[Music] 5th 2025 please rise for the Pledge of Allegiance I pled to the flag of the United stat States of americais
liy andice thank you huh M was in rush today yeah speak a little fast all right um before we uh before we get into it tonight um I'd like to uh give our newest member Mr Philip Adams a chance to introduce himself and uh just give us a little background on you thanks Mike yep uh Phil Adams I'm uh lifelong resident of kush currently reside in Reservoir States
uh with my wife and two kids I for form a town employee uh 10 years ago I left the police department here to join the easn police department and I'm currently the deputy chief there so um I know what all the town's going through right now financially this is good to have you on yeah we're we're experiencing our own issues and budgets that we're trying to deal with um this is my second third budget that I've done
so it's uh yeah it's going to be a challenging year so I'm glad to be here and hopefully help out got the right here oh yeah I'm still the only one with hair what the hell this is my choice this is what happens if you're in the finance committee for 20 years you L you all right um so on tonight's agenda we're going to get an update on the FY 26 budget and we'll discuss um our
upcoming hearings so Mr Kelly the floor is yours uh at the last meeting I gave you the revenue sheet I've updated it and given it to you with the governor's figures as you know the uh usually the governors are the lowest figures and just so Sue's all set in
the bottom left Corner oh it's dated it's dated thank you I didn't even I had just dated on the right hand you need to date your superseded copies you know yeah uh Governor's figures usually are the lowest and the legislature
uh house will usually up ugga and or the Chapter 70 and then the Senate will come in and do the other and then the conference committee settles in the middle we all know that uh the Selectmen have set June 2nd for Town meetings so the timeline I gave you in the past I'll be sending out a new one it's pretty much the same in
the interior until we get to the publication of the warrant uh I've been told uh that uh it's very likely that we'll see a Deb exclusion brought forward by the school the chrishna schools on their air HVAC system wants uh we
don't have a figure yet from the schools they're working on it depending on how many grants they get uh once the debt exclusion is decided in the election then uh there will be a funding appropriation at town meeting if it passes I'm sure it will
be moved forward if it doesn't pass on the election then it's up to the town whether they want to take it out of the operating budget which will mean that we won't have an operating budget fund the repairs for the air or AC whatever it is through the operating budget of the Town well that's will be the choice of the town if it does
not pass the Deb exclusion so that's just I mean that's that's not a that's not a realistic option right like I think it needs to be I hope I hope you're right it has to be presented that way it's not they in other words the town can't say well the school can't say well you didn't vote for an a debt exclusion but we're still putting the article forward you don't get shot down how can you put it forward when there's
no there's not be any money there to pay for it the article at town meeting is an appropriating article not a debt exclusion article your debt exclusion comes at the election so if they get it through town meeting is an appropriation and we don't find a way to fund for it we still are on the hook for it yeah well that's going to come out in town meeting and be 100% I think it's got to come out a lot sooner than town meeting but needs
to be highlighted during town meeting that this if you vote Yes on this the town is on the hook for it whether we find a way to to finance it or not yep so uh and it's my knowledge that Old Colony will be coming in the fall for a debt exclusion for the new school any idea what that is wise
no but our percentage is based on percentage our percentage is based on pup so you're responsible for approximately uh one3 of yeah that whatever is not cover that's going to be a very huge number I wasn't aware that their their study was even completed I was I was told that uh the town administrators and the
town clerks are going to be and going to be asked to hold uh figure out when the special Town election will be in the fall and my understanding is it's going to be all towns at once and it'll be a majority vote of the pool voting we was in a study not town
by Town yeah I remember when Mr pansky came in the discussion the original discussion was either a renovation of the existing School uh addition right in addition and renovation or a new school so what happened with that I me he also talked about this being like a a two-year study there was going to be public hearings about it it kind of seems a little rushed CU I thought there'd be vot either way I I
think part of it too is that if Old Colony doesn't pay for the special election we have to figure out how to pay for it so it has to be in our budget operating budget that we're passing at to we that's why we're probably getting a heads up on the fact there's going to be an election for whatever amount and whatever they decide in the fall so
you're having a Deb exclusion in the spring for the acoet schools and a debt exclusion in the fall for old col so I IE property taxes going on hugely if if equipment pools out like Freetown how's that going to be I don't know what the removal uh notice Etc is in your agreement I'd have to
look that up but freet town is not a member Town that's what he saying he was talking about it but Krishna goes the way of freet toown removes itself from the old colony but we are a member town where freet toown wasn't a member town were yeah no free toown was I'm sorry what freet toown was paying tuition free toown was not a member town of Oak I thought that I thought freet toown was any pulled out no they were not a member they were using it yeah with tuition
like you're using Fair Haven High School so is that implying that we cannot pull out I don't know it's just it's different we are not like fre you would you would have to give notice etc for that school there the whole process for that I'm not I'm not recommending it I don't know anything yeah no it's just I wanted to make sure like we understood I was under the impression at free town was a member and they pulled out no no so like all
the like back in the day when I was when I used to be the the rep like we there was a new roof and there was a science lab so there was a debt exclusion for that actually it wasn't even a debt exclusion it got wrapped into the budget but like we paid for all of that right where freet time was just paying normal tuition like we do for PR Haven that sounds like a good option for us to just pay as you go as they were paying more per per p and they didn't have priority
like do that's why fre we stopped taking free time we had right it was too much of a waight list at least from what I remember from the meeting yeah so I just like it isn't as easy as just walking away I wouldn't expect right plus where do all our kids go they would have to find another V new bedroom I can't go there I don't OB yeah yeah did they
get funding from SBA or they will but we don't know how much we don't even know the price tag yet but my view well My worry is you've got a dead exclusion in the spring and another one and then you've got a dead exclusion in the fall and so then perf storm yeah and then your next tax
cycle you're going to see both debt explosions on top of your tax bill yeah but I it's going to be $200 million project right I mean to your to your question I think I mean a cushion we're not going to get the same type of msba Grant whatever like for River for dery no you like not even close no you're not uh you'll be Lu it's not 99% you'll be lucky you'll be
lucky to get and that okay cuz I had heard the 60 number before all right so if we think about you know us needing to cover us meaning the member towns covering 40% of possibly hundreds of millions of dollars right like let's okay say it is 200 right we're going to cover 40% 80 million bucks divided by the member towns a third of 80 like I mean stupid
accountant huh 26 like that's not going to happen I just there's no way that that how's our how's our rating like I hope we're still at Right double A plus 2 cuz that's always the that's always the fight we have like we we want to maintain for the years that we end up having to borrow yeah but uh you it's a dead exclusion that is it's
more like an assess uh charge it's more like an assessment they will tell you what you ow and it's based on the 910 formula of student population you mean the old colony piece yeah we're just doing rough rough you know we're third right now we're about somewhere between 30% and 33% right if it's 80 million you're at like 2.65 you
with the msba and you can back me up you can it's not a simple 60 you get a percentage here and then they might give you two or three points there and for other uh you check other boxes you get two or three points here all I was trying to get an understanding of is it a it is not going to be like what Fall River got for dery which
what I had heard was like 99% covered by the gr we are not there there is no realm of possibility that we would even get close to that look at the difference between what Fall River gets in chapter 7 what you get that's my I want I want it to be I want it to understand and make sure that we're all on the same page you're right you're uh it's coming out of your pocket not out of msba
yeah so that is the climate you're looking at as we go into this budget year for the Chate taxpayers they've got the potential of two debt explosions and right now I've got a
revenue increase of of just under $500,000 Y and I've got before we look at any budget just with the asks I've got on the town side about $700,000 increase and that does not include the school
pretty much uh union wages and the joint account increases pension benefits Insurance Wipe Out the 500,000 of increase Revenue okay is there any more consideration
last time we met was uh discussed about um closing out the unfilled positions uh and uh I've discussed with the board are hiring free for now and then to look at what would have to be filled and what wouldn't or shouldn't be filled yeah the board has not gone
over any of the uh budgets yet we've had discussion on just general discussion and it's a general discussion when to have with this board tonight the budgets I've given you are the no change budgets from the amount requested last year and that's what no change in that list means I'm not saying that
there'll be no changes in these budgets I'm saying that I would recommend there be no increases but we still might have to cut [Music] understood no change should just say no [Music] in and when you look at them a lot of them are very small budgets so they really don't make a
difference in the larger picture is there any debt coming off the books anytime soon uh the what we're looking to do once I analyze free cash is between free
cash and the solar tax uh in Revenue to get rid of the ban on the school roof sorry once more with feeling to we've we almost have the ban on the school roof last town meeting if I
have enough in free cash in the Solar Revenue I'm going to recommend that you get rid of the rest of the band and that would retire that debt okay your uh so I mean but and I know
we never want to use free cash to balance budgets because that's a bad idea when I don't disagree a bulk of the free cash that we have now a good chunk of it I think we talked last time was because we have so many unfilled positions right like you have you have unfilled positions and you have positions that were unfilled for part of the year right they might have been filled yes vacant for
6 months and then filled again I guess before recommending that we do that with this for the school roof shouldn't we wait and see where we stand because with regards to the budget and if you don't want to use free cash I I totally understand that but sometimes a Band-Aid is better than a long-term fix but the other problem is with do they want you to pay it back on a threeyear schedule [Music] they want you to
pay it back to who the free cash back if you use it for an operational budget yeah they want you to restore it into stabilization or free cash or whatever on a three-year schedule I think we just need to let people I totally which is different than 10 years ago when I did use free cash in another community and you didn't
have to pay it back I guess but that is a factor that everybody should realize because we're going to get told well we have all this free cash just use it to balance the budget well here's okay every action has a consequence and this is our consequence we'd have to live with and it is again another onetime fix just like what we did last year overlay right last year we we did that like there are no more real kind of pulling rabbits out of hats well that's why I I
have only 500,000 in increased Revenue because last year if you remember Old Colony came in and they had 132,133 in the budget of in their budget as the last year of a debt payment our share of a debt payment yep and we used overlay to pay that to took it out of our
allocation so if if I still had that 132 in my Revenue figures and you can see I took it out y then we'd have typically what you've had in the past 700 600 700,000 what's the stabilization balance uh off the top
m head I'd say it's 3 million yeah we were at the 10% yeah but that's what you have to yeah keep maintain Bond raing where right thought it was like 5 to S it's 5 to 7 for them to question it's 10% the recommendation them to tell you that they're going to say and with everything we got approaching it we're going to have to go out
and borrow we'll need a good rating oh yeah MH you're going to need uh you've got roads you've got pipes you've got slum Street if the state doesn't give you the uh we're still waiting on do to tell us about the transportation bond issue that you
people were promised 1.5 million since 2014 yeah how's hlin road that almost done I the bridge spr yeah just wait for it to warm up so they can pave yeah and I I'm sure they want to uh see the Melt and then see what they're doing but spring I called do but couldn't get a date answer
my suggestion is for the simple uh dep departments uh you don't need to call them in unless we're going to cut them and uh we can then look at the list and try to figure out when you people are going to talk to the other departments well I don't know what we cut out of the simple ones and when we looked at them year after year after year there's nothing to cut there's nothing to cut there's no F no you're
looking at 500 here 250 there and and that's Chase yeah you take $250 out of a $500 budget and find out that they needed them anyway so it's just going to come back and hit us next year we're going to need an idea of where the schools yeah at basically yeah cuz it's pretty much going to handle fire emson y That's the only
options we have M the rest what do we touch we but we realistically need to understand go still your Enterprise fund I'm sorry you got to look at do they bring in any all the hires increases and we got to we there's no way to balance a budget with just cutting it has to include some layoffs at this point and we said this last year we we warned everybody last year yeah
I'm not sure there' be layoffs but we just don't fill positions we just we won't fill positions yeah now I've already I've already talked to the board of Selectmen and uh we are working on filling positions in finance we that's a necessity like that's it that's my concentration because as you folks know
I'm leaving June 30th this year you picked the fine time to leave and uh why you still smiling yeah two out of every three ta candidates I see uh out there getting jobs do not have Finance experience their HR
or their grants or their Economic Development Etc they might know a little bit about Finance but they don't have my background so you filling those Finance positions are crit is critical but are we saying that I mean just because positions are filled they're
not yeah they're not sacri no you might have to l i yeah I I just want to understand what the parameters are that we're working with like in my mind just because it's a filled position if we we need to fill certain positions we need to fill Finance like that's ridiculous I'm just making that comment because if there were a lot of uh
options of layoffs that's one thing but when if people start to say first last in first out you can't afford to do that with the finance people no no we went through this years ago mik like we there were lots of cuts lots of layoffs lots of departments that were reducing headcount and then once the kind of
economy turned we started bringing them back but it hasn't really been that much of new ads and on the town side and on the town side we've L could be filled on the town side we've been economizing by filling positions halftime sharing positions with other towns uh making sure if offices need to be open the clerical position position
is the full-time position and the professional position is part-time mhm okay all right so Jamie that list we're going to we're the board of s uh uh the board of Selectmen uh representative for budgets and
myself are starting to bring the major departments in so the board's recommendation to this committee should start to flow I just don't have a uh definite schedule yet but I should in a week of who we're bringing in but we're going to bring in the big three first Place fire and DPW we are
are they going to be ready to the board is okay and then once the board makes their recommendation then I can get that to you but where do we stand on this might be a stupid question if it's already filled the police chief and the exam and all that other stuff uh I was on the phone with the Civil a couple of people at civil service today and we
have four people who have their hands in the uh Assessment Center process from Civil Service we've got one on creating the deputy chief position we've got one on the job description or the essential functions of the deputy chief we've
got one on uh the assessment center and then we have one overseeing all that and I'm calling them on cell phones so I think they're working remotely which is interesting but the process is moving along we've got a title we've got a job description for the deputy that has been
uh accepted by the board and now and it's been sent to Civil Service uh once they approve that and it goes through their supervisor then we also have an RFP ready to go out for the assessment C so once they give us our delegation letters and the RFP goes out we can put the
dates in as far as uh in the RFP as far as where the uh when the assessment center is going to be the people who will sign up for the assessment center must have 10 weeks to study for it but it's not locked down until the actual vendor meets with the board and they determine what the
the board wants for the assessment center to test and Civil Service approves that you're probably looking somewhere at the end of the summer so over over a year then right for the for from now till the end of the summer right just well year and a half since he announc his reti yeah well you've got the
10 weeks that you can't they have to the opportunity to study I'm assuming I was told it's you usually the form 30 and the job description go back and forth three or four times with the director of that function we find agreed on a title
a couple weeks ago and a job description cuz we want to run both a both positions through the same Assessment Center so it's too early to really schedule out
which yeah so we can't really we can't really set up our schedule well uh if there are ones you'd want to come in that and we discuss it and they're simple ones and I'd see if we could bring them into the board quickly I mean I'm just looking at so like Library they're usually we know that's a formula right and they usually don't have a
a big increase at all uh Council on Aging Board of Health um I mean we could probably bring all them in um because they usually come in town clerk town clerk had advise until
we get an answer from uh Old Colony and I'm waiting for it right now on who's going to pay for the special election whether it's Old Colony or us don't we pay for it anyway I mean it's in the budget we pay for it anyway well I in talking to Mr palansky was my suggestion that they should
pay for it cuz it's about 8 Grand and he said he had look at it because he thought very likely that under the statue of the RS they are supposed to pay for it for is that something that they would have to provide to every uh member town a special I don't know I'm just and we don't know the far of the election whether it's a one-day election whether
it's a one day in person election whether it's a one day in person plus so many days early voting so I'm just I'm thinking ahead here looking at this uh calendar to try and figure out when we would have our next meeting so I mean I don't think it would make sense to meet next week not if we don't have anything to
discuss other than the same thing we're discussing now no and then the week after that is school vacation week so we already uh said we weren't going to meet on that week correct right correct uh the other thing that the board or committee should know is uh Mr McIntyre has said that it's the school committee will want one
one meeting with the three boards on the Deb exclusion and one meeting with the three boards on the budget and you might uh you might want to get the debt exclusion out of the way I think that would be that would be the first one so we're going to have to coordinate that CU that's going to be a separate
a separate meeting so you might want to uh work on that very quickly and schedule that and then also schedule their budget I think they finalize their budget midm March but uh I can have him contact you and
you can deal with him on that you've been dealing with him on the debt exclusion substit of matter anyway and then we just got to kind make sure that we can get the board of Selectmen there at the same time you know make sure these are going to be full board meetings right not Representatives just full board is what they wanted all three boards yeah yeah I mean that would I think that's that's how it should be yeah so I
mean I I think like so if we're going to start our like budget hearings I'm looking at February 26th that's probably when we're going to start the next uh the board of selectman meeting is February 25th so by the 26th would we have some departments ready to come in I can they could
come in and present to you but they probably won't have I won't have from the board of Selectmen a determination of what their the board's recommended budget is going to be at that point but they can come in and make their budget presentation we've done that in the past anyway we we didn't necessarily have to wait we the budget before yeah you don't
have to wait but I I very much thought I would have be able to avoid this but I think it's going to be similar to last year where uh we were cutting almost to the day we published the warant y so I'm thinking
like on the 26th we could have the library come in councel on agent Board of Health those are three off the top of my head that I can think of right now Animal Control animal control that I mean we could we could probably take care of four of those pretty easily a number of the The General government
departments that are not listed as no change the real change on them is just the uh collective bargaining increase the expenses are all been level funded so it's whatever is in the collective bargaining so uh yeah you could have animal control you could I probably have building inspector uh I
don't think we usually have a building inspector come in we haven't all right you could uh I think those four and that one night that's probably good so nothing the 12 and we're going to I think you could probably have conservation that night and planning
so that's like six six quick on so realistically none of them are going to bring any drastic asks or changes to it it's almost all just contractual and as you know conservation and planning the professional is a part-time and it's the clerical well here's a question if we've got no increases on a budget other than contract why bother having them come in
until after I mean until after the board of Selectmen finalizes their budget for what their General mindset is i' I I I think the exercise of cutting budgets other than the analysis of the most expensive on the town side are going
to I mean like we did last year it was when the school came in and we got an agreement with them that they wouldn't wouldn't increase more than 330 and we found manyy other places to balance the budget and we then cut the hell out of the towns side okay but
my point is is we did our due diligence last year and cut the hell out of the Town side to begin with in the ones that we're talking about right now what what more due diligence is there other than if if we have to slash and burn you're don't get me wrong I'm happy I'll be here IR regardless and slashing burning expenses on
a lot of these Town side it's not going to get you a lot of money it's the type of thing you slash and burn you might get 50 Grand if you need 50 Grand to balance the budget right but we did that last year yeah I'd like to give the department heads the opportunity to come before us so we can actually you know potentially hear their needs too so some of the other bigger departments in town can hear what these folks are saying um so
I just I I I want to hear what they have to say that's a good point Mike so Kathy did you get those six y so that would be on February 26th so no meeting next week the next meeting will be the 26th yeah cuz we're going to get six out of the way right off the bat and then after that like he's it's going to be police Fire EMS DPW and then the school yep the
uh I don't know if you wanted to uh have a meeting next week and invite Mr McIntyre in to find out what's going on I haven't been at those meetings to get yeah that might not be a bad idea um what do you folks think of that yeah if I can myar already so yeah I mean they might not have answers or anything but at least you'll start to be in the lope h I'll email him tomorrow ask him if
he could be available for next Wednesday tell him and then I'll get back to everybody tell him I'm sorry I threw him under the bus the other the other thing I'd like to potentially do if we had like an open date where we weren't doing hearings is I'd like to actually have our two new reps come in before us before the finance committee so they can introduce themselves give us their background and let us have a question and answer
session with them so we can address our concerns and questions to our new state to our new reps were elected um because I know I have quite a few questions maybe you would if you could invite them next they could sit and listen to the debt exclusion presentation and then you could talk to them I mean I personally would be I like that idea i' be will to do a non Wednesday off so we don't cut into our
budget I absolutely want to do this this is like top priority for me so it can make it suitable for whatever day they can make a Monday or Thursday I mean I'm not I'm speaking who would reach out to them would it be you um uh I'll have try and coordinate I'll I'll reach out to the senator and the two rep and see if we can they can mesh the their schedules and get
back to me but do you want it sooner than later yes all right yeah before they start voting on stuff ask them if they can bring the governor with them yeah you don't want that well speaking of that uh you know when you when I see you know them talking about putting $425 million bill before the house to for establishing a migrant shelter I mean that's that's going to get to me that's irresponsible when you have
uh towns that in need of local Aid that's going to get destroyed so that that would be one of my questions what's your what what is your opinion of that this is on top of the 500,000 that they did just a few months ago that was supposed to carry them they said through May for six months so that's number one and I want to know who's going to get these the utility companies under control State cuz it's freaking out of control I mean eversource is crazy t for delivery a over Supply chares well the Massachusetts Department utilities
who sets the rate and then the governor signs off on it they just I mean this is just insane what not everybody has solar panels on their house but you also have the Kristen can back me up you've got required net School spending and even if the governor and the legislature increase the per student minimum you're not going
to get to the increase in re re required net School spending your minimum aren't you your District or close mhm yes yes isn't that going to be like $7 this year right now it's 75 our student I think 75 I think between the what we budgeting
for no but between the two School a chriset schools and Old Colony uh your change in the required net School spending is around half a million and I mean realistically schools can't operate on minimum net School spending so most communities other than your big urban districts cannot operate on a net School spending
budget I know that that's been talked about in in this community um maybe not in the recent past but it has but you know as someone who works in the schools it just it would really um really devastate this this school department I remember Dr Donovan giving really devastate off correct but if you have a half a million increase in required net School spending
and you've got a Chapter 70 increase of what uh 1% yeah they put all the all the pressure on the towns they they're putting the pressure on the towns so you should let the state especially since they're new you should like the state reps know but I will tell you that you'll be pre reaching to the choir for one
of the state rips as far because you have one State Rep that has been a town manager and knows what we're facing well the problem is the chapter 78 is not does not keep Pace with these contractual increases in the fixed cost it doesn't even keep Pace with the
demands of the what the state wants us to spend per pupil and it's that's been talked about as a problem for for years years they looked at the formula right Christ and it didn't get us anything no no it didn't it didn't didn't get us anything well I think when they looked at the formula in shortly thereafter we we had the Immigrant issue develop in the state and then I want to know where the millionaires
tax revenue went it right it went to roads roads last year nothing nothing that I know of has come into to that's what I was supposed to that's supp transation and education but I don't think anything come into to like some go to E English Second Language and teaching and not that I know of but then I also heard maybe higher ed was getting some
money too but just not the elementary and secondary every meeting I pick up my daughter who dance I'd like to know if this uh I'd like to see what the stats are are there more millionaires now or less in the state that's what I'd like to know there's less who's contributing there's less million because they're leaving because they're smart and was it some of that supposed to go towards the um Community College I think think so that program yeah right right I'm
not not sure about that though okay if if some of the fog would clear and the state would in this uh long legislative year do the budget sooner than later then we might be able to know
how much the increase and if the increase that the House and Senate gives us brings us back to 700,000 then at least we have a shot at pulling some rabbits out of the Hat by not filling positions by convincing the school to be reasonable and hopefully convincing Mr palansky to be reasonable that's a nice world
you're living in I said if if if how many open positions are there currently unfilled unfilled unfilled open unfilled and funded on in the process of counting yeah that would be a good number to know and in all honest and where I mean we know Finance we have to fill Finance no doubt about it and uh how many
will we it seems for everyone we feel we bleed one out and lose somebody yes always the problem and of course we have the problem of no recruitment of young people and some of the physical positions or with licenses
of permits that we need I want I want to take up uh next on the agenda this uh Reserve fund transfer for the Council on Aging it's in the amount of $99,950 um explanation the Council on Aging is in need of replacing an 80 plus gas LP furnace installation with a 4 ton condenser and coil uh this is due to the fact
that the system is being outdated uh there's they've had multiple ongoing issues that have been attempted to be addressed and the issues continue so replacing the furnace will help mitigate any further problems for them I just this year I was say I just have a question why mitigate wouldn't this take care of the problems that they're having with the HVAC system uh no you you're going to down the road you're going to need to replace more it's just we can't afford to do any more than this right now so
is this one of multiple units okay so two years ago my my wife actually um had presented to the administration at the time there was an estimate about $36,000 to replace all the the existing system um I I have concerns about spending just part of this just to fix part of the system just to have it fall apart the
rest of it fall apart um especially in light with our financial situation coming down the pike where we're going to be spending big dollars kind of concerned what's going to happen to the rest of the system um two years I mean not sure why it hasn't been addressed in a 2-year period but um it it it was looked at a couple years ago and it wasn't astim yeah and they've been a number of other repairs to that building as
we know uh and we can get this done now without going out through procurement if we go through procurement we're going to end up in that uh having to go out get prices it'll take us a while we can get this done now and uh as I said I don't have free cash certified and
I don't know what's going on with other but we have Myriad of expenses like this coming down the pike so because of this problem right now they have issues heating building part of the building yeah yeah so I think this is you got to I wouldn't address in best of all worlds I'd rather address the whole problem but I've also got other buildings that have the same issues and
uh we're already taken half of the reserve fund and I don't want to at this time of the year go in and start to move other stuff especially since we also haven't addressed the uh elephant in the room my understanding which uh which is uh how much the public safety uh departments
are going to come in for uh replenishment of their overtime budgets so can I throw something out there this is my understanding that there's some mini split there's a surplus of mini split units in town um I know there's one at EMA that's just sitting there and has been sitting there for some time I don't know um I'm not of facilities i' to see that looked at
was this a singular quote because you mentioned procurement the number is right under 10,000 so yeah Mr Kelly just a off-the-wall question if we do have to go the way of a debt exclusion is there an opportunity and would it make sense to look at some of these outstanding projects that we have have to get done eventually or it's just going to keep snowballing itself and
getting bad and roll in one dead exclusion you would the schools are coming in on one we would have to put together a second debt exclusion you have to be specific on what you're excluding and what you're asked the voters to fund so you you could put together a laundry list you could put together a number of things uh putting all
that on the backs of the taxs I think is uh in this environment in this economy is not advisable I was just asking if it made sense or not because sometimes it you got a borrow to pay $100 now to avoid paying $300 in two years my Spectre that's causing
me to lose sleep at night is that if Washington turns off the state's spot then you're going to see n9c Cuts coming from the state after we set our budget and they say they're withholding 20% 25% of state aid and then what are you going to get rid of
all the elected officials that have caused the state to not get the funding from the federal government but the uh until we I I wouldn't be advising anybody any town to spend a lot of money right now until the missed clears and you know what the economic situation is it's not as bad as
when two and a half passed but it's getting close and at that point I remember laying off almost 50% of a Workforce one two and a half pass for the first time well the last thing we want to resort to in this town is T any tax overrides especially to fund our
operational budget that should not be happening I don't care if other towns are starting to do that doesn't mean we're going to do it I wasn't advising it if things don't change we we may not have much Choice uh you always have a choice you decrease services or are you you got we have a big population in this town under fixed incomes oh I I I know there's no way they can
absorb uh additional additional tax increases top of uh the utility increases right now and everything else I hear you it's it's just definitely a perfect storm but looking at things that are coming down the road that we're going to have to face financially that be interested to figure out how we're going to work through those you have
to you have to figure out first what's happening with the two schools and those dead exclusions we got to know what we're working with is the problem we don't know right now well we know potentially our own school that's potentially $4 million that's just for the environment we still got the roof issue we still got I mean no the Ro done
but still with this uh HVAC system they have an uh no one's gone on record as saying how does that affect the warranty of the roof mhm right we're still waiting for an answer on that mhm I thought they were still having leaks and we still the leaks are in the wall to be on it either anyway you going back to the uh the transfer here
um I would appreciate it to get that done since it is our warming Center any more discussion on this no all right do we have a motion I'll make a motion to accept is there a second second all in favor I anyone opposed one exstension okay motion passes
[Music] all right next on the agenda old business anyone have any old business to discuss uh on new business um the only thing I want to bring up is you know having having our two new state reps uh come in uh before us at some point sooner than later uh just for
uh courtesy if we're inviting the two reps we should invite the senator or a representative of his office too he don't want to invite two and not one I mean obviously you know bought Elman as well I mean I mean but it's realistically It's usually the senator sends an aid
that sits and uh reports back right I mean did you want this like a town meeting event where people can come and ask questions themselves or is it strictly our committee asking questions of the representatives well I know one one of the state New State reps has set up office hours at the COA yeah I would like it just for our committee MH yeah is any
particular day other than Wednesday work for anybody cuz I'm pretty much old I think any any probably Friday we're not going to do on a Friday so Monday through Thursday in the evening like 7 o' just like we do now I might have an issue with some Thursdays but yeah I I have before ta season second Thursday of the month I'm in Boston on Tuesdays and
Thursdays so Monday one good any other time except that second Thursday like Monday or Wednesday then all right um if I can only get one of the two new well just do whatever day and then I can try and if I can only get one come in on one day and one on another yeah if it's Happ if it happens to be separate days I think that's good all right I'll contact them and see what they
say just find a day that works I might be able to maneuver my schedule and everybody good with that I mean everybody like this idea of doing that yes yeah more information to follow obviously are we uh meeting next week is that what we said with the school Poss possibly I'm going to uh email Patrick tomorrow you see if he can come in to give us an update as to where what where they are right now with that project
so um so if we don't meet if we don't meet next week then it'll 26 and we're going to have those six departments come in uh and then we'll just go over their budgets and that'll probably be a relatively quick night I think that's about it motion to adjudge Second all in favor thank
you [Music]