elcome to our July 8th meeting of the Huntsville County Commissioners. Um, Commissioner Bergstrom and I are here present uh in person and Commissioner Lions will be joining us by remote which means that all of all of our votes will be roll call votes. Okay. So uh without any further ado, let me just remind everybody that uh this meeting of uh the board of regional commissioners is
going to be conducted in accordance with the laws. Anyone wishing to participate may do so either in person or by accessing the meeting via Microsoft Teams [clears throat] or you can view the meeting through our live broadcast on our Bonable County YouTube channel uh which can be found on our website at uh www.kimcot.gov. Um and any person who is or would like to record this meeting uh here in this room uh please let us know
announce yourselves. Um and uh I want to uh what else do we want to say here? I think we've got everybody. We're ready to go. So, um, this meeting has been called to order and I'm going to ask folks to join us in a pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands one nation
for all. [clears throat] And now I'd like to ask everyone to join us in a brief moment of silence to reflect on the bravery and the sacrifices of all those who put their lives on the line in service to our country.
Thanks. Uh, the next item on the agenda is public comment. Is there anybody here in person who would like to make a public comment or statement for the commissioners? Is there anybody online? We have anybody online seeking recognition. Hearing none, we'll move on to the next item on our agenda, which is general business. Um, we got Excuse me. That's right. We have uh guests here from the assembly. So, I'm going to acknowledge and introduce uh Susan Warner and uh Deputy Speaker Carl Frenzal, the speaker and deputy speaker. Come on,
join us up at the table and uh feel free to share with us any insights, observations, anything, any new from the assembly. So, it's good to see you both here. Welcome and uh thanks. Okay. Y good morning. Good morning. Beautiful day today. [laughter] Um I know that we've been doing a lot of different things at the assembly uh both um internally
taking a look at our our own governance and stuff and trying to make adjustments internally to things that don't seem to really work anymore as well as they might have when they first were uh instituted. uh for example um the committee on uh governance um was was not really used the way in which we're using it now. We're using it much more actively and um that particular committee ended up having seven people and two alternates whereas all our other committees have five people and two
alternates. And after several meetings together, we decided that we would like to have that a five meeting twoerson uh along with the others. And it it it and always ends up working better in that in that number because we want to part of the reason we we have been using the committee so much more is because we want to move things in a in a meaningful way and still do the homework we need to do to get there. And um sometimes when the committee I mean bringing it to in front of the assembly can be uh uh a a point of not being able to get it done because it gets stalled by all the
different things that people want to bring into it. So um uh and we have been using the committees since uh uh in recent years a lot lot more than than before and and they've been very very effective. Um and it really I think has engaged a lot of them uh a lot differently than perhaps they had been before. Um uh we also recently um uh you might have gotten the press release on it. We we we voted to um support the um uh Diane Zigglio, uh on her effort to get um transparency
in the federal and in [clears throat] the state government. Um, and that's one of the things that we've uh we've always pushed for and and we really feel since the the voters have already asked for it, I kind of find it um yeah, interesting that that there has been no movement in that direction and there's so much um push against it. Um and a lot of people think, as you all know, a lot of people think that that that uh audits are are bad things. That's not always true. I mean, sometimes it's just to to introduce you to to some new uh some new ways to do things better and um uh so
many way um would you like to offer something Carl kind of where Oh, sure. So, we have some pending ordinances we haven't finished work on um that may or may not get to you. [laughter] Um and uh one of them I think um you might have already heard about and perhaps the speaker has talked to you about it when we dealt with uh potentially creating a something similar to the aqua fund with respect to um the ability of homeowners to borrow money in order to acquire generator equipment. Uh this
really comes from the last terrible storm we had u where a lot of people were left in the cold for quite a while. um that has run into some trouble in terms of its legality according to our council. So it's uh back for more study um in committee telecommunications committee. Um another um article which or ordinance which is still pending is an ordinance on the ICE um activity. Um I know that you have issued an executive order which was piggybacking on the state executive order,
the governor's order and there's another ordinance here which uh many members of the assembly feel would be um an improvement by making it official part you know something ordinance that's uh a permanent and cannot be changed and it is a little broader than some of the executive orders but that's pending uh what happens on Beacon Hill when they before they end this month in their session. on um their own protect act uh in what that will cover. So um that is still in committee shall we
say and not pending before the assembly. Um and then there's a a new ordinance that has been submitted that will be studied and again in committee and that's an ordinance dealing with potential tax searchcharge um home rule petition. the Taylor Swift tax that the Taylor Swift tax of Rhode Island uh which I was surprised to read. Um but Taylor Swift I'm sure is not a problem for her but it could be for many others in the state. Um and um that is just beginning its work in
committee. And then the last thing I'll point out on committees is that we've been very active in the finance committee uh dealing with some of the ordinances you've sent to us which we've passed and I think will be on your agenda today. Um some of them are housekeeping but some of them are um some change in the way in which the commission is going to finance its acquisition of its new property which we would all of them were following um in exactly what the board of commissioners had recommended. So I anticipate that signing it won't be a problem for you after we you see them we sent
them back to you approved. Um, and then I think we're trying to and we're working very well with uh the administrator and your finance director and assistant administrator on getting ahead on looking forward on the projections for the operating budget for FY28 to 31 which is projecting cumulative deficits close to I think over 10 million but it's a projection um and uh but we want to see if we have some things which we can um pass by resolution which might be a
statement at least from the assembly of where we think how we can work our way through this. We know we're have a combined squeeze here. We've got significant um potential capital expenses um some of those deferred maintenance um and some of those we know as PAS for example liabilities and that has to be finance and that squeezes the operating budget to some extent um and also just the continued um increase in expense for personnel and a major driver there is health insurance. We
all know that everybody's dealing with this one alone in this problem. Um municipalities are dealing with this. So these are things coming at us from external sources that we have to uh manage with our excise tax which is the major source of revenue. But we also have been prudent right together the commissioners in the assembly we've put aside almost $16 million in in rainy day funds and capital funds. So we have something to work with there too. So anyway that's what we've been active doing. Um and uh so far it's worked very well working with the administration on that.
Thank you. Well, let me just say just the reaction on the financing. I'm thrilled to hear this this kind of commentary because this is exactly where we've been for quite a while. We've been very concerned about this and to see the leadership of the assembly sort of talking the same way we're talking I think is incredibly important. We've put a lot of pressure on our finance director and our administrator to help us sort of come up with a game plan to walk us through this. My hope is is that uh when we do our budget message uh you know after Labor Day uh it will
be what will be reflected in it is um significant movement in that direction. So we but we've got things that we've got to work out. Uh we've got to deal with our facilities planning. We've got to get the roster nuts on our Pass cleanup so that we can fine-tune those numbers. So, we may have some there may be some estimates uh of cost uh that we'll have to work from uh in terms of laying out a long-term plan, but I'm I'm very pleased to hear uh your comments. Um I'm going to ask Commissioner Bergstrom to uh to chime in. Yeah, it you know, we're all on the same page
looking down the road at the county's finances. You know, we've been we've been fortunate so far and there's always a risk in predicting two or three years in advance because you never know what's going to happen. Yeah, no one could have predicted the the boom in the real estate uh sales the way it the way it has happened. And of course we I have lived and Mark has too through a downturn in county finances back you know 15 16 years ago when we actually had to cut back in the fiscal year and some of the stuff that we did. So, and I have a record of of those years
where actually fell short on revenues. As far as the the um activities of the assembly, you know, when you ask the legislature to do something, it's usually in the form of a homework petition. You pass an ordinance, it's basically the county doing something. So now I'm trying to figure and and I was speaker of the assembly for years and I don't know that I have a handle on this, but are we are we looking for a ordinance to create a home rule petition or are we looking for the assembly
itself to send a home improve petition up to the legislature? I mean that's that's the question. I mean if he goes up there and does nothing, I don't want I don't want the commissioner's complaint for blocking it. So is is are we on firm legal ground that the assembly itself has the right to send all the petition to the legislature? Yes. the approval of commission before we actually uh uh did the last one which was uh very very even. I mean it was very controversial and it was there
was about 50/50 uh and um we made sure that we had it uh looked at by uh legal and and made sure that whatever was not supposed to be in there uh wasn't. But it's it's the home petition that that uh went up. So, I would assume that if we decide to move the um the tax on on people with second homes who don't live here full-time, um uh not the tax because we don't tax, but um if we move
the question to the to the assembly, I mean to the legislature that it would also be in that form. Okay. It's just it just that you know for years the county spoke with one voice. you know it wasn't you know going back a ways it wasn't the assembly they did something other that's but you know that changed for various reasons a while back so now want to make sure the process is clear so that for instance we don't you don't have to go through get a home to consent it on your own but I think it's important you know to keep you informed about you know what comes in I this this
last ordinance that came in is a home would end up being a home rule petition and I think It's It's labeled that on a um and um uh again, I I I don't know. uh since it just came in, we're going to give it to committee first and we're going to probably break it up in two different committees uh because it's a big issue and and I I want to have the finances looked really carefully and I uh having having been on the finance committee myself, I I they do a great job and and uh I want to make sure that that's really looked at carefully and working with we usually work with
who you file these home group petitions with. Um it's it's the legisle. It's either Julian or uh um Dylan. Um and then they tell us uh you know if if it has if it's going if it's still in the in the in the waiting for a hearing mode which is what the other uh particular petition is. And from what I gather it's going to be waiting for a while. Well, I mean it's it's also I think maybe I'm wrong because that it's not necessary for the legislator that you
submit the petition to to actually agree with it. Simply handing That's right. Right. But that but we don't um our representatives have asked us to send it to them first and then they will uh hand walk it over to who and I think it's usually the the head of the uh uh probably the head of the uh they they have a process they got it could be going technically through the clerk and the reason that they asked us not to do that was to make sure that there that they didn't see anything that was
uh andor that there was stuff in there that if they chose they would you know consider in other putting together with other uh people who have other counties who have say you don't want to see how laws and sausages are made [laughter] [clears throat] comment so just another quick question have you looked at a summer schedule I mean you're going to meet on a regular schedule coming up yeah we we we we meet on a regular schedule [cough] so um if if we if we have a limited amount of things
to address. Um we may sometimes, which is rare, but we may sometimes uh uh take a break on a week um just so that we don't have everybody coming in for you know a 20-minute meeting and then going especially for our uh you know people that are further down the Cape. So um uh we we've still been doing what I uh hybrid meetings and uh in the summer it traditionally um upper cape is
pretty much um it doesn't take try to try to fight the traffic up or down and that's fine because it it you know it is pretty busy on the weekends and or on the week days that we do it. So um so that's good. It works out okay. I think you know if if there's something which had to get done and is wouldn't only if the meeting would otherwise be short we could do a pure uh meeting by Zoom. We've done that before on any emergency ordinance. So if there's something that quickly has to be done um and we otherwise wouldn't meet that week because there just isn't enough business
on the calendar um we could meet remotely and do the business. we taking also taking the time to do committee meetings if there's um if we don't have an assembly meeting we gives us a little more time to work in committee and right now as we mentioned there's a fair amount of work to be done in the committees frankly before reporting uh to the assembly um and uh one other thing I'll mention is that we are on this new Taylor Swift tax if you want to call it that um is um we are submitting that to council as well to have council look at that home room petition
and get back to us about the legal aspects of that. So, just as the other home room petition, I think this one we're doing the same thing there. Are you submitting it to county general counsel or your own? Well, no, our assembly council special. I got one more one more thing is that my little discussion with some of your members. It seems that you might have a turnover coming up in the next election. And I think I don't know when the papers are due. Probably in sometime next month, but it would be be in the council. They're due now. They're due July 21st, by the way. 28th. It
would be county's interest to make the word out so people, you know, qualified people understand that. I think that um uh there's a certain amount of that that's already being done. Okay. Um and um uh some people are are leaving for health. Some people are leaving because of their age. They've reached a certain milestone and feel that it's appropriate to step back and uh and let other people in, so to speak. And um uh and some people we we we're we're not sure uh you know why uh it
is it is quite a big number right at this point. It's either six or seven and um um it's coming close to half. Yeah. So um it's um but there are people out trying to you know actively recruit if you will uh for positions that that will that we know for sure will be available. There's a couple who say, "Yeah, I'm going to I'm going to uh not run this year." But we never know because they do always run. So, um you know, I haven't That's why I say six or seven. It's it's But um um and it is
that the three people that replaced people who left before [clears throat] are also electing to leave uh Chadam. Um uh let's see. Is it born as born and uh from before we know? Yeah. Yeah. The only reason I mentioned is because unfortunately what might happen is if if nobody steps forward, somebody else somebody might jump up who would never get elected to anything can say, "Hey, you know, I'll get my name on the ballot and I'll get Well, Glenn might try. It's important
that we get, you know, people who are really interested in the job and have time. Yeah, I I understand that. and and and um I mean we there are like four people who are actively uh kind of word of mouthing around trying to find new people. Um and um but we'll we'll step that up once we have confirmation once the paperwork is in and we know for sure who who is actually uh not coming back next year. Commissioner Lions, would you like Thank you. I was just if they knew
what towns those were, but if you're going to wait until all the papers are in, I understand. No, no, we there are uh let's see um Orleans is stepping off uh because he went into sort of suit retirement and now all the locksmiths are off the uh Cape and they have more business than his son can handle. So he's back 100% in the business and he just can't do both uh at this point because they also handle the the islands that you know Nantucket and Martha's Vineyard. So he's just
way too busy and he's done a good job of keeping up his end of the bargain but he he said I can't run again. So um let's see that that's one. Um no Bourne say it again. Bourne Bourne is Yeah. Bourne. Uh those are the three new ones. That's um uh Samson. Yeah, Samson is Yeah. Yeah. Wayne Samson is is stepping down. Um the um uh we've heard that the wealthy person may step down, but she's the one I'm not sure she is definitely stepping down. Um because she's been on the
assembly for a very long time. Um so she's one I I I would definitely wait on. Others are people who have definitely told us. I'm told that Sally Teague is stepping down from Truro as well. Um and I haven't yet spoke to her myself. So uh I I might try to convince her otherwise. But but um um let's see who else. How many is that? That's four. Well, we don't Chadam. Is Chad have you talking? Oh, right. Chadam. Chadam. Uh Michael King is uh stepping down. And um how about
uh the new one from Nashby? Yeah, the one from Mashelby. Mckelby. Who is it? Mckelby Greg. Oh, right. Miguel then is right. Yeah, he's stepping down. He is. Yeah. Okay. So, uh, that's kind of it. And, uh, hopefully there aren't any more. Very good. Any other business that we need to discuss? Commissioner Lions, you good? No, I'm all set. Let me take my hand down. I apologize. Commissioner Bstrom? No, I'm I'm I'm fine. Very good. Listen, thank you for coming. Thank you. Pleasure. You're free to stick around uh while we uh yeah have some of some other business to attend
to. Right. You can stay here actually. Be good. I'd like to keep free up the seats. Okay. Okay. Uh so our next I don't want you to talk. Our next item of business is um an overview of the county charter review process. uh the elected uh the elected creating an elected county charter commission. So we have with us today Lauren Goldberg, our county council. And uh can we bring can we bring Lauren up on the screen? Robin Ian
has permission. Say that again. She has permissions to unmute and show her. There she is. Good morning, Lauren. Good morning, everyone. Thank you for having me today. Morning. Great to It's great to see you. Um, just before Lauren begins, I'm just going to just um and ask people to allow uh if you have any questions about her presentation, hold those questions till the end. Uh we're going to be using the recording of this for
uh educational purposes. So, I'd like to get through her presentation and then we'll have plenty of time for questions. Commissioner Okay. And obviously Carl and Susan, you're more than happy to weigh in on the questions as well, but we know you've heard most of this because I think Lauren gave a similar presentation to you at your at your one of your meetings. Lauren, I'm going to turn it over to you. Wonderful. Thank you, Mr. Chair. And uh good morning everybody. I am going to share my screen. I'm going to try see how it goes. Um,
okay. Let's see. Oops. That's not what I wanted. Um, all right. Let me go here. Hold on. I was in the wrong spot. And let's go here. That's unusual. Yeah, this isn't my uh my best uh my best skill set. Um, all right. So, let's try to play from the beginning. Can you see what you need to see? Perfect. Wonder. Looks good. Um, okay. So, have to tell us where the lighthouse is. Lauren,
I'm going to let you tell me. Um, today's charter. Uh, today I'm going to talk about um kind of an overview of this charter study commission process and try to give you some context for that as well. And what I wanted to do was to start with kind of an overview of the home rule amendment and what it did in Massachusetts and also about charters and charter commissions kind of at the local municipal level and you draw some comparisons to the state uh to the county process and then briefly review
the study commission process. So, um, in 1966, the state adopted the home rule amendment to the Massachusetts Constitution. And this was really important because it changed the relationship between cities and towns and counties and the state. Uh, prior to that time, local governments of any kind couldn't make changes to their form of government unless they received permission from the state. and that was active permission in the form of approval essentially of a special
act. Uh or the general court could make kind of statutory forms of government available and those were the only real choices. Um, following the home rule amendment, cities and towns can elect a charter commission, as can Barcel, uh, to adopt or make significant revisions to a charter, or there are kind of easier processes to make smaller scale amendments to an already existing charter.
And this is uh special and important because essentially this is what allows each municipality, each existing or currently existing county and um regional governments um to kind of adapt and reflect the priorities and values of the residents and voters in those communities. And so that is why you know you can't go from Brewster to Chadam and expect everything to be the same and why
uh you know Barnstable has villages and a council while the other um towns in uh Barnstable County have uh select boards and you know open town meetings or representative meetings. These this the home rule amendment is what makes that allowable. Um and sometimes there are similarities. You know, bylaws can uh not contradict state law. Um so there are things from municipality to municipality and um in the county form of government that are similar,
but there's also variations and those are unique to that municipality or um or county or regional government. Um under state law um in order to adopt or amend a municipal charter then um there are basically two branches to follow. One is the special act process and that's a petition filed or approved by the legislative body and if it's uh a mayor in that municipality then with
the mayor's approval and it applies only to um to that municipality and a special act can make major amendments to the form of government and that would include the form of the legislative body uh and the executive cutive branch and um you know the uh manager in uh the county it would be an um county administrator or executive um so that's one option and then there's another option which
is a statutory option and um chapter 43b of the general laws uh implements the home rule amendment for municipalities and essentially what it says is there can be an elected charter commission which can make major amendments to the form of government um and only an elected charter commission using the statutory method or minor amendments can be made using the statutory method which is a twothirds vote of the legislative branch and then approval by the voters. Um the
statutory method then uh you know is a way to make these changes without going to the general court and there are a variety of different types of matters that are deemed consistent with the general laws um that can be done using the elected charter commission. Why then do towns use um an elected charter commission versus an appointed charter committee? And as you know uh the county also has similar um options available to it. Um and you know the reasons for cities and
towns is often that there are content limitations. Uh the major amendments can be achieved by an elected charter commission and under state law relative to municipalities an elected charter commission can only be initiated by the voters by petition. the executive, meaning the select board, the city council or town council, cannot place a question on the ballot asking whether an elected charter commission should be um should be pursued. So those content limitations mean that sometimes
um you know a um uh board of selectmen or select board or um you know a city council or mayor want to see a charter review or a significant charter review but there isn't a ground swell of support for that and so the only way to do it is through an appointment process. Um why do uh elected charter commissions or why are they attractive? And one of the reasons is that elected charter
commissions typically reflect a b a broader range of viewpoints because the members are chosen directly by the voters. Um when there's an appointed committee those appointments are often made to um you know be similar to or to parallel the elected charter commission process. maybe five to nine members uh with each member, you know, let's just say a five member select board and then um maybe you know two appointments made by um by a moderator and maybe two from amongst
uh the voters who apply. Uh so that is kind of a a a typical path but bottom line is elected charter commissions when they're created the members are elected directly by the voters um and so reflect you know the voters viewpoints. Um voter approval is required when an elected charter commission makes a recommendation or um proposes adoption or amendment of a charter. when an an
appointed charter committee is used, the special act approach can be used for those um amendments or has to be used and then those amendments do not require approval by the voters although often times there is a provision in the special act that will submit uh the proposed amendment to the voters but it's not required. And then the final reason that elected charter commissions are sometimes um sought is because there is a specified process that has to be followed. Uh two
public hearings. A preliminary and final report must be prepared. The final report is mailed to all the voters and the time frame is dictated by an election cycle. So it doesn't go on forever. It has to be resolved in a certain amount of time. Uh in Barcel County, uh the charter um the home rule charter does provide similarly for major and minor amendments. Um and it requires a special act
process for major amendments. Um and uh it also provides however that the charter can be replaced, revised or amended in accordance with the procedures made available under chapter 801 of the acts of 1985. Um chapter 801 of the acts of 1985, specifically sections 3 and 14 identify three ways to initiate charter amendment adoption or revision. The first is through a resolution of
the Barnstable County Commissioners and that is in fact what we are um what has happened here. That resolution is filed with the Secretary of State and um it proposes the election of a charter or or the the creation of an elected charter commission. Um an elected charter commission has the duties that you see here. Um it is to uh study the form of government, compare it with other forms um and
determine whether you know the uh government of the county could be strengthened, made more clearly responsive or accountable to the people or whether its operation could be more economical or efficient under a changed form of government. And you know this plain text essentially sets a stage for a global review of the charter and of county government. Uh the ballot question of you know whether to elect a charter commission or whether to create an elected charter study commission
uh will appear on the ballot in November that the November 3rd election. And that question is a yes or no question. Do the voters want to create an elected charter study commission? [snorts] If the answer to that is yes and the majority vote throughout the county is yes, then a charter study commission will be elected. The commissioners for the charter study commission are elected at that same November election and there will be 15 charter commissioners elected on that ballot. one
member by and from the registered voters of each town. Uh it is important to note that regardless of whether an individual voter is in favor or opposed to the election of a charter commission, every single voter gets to vote for a candidate for election. Um, so it's not required that voters, you know, vote yes or no on the question in order for them to vote for a candidate.
Regardless of how they vote on the question, they can still vote for a candidate. Um, to summarize chapter 801 and the charter study commission, uh, we just said 15 members are elected, one from each town. The nomination papers are available from the local town clerks in each town. uh and they have to be filed with the town clerk by July 28th. Um the process this the local process is for the signatures of of 20 registered voters to be certified and the the town clerk in each town
is the only person that does the certification or the only office that does the certification. uh only the names of registered voters from that particular city or t um town can be certified. So if you had a nomination paper that had some you know residents from Truro and some from Province Town and some from East Ham submitted to the East Ham town clerk only the signatures of the Eastam registered voters could be certified. uh just to bear in mind. Um so the there's a signature
requirement for 20 registered voters and just a note that the state typically recommends at least two times the number of signatures be um collected and submitted for certification because of the standards applicable to certification. Um and uh finally those papers will then be returned to the candidate at their request. Um and then the candidate will have to file those with the secretary of the commonwealth no later than August 26th. So just a reminder if anyone's considering
running that they have to both submit to the local town clerk and then to the state and they have to actually be filed with the secretary no later than August 25th. They can't be on their way. they have to be in the office by 5:00 p.m. Um, the charter study commission has also several ex official members and that is each of the Barnstable County Commissioners or their design and the speaker of the assembly of delegates or their design. So the there will be a total of the 15 elected and the
four exopicial members. [snorts] Um there are also other participants who are essentially um you know exeicial but without the right to vote. So members of the assembly of delegates have the right to participate in the deliberations of the commission but not the right to vote and they can endorse or descent from any report of the commission in their official advisory role. Um, it does not prohibit members of the assembly from running for or being elected to the charter commission,
but it wouldn't get them, and I think this is obvious, but it wouldn't give them two votes. They would have one vote and they would um already be able to weigh in. The other person that gets to participate um is the county administrator, non- voting advisor who's essentially providing support and information to the commission as the administrator deems you know important to to the form of government um and will attend meetings of the of the commission as requested. Um, in terms
of the commission's votes and operations, the 15 members each cast votes weighted by population and then the uh four non-elected members or their designates cast a vote representing the average of the weighted votes of the elected members. Um the county provides um space and the town um for hearings and then there's a financial um uh amount reserved for the commission if if a commission is created and that's 35,000 and the stat the chapter 801 says with or without appropriation.
Um and then the uh commission can hire staff as it account permits. Um in terms of function, the commission is required to hold public hearings um sponsor public forums and provide for this is language right from chapter 801 for widespread dissemination of of information. It will report its findings and recommendations on or before the 18th calendar month following its election in a quote unquote final report filed with the county clerk and delivered to all elected county
municipal officials, the legislative delegation and the secretary. Uh it has to be printed and made available at uh at it and at uh no cost to the public at large at a number of copies equal to at least 1% of the registered voters as of 40 days um from the most recent primary or general election. uh the county the charter commission has to publish uh the full text of its proposed amendment or charter and a summary um along with analysis of its recommendations and then
the charter revisions are later presented to the voters at an election. Um I mentioned earlier that a charter study commission has you know authority and a directive to review the charter in a global manner. But I do want to also remind um uh you know remind the body that uh the commission would also review matters that would typically be considered during a periodic charter review. um and they're listed there, but you know, clarifying language, you know, making uh making
sure things are internally consistent, addressing grammar, um looking at state law and, you know, determining whether any updates or revisions need to be made based on changes in state law. um you know kind of looking at streamlining government functions and um reviewing and and I know I've talked about this at several meetings but kind of reviewing the difference between what the words of the charter say and how things are being implemented um and you know vice versa as
well. you know, what's what's kind of happening on the ground versus what does it say in the charter and trying to consider whether those two things um should be made more consistent. And that is the end of my um presentation and I'm happy to answer any questions that the or that may be directed to me. Thank you very much. Uh we're going to start with Commissioner Brookstrom and then to Commissioner. Yeah. Uh You answered one of my questions. It's a weighted vote just like it is
in the assembly. So the trio will only have less than 1% bars will have 20% in the original vote and the official will have an average. Yes. Yes. Thank you. Um it is a weighted vote and that's right in chapter 801. Um, and I'm just trying to see if I can give you this the reference. So, if anybody wants to look it up, they can. Um, just give me one second. I'll grab that for you.
Okay. Um, let's see. It's too small for my eyes. So, one moment while I uh increase the size. So, um, yeah, it says the 15 elected members shall each cast votes weighted by the populations of their respective towns determined from the most federal and most recent federal or state census. The four non-elected members shall each cast a vote which is the average of the weighted votes of the
elected members. Now the other question and this has come up before is then suppose that the major changes are made in this in the election I guess would be 2028 recommended major changes in the in the makeup of the of the commissioners of the assembly but it's not certain that voters will go along with that. So you could have people on the ballot let's say it was recommended that they have five commissioners instead of three. You'll have commissioners. You'll have people running for the for the existing system, but you'll also have a new system being introduced. In other words,
h how can you have candidates running for offices that don't know it's going to exist, but they don't know the uh the term of office or any of the requirements? I mean, it it's it seems a little complicated. Yeah, Commissioner, that that's a a good point. I I believe that the charter change would appear on the ballot in 2028 if that's what was recommended and there was a change whether to the assembly or to the size of the county commission or anything else and that those changes would be implemented going forward and not at the same election. Um I you know it's not
something I've I've spent a significant amount of time looking at commissioner but in my experience at the municipal level those changes would not you know be on the ballot at the same time as the question of whether to make them. So I think you know if I if I had to predict I would predict that the changes would not occur at the same at the same election. And um you know when the commission I if a commission is elected and it's working on um a proposed a proposed revision to the charter
if it was of that kind of nature. My suggestion if I you know were to be asked would be that that should be addressed in the transition sections of the proposed new charter or the proposed revised charter so that it was very clear um for municipalities it will often say you know that that the uh question of or or that the additional offices of XYZ shall appear on the ballot at the next regular election and it'll even say how they should appear. year either whether they should
appear you know in the same office i.e. vote for three or whether it should be one vote for one one vote for two one vote for three years. So that's something that can be addressed specifically in any new proposed revision. So we might be looking at we might be looking at 2030 before any any changes which passed the budget in 2028 wouldn't be actually implemented and the offices would be changed until 20 the ballot of 2030. Yeah, that would be my expectation. Again, I haven't looked
at it closely, but in my experience, the change has to be approved before the option of electing new people or changing the format or anything like that could be done. So, changes that didn't require elections um could be addressed in terms of when to implement. That could also be addressed right in the document. So if there was going to be a change in the budget process and it happened before a change in the you know the number of commissioners or the assembly or whatever the
process to be followed in the interim could be addressed right in the the um proposed revision. One more one more quick question. I know that the way at least my understanding is the weighted vote in the assembly and other organizations I I chair the regional transit authority. We also had a weighted vote for some things is sort of mandated in the constitution of Massachusetts so that everybody has the same vote. And I think that I mean I would think that the charter commission would need legal counsel not only on that issue but any other issues they might address that might
come into conflict with the with the constit with the constitution of Massachusetts. So are they going to have you recommend they have separate legal counsel? Is KP law going to advise or how does this work? Um well that's also obviously a good question commissioner. Um, in my experience, it is important to have legal counsel um, when a new charter is being drafted. There are certainly entities out there that provide charter revision services where it is not an attorney who does that. Um, you know, I'm biased in that I do think it's better to involve an attorney.
um not only because they're used to seeing, you know, this type of um writing and documentation, but also because they are aware of the issues similar to what you just discussed. You know, the one person, one vote concept and and lots of other um you know, matters that are that are um implicated by revi revision of a charter. Um that being said, uh I do that work frequently. I do it throughout the state, both for our regular clients and for special counsel clients. And there
are other people in Massachusetts that do that as well. There's it's not just me. Yeah. Just just to say I I wouldn't want to put you in a conflict because obviously KP Law is fire is hired by the commissioners and we'll also be sitting on the on the charter commission, you know, if we don't like what you're telling us, you know. But no, I'm just saying I want to make sure that the process goes through so that nobody can question the process and how it works. Thank you. Yes. Well, I I would say um just to that point, um you you already know this about KP, but just for those that don't,
um you know, we can't change our opinion because of who's asking the question, um we review the law and we review the implications of the law. And unfortunately for us, sometimes we do have to give clients the the advice that they wish they did not have to get. Um but you know this is you know as an attorney our duty is to provide decision makers with the information that they need and then they decide whether you know and how what and how they wanted to to do with that information. Um
you know again we do this work both for clients and for non-clients and I personally do not feel conflicted um in providing you know the correct um advice. I provide the options and the information and the determining body whether that be the county commissioners in this case or the you know the charter study commission if one were elected a board a committee you know the the the information is provided and what to do with it um obviously is the decision of the policy
makers and certainly we advise as to relative risk and to you know the options but ultimately um the information that we provide is going to be fair and accurate and appropriate. Thank you, Lauren. Yeah, just to say I never questioned that, but sometimes we have had attorneys who you may that made decisions that the commissioners agreed with and outside entities would say, well, you just say did that because of the commissioner. So, I'm trying to make
it clear that we're not putting, you know, that you're you are an independent entity and you are going to give us and the and the committee the the advice that that you believe is sound. So, Thank you. Thank you for for that. Yeah, Commissioner Lance, unmute. You're gonna have to unmute yourself, Sean. Thank you. Uh what h Good morning, Lauren. Um what happens if um there aren't enough people to that decide they don't want to run and there's towns that
are after the election don't have anyone to represent them? Is that the end of the process? um through you, Mr. Chair. Um I don't think that's the the end of the process. Um there is language in chapter 801 about vacancies and I'm just trying to get to it just to make sure. Um and what that said, just give me one second. It says if a, this is in section 7, if a member dies, resigns,
or ceases to be a registered voter um of the town from which the member was elected, such a vacancy shall be filled by the unsuccessful candidate who received the greatest number of votes um in the election of that charter commission member. If the vacancy cannot be filled in this manner, the selectman of the town shall fill the vacancy. And then it specifically says the commission may continue to act notwithstanding the existence of any vacancy. Okay, great. And my
and and I'm sorry, I don't mean to speak over you, Commissioner Lines. Yeah, I was just going to say under state law chapter 50 section two, a failure to elect is also considered, which is um a tie or you know, nobody um would be considered a vacancy. And I uh if I was asked, I would opine that that would be the way to fill it. But I would just like to remind uh the county commissioners and um that in an election, the person receiving the highest number of votes wins. So even if no one's name
was printed on the ballot, if there were writins, the write in the per the candidate or the person with the highest number of writeins would be elected. Um and so you know that's important uh to consider when people are considering whether to pull papers because as you know that could be a planned write in campaign where you know people say I didn't I didn't submit my papers but I'm very much interested in running. They would notify the town clerk and the town in which they ch you
know which they were going to run their writing campaign the town where they're registered. um and the clerk would then know to instruct the pole workers to look for that name and record that as writeins. However, this is a state election. The ballot is already going to be complicated. It's going to have many state election questions. It's going to have this question on whether to elect a charter commission. Um and uh you know the thinking about what's best or easiest for
the voters. Submitting nomination papers if there's interest in running is likely the the easiest way for people to pursue this rather than waiting until later and saying I'm going to run a writing campaign. And if no writing campaign is is sought then anybody whose name is written in has the potential of being elected. And you know from the the presentation I just made there was a discussion about how um you know elected charter commissions one of the benefits is that
it represents the viewpoints of the community. And if a person wins because, you know, five people wrote them in, that may not in fact be the best reflection of the community's viewpoint. So, um, you know, just kind of bearing all those things in mind as people consider whether to pull papers and whether to, um, submit them to the town clerks for certification. Right. Very good. is be um and so this is all due by the 28th. Am I right? Are you looking at that or is that just papers? Okay. So,
it's going to be very complicated and it really is sort of up to county to make sure we get word out to try to educate people on this is that it seemed like that was in the beginning of your presentation, the responsibility of informing the public and getting this out so people are aware. Yeah, Commissioner Lions, I I think it is important knowing that the question is going to appear on the ballot and knowing, you know, as we just talked about the the complicated nature of
this this year's ballot, the more people that are aware and, you know, people that hold and return papers, I think that is going to make it easier for the voters at large. Um, and you know, that there's real value. There's always real value in pulling papers and running in, you know, submitting and having your name printed on the ballot as a candidate. As you all know, having your name printed on the ballot is important. Um, but especially in the circumstances of this year's election, I think that will be um helpful to voters generally, not just to the person who's
running. I just want to make a comment and um give my empathy and sympathy to the town clerks of uh of all towns this year. Number one, I mean, I just know from my own town, it's a small town, one clerk. When there's tremendous amount of ballot questions on there, there's lots of candidates. Uh and then there's things like this that are not out of the norm. That's a lot of work. So, I I'm putting in a plug for anyone who's listening uh up at the legislature to give more tools to our
town clerks. Anyway, um I can't think of another question. I think you covered it mostly with uh Ron, and I'm sure Mark will uh have questions that maybe I'm not thinking of right now, but I'll chime in while you're still here if I think of one. And thank you. Uh, I look forward to having that presentation because it's going to help us explain this process and what's going on here. Thank you. Thank you, Commissioner. Um, Lauren, we have with us uh, Speaker Warner and Deputy Speaker
Frezel. I want to give them an opportunity if they have questions for council. Okay. Uh, hi. Uh, yeah, I do I do have a question. um if nobody fills in a particular town or nobody's running for a particular town, what happens in that case? Does do do the selectman from that town then place a candidate in there or uh does it just remain empty and instead of 15 there are 14? Um through
you Mr. Mr. Chair. Um, so the the way that the stat the chapter 801 is written, it talks about um filling vacancies and in my opinion if no one appears on the ballot and no one is written in, that would constitute a vacancy. And I would um refer to section 7 of chapter 801 where it says, you know, if there's um a candidate who received the greatest number of votes who wasn't elected,
it would be filled by that person. But if not, the select board of that town shall fill the vacancy. So that would just be majority vote of those present and voting by that by that select board. But as as I was just discussing with Commissioner Lions, um under state law, a person is elected who receives the highest number of votes. So if you know on the way into the polls, someone was to say, you know what, write me in to uh for um charter, you know, the charter study commission,
and five people heard that comment and five people wrote in that person's name, that person would be elected. the likelihood of no one getting elected in my opinion based on my experience is small. Um, somebody would be written in and somebody would get elected. Um, and as we were just talking about under the circumstances, you know, the ballot's going to be complicated. Um, so, you know, having names printed on the ballot is likely going to be easier for voters rather than
having to write people in. But um again I expect that someone would get written in and whoever that someone is with the most number of write in votes even if that's you know five um that person would be elected. Thank you Carl. Yeah. Thank you Mr. Chair. Um so I have two questions. One is front end one is back end. Okay. So the front end question is it's an 18month process. So let's assume the voters say yes, we want a chart like the charter commission. What is the mandate of
the date it must start and the date it must end. Um that's the front end question along with how does it even get organized? I mean and who runs this? Um who gets it started and launched and get off the ground and then who's in charge once it's off the ground. Then my backend question is on your slides I saw that after there's an approved report it the whole thing goes to the voters of Bonable County. So in that equation I don't see the legislature. So just confirm for me that it
goes to the voters and the legislature is not part of this process or if I'm wrong explain why I'm wrong about that. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. um let's take those uh let's take those separately. So the first um part is that the committee uh the commission sorry um is required to uh organize I think it's 15 days after the date that the election is certified by the governor's
council um which is usually like 15 days after the date of the election. Um, at that point, the person who received the highest number of votes organizes and posts the meeting. Um, let me just double check here. Uh, yeah, no later than 15 days after the certification. If that person doesn't act to post a meeting, then the Secretary of the Commonwealth can designate another member to convene the first meeting. At that meeting, the commission will organize by electing a chair,
a vice chair, a treasurer, and a clerk, and they have to file notice with the secretary of that organization. Um, I do want to point out that those positions um and the discussion of who should fill them are subject to the open meeting law. So, the 15 member board um ultimately has to make that decision at the table. um no more than a quorum can discuss that outside of a meeting and there are several attorney general decisions on that. So just important to remember if that goes
forward and certainly I'll be happy to um you know remind uh remind the the commissioners if we get closer. Um but uh once that happens then the um you know whoever's the the chair would be the one to schedule and run meetings. um with whatever assistance they they needed from the administration. Um and uh they would continue to do their work. as as I said, they're required to
um hold hearings and to um just going to see um it says um um the county um okay um sorry hold public hearings, sponsor public forums and provide for wide dissemination of information and stimulation of public discussion. Um essentially, uh at the municipal level, that's at least two public hearings. Um one before this initial report is um prepared and
one before a final report is prepared. Um chapter 801 doesn't provide for that specifically. It just says hold public hearings. It says that the the findings have to be reported to the citizens um on or before the 18th calendar month next following um in a final report and the final report and the analysis and recommendations have to be published twice um on two successive weeks. Um once that happens then the um if the commission now we're switching to section or to
question two section 13 of chapter 801 says if the commission shall have recommended adoption of one of the forms of government they place a question on um if which is unlikely if they have proposed a special charter. It shall be the duty of the commission to petition the legislature forth with for a special law or laws pursuant to the state constitution um and in the manner provided by general enabling legislation to carry out the recommendations of the charter commission. Upon enactment of the enabling legislation, the special charter shall be submitted to the voters
of Barnstable County for adoption. Um, so, uh, I it will go to the legislature for the legislature to pass a law allowing the county to adopt a special act. Um in terms of the timing of that um again it's going to happen at a state or the elect the election to um whether to adopt the special act is likely to happen at a state election and therefore um you know it would get
pushed uh to um the next occurring state election for which it could qualify. Um certainly the uh county's uh legislative delegation is going to be aware that that's happening. Um my kind of thoughts about how to um how to minimize the amount of time it takes to get from one process to the next is to um you know work collaboratively with the the legislature and house counsel and senate council as things go along with its final recommendations
so that there's some feedback already from from the state level about whether and how um you know what's being recommended um is consistent with state law making any changes that are needed um and then hopefully the legislative process could be expedited. Yes. So Mr. Clar it sounds to me then that after the report of the commission working collaboratively as you mentioned with the legislature we need a special act of the
legislature to happen before it can go on the ballot for the voters to say yes. So the voters are saying yes after the legislature has acted. So that could delay our time in class past the election of November of 30 even depending upon how fast the legislature acts. Great. Uh Mr. Chair through you. Um yes. So that agreed. It could take longer. Um I think if if the goal is to get it on the ballot um you know at the uh next election then the goal would be to work collaboratively
with the legislature um throughout the process and usually house and senate council. Obviously, I can't speak for them and I can't speak for your legislative delegation, but in my experience, um, they are willing to work collaboratively and to address any legal issues that might impact, uh, it's the the bill's ability to proceed, um, you know, uh, in in an expeditious and efficient manner. Um, and I would imagine that whoever works with the commission would be um,
making that contact and trying to ensure that uh, that there won't be a delay based on legal issues that would prevent the legislature from being able to act quickly. Thank you. Thank you, Lauren. Yeah, I can say that in 1988 when we did this before, there was very close collaboration with the with the legislative delegation. They were very hands-on, very engaged. Um, having been around back then when this was previously done, um, I I can attest to that. Um, Commissioner Burst, did you have another question? Yeah,
just, you know, I'm running the math through my head and I'm not getting any results because what you're saying is that there'll be four exopicio delegates and they will have a weighted vote, each one, I assume, as the average weighted vote of the of the entire population of Cape Cod, which means that the the the committee will actually represent a population that's greater than the existing population because you'll have 15 members who represent the 15 the population of Cape Cod and then you'll have four members numbers which will will add an additional 30% on top of
that. So you understand? So then the question I mean it's a little complicated. The question is how does the vote go and who who decides what you know? I mean so I mean it's I'm sure we can all figure it out but it's it takes a little map to figure out who's who's going to have say in the in the uh final break makeup of the uh of the committee. The other question I have is u you know I've been through several uh charter reviews in in towns my town of Cadam and normally
everyone on the charter committee was independent of the actual organization. They didn't have any uh selectment on there and they usually didn't have any town employees but there's no prohibition against say a department head or town employee being being elected. Um Mr. Chair you go ahead please. Um, so under the under the conflict of interest law, that that would really be what would prohibit someone from serving in two capacities. Um,
and typically once you uh, you know, you can hold an elected position and um, serve in an appointed position, there are sometimes conflict of interest law issues. um for current employees, there's various exemptions that um could be available for that. Um and I do think, you know, that the state ethics commission is available um certainly um to call. And I always say if you're forwardlooking,
you can always call the state ethics commission and ask them for an opinion. Usually, if you're calling about something that's already happened, um they'll change you over to the enforcement division because they're an enforcement agency. But forward-looking questions, um are typically okay. And then the other thing is that under chapter 268A section 1 which is the definition section um when you're looking at the definition of um a uh I'm just trying to see of a municipal
official. Um, you will find that members of a charter commission established under the home rule amendment are not considered municipal employees, and I'm putting it in quotes, for purposes of the conflict of interest law, meaning that a person could serve as an employee of a town and serve on an elected charter commission. Um, it doesn't specifically say that for county for counties. Um
but that is something we certainly could examine before um the election. In any event, however, it would not prevent a person who works for a municipality or for the county from running for the office. Um so there's time, as I said, to kind of sort that out. Also, I just want to note that just because nomination papers are submitted to the clerk for certification doesn't mean that it's automatic that they get forwarded to the secretary of state for filing. That's a choice and anybody
because the conflict belongs to the individual. any municipal or county employee who has concerns about that um you know can can work between now and the sep the um the August filing deadline to try and sort that out um andor even if they didn't sort it out in that time they could still sort it out before they were sworn into office if they had concerns. So that's something to follow up on. But again um I you know for for the state I mean for the municipal employees they can
serve in an elected charter commission without any conflict. So that would be something again that if for if it's a county employee we would want to um you know to to double check. But um I don't you know I I don't imagine that it's going to be a conflict to serve on an elected charter commission. Okay. Well, we're gonna we're going to end this this subject uh right here at this point. Uh Lauren, you've been incredibly helpful and informative. Uh we appreciate all your time, all your insight. Um and uh I I would also like to uh uh compliment you on your grasp of this. You've
obviously worked on a lot of charters and uh we we appreciate you bringing this level of expertise to this whole topic. So, thank you and Oh, thank you. And I wish you guys all the best. I know this is an exciting time and um you know we'll we'll see uh we'll see where things are after after the end of July and and August when we know it's been filed, but happy to to um you know to come back as needed and answer any further questions, Mr. Chair and members of the commission. That's great. Thank you very much. Okay, thank you commissioners. Byebye. Okay, we're going to move on to our
our next item on our agenda and I'm going to ask the staff to bring up another chair to the table. Um because I'm going to invite Andrew Flat uh Ronique Goldstein and Andrew Palachi from Eversource to come to the table. We're going to talk about um emergency response, emergency management. We're going to talk about uh the July heatwave and we're going to talk a little bit about Blizzard Hernando and some sort of look back uh on on that situation. But I want to welcome Ron
and Andrew to to our meetings. Thank you very much for coming to join us on such short notice. Um and uh I think you folks have been incredibly busy in terms of interacting with the community and I appreciate you carving out time to join us today. And Andrew obviously Andrew is our emergency management zar and u we we appreciate everything that he's doing as well. Um, I'm going to ask Michael Dutton, our county administrator, to kind of help us lead this discussion. I do think that,
uh, in the interest of time, we want to talk about the heatwave first and then look at the, uh, the look back on the other situation. But I just want to just go on the record and thank Ever Source uh for all of the all of the incredible attention, energy, and effort uh that you have made uh here on Cape Cod in dealing with our emergencies, particularly the winter blizzard. Um you know, we were we we ran shelters. We were very busy. Uh Andrew was in our operations center helping
uh run things and uh we could see firsthand a tremendous amount of work and effort by Eversource and uh I just want to on behalf of everybody here in Barnstable County, thank you for the for the tremendous effort. Uh Cape Cod uh was very well taken care of by Eversource during the storm and we appreciate it. So um thank you. Uh um [laughter] I'd like to if for a moment Roique Roique Goldstein uh manager of community relations uh with Eversource I I see a lot of familiar faces in the room. Um as you know I've been I'm in my ninth year with the utility. Uh been on a lot
of uh storm events and and emergencies including tornadoes on the Cape. Um and I'd like to thank uh the board of commissioners for having us uh here today. And I do want to give some credit to your uh your county employees, many of whom are in the room uh who may be online, whom uh we have a longstanding relationship with. Uh it's a great partnership uh with the multi- agency coordination center, i.e. the MAC. Um, and so we really really appreciate uh that that partnership throughout,
especially uh her uh Blizzard Hernando uh which was uh you know many folks at the utility are saying it's it's the worst storm that they've seen in in decades uh on the Cape and in the we had the entire south and and the Cape uh but specific to the Cape there was a significant amount of damage and really significant amount of uh just really really difficult conditions. uh both ice and the amount of snow. So, and as well as the wind, not to mention the wind. Not to forget the wind. Yeah.
Well, I appreciate your comments. That's one of the reasons why we want to talk about this recent heat wave that we've now um come out of. Thank God. Yes. Um you know, we we saw significant power outages around the Cape and in some communities the power would come on, go off, go on, go off. uh we wanted to give you an opportunity to help explain to us essentially uh what was happening uh what's going on and what the challenges are that might lie ahead. There's some people that are concerned that is this something that we're likely to continue to experience and and if we when the
heat wave comes back later on this summer. I think those are some of the questions that that uh that we've been getting as commissioners and here into the office. So, uh, we thought if now would be a good time to give you a chance to talk to us a little bit about what happened. Sure. The heatwave, what's going on, and what kind of problems or issues do we need to work together on to see what we can be of some help to you. I know sometimes with the utilities, we end up putting limitations. the communities themselves. I hear this a lot in the lower cape because yeah, um when I was a municipal official on the lower cape, we hated we hated it when cell towers would kept
popping up and so we we're putting restrictions on cell tower operators and then we complain about not having decent cell service. So sometimes we can be we we we can shoot ourselves in the foot on some things and I'm sure sometimes we find ways to make your lives complicated too. Um, so I'm I'm interested in hearing any and all angles and perspectives on this, but I don't know if Michael or Andrew, you wanted to tee things up first. You want to say a few words and then let Andrew and and Monique Sure. Um uh just just as in terms of a introduction, I think we were originally
intending today to be uh sort of a introduction uh for Andrew uh to the commissioners and also uh sort of a little bit of a a uh pre-introduction to the emergency management department that's on your agenda a little bit later. Um obviously the heatwave took uh took a little bit of uh u attention away from that. So, we thought it would be good to have our Eversource folks in to have a discussion about, you know, what what really happened and and if there's anything that
we can do at the county level to encourage uh towns to adjust some policies that might make uh outages less common. So, um so that was really it and uh we'll get to Andrew and and he can uh talk a little bit about the afteraction for uh the blizzard, but um but I you teed it up fairly well. Let's go right to the heatwave and I know you want to make Yeah. So, I'll jump in. I I would like to introduce Andrew. Another There's too many Andrews in the room, right? Not too too just enough. Just enough. So, Andrew Palace is uh new to Eversource. He's in his fourth week. Is it third or fourth
week, Andrew? So, I'll take the lead on the discussion, but he's here for the opportunity to engage with all of you and and here um and continue to to to be on boarded with the utility. Um so I'll sort of pivot if I can just level set with respect to the heat wave. It's an emergency uh like any other it's a little bit different. So Eversource as a utility has an a dedicated emergency preparedness department that is planning year round for all types of emergencies.
Uh in fact they were planning uh months and months in advance for the World Cup because of access issues both in the city of Boston and in our gas territories for emergencies. So you know it's not just weather. They they prepare for everything and look at the full scope of staging and housing you know lodging and lay down areas for material uh depending on the severity of the um of the event uh the heat wave. And so we do that as a matter of practice and we stand up an an incident command structure similar to your police and fire. We work very very closely with
all of the public safety officials on the Cape. We have a great relationship with with all of the towns. Uh a heat wave is a little bit different because we can see it coming. We're monitoring the weather as a matter of regular business 24/7. We in fact we have a meteorologist that serves the utility in all three states and they look at the weather and there's a model a couple of modeling systems that they look at in terms of not just weather but based on the predictions where there going to be trouble areas right trouble spots um they put this into a model it spits out some numbers and it gets adjusted based on uh and it looks at system conditions the same with a heat
wave the difference with a heat wave is that we're really focused on meeting demand ensuring that the utility can keep Everybody's running their ACs. We also have to look so so we started calls on Wednesday I would say for this particular heat wave uh Wednesday morning early afternoon and they go through all branches of the operating system including supply right so we supply is is is owned if you want to call it it's not really owned but it's uh overseen by ISO New England independent
system operator um we didn't go into a level where supply we came close but they for monitoring. Um there's a level called OP4 where you start to get a little concerned that the entirety of New England would have to go into rolling blockouts because of lack of supply. We did not go into that. Uh that was reported out at the beginning of every call. We also look at demand response. So people can uh subscribe to a program called connected solutions. Um it's through the mass save. Um, Eversource and all of the administrators of of energy efficiency run that help to run that
program and people can uh are incentivized to reduce load. Uh, they do a outbound call. They called every single program available in this last heat wave because we could see it was going to be, you know, close to 100 degrees for 3 to four days straight. Um, you get head room from that. You know, you get, I want to say a thousand megawatts, right? Um just one of the things that were called out and this is reported out on every call you go to then to transmission. How's the TR transmission system holding up substations and then the distribution systems um you know how
are transmission uh uh substation forgive me substation uh transformers operating. They look at anything that's operating at over 80%. What can we do in the way of switching or offloading they call it right? switching the the from circuit to circuit to supply. Uh so big picture, I will say that the system held up. Um it didn't hold up without issues, but it held up pretty well all things considered. We rolled into an ERP level five uh starting at noon on Wednesday. What that
means is we anticipate less than 14,000 customers across the state, which it was, and 1 to two days of restoration. So 24 to 36 hours at max, which most outages were. So it was inaccurate. We would have elevated had it been more severe. Um but I think what you saw especially to give bring it from the big picture to hyper local. Uh what I heard from from operations and and Andrew and I were fielding calls throughout the weekend is that um there were a lot of single outages which makes it harder to you know if you can pick up 300 or 200 or even 50 at once with a resource
or two resources versus going to a 100 different calls, right? were a lot of single um what and and there were a and there were a fair amount and I I don't have the number before me but I know looking on Sunday there were a couple dozen uh pull top transformers that were just you know uh on the fourth day of almost 100 weather they're starting to heat up. Yeah. Um, so you did see some equipment failure. Um, and they continued to see uh into, you know, running into, you know, with the rain yesterday. Um, our counterparts in Connecticut had a significant um windstorm that
pulled some resources at the end of the weekend. I don't know if folks are aware, but there was about 100,000 customers out in in Connecticut. So, we we provide mutual aid. We requested folks stay back and they did to close out folks that had been out on the Cape and they did that and closed everybody out. I would say by uh sometime on Sunday, anyone that had any remaining outages. Um so that's a big picture. Hopefully I covered everything. Um I don't know if there's anything I missed. Keep me honest here, Andrew. Um and I I'd love to take questions. The experience that I've been I've
heard is that in some communities literally every hour every sometimes even frequency levels that were shorter. Um, power would come on, it would go off. Power would then would come back on 15, 20 minutes later go off. And I'm assuming is that a transformer? What's what what's what's causing that? Yeah. I couldn't say specifically. It depends. So if we're talking about flickering lights, yes. Right. That's flickering, but also it's out and then literally within seconds it
comes back. So that's actually the system is working as that is true. That's auto. There's a lot of switching. We've done a tremendous amount of installation of automated switches on the Cape. So, the flickering lights, folks don't usually know, but that means the system's working. It's an automated recloser or a switch that kind you can see them on the poles. They try to self-regulate, right? They open to shake the the branch, the squirrel, the whatever might be, you know, in reality on there. And by the third time, if it's flat, it means this troubleshooter needs to go out there, there are first responders, and manually make the fix. But that that flickering
is is actually the system working as it should. It's a nuisance, but it's the system working as it should. In terms of intermittent, it could be that we were doing some switching. Um, you know, our goal is is anything under five minutes is considered a uh a momentary call it. I don't know if that's the right terminology, but I've heard it said multiple times. So, it's it's a very quick restoration under five minutes. And you're saying it sometimes less than that? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, there was our dispatch was uh people were working all throughout the weekend. Our engineers are
still working to mitigate some of the uh issues that were caused and and create and do the fixes days later into the end of this week. Sure. I understand you interact regularly with ISO New England making sure that from the supply side there's ample supply and then based on that they may have we may have these individual issues where it's equipment or some surge in demand and the system itself is structured in a way to respond to that in some way. Uh and like you said in the
instances that I've the cases that I've presented um that's an indication that the system itself is trying to correct in some way. Forgive me. To be clear, yeah, the utility plans for the hottest day of the year. That's what the util for the peak demand. That's what we build our infrastructure to plan to be able to withstand. Now, I don't have the numbers just yet, but I saw anecdotally that we came really close to the all-time peak on the 4th of July. Um, I don't know if it's the I didn't it's something that I brushed I skimmed over really quickly in an email. I don't know
if it's the all-time peak overall or the hottest fourth of you know the all-time peak for Fourth of July ever on the Cape. Uh but I know the South was um very very busy and and you all you know you live it. There were a lot of people here. So [laughter] yeah. Yeah. Commissioner Burton, you have any questions? Then I'm going to go to commission. The question I have is is you know the there's there's a lot of talk about the the the effects on the Cape's infrastructure, the roads and you know the water supply and stuff and of course also the electricity. Do you have an
a a analysis of the the increase in demand if you average the demand out? Now you're saying this is the demand. This is the peak demand today. peak demand in 2030 will probably be x number of more you know and and you built that because obviously there's bigger population people are building houses that you know McMansion takes a lot more air conditioning than you know small house so do you have does does source have an idea what the demand is going to be so that you can meet
emergencies like this not just now but maybe five years from now. Yes we do. So we have a system planning department both on the transmission, the high voltage and the distribution. They do a 10-year outlook that is redone every year. So every year it's recalculated because they have to take into account. So it's not just for the peak demand that we plan, but we also have to serve everybody every other day of the year, right? So if there's a big development coming, if there's a mall, if there's a a large user and even the small users, we have to calculate all that in. But the
reason we do it every year is because that could change. a developer could decide not to build that development or you know things things change. We have an electric sector modernization plan that we filed with the state along with the other utility electric utilities in the state uh with that tenure outlook. So there's new substations that'll be needed to meet demand and you're so you're you're pretty much keeping up with that. Yes. Yes. Commissioner that's our job system planning. Commissioner Alliance is out in Wellfleet, which is always a challenging environment. But we well,
I can only speak personally, but all went well in the last heatwave, and I thank you for that. Um, yes, the I the uh use of generators. So, those click on when someone's power goes off, correct? I mean, they're that's how they're triggered. It's not someone can't use a generator manually like I there's a heat wave coming. I'm going to switch my house to my generator. That's not possible. Correct. So, you can you can go on generator even if you have street power. It all
depends on how it's set up in the home. We don't you know we don't regulate how those how those are installed. We actually don't even know I wish we did but we don't know who has generation in their home and who doesn't. they're not required to report that out and how they've installed it in their home. Yeah. I mean, I'm just thinking um as as um things change here and you know, some of us would say not for the better with more more development. However, I somehow I see a relationship there um that could be helpful to everyone. But that's another conversation.
But I'm just throwing that out there because it's um some people could take the load off if if that was uh deemed to be so you know it would take work and legislation and all that I'm sure but um and then reporting who has generators and not but I think that's information that would be good to have for for everyone. Yeah, there are ways Yeah. Yeah. Go ahead. I don't know if um if the example
of a generator is is the direction but there are there are a lot of uh there's a lot of industry development and and if we can get the regulation in the state in the right direction there's ways for I'm going to call it people to share in the ecosystem is my best description. Um so we we're we're involved in something called DERMS. It's distributed energy resources management system. So with new smart metering that's also going to open up a lot of pathways that'll be installed in the next year or so. Everybody's going to get a new meter and it's going to be a smart meter
that reads people will have much more insight into how much they're using and they can reduce they'll have more control both from a bill perspective right to reduce their usage and if they opt to go into this say connected solutions then it gives us sometimes it gives the utility the opportunity to turn down the automatically it turns down the thermostat they get incentivized. So there's I guess my point is there ways to incentivize and work um through sharing the ecosystem. I'll just call it that. That's my my best description and and having enough for all. Right. I think it makes
Yeah. Can I just follow up on that, Commissioner Lance? Um, so what you're suggesting is the scenario that you envision developing over time is that let's say in my neighborhood, my community, there are several there may be some businesses that have uh battery power, let's say battery storage, uh other residences that have storage. The system is evolving to the point where in an area there may be opportunities for sharing that energy from other power sources. Is that what you
Yes. Yes. So if someone had a Tesla battery and they wanted to discharge it into the you know once this is it's going to take some time and and some additional from a regulatory perspect everything we do is right we have to ask permission for so literally so it's it's it is a vision you know um no that's encouraging because I think what it does it also encourages solar development. I mean, I happen to be a supporter of solar energy development because it's so distributed. It's so decentralized and it's easy to access, particularly if you have a battery that's
connected to your system. Um, I want to also just acknowledge we have the the speaker and the deputy speaker of the assembly here. Uh, I know they have uh probably been getting questions from constituents on this topic and I want to invite them if they have any questions. Carl or Susan, if you have any questions for our friends here at Eversource, don't be shy. All right. So, [laughter] but um no, I think I I I think this is a very interesting de development. I
I would be interested in appropriate time to have more conversations about this. Now, as you know, at the county level, one of the things that we did during this heat wave is we were engaged with our municipalities and and other partners, uh, because we're concerned about making sure that we had cooling stations and places for people to go to get some to to to cool off and deal with us. And I want to give Andrew an opportunity just to update us a little bit on how that went and whether or not doing that. Can I just ask one one question just a global question but in your opinion at
Eversource is it more generators owned by private homes better that help us in crises of cold or hot um when the say the system is down the overall system is down is it better to have that as a backup plan so generally speaking I can't speak for the entire utility on that. I will say that it um you know there's I'm you know it certainly helps to to alleviate the stress when power is
out to have that as a backup. But I think again our goal is to is to provide safe reliable power at all times and to ensure that it's um you know at the most affordable price to the extent possible. I should say that and I know that that that's a hot topic as well, pun intended with the word hot but um or maybe pun intended. Um, so I don't know the answer to that. I think we live, you know, we live in New England. We live in an area that can be very unpredictable. I mean, who would have thought that that you'd have to four tornadoes or three confirmed, fourth possible
on the Cape. I mean, that was to me I I don't know that anybody would have ever imagined that. So, I think um it certainly can't hurt, but I don't know that the the utility really doesn't take a position on that. Um, yeah, I will say in terms of what the the county can do to help or the commissioners in general is that we, you know, we're in the business of building infrastructure and it's not always um I guess beauty is in the eye of the beholder and not everybody thinks our infrastructure is beautiful. So, just to to work with us to to figure out how to build this
infrastructure because it's needed. It's not, you know, I don't think I don't see us I don't see electricity going down. Um, especially if people electrify adopt heat pumps, which they have now as a heat pump rate. So, we just need to work together and figure out um you know, well, we build it together. We're very interested in working closely with you and being helpful and addressing whatever needs or issues that you have long term. I'm particularly interested in the the the your vision and particularly this whole aspect of distributed energy and the ability
to move energy from non-traditional sources of power, let's say. I think that's fascinating. I think it's potentially revolutionary and I think getting a sense of your vision, your thinking on that I think uh at the appropriate time and you know I I would encourage you to stay in touch with Andrew and Michael. Sure. And uh I think we definitely want to have an idea of what that vision is and how this is going to unfold. And again, we're county government can can be helpful. Um but Andrew, I know you were about ready to say something. Oh, Commissioner Lines,
go ahead. I just wanted to say one thing before Renita is off uh off the stage there that I did to a lot of the um you know, I chimed in on those emergency calls and I just want to say that I thought her information and participation was really valuable and I wanted to thank her for that. Thank you. Thanks, Commissioner Andrew. All right. Uh so as far as the the heat wave um that we saw um as far as county actions and emergency management um you know we we saw this
coming you know pretty far out. So we we had already uh been engaging with the towns for the Fourth of July holiday which of course is that added risk factor. We had a lot more people on Cape a lot of events people going to be outside. Um we had already deployed uh quite a number of pieces of equipment to the towns for that effort. We do a lot of uh planned event support. So, um, lighting towers, our sign boards all went out. Um, our mobile wireless camera trailer was out in the town. Um, we also deployed our AM radio station to the town of Chadam. Um, so 1620 um was was going
and they they utilize that for um communications and that's something I'd like to see expanded um as well. But uh those pieces were already in place um with the heatwave. We were able to uh work with the towns to open seven plus cooling centers. Um so the the towns and again this is a a situation where when we look at what is an emergency when do we activate the county kind of at what level? Um I I use the word capacity a lot. Um so an emergency or disaster is when we are exceeding the capacity of so a local emergency is exceeding the capacity of the municipality regional emergency exceeding
the capacity of the region. Now we're asking the state for help so on and so forth. Um I I think we we look at this as something that is within the local's capacity to to to manage but something that we want to be supporting and helping them with coordination. So um we worked with our public information officer Sonia Seasily um to make sure that we're helping them push that information out um as far as uh people finding out where those cooling centers are. Cooling centers uh you know similar to uh warming centers in the winter obviously for cooling. Um, one of the
advantages is it's usually in a building that's already open. Um, they might expand the hours. They'll add um some services like providing water and things like that. Um, so most of them were in libraries and and community centers. Places that were going to be closed on the 3rd of July because that was the observed holiday um were kept open um and made cooling centers um and notified to the towns um as well as on the 4th of July holiday. So th those are the a lot of the actions we saw. Um, we also asked our partners at the Family Table Collaborative to support these. I know a few of the towns did uh take advantage of that and getting um just some light snacks and and
and water for folks who might come in. Um as well as our uh partners at the Kid RTA once again activating their dispatch line. Um so if you know towns could put out that number, people can dial that number and get picked up through their more direct uh pickup system and brought to those cooling centers. Um working to get some numbers on on what that ended up looking like um and how many took advantage of that. And of course they were had normal operations running as well because this wasn't a snowstorm where they were suspended. So um so that that was really um a lot of what we had uh put before the storm out. Um you know as far as how the weekend went. We didn't
see you know outside of the you know some of the the power flickering. We didn't see a lot of major incidents occur outside of you can call traffic a major incident. There is a lot of traffic but um you know I things went relatively smoothly smoothly across the towns. I know folks did take advantage of the cooling centers. Um and uh you know I think it was a good effort to another effort to kind of practice in how we we help our towns kind of grow in their capability and these these things that are a little bit between you know day-to-day operations and emergencies and
the more you know hurricanes, winter storms. this is something where you know how do we be proactive about these especially when we have a lot of risks coming together drought high heat fourth of July weekend wildfire risk all those things converging so um I think from that perspective it was a successful weekend um and uh yeah I just thank everyone who was uh you know willing to read my thousands of emails that I sent out [laughter] I I did you didn't Commissioner Lions I did yes
I even shared Thank you. Thank you, Commissioner Bster. No, I mean just another example how Bible County is is poised to respond [clears throat] to these kind of emergencies. I mean that they they don't come all that often. Sometimes they come in bunches like they have lately, you know, but uh uh you know, for all the good things that we do proactively, there's also these reactive uh situations that we're prepared to deal with. So, it's a kudos to your department and people
involved. Yeah, very much so. Um, I think this can kind of conclude our discussion of the heat wave. I don't think there's anything to add on that. Should we go to the talk a little bit more about the the blizzard itself and the next steps? Um, and I I don't are we going to have a resource participating in that discussion or is it largely focused on us? I I think it's probably just if you guys want to uh I think it's welcome to stay. We just don't want to feel feel like you're on the hot seat while we do an afteraction review and look at some of our lessons learned. Yeah.
On on the Blizzard. Do you want I think the only thing I'll say is that Eversource has done after action immediately after the Blizzard as well and we have all of our branches of of the incident command structure are doing you know we're we're in the business of doing the same work. So yeah, just I just want to say I noticed that there were crews from as far away as Illinois, Kentucky. You guys didn't spare anybody else. Canada didn't even speak English. [laughter] Really? No, you got your
resources. Whatever resources were available, you you applied to I think it's a reflection on the leadership of Eversource. When people here on Cape Cot go out their street and they see a huge line of utility trucks in the middle of a blizzard going down their streets with with local officials plowing out areas to get in there to restore power to people's homes. Um I just thought in this blizzard there were so many examples of this fullcourt press. It was incredibly impressive.
It really was. But it says something about the corporation. It says something about what it's all about. That you care about the customers here and that you're going to step up when when there's big need. And uh I I just want you to know we we heard that loud and clearly from people all around the region. And you should and I'm I hope you've been hearing a lot of that too because I know we've had our days where people get the complaints. Um but uh during during the blizzard Yeah. Eversource uh I thought shine very well. Great. I will with your permission relay that to
our president of electric Doug Foley. [laughter] Yeah. Know the president the engagement was very noticeable and appreciated. Okay Andrew. Okay. All right. I'll you guys if you like and thank you again. Thank you for having us. Um I will use my my as all the staff know my powers of brevity um speaking to not take up too much of your time but you're almost unique in that [laughter]
way. So um thank you commissioners. Um so a as you know we've been working through and Michael's brought up a few times an afteraction review process from the storm. Um it is now uh July after actions and I've done many of these uh postco I did hundreds uh too many of them but um you know these are processes this is a formal process that that you go through um and there are many different ways to do it but uh the way we went about it was to get the best information
we could on the county's internal operations and how we responded to the storm the county staff um and kind of the the things that were within our purview. Um so certainly there's there's more uh pieces and and more things that occurred that are likely to be seen in other afteractions as you know Eversource for example and um I know many of the towns have undergone after actions partner agencies like the Red Cross do their afteractions um so um having everyone do these bring them together into um findings. I'm going to be making the same present uh presentation a little
bit different next week to the RECC um to kind of get some of that regional perspective as well and and start to link those together. Um, if I could move my slides forward. There we go. Um, so just to give uh bring everyone back a few months, if you if you want to go back to the the cold months um in the incident that we had um we saw uh over a foot in some cases close to 2 feet of uh he uh uh wet heavy snow. Um 3 to 4 in uh peak. Um the the big piece of this was that this was
uh Franco Olaflin, the REPC meteorologist, calls it Gorilla Glue snow. This was very wet, heavy, dense snow um because it was near that rain snow line. So it stuck to everything. Um and then when you combine that with the 75 mph wind gusts uh near hurricane force um in some cases over hurricane force um you're going to get a lot of not only power outages, but you see a lot of tree damage. Um and the trees coming down. It complicates things where you have you see over 150,000 customers without power. You have to first clear the roads so that the tree crews can
get to the trees who can then clear the trees so that then Eversource can come in or whoever can come in and restore power. So it's a it's a process and we actually saw with some of this snow it got so dense that it was almost like concrete and uh some towns actually had to bring in heavy equipment to [laughter] move the snow. It was too much for their typical uh their their trucks with plows on them. So, um, we saw pretty significant power outages. Um, the, uh, our first REPC call, um, regional call was on the Saturday before the 21st. Um, so we we got folks, uh, over 200,
uh, participants. There was a blizzard warning, um, and a state of emergency had already been, uh, declared by, um, the state of Massachusetts. Um we activated our multi- agency coordination center the next day um around 5:00 p.m. um bringing in county staff and our our partners um to help manage uh the event. Um importantly, NSET Regional High School and Barnesville Intermediate School um opened before the storm of shelters. That was a decision made by the town of East Ham emergency manager and the town of Barnesville emergency manager. They're the ones who make the ultimate
decision to open the shelters in their towns. [clears throat] Um and we saw the storm begin uh peaked on Monday. Um we did have an incident where uh it turns out NSIT's heating system was not working on the generator. Um and so what we had to do pretty quickly was identify um an alternative if we once we determined that wasn't going to be able to be restored. Um and so uh Dennis Yarmas High School um had been opened as a shelter by the town of Yarmouth post storm. So once the storm had died down, they decided to open theirs. Um and we used the Cape Cod RTA to um basically evacuate
the folks from the NSET shelter and transport them to Dennis Yarmouth. Um uh through Tuesday and Wednesday um we continued to operate those shelters. NSET had since closed. Um, as I said, um, Cape Cod Tech and Harwitch, uh, we made the decision, uh, with the town of Harwitch to open in order to help support the outer cave, especially, um, with our primary shelter on the outer case being closed and make sure there was something a little bit closer, um, that was open as well. Um, and then we saw um, on uh, Thursday and Friday, that was when we transitioned command up in the
MAC. Um, I turned things over to Vera um, and uh, Misty finally got some sleep um, from Americanore, who was running our shelter operations. Um and uh we transitioned that and then by Friday um the shelters began to demobilize and close um and the uh uh MAC closed as well soon thereafter. Um so that's just kind of a a brief bringing people back to to the incident that occurred. Um there's a bunch of numbers up here. Um I will say um you know we we've seen these before but um really when we look at um a response to a storm like this um there's the county there's our department
um and what we do and then there's the Barnsible County Regional Emergency Planning Committee that is a coalition of the towns appointed by you all of course um who really bring together the fire police um EMA all of them to help um with the response to help coordinate regional action um that has existed for a long time um many many regional coordination calls. Um there's some findings related to that and how those how those go because there's a lot of folks on those calls. But that's our um Sean O'Brien who uh kind of worked and started all this a long time ago used
to describe it as a big conference room table to bring everyone around um and and and speak. So um that's where uh kind of that piece went from. So, how we conducted our afteraction review um using kind of FEMA's uh process that they recommend. Um we went through and we did a bunch of um focus groups. Um we met with county staff um for an internal hotwash. Um we met with uh different um groups from our municipal partners and partner agencies. We met with town health agents. Um we
met with the town emergency management directors. Um we had a a session with our community partners. Um we had a separate session with all of the Americanore members um the alumni um and their ad board who also um assisted in responding to the storm. Um and then we following all of those we also sent out surveys to all of those groups as well to capture as much data as we could um and bring that together. Um from all that information we um distilled that down into a series of findings. Um these findings are categorized um in these ways. So we have uh best practices. These
are things that um where we had to do something in an ad hoc fashion that was outside of our normal procedure, but um it's something that we think is worth continuing doing. Uh strengths are things that we plan to do and that did happen and work well. Um areas of improvement are things that um we uh uh areas that we we think we can do better. Um and then mission critical, those are really the the key things that you know we need to make immediate changes or take action on. um ideally before the next um before the next event occurs. Um so we had over 29 findings across seven
focus areas. We broke them down into um these focus areas. So sheltering, um communications, uh Mac or EOC operations, uh mobilization, um IT and infrastructure, um admin and finance, and just kind of organizational culture. Um we'll and I will say before uh going through all of them um really this response succeed and we got a lot from on the outside of people like this hey we did really well this is a good response a lot of folks got a lot of accolades and I think it was because of the people um the people who responded the different agencies the leadership um of different
folks in the towns and at the county um in a lot of ways they compensated for any structural gaps that might have existed or challenges that might have existed. So um in looking through this it's really figuring out where are those uh gaps that we can start to fill with with policy and with structure and with frameworks so that it doesn't matter if I'm here someone else is here. It's something that we have continuity in um as we go. So our first set of findings um really came into uh sheltering which was the major operation that we really undertook during the storm. Um there's a
few different things. Um there is a full written report um that after we present to the RECC, we're going to be able to um kind of uh then produce um for you all um that's going to go into a lot more details in these things. Um but um just as a a basic overview for sheltering, um we did find that there were certain uh shelter models um that existed in some areas that worked better than others. Um we saw uh Dennis Yarmouth is a good example. They actually provide their own kitchen staff. They have their own system for utilizing the food that they already have in the shelter. um and the staff that they have there to provide feeding um and to and that really worked
really well. We also saw Province Town take the initiative to open and manage their own shelter um through kind of a very locally controlled program with resources within the town and that worked very well for them. Um and you know we certainly supported them but I think that's uh something that we could carry forward. Um uh challenges that we saw in sheltering specifically um facility readiness um I already mentioned NSET. That was a a particular issue with just the how it was built. But um you know making sure that we are we have a formalized process of pre-torm inspections
going through each of these shelters. What has changed? You know these are all schools um that we use for our regional shelters. Sometimes the school districts changes things move around. Um we saw at some of the shelters um it just took a little longer to mobilize because we had to clean out certain rooms in order to use them for other things. So making sure that we we as the county can can assist the towns um on an annual basis of inspecting all of this, inspecting the equipment, utilizing our Americanore to do that will be important. Um we also saw that we you know we had a lot of volunteers come in um and people come in from out of the state. The Red Cross
and other volunteer agencies brought folks in. Um we didn't really have standard identification for them. You saw a lot of people in the shelters with some with Red Cross, some Americanore, some you know different agencies. um developing some more standards identification so people in the shelter can identify these as shelter workers, shelter employees um whatever it may be um I think was important and really a big one was just roles being kind of unclear. I think it depended on, you know, we've had this long uh process. We've had this long history of having the shelter program. I think over time it's evolved. Different people have come and gone about who owns what um
in the sheltering program. Is it the town shelter? Is it the county? You know, some people will say, "Oh, the county does sheltering." Some people will say, "Oh, well, the town owns the shelter or Americanore runs the shelter." And it it was different in some of the towns. And I think um uh a big thing that we saw is we really need to update a lot of those agreements. And you'll see kind of the the mission critical um finding here is that we don't really have any more updated formalized agreements related to the shelters. You know, the REPC has a shelter
plan. We are party to the REPC. It's our you know, it's a county it's a county board essentially. Um but that's not a signed binding document. Um the what we really need to see are MOAs or memorandums of understanding or contracts with the towns with our partners really defining what the county does versus what town does or the agency does as far as command staff for the shelter, feeding staff, health inspection, um rather than dealing with it in an ad hoc fashion. Um, I'll say that this
a finding that'll be highlighted a little bit later is I think a symptom of over time the lines between the RECC and our department and the county being a little bit blurred. I think as folks have changed, you know, the the original REPC, the chiefs that that started that, you know, it was a much more town driven. those those chiefs kind of ran everything and and it was um really a coalition of them the towns coming together and and over time I think what we've seen is a lot more of it has been put on the county to say and probably through our own
admission saying we'll do that we'll take this on we'll we'll run this piece um but we never really followed that up with any sort of written agreements that kind of holds us to it but also holds the towns to their end of the bargain as far as what is supplied to these shelters um we see that The last time the regional shelter plan was updated was 2017 when I when I was last year. So um it it doesn't necessarily the framework that exists doesn't necessarily match I think the postcoid landscape especially that we've seen. Um, we I I think the direction things are really
going and that I I would recommend would be really focusing on building up local capacity so that every town has an idea of how they're managing local sheltering like we saw with heat uh with the heat wave and with cooling centers and warming centers. And then how do we as a region and as a county build a framework on top of that so that when their capacity is exceeded, we now um activate regional resources to support that and develop the and and bring these into regional shelters if that makes sense. So starting all disasters start local and then building
a framework on top of that rather than building a system that might look like oh well the county or the region's just doing it for you if that makes sense the way I'm saying that. Um the kind of the third mission critical and I think this is the one that most people are aware of. Um medical staffing was critically lacking. Um we did not have a large deployment from our medical reserve corps. I think a lot of what we found especially in the postcoid landscape. A lot of volunteer agencies are struggling to not only recruit folks but getting folks to deploy especially in the winter.
A lot of our volunteers are snowbirds. Um, but you know, I I think there's also a lot of, well, I can come for an hour or I can come for four hours, but then I need to go check on my dog, you know, or I need to go, you know, check on my house. And the reality is is that once you go in for one of these storms, you're not going to be able to leave. You're not going to be able to travel. And I think that's a um a disconnect with some of our um volunteer agencies and kind of how, you know, postcoid volunteerism works. Um I think what we've seen since the storm is some of the towns actively looking within their communities for what healthc care uh capabilities exist. So
for example um sandwich you know working with Spalding because they're there you know can you pro can we have an MOA for you to provide for our shelter um some CNAs or some some staff. Um really the need that we saw within the shelter was less so um you know we do need nurses um for certain medical situations and EMTs for emergencies but really what it came down to was more the the home health aid level of you know supporting people going to the bathroom mobility assistance things like that. Um and unfortunately in the absence of those medical staff it put a lot of
our Americanore members who we deploy to the shelters in a tough position where they ended up having to assist with a lot of those things which they're not really trained to do. that's not really what they're there to do, but they are very uh as I say, they're very empathetic people and they're not going to let someone go without assisting them. So, they stepped up to do that, but that should not be the way that things are done in the future. Um, so that's a big topic. Yeah, I saw that in in in in my observations at the shelter, but I I clearly agree with you. It's because there the absence of that personnel. Yeah. people stepped up to take and and and I applaud
them for doing that because otherwise things could have deteriorated with an individual. So I get all that but your your your point's well taken the need we have a need to sort of find a way to strengthen that capacity at the facility. So thank you and and I think that's um there's a lot of different ways to address that. Um, I think all of this kind of goes back to the primary, which is it's not a one-sizefits-all approach. What works for sheltering in Sandwich doesn't necessarily work in Province Town or in they might they're going to have different resources
available to their local community. And I think it's understanding what's there and building those public private partnerships I think is is I know some of the the kind of sub regions of the county are already doing that and that's something we certainly support and want to build a framework to support. On top of that, um the next few are a little bit shorter, uh thankfully, but um communications um was obviously another big pillar of what we do, uh for emergency management. Um Sonia Shazley, our PIO, and all of the um the staff that she pulled in to assist her. Um again, in a very ad hoc fashion. I think that's um kind of the the theme here. Um we pulled a
lot of things together um and they worked, but we want to we want to codify those. So, um, our communications plan, the the sit reps that Sonia was putting out and her team were putting out, the county website, pulling information regarding, um, gas stations that were open, things like that as people requested that information. Um, that has been consistently pointed out as a strength, something that, um, is a very good place for the county to sit and doing. Um, helping the town public information officers and the communications folk amplify um, speak uh, with the same language.
Um, you know, I say sing from the same sheet music in in terms of what's being said. Um, and how we making sure that that information is getting to our elected officials and to our um our our Cape Cod delegation to make sure they're saying the same things and that we're all kind of on the same page. Um, I think that was a strength. I think it's certainly something we can we can continue to improve and and build out. I think that's definitely an area of growth for what we do. Um, but I'll also say that I think one of the findings we definitely had was that the PIO, you know, Sonia herself was doing a lot of the work for just like many of us for 96 hours. And I think um,
another recommend recommended theme here is going to be how do we better leverage all of the county staff and all of the county resources to support that. We have other communications folk that could potentially um, work as an assistant PIO under Sonia or be trained to do that in an emergency. And so being able to identify how do we build capacity for these um for these different roles and functions without having to you know hire a bunch of staff rather how do we leverage what we already have and the people that you know across all the departments that that touch these things.
Um we did see that we had um you know we we had some degraded communications. We have a lot of redundancies here at the county complex. We have um you know open cape. We have Verizon backups. We have Starlinks. But um you know it we don't necessarily have a good um you know we kind of do again do that in an ad hoc fashion. It's like oh this went out okay turn this on. Um rather than having kind of a more written program around how we do that um you know building some of that more into you know our our infrastructure. Um we did have a little bit of um um trouble um because
it just we didn't move quickly enough I think in some areas for um quick translation um into other we have a lot of other uh or we have a lot of um different communities represented around the Cape. So how are we getting information to those people? Um you know we push things through our county website that doesn't necessarily hit people who aren't on the computer or people who don't have power internet right. Um so I talked about the AM radio station. Is that something we could expand so that we can really use a cakewide rather than in a region? um are there um are we building relationships with these uh local community groups and and trusted uh you know people within
those communities non you know non-native English speaking communities and um different communities to make sure that information is getting passed along to them um in a way that's accessible. So that's something that we can work on. Um I also think we you know we heard from our health agents we didn't really integrate them well enough. Um they um would typically work through our health agents coalition with our department of health and environment. I think that was an oversight on our part where um we were communicating with the emergency management folks and that wasn't necessarily getting to them. So I think there was a lot of roles they could have played in the shelters um above and beyond what they did. Um and and again how do we not only leverage our
county staff but all of the staff within the towns as well and what they do and make sure that we're we're coordinating. Um so that was a big piece as far as our EOC operations. Um again uh the REPC can and certainly is a regional anchor for preparedness. Um I think once again we see that is a much older structure. Um we it it those a lot of those calls used to run in the days where it was literally a conference line as as as we all remember. It's now on teams. Um it's a large 300 person call the way that we run it. Anyone can speak at any time. We've already had a lot
of discussions around how we can structure that um in a way that's a bit uh more efficient for folks so that we're not taking up a bunch of time from from the emergency managers in the field, but we're also getting information out to people. Um using different models to have maybe some sub meetings with certain groups beforehand so we can hash out certain issues and elected officials meeting and then use the big call with 300 people as more of a brief out of all of that information to try to streamline it. Um so that's something that we we've definitely been looking at. um and how we the county engage with the REPC. You know, what is our role the county versus what is the
RECC doing as far as, you know, creating different functions. I think that's something conversation that we're going to want to have going forward. Um we've already talked a lot about our external partners, Family Table, Cape Town RTA, all of them um did a tremendous amount of work. Um how we communicate with the state. So they use what's called web EOC, web emergency operations center, where you um input all of this information. and they've really gone to this more that sort of uh digital framework. Um I think it took us a while to really be getting information uploaded into that for them especially with the power outages we experienced. Um and that led to a
gap where even though we had a state liaison um he knew everything that was going on but that wasn't necessarily reaching um up at the state um EOC which meant you know they didn't have a clear uh situational awareness of what was going on here in Barnsible County for the first few days. um they didn't realize quite how bad it was. And I think um we can be more consistent and we can get that information to them a little bit better um and making sure they understand so that they're operating from the same sheet music as well. Um I talked about um utilizing
county services. We have multiple departments that have a lot of programs and services that I think could have been deployed county helplines um and different uh programs that we could have brought in a little bit earlier. I think as we identified in the map, um it was important for us to bring in um we started to do something we hadn't done before, which is rather than relying on external folks coming in, understanding they're very busy out in the field, we brought in county employees um from other departments and kind of tied them into their areas of specialty. Um and that worked really well. So I think how we uh go about doing that is going to be very important. Um,
and you'll see at the bottom there's something called an incident support model, which is how do we build out an EOC or a MAC that is really run by county staff versus what it used to be, which was a bunch of police and fire coming in and running it um from this REPC coalition, which doesn't really happen as much anymore. Um, really because they are so busy in their own communities, they can't really spend the time coming to the county um to do that. It's more and more than county staff running this. So, we should build our framework to better support that. Um and then we also saw a need and this is something you know I'll be talking a lot about um in the next
few years um which is going to be improving our equipment caching um and infrastructure. We have a lot of you know as I mentioned we put out a lot of equipment for the storm. We have those large generator trailers and different things. Making sure that those things are in a state of readiness so that they can go right away and we're not having issues with starting generators. They're not being stored outside where they have you know they start to get issues from being you know outside in an idle capacity for too long. that can start to create um kind of a a um a debt with them, a uh a maintenance debt um that um I think all of our stuff sort of at the fire academy um
we've identified that's kind of you know it's in the back woods there so it's not really that well accessible during a storm. So things like that um definitely came up as well. Support functions. Um, again, this is more about um incorporating some places where we can incorporate more of our county departments into uh what we're doing in emergency management. IT is a great example. They run it for multiple towns. Um they don't typically have a seat in the EOC um other than helping us with our own issues, but they're a great resource to to coordinate with the towns to get us information
about police departments that are down um and to and to help provide, you know, tech services related to emergency management around the around the Cape as well. Um likewise with finance, we you know, uh Carol got the the joy of coming in towards the end and trying to pour through our paperwork and get ready for FEMA reimbursement. Um that is a that is a process that I think starting that from the beginning by embedding them earlier on and getting them involved from the outset would have made that a lot more smooth for folks. Um I already mentioned the the leadership transition. I think that was handled cleanly, but I think that we could um do a little bit better as far
as how we determine when we activate. talked about um the uh I talked about for the the the heat wave how there's a difference in when is it an emergency that we need to activate. Um, traditionally the MAC was activated through the REPC deciding to activate it. Again, coalition of the towns, but since it's transitioned more to the county kind of running this, who decides, you know, I said we're opening the MAC at this time and I, you know, I talked to to Michael about that and we kind of having that again written down as a as a program and policy for really how we're
going to do that in the in the postcoavid era, as I keep saying. Um, and then as we identify these different staff and these different departments that we think could better support our mission, um, what training are we providing them? You know, all of our staff in emergency management are obviously trained in ICS and all of those things, but um, are we training are we, uh, you know, what sort of training and and stuff should we be providing for other county staff that we may bring in in an emergency situation? So, I won't read these again, but that's kind of just
an overview of those mission critical findings. Um, again, a lot of it has to do with the the regional sheltering plan. Um, you know, I I think there's a lot of different uh paths that need to to go from here. Um, as we look at the path path forward, um, a lot of things went well. Um, our our partnerships were strong. We have a good baseline. We need to both strategically plan for this department for emergency management for how the county engages in this for the next two, five, 10 years going forward. how do we build this function? We also have but we also have the added
um need to make sure that in that intervening time we're still providing the service, right? So, we both need to be planning for the long term, but we need to be ready for a tornado tomorrow. Um, and that's kind of a big piece of a lot of this, and you'll see that in in the full written report. Um, so that's really all I had. I'm happy to kind of answer any questions um and go into more detail. Again, this is just kind of an overview of of what we found in the AR. There's certainly more pieces, but I'm happy to answer any questions and talk for longer. Commissioner Ber. Yeah. Uh,
you know, this seems to be an exercise in going into the past darkly, but I think we're in hurricane season. We're currently in hurricane season, so it's possible. I mean, Hurricane Bob hit in August. I remember it very well. So, this is important that we we review what we've done and we're ready for the next event, which fortunately we'll get um you know, I've got nothing but praise for a response from the people I talked to and I get the impression some of them that they weren't aware of any of this. You know, they they they wind up out of power and
their idea was a shelter. Well, you know, they'll open up the gym and I'll go there, I get it. amazing that they found out what exactly was involved and the resources were put into place. So I think all in all you're getting a you know an A minus maybe [laughter] getting an A minus. How's that room for improvement is always always but I think we've done well and uh you know the basic the basics is yes decide who does what who made who makes the call on
when the shelters are open and who organizes the the resources and that res those resources are aware early on that they may be utilized and and so on. As far as the nursing staff goes that's a tough one because it covers [clears throat] the whole cape. I mean, lack of medical personnel, but by and large, you seem to have covered a lot of bases and uh hopefully we're never going to have to utilize this again. Yep. You never want to see me on a small screen talking. That's usually a bad time. [laughter] Commissioner Lions, um I just think this was a very thorough review and,
you know, an honest review of what what didn't what needs to be improved and what really uh was lacking. And um you know I think it is something that the that the towns really do need to be sort of engaged in onto a certain level because you know there's a lot of good information in here and things that they could put in place and then you know what's happening. So I know it's a lot of work to coordinate all of that and to get everybody's feedback and commitments
but looks like you're you've done a good job in analyzing the situation and seeing what would make everything better. So, thank you. I mean, it's really a very good report. Yeah. Thanks, Commissioner. Uh, I I would agree with everything that's been said. I think it's a terrific report. Uh, I know you got some help in putting it together and organizing it, and I appreciate all the folks that were helping out uh in organizing this effort and coming up with something quite thorough and comprehensive. I think this is exactly what we need to help you figure out what
you're going to be doing 247. Yeah. for the next sever. I mean, this is this is a tremendous amount of work and I think I think it's a reflection of the board. I mean, we we've been anxious to create a better structure for this and I'm glad we're doing it now [clears throat] because as Commissioner Bergstrom said, um, we're going to be in the emergency management business, I think, with a greater degree of frequency than we might have thought in the in the past. All right. between what's happening with climate change and heating events and some of these other things that
are going on, the winter storms and the weirdness of the weather patterns. I just think that this is something that's going to keep us busy uh on a far more sustained basis. And I think uh the approach that you're taking is is terrific. I think you're doing you're on all the right things with respect to the the working with the towns. That's going to take some creativity. All right. Um and I think from my point of view having worked uh you know with administrators and as an administrator in
municipal government off and on for for several years uh I think um you know the managers can be helpful but I think quite frankly you know you're almost dealing with a constituency that sometimes managers don't even interact with with a great deal of frequency. you know, you're dealing with people um that um you know um are [clears throat] hard to reach and that's going to be the challenge is working to get those people and get them engaged and um and and it's going to take
time. It really is. Um, what I'd like to see is if in terms of interacting with the health agents, I'm wondering if the health agents can play more of a role. If if if we have our health department regularly meeting and interacting with all the health agents, maybe the conversation they need to be focused on is maybe they can take the nursing piece of this. Yeah. All right. Maybe we just get the health department and the health agents. You guys have to This is what we need from you. When
the call goes up, when the whistle's up, when the balloon's up, when we have to mobilize, here's what we need you folks to deliver with deliver us with. And I think that becomes the conversation for them. Okay? I need for each town two nurses or three nurses or whatever the whatever it is. But every partner that we connect with has something that they have to bring to the table. And I'd like to I' I'd like to see yes, the the agents may felt disconnected. And you know what? Unfortunately,
that happened. But on the other hand, here's what we need you to do. It may very well be that they step up and and rise to the challenge. And the thing is is since we're pumping some additional dollars in collaborating and working with public on the public health side uh with some of the state funding that we're getting, I'm wondering to what degree any of those resources could be utilized or leveraged. All right, because we're getting money, big money on the public health side. I think if there's an area of public health need, it's clearly here. This is a priority. You
know that, we all know that. And obviously this report documents that. So I think I'm going to be interested and I'm happy I [clears throat] mean I'm happy to to to to to chime in or be helpful in any way beyond just sitting, you know, behind this desk as as a chairman of the board of commission. We all would, I think. Yeah. I mean, we we can we're we're helpful. We're we're we're ready to be as hands on as you need us to be. Uh, but tell in terms of dealing with the nursing
because I've been I've been wrestling with that question on the back of my mind after being in in um the DY high school hanging out in that shelter and watching all of these people coming in needing a home health aid or some help. And I'm looking at these incredibly energetic diehard Americaore can do spirit Americanore volunteers and I'm thinking, okay, this is it's great that they're there. It's great that they've got that attitude. It's great that they've got that in their DNA because that's
that's what we're trying to facilitate. Right. Right. We we want Americanore volunteers leaving Barnstable County with that can do spirit. We can get stuff done, you know, uh attitude and they've got it and and they clearly it's evident there. But we also need to know that we want that spirit and that energy directed in some areas and other areas we need to find ways to get more people to cover for that. the health side, the nursing side, I think I' I'd like to see better collaborations on that end. Now, the other thing is is I think it's nice that we have our own radio station,
but when 1620 is if I went to it right now, what am I going to hear? that it'll be dead. So, it gets activated in the event of a storm and is it largely something that Chattam people can tune into or can I [laughter] uh No, it's so it is a um so we've licensed from the FCC um the 1620 radio station. There's certain requirements on how and when we can use it for training purposes or for emergency broadcasts. Um we have three basic uh radio systems. We they are basically a box with
the radio system and then a large antenna. Um two of which are mobile units. One is in Chadam right now on top of the uh the fire station that we set up for them for the event. Um one is in my truck um out back and one is actually mounted on a very large sign board um that's also in Chattam right now. Um and those all operate on 1620. They they can't overlap. The the distance really depends on where the antenna is. So, it's on top of the fire tower for that. Um, so but it can't um it we
wouldn't be able to reach the whole cape with what we have now. But it is something that if we put it up on the the the jail for example um how far throughout Barnstable would be able to hear it. It was really purchased to put mean the old jail. The old jail. Yeah. Um it was really purchased to put on the side of Route 6 um the particularly the sign board to say tune in to 1620 for bridge information or something like that. Is there any value connecting with or having a partnership agreement with an FM radio station where during a storm we can just be on they can give us time public service time like QRC or XTK um and or the community college they have an FM uh station and I
think they may even have their own tower. Yeah, I I I think there's a lot of value to do there. Um that's an area we can certainly grow. Yeah, I I think finding a way to build a partnership with the with with a a network of FM radio stations on the Cape because I'm not sure if there's one station that covers the entire region, but there may be. Who knows? And I think that's that's something that I think is worth exploring is is being able to partner with uh a radio station or a network of radio stations where they'd be willing to pick up a feed live every half hour or every,
you know, at a period of time. Or maybe the press strategy is is that we do communications wise a press call or a press conference. We did this during co Yeah. where we had press calls but they quite frankly I I I don't want to talk long about the problems that I saw with those but we may want to do our own version of a communication blast of some sort that we get some help with. Um but I I I like what you've done. I think this is terrific report. Um, I appreciate you and your
team sort of touching all the bases. Um, and like I said, I think the commissioners want to be as hands-on as you need us and obviously we want to be as supportive as you need us. Um, so back to my fellow commissioners, is there anything else that we need to talk about? Just a number. What's the number of people you think you serve [clears throat] on Capecon? Uh, during the storm, uh, what's the population? Uh, let's see. Two 200,000. Um I mean realistically um you know as far as the sheltering goes we saw a peak of around 250 at DY I think about 150 at Bars school. So, you know,
close to a thousand people sheltered. Um, and you know, obviously we provided services across I think, you know, because it went as well as could go under the circumstances. I know there's improvement. I think people underestimate what a dangerous situation it was for a lot of people, especially the elderly population. You know, to be without power and heat in the middle of the winter could could have been a lot worse than it was. Yeah. There are people that came and took advantage of shelters. But there there's so The challenge you're going to have is keeping track
of all the people that we've helped. That that's a low number. We we help far more than that. I'm convinced of it. Uh it's just we I I don't think we figured out a metric yet to calculate all that. And who knows if we ever will find a good metric. Uh but you're focused on doing all the right stuff. Clearly, you have now a fairly long list of things to do. [clears throat] you're going to be very incredibly busy and again we want to be supportive when we want to be helpful. So, you need to, you know, through through your chain, let us know when we have to be engaged again. Um,
and I'm all big on uh and I think we're open, you know, we've developed a very good relationship with our elected officials if there's something unusual on the capital side that we need to pursue to improve our ability to respond and deliver an emergency. you know, if if we have to make a special request, knock on some other doors or whatever, I think we're all in on that. I keep wondering if we need to have our own physical structure where we can bring people where we can do stuff. I've often wondered do we need a place where we can do
a larger clinic or a larger healthc care work or do we need a facility where uh the certainty of you know operations in any kind of event is is is there do we need to partner more with JBCC I keep wondering that when the next hurricane comes the amount of debris alone how are we going to manage that what's in the plan for that we have a plan for that or is that on the list of the multitude of things that you're working on to figure out? I I'll tell you that um that you you're talking
you're hitting on right now is recovery and that's I think an area where the recovery piece we can prepare for a storm. We we try to mitigate impact. We try to prevent loss of life to the greatest extent possible. But the the real challenge is going to be how do we how rapidly can the Cape recover a hurricane? I I will always be very blunt about this will be devastating to the region. Um a major hurricane will cause a lot will have major impacts, right? Do we have the systems in place?
Economic recovery, that's obviously going to be a major issue. Debris management is one that I we actually are focusing on right now. We want to have an exercise for debris management. the state has a debris management plan, but I think for a lot of those things what we see is the state has a big plan, but it's for the state and we have some very unique needs and local needs that we need to try to address in that regard. Yeah. And the thing is is with Joint Base Cape Cod going through a master planning process. I think we need to be at the table. I mean, we're at the table with Mass Development and the military on regional composting. Uh the
towns are at the table on wastewater. We have our own clean water center there that is going to grow out at the base. But when it comes to disaster management and disaster response, they have needs, we have needs, we need to I would like to see us have more collaboration with the military and how we can work together because sometimes a partnership with the military will bring assets to the table that are military in nature, right? heavy equipment for example um that military they
can activate engineering divisions you know there's just what I I would love to figure out a way to have the national guard as an active partner with us in the MAC or somehow and and the more we have a presence at Joint Base Cape Cod the more we have the opportunity to mobilize people there and and I would say for that piece a big part of that is going to be the relation ship with MIMA because under in an e in a response phase the national guard is under the governor they're under
MIMA's you know MIMA is the one who deploys them and can control those resources um for example the ones that were deployed here during the storm um and so I think the the stronger relationship we have with MIMA and actually having an agreement with how that works how we almost operate as a subregional EOC for them um in the sense that that gives us greater access and and quicker access to those things. Yeah. Yeah. So, I think on the planning front, we need to to do more. But, you know, we we've had meetings with Mass Maritime and their emergency management program and their
leadership there. They're they're anxious to work with us to take take on some of the load. And I would love to find a way to take advantage of the mass maritime talent because right now this is a you've got a massive workload sitting [clears throat] on your on your lap right now and uh you need some more partners to help you carry it out. Uh, and I would I would definitely, you know, encourage more interaction with Mass Maritime and their their team, their emergency management program. Like I said, they in fact, we may have they may want to have interns and help us staff
uh an operation center. Right. Absolutely. In order to train their people that will be doing this stuff. So, I see enormous opportunity there. So, in any event, I appreciate you coming in. I appreciate your update for the commissioners. Again, we're we're we're we're hands-on. We want to be as helpful as you need us to be. Thank you. All right. So, thank you, Andrew. Thank you. All right. Let's move on to the uh another item. I'm going to ask that we pull something out of order. Um and we get into item C6 D. and that is we discuss and uh get briefed on the mass service
alliance grant and we take that item up out of order if that's okay without objection. Uh I know that there's some pressures on people's time today and so we're going to take this item out of order and this is obviously exciting news and uh we're thrilled to get an update on new funding for America. Last time we were together were talking about no funding, right? and uh we seem to be at
the moment having something to celebrate. So, thanks for being here. Thank you for having me. I just need to connect to the meeting really quick. Okay. Apologize I was out of the room. And you know, from my point of view, I know we talked about probably going over a number of things, but I think in everyone's interest of time since I know you're under a lot of pressure, if we just go to the grant, talk about the grant, what the funding is for, what the requirements are, and that we let the commissioners vote on that without going into any other detail about all the things
that we're doing. I think that would probably be helpful to you and be helpful to the rest of us. Absolutely. I'm happy to do that. I'm also happy to come back and share the rest of the the wonderful updates if you would like. As you know, the Americanore program is a is a hot program at the assembly. It's a hot program clearly with us as commissioners. Uh if you've got good news to share, I think we're all everyone we're all ears. I'm just waiting to join. Um but I can you know obviously start um talking and then once the slides are up I can um share them. But thank you
for having me today. Um I'll just start jump right into the great news and that we um were awarded a three-year recompete grant. Uh that is for this year $499,999. So just short of the 500,000 mark. And we are um locked in then for three years for that amount. it'll get re um renewed and uh we'll get a new contract each year, but that is locked in for those three years. And we have not had one of these um grants in um we've had two service years that we have been on a one-year uh grant
that is still a national federal funding, but was directed from um MSA whereas this is directly from the Americanore state and national program. That's great. Um, I'm going to need you to state your name and Yes, sorry. I'm sorry, a little bit um off here. Uh, Misty Nemer. I'm the program manager for Americanore Cape Cod. And um I will I think I'm ready to share my slides here. Go live. Yes. And I will just skip ahead. Um, sorry. Get to where we're going. It's a nice photo. Thank
you. Um yes, I will make sure we get to share these um with you uh right later on. So yeah, so I don't have um many slides at this point, so I can keep it pretty short, but we um received our um our funding and or we received um notification of our funding and we um like I said, this will give us stability for the next um three years, which is really wonderful. And it will also allow us to focus on other things like um supporting our members and other challenges that we know we're
going to be facing over the next um few years and also allows us to more extremely move from um service year to service year whereas we are always waiting for funding but always delayed um projects and delayed moving forward. Uh so we already are having a really stellar recruitment year. Um twice the number of applications we had last year which as you guys know we've been having a really remarkable um year and I'll touch base on that in at another meeting. Um but we think the real uh key component of that is recruitment. So if recruitment is strong and we're able to
select members that are you know compassionate, service-minded and dedicated and committed to this program um then that is leads to the success. So, we already have 189 applications for our 20 positions. We've accepted 19 already. We're just finalizing the last one probably today. So, we have a full core and we're back up to the 20 we had reduced last year due to funding limitations at the the state level. So we are back to our full full force and um which I'm really excited about because this year 18 people have done remarkable amount of work and so at 20 I'm really excited at
what we can do next year and we are also currently uh hiring for our three program supervisors because we will have three leading this year um which is pretty typical for um for this program. So we're hiring for those positions and hoping to have that wrapped up in the next few weeks and now focusing on next year. So, we're working on agendas for our Haritch meeting uh later on this month and also we have a meeting in Turo. Um might want to consult with Michael. We should figure out um when we're on the road on a road show, maybe we can do a highlight and maybe focused on an
individual town to anchor the presentation. So, um what I'd like to do to move things along, Commissioner Burkstrom, do you have a motion? Yes, I do. I have a motion. I move to authorize I move to authorize to accept and execute a grant agreement between Massachusetts Service Alliance acting by and through Americanore state and national and Barsal County acting by and through Americanore Cape Cod and the cooperative extension in the amount of $499,999 for the first year of a three-year award for the Americanore Cape Cod service year for the
period beginning on September 30th, 2026 through September 29th, 2027 with the three-year award will continue through September 29th, 2029 for a full grant award totaling approximately $1.5 million. And Commissioner Lions, would you like to second that? She's saying yes. Second. Okay. So, we have a motion and a second. Uh, is there any more discussion or any more things or comments, my fellow board members? No, just congratulations and excellent news. Great. Okay. Uh, roll call
vote. All those in favor? Commissioner Lions. Uh, Lions votes I vot and Forest votes I. It's unanimous. Thank you. Thank you. And I I just wanted to take the moment to just thank you all for your support. The last few years have been a little bit bumpy and we just really appreciate your continued support of our program. Well, we're happy to do It was a long and difficult process and we didn't know where it was going to go. So gladly it worked out the way it did. Thanks. Thank you. Thank you. All right. We continue.
Okay. The next item on our agenda getting back on track is uh an update on our finances. Um we have u I think that's where we are correct. Fiscal year 2025 independent audit report by Carol and Renee Davis. Is Renee with Oh, there's Renee. She's on the screen. Bingo. So, you're gonna let Renee do all the talking? I I can let Renee do all the talking. Thank you. You heard that, Renee? Right. Yeah. Can you hear me? Okay, we can. You're great. Okay. Thanks. Are we Are
you ready to go? Um Roina is actually with me as well. So, good afternoon. I'm going to say good afternoon at this point. Um, thank you for having us. We appreciate the opportunity to come in. We are here to talk about the FY25 audit. So, we just ended FY26. It's always a looking back at the financial progress that you made and and the financial statements of the past. Um, can you see the presentation now? Yep, we can. Okay, good. Okay, beautiful. So, again, Renee Davis, I was managing director on the engagement. With me today is Romina
Mli. who was the director on the engagement. And what we're going to do is walk through the results. I think in your packets you have the the annual comprehensive financial report for um for the county. And we're going to go through some of the financial highlights in that and the results of our audit. So, next slide, please. I'm trying. Hold on. It's not moving. Well, while she does that, there we go. Um we're going to talk a little bit about what the audit does. We we do a lot of communicating back and forth with the county about what an audit is and what
an audit is not. We come in always again after the fact once the books are closed, once Carol's done all of her hard work and got the county's numbers reconciled and has good ledgers, we come in to test those numbers. So the audit really is designed to verify that the financial statements are presented fairly. We do not look at every account. We do not look at every transaction. We look at your systems. We look at your internal controls, your financial policies, and how you're
um transacting, how you're recording revenues that are coming into the county, how you're recording [snorts] expenditures and managing your budget, and really your processes and procedures to come up with your financial statements. Now, to do that, we also help as a non- audit service. We put together the ACT first. So, not part of the audit, but an additional service. We do help to put together that pretty large report, but all of the information comes from your records and and you actually review and approve. Carol reviews and approves all the information in that. Um,
we also audit your compliance with laws and regulations. We're going to talk about that today. That's your single audit or your audit of your federal grants. Um, for the past several years, ARPA has been the name of the game there. We're finally getting to the end of ARPA, but you still got a little ways to go. And what the audit really is designed to do is to give you an independent opinion on your financial statement. So, it's not just Carol telling you how well you're doing, but really, we're not part of management. We're not there every day. We come
in after the fact. We verify that the information that she's reporting to you is accurate. Um, and that your financial statements are in compliance with generally accepted accounting principles. so that your financial statements can be compared to other financial statements of similar governments. And there's two um there's two reports that gets issued as part of your audit. One, the first part of it is the financial statement audit that is in your annual comprehensive financial reports. What we call an ACTER. Used to be a CAFER, now it's an ACER. But within the
acter is your financial statements, your full financial statements as well as our opinion on the financial statements. So really the part that we are responsible for is three pages of the report where we give an opinion and the financial statements are put together in accordance with US um generally accepted auditing standards and government auditing standards. So we follow a set of rules, the Gazsby statements. We make sure that the county is up to date on all the latest Gazsby standards. Changes from one year to the other always happen due due to new
implementation of Gazsby standards. And the second report that gets issued is what we call the single audit or your federal award report. It would be triggered when you had federal expenditures over $750,000. You're clearly well over that. The threshold for that is going up to a million dollar starting in FY26. you will exceed you'll exceed that every year anyway. Um the standards that we follow are called uniform guidance and that the federal government comes
out with a compliance supplement every year to tell us what we have to test. So we have to go through a process to say what are your major federal programs? How much did you spend? Are they big enough to be considered potential for major programs and which ones are the riskiest and really need the attention of the auditors? And again, for the past several years, ARPA, ARPA is the name of the game, right? So, we have a couple more years of hopefully one hopefully one more year of testing of testing ARPA, but ARPA was so new and so big um and so many different
compliance requirements associated with it that we had to structure our testing related to that. And we'll talk about that in a few slides. And part of that report, there's a full schedule of all of your expenditures of federal awards and any findings that would have resulted from that. So the audit opinion I mentioned um that's the result of the audit of your financial statements. The three pages with our letterhead, my signature on it is an unmodified audit opinion. So the best result that you can have, no material weaknesses, no significant deficiencies,
no non-compliance noted in your um your SIFA and a consistent track record. You've had um several years of having unmodified audit opinions and what we call clean audit opinions. And your federal awards, this is again, we talked about your SIFA. you had a total of $23 million in federal awards. Um, of that n um 19 18.5 million was all related to
um ARPA the ARPA grant and so we have to do a deep dive that's considered your one major program this year. So we have to do specific testing of all the transactions that happened within ARPA. So a deeper dive than you would do if it was just within your financial statements. We are testing transactions for allowability. So, did you spend the money in accordance with um the federal final rule that came out related to ARPA cash management and reporting? Are you um are you reporting it correctly to the federal government? You have to report your expenditures.
You have reports that are due. I know you go through sort of the county process to do that, but we're testing to make sure they're accurate. They tie back to your ledgers. They're filed on time. Um no issues related to that. [snorts] checking for procurement to make sure you're following both federal and state um procurement laws for eligibility of vendors and period of performance. That's big right now, right? You had to obligate all of your all of your ARPA funds by a certain date. That date's now passed. You now have now you're on a
short timeline to make sure those funds go out the door and that they're expended. So period of performance is something that the federal government really wants us to look at. They give us instructions on that and you are giving a lot of that money out of course to subreipients within within Barnstville County. So subreient monitoring is on the county to do. We have to test to make sure you have internal controls and processes to be able to do that. And [clears throat] what the audit covers this is the audit covers all of everything
in your financial statement. So, not just your general fund, it's all of it's all of your funds, but really you have um over $80 million in cash and investments under management. That does not include the OPED trust. That's $80 million in all other county funds. So, of course, we're focused on that to be able to audit that. we get confirmations on any significant amount of investments um or cash from an outside party to make sure they're there, that they exist, that you're reconciling them back to your records and you're reporting them accurately
in your financial statements. Um the big news for fiscal year 25 of course was your stab you increased your stabilization funds. So, you know, strong financial policies but also strong reserves. You now have over $33 million in your stabilization funds. um with a big transfer in from your general fund to to bring that number up for fiscal year 25. The OPED, we're going to talk a little bit more about the OPED liability, but you have $5.2 million invested for OPED. Um
that helps to bring your liability down and make your whole financial picture look better in your financial statements because you're funding a known long-term liability. And of course, there's all the other funds. So you have over a hundred other indiv individual funds, grants, all the smaller revolving funds and grants um within your financial statement. So the audit covers everything I mentioned earlier. We're not testing every transaction. Some of them are very very small. They may not get picked at all, but we do a riskbased assessment on what could go
wrong in your financial statements and we design our audit procedures based on what could happen and what goes wrong. what could go wrong. And I'm going to go through some very, very brief, you have the financial statements. Um, I'm going to go through some brief highlights of how you did this year. And I just want to make sure we explain the financial statements. It's a big report. Um, but really, we always start with the general fund. That's your your key operating fund. And we talk about your internal controls. We look at your financial policies that you have documented
built-in controls. you know your budget process way more than I way better than I do. Um, but your general fund budget for fiscal year 25, this is going to look like a big number. It was $ 38.3 million. That number includes the large transfer out to the um the new stabilization funds. So you budgeted in total to use 38.3 million of that you budgeted to use. When I say use 15.6 6 million of reserves. Of course, that's your fund balance in the general fund that you voted to transfer out
to build up some of your some of your reserves and your new revenue contingency stabilization fund. So, within your budget, you you used 13.9 million to transfer to that new reserve, a million just used for county operations, and then some to go towards the P the PAS cleanup. Um we're seeing that in a lot of communities that there's money now that's being put aside for PAS. Um every community has a different a different situation and way of dealing with that. But overall you had strong controls. Your revenues came in over budget by over
$6 million. Your expenditures um and incumbrances of your current budget were under by 2 million. So all of that adds back to your fund balance, your general fund net position. Your net position on a budgetary basis, that's right in your budget to actual in your financial statements. You had a net decrease of 7.2. So again, you planned on using some of your savings account, um, if you will, I'm sorry, some of your checking account to go into savings. You budgeted to use general fund to go into your stabilization or your savings accounts, but then you had strong
performance and that made your net position only go down by $7.2 million on a budgetary basis. And what happens when you go from the budgetary basis up to the financial statements is you you merge together your general fund and your stabilization funds. So accounting standards require that you report them together. So when you're looking at or any outside party is looking at the county's financial statements, your general fund balance looks large. You have $44.5 million
in your general fund. Most of that 33.5 is now in stabilization funds. You have about $1 million um in your actual operating general fund on a budgetary basis. So just make sure it's it's really hard to go from one to the other just because there's so much money in the way you report it. And that's why your general fund balance is looks so big, right? 192% of general fund expenditures. All of that is because you have um taken a proactive step to put a lot of money away in your stabilization funds. Um you've reserved some money for incumbrances,
not too much at the end of the year. And again, that unassigned fund balance is 40. The 44.4 33.4 4 is all in stabilization money and it's reported within your footnotes and your financial statements. There's a nice chart now that breaks out all of your stabilization money um separately. This is the first year we've done that. But you know the numbers um here your general stabilization is 1.3. Capital stabilization, you've had that for a while 7.8. Emergency is 1.6. You've got 8.2 in PAS. And the new one is the revenue stabilization over $14 million.
Um, so that's sort of the one of the bigger things that happened financially for the county this year and other funds above and beyond the general fund. Of course, you have some unique funds related to Barnesville County Cape Cod Commission um with a $10 million balance and of course that had over $4 million this year and in your special tax and about $4 million in expenditures related to that. um the septic loan program. You have $17 million. This is a lot of your borrowing
relates to the community septic loan program. You have loans receivable outstanding which right now are fully deferred on your financial statements. Um great program to take advantage of. You know, most of your debt relates to that and they're 0% loans. So, it's a wonderful program that you're take you're taking advantage of. We talked about ARPA. Um for ARPA your balance right now is $3 million at the end of the year for the good thing about ARPA one of the nice things other than the federal government giving us money is that you get to keep the interest and use that interest. So
the balance in ARPA very typically is just the accumulated interest that you've gotten on those funds throughout the years. That's $3.2 million. Your unearned revenue is $4.9. What happens with federal grants is when you get the money, ARPA, they gave you the money up front, you got cash in the bank, you don't recognize it as revenue until you've actually lend um given the money out, you've granted it to to parties or you've used it. So once you spend or use that money, you
recognize the revenue. So at the end of 25, that 4.9 million in unearned revenue on your balance sheet is all money that you haven't you have the cash in the bank, but you haven't used it yet. and smaller funds. The gifts and grants funds of course 356,000 and then everything else that's governmental um other than the enterprise fund goes into a category called non- major governmental funds. That's all of your other um revolving funds, special revenue funds, anything else of a capital nature. And you have because you're doing a comprehensive report,
there's schedules in the back of your ACT for that will give you a breakout if anybody's interested balance sheet and income statement for all of those non- major governmental funds. And another unique one for for Barnesville County is the dredge enterprise fund. The dredge enterprise fund is always shown on the full acral basis of accounting. So, it's easier to look at it from a cash basis really than than a fund balance basis. When you look fund balance-wise, you only have $435,000 of ending balance, but really it's because you're reporting the
long-term liabilities pension and OP related to dredge. So, if you want to look at it, you want to look at it and manage it more on a cash flow basis. And um and you're fine that way. It looks like a little balance, but that little balance is really because of the long-term liabilities. and we'll talk a little bit about the big liabilities. So, from an audit perspective, we um spend a lot of focus on the big numbers in the financial statements and how we can audit those and make sure they're accurate. And of course, OPEDB and OP and pension are always the big
numbers in the financial statements. OPE of course is your um requirement to pay for health insurance um and benefits for retirees. So, you have an obligation to measure the liability, to report the liability, and you have the opportunity to put money aside to fund the liability, which you've actually done a good job on. You in fiscal 25 set aside $500,000 towards funding that liability um in a trust fund that you've established, you're now at $5 million,
which is invested with a long-term outlook on those investments. Helps to bring the whole liability down. Um the valuation that was used to measure your liability was as of June 30th 24. You rememeasure this every two years. So every two years the actuary comes in and says how did we do? We made some assumptions on how long people would live, what health insurance was going to cost, um how many people in retirement were actually going to take advantage advantage of our health insurance plan and you you really compare that to what really happened and rememeasure the
liability. So, your unfunded liability reported um as of June 30th ends up being $20 million. You are just over 20% funded now with OPED, which is better than most. Um you know, we have some odd communities that are that are fully funded or getting really close, but really if you're averaging yourself across the across the street state, you're doing pretty well. Um, there's a lot in the financial statements, note disclosures related to OPED, and what you're building on to,
what the accounting standards started to let you build on to is a 10-year trend schedule. So, if you look in the back of the report, it will give you show you that nine, we have we're up to nine years, but nine years ago, you had zero funding for OPED, and now you've put aside $5.2 million. So the standards in measuring it really have helped to bring those liabilities down because people are measuring paying attention to the benefits that are offered and and really putting money aside to help fund that um fund that in the future. And the next one you have less control
over um is your share of Barnesville County Retirement Association. So Barnesville County of course is um groups all of the communities in Barnsville County. you are a portion of that and you are required to pay your um what they come up with for your assessment into Barnesville County. Now the county system is almost 70% funded um some good years some required contributions. So our anticipation always is that the retirement systems will be fully funded far before OPED because the
law requires you to be on a funding schedule. They too have um they reme-measure it every two years. they have a new valuation, the actuary comes in and to see how they did, how their investments did um and how their, you know, how people measured up or all their assumptions measured up compared to what they expected. and our other than getting the the reports from Barnesville County Retirement um which we we end up doing one of our one of our other departments another group of people do
that audit report but other than getting that we have to focus to make sure the information coming from Barnes County going over to the retirement system is accurate so your share of Bible county depends on you giving them good information so our focus when we're auditing that number from your perspective active is to make sure that the reports that you're transmitting to them, the census information that they get from you is accurate so that they are accurately reporting back to you your share of the liability and no issues related to that.
And some of the other big numbers in your financial statements, yours not so bad, but I was just looking at your governmental debt. Overall, you have um your debt burden is pretty low compared to other other governments. Um, you've been very fortunate. I mentioned earlier that your long-term debt, even with the dredge and with um, your general government, most of it is in Mass Clean Water Trust interest free loans. We like to think that's good debt, right? That's good. If someone's going to lend you money to operate a really good program and they're going
to give it to you interest free, um, it's a good program that the state runs to that you should take advantage of. So really, your debt service is 1% of your budget. Very, very low. um compared to other governments. So that's really strong when somebody's looking at your financial position. And we'll talk a little bit about how your your policies that you have in place and how they relate to the audit and help you financially. Um this this um this slide really has all of your
your key financial policies listed. I will say we pay attention to all of these for the audit except for financial forecasting. That's the one area that I'm not concerned with because we're we always have sort of a looking back view. But we start the audit. We talked about budgeting, your budget process. Do you have a process to have a balanced budget and do you have controls in place to make sure that you are keeping people in line with that budget? That you're watching it, that you have strong budgetary results. We talked about that and you do. Of course, accounting and
financial reporting, having documented controls over that helps you to be able to prepare your financial statements. Financial statements that are accurate, um, that are timely, that don't require a lot of adjustments, and so and so forth. Financial reserves, those are your stabilization funds. That was the key thing that happened this year for your audit. Um, [snorts] capital, of course, capital you're planning. We I heard you earlier talking about capital planning and how you were going to fund capital going forward. As far as the financial statements go, you report
your capital assets once a year. We check to make sure that you have strong controls over identifying um not only the assets but estimating your lives of the assets so that you have a strong plan in place not only to to build new assets but to maintain and account for the assets that you have. um debt. We just talked about investments. Um we want to make sure you're in compliance with the law, that the investments you have comply with the law. OPE of course can be invested differently than other funds. Um and you do and you do that, you take advantage of that,
but making sure you've valued them properly and they're again they're in compliance with we have strict laws in Massachusetts about what you can and cannot invest in. Grant management, that's ARPA. Um and then the smaller gifts and donations. So your these come right off of your financial policies. Having them in writing helps. Um Roina if you can just go to the next slide. So you know good good policies that are documented. That is what not only um the government finance officers association recommends, division of local services recommends. That is one
of the first things that the rating agencies look for. Do you have strong policies that um that are documented and that will outlive you know transitions in staff, transitions in elected officials and so forth. Um if you have them in writing then they will live you know through those. Right now we are in a world that people have a lot of transition and financial positions. It's hard to find people. It's hard to find you know good qual quality staff. And if you have any kind of downturn, having your documented policies really helps. They help to
have strong internal controls that are not sort of ad hoc, but that you have them documented and you're following them. And really, it gives you discipline in your financial reporting. So, um, your report, your act, we talked about you have an ACE for not just financial statements. You did get an award of excellence in financial reporting from the GFOA. Um, you've gotten that for several years. you are were the first county I don't think we have any other counties in Massachusetts that are getting that are submitting an act for that I'm aware of but I know you were
the first to do that you did get the certificate um you've put you've again put the put your you know put this in to you know your next act for you you always go forward and put the next act for in so 24 got the award 25 was put in for the award um and consistent clean opinions if you didn't have clean audit opinions you wouldn't be able to do that and submit for that special recognition. And I'll wrap up with this. Um, some key takeaways from this. Clean on both accounts. So again, clean
audit opinions, all the work, all the testing, and audits never fun. I think I heard somebody earlier um early at the beginning of the meeting saying that audits aren't always a bad thing. Um, audits aren't a bad thing. Audits are a good thing, but I will tell you they're not convenient. um we come in and really disrupt um the day-to-day operations and we do a lot of testing and and it can be a little bit annoying for people to do but um we get a lot of support in Barnstable County. I think Carol and her team do a great job helping us. The result of that is clean audit
opinions. Um your policies really are driving consistency. Your internal controls are strong and really the outcome is shown in um the audit opinions and the GFOA award that you receive. And with that, I will take um any questions you have on the audit. Great. Thank you. Um excellent report. Uh Commissioner Lions, would you like to go first? Well, um you know, we have uh we have an excellent uh director of finance and she does a great job and it shows. But a lot
of people will look at this and say, "You're sitting on a lot of money there." You know, give give me some. [laughter] How do we say that this is actually a good thing and we're doing the right thing by being prudent and um uh go ahead you no no I I will right so I mean that does come back to having strong policies and yes if you so there is a lot of money there and you you know I hear you talking about right there's budgetary constraints and we have you know what are we
going to be looking at for deficits going forward how are we going to move forward word. Um, you can't live dayto-day in the in governments, right? Having policies to make sure that you are setting limits. You don't want to have, you know, your stabilization funds at whatever you can have them. You want to set them at limits. Here's what's right for us. We know we have these things coming down the road. We know we have some potential PAS liability. We know we're going to have some budget constraints going forward. You want to set your policies and you do have a general fund policy to say we're going to keep our general fund balance. um at approximately a certain percent I think
you're you know a certain percent of our operating budget. You want to have enough liquid money you know just think about your personal finances enough liquid money that if you have a couple of down months that you're still going to be able to pay the bills and operate. You want to you know you're you have some good guaranteed revenue. So we you know you have strong revenue sources which is really good going forward but there's always the constraints on the requirements of we don't know you know you've got a fund pension you don't know what health insurance is the costs of everything are going up you know sometimes in some cases higher than the revenues are
um but when you're looking to say how much cash do we have don't look at it from a cash perspective because that cash is not all available for you to go and spend it's not all all available for the budget process. Thank you. That's [laughter] what I needed to be said. Okay. Thanks. Thanks, Commissioner Commission. Yeah. [clears throat] Um, yeah, obviously it's a good picture. You know, you can look at it and say we built up reserves and, uh, we should be set, especially with revenue contingencies in case we do have a couple of down years. But, you know, I've always said the county
is not a bank. We we we exist to supply services to people. So collecting money in the bank is it's not really our purpose in life. Fortunately or unfortunately we have you know some financial liabilities going forward with uh a lot of capital expenditures. We don't know what OPED is. So we so to I think it's important to take the reserves that we have and designate them for the future so that they're not hanging out there for people to to speculate on what what we can do which would
probably be unrealistic and financial financially because uh you know to some that the county might be the goose that laid the golden egg and think well let's see what we can get out of it but uh right now I think we're on a we're on a good path and we should beat [clears throat] that path and be conservative. ative because as is said many times we have future responsibilities, future liabilities and we want to make sure we can meet those and look ahead five 10 years in the future.
Thank you. Any questions commissioner? No. Okay, great. Um Renee, I I think this is um was a terrific presentation and I also appreciate uh your commenting on our financial policies and our financial position. I think what we've been working hard to do is to put the county in the strongest financial position so that it can deal with some challenges that are in front of us. Now, we haven't finalized the plans and we're working on that now. particularly with the
county complex. Um, you know, we're working very hard on addressing a a PAS pollution problem. So, that we we know we have some big builds ahead of us, but I I I do think your report is just further confirmation that we've positioned ourselves well in terms of meeting those challenges. Now, what we have to do is just sort of figure out um more details and and and and spend more time sort of laying out a longer term plan. But we're um I think your report um is just confirmation
that the way I look at it, it's confirmation that we're on the right direction. We're headed in the right direction and we're managing our resources prudently on behalf of the uh the taxpayers and the people of Barnstable County. So, um it's always nice when you get a a very strong, very positive report from the auditors. No significant findings. I always that's always the first thing that I look for when I hear from the auditors. are there any material significant findings? And uh once again, this is another year where we're in strong shape on that score. Um the other thing
that I think is also important and and and one of the reasons why we do this publicly is I think um and have this public presentation, it's it's to promote transparency in terms of how we uh manage the county's finances. um you know we don't have to have I mean we should have in in in the interest of transparency it's important to have this kind of discussion so that the public can hear directly from the auditors and other interested officials can hear directly from the auditors what they think um you know what they think of our financial statements and financial
reports. Um I appreciate the fact that uh in your initial the initial slides in the presentation you talk about reviewing procurement you uh and monitoring of grant recipients subreients the way we go about staying on top of um making sure the subreients managing manage their dollars in accordance with the requirements that we're obligated to follow. Um, you know, I don't think
we talk enough about that, but I think for folks watching this presentation, I think it's important to get across the point that um, particularly with the grant funds, we go through significant scrutiny um, and we we undertake significant scrutiny um, and we sometimes will be criticized um, for the level of scrutiny or let's put it this way, we we we often get complaints uh, of from uh recipients for the level of scrutiny that we apply. But we think it's incredibly
important that we make sure that we do follow and adhere to uh the federal grant requirements and the other grant requirements that we're obligated to work under and we follow procurement policies that the Commonwealth has established and we we we we safeguard these resources and manage them with a great deal of care. Um, and I think that's another sort of aspect of an audit like this that comes out and becomes pretty evident to the p to the public. You know, we live in an age where
um, you know, a lot of people are cynical. Uh, it's easy to get cynical if you follow social media. Um, but every now and then you need to have an outside auditor come in and basically take a hard look at what you're doing and give an honest and straightforward assessment as to how the county's finances are being managed. And that's what you've provided. And um and it it it also reaffirms the confidence that we have in our county administrator and the confidence that we have in our financial team which is led by Carol Capola. Carol and her team do an outstanding job
uh of managing the county finances. Uh they provide great advice and counsel to us as commissioners because we've made it very very clear from for quite a while that we want to meet um the highest standards. We want to follow the best practices. We want Barnstable County to be sort of the on the cutting edge and the flagship county uh county government in Massachusetts. We're often called the flagship county government in Massachusetts. And that takes a great deal of
work and effort. So, um like I said, this is sort of the uh the report card. That's the way I look at it. It's a report card on how we're doing and our financial team clearly uh they they get all A's and uh it's nice hearing that publicly quite frankly and uh and we and and uh I know as as you said Renee do doing an audit can sometimes be excruciating um and it's always nice when it ends um but really the the the the most enjoyment that I get is when you get the when
you get the report and you get the statements and you get a presentation. like this. So, I appreciate you being here today. I appreciate it all every time you come before us and give us the straight scoop on our county finances and uh you do a great job for us and uh we appreciate all your service to Barnesville County. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. So, unless there are any more questions, Carol, Michael, anything else we need to highlight or talk about? No. We'll see the auditors in a few weeks. Okay, [laughter] Susan, is there anything you would like to ask?
No. Okay, great. Listen, once again, uh, Renee and Roina, thank you so much for all your work and, uh, I'm sure we'll see you soon. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. A very big thank you to Carol Capola and her team. All right. For that. Very good. So, we're going to move on to the next item on our agenda, which is 6D. And this is the reauthorization of the annual delegation of certain duties to the county administrator. You have before you uh an updated version of the
annual delegation. I'm going to ask if I can have a motion. Uh yes. Um I move to what's the where are we? Six 6D. E 6D. I think it's E. No, I'm on 6D. Oh D. I move to authorize the reauthorization of the annual delegation of certain duties to the county administrator as outlined in the July 8th, 2026 memo. Second. Okay. So, we have a motion in the second. Uh, let me ask, am I do I is there Oh,
I see. I I have a PDF version of the agenda that is different from the one that is in front of me right now. So, things have been reorganized. We do that just to confuse you. Yeah. Thanks. Thanks. So uh no the administrator is uh right and uh so we are on in with respect to the revised agenda on item E. Okay. So we have a motion. We have a second. Is there any discussion? Hearing none. A
roll call vote. All those in favor? Commissioner Lions. Lions votes I. Commissioner Bergstrom. Bergstrom votes I. Commissioner Fors votes I. It carries unanimously. Uh we're going to move on to item uh F in our revised um agenda. Okay. What did Commissioner Lion say? Oh, I thought we were Yeah, we're on Does everybody have the correct agenda? I mean, well, we have it's following along. It's just the lettering is um missed the letter. Somebody skipped talking.
Well, we just the next the next item. Yeah. The next the next the next item F. Yeah. Do I have a motion? I move to to approve ordinance 2026-15 authorizing the recession recision of a portion of borrowing authority authorization previously approved under ordinance 2024-01 for the cooperative extension Americanore vehicle replacement project in the amount of $6,63425.
Second. Do we have a we've got a second on that? Yeah. Okay. Second. So, um, any discussion? Hearing none. Commissioner Lions. Lions votes I. Burkstrom. Burkstrom votes I. Forest votes I. Next item on our agenda is G. Ordinance 26, 2026-16. Do I have a motion? I move to authorize, excuse me, I move to approve ordinance 2026-16 authorizing the recision of borrowing of authorization
previously approved under ordinance 22-09 for the Cape Cod Commission Capital Building Project associated with the purchase and renovation of office and meeting space in the amount of $4 million and would further authorize the project to instead be funded through the use of restricted balances within the Cape Cod Environmental Protection Fund in the same amount of $4 million. Lions second. Okay, we have a motion and a second. Any discussion? Hearing
none. All those in favor? Commissioner Bergstrom? Burkstrom votes I. Commissioner Lions votes I. And Commissioner Forest votes I as well. It passes unanimously. Um item H regarding the uh authorizing the Dredge Enterprise Fund. Do I have a motion? Yes. Um, Mr. Chairman, I move to approve ordinance 2026-17 authorizing the Dredge Enterprise Fund Capital Program to resend borrowing authorization previously approved under Ordinance 2025-01 in the amount of
$150,000 for the replacement of a CAT engine on a booster station and to authorize the repurposing of remaining authorized, unissued, and/or unexpended bond proceeds in the amount of 76,6131 for the cat engine capital project for the Dredge Enterprise Fund. Buy and second. Yeah, we have a motion and a second. Um, I'll call for a vote. Commissioner Lion votes I. Commissioner
Bergstrom. Burst votes I. Commissioner Forest votes I as well. It carries unanimously. Uh, we're on to uh item I, ordinance 26, 2026-18. Do I have a motion? Yes. U Mr. Chairman, I move to approve ordinance 2026-18 authorize general fund budget transfers totaling $81,500 for the purpose of funding information technology salaries of $1,500 and laboratory supplies of $80,000. By
second. Okay. So, we have a motion and a second on the floor. I'm going to call for a vote. Commissioner Lion. Lions votes I. Commissioner Burkstrom. Burkstrom votes I. Commissioner Forest votes I as well. It carries unanimously. Uh the next uh item J ordinance 2026-9 creating an emergency management department. Do I have a motion? Yes. Uh Mr. Chairman, we've discussed this in the past and given um the administration authority to create such a
department. So I move to approve ordinance 2026-9 creating an emergency management department. Lions second. Okay. So we have a motion and a second. Um I'm going to call for a vote. Commissioner Alliance. Lions votes I. Commissioner Bergstrom. Bergstrom votes I. Commissioner Forest votes I. It passes unanimously. Uh item number K, proposed resolution 2026-06 supporting the voters's approval for an audit of the state legislature. Do I have a motion? Um so
moved. I don't have anything in front of me. Lion seconds. Okay. So we have a motion and a second. Is there any discussion? Yeah. I just I talked to one of the sponsors of this ordinance and his feeling was that his constituents felt that they had voted in a positive positively to create such a a an authority for the auditor to audit the legislature and simply they were reflecting the views of their constituents. Okay. Is there any other discussion? Commissioning alliance? No,
I I do think that that's um the the sentiment of the voters uh in the majority. There's a majority sentiment there. I'm not sure if I'm part of it, but I will I will second that. Okay. So, we have a motion and a second to support the uh approval of an audit for the state legislature. Uh Commissioner Alliance. Lions. Commissioner Bergstro. Birchham votes I and Commissioner Forest
votes I as well. Uh new business. Do we have any new business that we need to bring up at this time? Hearing none, I'm going to move on to the commissioner's consent agenda item number eight. Um and we have a a multitude of items, bid awards, contract amendments, discharges, all posted on our agenda. Commissioner Bergstrom, would you like to make a motion or commissioner? I I move to approve the commissioner's consent agenda items 8 um Roman numeral 1 through 8, Roman numeral 5,
including all subsections as listed on the July 8th, 2026 meeting agenda. Lions second. Okay, we have a motion and a second. Um and I'm going to ask for roll call vote. Commissioner Lions. Lions votes I. Commissioner Forest votes I. Commissioner Bergstrom. virtue votes I. Okay, it passes unanimously. Uh the next item nine on our agenda is the approval of the meeting minutes for June 29th. Do I have a motion? Um yes. Go ahead. I move to approve the June 29th, 2026 regular meeting
minutes as drafted. Second. You have a motion and a second. Any discussion? Hearing none. All those in favor say I. Roll call vote. Commissioner Lions. Lions votes I. Commissioner Bergstrom. Burkstrom votes I. Commissioner Forest votes I as well. It passes unanimously. Item number 10 on our agenda. Commissioner reports. Commissioner Alliance. Do you have a report for us today? I do not. Okay. Commissioner Bergstrom. Nope, I do not. Okay. We'll move along to uh number uh 11,
upcoming business. Um and let's take a quick look at our schedules. Our uh Yes, Mr. Chair, the the uh schedule for your next meeting is actually Thursday, July 30th in Harwitch. Uh we adjusted your normal uh Wednesday meeting uh pushed it off a day to Thursday. So it's Thursday, July 30th. Um in Harwitch, excuse me, in Harwitch. Uh as the chair mentioned, we may be reviewing uh the Americanore projects, which we didn't uh get to today, but uh specifically
uh Haritch projects that Americanore has worked on. We'll have some new staff introductions. Uh we'll also have an update on the Cape Cod license plate fund um and the kickoff for the new round of uh of opportunity funding opportunities there. Um and between now and then I'm sure we'll have a number of other items that get added to the agenda. That's what we have right now though. That's great. Can I ask question? Go ahead. Where are we going to meet in Haritch? Should we at town hall or the community center or I believe we're a town hall. Uh but obviously we'll confirm that
and advertise that. Yeah. Right. Most likely in the Don B Griffin, otherwise referred to as Bucky Griffin conference room. Griffin. Yes, I work with Bucky Griffin. He was the leader of uh in the independence movement on Cape Cod when I was on the Harvard Select Board. He actually even helped put together a flag. So, I know. And you were on the Harvard Select Board. I I used to work for the Harvard Select Board. Oh, yeah. That's where I started. I worked by the uh in I worked next to
the vault in the basement of town hall. All right. Any other comments or questions, Chila? No. Thank you. No, Commissioner Bergstrom. No, I'm happy with that. Yeah, I think it's going to be fun being in Rich. Um, one of the one of the things uh as we go on to um uh a commissioner a a sort of an item I want to mention this to Michael because um at last night's Yarmouth select board meeting we invited the Cape Cod Commission rep to come in to uh update the select boards and he actually
brought a handout handout of materials that were prepared by staff at the Cape cut commission and I thought the packet of information was very very thorough, very interesting. Uh provided background on the amount of open space and a host of other characteristics of the town. It was a very very um I think a display of some just some of the some of the data collected by the Cape Cut Commission that is clearly of interest and of use to the towns. And Dennis brought this in. Sarah Kovven
was there. She handed it up to the select board. It was great. I think when we go to Haritch, we should ask uh Christie and the staff to maybe do prepare something like that for Haritch because I think we're asking the commission to come in to give us an update on the license plate funds and they're going to update us on the next round of funding and some of the priorities of funding. I do think that in Haritch if Christy and staff will be there now. We need to make sure that that
date works for them. I think it will, but we need to just double check with her. [snorts] Um then I think it might be helpful to bring in a packet of some of that information. Uh because I thought it went over very well with the select board. Good. Uh that handoff and obviously we we have a very good rep in the town of Yarmouth serving on the commission. So, um, are there any county administrator staff reports? We have very lengthy report. No, we don't. Um, I just want to let you
know [laughter] I just want to let you know that the shared regional housing uh, program for 2027 is uh, up and going and uh, we've had obviously good response. um Haritch, as I had mentioned, has joined uh which is great and uh and so we'll we'll be uh carrying on with that program for the next fiscal year and the fiscal year after very likely. um had an opportunity to get out and visit the dredge uh in its last one of its last days in Harwitch and uh saw firsthand the critical um
service they provide uh as evidenced by uh fishing boat getting uh uh stranded up on a on a sand uh sand uh sand sandbar. Thank you. Um and then uh last I want to tell you that uh we are working internally on the uh another change order for uh GZA, our contractor that's working on PAS issues. Um and that will be coming to you fairly shortly, but I just want to let you know we're working on that. That's great. Happy to answer questions. Any questions for Michael Sheila? No. No. Um the
the only other thing that I just wanted to add a footnote in terms of Michael's report is that he and I have been regularly talking to our state representatives uh making sure that there are amendments being worked into a couple of pieces of legislation to provide funding for dredging throughout the Commonwealth and including our Cape community and funding for uh Representative Luddy wants to do a study on long-term dredging needs. And there are others that think it might be also
helpful to analyze the econ the economics of our ports because we generate a lot of economic activ economic activity and that's information that could be helpful for in a variety of purposes. So um there's a study measure that has been both of these measures have been adopted in the mass ready act bill that was the house and now there's discussion and it may have already happened. I'll be getting an update later today of amending the House economic development bill uh that is working
its way through to include similar language for dredging and a county study on the economic value activity in our ports. So just an update on that Michael we've been sort of tag teaming on that. So um that's moving forward. So anything else? That is it for now. Okay. Um then I have one final item on the agenda. Do we have a motion? I move to a All right. Uh do that. Was that a second,
Sheila? Yes, it was. Okay. Um let's go right to a vote. Uh all those in favor? Commissioner Lions? Lions votes I. Burkstrom. Commissioner Burkstrom votes I. Commissioner Boris votes I. And uh that was unanimous. And we are now adjourned at roughly what? 1:30. 1:30. Hey,