Welcome everyone. This is a meeting with the board of selectment. Today is Wednesday, May 27th. It is 4:30. Is there a motion to call the meeting to order? >> So moved. >> Second. >> All those in favor? >> This meeting is video and audio recorded. Please rise for the pledge of allegiance.
I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all. >> All right, gentlemen. The first order of business we have is an executive
sessions for convening executive sessions mass general law chapter 38 section 21 subsection 3 to discuss strategy with respect to collective bargaining or litigation of an open meeting may have a detrimental effect on the bargaining or litigating position of the public body and the chair so
declares fire EMS local union 3281 USW AFL CIO CLC supervisory unit 9517 Ask me local 851. The board will return to public session at the conclusion of executive session. Is there a motion to
go into executive session? >> So move. >> Second. >> All those in favor? I. >> Roll call vote. Mr. Engley? >> Yes. >> Mr. Rosendi? >> Yes. >> And I am a yes. We are now in executive session. Motion to reconvene open session. So move second. All those in favor.
>> We are now reconvened. The next order of business on the new business is fire permit fees. We have Chief Tom Fallin with us tonight. Mr. Fallen. >> Afternoon gentlemen. >> Good afternoon. >> Good afternoon sir. Chief
I know it anyway here. >> Too many chairs. Chief. >> So, Chief, I know that we've done some permit fees before with you and you've provided an updated list, if you just want to give us, you know, a quick update on the the new ones and the
reasons why showing it up a little bit. Um, so basically as we go through what we do and the fire code and we start learning different and taking different classes and we figure out what's actually in there and what we're
supposed to be doing and what we're not supposed to be doing, a lot of things have come to light. Um, so basically anything that we weren't doing that we're supposed to be doing by the fire code, which is uh 527 CMR under mass general laws, um, is something that we need to make sure we're doing. Um, so
there I think there was only two or three new ones um in this round. Um, one of them was the dumpster permit. Um, it's not any dumpster, it's anything that's going to stay somewhere on a property overnight. Um, and that's
because it's been deemed in the past to be fire hazards, especially if they're close to a building. Um, you know how it goes when you have a dump seat, you just throw everything in there. And with today's technology and lithium ion batteries and god knows what else people put in dumpsters, um I know that Mr.
Hinckley reached out to me with a concern. If it's there for one night, I really don't want to pay the fee. As always, I can always come to the board with a a fee waiver if it's a short very short-term thing. Um but the the permit would need to be filled out anyway. Um
just so that we have a record of it. Um the other one that's there is >> and chief to be fair that's a dumpster that's greater than six cubic yards. >> Correct. >> Um the next new one that's there in this is something that doesn't uh occur very
often in the town of Aushnet. Um most of the the homes that we have are single or two family homes. Anything three family and more follows a different part of the fire code when it comes to smoke alarms or carbon monoxide alarms. It carries a different um certificate template with
it. Um and because there's more to check on it and more to go through, it also has a different fee that we weren't charging before. >> Okay. >> Um and what is the last one? I'm sorry. >> The fire alarm system work upgrade or install and sprinkler system.
>> Okay. So, this is another one that we don't have very often um but was missing from our uh list of permits. anytime a company comes in, for example, say like to the the old Titus building, the testing
facility they have on Manchester Lane, and they want to do upgrades or they want to install a new system. Um, anytime a building like that is not protected by fire for any part of the the time it needs to have a permit so that we know and if we deem it necessary, they have to have a fire
watch and that's something they can provide or they can pay a detail officer, a detail firefighter for that. Um just so that during the time that there's no fire protection in the building, we don't want there to be a smoldering fire or a fire of any kind and it just grows and grows until somebody comes in the next day.
>> That makes sense. >> Chief, the bonfire one, is that yearly? >> So, the bonfire permit is something that's in there. It's more so for large events like July 4th. Um it's not yearly. It's just in the list because
it's in the fire code. Um, I've never issued a bonfire permit. I don't believe Chief Gallagher ever issued a bonfire permit in his tenure when he was chief. It's not something very many people request. Um, and like I said, it's usually a one-time thing. Um, Fair Haven
restricts it to July 4th weekend. >> Similar like how New Befford High used to have a big bonfire year. >> Yep. >> That's basically it. It's for people that want to have larger fires. So, there's not many places in a cushion that would be able to have that. >> Okay. about my dad's backyard.
>> I'll leave it at that possibly. >> And one other one that caught my interest. >> Sure. >> Um with primitive arms though, the black powder, smokeless powder. So, >> I didn't have anything to do with
primitive arms, meaning muzzle loader. Uh, it's more so for either a commercial property or a residential property that packs their own ammunition. Not so much a muzzle
loader, but like any kind of ammunition. Um, but the quantities in the permit, nobody in the town of a cushion it hits, not even JNR, >> right? So, it's there as a list because it's in the state code as a as a as an item on the list, but we don't have anybody in town that currently qualifies
to. >> So, it's basically there for record in case something were to happen and we weren't the town wasn't made aware that that was conduct was being conducted in that and they and got involved with insurance companies. We can say, well, we require a permit for that. They didn't check our web page for
>> correct >> that permit. >> Correct. And based on the code, the the quantity that would require a permit does not exist currently in town >> that we know about.
>> Correct. Okay. Very good. Gentlemen, any questions, comments, or concerns? I think makes sense what the chief's done. >> Yeah, I had addressed my questions with the chief and I'm okay with everything. >> Is there a motion to approve the new permit fee schedule? So moved.
>> Second. All those in favor. >> Chief, great work. Thank you, sir. >> Thanks, Chief. >> All right, we do have a few requests for vacation buyouts, carryovers. Um, certain people have requested either or.
Mr. Long Chain, do you have any comments for the board? >> I I do, Mr. Chairman. And uh what I did is I emailed the departments uh encouraging folks to use their vacation time before the end of the fiscal year. Since then I I have uh a couple
employees that decided to use their vacation time. I I commend them for making efforts. I mean granted it's the board's decision. Um the I all the requests are within your packet and I leave that to the board. I did I did
what I can do to encourage folks to use their time that they have and um I leave that decision to the board. >> Yeah, gentlemen. I I mean look, some of these are like in hours 21 hours, 27 hours. We still have 5 weeks left in the
in the calendar year to use it up 14 hours. Um the only one that's a little bit in there's two of them really. one is the fire chief that just left with a little more time, but he's going to do he wrote he will do his best to burn it
up as best he can without vacating the department being the public safety division. And then we have Mr. Tibbles at the golf course which is an enterprise fund. Um and he's got like five weeks left on the books cuz he went out on leave
>> surgery >> for medical leave. So he used up his sick time. So, I mean, he's going to lose a lot of his vacation and he was asking up to one week. Um, I don't know. I think for the small amount of hours that we're talking about, I I think, you know, Mr. along made his point that do
your best to burn it up and um if there's a reason why somebody can't do that from now moving forward um we could take it up at a future selected meeting to address it if that's the board's pleasure on rationale on why somebody couldn't burn up something like 21 hours
27 hours I mean it's three or four days with five weeks left in the year it's one day a week I don't see how somebody can't do that um But it's whatever the board wants to do. >> I agree, Mr. Chair. Do your best to use
what you can and we'll revisit it at a future meeting. >> Mr. Chairman, I completely agree. I would go as far as having uh the town administrator send out another memo specifying use up as much as you can, especially when it's low hours. And then
there, like you mentioned, there are a couple in here that we can address individually, but we have at least a handful of meetings before the end of the fiscal where we can address this, but I think we have time to narrow this down a little bit. Um, if it means
taking a couple of Fridays off in a row. >> Nice long weekend. >> Nice long weekend. Just do what you can. Um, >> we're up against it this coming year, so um, as much as they can use this year, the better. >> I agree. All right, Mr. Long Montine,
can you um send that memo out? >> I will follow the individuals that have made requests to ask to burn up or whatever they can and if they can't, the reasons why they couldn't, >> but I don't think it's a big ask based on the minimal hours that they'll
remaining with 5 weeks left. >> Mr. Chair, just for clarification, do you want me to reach out to the indiv individual requesters or send it out to the departments? Again, I could do either more or >> this is this it's kind of late for anybody else to put in a request. So, at
that point, use it or lose it. Um, again, I did specifically state there's an individual that went out on medical leave with 5 weeks vacation. I get that the circumstances because it's the golf course a little bit different than everyday um department headed and and
again public safety um there's some rationale there too. So we might be have some flexibility in the future for that achieve. But other than that, if everybody can do their best to burn it up, burn it up. It's I don't think it's a difficult task when you're talking
about even 30 hours with 5 weeks left in the calendar year. I mean, I look at it as I I would want my you earn vacation for a reason and it's to sit back and take some time off and be able to, you know, recharge instead of the stress of
everyday life going on. And that's the reason why you have vacation days is to de-stress and, you know, decompress from from the town's business and have some time fun and family with family. So, um, I would definitely encourage everybody to use their vacation time.
All right, so that's that. And we do have some individuals here from Koopa Lane Heating and Cooling LLC. As you know, Mr. La Montana and the town
put out some bids um for an HVAC project work at the Council on Aging building. Um and it appears that Koopa Lane Heating and Cooling LLC was the lowest bidder and their total bid was
45,380. Gentlemen, you well, we have these two individuals here. Do you have any questions, comments, concerns for these two individuals? Mr. Chairman, I do not. >> No, I'm good.
>> Is there a motion to award HVAC project to Cooper Lane Heating and Cooling LLC for the COA? >> So move. >> Second. >> All those in favor? >> I. >> Motion passes. Congratulations. >> Thank you, gentlemen. >> Thank you.
>> You're welcome. >> Let us know when you're going to do the work. I'll come down for that bottle. All right. >> I got it. I'll have it on my >> I'll have it on. I'll be right back in. >> All right. So, >> one stop. So, Miss Al Farro from
planning had asked us to re he she did work with and I happen to walk into Mr. La Montine's office for complete streets, but the first one we have is a one-stop grant application. she was discussing and again as as usual
with this state commonwealth of mass with everything that they try to do they try to incorporate all this crazy language. I do have some concerns about this recotification. Um we talked about it was basically updating our current zoning bylaws and I
was I was cool with that. But you start reading in the lines and you know it brings up language as such as um including MBTA communities and ADU changes. Obviously ADU changes have to apply here but we're not an MBTA
community. We never will be. Um the state's going to prove that that train can can function on its own for a minimum in my opinion 5 years before we start doing anything crazy. And I'm still not um in the mindset to do anything as far as that goes. So, I
wouldn't want anybody to be looking at, you know, MBTA communities, overlay districts, it mentions. That's something that was brought to the board of selectment several years back. I spoke adamantly against that. Overlay districts are extremely dangerous, especially for our current residents and
where they live. Um, I'm not a big fan of overlay districts. So, there's some things in here that I would I would ask them to, and this was something that they did in that poison um in Victoria. I passed it on. And then the second page says budget 145,000 not to exceed
matching our SH bond EOI from last cycle. If a cushion applies under the rural development fund planning and zoning track cap that 100k per application we can also adjust to fit within that cap. If applying under community planning grant track the full
145 can typically fit in a single award. I don't believe for a minute we need to be doing all of the things that are mentioned here under recation. Um, I think it should be just um really looking at our current zoning bylaws and provide
the town with appropriate language to fix our current zoning and nothing more. I don't know how you gentlemen feel, but we can continue this dialogue with um Victoria to make sure if she's going to put out a scope of work um and apply for a certain kind of grant, we can
communicate that with Mr. La Montaine. It does talk about different time frames for getting this going. Um, and I'll I'll have a conversation with the town planner and I I wrote myself a note. They have to wait until July, early August to start just because we're wrapping up the end of the fiscal year
right now and that's a busy time of the year for the town. So, I wouldn't want, you know, I know people are looking like the Victoria's been a go-getter trying to get this stuff going, but I don't want it to be her trying to get something jump started because she has time, but our other departments don't have the time. And the reason why I
mention that is I bring up the assessor's office. She would be I think pertinent to have in this kind of a conversation for zoning. Um but she's way too busy at the end of the fiscal year wrapping things up for the board. >> So there's timelines that we have
certain people that can be doing this stuff and there's other timelines that just ain't going to be accommodative to some of our other department heads and it does talk about that as well. Yep. >> So, I don't want to be putting too much additional strain on people trying to make these things happen. I don't know if you guys have concerns. Again, it
goes back to the same complete streets thing, concerns over different kind of verbiage. Um, I don't I don't think we need all of that. I think we need to really just look at, you know, looking at our current language and our zoning and fixing whatever it's going to be as a recommendation for for fixing it. And
then it would have to obviously be sent to our town council for review as well. >> Mr. Jim and Austin, excuse me. I really really like the idea of the recotification simply because I want to make sure we don't have any conflicting bylaws or any issues enforcing what we
got. So, I completely agree with the thought here. Yeah. >> Um, when I was jumping into I actually, you know, put a question mark next to that paragraph as well under the MBTA communities ADU changes and stuff like that by reading this because I can tell
that, you know, from communitycale.com, this Nells person that kind of put this together for Manapoit. I think he was just really wrapping around the scope of work. So, I don't believe this would be as straightforward as just copy pasting
Manapois. I would definitely want Victoria to really tailor this towards us and I completely agree. If it doesn't need to be in there, it doesn't need to be in there, >> right? >> Um, and the one thing I would say is going back to the MBTA communities, you get a lot
of questions on whether we are or not. And the state's gone back and forth multiple times saying we're MBTA, we're going to be MBTA, we're going to be adjacent. The only thing I would say is if it's not written down saying we are, I'd be happy to add that to some zoning
regulations saying we are not. >> I'd go that far rather than even mentioning it, saying it's a possibility. >> Yeah, we're not. I'm tired of the state trying to dictate to us. They're already doing it. They're taking away local zoning control from the people that built the community to see how this
community wanted to look like over the years. They're stripping that away from our people, right? Y >> with this ADU um BS that they've done, the unmmergering of lot sizes that they're doing, trying to tell people to just build on whatever size lot. Pretty soon that town's going to look like a
mini city in different areas. It's really embarrassing what the governor and the state has done to this to the Commonwealth of Mass. So, I'm all set with them. There's going to be a point where the town's going to say, "Take your $8 million in state aid and keep it. We're not abiding to any of your crap anymore. It'd be cheaper cuz
they're really killing people. >> Yep. >> I mean, Freetown's an absolute disaster. That train's an absolute disaster. You go up to uh Church Street and you look at the parking lot, they got 20 cars parked there and that damn trains running 30 times a day blowing that horn I hear at my house and I'm in a mile 1.3
miles away from that. And that's all you hear is that annoying horn. And you even hear it at midnight. I'm kind of tired of politicians saying this is what you're going to take. Like it or like it or leave it. So, I'm just kind of done with all that stuffing things down people's throat. And it's really
embarrassing to take away what the what a generations ahead of us have set up for us to enjoy as a community. And that's all being stripped away because of someone in the state house. I think that's an embarrassment to everybody that's spent time going to town meetings
to regulate how zoning should be over the decades that have passed, including ourselves. >> So, >> agreed. put 20 people taking the train that stuff. So if if you want we can
just have Mr. Lamontine work with Victoria on kind of maybe rewarding some or re >> like establish some guidelines of what we're looking for Mr. Lontaine with with Victoria on recotification of the bylaws.
>> Yeah. Let's to simplify it down a little bit. take that MBTA out >> just keep it just for Kushn it's uh zoning bylaws and reviewing those you're doing that's the board directly right >> yeah I think if you look at the scope of work that's the one thing that seems to
be pretty straightforward which is comprehensive zoning review and revision you can start with that and say with appropriate board approval you know obviously as we go through this you know if my main goal is to make sure that you
Article 8, our zoning bylaws is completely transparent, easy to understand, easily enforced if needed, and easily interpreted rather than having different departments interpret things different ways. That's what my
main goal with this would be. And I think I think that's doable. >> Yeah, >> 100%. >> I agree. And easily located. >> Yeah. >> On the town web page. Correct. It's >> difficult. I don't know what you're looking for. >> We do have and I talked to Victoria and Mr. Lamontain about it in that meeting.
I said unfortunately we do have bylaws that conflict with each other and it kind of gets us into legal battle. So >> if she can apply for a grant and you know I don't know if it's going to cost that much money but whatever these >> people see grant free money spend it all do whatever they have to do with the
reality it's taxpayer dollars that are funding grants but >> if we can get some money back out >> different pocket >> correct to to do this work um I think it would would help the town out for the future >> right and then on the old business I I
promised Victoria I'd put this back on the agenda as Well, I did read through this document that we went through and ultimately the board did have concerns on certain verbiage being used. Um, and I did know Mr. Lontaine and Miss
Victoria Pharaoh did um review this and start redoing it. I've read through it. It's it's a lot better than what it was. I don't think there's much here that's going to hamstring the town doing future road projects. I think the way it's
written, it's um it's very the way they were creative in some wording. I I really like it. I I think it just it talks about when afforded, when appropriate, things of the like. I think it's a pretty decent document to move forward with. >> Completely agree. >> I agree. >> Is there a motion to approve the
complete streets policy? >> So moved. >> Second. >> All those in favor? >> I >> Mr. Line, thank you for your work with Victoria on this and thanks thank you to the town planner for her work on it. >> Agreed. Thank you both. >> So
unfortunately we have discussion of annual town meeting and budgets and warrant don't know how to put this to the public but after sitting down for a few weeks reviewing budgets with department heads
mostly our major department heads police fire AMS DPW which includes trash hall and seam mass pass and things of the like. Mr. Lamont Montine, myself, Mr. Kelly have sat down with them, reviewing their budgets, scaling back as
much as we can, um trying to figure out where we're at and try to accommodate a little more revenue to to accommodate the Accent public schools versus where Oak Colony is their request is um being $410,000
from Old Colony. Unfortunately, when we sat yesterday and I was here for over five hours, we're dealing with that and doing some calculations with them and I went home and this morning I woke up and I I did um some review work of our work
yesterday. Um if I found that there was some errors and calculations on the revenue sheet. Um, so now we're kind of at a standstill trying to figure out there's not much room for us to move on revenues and there's definitely not much
room if at all any room for further cuts because I believe that Mr. La Montaine, myself and Mr. Kelly kind of hammered down budgets as much as much as we could. So unfortunately until we figure out what we need to figure out um we
cannot finalize the budgets. We did finalize a lot of the warrant articles, but unfortunately I have to make the people aware that we need to postpone town meeting as we did a couple of years ago. I was forced to do it. Um, and after finding the errors today, I am
now forced to ask for everybody's patience and to postpone town meeting from June 15th to June 29th, Monday night, 7:00 p.m. It gives us a couple of weeks breathing room to figure
this out and continue to work with departments including the schools. I don't know if we're going to get anything favorable. I don't believe we will after the conversation we had with O' Colony, but there's some disheartening
members of Fidcom that took Mr. Pansky, the superintendent of Old Colony, when he said he met with them twice, they met with him once, and the one time that they met with FinCom wasn't even a quarrel. So, it wasn't even official meeting. Um he definitely expressed at
that last meeting when I had him in um to discuss the budgets um they had no willingness to continue or to even try to cut their budget. It was a simple this is what it is. Have a nice day. The bigger problem is is when you have
old Colony asking for $410,000 plus every year. We only have $850 $900,000 in revenue every year. They want half that money. We have a Kushner public schools that need a fair share of revenue every year to keep their operation going and then the town has
their side of the operation including fixed costs um that most people don't realize but we do carry a lot of fixed costs for the school as well. Um it's just we don't have the money based on the ask. So it's it's gotten really complicated. Um, unfortunately we did
have some errors in revenue numbers that after adding up all the budgets, it was pretty exorbitant and there's not much room for us to go. So, we need a little more time to figure this out and that's why I'm asking the board to
postpone town meeting to June 29th. It was second to last day of the year. So, we have to do what we have to do. But, I'm going to work my hardest with Mr. La Montaine, Mr. Kelly and T staff to try to figure out how and why we've gotten to where we are
right now and you know we got a little burnt up today doing it but that's why I told him there's no way we're doing this tonight. We need to postpone. It's extremely unfortunate when you have people asking for money that the town just doesn't have. And I think that's a
message to everybody at home. Beware because certain people want to come and get the money that isn't there. And if that happens, it will be detrimental to this community in your tax dollars. So, um, be aware of what's going on out there in your in the community and at
town meetings. And I'm really disappointed in no colony that nobody even reached out and said, you know, we're trying to do our best to to, you know, reduce our budget um based on the ask of the board of selectment, but I don't know how they don't they feel they
don't have to share in the pain. Um, but that was clearly their message to the board of selectment that night and it's um it's very disheartening that that happened, but it is what it is. So, is there a motion to move town meeting to June 29th, 700 p.m. Ford Middle School?
>> So, move. >> Second. >> All those in favor? >> I. >> Selectman's announcements. Mr. Hankley. >> First week in a while. Mr. Gasper, I do not have anything to say. >> No birthdays. No anniversaries.
>> There might be some, but wait. We'll wait until next meeting. >> All right. Actually, I'm sorry. I will say something if you don't mind. >> Knock yourself out. >> My daughter was selected as one of the
finalists for an art pro an art show uh at the schools today. So, I was able to right before this meeting uh go down and her art along with I believe nine others were showcased in the main case and they had a really nice art show for the rest
of the grades that participated as well. So, I just like to tell my daughter Beatatrix congratulations and great job. >> Congratulations. That's awesome to all the students. >> Lots of good artists there. >> Awesome. I look forward to looking at the pictures.
>> Mr. Rosendis, what you got? I got um my 17th wedding anniversary is on Saturday, May 30th. So, I'd like to wish my wife a happy anniversary. >> Happy anniversary to you. Happy anniversary to you. >> I think she should get a citation for dealing with me that long. That's another discussion. Um also, I just got
word the boys um middle school volleyball team are going to the championship. So, congrats to them and good luck. >> Awesome. Yeah. Awesome. I know. I know your son plays, right? >> He does. >> Kill him. Go get them, Mr. Chair. >> All right. So, the only reminder I'm
going to do every time I have an opportunity to remind the general public and all you taxpayers out there, we do have a meeting. Old Oak Colonies Revote June 20th. I spoke with the town clerk today. Absentee ballots are available
today, starting today. So, if you can't be here June 20th to cast your vote, stop by the town clerk's office and fill out an absentee ballot. Um, it's important that everybody gets out there and votes. Other than that, I don't have any other
selections announcements. Mr. Lamontine, you got anything on the town administrators? >> I do. >> You do? >> I just want to, Mr. Chairman, thank you for your due diligence and time working with the administration to try to get this budget balanced. It's certainly a
challenge. I I don't think unless you're you you've been on the board and you're in the room sitting there trying to balance the budget, it's it's not easy. And we're trying to do our best within limits of Proposition 2 and a half to make sure we have a budget that's
balanced and that we can present to the town's people that they could have faith in. >> Correct. >> And it's and it's and it's it's even harder because schools want a million dollars and the reality is we can't do that.
We're doing our best to get them as much as we can, but at the same time with old colonies request of over 400,000. >> It basically takes away essentially all of our new revenues. >> Yeah, 100%. >> And we're doing our best to get through
this budget. It is an adjustment for me working on nearly a $40 million budget. Um, but I I do appreciate the chair's collaboration working with us as well as the board for extending. I know it's not easy to do this, but we're doing what's
best for the community and to get the balanced budget that the town's people deserve. So, thank you >> 100%. Thank you. Thank you. >> Thank you, Mr. Chair. >> You're welcome, gentlemen. You You both know what I do and I do it for the
people of this community because I love this community. So, it's never easy when you're talking about money and trying to disperse it as equitable as you can to everybody. And you know, I I think Mr. Lamontine hit the nail right on the head. You know, you have a school
department that's asking for a million dollars. That's a request that's never come before. >> Um, and if it has, it's never been granted because we just don't have that money. So I you know the first thing they everybody has to ask themselves is how much money do we have and what
percentage of that pie can I get and unless and until everybody starts asking the same themselves the same question it'll be a total disaster every year moving forward because we just don't have that money and as I discussed last meeting overrides are failing everywhere
like everywhere >> people are at their breaking point >> correct I mean it's it it doesn't matter Well, you're down here in Bristol County, you're in Plymouth County, you're in Esex County. There's there's certain should see there's certain
places up there that are very very wealthy communities that have passed small overrides, but outside of those small wealthy communities, they're failing miserably everywhere, right? And people are cash strapped. And you know, I talk about senior citizens making
choices between food and medication. And I I I I I struggle with in America, that's the conversation we're having nowadays, right? I I think it's an absolute embarrassment that we have to have that conversation. But um too many people are drinking from the
the punch bowl for too many years. And that's what happens. You spend too much money and you live without outside your means. And it's like anybody else. If you do that at home, sooner or later, you're filing for bankruptcy. >> And you know, it's not really an option. But we we definitely need to figure it
out. We definitely need to have more conversations with our legislative delegation. Um we sent letters out on behalf of the community, school school committee, um the town for chapter 78. Just so many conversations that we should be having with them. Pension reforms, things of the like, health
insurance, all of that stuff is just driving our cost through the roof. Um when I was looking at the numbers, I was like, "Wow, that's a lot of money." Everywhere we look, it's this is a lot of money. Just pensions alone this year when I $105,000.
I will say this to the department heads that we we sat down with. I want to commend police chief Gary Copper. I want to commend fire EMS um director Mr. Tom Fallen and Dan Minatada, our DPW
director cuz they were they were um very good with us when we sat down with them and said we need to crunch the numbers more. Crunch the numbers more. um they they're reluctant to do it because, you know, everybody wants what they want, but they were great to work with. So, I commend all three of you folks. Not that
I'm not commending any other departments, but you guys gave level level funded budgets. Kudos to you. And when we were all done with this practice after, you know, I caught a mistake with the revenue side with what we were spending and that's what kind of shut down the operation that we couldn't move
forward. Um the reality of it is the town side including fixed cost which I have never seen done before including fixed cost is lower than O colony's request and the accush public schools.
That is incredible. And I've been doing this for a long time my friends. And when I when I did the the math, a simple addition, and I did that math, I was like, "Wow, I didn't realize that we made that much progress in the room from our side, the town's side budgets, but
we killed it." Like I mean, for us to be up, call it 400k, 390, 400K after all the negative budgets that we had, including fixed cost is is pretty incredible. >> So, I don't know what else we can do. We
just that's what we need to figure out and we just need breathing room to do it cuz we're down to the Y. We would have to go to print and posting in two days from now which we can't make it. So I told the administration, the folks I was working with today, I got to make the call. I'm going to make the call. >> Yep.
>> We got to do what we got to do. As Mr. Lamontine says, we owe it to our people to present a balanced budget and that's what we're going to do our best to do. >> Absolutely. >> So all right. Um there's nothing else going on. Is there a motion? We have the town moderator. I want to be
disrespectful. Mr. Dacon, town moderator. Do you have anything to say to the board before we close? >> No, Mr. Chairman. I'm good to go for the 29th. >> Thank you, sir. >> Thank you. >> All right. With all things being said, is there a motion to adjurnn? >> So move. Second. >> All those in favor? We are now
adjourned. Heat. Heat.