the plan. If time permitted, DPC members would review other sections of the plan and edit and identify additions.

Format and length of the plan to be modified to make it easier to read and be used by the town for zoning, capital budgets, policy statements, etc.

Grant to be revised in line with new plan draft requirements and submitted for approval once the “Request for Proposal” responses are received.

Previous Action Items:

On hold until further notice.

Close:                                     Meeting was closed at 9:25 pm.  

Next Meeting:                     Thursday 6 November 2003, 7:00 pm

________________________

Clerk / Date

Send mail to Mert.Leonard@DanvilleVt.com with questions or comments about this web site.