While Director of the Department of Public Works, Jeff Williams would make a recommendation to the select board as to whether or not to pave the road, the decision would ultimately rest with the board.
At the meeting on Tuesday evening, Williams said that he was not in favor of paving the road the way it had been proposed, but that he was in favor of paving the road in general.
"It's been kind of a moving target since they (Habitat) first started," said Williams. "We talked about originally paving, before the project even started, at least up to the first house."
However, Williams said it didn't make much sense to pave a portion of the road as it would likely have to be torn up when the rest of the road was ready to be paved.
The uncertainty of when the road was going to be paved was cause for concern for some residents of the neighborhood, such as Kurt Baccei.
"We have no answers to anything. We have no promise. They don't tell us what they're going to do up there," Baccei said. "They said they were going to build five more houses in one more year. So, that means we were going to get our road blacktopped in a year. I don't believe it. There's no possible way that can happen. They work
Baccei continued to say that the residents of Jennifer Lane needed some answers regarding the paving of the road and the water main.
Negotiations are expected to occur in the near future and O'Keefe said a quick resolution to the matter would be beneficial to both the town and the residents of Jennifer Lane.
"Every month that goes by is a month that we've lost time on," said O'Keefe. "The longer we wait on the agreement the less beneficial it is for the neighbors. It's my opinion the sooner we have an agreement the better off the town will be."
While the town is unable to control certain aspects of the project - such as how many homes Habitat builds in a year - they could control the schedule for the water main and the paving.
Another issue raised by resident Cathy Hill centered around fixing the bump in the road at the beginning of Jennifer Lane. Select Board Chairman Ivan Beattie said that if the conditions of the permit allowed the board to require Habitat to fix the road at their expense then they might want to take that under consideration.
Another issue raised by Baccei was that some of the permits related to the project have been revised without residents having an opportunity to revote on it and he felt it was the responsibility of the select board to investigate the matter.
"We have received an official complaint relative to that issue and we're still in review of that and have actually engaged an attorney to review for us what the proper procedure should be [and] if we as a town are following the proper procedures," Beattie said.
Beattie said encouraged residents to inform the select board of any infractions they felt might have occurred so that they could incorporate them into their investigation.
The board also heard a presentation from Bread Loaf: Architects-Planners-Builders out of Middlebury for the concerning the design, costs, and proposed construction schedule of the Park House.
Vice President of Business Development James Pulver said that according to their current schedule - if the services of Bread Loaf were to be retained - demolition of the existing pool house would begin on Sept. 7 and they are projecting that the building would be completed by Feb. 8, 2013.
Bread Loaf would be managing the project for the town and O'Keefe said the current plan is that all the trades - such as concrete, plumbing, electrical, etc. - would be bid out.
"Bread Loaf is just saying to us 'we can guarantee that we will build this building for the guaranteed maximum price. If we don't, we'll pay the difference,'" O'Keefe said.
The guaranteed maximum price is the overall cost of the project.
At Town Meeting in March, voters approved a bond vote of $1.5 million for the construction of the Park House. If the project is built for less than $1.5 million, the town keeps the remaining money, O'Keefe said.
During the presentation, Project Manager John Dale also noted some changes that had been to the design of the building. Among them is the removal of solar panels on the roof - which had originally been proposed as part of the design - for budget reasons. Another major change is that back part of the building will now be constructed out of cinder blocks as well instead of wood.
The select board also honored Nathaniel Boone on Tuesday evening. Boone received the Congressional Gold Medal - the highest honor that can be bestowed upon a civilian - last month.
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