GOLD HILL TOWN MEETING NEWSLETTER

Minutes of the August 13, 2018 Town Meeting

 Next Town Meeting will be Monday, October 8, 2018, 7:00 p.m. at the Community Center

 The meeting was called to order by Chair Tony Vrba. Nineteen people were present: Michael Petrillo, Karen Simmons, John Sand, Peter Swift, Treasurer Martha Knapp, Elisabeth Caspari, Marcus Moench, Cherry Sand, Chair Tony Vrba, Vice-Chair Jojo Morrison, Debra Yeager, Marielle Sidell, Bear Carlson, Linda and Jack Laughlin, Deanne Grant, Member at Large Dan Maedke, Chrissy Maedke, and Secretary Gretchen Diefenderfer.

Minutes of the June 11 Town Meeting were approved as published.

Treasurer’s Report –Martha reported:

At the previous regular Town Meeting in JUNE 2018 our bank balance was $15,477.27.

Our current total cash assets are $13,608.71.

Revenue since June includes pint glass sales, town cleanup donations, cemetery fund donation, and town photo donations.

Expenses include the town cleanup dumpster, pint glass purchase,cemeterymaintenance, and community relief fund disbursement. A check was written tothe Airlink Amateur Ham Radio organization c/o Dina Elder for equipment repair and maintenance, which came out of the Safe Link fund.

Current earmarked fund totals are as follows:

General Fund $949.23; Cemetery $6,921.78; Community Relief $2,326.95; Forest Management $0 (zero;) Safe Link (combined funds for SafeSite, AirLink, NeighborLink projects) $3,410.75; Community Planning/Fundraising $0 (zero.)

For more, go to https://goldhilltown.com/category/gold-hill-finances/

Bylaws Review – Chair Tony Vrba decided to lead off the meeting with a discussion of the proposed changes to the GHTM Bylaws by reading Gretchen’s notes on the proposed changes along with the sections affected, which had been handed out to everyone.  Part way through, the discussion became very confused.  Martha requested that the entire bylaws be presented instead of just the proposed changes.  No votes were taken and the discussion was tabled until the next meeting.  It was decided to put out the entire bylaws and the proposed changes to everyone, and mail them to those who do not have email. Here is the link, which will take you to the town website (goldhilltown.com)

  https://goldhilltown.com/bylaws-and-proposed-changes/

I will bring copies again to the October meeting, but if people will look them over before the meeting, this will make the discussion easier.

We will also bring maps in order to look at possible changes to the boundaries.  There are several options – making minor changes to make sure we include people who have now built outside the original boundaries, but consider Gold Hill their town, or possibly adopting the Fire District boundaries, or something in between. There are links to these maps in the above bylaws link.

ELECTIONS

 Treasurer – Tony began the elections with the position of Treasurer.  Martha agreed to continue as treasurer and was elected by acclamation.

Chair – Tony was nominated by Jojo and seconded by Chrissy.  Peter Swift was nominated by Martha and seconded by Bear. Tony was elected 8-7.

Vice-Chair – Jojo announced that she would not be running. She will be finishing her Masters, and is not sure where life will lead her after that.  She nominated Marielle, Debra seconded, no one else accepted a nomination, and Mari was elected unanimously.

Secretary – John nominated Gretchen, Bear seconded, and, as no one else wanted to run, she was elected unanimously

Member at Large  – Dan was nominated by Jojo, Michael Petrillo seconded, and Dan was also unopposed and elected unanimously.

Congratulations were expressed to all, and many thanks to Jojo, who will continue to pursue our interests in Rancho Fazoo.

Gold Hill School – Chrissy reported that all is quite good at the school, and she requested that Jojo finish the report, as she needed to take the kids home.  Jojo reported that Mishie, who had taught K – 2^ndgrade had stepped down, but, to everyone’s delight, Sue Kidder has been hired back.  Also Elizabeth (Eli) will take Jojo’s job. 

The Fall Fiesta is tentatively scheduled for November 14.  School starts Wednesday, August 22.

Wildfire Safety and Forest Health  – Virginia reports that she was excited that 17 people participated in the Wildfire Partners (WFP) assessment process.  There will not be a chipping event because not enough people wanted to participate (needed 5).  Regarding the huge project west of town, this is a USFS program to preserve and regenerate the Fen, which was being impacted by the encroaching trees. The piles will be left to cure for a year and then dealt with.

If your property borders forest land, talk to WFP – mitigation can be done on forest lands.

The National Resource Conservation Service (NRCS), Longmont and Boulder Valley Conservation District will make a presentation and perhaps raffle a chainsaw and other mitigation and forest health tools at our Gold Hill Gold Rush.

Community Planning – Gold Hill Gold Rush – Dan reports that the Gold Rush is scheduled for Sunday, September 23 in the Beer Garden at the Inn with the great support of the Finns.  He has secured Larry Worster and friends for the music.  He’ll get an email/poster out soon asking for volunteers.  Joanne Cole is handling local artists for the Craft Fair. Anticipated expenses include new signs, an increase in the expense for food as we ran out last year, more pint glasses, ads in the Camera and Mountain Ear.  He’s also posting in Next Door and Facebook.  Expenses were about $400 last year (and netted around $1700) and he’s requesting $600 this year.  Will also raise prices a little.  John moved that we accept Dan’s estimated expenses and move $600 to the Community Planning Fund for this.  It was seconded and passed.

Weed Committee – Pam Sherman submitted an email report:

(1) On July 31 we did a Walk n Talk in the Town Meadow with three guests from the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS–formerly known as the Soil Conservation Service), a subdivision of USDA. They all came from the Longmont Office: Soil Conservationist Sylvia, Forester Dan, Intern Cat, and also CSU Extension Boulder County Small Acreage Management Coordinator Sharon came as well. Gold Hill Joanne led us on a hike up the Meadow Trail. There was lots of discussion up and down the trail and Gold Hillers said they asked all the questions they had about revegetation and weeds and anything else related that came to mind. Btw it was also fun! 
(2) Forester Dan (see #1 above) runs a new federal program under NRCS which pays part of the cost of fire mitigation on private land (land as opposed to structures, which is Wildfire Partners’ focus). He said it was up to 1/2 to 2/3 of total cost per acre. This program works with homeowners who have gotten together to pool their acreage for this work. Total acreage in each neighborhood pool has to be at least 1-300 A. By town meeting we should have more info.
(3) Residents have been mitigating spotted knapweed, mullein, leafy spurge, Canada thistle, and others with a habit of taking over. Canada thistle flowered a month early this year at my place; took me by surprise.  Other plants both native and adapted are early, too. What have you noticed?
For color photos of the invasive weeds on the state of Colorado list go here – https://www.colorado.gov/pacific/agconservation/noxious-weed-species

Cemetery Committee – Maggie Simms submitted an email report:

Since last meeting, we were contacted by 2 families for burials.  One burial completed, and a second one is scheduled for September 1^st.

Town members are encouraged to go down to the cemetery and pick up kindling and pieces of logs and slash left over from the June 2^ndcleanup. These have been placed at the front of the cemetery ready for pick up.  If the logs and slash have not been picked up by the end of August, Maggie will contact at chipper company to chip the excess slash and charge the costs to the cemetery fund.

Historic Gold Hill (Museum) – no report

Historic  Zoning – Bear suggested that, if you haven’t, go by and see Marcus and Elisabeth’s project (the old Weaver house).  They are doing an amazing job and worked hard – to preserve as much of the structure as possible.  The outside materials have been approved

Community Center – Peter submitted an email report and was there to discuss the project:

CU Denver has dedicated a class to study a community center for Gold Hill. Two meetings will help facilitate the development of plans; the first proposed meeting would be a public input session attended by Prof. Keith Loftin.  Interested community members will be asked about 1) possible locations for the building, 2) proposed uses of the building and 3) appropriate architectural styles. The meeting will be on Monday, August 27th at 7 pm in the Fire Barn (tentative location).

The second proposed meeting will be on Thursday, August 30th at 1:30 pm at a location to be announced. The students will attend along with Prof. Loftin. The group will tour the proposed building sites and analyze community input from the previous meeting. They will then assemble (tentatively) in the Fire Barn at about 2:30 to receive comments from those who couldn’t make the previous meeting. 

The purpose of this exercise is both to provide the class with a “real world” project, but also to use the project to start a fundraising effort to hire consultants to design the building and do site engineering. Subsequently, there will be fundraising to get it approved and built.

Please come with your ideas and suggestions to help with the design and use of the building. 

It was suggested that Peter put up signs at the Store to announce these meetings, which he said he would do. Properties the town owns include the piece at Pine and Lickskillet (behind the Red Store and across the street), part of the Meadow (although the deed prohibits any building, which the vast majority of community members support), the Cemetery Annex, and the People’s Park (a small parcel along Dixon approximately across from the Eaton’s property).  Martha suggested people go on e.mapping at the Boulder County Assessors office to look at these properties. 

            John pointed out that this is the same Professor whose class did a study a number of years ago and there is lots of information on that at the Museum.

These plans will be presented at a town meeting and we will put up plans and drawings on the website for everyone’s consideration.

NEW BUSINESS– more Historic Zoning– Michael Petrillo wanted to report on and discuss the new residence proposed by Joyce Robinson at 360 Boulder Street.  The original plans, approved by HZ, called for only the bottom floor to be finished and the second floor to be essentially an attic.  The new plans add approximately 5’ to the now finished second floor – i.e, 2 full stories, now 27’ tall.  To compare, Matt Legg’s garage, which generated some controversy at the time is 25’, and down the hill.  This will be right between Laughlin’s and Michael’s house and he thinks will dominate the hillside.

            There is a public meeting at the County Commissioners on Tuesday, August 14, which he intends to go to and Bear indicated he would attend as well.

Respectfully Submitted, Gretchen Diefenderfer, Secretary