Page 10 - 2025 Brighton VT Annual Report

Town Hall wasn’t without its issues either as the hot water heater
failed at the same time that we discovered a broken sewer line under
the basement floor that had issues all the way out the back of the
building where it connected to the new sewer line that was installed last
summer. The water heater was slated to be replaced with a new heat pump
hot water heater as part of an energy upgrade to the building. We were able
to complete this job with grant funds and no cost to the town. We were not
as lucky with the sewer line as that repair pushed our building maintenance
line item $15,000 over budget. I would like to thank our Facilities &
Maintenance Technician Bruce Rumball-Petre for assisting with coordination
of these repairs.

The road department was working to refurbish all of our existing equipment
when the one-ton plow truck failed to pass inspection and was more rust Facilities & Maintenance
than truck. The town secured a great deal on a new 2024 truck, and it was Bruce Rumball-Petre
able to purchase it from our reserves, eliminating the need for a new truck
loan. The crew has done a great job of refurbishing, repairing and painting most of our equipment, saving
the town money in equipment replacement costs. The town will be placing an order for a new dump truck
in the coming year as the current wait time is two years and one of ours will be 10 years old at that point.

The fire department also upgraded this year with a new fire truck. I would like to commend the fire
department for taking the proactive steps necessary to secure the equipment they needed. They came to
the selectboard with all the specifications, what trucks they would replace and an approximate budget.
When a truck suddenly became available that met their specifications, I
helped the selectboard make it a reality. We are very lucky to have such a
dedicated group of volunteers that serve our community and it is imperative
that we provide them with the equipment necessary to do the job and remain
safe.

After several years of hard work, the town’s Wastewater Treatment Facility
Upgrade finally broke ground. This project began right before COVID and had
a price tag of $3.756 million. When the project finally reached the bidding
stage, the costs had doubled to $7.5 million. Joel Cope and myself were
able to cobble together grant funding in order to fill the gap. The difficulty
didn’t end there though as when the construction company began digging for
the foundation of the new operations building, they found all the decaying
trees that were buried on the site when the plant was constructed in the
Town Administrator 1970s. This resulted in a redesigning of the building’s foundation, adding an
Joel Cope
additional $600,000 to the cost of the project. Barring any additional large
changes, the Town currently has enough financial capacity to complete this project without exceeding
the initial $3.756 million town bond. This project has consumed an enormous amount of staff time and
I am thankful to have had Joel, our Town Clerk Teresa DeBonville, the water & sewer department’s new
billing clerk Katie Mientka and the staff from our water operator H2O Innovations, Kean, Zach and Andrew
to help with getting this project over the finish line. The plant is expected to be completed in late summer
or early fall of 2026.

The Town Clerk’s office was especially busy this year as they first had to work with our outside auditing
firm to prepare the town for the single audit process which is required whenever the town expends
more than $750,000 of federal money in a single year. With the multitude of projects in the pipeline, we
will be meeting this threshold for the foreseeable future. Just as they were wrapping up this work, the

8 Town of Brighton, VT