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Good evening everyone. Welcome to tonight's select board meeting. It is Tuesday, April 7th. Uh today I'm pinch hitting for Chair Bernard Green who's not able to join us. We will first be going into executive
session or I will be moving that we do so. I move that we go into an executive session pursuant to general law chapter 30A section 21A3 purpose 3 for the purpose of discussing litigation strategy related to a claim by Anthony
Wono Alec Lebitz Joslyn Murphy Richard Murphy and Denell Shaun O'Neal senior seeking reimbursement for attorneys fees following an investigation into potential violations of town policies and state laws and that we also go Go to
an executive session for approving the executive session meeting minutes purpose 7 of March 10th, 2025 and March 24th. Oh, excuse me, 2026 and March 24th, 2026.
So, John >> I. >> Paul, >> I. >> Michael >> I. >> And I also vote I. We will be returning to open session following the executive session. Hey. Hey,
hey, hey. Heat. Hey, Heat. Heat. Heat. Hey. Hey. Yeah. Heat. Heat. Heat.
Hey. Hey. Hey. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Glory
to you. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat.
Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat.
Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat up here. Heat. Heat. Heat.
Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat.
Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat.
Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Good evening again. Welcome back to our
select board meeting of April 7th, 2026. We will now proceed to announcements and updates. Do any select board members have any announcements or updates to make? John, >> I had a question and u ch I apologize
for springing this on you and I think we can hold you harmless if there is no clear answer. Um but uh uh don't ask me why somehow uh the question of u signs being placed all over town um at this season of the year. It has been on my
mind lately and I have noticed some signs being posted on tree lawns. So do do we have a clear policy on what happens to political signs that are posted on tree lawns? >> Yes. If they are posted on public property, they are taken off public property. The exception is you can put
up signs. I I will I let me reconfirm this. So this is off the top of my head, but my recollection is and we I will happily reconfirm this that um political signs are allowed to be placed up the
night before the election. Um and but they can't be placed within 150 ft of a polling place. Um and there are markers at the polling places that say where they can and can't be placed. Um but that otherwise um signs uh political or
otherwise cannot be placed on public property. They have to be placed if you if you own the private property, you can put up a sign there. But please do not put up signs, advocacy things, any of that stuff on public property. That's not allowed. >> And that includes signs related to ballot questions.
>> Yes. >> Okay. >> All right. Bernard, I see you have your hand raised. Go ahead. He's co-host, so he should be fine. >> All right. In the meantime, any other select board members? >> It looks like he's muted.
>> He can unmute himself. Uh David, I'm sorry. I was muted. >> I'd like I think it'd be useful to circulate that policy uh to the campaigns because historically some campaigns understand it and and obey. other campaigns, particularly new
candidates, uh don't uh so be and if you if the town takes signs down, uh there's a big uh reaction. So I think it's it's useful to uh send that to the campaign.
Secondly, I want to say that um I recently had a little medical situation. uh not it was serious but not uh fixable and I am uh just recovering so I'm uh
meeting from home and hopefully I'll be able to uh go through the meeting but bear with me if I get incoherent at some point. >> Bernard, you're always very coherent and hopefully you'll make it through and
we'll be feeling better soon. >> Yeah. Thank you. Any other announcements or updates, >> Chaz? >> Yeah, just a really short short one. Um, it's public health recognition week. Uh, and the public health carnival is down at the high school, I believe, from 3:30
to 6:30. Um, I will double check the timing there. Um, but just want to um acknowledge uh all the good work that our public health department does and encourage folks to come down to the carnival on Thursday. Um, it's a lot of fun. It's very educational, um, but not not bad edutainment, it's good
edutainment. Um, so you'll learn something and you'll have fun. So, uh, come on down to the, uh, public health carnival. >> All right. Thank you for that. And why don't we now move into public comment, Melanie, if you'd like to read the instructions. >> Thank you for joining us for public
comment. This is an opportunity for us to hear your perspective on the issues in Brookline that matter to you. Each person speaking tonight is limited to three minutes. You don't need to use the entire time, but you may if you like. Once 15 m minutes has been met, there is an opportunity at the conclusion of the
select board's business for additional comments. Members of the public sometimes raise questions during public comment. We may be able to provide a quick answer to a question, but are more likely to work with staff to get a more thorough answer and respond over email. The onscreen timer will flash orange
when you have 30 seconds remaining and red when your time is nearly up. Please conclude your remarks at that time. If you have more to say, you're welcome to send an email to board members expressing your thoughts in greater detail. Any person wishing to speak must begin their comments by identifying
themselves with their full name, either their Brookline precinct number or street address, and the specific topic on which they wish to speak. The board encourages but does not require that remote users turn their video on when commenting. >> All right, so we >> signed up. All right. No one has signed
up. Anyone in the room? All right. If you'd like to come up. >> Have you signed up for your specific topic? >> Oh, okay. All right. All right. Then with that, we'll move on to miscellaneous items. Licenses. >> Got one person with their hand up. >> Oh, okay. Uh Hannah Clot, you want to
unmute yourself and you have three minutes. >> Yeah. Hi. Sorry. Um my um my camera is just not working right now, but I wanted to speak about warrant
article 25 um which would be asking Brooklyn to remove itself from BRIC, which is the Boston Regional. So, sorry, sorry to pause you, but we're going to be having
a public hearing on Warren Article 25 later on in our meeting, and you're welcome to participate at that point. This is for general public comment on topics that will not be addressed via public hearings later on in our meeting.
>> Okay. Yeah, then that's it. Thank you. >> All right. Thank you. Anyone else online have their hand raised? It appears not. So with that, we will move on to miscellaneous approval of miscellaneous
items, licenses and contracts. Any members have questions about any of these items 5A through 5F? >> Are we taking 5A separately >> because it's the minutes? Yeah.
>> Yes, we can do 5A separately. Any questions on any of these items first? All right. Seeing none, I move that we approve the meeting minutes from March 31st, 2026. >> Bernard,
>> yes. >> John, >> yes. >> Paul, >> I. >> Michael, >> yes. >> And I also vote yes. Next, I move approval in omnibus fashion of 5B, 5 C, 5D, 5e, and 5F.
Bernard, >> yes. >> John, >> yes. Paul, >> I. >> Michael, >> I. >> And I also vote I. With that, we will now move to department budget reviews. And first up, the building department,
Dan Bennett. >> Hello. >> Oh, there he is. Um, >> Melanie, can I share my screen? >> You should be able to. Yep. >> Okay. Can everyone see that? >> Yep. >> Can everyone see that?
>> Yes. >> Okay. >> Um, thank you. I have Charlie Simmons, director of public buildings here, and, uh, Paul Campbell, my deputy building commissioner. Um this screen up here now shows the functions and responsibilities
for the different divisions within the building department. It identifies some of the workload indicators, work orders, in-house, uh service contracts, uh permits reviewed and issued, uh performed inspections as well as
complaints and under construction renovation and identifies projects that we are working on or have completed um recently. Uh some of the accomplishments we've had
um over the past year is with the Excel permitting system, we were able to incorporate a new demolition process that has um streamlined the project process a little bit. The applicant doesn't have to run all over town. It's
all done on the screen. Each department gets notified. They check a box, it gets approved, and we can issue the permit. Uh in addition, we've moved forward with our capital improvement plan. The Pier school construction is ongoing. Fire stations one and four continue. Uh we
completed the Brookline High School tunn tunnel project. And something that we've done that's not on here is some of the roofs. Uh we're we're moving forward with our roofing contract that um uh we did three or four roofs over the summer at the high school and we're going to be doing five, six or seven roofs this
summer again uh uh across town. In addition, um on the sustainability side, we have uh completed the electrification of the senior center and under our pilot energy code um uh process, we have
approximately 31 new structures that are um fossil fuel free. Uh some of the goals for the uh fiscal year would be in the budget book. I don't know if you noticed there is a provision in there that uh Chaz had put in uh with respect to investigating or
analyzing a inspectional services uh department. So that's something that you know staff would work on over the next year with them. Um we would want to increase interdep departmental workflow with respect to certificate of occupancies, c TCOs which are temporary
occupancies, certificate of inspections and um other functions that we can you know kind of get a better handle on um and again always advancing sustainability um um through you know solar
electrification and other you know means uh necessary. Um some of the current and uh long-term goals uh that we have um are um if there was to be an inspectional services division, you know, code enforcement and
zoning program would be part of that uh incorporating um you know, may possibly some new staff, but certainly, you know, a better complaint investigation division. Um we would advance uh streamlining some of the process through
the Accela program. I'm again trying to expand that as much as possible. The select board just recently went online with all certificate of inspection applications. We're doing that. As I said earlier, the demo permit is something that's out there. We are working on uh accessory dwelling units.
We're working on other um applications that we have um to try to uh again, you know, streamline that process and make it easier for the for the consumer. Um with respect to some of the functions and operations that we've done that help
with the select board's goals, uh the Acceler portal is one of the primary ones. Every department in town uses them. This will expand um potentially some efficiencies and um help you know some of these processes go you know a
bit faster and potentially smoother and again um efforts on sustainability specifically electrification. and Chaz and Charlie have worked very hard in trying to fund um these projects. Uh again, we finished up the senior center. There's money in the budget if
everything passes for the town hall. Um we've got uh solar going on the Driscoll that will be townowned. We're looking to do the same thing for the Pier School. Um and the fire station renovations. When those are done, all those buildings will be uh fossil fuel free. Um with
respect to some of the services the department does um you know some of these larger buildings uh the newer schools the the um the high school facility the uh Driscoll school and when the pier school comes online these
energy management systems are you know much larger much bigger and more involved than um what was previously there. Um, so this is something that our staff continues to struggle with. Charlie does his best with what we've
got and we're trying to find a way to, you know, assist us, you know, staff in moving forward, uh, in handling all of these things that happen. Um, the repair and maintenance is another, you know, continuing, you know, effort. You
know, we've got funding cuts. Um, we've been under underfunded, you know, due to inflation. Um we had just heard at a recent um advisory committee um that the schools did not put any money in their override request for uh opening the pier
school. So in FY28 uh something's got to be worked out. We're going to have to try to, you know, figure that out as we as we go forward. Um local regulations for zoning and other it hasn't been as big this year. You know there a lot of changes last
year but there are some state level things that are happening specifically ADUs and some of the approval processes that we go through and what they're asking for under those conditions. You know continue to you know take up staff time and uh you know we have to educate the public and educate ourselves because
this is kind of a moving uh target sometimes and we have another ADU bylaw coming in front of the um town meeting um in in May. And lastly, building codes and other codes. They're they're always changing. They're always um um modifying
them, adding them, bringing out, you know, some of them up to the with the latest technology. So, those are things we know there's learning curves there that we have to educate the public. They educate us sometimes and we, you know, continue to move forward with that. um in in the current budget, you know,
we'd just like to continue on with the um the relationship we have with the sustainability division. Uh that's something that Charlie has worked very hard with his staff and Erin's staff to um you know, keep that, you know, going and
moving forward as well as the Excella again enhancing enhancements and expansion. Um, we were able Charlie Charlie was able to get the school department to convince uh to to to um buy in to this um unlicensed HVAC
technician that we were able to get for the town about two years ago. Uh, this person um takes care of a lot of the preventative maintenance, uh, changes belts, motors, filters, and this is a big part of our, you know, program, the
HVAC systems out there. Um, so we're able to get two on the school side, which will help, you know, move forward. I'm not sure if you recall, we've got three HVAC positions licensed that we've been unable to fill because the salaries were just too low. So, this is our way
to kind of see how this goes, you know, with that. And we are expecting a savings, but we need to do it for a little while before we know that that specific amount. Um if we were not constrained by any any budgetary restrictions again we'd go move very for fast with electrification
of our vehicle fleet electrification of town buildings and school buildings you know that's that's a multi- multi-million dollar you know project um the numbers fluctuate tremendously uh because I think everybody's doing it and there are severe lead times I would also
like to fully fund the repair maintenance uh budget um as well as finding some way to get something in a budget for the opening of the peer school in FY28 and um again code enforcement and
expanding that division you know would be uh a target if we moved into some sort of an inspectional services division. These last uh slides show uh some of the current projects that are ongoing both private and public and then some work done by the public uh
buildings division. So we have here 1180 Boilson Street. It's a six-story mixeduse building. It's a 40B. On the right we have the Porsche dealership down on Comm. Uh these are some pier school uh photos from uh last year that um uh provide you know where we were
then and where we are now. Um we've got a a project on the corner of St. Paul and Su A. Uh this is a 13-unit multif family building. uh we worked with that developer or the town did to save that original building and provide an
addition um that will be all combined with you know 13 units on the right side that's so drive which is the project that is across from the reservoir on Boilson Boilson Street corner of Caitlyn Catelyn and Boilston that's 12 town
houses that was in court for probably three or four years so that's what's delayed the implementation of that project. These are some uh slides of uh work at the Kraane pool. Uh the Terzo floor in the lobby. Uh some painting and
striping of the uh grandstands. And the last slide provides some work that was done uh by public buildings. Uh select board hearing room has new carpeting. We got some carpeting in the uh hallways up in fire administration. And over in the
health building in the Denny room, it's a fresh coat of paint, some shades, and um new flooring as well. So, that's uh my presentation. You got any questions? >> Any questions? >> Yes, I have one.
>> All right, go ahead, Bernard. >> Yeah. Uh first of all, Dan, this was an excellent report. Let me see if I can get my video. um is helpful in my opinion to the uh select board's understanding of your work and its challenges and how you are
aligning with our select board goals which is important and secondly sort of a question and maybe this is best directed somewhere else but I'm going to just ask you ask you it because you raised this or you presented it so I I didn't realize that there's a Porsche
dealership going up in Brooklyn on Commonwealth Avenue uh and I assume that we're that's going to generate a huge amount of excise taxes on their inventory. Um, is that correct? Maybe that's for Chaz.
>> Yeah, I Yeah, I don't know about the excise tax, but this was there was an existing dealership there. They tore This is part of the Herb Chambers. I think he's gone right down the street. This is the last building that he's doing. So, they tore the old building down. They're building this one in its
place. Um, it's going relatively well. I've got minimal, you know, complaints from neighbors u because it's kind of on the outskirts, but I haven't gotten any any complaints from, you know, Brooklyn or even, you know, the Brighton portion of Boston. But with respect to excise
tax, um I don't know if Chaz has the answer to that or um somebody in uh maybe the assessors or Treasury, >> I don't have the answer off the top of my head. Um but yes, we we'll talk about it and get you an answer on that. I don't think there will be a significant shift, but we will double check.
>> Okay. I didn't realize this was a continuation of the um Honda dealership there. You put you there. Uh finally, um there is a troubling item in our miscellaneous calendar. Dan, we have authorized the hiring of a building
commissioner. >> I mean, that that's troubling because in my experience over many years, it's going to be difficult to replace you. and I'd like to thank you for your work. Um, and I I don't have a lot of interaction with you and many times it's
your gruff manner, but always the quality of what you do is is top rate and I appreciate that. Uh, it's noticed and appreciated. So, >> thank you, >> Michael. >> Uh, thank you very much for your report
and uh the the breadth of the work that you do. Um and I particularly want to commend the progress that you're making with the uh CELA system in terms of streamlining the processes um for the
town uh in interacting with both uh the building department and others. Um I had two specific questions. Um, one was you mentioned that there are now 31 buildings in the town that are fossil fuel free and I'm wondering what the
denominator of that is, how many buildings there are total. >> I I could I'd have to go back to the total because it's only been about I think we're in our third year, but um that's just for this past year. I did not add the total, but it's been about
30 35 a year. So, I I would say we're somewhere in the 100 range um for that. >> Great. Um and the the second question I have um a lot of uh constituents talk about um the need for faster
inspections. Um, and the thing I'm wondering from your perspective is to what extent the backlog of inspections are delaying any receipt of permit fees or other revenue for the town.
>> So, um, the permits are applied for upfront and paid for at the time of application. So, that fee comes in before any inspections, you know, are being done. So, I would say there wouldn't be any anything holding up uh
permit fees or um or you know an application process, but um I do have one vacant um position right now. One of my inspectors uh went to become commissioner in another community, so I have four. So, we do have a little bit
of a backlog on um the inspections for his district as well as his permit applications. and we've shifted some things around to try to make up for that. Um, I think the biggest backlog for inspections is with the plumbing and
gas and the electrical because they're one man shows. We have deputies that come in once or twice a week and help out. So, that's probably the biggest area um where there's a bit of a backlog which could be a day or two. >> Thank you.
A question I have is uh regarding fines. So, is there a uh amount of revenue that's been generated off of fines? Is there a plan in place to collect fines? Uh these are questions that frequently
get raised with me by constituents. >> Yeah. So, you know, I' I've kind of shifted my policy on that because, you know, so enforcement can take uh two avenues. One could be you you go to court and you you know try to get the
the judge or the clerk magistrate to issue something to the applicant. Um with the town council's workload uh that's been you know difficult and the court is you know delayed you know sometimes two three months. Um so I've
tried to implement fines. We do get fines. It's not a huge amount of money, but I've resorted to writing the fines and depending upon, you know, what the violation is. Um, depends on uh the
amount. So, it's 50 100 or 300 under the zoning. I I I I did find recently uh there was a property over at 73 Beverly Road that was torn down without a permit and I find them $10,000 which was paid
you know relatively quickly to avoid any further um issues. So that's probably one of the biggest ones and that was probably within the last six months. The other ones would be smaller in that, you know, 5000, 300, you know, range, but it's not
typically not a uh a large sum of money. >> Sometimes in lie of fines, will a an occupancy permit be withheld? Yes, if this viol Yes, I would hold up
issuance of a per and I think we've got a you know, for instance, I can't issue permits or certificates whether it's an occupancy or a certificate of inspection or issue or or even issue a building permit, excuse me, if they're behind in their taxes. So, that's one, you know,
so we have a relationship on the Excella. Uh they will put put a hold on that. So, someone will try to apply, they'll call us and say, "We can't apply. It's not letting us go through and we can look at it and say, well, you owe taxes." So that's, you know, a bene one benefit of of the Excel, one of the
many benefits of the Excel process. But if there's a violation or if they owe some sort of fees, yeah, we would not issue uh any one of those certificates of permits until that fee was paid. >> All right. Thank you. Anyone else?
Quick, maybe John. Dan, I want to pick up on what um Bernard Green said. Uh, I I admit when I looked at that I I convinced myself it wasn't you, but now now I'm led to believe it um it did refer to you. And I
just want to say on your behalf um you know, I think as select board members, we try not to be in too intrusive in terms of helping constituents with issues that they might have with any department um at town hall. Um, and in
in Dan's case, I would say our our interactions have been uh judicious and only when, you know, there was a quick route to solving a problem and and you were the person who would best intervene. And in every single one of
those instances, um, I came away so satisfied with, uh, the ability of you, um, and it's representative of the ability of our staff at town hall to be responsive to constituents, to take seriously even the most minor kinds of
complaints. Um, and I'm not saying this is minor, but the most recent example was, you know, someone was um a little bit disconcerted that there was a certificate in an elevator and it and it hasn't hadn't been brought up to date. Um, that was dealt with um expeditiously
by you and in a way that I I think educated me, educated the constituent about the process of elevators inspection, elevator inspections, excuse me. um and at the same time um made clear that this was going to be taken
care of. So, thank you not just for that, but for those those instances over my years on the board that we've had dealings to with each other to to try to solve somebody's problem, and you you always came through. Thank you very much. >> Thank you. I appreciate the all the kind
words and I I couldn't be where I am today without a lot of my staff with Paul and Charlie and Lap and and all the inspectors and tradesmen, but uh I thank you all for the and it's been a a great time. I've I've thoroughly enjoyed my time here. There are some tough times
and tough days, but you get through them and hopefully the the good days outweigh the bad. >> All right, anyone else? Okay, thank you very much, Dan. We will now >> thank you >> move on to the next presentation from
planning and community developments. Cara Okay, good evening. Uh, my name is Cara Brutin. I'm the director of planning and community development. Um, with me on this floor is twothirds of my division heads. Um, Aana Linda Smith of community
planning and Meredith Mooney economic development, Paulie Silico is down at advisory because we're supposed to be presenting our budget there as well right now. So, we'll see how this goes. Um, but we can bring Paulie up here if you have any questions. Um, our department's mission, for those of you
that that don't know us well, um, we are responsible for positively affecting the people that live and work here today, as well as those who could be part of the Brookline community in the future. At the local level, we have an impact and are very proud of having an impact on our regional housing crisis, our
nation's systemic racial inequities, and the global climate emergency. >> Got it. Sorry. Um just going to go through a couple of accomplishments um and objectives for next fiscal year. Um there's many more in the budget book and um be glad to
talk about any other ones that you want to talk more about. Um so in fiscal 26 um by the end of this fiscal year we will have a draft of the comprehensive plan. Um and uh there are six uh kind of
chapters or categories that have risen to the top over the last um year or two of process. Um and that's community well-being, livable neighborhoods, mobility and accessibility, thriving commercial areas, expanded housing options, climate action and resiliency.
Um, so we've um gotten that far in the process and we should be able to wrap up the comprehensive plan um by this fall. So, thank you to Paul Warren and Linda Pelky for um leading the comprehensive plan steering group and and moving that
forward with two very big pushes of um public outreach. Uh, as you know, we have finalized the Chestnut Hill commercial area study recommendations, including preparing zoning articles for town meeting and coordination with a lot of support from
DPW related to infrastructure. We've continued community work with the Fischer Hill West Uses Advisory Committee, thanks to Bernard Green for chairing that group, um, to make recommendations for the permanent use of the municipal property that the town owns at the top of Fiser Hill. Um, and
that includes securing a state planning grant of $150,000. Uh, we continued assisting the Brooklyn Housing Authority with funding and related uh, federal compliance for the construction phase of 32 Marian that um, construction document phase of
high Walnut Street property. Um, both of these will significantly further the town's goal of increasing the percentage of deed restricted affordable units. And the reason I bring up these examples is because a lot of times when the permitting is done, um, as Dan was talking about, people think, okay,
that's that's all that our staff have to do. Um, in the case of projects like this that are funded either locally with housing trust funds um or sometimes in combination with federal funds, there's um certain document review that we have to do on
behalf of that agency for making sure federal funding compliance is in place and also helping them as they seek other um state grants um that leverage our local funding. Um, also in town meeting for this
spring, uh, is a result of working with the housing advisory board's accessory dwelling unit subcommittee. Um, that subcommittee also included people from different groups, including someone from advisory committee, from the land use committee, and we thought that was really a helpful process and one that
we'd like to um, reproduce as other policy issues come from the state. Um, that way everybody's kind of working on it together as a group, public meetings. Um, we also did a preview of that ADU
bylaw with advisory um, in order to before the warrant closed in order to um, help bring up the understanding of what we needed to do to get that done to be in state compliance. We completed our uh, ARPA funded projects. They are done. You've seen
them. Um, everything from art murals to small business grant programs, expanding the parkletits. Um, moving on to FY27. Um on the left side here are the select board goals for FY27. Not all of them um
but there's five of them there that we think most directly relate to us. And on the right side is um the goals that we put in our budget book. They are extremely aligned. And I just want to thank take a minute to thank you all and thank town administrator Carrie for um
working in these last couple of years to uh work on those goals together when we have time to to plan for them and and then execute. Um so our kind of aligned FY27 goals with the planning department supporting the elements of different
plans that have either been finished or about to be finished. um increasing Brooklyn revenue that would add a million dollars of currently unplanned new growth, facilitating Brooklyn residency for public employees of some of our incomerestricted housing. Um and
then also um thinking about a prioritization of strategies to increase those households as well as promoting mixeduse development along Harvard Street um along with community development standards.
Our operating budget is $1.38 million. Um, compared to last fiscal year, it's a 13% um, cut. The salaries are cut by 19%. Um, and we are increasing our services line item in order to maintain some
technical consulting needs for some of this plan implementation and partially to offset some of the um, critical functions that are being cut. um our cuts to staff will be an impact. Um we think the impact to the public will be
dampened um due to lower permitting case load that we're seeing um this year and part of last year as well as the completion of all those ARPA projects. So we will be okay. It's it's a big cut, but we will be okay is the message here. Um, I don't think that they're going to
likely impact the sleptboard's FY27 goals, but we should have a conversation as we're forming those FY28 goals together and just make sure that we're being reasonable about not adding on any additional initiatives um without the staffing or or other tools that we might be needed. Um, the cuts to staff will
require continued efficiencies in the way we do permitting in order to lower our case load. we may see some additional staff cuts in FY28 and further to better align um with the flatline CDBG funding and the regulations around how that should be
used and Aana will be here later tonight to talk about that. Um but even that might be dampened by some retirements that we're likely to see in FY27. This is our um organizational structure chart. um if you have any questions, but
the cuts that we're having in the staffing side are vacant positions. Um and this has been going on for the last six or seven months, some of these vacancies, and we have purposfully not backfilled them um knowing that FY27 was going to be a tough year. The other
thing that I think is important to let you all know is that in addition to those cuts, um, one of the positions, the senior housing planner position is going off of the CDBG funded position and being picked up by the housing trust for FY27. Um, so it doesn't affect the
town's bottom line, but it is a shift off of CDBG funds onto the housing trust. I don't um the housing advisory board was clear that that wasn't an ongoing vote. That was a vote to get us through the hump of FY27. So that's kind
of another hint of why we may need to look at um staffing levels as we move into FY28. Um but we'll do that in concert with the town administrator's office. And I believe yes, that is it. I am two minutes early which kind of is
scary but um I'm happy to answer any questions and along with our division heads as well. >> All right, any questions from select board members? >> Paul, >> uh thank you Cara and thank you team the back there.
>> Great work. Uh comp plan. So for um the comp plan which will be done soon um implementation which we still need to define specifically what the next steps are but how are you positioned within
your budget to take on additional work for the next steps on any additional planning or uh refinements of the comp plan. So, on the staff side, we are um with the other division heads, we, you know, have a kind of three-year workload
plan, a big huge Gant chart, and we know it's all going to change, but we are looking at using people like Maria Morelli, who is, you know, very good at zoning um to be ready to take on the implementation pieces, but we're also so we have some staff that we can support
from all the divisions to help the comp plan move forward. But one of the reasons why we wanted to ask for significant consulting funds is to help us with whatever project X is that's the top priority for the town. We want to make sure that we have consulting funding to see that through. >> Great. Can I I have two more questions
if I may. Um this is an easy one. What in the world's going on with Waldo Durigan? >> Um I know where Waldo is, but I can't tell you when Waldo is. Um, I have heard different thoughts through the grapevine, not directly from um,
Chestnut Hill Realy. I have heard that when they do come back to the town, they're likely to ask for additional stories. Um, I have heard that they are not close to being ready to come back and ask for that. And I've also heard that they will soon be knocking on our door. So, this is I don't know.
>> No news. >> No news. >> Okay. Um and then my last question just your thoughts on um we now have our second developer um created zoning article that's coming
before town meeting. We have one for uh monities and now we have one for Pleasant Street. Um, I'm curious about your thoughts on the types of challenges that this creates for for you, your department, perhaps for the town, um,
and what we might be able to do to perhaps uh, get ahead of it in some way. >> Um, thank you for that question. I something that we have done for the past five or six years is that when a developer knocks on our door with, you know, maybe we didn't know that they
were thinking about doing something with our property, we always meet with them. We ask some questions. We talk about what the town's plans and policy documents are, what the current select board's objectives are, their top priorities. Um, and that does change every couple
years, right? That shifts a little bit. And then we send them a memo after they leave and says, "Here's what you're proposing. Here's what all the town plans and policies are." And there's a gap. There's usually a gap. Here's all the way that ways that there is a gap. We ask them to reach out to the
community. We ask them to close that gap and align their idea with plans and policies. And we also talk about what other projects are our top priorities and why a one of parcel study especially if it's not extremely meeting town needs
and goals is going to follow at the very bottom if at all. Um so you all supporting that message because I know a lot of you get phone calls from people that are looking for you know oneif of a mayor. So supporting that message would be very helpful. Um I think the
discussion with advisory committee will also um tease some of this discussion out I think in a helpful way. Um and so we'll we'll see where it goes. But sometimes not spending a lot of time and just saying
no is okay. >> Yeah. I guess my my uh one more David thank you. Uh I guess my concern is that at least these two times that it's occurred, the developer is performing community engagement, you know, to the extent that they believe they they
should be doing it. Um and it and it although I do think maybe Romanities, there was maybe a little more interaction with your with your team to help navigate some of the stuff there. This next one doesn't seem so as much.
Um and it uh I I'm concerned it's problematic if we if we're seeing this it's going to be happening more and more. >> Yeah. The the difference um from my perspective of the two processes is in both cases in all cases even if it's something that's allowed by current zoning we always ask the developer to
meet with the neighborhood as a first step. Um that happened in both cases. We followed up with town meeting members in that precinct or neighborhood representatives in both cases to make sure they had actually met with them and we asked what did you hear? What did you see at the meeting? What do your neighbors think? In the case of my
Modney, what we heard is we think this could work. This is a reuse of an existing building. However, we have these two or three ideas that we'd like to make sure that we're going to get button down. And so that's where we spent our time is making sure that what people wanted to come out of that zoning
um was actually on paper. In this more recent example, we didn't hear that from the community. We heard from some people who said yes, this is great in that precinct and we heard from um some people that said no, we can't do this without community process. What we didn't hear is this might work only if
we further developed open space or we got rid of the ground flooror parking. And so that's when it's not worth us to, you know, dig in too much. >> I gota Okay, thank you. >> Anyone else have questions? >> So, one that I have is regarding the accessory dwelling units. You talked
about that a bit and changes that were made uh via warrant articles. Uh where do we stand in terms of ADU permits? If it's still low, to what do you attribute the figure? >> Um I'm gonna look at Polly and see if
she has anything to add. and Dan Bennett, who I'm going to miss terribly, who is our work sibling across the hall, um certainly is more on the front end of this these days, along with Jonathan Simpson. So, you know, a lot of people don't realize when we when we're in this in between phase, multiple departments
are working together, even case by case to make sure that we're still meeting the state law even though our local um bylaws don't meet state standards. I believe that we're still at three or fourish um ADUs a year, something like
that. Um and a lot of those cases are ones where the structure was built in the last couple years and they're now coming back to Dan Bennett and asking for that to be considered an ADU. So, it's like a change of use or a change of the condition. Paulie, do you have anything else to add there?
>> Okay. Um I don't think I answered your question though. Can you can you repeat your question? Well, to what do you attribute that it's only three or four per year? Because I think there had been this great hope that there would be a lot of uh homeowners in particular that want to utilize the changes in ADU law
at both the state level and municipal level. >> Yeah. So, lack of clarity at number one. I mean, there's certainly not as many construction cranes out right in the region. Um, so that is an effect, but at number one, I would say because our local zoning bylaw doesn't conform to
the state laws yet. And because people are allowed to do a little bit more than what our zoning says, but not, you know, who knows exactly how that's going to be interpreted or if it has to go to board of appeals. Paulie, go ahead. >> Holly Silico, regulatory planning director. I mean, what Cara said is
correct. Um, when people call and ask about ADUs and and what should they do? They'd like to have an ADU. We have been explaining to them that our current zoning is not consistent with the state
zoning and therefore things are kind of up in the air and that they really should wait if if they want clarity until this town meeting when we do hopefully pass an ADU
um warrant article that is consistent with what the state has said we can and cannot do. >> Thank you. Another 80 related question I have to the extent that there is uh space in someone's basement for instance
that is already in excess of a,000 square ft because that's just how it was when the person acquired the property. uh does that pre-existing condition come into play in terms of whether it can qualify as an ADU or does someone in
that situation have to essentially divide up that space so that it's no more than 1,000 ft? >> Yeah, unfortunately they would have to divide up the space because there is a maximum amount of space that's allowed for an ADU.
>> All right, thank you. Anyone else have questions? Michael. >> So, uh, you mentioned the three-year Gant chart. Um, and I, uh, I want to, uh, acknowledge, um, Paul's question
about sort of the impact of these one-off projects. Um, but I'm wondering whether there's any specific um assistance from the select board that you can get in order to either
streamline or accelerate what is on that three-year plan. >> Um, I think it will be helpful for us to have a probably a more in-depth conversation about the road map. um maybe even like when HAB when Roger
Blood come especially related to housing issues um and I think we could even have that conversation after you've set the roadmap but then prioritizing which of those many things um should we work on and I think having that conversation with Roger Blood the chair of the housing advisory board would be very
helpful to make sure that we're communicating to you all what to expect with different policy ideas um and then how to prioritize um those into action >> and when you say the roadmap There. Are you referring to the select board? >> Yes. Yep. >> Got it.
>> Paul, just one one final question for me, although others may have more questions. Um, you mentioned that the community planning uh position was being funded by the HAB, >> the senior housing planner. >> Senior housing planner. Uh, Chaz, is that something that needs to be approved by the select board?
>> Yes. And I have not written the memo yet. Okay. >> HAB has made that recommendation. Um, we have carried that assumption through in the budget that's before you. Okay. >> Um but we have not come to you and asked you to approve Hab's recommendation. >> Right. Thank you.
>> All right. Anyone else? Okay. Seeing no more hands, we will move on. Uh thank you very much, Cara, for the presentation. And next we have capital improvement programs with Melissa Goff.
>> So there's a actually Hi, Melissa Goff uh deputy town administrator. There are a few items uh that the board will be taking up. Uh the the CIP, you've gone through most of the departments. Um and so these are basically non-EP departmental budgets. Um I do need some
assistance with my presentation. So uh I did send it to you Melanie. Um or I can log in. It would just take me a minute to log into my email here on this computer. >> I've got it. I >> You've got it. Thank you. Um so we're talking about uh debt and interest unclassified and the capital improvement
plan. Come on, slideshow. Let's go. >> Thank you. >> I'll take less. I promise. >> Of course. >> Thank you, Chess. >> There you go. >> Go ahead and go to the second slide. Here
we go. >> Okay. Um so as you are aware um we have a policy that dictates funding for the CIP. Uh that policy we are diverting from in fiscal 27 and we've talked about um continuing that through the three years of the override. So the CIP is
using 6% of prior year net revenue as the target. Uh and then we are looking at an investment of about $259 million over the the five years of the plan. Uh which is approximately $43 million a year. Uh these items in the CIP, a lot
of them are kind of recurring revenues. Um sorry, not recurring revenues, but recurring appropriations. Uh deferred maintenance is a highlight of the CIP. Street rehab is always uh an issue that we're talking about with uh the advisory committee as well. So, um, given the
full funding of the CIP, when you take the operating revenue that we're dedicating, adding free cash to that, we are also using the overlay surplus coming from the, um, assessing uh, overlay account. Uh, that's $1.5 million that we're also adding to the CIP. And
when you add all of those together, we get to 8.1% of prior year net revenue. So, we are um we're at the policy target um with those additional funds uh added to the equation. Uh and then when we add the debt exclusions, we're actually at
19.8. Uh so, we can go ahead to to the next slide. >> Sorry, it's my fault. >> N there we go. >> So, these are some of the major projects that are in the CIP for the upcoming uh years. And some of these have been kind
of marching along and some of these are new. So as an example, the strategic solar initiative that came out of the work um with the sustainability division working with the expenditure and revenue committee and ZAB. Um so that is a new program that we were able to find funding for in fiscal 27 of $3.2
million. Uh then you have um the town hall electrification which the building department talked about as well. And then uh funding for things like the Washington Street rehab and complete street program which has been marching its way through the CIP for several years now. Uh Lincoln school grounds was something that last year we had to put a
pause on given the uh constraints in the school department budget. Um but that is fully funded in fiscal 27 and 28. Uh design work in 27 and then construction in 28. So we can go ahead to the next slide. So, this just shows how the funding
works for the 8.1% policy. Uh 6.6% is the norm for uh operating revenue and then free cash to get to 8.1. Uh with that, we have a goal of our debt finance piece and our uh revenue finance piece in terms of how much is debt and how
much is uh revenue finance projects. And then we have free cash that gets us to that 8.1. And we can go ahead and go to the next slide. This is also in the book as well. It's um you can't really read it very well from the podium here, but this just shows the articulation of the funding sources and showing how we get
to our policy targets uh for the CIP uh and then how free cash factors into that as well. We can go ahead and uh go to the next one. This is our free cash policy. The board should be very familiar with this. We talk about this all the time. the waterfall, how we are prioritizing uh
the town's overall uh budget reserve position uh primarily. Then we are looking to uh add money to the liability fund uh per the fiscal policies there. There's a part uh target of 1% of prior year net revenue. Uh then we fund our
CIP. If there's any funding after that, we have affordable housing trust fund that we uh add funding to to support the the work there. And then if there's any funding funding available after that, we have special use. There are other trusts that we look at for their fund balances to see if we need to put additional
funding towards that. At this point, we are recommending that the full amount um be used for additional CIP. And I will note that we have not had free cash certified just yet, but um the finance department was pretty confident with the numbers that we were carrying through the plan. We can go ahead and go to >> Can we do a timeout? Sure. Actually, can
I ask a quick question? >> Um and this may be for Chaz. Chaz, we um we had had some discussions about uh diverting the money from the housing trust given the uh the CPA uh funds and other sources of funds for
the the housing trust. Um I thought we were going to use that money for something else. >> We we we talked about it. Um I'm and again I'm happy to have that discussion again if we want if we want to have that discussion in advance of the budget. But I think >> other communities do the CPA
differently. Right? The CPA here is controlled by the CPA committee as it is in other communities. But in other places the CPA committee gives their version of the HAB broad leverage to do what they want with that money. here
they have to apply like everybody else and be considered as part of that which again is a legitimate way to do things but it just means that that is not a guaranteed source of revenue like it is in other communities. Um we do think that they are those bodies are working
well and more closely together but it's also just a matter of I I think we can certainly have that discussion. I would just from from my perspective I would want to see a clearer agreement long-term agreement between the CPA
committee and the HAB on reliable funding for the affordable housing trust out of CPA funds right >> before you took away that source of revenue for them. >> Well, I guess you know we're going through an incredibly difficult time right now. >> Yeah. Right. So I I think it would be helpful for us to discuss you know
before we get to town meeting um whether we want to make an adjustment in the budget. uh for those funds because there is I mean you get some serious holes in the budget. >> We so I have talked with Roger Blood that in in a in a failed override situation that is a vulnerable funding source that likely there'll be motions
on town meeting to move that money elsewhere. So I think he understands that in a you know if the override is successful there's more security around relying on that as a funding source for the for the affordable housing trust. But if the override fails, that that likely will be out up for debate um as
to where it should be allocated. >> And again, I think it's really important to consider, remember, at the end of the day, this is a free free cash, which is onetime money. Um and so we've got to be careful when you talk about the serious things that we have in the budget. You're right. Right. >> But those are structural concerns, >> right? But I I think what I had proposed when we discussed this was to actually
move it into the uh override reserve fund that you developed, stabilization fund. Yes. >> Which would be a great help to have that there. Yeah. Um and again that would be an important trade-off but we you know we do have a cliff that we're coming towards >> certainly in a few years. So >> yep and I think those are those are conversations worth having
>> which we can't fill with CPA money can fill with the free cash. >> Correct. >> Uh this slide here just articulates the revenue finance component of the CIP and you can see how much of it is coming from free cash and the overlay reserve and then how much of it is coming from the general operating revenue. So we can
go ahead and go to the next one. uh uh keep going those uh the next uh category that we're talking about is our debt and interest budget. And so these are principal and interest payments on um bonds that we have. Uh the upcoming bond sale will be happening sometime this spring. Uh and then we are looking
to go out for um some the pier school and the fire station projects prim primarily. So that is the majority of the increase that you're seeing there. And then um a small piece for um building related uh roof and mason masonry work. Um so we can go ahead and
go to the next. And so this is kind of in line with the policies that we were just talking about. Um these are some of the other areas of unclassified. These essentially are items in the budget that don't belong to a particular department, but they are um funding uh requirements that
we have. As an example, the audit and professional services budget that is our annual audit. Um the town administrator does have an account or did have an account um for professional services where he would engage in consulting for a ver variety of reasons uh in a no override scenario. We are reducing that
budget. So that's why you see the decline. Uh property insurance we actually got a an updated quote from our insurance consultant which did show a little bit of a decline. Um the advisory committee is very um tuned into this and you know some of that is likely related
to Pierce being offline and um they are mindful that there likely will be a bump once we are fully online with Pierce. Um then we have the contingency fund. You'll see that's a big drop there. That is where we parked the money for the Lincoln school grounds in fiscal 26 when we were looking um at potentially using
that to solve the school department uh budget at the end of the year when we were trying to figure out um how we were going to close what they had as a remaining gap. They ended up closing that using circuit breaker funds. Um so uh those funds are still sitting in the contingency fund. But I will say that as
we are looking at developing a budget amendment for fiscal 26 and given where we are with snow and ice and fire overtime and utility projections, we are likely going to need to use every bit of that 970. So it's al it's a good thing that we didn't need it uh and that we
have it available to us to help us balance out the the close of the year. Uh and then the the accounts at the bottom are the policy requirements for the affordable housing trust fund, the liability fund, and the stabilization fund. And that uh that pretty much captures all of those items. Uh and
Tiffany, not sorry, not Tiffany, Melanie, I will give you your three minutes back. Of course, I have it with the >> All right. Any questions, Paul? >> I have uh just one one comment. Um
although I could maybe turn it into a question, but um it has to do with the CIP and um our improving roadway situation. >> Okay. >> With the funding, how much are we how much is in the CIP for roadway maintenance this year? >> I believe it's around 5.3 million
>> about 5.3 >> for the town's contribution. And then we have the state chapter 90 as well. >> Right. Right. And I just I want to um just mention that you know maybe two years ago um we worked this board with in collaboration with the transportation
board and also under Erin Chute's leadership um we transformed our policies around complete streets which was really preventing um uh maintenance ongoing maintenance of our roadways in a way that would prevent
you know continued degradation of pave pavement. Um, and we got in, if you remember, we had this long presentation about the pavement management, I think the PMI, the pavement management index. Um, which is fascinating, but um, I I think I just want to speak briefly about
this and emphasize the importance of us sticking to our policy for, um, enabling our, uh, commissioner of DPW to continue to maintain our roadways without having to reconfigure them completely. Um, this
is showing up. The reason why I raised this is this is showing up a little bit. I've started to get some phone calls. Maybe my colleagues have gotten phone calls from folks looking to just just make it a protected bike lane on Harvard Street. You know, bump the cars out and make a protected bike lane. Um, I you
know, I the the policy that we put in place was a pavement management to maximize the longevity of our payment pavement so that it doesn't deteriorate to the point where it costs three, four, five times more. um that policy is in place. Harvard streets being done by that. It's not a complete streets
project, although there are some improvements going on with ADA ramps and stuff. But um at this stage of the game to to pause the project, have community engagement for seniors, for pedestrians, for the businesses. We know what it was like to
go through Chestnut Hill uh and also Washington Street. Um, I think it's really important that we allow DPW to maintain the roadways the way we've empowered them to and also do those significant projects where we're looking to reconfigure things uh for bike lanes
and other uh mobility enhancements. Um, all in support of that. It's not a huge amount of money. 5 million is not a huge amount of money to maintain our roadways when we're probably a hundred million in the hole, I think was the last estimate. Um, so I just wanted to to make that
comment and encourage us and this board uh to stay the course uh and the future board to stay the course and making sure that our roads are maintained in a way that makes them safe for uh pedestrians, bicyc and and and automobiles. So thanks. That's my comment. John,
>> I want to thank Paul for that comment. And you know, I think Paul, you realize you're you're preaching to the choir here, as they say. Um, you know, the select board uh uh in in my time has been um united. Um took a little doing, but we all came around to the same point
of view, which is that we were not making enough progress um on maintenance of streets. Now we're playing catch-up. Um and that's good. Um just a quick comment because you mentioned the Harvard Street project and um uh I I think you absolutely put your finger on
the number one reason not to suddenly depart from the uh planned reconstruction of the seat the street over the course of this summer. Um uh but there is a secondary reason which I I I will defer to anyone who can prove
me wrong on this but people keep raising the example and it's a good example of a of a good bike lane that is well protected um in an area Paul's very familiar with the St. Mary's area. Um, but I think what maybe people are missing is it worked there because you
still have two lanes of you have room for two lanes of car traffic, you know, in addition to the parked cars that are, you know, set apart set away from the curb and in addition to the protected bike line that is lane that is between the parked cars and the curb. um you've
got two lanes of traffic so that when cars have to do this a little bit unusual maneuver of uh pulling up alongside a uh lane that is a little bit in the middle of the street um to parallel park um in a space that is
available. They don't stop all traffic while they figure out how to parallel park because there's there's a second lane for for everyone to be diverted into and and to go around the car that is parallel parking um in in those
parking spaces that are kind of out in the middle of the street. We don't have that on Harvard Street. And um without having done any study and without being any an expert on this subject, I would venture to say there's probably not room for the kind of protected lane that
would require um there to be uh a certain width of lane available to the right of a whole bunch of parked cars, which would then have a space available in the middle of the street to do backing into the the parking spaces
without completely tying up um traffic uh on Harvard Street. So I I solutions that work in some places don't necessarily work in other places. And um I'm glad that you know the people who are watchful people who are um advocates for bicycling are watching all of this
and are speaking up. But I also think that the right decision has been made by our DPW. Um sorry to take too long for that comment. I did have a further question just just um for Melissa and it's a very broad question but it's one that I think about um um now and then um
in in all that we do for capital projects um to do new things but also mainly to do maintenance of our existing capital infrastructure. Um, do we take the big big big picture view um from
time to time to say, you know, if you add up all of the um sunk investment in our in our drainage systems, in our road systems, in our sidewalk systems, you name it, name it, name it, name it. Our buildings, etc., etc., etc.
and you consult the guidelines that would be used let's say in industry for when you have sunk investment in infrastructure. Can you do a ballpark estimate of what you should be spending on a year-to-year
basis given deterioration of your, you know, sunk investment, etc., etc. And do we ever do that kind of a periodic big big picture look and then say, you know, we really should be spending $60 million a year, you know, um, total on all this,
but we're only spending 50. so that we have a a handle on whether we actually regardless of where the money is going to come from, we're actually spending enough or maybe not spending enough um on maintenance and upkeep of our capital
infrastructure. Yeah, I would say that in certain areas we have, you know, formal studies that help us like the PCI, you know, the pavement condition index, you know, DPW knows what they would need to kind of keep the pavement in the condition that they would like to see, you know, that would be a good
standard for the town to have. Um, for building maintenance, I think, um, that is a little bit more difficult, but we have done a lot of significant building maintenance projects over the past decade. Um, that has put us in a very good position. I think that we could also um point to the water and sewer
infrastructure investments that this town has made and how we're seeing that savings manifest in our MWR assessments. Um so that just shows that we're getting a return on on the efforts that we are doing there. Uh in terms of you know there are metrics that are used by the ratings agency in terms of our level of
debt uh and things like that. Those are kind of measures as to whether or not we're you know utilizing de debt in a in a sufficient way. Um but we also have a robust um revenue finance CIP that also plays into that as well. So I would say
that you know there are certain measures that we do consider when we're building the plan. Um but it is kind of uh dependent on the on the overall project and the department u recommendations around the the level of investment. >> Dave, if I may quick follow up because you said something interesting which I
confess I hadn't thought about before. So, uh, did I hear you say that the rating agencies actually it's not that they constantly worry that the municipality might be spending too much debt that they also look at, you know, >> given what this community has to
protect, >> they should have a consistent level of debt that is used to fund, you know, uh, new new capital projects and upkeep on existing capital. Yeah, there's a in the narrative for the CIP, it describes the kind of the ratio that they are using
and what they are looking for out of cities and towns. >> Interesting. Good. >> Paul, oh, I'm sorry, Michael. >> I've already asked a question, Michael. Go ahead, Michael. >> Um, so, uh, ear earlier in the select board's deliberations, we had been
talking about, um, having a committee looking at all of our, um, infrastructure in terms of buildings and so forth. Um, and I was caught uh by your comments about property insurance um in the context of of whether or not
the select board should re-engage in this question of like are we using our buildings? Well, uh are there buildings that we should be trying to acquire or trying to dispose of? And I'm wondering whether in the context of of our sort of
broad maintenance plan that you and and John have been discussing um whether you have any thoughts about the value of that work um and whether how the select board should re-engage with that that challenge um in the context of our
overall uh our overall infrastructure >> um in terms of the the property values and and >> well in terms of in in terms of like are we getting the best uh economic value? Are we having to maintain things that
we're actually not using efficiently? Um and sort of all those kinds of concerns of of our physical infrastructure that end up get having impacts on our budget. Yeah, I I think that we do um you know, for our infrastructure, we Charlie Simmons does a phenomenal job with the
upkeep of our buildings. Um we have a 25-y year plan for roof and masonry that we've been doing for just about 25 years, and we're now kind of going back to the beginning of the line and starting all over again. Um and then in terms of um he is trying to pair the
town policies around sustainability with the work that he's currently doing around solar. Um, you know, I think when he first started, there was a capital um in there was essentially a plan that he was given to implement the the hiring the creation of his position was to
actually implement a a long-term building maintenance plan. And um you know, we've talked about whether or not we we should kind of spend funds to re redo that plan or whether or not um it's worth doing that or whether or not he has all of the components of that plan
kind of in his head that maybe needs to just be put to paper so that we can kind of continue the work that he's doing. >> Right. But I was also in addition to to those sort of necessary pieces for the for the uh physical infrastructure that we have. I the the the related question
has to do with uh the capacity that that physical infrastructure provides to the town. Are we using that capacity to its best advantage? >> Yeah. And I think that there are pockets of studies that also point to this. I'm
thinking the park and open space master plan talking about that we don't have enough fields for our population um and you know what we can do to try and expand on that. So I think that there are >> maybe not fully consolidated plans that kind of point to the utilization of town
spaces um but nothing that kind of provides like a comprehensive summary of that. Okay. >> Thank you. >> Question I have about the Washington Street corridor also bike lane related. I see that for FY28
looks like there will be uh 29 million coming in from the federal government. >> So that's the state the state which I mean it's a combination of state and federal, >> right? So has has that already been approved or are we still assuming that it will be approved? >> So we are on the tip. So I believe that
you know we are you know if we're continuing in the schedule that we're it should be happening in fiscal 28 as long as we are remaining on the tip. >> Okay. Paul, >> uh, one of our favorite subjects, pool.
>> Um, two parts of my question. One is, um, I'm combing through the CIP. I can't find it. Do we have any placeholder for a pool at this point or are we still thinking about whether we need a pool? We are still funding our existing pool
and there's a significant maintenance pro uh project in fiscal 27 dealing with our existing pool. >> But this would be for an outdoor pool, >> right? So the outdoor pool I I believe um is still in planning stages and there's no formal request that I have received that I would be able to
actually put into any kind of debt service plan. >> Okay. Wreck is wreck has engaged a consultant and is looking and is doing the >> study as has been requested by town meeting. >> Yeah. I you know I'm not going to prejudge the outcome of that. >> So I want to so just want to intersect
that with the conversation we had a week ago and I I think you had made a commitment to have us have this discussion before the end of the month which is uh the DPW site at Lars Anderson. >> Yes. and yeah and and you know whether that
site is included in an RFP that's going out uh for a study of that area which should in my mind include the possibility for that site being repurposed for something else which could include a pool as opposed to storage of uh DPW vehicles and other
assorted junk. >> So what I'll say about that is that is an active site, right? So, it isn't just, you know, it's not it's it's not just junk, right? We are using it. >> Well, there's a lot of junk there. You would admit that. >> I mean, there's it's pretty dusty. It's pretty, you know, there's a lot of heavy metal there. Um there's going to be
there's I'm sure there's leaded gasoline in the ground. There's going to be a lot of issues there. Um there's this best in the buildings, I'm sure. Um so, I that discussion has to that discussion dovetales with the broader discussion of
DPW's facilities. There is also money in the budget to conduct an analysis of DPW's facilities at large, the transfer station, the municipal service center, the water and sewer building, that area um at large. Um and trying to think
about how we effectively utilize that space and consolidate that space. But I think the you know the predominant question there is not could you put a pool there, but where would those existing what what what would we do with that existing storage? how would we deal with it? And I think that is a broader
question that we have to address holistically with DPW. Um because I don't think it's fair to them to say this is your problem without also addressing the critical space needs that they have been experiencing as a
department. Um so okay so my and here's and again it does relate tangently to the CIP. So there is an RFP that's going out. I don't know if it's been issued yet, but there's an RFP that is going to be reviewing Lars Anderson um in some way, shape, or form that my
understanding is it it excludes the DPW area, >> right? >> Um which which to me, I don't know how you can exclude multiple acres that frankly are not in keeping with the use of what that what the will asked for. I don't know how I don't know how DPW ever
got space allocated at Lars Anderson. um it seems completely uh not in line with what um the you know the the will uh in the land acquisition or gift to us was for. Um and you know I would just
encourage us to look seriously at that at rep repurposing that site to be in keeping with the the the will of the Andersons who who who gave us that land. Um, and and I do think that could include a number of things, including
restoring it to walled gardens or putting a pool there, but certainly not a place to store DPW equipment and discarded meters. And I mean, I' I've walked that site many many times. It's it's a mess and there's a lot of junk there. Probably some heavy metals as
well, but discarded stuff. Um, that that Anyway, that's my point. And I hope that we can actually take a serious effort to to look at that. um and include this RFP to look at that site for potential repurpose. >> I think you know and I think all I'm I'm
saying here is that that's almost a different I understand where that comes from but then you have to think about how that's effectively you're looking at almost a different sort of asset class. You're asking about moving one one one purpose re readting one purpose for another and in the abstract looking at
Mars right yes you can think about what could go there what's theoretically would be has to go there but in order to answer that question you have to ask the answer the other question which is where what is the stuff that is currently there where is that going to go >> so when so when when have we initiated the study to look at that to determine
>> that's in FY27 >> that's going to be done in FY27 >> to look specifically at that site or is that part of a broader issue >> broader analysis of what are we doing with DPW's space at large? How can we how can we better and more effectively use DPW space? Is it possible that DPW
needs more space and what do we what how do we do that? >> We could allocate more large Anderson for for storing a uh >> we have the same issue with the building department at Fischer Hill right now. We have maintenance staff in that building. If there's a new use that's being desired for the that building, we've got to figure out what we're going to be doing with the building department
staff. So it's the same it's the same issue >> and so again it's not saying I it's not saying no I think I think we should be considering what we do with debt space. I think it is I I agree as in principle that it should be a priority for us to think about how to you know maximize the
use of parkland for parkland related purposes >> and also that lot is where it is and we need to figure out what to do with that function that function can't disappear. Your answer is that there's going to be a study in 27. Yeah. >> Around DPW needs. Yes. >> In locations.
>> Yes. >> And the only thing I would ask is since we are going to be issuing an RFP for a master plan or some plan around Lars, it should include the DPW space just in case we determine, hey, we found a place
for this stuff to go and now that that area is free and clear. Why have to go through another master plan or augmentation of the master plan? um have them look at the space and we shall have that option. That's my suggestion, but we're way off the CIP now. Thank you.
>> Anyone else? John. >> Um and I hope this doesn't get us even further off, but uh I I do think there's an interesting question behind the discussion that just went on between Paul and Chaz. Um and that is um where are the lines drawn between the control
of the park and recck commission over the use of land at Lars Anderson Park versus the control of the select board um over the use of land at the at Lars Anderson Park. >> You know, I don't know the answer to that question. Um >> an interesting question. It is. I mean,
and I'll say too, like the last time the the number of special laws that govern parks and wreck and DPW in particular in Brooklyn are a very tangled web um and so it's I mean COS did some really good
work on this um right before I arrived, so around four years ago now um about the history of how the parks and recck commission has evolved and what they have authority over versus what they don't um what DPW has authority over and therefore the select board. Um it's my
understanding that parks and wrecks >> mandate they have large they have stronger authority over wreck than they do over parks. They have a kind of advisory authority over parks and they have mandatory authority over wreck. Um but that's >> that's at a very high level. Um and
that's not going into some of the nuances there. Um, so I can do a little more digging and talk about that in the Lars context specifically, but generally speaking, right, there's been a, you know, there was a board of parks and a board of wreck. They were merged. Well, some got some functions got abolished.
>> DPW in the early 80s wound up taking some of the direct responsibilities of the parks commission and putting them into the department, which put them under your authority rather than the >> uh the parks and recck commission's authority. So, it's complicated. Um, but I can do some digging for you.
>> Might might not at the same time might not be a bad idea to look at the overlapping authorities of the transportation board and the select board. Oh boy. In terms of who who makes the decisions on whether a street project should be as the one is that we're going to do on Harvard Street this
summer, you know, or is it even the select board? you know, cuz I I I know the transportation board had a very interesting discussion on all of that and came to the conclusion, good for them, that we're going to do the project that we're going to do. Um, but what if they had come to the opposite decision?
Um, I I I you know, >> there's I mean, right, that's sometime now we're now we're getting farfield, but I know, you know, but yes, you know, >> but it it impacts our capital >> in in how we use our capital >> in theory, right? Decisions transportation board can be appealed to the select board. Um, and there's nothing in the rules and says the select
board can't appeal a decision to the transportation board to itself. >> Yeah, but that usually applies to they've granted some change and it impacts a neighborhood and the neighborhood objects. Um, but you know, when it comes to like doing it one way instead of doing it another way,
>> right? And that's where I'm not sure about. Um, >> that's also where town meeting comes into play in the appropriation vote that essentially will dictate what the work plan is. >> Yeah. All right. Right. Any further questions, comments?
Seeing none, thank you very much, Melissa. And we will now move on to warrant articles and public hearings. First up is article 12 regarding the transparency of public record request
and responses. Uh this will be a public hearing, so I'll open the public hearing. But first, let's hear from the petitioners. All right, Mike Toffel, whenever you're ready.
>> Uh, Alex is just running over from AC. He'll be online in about 30 seconds, >> but I can begin in his absence. So, uh, we're we we are co-partetitioners for Ward Article 12 and 24. They're, uh,
linked in some ways. They're both regarding access to public records. Uh, the bylaw is 12, uh, is uh, seeking uh, to make the public record
requests made of the town publicly ex public publicly visible on the town website as it is in many other towns. Uh, Warren article 24 is a resolution that asks
uh for the moderator committee uh well it endorses the select boards handbook revisions that we spoke about with uh with the town administrator which is asking all
boards uh in their emailing to copy the Brook a Brookline MA archive email so that the town can have access to those records when responding to public records requests. So that's already
going to be required by the select board of select boardapp appointed committees. We're asking for uh others as well. So we're endorsing that and we're asking others as well like moderator appointed committees including the AC to similarly
follow suit. So that's uh what you're seeing in 24. And again, 12 is looking for the town of Brooklyn to, in a sense, catch up in its transparency practices to those of other towns in uh our other
municipalities in Massachusetts that use the very same software that we use uh to uh open up and let the public see what public record requests are being issued. And we had a conversation with uh the
town uh clerk and town council at an AC subcommittee where they expressed to us some concerns about the cost of of uh allowing the public especially to to see on public website the responses
because there was a concern about the need therefore to do redaction. That's not necessary when uh sending it directly to an individual. But if you put it on the website, apparently there's additional reduction required. And also there's a pending modification of the ADA, the
American Disabilities Act, that will place additional burdens on the town to uh uh to have to make all public records or all documents on websites publicly accessible. And so that would include it's not less of a problem for text, but
a bigger problem for images and for graphics and so on. So they express some concerns there. So we uh are trying to meet uh those concerns but with a compromised provision that I think Alex is here now
and he can sort of take over for me. >> Good evening everyone. Apologies for my lateness just switching over from the advisory committee. Um sounds like Mike gave a great overview of the two articles already. So, I'll just jump in and comment briefly on the changes that we've made um to the petitioner's motion
under warrant article 12 um which I believe we shared and should be in your packet this evening. Um there's a couple um I think important changes that we've made here. Um and as Mike mentioned, this all flows from our conversation with the town clerk and town council. Um
so one is we've added definitions for what we mean by the requests and responses um that we are through this bylaw um directing the town to publish on a periodic basis. Um so now we've offered clarity that the requests
include um the name of the requester, the date that request was submitted, the department to which the request was made and the text of the actual request. Uh meanwhile, as Mike mentioned, to um avoid the pitfalls and costs associated with the new ADA policy for any for the
posting directly of any public documents um provided in response to one of these requests. We've clarified that the responses we'd like to see published um include only the response date um the responding department and a brief description of the response provided
rather than the actual posting pro proactively of all the public records produced um and that that um response or that summary rather should include a list of the public records provided. Um we think that strikes a comfortable balance between um the cost burden
that'd be necessary for the increased redaction and accessibility requirements of directly posting the documents. Um, under our compromised motion, residents would still be able to verify, excuse me, that the town is responding to these requests in a timely manner, and they
would also be able to see the content of the request. And should they desire to review the public documents themselves, would be able to easily submit follow-up requests for the same public documents, which presumably would have already been redacted for the initial response and could then be shared without additional
costs um to any interested members of the public. The second main change in this motion um is that um we have changed the timeline by which we request that these reviews
and postings be done. Um originally that was um significantly shorter. Um it was 14 days. We've lengthened that to 30. Um and what that allows um and again this flows from our conversation with Ben Kaufman is for this work to be done in
batches. um and for it to be done periodically rather than um the town clerk needing to work this into their daily work stream. Um, so what we'd be talking about now essentially would be at the end of each month the town clerk posting um a summary document that
includes um all the requests and the relevant information I mentioned as well as the response summaries including the lists of the documents provided but again while avoiding the very costly accessibility um requirements that will be placed on the town in the coming
months. Um, and I just note in terms of some specific cost estimates, um, we very intentionally modeled the new requirements in the petitioner's motion on a public records request that, um, we
became aware of through the process of bringing this article that was submitted by Brookline News. Um, Brookline News in that request submitted um, a retrospective look back of all the public records requests that the town had produced over the LA or received
rather over the last calendar year. Um, that work um, which Ben was uh, generous enough to provide us rundown of the staff time required and the per hour costs that were associated with that. >> Um, cost in total uh, about $2,400.
So we would be essentially annualizing that cost by asking for a 12th of that work being done each month. Um we feel that is a reasonable compromise. It uh preserves the very real I think transparency concerns and rationale behind these articles while also
ensuring that any cost impact and staff time impact um will be um evenly distributed throughout the year. It'll be done in a way where it can be um methodically added to monthly work practices. Um, and it's we we feel really the least resource intensive and
disruptive way um to, as Mike said, catch up to these other municipalities and what we really feel is basic transparency practices. Um, so with that, I I would ask you consider a vote of favorable action and we're happy to take any questions. Thank you. All right. Thank you, Alec. So, do we have
any questions or comments from board members? >> Michael, >> I just have one clarifying question. Um, when you mentioned the $4,400 cost, uh, was that a cost for materials? Did that include staff time? Um, what were the
components of that? >> Yeah, that's a great question, Michael. So, so just to be clear, the cost was 2400. Um, and the main driver of that cost was staff time. Um these requests when or when responses are crafted to
these requests um there is staff you know time requirements placed on the clerk's office for compiling the documents um and also making necessary redactions which are required under state law in many cases. Um there's also um
sometimes additional requirements on department heads when a request involves a specific town department. Though typically the role of that department head will be as a reviewer rather than um the primary author of the response to
the request. So the overwhelming majority if not the entire cost that we're presenting is staff time. And that just reflects the realities of of how we respond to these requests. >> And and just a one quick follow-up question. Um was that was the rate of uh
converting staff time to dollars there based on on a standard rate for public service requests or was it based on an actual calculation of the cost of the staff person who did that work?
>> Yeah. So what we um sought to do with the the assistance of the town clerk and in our meeting with him was to get an estimate basically of what the the highest hourly rate um might be for someone conducting this work. So that calculation is um based off of a
composition of the clerk's hourly rate and his uh um you know for his part in that responsibility and for the hourly rate of the department head. Um I believe we flat estimated that at 100 an hour which we understand is a fairly
conservative estimate. Um the average department head hourly rate we were given at that meeting was somewhere in the 80s. So we rounded it up to 100 to be inclusive of fringe. Um so we actually feel this is somewhat of a a conservative cost estimate. >> Thank you
>> Paul. I thanks Alec and Mike. I'm I guess I want to dig in a little bit into the technical aspect of this and then raise it back up to a broader question. So So if I understand your first what system do we use for tracking requests
today >> called foyer direct? >> We do use foyer direct. >> Yeah. >> And that's is that what Newton's using? It's I can't remember exactly, but in the article explanation, we provide screenshots of other towns that use FOYA direct that have not chosen the private
settings that we have, but rather the public settings that we're seeking. >> Okay. So, we use Foyer Direct and it looks like I think based on your documentation, Newton um is also using as well. So, we're already putting in someone's sitting down and keying in the
request into this system, correct? >> Yeah. >> Okay. Yes. Um, and then I assume this this platform allows you to expose that publicly based on some security setting. Uh, so that the public could actually see what came in and what the status is.
Is that >> Yeah, we're just asking for us to do what other towns are doing with the very same software. >> Okay. So, that's I'm just uh be patient with me because I'm trying to just fundamentally understand what you're doing uh what you're proposing. So, the the labor of $2,400 a year,
>> what would that what would that entail? Is that the effort it takes to click the button and publish it, or is that to make sure that whatever the responsive documents are that were sent to the requester are loaded in and and properly indexed and whatever complete in the
system. So, so Paul, that cost estimate was um one we got directly from an analogous work product produced through this process, which was as I mentioned that public records request that Brookline News submitted. Um so that was a
calendar year summary of all requests received. Um and as we mentioned, it's not as comprehensive as um what some of the other communities that utilize FOYA Direct have made public. Um, as Mike mentioned, you can see in our explanation what that public facing screen from, say, Framing aim looks
like. Um, we did inquire with the town clerk as to, you know, is the easiest solution just turning on the public facing setting with Foya direct. Um, he had raised some concerns about that. Um, and he had noted that his understanding was that would come along with
additional requirements for new redactions. Um, so again, we wanted to be flexible. We wanted to reach compromise. So, we base this on, you know, a process that the clerk has already successfully completed um that we feel again would honor the spirit of this bylaw and the transparency needed while minimizing costs.
>> Okay. So, so I just again I want to just really understand. So, you're essentially asking to publish the index. >> Yes. >> Right. And in on a regular basis and would that include the response a link to the responsive documents? That's my question. So, this is where we would
potentially run a foul of the new ADA requirements for the municipality. And this is why Mike and I in in this version of the petitioner's motion have taken out the requirement that the public documents be directly posted. And the reason for that is um if we required
that they be publicly posted on the town website, each of the public documents would have to be u meticulously screened and made fully accessible by staff. it would be fairly expensive based on the estimates we heard. Um, so as I mentioned, our our thinking here is
well, let's provide a description of the response. So, a brief substantive summary and then a list of the public documents provided. And what that would allow is because they would have already had to be redacted by the clerk to respond to the initial request. They just hadn't been made accessible. This
would mean that if an if an interested citizen when the index was posted saw that this request had been made saw the documents were that were provided it would be very easy as a matter of princ or of fact for them to submit their own request and because the documents would already have been prepared and redacted
appropriately they could be directly shared at that point by >> all right and so then I guess this will get to my my broader comment um and so this does seem if if the estimate's right to seem to be a minimal impact financially But I do I
worry Alec that at a time when we are really concerned about uh maintaining existing service levels uh actually we're not maintaining existing service level because we're cutting and we're going to ask the voters for a whole lot
of money uh that this is proposing expanding services uh that will cost money. So, I I do appreciate that you're saying it's it's a small amount of money, but that small amount of money could quickly expand into a large amount of money um you know, in order to be
able to translate those a those documents ADA compliance in the future, but you're not asking for that right away. Um it's just it really is it's kind of a messaging thing that we're we're cutting services right now. Um and you're asking to expand services. Uh and it's just it's a it's a complicated
message uh right now given the times that we're in. If if I might, Paul, I I'm very receptive to that critique and, you know, we've had a number of other articles that have come before the advisory committee and that's been, you know, a concern we've all expressed. Um, I will say though, I think in terms of
the impact on public trust for the minimal amount of dollars we're asking for here, I actually think the impact of this could be quite profound. Um, as we began the process of crafting these articles, we um, put out a call on the list serve just to kind of see what was out there and what people's experience
had been like with the public records process. Um, and what we heard was was really, really troubling. Um, there is at minimum a perception problem about transparency in the public records process with our town. Um, it may extend
further than that. So I I actually see this in a time where faith in government is really being strained to its limit. I think this is something we just cannot afford to ignore at this point. Um particularly given the state's complete um stepping away of responsibility for
this process. Yeah, I I I can't I'm not going to I don't want to debate you and I'm not going to completely disagree with you, but I think of the 62 63,000 residents in Brooklyn, um there is such a narrow narrow narrow narrow sliver
that would even consider what you just said to be a real problem. Um you know, there's a there's a very narrow group of folks in Brooklyn that will do foyer requests. That doesn't mean it's not important and transparency is important, but I think what they're really concerned about is their tax bills,
maintaining the streets, making sure we get enough teachers and police officers and firefighters. And you know, those are the things that I hear from constituents. I'm not getting any call from constituents saying my my foyer request is not uh visible on the website and not responding to me quickly. As a
matter of fact, in all the time I've been in government, I've never had anybody say that to me. So again, I it it's it's a messaging thing, Alec. Um given where we are right now and and in in this moment in time where we're we're
asking the voters to approve a $23.25 million uh override, operating override, so that we can not cut services. You're asking to expand services. It's a messaging problem. And I'll just >> I'm a little I'm a little confused at what we're doing here. seems like we're
debating the merits as if we're voting on it here at select board. At least from my perspective, what would be helpful is any input you have on the article that we'll bring to town meeting. >> Well, Mike, I actually Mike, right now I can say whatever I please. Uh you're
coming before the select board. I'm asking questions. I'm giving you feedback. It's my right as a select board member. I have three more weeks to do it and you won't shut me down. Thank you, >> John. Uh well, thank thanks to the sponsors
for bringing this article. Thanks to Paul for asking some good questions, I think. Um and I hope my questions are are also worthy of consideration. >> Mr. Tooff will determine that for you. >> Okay. >> Apparently, >> no comment. Um, so, uh, the Secretary of
the Commonwealth, um, and the attorney general are responsible for enforcement of the Massachusetts public records law. Um, who would be responsible for a measure taken at the local level in Brooklyn that goes beyond the
requirements of the Massachusetts public records law, >> the town clerk's office and with the assistance of relement >> compliance compliance with the stat the bylaw would be the town clerk. But but
who who would be in charge of >> enforcing? Could someone appeal to the attorney general and say there's a municipal bylaw that goes beyond the Massachusetts public records law and the their town clerk is not enforcing the uh
complying with the municipal bylaw? >> My understanding is enforcement would proceed according to the general bylaws which are governed by articles 10.1 through 10.3 just as any other bylaw. >> Uh but well uh you you you're good at you're very conversant with what is in
that section. What what does that say? >> Well, it says a couple things. Um, it says that bare minimum the officers of the police department can enforce any bylaw. It also establishes joint enforcement authority um between multiple departments in certain cases.
Um, I also think, you know, we'd be governed largely by the public record state law here um for appellet matters. Um, but yeah, no, I mean the the the penalty for violation of this bylaw would be a fine as it is for numerous
other bylaws >> enforced by the police >> potentially. Yes. >> So you're actually by virtue of this um this warrant article, you're adding a responsibility to the responsibilities of the Brooklyn Police Department. only
in so much as we anticipate the clerk not complying with the bylaw. And I've been given no reason to believe that would be the case. >> And and so you an officer of the Brooklyn police would show up at the town clerk's office and say um we order you to comply with the municipal bylaw,
not this not the state uh law on public records. >> Well, this is in many ways discreet from state law because as you mentioned, this is a separate requirement that's not created under state law. But there's no such requirement under the state public records bylaw. Public records laws, excuse me.
>> That's right. >> Okay. Um well, well, John, I I think that Alec is simply explaining how any bylaw is enforced. So, in theory, the police and the relevant departments enforce any bylaw, whether it's this one or any other that comes before us or is
already in existence. >> Right. And I can easily conceive of, you know, police ticketing someone for parking, overparking a parking meter, enforcing that as to, you know, a municipal extension beyond the requirements of the Massachusetts public
records law. I'm not so sure that that the police would would actually have the authority to do that. >> Let me let me just be clear on this, right? Like if someone doesn't comply with a mandatory duty of a by and there's no fine or other criminal violation in the bylaw, the police chief
of police is here. um I know are not going to are not going to arrest that person because there's no grounds to arrest them um for failing to comply with that. It's not a listed penalty. You have to know that there's a possibility that you will be arrested or otherwise uh u penalized for failing to
follow this in order for that to happen. What's more likely to happen if is what happens when any when there's an allegation that anyone is not complying with a mandatory duty in a bylaw, which is they take us to court um and they get a court order that says you must comply. You you are not comp you're out of compliance. You have a mandatory duty.
You've got to comply with this. Um and then if there's an issue with that, there's a cont you can move for contempt of court. But again, we're not in the business of defying court orders. Um so I think that this hypothetical may may not be kind of realistic. I think what would happen in this circumstance is
what would happen in any circumstance. Um where there was an allegation that the town wasn't complying with the requirements of the bylaw. >> Um so I would really want us to be clear on that. You know again as with anything right if town meeting directs if town meeting passes a bylaw and directs us to
to to do something we do it. Um so I don't want to be in that situation. I think there would be a question to I think John what you may be asking is is there a you know basically a supremacy clause question here is there does state law preempt local law on this? >> Yes.
>> I don't I I don't maybe town council wants to answer that because I don't know the answer. >> Well, and if I may just sharpen the question a little bit. um uh you know, wouldn't the wouldn't the obvious path as it is under the Massachusetts um uh
uh public records law be to sue um uh uh at the state level the town clerk of Brooklyn, but what for what? Because he could say, "I'm in compliance with the Massachusetts public records law." Um and this municipal law actually goes
beyond the Massachusetts public records law. So, as long as I'm in compliance with the Massachusetts law, um, you know, uh, there really isn't grounds to sue me here. >> Joe, what say you? >> Joe may be in transit, so >> Nope. Uh, I am I am at home uh, working
on my computer, but I was paying attention and I understand the question of um, if this uh, warrant article were to pass, what's the enforcement mechanism? And there isn't one. um because it wouldn't go to the supervisor and the attorney general's office because that's a bylaw and they enforce
the public records law, a state law. Um violations of bylaws generally um residents don't have standing to take us to court, take the town to court for violations of uh local bylaws. That's been an argument I've raised u many
times before as a municipal lawyer. Okay. Bernard has his hand raised. >> Bernard. >> Yeah. Um question I think should always be raised uh with respect to certain warrant articles is why do you need a
warrant article? Why can't you just talk to the town clerk and work it out so that he turns on the function on uh Hoya direct and uh this is solved? And the reason why is that there are just too many things that could be solved without
warrant articles that end up going to town meeting taking up a lot of our time and uh in some cases even though the amount here is relatively minor you say uh costing a lot of money unfunded type
mandate um I mean seems to me a question of you know you don't trust that you can work with a town clerk to um make this relatively minor going to change. >> So I can speak to that. So I appreciate that, Bernard. I always start by talking
to staff always before proceeding with a bylaw. In some cases, we proceed with the bylaw even if staff agrees because we want to have town meeting be the one to determine when to turn on or off that agreement that we make informally. In
this particular case, uh, our discussions with the town clerk led to, uh, did not lead the town clerk to turn on the functionality. So, here we are. >> Did Did the town clerk give you an
explanation for as to why the clerk's office was reluctant to proceed in the manner that you're suggesting with this bylaw? So what what the town clerk told us in terms of the turning on the public facing functionality of FOYA direct was
that his concern with that is that would raise more requirements for redactions um for the various uh information that is contained in those fields. um which again per the estimates for cost and staff time we were given would have
raised the implementation cost significantly above um the cost associated with our revised petitioners motion. Um so you know I I think even though to Mike's point you know we ended up here with a bylaw proposed um you know I think we we want to be flexible
and we want to reach a good compromise and that's what I think this petitioner's motion represents. So, I'm curious about your estimate of $2,400 because I think you would agree that no two FOYA requests are identical and some can be extremely comprehensive and
cumbersome to produce. Others might be a couple of emails. So, how did you arrive at that estimate? >> Yeah, that was based on the Brookline News um public records request that had been produced um and made available to the petitioners as we were crafting this
article. Um, so what we did was we worked backwards essentially from that task which then produced the index essentially what we're asking for for a full year's worth of requests. Um, we costed out how much that cost, how much staff time it required. Um, and we think
because that captured a full calendar year, that's a reasonable um, estimate to work from. Um, given that we're now asking for that to be done gradually over the course, you know, monthly over the same year period. David, I'll just add it's important to note that that cost is not the
production or the response to the public records request that's happening now with or without our bylaw. The only thing and the reason why that number is so small, the only thing that number reflects is staff time to do the redactions
of the summary of the requests and summary of the response. So that which is really just a few paragraphs they're going through to look for people's names or or phone numbers or emails uh that they feel they need to redact. So that that's the only thing that that that's
why the number is so small. >> All right. Uh my other question regarding uh conformity with state law. So under state law, a municipality has 25 business days to come up with the uh full response after responding initially
within 10 days. And I see that this proposed bylaw, your language would be within 30 days. So I see how that matches up. But what happens in a scenario where it's a particularly voluminous request that realistically
may take more than 30 days either because of staff limitations andor the related fees aren't paid in timely fashion. I know that there is the opportunity to uh request an extension
and then the supervisor of records can grant one if there is not agreement. uh by the person requesting the documents. But uh beyond that scenario, does this bylaw contemplate any additional flexibility around requests that might
be timeconuming? >> Yeah, that's a great question, David. Um and in the language in the revised petitioner motion um in section um XX2, uh I would just draw your attention to the the last three lines of that that paragraph. Um so what we call for is
that the responses and the request be made >> um published 30 days after either the town receives a request or the town issues a response. So our intent there was that in the in a case where a response is given there would still be 30 days following the issuance of the
response for the posting to be made. Okay. Uh anyone else on the select board have any comments or questions? All right. Then uh I had initially opened a public hearing for warrant article 12 at the outset and Regina
Frolley would like to comment. So please come up to the podium. >> From Southwork Precinct 16. I did a lot of these but prior to CO or one of them was into CO. So the law may have
changed, but it used to be under the law that the first few hours of the research of a a an agency would be free and then it would be $35 an hour at the time was considered the standard rate
and I think Alex said a 100. So maybe it's changed, but I I think it's something worth looking into directly at the Secretary of State's office. In terms of enforcement, the way it had worked, and believe me, I have a lot of experience with this. If
you file the complaint that it wasn't compliant, um it usually, especially for the open meeting law, it would go to the AG, they have an office of compliance for local government. Um, they usually send a letter out on
letterheads saying, "You're very naughty. You shouldn't do that. Don't do it again." I mean, generally speaking, the complaint had evidence that proved that something had happened. If it happened again or if the worst of all, if there was a pattern that had happened
several times by a body, a legal body of a community like the school committee for example, then they get fined and they get fined heavily. And there was I won't name the commun community unless you want to know uh got fined $50,000 the school committee because they were
consistently doing meetings against the open meeting law. So this is to me manageable unless the law has changed and I'll be glad glad to cooperate and look into that again. But the first few hours and you remember this is is about public service. This is about
accountability. This is about transparency. I haven't read every word of their warrant article, so I don't know about some of the minutia, but I think it's wonderful if there's a Well, let me back up on one more thing. If it's something asking for your emails,
you're supposed to be using a town address on the I don't know if the computer is yours, but the town uh le email when you do town business has to be a town address. That's a couple of strokes of the of the uh keys to provide
that. that would come under the the first few hours being free. So I I don't see this even necessarily being the 20s something$und00 uh really is potentially could be zero in the course of a month depending on
what they ask for. I hope that's helpful. >> Thank you. Do we have anyone else who would like to see somebody has their >> Marty Rosenthal? >> Marty Rosenthal. And remember this is specific to warrant article 12
>> in the meantime Michael I think I saw that you wanted to make a comments. >> Yes. >> No. Okay. >> I'm trying to talk. Am I in? >> You are. Go right ahead. >> Oh yeah. So I um I I was coming in for a different article, but on this one I had a question that uh I'll pose
rhetorically because I heard the description by Mike Toffel and uh maybe I misunderstood what either he or Alex said, but what I thought I heard was requiring someone to summarize the
articles uh which was put forward as a simplification. uh process, but it sounded to me like extra effort and maybe I'm I'm looking at the actual article. I don't know if there's a different version that they're
talking about. So, um anyway, that that's a rhetorical question that I heard during the discussion and maybe I misunderstood something. Thank you. >> Would the petitioners like to comment on that? >> Yes, be happy to and and it's a great point. Thanks for raising that, Marty.
Um yeah, our our intention here is definitely a simplification. Um and I think the biggest piece that's, you know, of import there to to consider is the fact that rather than requesting all the actual public documents be posted, we ask for a list of the public documents provided. Um so that alter,
you know, the additional description beyond that, our vision of that is one or two sentences very very briefly summarizing what was sent in response. um with the idea being that if there is an interested party in the public after they see this published on the index they can very easily submit their own
PRR um and because the documents will have already been redacted and prepared for the initial requesttor they could actually access the full response at that time. Now you cited Newton and Framingham as some examples of communities that are already doing what this warrant article
envisions. Did they pursue a city ordinance or u its bylaw equivalent or is this just their practice? >> Yeah, it's a it's a good question, David. In the case of Framingham, which I you know I think we've is a good
example just because we've presented what you can you can see in our description what they actually make publicly available. Um they have opted to use Foyer Direct's public facing interface. um you know we can't with specificity I don't think speak to how
they've been able to do that if there are additional redaction costs that they've incurred to do that um as has been indicated would be the case for us by by Ben Kaufman um but yeah so you know there there are other models out there that we've seen um the model we
put before you tonight is by our estimation the most cost-effective um and the kind of the rights sized approach for Brooklyn >> all right thank you Any more members in the public who would like to comment on Warren Article 12?
All right, seeing none, any further select board comments? >> Do you want to close the public hearing? >> I will in a moment. >> All right, seeing none, we will close the uh public hearing for Warren article 12 and open the warrant article hearing
for uh warrant article 24. Now, uh, Mike Toffel already gave us an introduction to warrant article 24. Uh, perhaps very briefly if we can reiterate that since we were mostly talking about article 12, just sort of a three- sentence summary
and then we will uh start discussing it. >> Yeah, absolutely, David. So, Warren Article 25 is a resolution and what it seeks to do is um codify what is currently the recommended practice in the select boards um boards and commissions handbook um which is that
official town communications and town business be CCD to the board archives at Brooklynmma.gov uh gov email for the purpose of automatically archiving and storing um public records that we are legally
obligated to archive and store. Um and in addition to making that a um requirement rather than a uh recommendation in for select board appointed bodies um the resolution also calls for that expectation to be extended to bodies appointed by the
moderator and other appointment authorities as well. >> All right. Thank you. Select board members, any questions or comments for the petitioners on warrant article 24? So, one question I have. So, the email
board archives brookline.gov. If this warrant article were to pass, uh, would would you anticipate such an influx of emails coming in that it would be at all difficult to manage or is that not a significant barrier? >> No,
we're F and I have talked about it where we think it's fine. I mean, again, this is what people should be doing right now. So, to the extent that they're not, >> start doing it. >> All right. Do any members of the public want to be heard on warrant article 24?
All right, seeing none, we will close the hearing as to warrant article 24. >> Bernard has his hand. >> Oh, sorry, Bernard. Go ahead. >> If you can unmute yourself. >> Sorry. So what con what are the consequences of
someone not uh doing this? >> So what we've said in the past is if you don't follow this policy, we will remind you to follow this policy and if you continue not to follow this policy, it can be grounds for the select board not reappointing the person.
>> Paul, >> yeah, >> minor inconvenience. >> Bernard had you have another question? >> No, I'm >> okay. Um the last um resolve last sentence in the resolve clause
includes the word um monitoring. So town meeting asks the town administrator and IT director to provide a report in December 2026 to update town meeting the on the extent to which they're training monitoring and reminders of affected adherence. What do
you mean by monitoring, Alec? >> Um, yeah. No, it's it's a great question. You know, I think um what has been uh communicated to us is that there are um boards right now where we are not
seeing frequent or in some usage of the Brooklyn uh or the archive at brickline.gov um account. So I I think our our hope was that town staff could keep account of how many bodies are utilizing that. Obviously we won't have a perfect
understanding of every communication that goes on particularly if one isn't properly archived. Um but what we'd like to see and I think would be helpful for town meeting to to know um you know in December of 26 would be are we seeing an increase in active town bodies using
this? Are we seeing the practice being adopted by um bodies that are appointed by different appointment authorities than the select board which we wouldn't necessarily expect to see now? So I think monitoring is just to get a sense of how utilization for the archival practices. >> Okay. But h but how would you propose
that be done electronically? Are you asking it to scan uh this mail database and see which named members are put how are you going to do that? I I don't I don't think the intention is to have it go down to the
level of the individual. More so just to see if the business of these bodies is being captured by the archive. >> But again, how would how would you do Alec specifically? How do you propose monitoring without I don't know
violating something? I mean, so let's let's say there's a moderators committee. Um, how would you propose that staff because you're asking the town administrator and IT to monitor that a moderator's committee committee
is using this archive. How would that how would that specifically be done? >> Keyword search in the email archive. >> You want them to search the email archive by for all the members that might be on that board. >> See if they've posted.
>> There's a little over 60 active boards and commissions. Um, it could be as easy as 60 keyword searches over a seven-month period. I, you know, I think that might be manageable. >> Just to remember, uh, Alec, this was a discussion we had with the town
administrator and the IT director, both of whom are on the call here. So perhaps the question be best answered by them because at the time when we discussed this, they seemed to not suggest this was a huge burden. Uh so perhaps Paul's
question could best be asked answered by uh the staff who would actually be doing the work. >> So fun can certainly speak to this but we had the discussion and >> about so I'm just specifically talking about monitoring. So you're going to
hold >> Michael you're really good at interrupting me and not letting me speak. Please >> please >> is that okay? Can I speak now? I have your permission. >> Agreed. Sorry. >> Thank you. Thank you sir. I appreciate your permission >> agreeing with you. >> Yes. >> So this is again I'm just I'm wondering
about the appropriateness right of a volunteer board. It's a moderator's committee. You've got maybe 10 members on it. Let's take let's take the comprehensive plan steering committee. There's 15 members or 16 members of the comprehensive plan steering committee.
How are you going to monitor if the comprehensive plan steering committee is compliant >> with this? >> So there there are a number of things that we can do on this front. Um and it doesn't involve being invasive of their
work or anything that they're doing, right? >> The goal of this all of the go the goal of this email address is to create a central repository to make it easier to respond. >> No, I totally understand. I know what it is. >> Yeah. So we we have that available and what we will do is probably on a
quarterly to six-month basis depending on how how this goes we'll run a search fun has come up with a search parameters to run this and run it you know index it against the membership of the committees to see if they're there and make sure that those you know that emails are
being copied. We're not going to go looking through all the emails to be like oh what are they saying? We're just going to say, are are these being copied? And for some of these committees, there are there isn't going to be any email traffic, right? Because they are either not conducting business
over email um as most of these committees are, or they're going to be conducting so little business um that there's not going to be any hits. And in those cases, we're just going to email everybody and say, "Hey, just for the record, looks like you have >> we've been scanning your emails and
we're noticing that you're not posting to the database." I all I can say is I'm uncomfortable with what you just said that now it and staff is going to surveil the boards and commissions about
their activity into this archive. Now, I understand it's limited. It's just metadata. I'm gonna plug in and see if Paul How many times has Paul Warren posted to uh this archive. Matter of fact, since I'm on multiple committees, you would know whether it's whether I'm
posting for a committee or what commission. I just again I it this this feels like we're crossing some line if you're going to be going into an archive of email and saying Dennis Dowy uh
you're not showing up enough and the and the number of commissions that you're on. Do you see the problem I'm raising here? >> Well, I mean again we're not we're not even going to do that with individual members. We're going to say to the B boarding commission, hey, you know, there there's here's the traffic that we see. um not looking at any specific
emails. Um is this accurate? You know, just a reminder, you know, you do have to copy this because you you know this, but you know, people listening might not. This this this is a solution to a problem that arose from public records
requests being filed for people who were using their personal emails to conduct. >> You and I helped craft this. I I know this. >> I know you know this, but other people might not. Okay, I'm trying to give the public some >> explanation for why this is. And this was in response to people saying, "Well, why don't everyone just get a
Brooklinma.gov email account?" And we've talked about why that would be disastrous. It would be disastrous from right cost-wise. It would be disastrous from a security level. >> It would be disastrous from the same reason why we don't let the select board have badges anymore. Um, people can
abuse.gov email addresses. Um, it's it's it's not a good solution. >> Okay. So I guess I guess what I my feedback for the petitioners is um I would ask you to either rephrase or eliminate the word monitoring. Um I
think it's fully within staff's town administrators IT director's purview to say even this board to say hey guys we're going to train you. Here's your monthly reminder. Please make sure that you are posting uh to the to the archive. Um, it feels
strange to me that we're going into I I think it's surveillance and I actually was thinking, wasn't there another article on our warrant that we're we're going to be talking about surveillance. Um, anyway, that's my that's my feedback. I'd like to see you uh take out that word and if not, I would uh I
would move to amend it and take out monitoring. >> Michael, >> so just very briefly, if I may, we we're happy to consider that suggestion and appreciate you making that, Paul. Um, I do just want to push back a little on the notion that this is surveillance because ultimately what we're talking about here are public records. Uh, all
of these emails are public records. Um, and I don't think you reasonably can have that level of expectation of privacy, particularly given the fact that to respond to a public records request, staff is already doing what you're what you'reing and they're doing
it to the level of the individual. So, I appreciate the, you know, the the concern and we're certainly happy to take your amendment um under consideration, but just wanted to, you know, put that out there. >> So, let me just let me just push back a little bit, Alec, because um you know, there's nothing in state law that says
that that my personal email address, if I'm on a commission or a board and I'm using my personal email, that I have to send it to an archive. Okay? That's not state law. and and frankly my my email is a public record and you have every
right to ask me as a responsive document to provide that to you. I I do think we're crossing a line um when you start measuring how many emails someone is sending even once to say you know what we've noticed that you haven't sent any
emails to the archive uh since your service on this committee. um that feels like we're crossing a it really feels like we're crossing a line. Um and I can tell you I I personally wouldn't be able to support an article that's saying we're going to monitor and I will replace monitoring with surveil your
activity as you serve on a border commission electronically. I think it's I think it's a mistake. So I think that a point that Paul may be raising although perhaps it's different uh is it does have an impact on the way people would comport themselves on these boards
if they know that the volume of their email is being tracked. I understand what you're saying, Alec, about these are ultimately public records anyway, so there's not an expectation of privacy, but it could still impact behaviors if people know that to some degree they're
being evaluated on their uh email volume. So, somebody who might feel that two or three emails is sufficient might suddenly feel pressured to write 10 in order to uh not be penalized publicly in some way by having a low volume of
emails. And I don't think that's the intention at all of what you're trying to do. Uh but it depending on how the monitoring works and how enforcement works, it could have that effect. >> Once a week, send an email with an X in it, you know, to comply.
>> Michael, >> I have two comments. Number one, >> we'll get to you in a moment. Go ahead, Michael. >> Um number one is I don't think that the purpose of this monitoring is for evaluation of committee members. And I and I think that that should be that
should be very clear. This is this is an analysis of of how well the town would be able to respond to a public records request in if it came to those committee members. Would it have the information
in board archives? Would it have or would it have to go out to the committee members who are using uh their own personal email addresses? So, and given the fact that there is no capacity in
here for for uh examining the contents of a committee member's personal email address outside of of that committee member's control of their own email. That seems to be a very different kind
that that would in my mind would be surveillance because you're surveilling their >> their email address. but to to claim that their that their use of the board archives at brookline.gov
is surveillance seems to be seems to be confusing sort of recordkeeping in this sense with surveillance. So that's that is my opinion. Okay, that's number one. Go ahead. Sorry. Okay. And the second thing that I that I want that I want to say is I don't know if the
petitioners have considered um the fact that if a committee member sends an email to somebody with a brooklinemma.gov email address, then those are obviously also captured by the system and they're
not necessarily captured by this by board archives atma at booklinemma.gov. So, I'm just a little concerned that a search only of Brookline archives at brooklinemma.gov as a reporting mechanism for traffic
from any particular committee or the creation of public records by that committee is under reporting what is actually happening at that committee. So for example, if a chair communicates with the staff person on some matter for around that committee, then that will
also be captured in the in the public's address. So I just want to make sure that that's that's considered in the context of the goal of this Warren article. >> All right, Bernard's been waiting a while. Let's go to Bernard. Okay, sure. Bernard, go ahead.
Oh, >> you're muted. You're muted. Sorry. So, if I'm using my personal email for public business, for example, uh communicating with someone uh on their personal email um on um some
deliberation on an issue. This Warren article seems to be missing that communication. And may maybe that's unavoidable, but basically it's only getting those communications at us as honest people. um
prefer or decide to uh archive in uh in in at this uh email address. >> All right. I Mike, go ahead. You're going to respond to a point Paul made. >> Uh yeah, >> my point too.
>> Yes. And respond to Bernard as well. >> I I'll I'll try. I might need Alex's help on the second one. Uh so here's a I welcome this uh question about monitoring the word monitoring and the concept of monitoring and and I want to uh so this is very helpful because we
want to it's not intended at all in the way that it's been interpreted and so here is an opportunity for us to go back and think about uh getting the wording right to ensure it's interpreted in a way that we intend. The whole idea here
of monitoring was simply meant that this is this approach as Chaz mentioned is uh us trying to work with staff to find a costeffective way to make public records requests uh more comprehensive
to respond to using this CCing of this email address rather than asking for all chairs of the committees or all members of committees to use Brooklyn uh email addresses like the select board members do yourselves or apparently you
sometimes do according to Bernard. So, so this was that's what this was meant for that the the language around monitoring was designed to basically provide some sort of evaluation to see is this working and if it's not working
which uh which uh particular uh boards or committees need another reminder from the staff to say look you guys there's been no emails uh
from your committee over the last 6 months, it's possible you're not sending emails at all, which is fine. But if you are sending emails on public business, don't forget you need to copy to this address. So that was the point. It was more of evaluation uh to ensure effectiveness of this
policy. And so perhaps we can work work in the words evaluation instead of monitoring. Perhaps that would be more comfortable. But that was sort of the intent. And so I welcome suggestions on how to if you agree with that intent to ensure that a policy in the select
board's own handbook is actually being adhered to. Uh we welcome suggestion other suggestions besides the the word monitoring because it's not we did not mean to trigger the conversation that's ensued tonight and I can imagine it would ensue in town meeting again if we
were to not change it. So I am eager to change it and I'm just interested in knowing what would feel comfortable uh if you agree with our intent. >> So >> So so Michael, let me let me uh thank you David. Just reply to that. So um
there's a difference between the word and then the action. So the the I questioned what monitoring meant and then it was explained to me which was we're going to have to take somebody's name. It be more than a name. It's going to be their email address. So Paul Warrenggmail.com
is my email um when I'm not on the board doing work. Um someone would need to search into the archive to see if I'm posting to the archive. I think when you do that you are going to trigger a lot of people thinking that you're monitoring their email. And I don't
think that's a good I don't think that's good. I don't think it's good for volunteers to feel that way. I certainly wouldn't want you uh give the impression that someone's sitting there reading through my emails. uh even if I'm on a public body and it is a public record, it still feels like surveillance to me. What I would suggest is it not be an
electronic uh uh compliance check that it would be a a periodic polling of the board of the commission. Send them a survey and say are you as a reminder you should be using this email address. Are you using it? If not, make sure you use it. Um that that's what I I would do it
to that extent. But once you get into electronically uh searching a database for my name or my email address or my identify to see if I'm doing something you think I should be doing, it's you're getting into surveillance. That's that's that's my view. That's what I'm struggling with. >> But before we move on for a moment
though, could we have an answer to Bernard's question, which I think was related to Michael's earlier question about somebody who is using a non uh.gov email address contacting someone who is using a.gov email address and whether
that would be captured. >> No. What? No, the question was whether you can get around this uh by just communicating using your private emails and not archiving them. >> And I think in in response to that, Bernard, I'd say the answer
unfortunately is yes. But I think that's also the case for every other system and measure that's been put in place to try and improve the archiving practices of these kind of records. Um, if someone is dead set on working around this by using a private email, I I think we're pretty
limited in in what we can do to directly respond to that. But what I do think this resolution does and it really builds on what I would argue was the the success and um positive update of the select boards board and commission hands uh uh handbook rather is we set the
expectation that this is this is an expected practice. >> Oh sorry I think I I you >> cut out there for a second. I was just going to say what I what I think this Warren article does that's really valuable is it sets the expectation of how people are supposed to comply with
this policy. Um and it goes it really builds on as I was saying the work uh the good work that the select board's already done in in updating their handbook by saying well you know this is something that we expect of you if you're serving on an appointed board and commission and you're con purely only in your conducting of town business of
course but this is an expectation. So, uh, as we've talked about tonight, you know, I think implement enforcement of this will be in some ways difficult and kind of ad hoc as I think it just has to be by its nature. Um, but I think setting the expectation up front is very
important. It makes it clear that appointment authorities expect this of the people they appoint. Um, and that, you know, we we expect them to be responsive to that policy. So, I think that's the value here. >> All right. Thank you, Michael. I I was just gonna sort of ask what I
think is a rhetorical question is that if you receive a public records request for the information uh you know for for the communications of a public body um on a on a particular
matter then is there any way to get that information without using the email addresses of the members of that public body. >> Of course, you need to use the email address. >> No, I don't think so. No. >> Okay.
>> And just to clarify, Michael, as well, if if someone is currently using a private email address and their records were requested through a public records request for their official activities on a border commission, they are responsible currently for archiving all public records and communications in the
service of business of that body for three years. and they would be responsible for turning those over to be in compliance with state law as things currently stand. So I our our thinking here and I think part of what made this addition to the select board handbook so welcome is this in many respects puts in
place a policy that simplifies and at the end of the day makes it much much less ownorous for any public you know board or commission member who does find themselves on the end of a public records request rather than digging through their own private email and sorting out things that aren't official
business. There would already be a record in this archive. It could be done much more easily. All right. So, we've been going on for a while on this and we have a few more Warren articles to cover, but thank you very much to our two petitioners. You've received a lot
of feedback on both 12 and 24. Uh, and as you well know, as veteran petitioners, we normally don't vote on the initial night of presentation. Uh, so you'll be coming back, but thank you again. >> Thank you very much. >> Appreciate it.
>> All right. So next up we well warrant article 18 has been withdrawn. So we will then go to article 19 which is to create a new town general bylaw to regulate the town's use of surveillance
technology. And our co-etitioners here are Andrew Fiser and Clint Richmond. Um, >> well, I I was waiting for Andrew to to come off. Uh, >> I'm unmuting >> mute. All right. Uh, >> okay. I'm unmuting and I'm
>> Yeah, he's he's the lead petitioner here. I'm I'm more of the uh uh slide assist tonight. >> Well, um I'm the names petitioner. with that I treat um Clint as well as Amy
Hmel as my co-etitioners. Um uh I have let me start by saying good evening. Thank you for your time and attention. These are late nights for for you even more than they are for us. I also want to give a thank you to Melanie
Atsuka who has been extremely helpful in uh helping me uh in arrange this hearing and preparing for this hearing. Um, I'm Andrew Fischer. I'm a a town meeting member from precinct 13, the named petitioner on warrant articles 18 and
19. Both addressing the problem of data collection by private entities such as flock safety, sufa digital or Amazon ring and protecting the privacy of personal information that's swept up in their data mining.
>> So, Andrew, when do you want me to start the slides here? >> Why don't you start? >> Okay. Uh I hope I can screen share here. If you bear with me, I will get that going. Um so we already mentioned 18 not being
moved. >> Okay. >> So here's the f here's the first slide for 19 and tell me when to advance. >> Okay. So my comment there we already know is that uh warrant article 18 is being withdrawn from the May town meeting. We hope to bring it forward in
the future. Warrant article 19 would set up a process for public notice uh for public notice, public comment before allowing the town whether whether it be a town department, agency,
division, board, committee or commission to come before the select board at a public hearing before engaging in in data collection or hiring any outside company such as
Flock. or su or sufa digital. Uh first to disclose any uh proposed data collection and explain what will be what data is being collected and what precautions would be taken to limit appropriately
um and to protect uh the the data being collected and to protect the data collection uh on residents and visitors within Brookline. and secondly to control any unnecessary or unlawful dissemination of anyone's
personal or private information. Um, this builds upon the recent experience by the select uh by the uh by the select board in uh the proposed data sharing agreement between the Brookline Police Department and Flock uh when
Flock was mounting license plate readers on private property in Hancock Village aimed at Independence Drive which is a public way and belonging to the town. Um, this this article 19 would also
cover the tracking and personal movement of anyone that interfaces with the SUFFA outdoor signs that are now prominent in commercial areas around the town, many of which are on public property. Most people do not rec realize that the signs
communicate back to SUFFA headquarters and I get that information from the SUFFA website. This includes tracking cell phone movements after someone interacts with SUFFA with a SUFFA in electronic billboard and providing SUFFA
providing the information to its um advertisers. SUFFA claims that this data collection is solely in the public interest. But we don't know. We do we know what sufa collects, how long it preserves personal
information it collects uh or it controls and um and and how what it does if anything to prevent wrongful dissemination of the personal uh private personal data it collects. where the town enters into a lease or
other agreement allowing SUFFA to place its marketing kiosks. This agreement would be subject to the same public notice, public hearing and disclosure that Select Board provided for Flock in Hancock Village.
Um and that's the end of uh as I'm saying that the >> public hearing would require uh precisely what the select board wisely did um
when it uh when it when uh the arrangement between Flock and the police regarding uh Flock's >> baseball gathering in in in um Hanok village would be the model for what this
uh warrant article would do. Um I guess I can conclude by saying that we've um that we've used what the select uh the way the select board has addressed this as a way as a template for how it should address address similar situations as
they occur. This would merely codify uh what the what the select board has already figured out. Andrew, thanks for those opening remarks. I just wanted to show some of the other slides here. Some of those you referred to here. So, um, uh, existing technology would be grandfathered in. Upgrades would be
subject to review. Uh, let's see here. Here's a picture of the SUFFA signs that just for those who don't know what they look like here in Koolage Corner. Uh there's a lot of surveillance technology that we've applied to this that's town owned like these surveillance cameras that are all around public buildings
like the health building. Uh this is based on model laws from the ACLU. Uh a note to the select board in those Washington. I I don't know if I can't remember if you shared this yet, Andrew, but we did get permission from the accepted language changes from the
monitor moderator uh to bring it more closely in line with the ACLU model. Yeah, I would say that there were some uh I I did the drafting of this and I drafted this based upon uh the um uh actually the clumm the Civil Liberties
Union of Massachusetts branch of the ACLU. Um and their their template has been used in Cambridge, Somerville, Medford, Lawrence, Northampton, Newbury report. and uh it's past muster. Uh
and uh I was encouraged to amend my l the language I in some cases changed to conform to the uh template that's now in place in these six >> municipalities. Uh and the amended
version that's before before the select board. Uh you can see the changes and all the changes do is change the language to the So, so we'll be submitting those to to you all if you haven't already. And I'm sorry, I guess that was the end of the slide deck. I just wanted to go back to here's some examples of of surveillance
technologies. It's not just cameras and AOPR. It's a number of different uh systems that I mean many time applicable. >> Thank you. >> Can I ask whether the um changes you made have been sent to us in red line?
>> I'm sorry. Could you repeat that? >> Have the changes you mentioned been submitted to us in red line? >> Yes. >> Okay. >> All right. Do any select board members >> Sorry. Go ahead, Bernard. >> I was just saying I I've been out of
pocket for a few days, so >> I haven't haven't seen a red version. >> There's no redline version in our packet. >> Uh the version you have uh I believe is redlined. Um, >> the moderator just approved them today,
right? >> Correct. >> So, I I don't I don't I don't Yeah. So, it couldn't be in your packet, but I I don't know if it's been sent or not. That's up, Andrew. >> So, that we had time to read it. >> Exactly. Um, but uh as as the moderator
said, they they we didn't see these as substantive changes. These were just uh closer conformance to the existing ACLU definitions and things of that sort. >> Okay. All right. Anyone have any questions or comments? John, >> uh, would this require us to cancel
contracts that are in effect with any companies? >> There's a long paragraph that says it, uh, that exempts uh, any current practices in effect. So that any contract that's in effect would um it w
it would not apply nor would it apply to standard practices of information gathering such as um mailing lists that the town clerk maintains of voters, voter lists, u tax
lists that the uh town assessor maintains. uh anything that's ordinarily now part of that might be construed as as um uh data data that could be collected uh if it's part of a current
practice it continues to be exempt >> and I heard a lot of mention of one company in particular Flock does it essentially boycott any contracts with Flock >> no as we um as I indicated ated in the
in my in my remarks. Um the model for this warrant article is uh the uh way the select board handled this when um flocks was coordinating with the police
department with respect to monitoring uh license plates on uh on public ways particularly in Hancock Village. But it doesn't it doesn't uh John it doesn't ban any it doesn't change anything that's in existence now and we don't have any exist uh an existing
relationship with flock and it doesn't prevent anything. It just requires you to hold a formalized hearing which we didn't have with flock in the flock instance. So there's no >> sufa not even the sufa sign. >> No but if you if we renew the sufa sufa contract then that would be um uh a new
application or an upgrade of some sort. So >> yeah. Okay. back to what you said. It only requires a review. It doesn't it doesn't require it doesn't ban anything just because you have to you just have to have a formal process. >> Andrew, you mentioned that this does not go backwards in terms of existing
contracts. Could you tell us where that is or maybe I'm looking at an older version of your warrant article? I don't see that. Give me a second here. It's >> Hold on. I need to get this on the screen. too many things open at once.
Section one definitions. Um survey surveillance technology is described quite extensively. Uh and that comes again from the umi civil liberties union model. Uh under
that there is this >> I don't see this now. >> Right. All right. I don't see any exemption language in there. >> Well, then I've then I've submitted the wrong copy before the board. >> All right, Paul. >> Yep. Uh, thank you for uh presenting
this. So, I have a question about uh private application. So, let's say there's a resident lives along, you know, any public way. Uh maybe they have an exterior uncovered driveway. They place a surveillance camera from any of
the major maybe it's a rain camera. Um that would cover the public way because it goes beyond the end of the driveway. It would cover the sidewalk. It would cover the street. Um would this would this require that that individual go
seek select board approval for the implementation of that camera? um this would be covered this would have been covered by article nuh 18 and it's um one of the reasons that we um
realized that article 18 wasn't ready for prime time yet. Um, article 19 deal addresses only um uh when the town engages in data
collection as defined in the article or when the town uh engages in um engages an outside contractor such as um or or contracts with a
an entity that gathers um that's that's doing data collection as defined by the by the ordinance um by the bylaw um such as uh with the SUFFA or the town
contract with Flock the police uh arrangement with Flock. >> Okay. So it's only for when the town is contracting with a party for uh surveillance technology. Is that true?
>> Exactly. when either when the town is doing surveillance technology or the town um contracts with someone with an entity that's doing uh surveillance technology either for the town or
>> or in okay >> as part of an arrangement with the town. >> Okay. So, sorry, Andrew. You know what? I've realized I was looking at 18 when I was asking my question. So, that's why it was an appropriate question for 18, not for 19. Michael um
as you as you pointed out the definition of surveillance technology is very broad. Um my understanding of the SUFFA technology is that it identifies passers by by uh by getting ping requests for
network services that are not associated with a specific individual or group. So I'm looking at the detailed the definition of surveillance technology and it would seem by that definition that a SUFFA system as they describe it
would not be considered surveillance technology and yet you've you've uh referenced the SUVA technology several times. So I'm wondering how you square that distinction.
Sufa. Um, when you um engage with SUFFA uh with your cell phone, with an Apple iPhone, um SUFFA um I think Clint may be able to describe this better than me, but SUFFA SUFFA
takes the information and continues to track the cell phone as you move away from the SUFFA kiosk and um stores it in SUFFA's central computers. so that it's available to the
>> to the uh corporations that are that are seeking the information for sales data. >> Right. But I don't believe that information is can be associated with a specific individual or group. That's my point.
>> Well, if they're tracking your your cell phone, they're tracking they're tracking where you're going. They're tracking I don't know what else they're tracking on your cell phone. >> Okay. So, I don't know if I want to get into the details of the painting. >> He may be using a bad example.
>> Yeah. Well, yes. I think I I think so. On the other on the flip side of that, uh if we for example had a parking meter that had a credit card reader on it, presumably that is information that could be associated with an individual
and would be covered by this surve as surveillance technology by your definition. Is that a correct reading? >> Yeah. And when the um uh when the police department or whoever is um
using the the material, they'd come before the select board. >> So >> via the process here, >> explain what it is and what they're doing. The select board would >> okay >> ask relevant questions and and approve it as it is or or have it be adopted or
whatever. I I I guess also to maybe elaborate, Michael, is that this warrant article would require town uh entities to conduct a review and they might conclude that there is no surveillance technology here, but it at least at least allows us
to know whether such a review has been done as opposed to say reviewing the uh uh select board uh agenda to see if there's something that could be construed as surveillance. So, uh, I think I think it's a more systematic
analysis of of of what may or may not be surveillance technology as defined in this bylaw. >> All right. Anyone else? Okay. Why don't we open a Bernard? >> All right. What?
>> No, Bernard doesn't. All right. So, why don't we open the public hearing for Warrant Article 19? Is there anyone in the room who would like to comment on Warren Article 19? I see we have Chief Jen Pastor here.
Would you like to come up and comment? >> Thank you all. Good evening. Uh, and I apologize in advance. I didn't realize 18 had been pulled. So I was prepared to speak to both but in one one statement. Uh it shouldn't take too long but uh I think what I want to focus on in the interest of time is just the significant
issues in both articles uh focused on 19 and I think you've all kind of uh identified those same issues. It a lot of it has to do with how some of the key terms are defined. the definitions given of surveillance technology, surveillance data, they're written so broadly that
they don't just apply to specialized or controversial tools like the ones mentioned here, but they apply to really almost anything. Everywhere we go, we're tracked. It's just if you have a smartphone, if you have an Apple Watch, it's it's I can't think of a way to not be tracked in this day and age. And that's that's
reality whether we like that or not. This language says that any device, system or software capable of collecting audio, visual, digital, location information tied to an individual, it's everything everything that every one of us has on us probably right now in the room. Um, anything that has that
capability. So in practice, you know, that would include and I understand now that the revisions have been made to exempt existing technology, but you know, it would have included our body warn cameras, our dispatch systems, our RMS, the mobile computers and our cruisers. It would even extend to our police radios that have GPS tracking
capabilities. Uh, and it doesn't stop with policing, and that's been mentioned already. The same definition would also capture things like home security systems, Nest cameras, business security cameras, the cameras that exist on some of our houses of worship, um, things that are in place for very good reason. I believe it would include smartphones,
all of which are capable of collecting and storing audio, video, and location data. And there's also language that includes any vehicle or system equipped with that technology means a police cruiser itself could be considered considered surveillance technology. All of our Teslas around town surveillance
technology. Um the same issue exists with surveillance data which is again defined so broadly that it includes police incident reports, arrest records, 911 calls, body camera footage. any standard routine evidence and standard police records and standard police
protocols would fall under this. Um 18 I won't talk about uh that went too far. It seems like the petitioners have recognized that. Um I think the unintended consequences here, you know, are significant. I I'm empathetic to concerns about privacy. Um but these
articles don't just regulate surveillance in the way that they might expect. They sweep in core everyday police functions as well as technologies that our residents use in their everyday lives. And because those definitions are so broad, the approval requirements that would follow would apply not just to new or controversial things, just to our
routine stuff and even, you know, the common devices. Um, you know, when we have a crime series or a crime spree, I'm thinking probably most recently of a sexual assault we had a few blocks away, um, where the victim
in that crime had mentioned that she's seen that suspect in the area many times before. I think that would be a totally appropriate use of a spot camera. Um the process that's suggested would put that off maybe a month by the time it's reviewed and reports are written and it's heard in public meeting in a month
is way too long I think to wait in that for that sort of a crime for technology that is just routine for us to use and I hope that the board that there's really a blanket trust when it comes to us using technology that we need to help solve crimes. Um so again I understand
the intent behind the proposals but that intent is different from how it's written and as it's written right now it goes way too far uh beyond that intent. It creates real operational and practical concerns. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. Are there any other members
of the public who would like to comment on warrant article 19? >> Uh Mr. Chair. >> Yes. Um >> go right ahead. >> Thank you. Might I respond uh to
um Chief Pastor's comments? Um my Mr. Richmond has uh due to my missing out on this suggested that we should be contacting um
affected parties such as Chief Pastor and and I know Clint has has already started reaching out. Um we should have met with we should have given m chief pastor notice before this hearing. Uh we didn't have the
opportunity to do that. that's my fault and I'm happy to sit down with her uh together with Clint uh or with Amy Hmel um and um go over her concerns and see see whether they're properly addressed or not and if not how to amend properly.
>> Well, I'm glad to hear that there will be further collaboration. Uh looks like Paul has >> um and I appreciate uh Andrea your willingness to to to work with the chief. Um, and I appreciated the chief's comments. It made me think about just
other other departments that may be using technology now. The water department, my water meter is a smart meter now. Um, it's kind of scary how much information that thing knows about the Warren family. Um, you know, and I would think that that would be something
that would be captured, um, you know, under this uh under this bylaw. Um and you know that's one that the chief had mentioned many things um there could be many many many technologies uh technologies that are that will be
deployed into our parks uh for certain types of things in the future that we just haven't thought of yet. um you know, transactional systems. If if the the police department wants to put in uh you know, Apple Watch readers for payment systems, would that would that
be allowed or would that need to be would that have to go through us here? >> Uh I'm sorry. I think that all of these would fall within the exception uh for uh pre-existing uh town practices and procedures. Um data is collected in a
lot of ways for a lot of legitimate purposes. Yeah. And uh those are all specifically exempted in the warrant article. >> Andrew, there was a um I'm going to I'm going to make a a a suggestion just something for you to think about. The prior petitioners, Mike Toffel and Alec,
they came to us maybe two years ago. Um Chaz and I to discuss um they they were going to file a warrant article and it had to do with with this archiving. uh they wanted everybody to have an email address and and we worked uh we worked with them and and asked them to hold off
on filing filing a warrant article and allow us to see if we could craft a policy and start with a policy at the board um and instead of just going running right you know doing a a warrant article right away and that's what they did and I think that's that's allowed
this warrant article which there's some archiving stuff which I use surveillance as a terminology um but I I think it it helped this board and staff work out the kinks and the and you know the the the things that could work or not work
through a policy. And I'm wondering if and if you would consider instead of filing a warrant article at this time, work with the board and staff to develop a policy because basically what you're asking for is a policy with the board and staff to bring attention and
awareness and transparency to the public when certain types of surveillance technology are going to possibly be considered and deployed by the town. Um I just I'd ask you to consider that. Um it it may allow us to work out some of the the kinks here. Um the terminology,
craft a policy that could be implemented for a bit of time and see if it's effective. It's a lot easier to change a policy than it is to change to change a bylaw through town meeting. Just something for you to consider. Um I I as I mentioned I think that we've
done I I appreciate the um suggestion first of all um uh and in fact we that's uh as I've said the reason we've um um
tabled warrant article 18 for now um we felt that we were adopting primarily the procedure that the that the select board used with respect to um the arrangements between flocks and the police and we thought that that was a system that
worked a procedure that worked well and in essence we're modeling that we do think that uh every day u information is gathered and um
I think that George Orwell would be um astounded at the technological ability to far surface anything he predicted in 1984. >> Um, and for that reason I wasn't uh we
weren't willing to uh uh wait. We thought we had a good model based on what the town what select board was doing. Um I'm I'm eager to sit down with Chief Pastor and to see if we can uh make this workable uh for the
>> I I guess I I I would add uh thanks Paul and you know we do have there are some analoges to what you're suggesting. We have an AI policy for example which was appropriate app propo to one of the uh surveillance technologies we're talking about or I'm sorry a I'm sorry a different software technology wasn't surveillance. Um, so I don't I I don't
know if you're proposing that uh the board would uh uh like to develop such a commit to developing such a policy that might uh >> Well, that's well actually that's actually what I I am suggesting and you know and I appreciate that that uh Andy is you both have referenced that you
know we you're modeling it off the what we did with Flock. Now you do have to realize what we did with Flock was totally reactive, right? because we got a bunch of phone calls and it wasn't, you know, it wasn't defined. We didn't have we didn't have a policy written. Um, we didn't have definitions. You
know, we kind of flew it by the seat of our pants. We had a public hearing and we listened. Um, but you want to now put that into into practice, which I think is not a bad idea. I just think jumping to a bylaw right away, um, is is is a is
really a big leap from a reactive public hearing that we held. um you I think operationalizing into a policy with the board and staff um working through the what that all means through the creation of policy and and deliberations at this
board with input from the departments. I think you're going to end up with a better product frankly um that could be revised easily if it doesn't work right away than you would if you try to go forward with a bylaw. It's just I I think policy would get you where you
want to get quicker and I think you'll end up with a better result um than the current the current path. Just my my thought. >> Michael >> um to to add on to some of the things that Paul is saying. Um obvious uh it seems to me that if this bylaw were to
be passed, we would end up having to craft a policy anyway um in order to operationalize the bylaw. Um, so I don't think we're going to that the bylaw itself would avoid the need for the conversations that you are you're
suggesting appropriately. So um the other point that that I would make um to the flock example is that one of the concerns that the chief expressed and and I share that concern is the sense of scale um of the work that would be
required in order to respond to all of the cases that could potentially arise from the the broad language that you've defined. And my my concern of using the flock experience as a as a model for
this is that I'm not sure that that model would scale to the number of uh uh occurrences that we would need to apply it um across all of our future all of our future consideration of technology.
Um my hope is that you know there's uh that we can use technology in order to improve the efficiency of our operations more broadly. Um and and so I I think that the concern that I have with the your definition of surveillance data and
surveillance technology is that they are broad. And I agree with Paul that starting with a policy um to really focus on the on the on a more uh direct
set of concerns um would be would get you farther faster. >> All right. I see that Superintendent Paul Campbell has his hand raised. Go right ahead. Unmute yourself. I I don't know if you can see me. I'm trying to put my camera on, but it looks
like it may not be working. Um, but that's okay. As long as you can hear me, >> we hear you. >> All right. So, I I just wanted to echo a little bit of what uh what the chief said and maybe add add a little bit. Um, I I appreciate that the uh petitioners
here are willing to, you know, have a conversation. Um, I I would be interested in seeing what the uh uh what the language is on. It seems like we have maybe an outdated draft and the current practices would be
grandfathered in. I'd be interested in seeing that. Um Paul Warren brought up an example that uh he was saying applied to uh number 18 that if there was an incident and a uh someone's ring camera
happened to capture that incident and you know the police went to look at that ring camera and wanted to use that video um and said well it seems like that that's prohibited by 18 but I think that's also pro prohibited by 19 uh section 24
um where it it basically says that without having a hearing, we can't uh enter into an agreement with anyone to share or otherwise use surveillance data. And I think a ring camera, someone has a a Ring camera that captures a
sidewalk, that would that would clearly be within the definition of surveillance data. um this warrant article would would require us to you know have a hearing with two weeks notice and I think put together like a surveillance package. I worry very much about the I
mean the nature of policing is we do engage in some levels of surveillance that I think I think that we all agree is um is warranted and productive and what the community wants. Uh we also
deal in data. Uh and so I I worry about, you know, where we're in a budget crunch where talking about cutting staff, doing more with less and adding, you know, the the potential volume of the types of
hearings that we would need to uh prepare for and and be present for and bring people in to talk about. I I I just worry about what that what that may mean uh for the department. Um I don't see any kind of an emergency exception
in here. And I think about a situation where uh where a child, someone special needs, a 10-year-old is missing, walks off into the woods at night and we want to call over to Newton. they have some night
vision or they have some thermal device that will help us search for that child. Uh seems pretty clear that might be covered by this warrant article and there's going to be no time to have a hearing for something like that. Um
I th those are just a a few of the a few of the concerns that I have. I I I do also worry about, you know, there are things that we do that involve surveillance that really are not for public consumption. Uh and
it's not that we're doing something that we don't want the public to know about. But just like we don't conduct our investigations in the media, uh there are times when we need to do things, we need we may need to be conducting surveillance and we may need for nobody
to know about that. And that doesn't mean it's a secret from CHAZ or the select board, but it's not something for a public hearing. It's not something that that we can broadcast to everybody. And I I worry that this warrant article proposal uh doesn't take that into
account. Um anyway, I I'll leave it there. And uh I'm optimistic that uh or encouraged that that the petitioners are willing to have conversation on this. >> All right. Thank you. We we do still
have a lot more in our agenda. So I recommend that we move on, but thank you very much to our two co-etitioners. You've received a lot of feedback. It's good to hear that you'll be meeting with the police department to further fine-tune this warrant article if it proceeds in that manner or perhaps
consider working with uh select board staff around a policy. So with that we will now move on to article 17 and I would like to uh reopen the public
hearing for article 17. But before we solicit public inputs, let's hear back from our co-etitioners, Chi-Chi Woo and Jessica Chico, also Marissa Vote. Uh
hello um and good evening. Um, Chi-Chi Woo Town Media Member Precinct 7 with my co-persioners Alec Leawitz, Jessica Kiko, Mura Vote. Um, we've had some developments uh since
last week. We had our me uh hearing with the advisory committee's ad hoc subcommittee on article 17 and 25. Um, we also discussed with the moderator making some changes to the article p uh
to respond to some of the feedback we received last week. Um, the moderator uh we worked with the moderator on some language that the moderator considered in scope which I believe is in your agenda packet.
>> Just want to make sure that everyone has that. >> I have that. It's revisions to art 17 space NW >> which I assume are the moderator's initials.
>> Yes. Um so as you can see the um >> revisions um include uh responding to some of the comments with respect to um
lang u minor language changes. um making the term federal civil immigration enforcement consistent. Um in paragraph two um changing the prohibition from the presence of civil immigration officials to the activity of
civil immigration enforcement and then changing the second sentence in section two um to respond to some concerns of town council. >> Hi there um a Amy cut out the section
Hi, >> Andrew, could you mute please? Sorry. Go, go ahead. >> Um, and so, uh, as I mentioned last at the last hearing, we intended to in, uh, amend the Warren article by including
paragraph 3 of the proclamation. Um the uh moderator um seemed to think that the first sentence of paragraph 3 of the proclamation was fine, but the second one um talking about how the town
administrator was authorized to seek injunctive relief um wasn't appropriate. So that was adjusted. Um, and to respond to the concerns of the police department, um, we explicitly put in the warrant article that
violations of this bylaw would be considered civil in nature only, so that they would not be expected to arrest uh, ICE officers and be in conflict with them. Um, we had our, as I said, we had our hearing with the AC subcommittee.
Uh, members of the AC also had additional language changes. We received something from the chair of that committee today which we haven't had a chance to um consider or uh include in a document or run by the moderator and um
from what we understand uh the chair of the AC subcommittee may not be the only one with suggested language changes. So um this is drafting not just by committee but by multiple committees at this point.
>> All right. Thank you John. Um, thank thanks again to the sponsors of the article. Um, if the um chair um agrees, I I'm I made a similar suggestion last week. uh it's 10:08 and everything that
the um has just been said in the introduction on this article um is is clearly true and and in fact I witnessed the um advisory ad hoc committee meeting yesterday and it was inconclusive for the same reason that I think any
discussion of this tonight at this late hour would also be inconclusive because the language is still being worked out and um it feels a little bit maybe there are select board members who have more changes that they want to suggest, but I
don't think we're anywhere near reaching any kind of culmination of our review of this article. And since we're going to be taking it up again when we know what the next round of changes will bring, um, might we abbreviate this consideration tonight and move on?
>> So, my recommendation would we could do that in part, but I would like to give everyone an opportunity if they have further comments based on this version. And also we have a couple people who've been waiting a while who wanted to participate in public comment at the outset of our meeting.
>> For sure. >> Uh so give them a chance to speak but then we can move on. >> Okay. >> So uh anyone on the select board want a further comment? Let me I I have comments, but I've delivered them to the petitioners for their consideration and
they don't need to come to this body >> absent of being incorporated into the the final product at the petitioner's consideration. >> All right. So, uh Marty Rosenthal is his hand raised. Go ahead, Marty. Unmute your unmute yourself.
>> And then other folks who if you want to make a public comment on this article in particular, I know we had some folks waiting from a while ago. Please use the raise hand feature so we can call on you. Thank you. >> I I think I'm unmuted. Is there some reason my video I don't care if the video is being blocked. Is that right?
>> We don't see you, but that's okay. Go right ahead. We hear you. >> Well, anyway, um just for your information, I'm trying to be seen as well as heard. Not that I care. All right. So, um I want to say a few things. I spoke last week and and this is a very very complicated subject both
nationally and locally and um um I know that it defies time limits but I want to try to mainly say three things tonight. One is that um I've learned the difference between an 800B gorilla and an 800 lb elephant. These are both
present in this discussion. The fact of the matter is that no matter what gets done on this, the bottom line is I know as well as you do that ICE is not going to care. Uh we have a an ICE agency that
doesn't even care about breaking homicide laws. They don't care about kidnapping fiveyear-old kids with bunny hats and and putting them in detention. So what are they going to care about this? The bottom line is it's a welcome statement to make that we don't want you
in state in in town buildings and town property. We don't want you doing anything in fact in Brooklyn. I'd like to say that, but the fact is it's not going to happen. And that's why I worry about a bylaw that's going to get struck
down by the attorney general. So, and that's going to I think uh infect all of the executive orders. So secondly, just in terms of the uh uh the town council memo last week, every time I look at
this issue, I see new things. Town council's memo says that the first prohibition is okay for two reasons. Number one, that it's similar to the executive order and it is not. The executive order talks about facilities and buildings. the the provision
provision number one would ban ICE officials from using public property in general. It says state facil public public facilities but then goes on to say parks parking lots. So, if I parks on a public street, I've said this
before, walks across the street, across the sidewalk into the police station, which is a facility, and says, "Is someone being released?" And they get information, and they wait outside to detain them. They've used public property to to enforce a an ace
detainer, which I believe are absurd detainers by an administrative agency that's corrupt. So that I think that violates our sanctuary policy and and in fact uh John Vanco thankfully I said last night that I was going to try to
get some other ideas for 25 to propose to the petitioners. I hope they'll accept some of them. One that John suggested to me last night, I don't know anyone else he suggested it to is that why if if I uh comes into the police
station and says is so and so being released, why do we have to answer that question? I don't think that would be interference or obstruction to say I'm not authorized to give you any information. That's in in accord with the sanctuary policy. So, I'm going to suggest some other things, but I think
question number number one is going to be clearly >> time is up. >> All right. Thank you, Marty. Do we have anyone else who would like to participate on this warrant article in terms of providing comments?
Anyone in the room? Chief Passer, >> good evening. And I'll be brief again on this. Um, my biggest concern uh changing this executive order into a bylaw or the way that it's written now is about the enforcement piece. And I appreciate the work that the board did. Um, appreciate
the work, you know, that that happened when the town administrator, town council and I sat down to draft the executive order. I think I think to toot our own horn, I think we did a pretty good job um, you know, with contributions from everyone in the room. Um, as it is, I'm comfortable with it.
Once it becomes a bylaw, the enforcement piece becomes crucial. I understand that the petitioners are willing to bend a little bit and make it civil and say that the police, you know, won't be the enforcement arm on this, but you know, as was pointed out earlier, we're the enforcement arm for all bylaws. It it's
written in there. And furthermore, in Mass General law, um there's the willing violation of a bylaw that's a criminal offense, um which does give us the authority to for any town bylaw, um to arrest. So, as as much as um I can stress that point, you know, I don't
think it should be a police department enforced um rule, uh I think I'm comfortable with it as an executive order as it is. And uh I appreciate you considering that. >> So, a a question I have for you, if I may. So, when you say that under Mass
General law the police would have the authority to arrest, having the authority is not the same as a mandate to arrest. Correct. So, how does the police department exercises discretion? >> We always exercise discretion and certainly, you know, this wouldn't absolve us of that duty to intervene
piece that's in our existing policies. Um, you know, and if it's obvious that excessive force is being used, for example, that there's an assault and battery assault and battery dangerous weaponing weapon happening, we have that duty to intervene. That's covered by state law and covered by our policies uh
as well. Um, and we could charge criminally for those things, but you know, I wouldn't want to, you know, we're in this room now and we all understand the intent, but 10 years from now, should this rear its ugly head again, I don't think any of us will be here, maybe you will. Um, and you know,
it's going to fall back to how things are written in the bylaws. >> All right. Thank you. >> A question I have for town council, if he's still on. So, uh, Marty Rosenthal had raised via email at least and some
others have brought up the issue about whether there's the unintended risk of a bylaw leading to attorney general review and then executive orders being uh, stricken
and this sort of having the reverse impact of what it sets out to accomplish. Could you comment a bit more on that? Um yeah, so uh Joe Kalan and town council. Um what I understand uh Marty's concern is is that our executive orders
are not reviewed by the attorney general's office. Byllaws, however, are. And in the scenario where the bylaw is um not approved by the attorney general's office, that would cause grave concern over the enforcability of the
executive order. So, um, you may, you know, I think his concern is you're, you know, adding additional risk by having this, um, as a bylaw that there's going to, it may, it will, if passed, it will be subject to the attorney general's
review, which may strike it down, which may make the executive order harder to enforce. Now, uh, Marissa Vote emailed us after our last meeting that, uh, Plymouth has a similar bylaw that it's proposed, and
I believe their town meeting meets before ours does. Uh, Marissa, do you have any more details on what's going on in Plymouth? >> Hi, everyone. Marissa Vote, town meeting member in precinct 6. Um, I don't. I believe their town meeting is set to
take this up this weekend. >> All right. Thank you. >> Or take up their version of of um something similar. Maybe Alec has something. >> All right, Alec. And then Chi-Chi, go ahead. >> Uh yes, thanks so much, Vice Chair Pearlman. Um I I just wanted to briefly
comment on this because this very question was um broached at the advisory committee hearing last night. Um, and in particular, the contrasting example was given of the renters's handbook bylaw, um, which you will remember I I appeared before you uh, in in April and May of
last year to to promote. Um, and we discussed at length in in consideration of that bylaw about why we had gone down a particular path as the petitioners to not jeopardize similar programs that had already been established in other communities. Um, what I said to the
advisory committee last night and I just wanted to repeat now is I think there's a couple key distinctions between the renters bylaw example and the example we're talking about this evening with these um the select board proclamation and the executive orders given in the other um greater Boston cities. And I
think the one difference is in the case of the renters handbook um what we were dealing with in these other communities were mature programs that had been in place for in some cases as long as a decade. um and had been really enshed and integrated into the tenant support
systems that had been established in those communities. So, the revocation of those programs through an action Brookline took um would have had a really substantial impact, an immediate impact on renters um particularly in those communities. I think in the case of this our proclamation and the um
analog orders that were issued in other communities, these are very new um and their enforcability and frankly their legality has not really been put to the test at this point. So in addition to um I think providing clarity for enforcement purposes and stronger force
of law behind it for um future enforcement actions which we feel are advantages of the bylaw approach. Um, I think it's also important that members of these communities, including Brooklyn residents, know if those orders are effective, if they are enforceable, if
they are legal, because right now um I think many members of the community are really counting on those policies um as shields, as protections, you know, from the worst excesses of this federal administration. So, if you know near verbatim language is struck down by the
attorney general, that may be something we want to know um because it may mean we need to alter what our official proclamation or guidance is. We may need to adapt it to make it more enforceable or to address whatever legal concerns might be raised by attorney general review. So, you know, we see those two examples as pretty different and I think
that's that informs a lot of our thinking in this approach. >> Thank you, Chi-Chi. >> Um hi. Yes. Uh thank you, Vice Chair Pearlman. Um I wanted to uh address um some of the points made by Chief Pastor on the enforcement. Um you know at this
point we've made it very clear that um this bylaw will only be a civil violation. Um you know I I you know we could put in explicitly that it's not enforceable under article 10.1 of the bylaws which is the criminal
enforcement. Um so that um you know there's nothing in the town uh bylaws that makes it um something enforceable only by the police. Um I you know I would say that while we can't control Massachusetts law saying stating that a
violation of a bylaw is a misdemeanor. Um I think it would be a very unusual situation to try to uh prosecute as a misdemeanor something that's in a bylaw that clearly says it's only civil in nature. So, you know, we've really tried to accommodate the concerns of the
police department on this. >> Thank you. >> All right. So, it sounds like there will be some further language refinements based on advisory committee uh recommendations. So, this not quite
ready yet for a select board vote. So, we'll continue this discussion at our next meeting. But, thank you once again for coming and explaining to us your updates. And thank you to those who participated in uh public comment for the hearing. That will bring us now to
article 25. I will now close the public hearing from article uh 17 and open the public hearing for warrant article 25. But before we go to members of the public,
let's go ahead and hear from our uh co-partitioners, Chi-Chi Woo and Alec Leovitz about any updates as to Warrant Article 25. >> Yeah, I'll be very very brief, David. You know, I think 25 is in a very similar position to 17. We got a lot of
substantive and I think in in many cases very helpful and and um um you know well thoughtout amendments uh to article 25 and uh we've received a number of sets of comments from AC members. We're expecting several more. Um we've also
invited um Mr. Rosenthal to submit his ideas as he mentioned he has a few for this article. So, um, you know, per John's, um, suggestion earlier, I think this is another article where, uh, we're still fine-tuning the language. Um, we're trying to, you know, build a consensus between multiple town boards
right now. Um, so this this is likely another article that would be more derain to revisit further in the process. >> All right. Thank you. And we have Chief Pastor here who may want to appine. >> Thank you all again. Um, so my concerns with this Warren article uh really start
with section 4, which calls for us withdrawing from the from the brick. Um, I do believe that this is based on good intention, but a misunderstanding of what our partnership with the brick actually is. Uh, the brick is not ICE. It's not immigration. It's not civil civil immigration enforcement entity.
It's a federally recognized fusion center that provides information related to serious criminal activity and only criminal activity to terrorism to threats to public safety. Our participation is governed by strict federal standards including 28 CFR part 23 which limits what information we can
collect in Brookline and what we can share and vice versa. Um so the problem with with the problem withdrawing is straightforward. So we would lose we stand to lose everything. Um we stand to lose our local access to critical intelligence including threat
assessments related to our schools, our houses of worship and our uh threat assessments for large events. Um, and it doesn't do anything to change federal policy. It just reduces our situational awareness here in Brooklyn and our ability to prevent harm. Moving on to section five, which addresses
fingerprinting for juveniles for m and for misdemeanor arrests. This is one of the most concerning provisions. Fingerprinting is the only reliable way that we have on the police department to positively identify somebody in our custody. People are frequently arrested without ID and uh lie to us and give us
false names, which I'm sure you're all shocked to hear. uh without fingerprints, we can't confirm somebody's identity. We can't check for existing warrants, and we can't accurately assess a criminal history. Um and so there's also a practical issue. Without first identifying someone, there's no reliable way to determine
whether or not they are actually a juvenile if they claim to be one. And um Superintendent Campbell has personal experience with that. The unintended consequence is that we are choosing to operate without knowing who we have in custody, which create risks for officer safety, case integrity, and accountability. It's unsafe and I don't
believe that we would maintain our accredited status if we were to adopt this section of the warrant. Section section six is a little bit more nuanced. Um it references policies that we already follow and that I expect the board to hold us accountable for following, including deescalation and
our duty to intervene and report misconduct. We already have that. It's it's redundant. I think it's duplicative. Um and then it moves into an expectation that we would investigate or intervene in actions of federal officials. And sometimes that's appropriate. And I would argue that sometimes um you know this is creating
an expectation in a bylaw that removes the ability to assess each situation appropriately. Um there might be times where you know it's not our place to do that investigation. We might outsource to maybe the Norfick County District Attorney's Office or state agency uh you know state police where appropriate. Um but this ties us to being the
investigative agency. And then the last piece uh section seven calls for the ceasing of the pursuit of UASI funding. Um again I think this is based on outdated information. The courts have already ruled that federal agencies cannot condition that funding on
immigration enforcement operation and I know that is likely to be appealed. Um but there's no current requirement tying those funds to ICE involvement. So the impact of walking away from UASI funding will be immediate and it would be significant. These funds support town emergency preparedness efforts,
interoperability, regional response capabilities across multiple town departments, not just the police department. Choosing to forgo them would reduce our ability to prepare for and respond to major incidents without any corresponding legal or policy benefit. And certainly in our current budget situation, nothing that's going to come
and replace everything that we have. Uh when you look at the sections together, the pattern is clear. Each one is based on a concern, but the proposed solution creates a different set of risks. loss of intelligence and ability to identify individuals, legal ambiguity and enforcement, and reduced access to
critical funding and equipment. We do all share the goal of building trust and protecting civil liberties, but these provisions do not strike the right balance. They would make it harder for us to do our job safely and effectively, and ultimately they would make our community less safe. Um, and so for
those reasons, I can't support those sections of the warrant. >> Thank you. Just a question I have. You mentioned that police department would lose its accreditation if withdrawn from if you withdrew from the brick. Could you explain that further? >> So if we were to adopt uh the provision
where we don't fingerprint juveniles or from misdemeanor arrests that's in there as part of the accreditation mandates that we fingerprint in custody. >> Okay. >> Michael, >> um I just want to make sure that I understand the distinction in number five. Um, I believe that number five says, um, calls upon the select board to
order the BPD and the BPD to cease forwarding fingerprints to the FBI, um, when individuals are arrested. And my question is, is there operationally a distinction between taking fingerprints and forwarding fingerprints to the FBI?
>> That's a good question. And right now, no, operationally, there is no. We roll prints electronically. We still have a mechanism for rolling in uh, ink prints. If you come in for um sometimes like a professional license, you'll need your ink prints rolled and submitted on a paper card. Um but part of our
fingerprinting process, we roll them electronically. They automatically get sent off to the FBI. That's the nationwide database where we people get um a state ID tracking number. Um that stays with them even if they change names or they use an alias. The prints
are tied to that federal identification number. >> Thank you. >> All right. Why don't we now move to the public comment portion? Oh, excuse me. I see that one of the petitioners has her hands raised. Uh Jessica Chico wanted to
comment on something. >> Yes. Hi, good evening everyone. Jessica Kiko. Um I'm the chair of the immigrant advancement committee for CDICR in the town and one of the co-etitioners. I wanted to respond to to a couple of things that have been said that that we've also um heard in prior
conversations that we had with the police department in preparation for um these public hearings and last night at the advisory committee uh public hearing. One of the things that I wanted I think there uh we we've lost your audio. uh chief
>> agencies that that contribute to the brick. That's not just a lack of understanding that we have. It's a lack of understanding that many have, including several Boston city councilors that have recently uh requested clarity uh from their own Boston Police
Department around exactly what communication between the police departments and federal agencies that are involved in the brink in the brick look like. Um, we know as we've presented before the select board before that the information that is fed into
the brick is not limited to criminal activity that it is it extends to surveillance of lawful activity. Um and that once that information is inputed into the brick um even though it is not perhaps directly shared by our local
police department with ICE for civil immigration enforcement purposes which would of course be a violation of our existing um policies. It it is there and it is shared perhaps with other federal law enforcement agencies who then will
share it uh with ICE and other agencies. I think we know that there's no kind of walls uh between federal agencies right now that any data that that DHS is able to get a their hands on um they will use and have used. Um I also wanted to
address the Yasi funds um because I think you know I I hear the concerns around loss of resources um that forgoing these funds uh would mean for a police department. But I would also hope that both our police and fire department are thinking about how
to continue to function without these federal funds. um because this is you know outside of this resolution um there are uh there have been repeated threats by the federal government to have strings attached to these types of federal funds um not just immigration
enforcement others um to you know withhold funds from jurisdictions that the federal administration considers to be sanctuary jurisdictions we're only a little bit more than a year into this administration and so far the courts have struck down these, you know,
conditions that would require us to engage in in immigration enforcement to receive these funds, but we can't be certain that the courts are going to hold uh the line. So, um I I would urge us to kind of think more broadly about that. And lastly, Yasi funds is what
funds the brick, right? So, um they're they're closely intertwined. Um so, those are primarily the things that I wanted to speak to. >> All right. Thank you. >> Just jump in briefly on Yuasi. Um because I I do think it's really important to I I take the co-etitioner's
point. Um I will say that since July of 2024, we on town staff have been preparing for this possibility that federal funding would vanish. So since the presidential debate uh which was pretty disastrous,
uh we've been watching this and we know what our exposure is. We know what would happen if we lost not just this money but all our federal money. Um we are ready for that eventuality. It's not going to be pretty. Um but I also think that that's not a reason to to
um self-withdraw from it uh in the absence of those. I think we should hold on to whatever resources we can for as long as we can as provided that we are not forced to do something that we are not morally ready or willing to do. And let's be clear, we were ready under with
Yuasi to make that. We were make we were operating under that assumption as recently as you know about a month ago. Um so we are ready to forego Yuasi if we need to. But Yuasi is critical to our operations right now. And I don't think
foregoing it voluntarily is wise um or especially in in this environment. Um, it funds so much more than just, you know, um, regular policing activity, um, equipment. It funds emergency management. It funds the fire department. Um, it's just it's it's it's
a critical resource. Um, so I do want to just reassure people that yes, we are prepared to lose it, but no, I don't think it's a good idea to voluntarily relinquish it. >> All right, looks like Chief Sullivan has joined us. Go ahead.
>> Thank you, John Sullivan. uh fire chief, emergency management director and the jurisdictional point of contact for Yuasi. Um so to just piggyback on what Chaz just said uh is that um not only have we been preparing for the
eventuality that uh the conditions would not allow us to move forward with Yuasi money. One of the things that this petition does not um address is the fact that anything that we have had and accumulated through YASI funding uh over the course of uh the last 15 plus years
or 20 years almost uh is subject to um pullback. So, uh, the fire department's SCBA, some of the, uh, metering equipment that we have, uh, all of the sheltering equipment for emergency management to maintain, uh, emergency shelters for the town, uh, our funding
for our, uh, um, uh, equipment in our emergency operations center. Those things are all subject to recall by UASI if we withdraw from from this. I think the petitioner just you know showed showed that the the real reason behind
um re withdrawing from yuasi is not all the good work that it does. It's because it is associated with the brick. Uh and you know chief pastor made uh a a compelling argument about what the brick actually does for uh her department. Uh
I it it's it's all tied back to the brick. I and for the the emergency management and the rest of the town functions that get much needed essential funding and equipment through
UASI uh to be held hostage to that I think is is not uh is not the right way to go about doing business. Um, this was this this is for communities that are at risk of being part of the global
fight against terrorism. We found that out in 911. Uh, and that's why this was this was funded. It's not because the town hasn't made done due diligence or anything like that. We are in we are in a position where we are contiguous to uh Boston which is a target uh for
terrorism that's been identified by the federal government long before this administration. Uh and it is realized that the the local governments as part of that reaction force uh should an event occur just do not have the ability
to be able to uh be standing up all of the equipment and resources they need without the the help of the uh uh these funds. uh the communications infrastructure so that we have interoperability communications all throughout the metro Boston region is
all because of the hundreds of thousands if not millions of dollars that have come through um the the UASI funding it it there there are certain elements in today's you know federal government and and immigration enforcement and and potentially you know the the the
information that the brick is is accumulating I don't have a lot of expertise in that I can't speak to that. Uh but to weigh that against the the dramatic amount of um equipment and training and resources that we get um it
it it doesn't it it doesn't make sense. So that's you know that's as the as the jurisdictional point of contact. I wish that the petitioners had come to me and asked me questions about how this would affect Huasi. They did not. Um,
>> no, no one to this day has has called me and asked me what uh my opinion was on it. So, I don't think the due diligence was done by the the uh petitioners on this. >> Paul, >> yeah. Um, I I just wanted to make kind of a a general comment, not about this
article, but in general. Um, I don't know if this was by design, but boy, you're playing defense tonight. Um, how many articles have you got up and spoke on? Three, four. Um, right. Uh, you know, it's remarkable to me. Um, a few
years ago, we went through a phase, and um, this will probably get some people excited, but I'm gonna say it anyway, of defunding the police. You know, that was a phase we went through. Um, I feel like we're now neutering the police. I mean, it's remarkable to me that you're
playing defense on so many articles. Surveillance, uh, limitations on what you can do. Uh, I don't know. I I feel like we've gone backwards. Um, that's I'm not supportive of this article at all and I'm very concerned about the
others and I feel like we're going backwards and nibbling back at at at at the police. Um, we should pay attention that she's been here for two hours commenting on various articles. Um, that should say a lot to this board. That's
all I have to say. >> All right. All right. And with that, why don't we go to the uh public hearing? Uh Hannah Clots, try to participate at the outset of the meeting. Thank you for your patience. So, why don't we go to you first?
>> Hi. Um I wanted to speak in support of warrant article 25. Um, you know, if we want to be a safe space for our constituents and our neighbors and our residents, then we cannot be helping DHS
spy on our neighbors. Um, participating in Rick allows ICE to target immigrants and POC within our community. Um, also if we want to condemn the racism and violence perpetrated by ICE,
we must prevent them from surveilling us in our community, which includes um social media surveillance of social justice groups. Um yeah, and I would also say that I
condemn um selling out our immigrant communities for um federal um surveillance funds. Thank you. >> All right. Next, we have Shashana Erlick who signed up in advance.
>> Hi. Uh I'm trying to put my camera on here. Got my plant out of my face. Thank you very much. I also am speaking in favor of warrant article 25 and I do want to focus on uh the brick and the
relationship between Boston public schools and ICE came to light in 2017 when a student was written up in an incident report after a bunch of students start uh failed to start a
fight. He was identified without any credible evidence that he was part of MS13. And despite the claim by the then superintendent of the Boston public schools that no information was um ever
shared with ICE, that turned out not to be the case. And pursuant to a lawsuit that was brought, at least 135 student incident reports generated by the Boston public schools were made accessible to ICE through brick.
Things have tightened up since then. There were amendments, but a critical ongoing concern is with the gang assessment database, which is an interjurisdictional shared database accessible to other agencies.
And um young people are assigned to this database based on a 10point system. And in 2022 in the case of Das Ortiz versus Garland, it's an embank
decision by the first circuit. The court talked about the dangers of its subjective criteria that can criminalize normal teenage behavior. Um, it presents a considerable risk of
error, requires careful factf finding that virtually any interaction with someone identified as a gang member, walking, eating, recreating, communicating, or otherwise associating with someone who themselves may
inappropriately be considered a verified gang member can in fact result in that person being added to the database of gang activity. And verification in this case showed
social encounters in unremarkable neighborhood locations, uh, park, school, front of teenagers homes resulted in a verification of a non-gang related student being identified. And
the court said, "Certainly the fact that young men were all his were all Hispanic does not permit an inference that any or all of them were gang members and we need to stand by all members and vulnerable marginalized members of this
community. Thank you." >> All right. Next, we have Sarah Sherman. >> Sorry, we had >> Hi, good evening. Uh my name is Sarah Sherman Stokes and I'm here to speak in support of Warrant Article 25 as well. I'm a clinical associate professor of
law and I also teach immigration law at Boston University School of Law where I run the immigration clinic and I represent people who are facing deportation. Um serendipitously the um young man that Shosana was speaking of is my client or I should say was my
client. I represented that child um who was a high school student when his information was shared by a school resource officer with the brick. >> And because his information was shared with the brick, he was detained for over
a year, almost two years um in ICE custody here in Massachusetts, separated from his family despite being a teenager, despite being a high school student. He was working part-time and going to school. He was pulled out of his community, sent to jail where he became suicidal because he was so
depressed about the horrific conditions that he was enduring. He ultimately gave up his case and was deported to El Salvador despite having a meritorious claim for relief because he could not stand being in detention. And this was all because of the brick. It was because his private information, information
about a wouldbe argument in a high school cafeteria, something that we can all relate to, something that probably all of us have experienced as teenagers, my own kids' experience as twins. Um, that information about a wouldbe argument in a high school cafeteria was shared with the brick and was detained
and deported on that basis. I am absolutely confident that he is not the only one. As Shosana said, many children have been targeted. Their information has been shared with the gang database and with the brick. Um despite what uh the um what uh chief pastor said um the
brick actually doesn't focus just on criminal activity. The brick has written intell so-called intelligence reports on anti-war groups, local activists, including Howard Zinn, the National Lawyers Guild, and the ACLU. The Brick has produced 1500 pages of surveillance,
on Occupy Boston, um on labor unions, on the Black Lives Matter movement. It has targeted and surveiled the social media presence of Muslims and Arabs for using common Muslim terms like UMA that means community. Um the brick targets many many people who
have nothing to do uh with criminal um nothing to do with criminal investigations, nothing to do with crime. I'll also note that as you know we're often compared to Newton, our neighbor. Uh Newton is not a participant in the brick. Um and as far as I know, their crime has not surged. Uh terror
attacks are not up. um we can be a safe and inclusive community without the brick. Um and that's why I strongly strongly support uh warrant article 25. Thank you. >> All right, we have someone in the room who would like to participate in public comment for this warrant article. Go
right ahead. Come to the podium. My name is Susette Abbott and I'm a town meeting member of precinct 10 and I want to make uh remarks in support of warrant article 25
and first talk about the current political situation. Currently, we see increasing threats to democratic functioning and we see a greatly expanded immigration police force that
functions almost as a private militia at the command of a wouldbe dictator. In the last few months, we all witnessed the much publicized murder of two white citizens of Minneapolis at the hands of
this force. Much less witnessed or discussed are the mostly hidden deaths of dozens of others. Almost exclusively people of color at the hands of or in the custody of ICE.
This is the federal law enforcement that we are discussing sharing our information with. The brick is the Department of Homeland Security funded intelligence gathering operation with
federal agents sitting side by side with Boston police. They have access to the full range of intelligence gathered by the agency. The Justice Department and DHS have made it clear that all
information gathered or held by any federal agency is available to ICE. At this moment, it seems clear that the greatest threat to the well-being of people of Brooklyn or the entire state
and country is not coming from crime unsolvable by traditional police methods. Rather, it is coming from our government which is perfectly willing to do away with our rights and liberties.
We should not be part partnering with their surveillance and deportation schemes. A yes vote on warrant article 25 is a clear rejection of those schemes and an
affirmation of our status as a sanctuary town. Thank you. >> All right. Next we have Marty Rosenthal. >> No, still can't. Oh, there it is showing up with my background. Okay. So, um I have
some thoughts on this. I didn't say much about it last week and I gave more last night with very severe time constraints to the advisory subcommittee. First, I want to respond to what Paul said because I really yield to nobody who was disturbed about the years that I called
the troubles which were six years and I was accused of being an apologist for the police department. I happen to know from vast statewide experience we have a great police department and they were unfairly attacked during that time and someone's running for select board now
that that actually voted against the contract for the 17%. However, I think Paul's wrong that this is part of that and I'm sorry the chief is going through this, but these issues are much different and and I accept much of what
Suzette just said that that we're talking about a crisis in law enforcement that it could happen in Brooklyn and there have been people detained in Brooklyn. So, I I think that to conflate those two things is really wrong. Uh secondly, I hope everyone will
read the Vera report that I sent you because it really gets into the complicated issues on this article. I really have less interest in the technical issues that you're talking about. They're important, but what I would like this article to do, and I
said so last night, is additional things that Brookline should be doing and proposing. And I'm going to do some of that. And I wonder if that should even if you should even be looking at next week as opposed to two weeks from now because I know the petitioners are
working on things and I'm going to send more things to the petitioners. I hope they'll be open to it. I want to mention briefly um the paragraph on the general orders. It's been discussed me briefly, but and part of what I'm going to propose, if I can ever get my act
together and start participating in all these hearings, is a referral motion that's going to suggest that the proclamation be put into the general orders instead of uh a bylaw that's going to get reviewed and I believe
struck down by the attorney general. And those general orders are referred to the the main one that's the artic paragraph 6. Uh it it does just repeat the use of uh it's uh order 51.
It doesn't add anything to order 51. But one thing I want to point out is 50 which is the one and they don't mention in here the duty to intervene which I think is very important in 50. But 50 does not apply to nonbrookline officers.
51 does and I think that needs to be looked at as well as one of the things that the general orders should be improved with. So, um I I'm going to propose other additional ideas. I think that the know your rights brochure needs
to be improved and and I'm and I know that Jessica knows a thousand times more about this immigration stuff than I do. Um but I I know a lot about people getting >> Your time is up. All right, we have a high school student
who would like to speak. Go right ahead. >> Yeah. Hi. Can you hear me? Um, I strongly support the proposal made by Warren 25 for Brooklyn to withdraw from Brick. As a high school student at Brooklyn High School, I fear for my black and Latino peers in the Brooklyn
community who have to worry about being connected to gang activities and crime just because of their appearance. It is extremely concerning to me that the group of individuals who make up Brick's database is more than 97% person of color. The targeted violation of person of color information needs to stop. The
right to privacy should be maintained for all regardless of race, which is why I support this proposal. All right. Thank you. We have another individual in the room would like to speak. Go ahead. >> Yeah. David Clafter, town meeting
member, precinct 10. I also wanted to respond to Paul's comments earlier. Um, I think that to conflate the period now with where we were six years ago is to really misunderstand the profound
political crisis that this country is going through. I think to be blind to the fact that our federal government is attacking many of our basic rights of
civil uh civil rights, due process rights and seemingly willing to undermine elections to stay in power even to the extent of threatening to run for a third term right now. um that that
to not deal with the question of how we relate to federal authority, federal uh police authority, um is to misunderstand the political moment in a really pretty profound way.
And I think that we'll discuss it in the town meeting, but I I think that the time right now is to be very skeptical of any cooperation, any information
sharing with federal authority as long as that authority is unwilling to restrain itself. Thank you. >> All right. Do we have anyone else online who would like to be heard as part of the public hearing?
>> I chi uh one of the co-itioners. We'll go back. >> All right. Go ahead. >> Yeah. >> Go ahead. >> Yeah. I just if no one else has public comment, I just wanted to uh respond to a point by Chief Sullivan. Um, Chief Sullivan um criticized the petitioners
for not meeting with him as the point of contact of for Yuasi. I want to say that we only learned that Chief Sullivan was the point of contact from UASI yesterday at the advisory committee subcommittee meeting. We had no knowledge that the
fire department was the was the lead on this. We did reach out to chief pastor. Um we had a conversation with chief pastor. she uh graciously and uh Superintendent Campbell uh and one other member of the police department had a conversation. We have tried to respond
to concerns by the police department. We are happy to try to cons respond to concerns by the fire department. Um however, we should make clear that um the we are very concerned about Brookline's participation in Brook Brick
and we need to have that conversation at town meeting. Um, I mean to to be honest, before this warrant article, I didn't know anything about brick. Um, and now that I've heard of it, I I'm I'm really appalled at the thought that we're participating in this and I I I think this needs to be brought to the
attention of town meeting and town meeting may vote it down and not have any problem with it, but folks should be aware of it. Thank you, >> Chaz. And I I I think as we're having this conversation, which is good that we're getting all this information out there, a couple of just points. Um,
one of which is I think a lot of the distrust of the brick and the issues that have been raised stem from things, you know, the reference that is constantly made is to something that happened in 2017. In 2019, Boston passed the trust act. Boston administers the brick as part of a response to the
issues that were raised here. Um, it's designed to provide oversight and additional clarity to the brick to prevent the things that happened in 2017 from happening again. Now, I understand that people may say, "Well, that doesn't go far enough. That doesn't, you know, this and that." We haven't heard that
discussed here. We keep going back to 2017 and this terrible incident that happened, and we aren't talking about the trust act or anything that's happened subsequently to that. And it's creating this view of the brick that is incomplete. And so I think if we're going to have this discussion, let's have a full discussion of what's
happened since 2017, what's happened in 2019, what's happened subsequent to that in terms of the oversight that is now being provided to the brick. The other thing that I think is really important to flag here is the general is is the expansion of this idea that we don't
work with the federal government. Um because yeah it's it is an unfortunate reality that we live in this environment under a federal government that is disrespectful of the rule of law that is flouting the rule of law. Um and as I
said earlier we on staff have been working on this issue about how we respond to a lawless federal government um since before this administration was sworn in. Um, I'm very proud of the work our team has done and the support the
select board has given us um in thinking about how to be responsive to a federal administration that is so nakedly corrupt and lawless and all of those things and to do it in such a way that makes it stick. That's the thing that
really gets to me. We are struggling as localities in the face of an overwhelming uh uh federal uh uh hostility and that doesn't mean we should just roll over and do nothing but that means we should work effectively. Um and I think the unfortunate reality
of the situation is we cannot fully disconnect from the federal government. That is just not possible. Um and we have to take into consideration what protections we can put in place without fully disconnecting from the federal
government. Um they it's this supremacy clause of the US constitution like we cannot get away from them. Um much as we might like to um and so we have to figure out how to make that work how to balance that out. And I will say that we have been committed, all of us, um,
across the departments to figuring out how to make that work, how to effectuate the will of Brookline, which has very clearly said to us, we do not support the actions of this lawless federal government, and we want to do something about it. And my response to that has been, let's figure out a way to make
that stick. Let's not be performative. Let's be proactive. And so I don't want us to go down the rabbit hole of picking the wrong targets, focusing on on smallcale things. I want to focus on protecting the people who live in this
town, the people who are subject to those ICE detainers, the people who will who could be picked up off the street. Uh I think of that poor student who's picked up in Somerville all the time. Um uh Romek, I I I live in fear of that happening here. Um, and I think about
how we can protect our residents and make sure that that doesn't to the extent that we can protect our residents, that we do our our best to make that happen. So, I don't want people to think that when you hear Chief Pastor, Chief Sullivan, and me saying, "Let's let's think about this, let's
talk about this," that it's a knee-jerk reflexive reaction or that it's, you know, a closing of ranks or any of that. um or that it is or that we are not taking seriously the concerns that this community has about the federal government. We are very concerned about what the federal government is doing and
we are fighting it, but we are fighting it in ways that that we're trying to fight it in ways that work. Um, and so I would just as we have this discussion, I would strongly encourage us to have that discussion fully informed about what it is that we're actually doing, what we
can and can't do, and then thinking strategically about how we can invest our resources to combat the unlawful activities of the federal government. So that's just where I am on this. All right, we'll go to petitioner Jessica Kiko and then we really should move on. >> Thank you. Yes. And I want to
acknowledge that it's past 11:00, so I'll be very brief, but I just wanted to mention that I think that there's a sense that if something doesn't violate the Trust Act, that then it's okay and there's no kind of cooperation or data sharing and and that's not the case. The
Trust Act speaks to specific prohibited actions um between the Boston Police and ICE. Um but what we are really speaking about is our values, right? the values that we stated that we want to live by and that
have shaped some of our policy. And so to really live those values, we need to go beyond kind of the limited four corners of a sanctuary city policy that we currently have or the Boston Trust Act and really look at kind of those more deeply embedded ways in which we
might be perhaps inadvertently um acting against our values. >> All right, Bernard. if you can unmute yourself. >> Yeah, I did. I just want I'll put my picture up here so you see what I look
like. Hey, I just wanted to uh speak to uh Paul's comment about the defund the police uh thing. I think there is a difference between what happened then which was purely performative and in fact for many people kind of the cool thing to do but now we're dealing with a
situation uh where it's much more dangerous and it's coming from a force that we can't fight. We don't have an army. So we have to figure out ways of sort of almost like guerrilla warfare. I no I shouldn't say that. have to figure
out um let's see what's a good word that won't get me into trouble. Uh figure out ways of resisting within the strictctures that u you know we're given by you know things like the uh supremacy clause and and and the power of the federal government and the failure of
our institutions to to uh put it in any controls. So in that regard, I think one thing that we should think about is you really try to analyze and understand the Boston trust act uh as well as the u what's it the protect act of um
uh in the state legislature and figure out well no and and realize that any assurances we receive from Brook brick like we received a couple days ago in an email should be suspect and we should figure out ways to demand honest
responses uh and and really question everything that they say and do and and require them force them to the extent we can to give us the information on who is being put in their databases for example. Um you know what what are the
incidents that have happened over the last few years that uh um you know uh are pretty outrageous and what are they doing about it? Now, that's not going to guarantee very much, but at least it's a proactive way of of of responding and
maybe getting some assurance and and just putting them on notice that uh if they want to uh carry out uh their their actions in the way that uh they have in the past that there will be some resistance. Um so I you know I think
that a lot of the thing I I agree with a lot of things that Chaz said but you know we have to we have to respond uh in some way and we just have to figure out the most creative um effective way of doing that. It's not always easy.
Thank you. And by the way I was chair of the slide board doing that defund the police craziness um and it was pretty harrowing. Uh, so I'll just say that >> I make one point since my name has now been invoked four times. I told you I
get some I get some reactions. >> Um, let me be clear. I said that Chief Pastor had been for the past four warrant articles, she's had to defend her department by being restricted in some way. That was my point. It reminds me of that period when she had to get up
multiple times and defend her department. Um, so you know, whether you like the rel the reference or not, certainly it's a much different time, but each one of these articles that we've discussed for the past two hours is directly impacting her department.
And I can't remember in my tenure on the select board her having to get up as many times as she has tonight to defend uh her department and actions that town meeting are going to take that may restrict her in her ability to protect
Brookline's public. Um and yeah, that does remind me from back when we were doing the defund the police time. Just the way I feel. Thanks. >> All right, with that uh why don't we move on to our next wording warrant article. So, thank you to the
petitioners. We will close for now the public hearing on warrant article 25. Uh, and we will reconvene on warrant article 25 at a subsequent select board meeting. So, next we have warrant article 21 resolution expressing support
for the Massachusetts Medicare for all legislation. Do we have the petitioner on? >> So, this is this is a continuation of the prior one. you don't need the update from the petitioners. Um, we have additional information in the packet about where this has been. Melissa, I
don't know if you're on. Um, >> Melissa is not on. >> Melissa is not on. She may be down in advisory. Uh, if they're still going. Um, hold on one second. Um, so you've got um an up you've got updated information
here. Um, the human services subcommittee report came in. Uh there was an amendment. Um the amendment um um is um uh does has does have some um
significant changes. Uh the resolution talks about um uh urges the Commonwealth to develop and establish a state healthcare system that provides universal, affordable, and accessible health care for all residences and reduces costs for municipalities. Um uh
they also make specific reference to the singlepayer healthcare system uh legisl that's legislation that's now pending in the legislature. Um but with those changes the um human services subcommittee recommended favorable action. Um
has the advisory committee taken this up yet in its current form? >> I don't know the answer to that. I'm sorry. Um Hold on. Um so the um the amended version um yes the the full advisory
recommended favorable action uh as amended. There's one small amendment that they made replacing the word um coverage with health care in the resolved clause. So it's a minor technical change. Um so coverage as opposed to health care universal exffortable and accessible
coverage for all residents. So the advisory committee by a vote of 17 in favor, one opposed, and seven abstensions recommended favorable action. >> So at this point, it appears that this resolution's essentially saying that the town of Brooklyn would like to encourage
pursuit of a singlepayer system. >> Correct. >> And it just it no longer makes reference to any specific title. >> Right. Doesn't talk about Medicare for all. Right. >> Right. Michael, >> um I I will note and I found this a
little confusing when I read it. There is a reference to singlepayer um in the in one of the whereas clauses I believe, but in in the resolution it says uh to develop and establish a state health care system that provides universal,
affordable and accessible health care and for all residents etc. um does not necessarily refer to singlepayer as the means for that, but um maybe maybe that's a presumption, but I don't
necessarily think that's the only way. >> So, what would members like to do with this? Do you want more time to consider it? Are you ready to just vote on it? >> I John, >> I feel ready to vote on it. Um I mean at
the same time I'm not sure uh what we can expect from this um at the when it reaches the legislative level. Um and I'm not sure that we've had a thorough vetting of all of the questions
that need to be considered. But I don't kid myself that um you know by vote of a resolution of the town of Brooklyn that we are taking responsibility for fixing um the medical insurance system in this country
which is seriously broken. Um but at least we're saying there needs to be movement in the direction of a singlepayer system and that that's good enough for me. >> So do you want to make a motion? >> I move >> 1110. I move that we by vote of the
select board indicate our support of article 21. >> All right, Bernard, your vote. >> We'll come back to you. John, >> yeah. >> I >> Paul, >> I'm going to abstain. >> Michael, >> I assume you mean recommend favorable action. >> That's what I do. Okay.
>> Thank you. >> I I Bernard, >> uh, I'm going to abstain also. All right. Sorry. >> I'm touched, Bernard. >> That I voted with you.
>> So, three eyes. >> That a lot, Paul. >> Two abstensions. And with that, we will now move to informative session. FY2027 and FY26 Community Development Block
Grant. >> Go right ahead. >> Yeah. Three minutes. No. Is that too short? >> She had three minutes. All right, I'll take from the
>> Okay. That's That's okay. >> All right. really appreciate self-driving car. >> Well, not self-driving, but you have a car. >> I am ready.
>> So, good night members of the U select board. I am David Kusman with the um planning department, the community development administrator and I'm going to give you an update about the CVG process for fiscal year 27. Um
so the purpose of the annual action plan is to outline how funds uh hot funds will be used to address the town's housing and community development needs for the upcoming fiscal year. It also serves as a framework to guide transparent public process for
allocating these funds. In addition, the action plan ensures that the town continues to make measurable progress towards the goals established in the five-year consolidated plan that we've discussed and approved last approved last year. So for this fiscal year we
anticipate we anticipate approximately receiving 1.3 million in available funding based on prior years allocation. Um so the priority needs identifying the annual action plan focused on several
key areas. This included rehabilitation of existing affordable housing units to preserve long-term affordability, support for economic development through job training initiatives and improvements to public facilities um particularly to enhance ADA
accessibility. In addition, the plan supports a range of public services such as senior transportation programs, assistance with food cost and other essential community u based services.
As you may know, um the uh the CDG program follows statutory requirements. The CWG program is fund funding is subject to federal allocation limits that guide how funds can distribute it. Up to 15% of the total allocation may be
used for public services and up to 20% may be allocated for program administration. The remaining 65% must be directed toward eligible programs and activities such as housing, economic development, and public facility
uh improvements. Within these guidelines, the town's proposed allocation uh prioritize the rehabilitation of existing affordable housing, support for job training and economic development initiatives, improvements to public facilities with a
focus on ADA accessibility and essential public services, including senior transportation and food assistance. This approach ensure ensures that we remain compliant with federal requirements while addressing the most pressing needs in our community.
So so far in the uh the current uh environment we have followed four uh steps within this process. Number one has been the release of a request for proposals between the period of December 15, 2025 and January 23rd. And the
intention of that release is just to capture uh prospective participants uh in users of the CG program. And then we have a public meeting um a public hearing. So the intention actually is to
have the CDG advisory committee uh reviewing all the responses from the RFP process uh with the um uh guidance of uh staff from the housing and community planning division. And then the public comment period is the uh step number
three. And we are just going through that process. We open from April 1st uh through May 1st uh 30-day public period comment as required uh by hot. So we are going to be receiving greeting comment
from the public. Um and then the expectation is to come back on May 12th so we can um do a public hearing with the select board to vote and to authorize the submission to h of the annual action plan fiscal year 27. So
what we are doing today in April 7 is is an update. It's a preliminary informative session uh to the select board on CDBG activities so far um in preparation for the fiscal year 27.
So on the meeting on uh March 17, we got uh extensive um feedback from the um CDBG advisory board and so far so based on uh
in um estimated allocation of one uh 368,250. So we uh discuss the allocation according to the caps the uh 15% cap for public services 20% cap for staffing and
then the remaining for uh housing and other eligible activities and the CDG advisory came up with uh some uh preliminary allocations that they are going to be subject to uh the select
board deliberation and approval at the um at the public hearing on May the 12th. So, so we can go through them and essentially we have couple of projects, housing projects, um Brooklyn CDC
project, formerly Brooklyn improvement coalition. We have a major uh roof replacement project with uh high street uh veterans property property from the VHA. We also have a minor uh repair and improvement project at two life
communities as you may see in the memo and as you may see in the presentation as well for it's a total of 733,718. Then we also have a discussion and conversation about public services and we have all uh prospective recipients to
come to this public hearing and to present. So we have so far four BHA typical resident service services services program the uh the trips program with the Brooklyn counseling aging and then the steps to success work
connections program uh and then the uh the food pantry for food cost and needs and then as usual we have 20% allocation to staffing staffing so we have three lines city administration which which is
the administration of the entire RCG grant housing division. We have many activities that support actually administration of projects like the highest street roof replacement in uh BHA property and then the uh comprehensive planning process which is
led by my colleague uh Jay Collins who is here present. So this is uh what has been happening so far. We also have a a pre year previous year allocation chart that we want to show you, but we would
like to reflect and just give you the opportunity to comment on this allocation. And again, this is this is subject to um to um a final approval from the select board uh in a public
hearing scheduled for May the 12th. and and we also are receiving public comment uh during a 30-day period for to articulate in a better way this annual action uh plan process to home. Um,
so I'm going to leave this proposed allocations open and we'll be more than happy to answer any questions and receive any comments about
this process. Uh, so far um, yeah, >> any questions, comments, Michael? Um thank you um David and thank you to the to the team for um bringing this forward
and uh helping the advisory committee to come to um their recommendations um uh and I also want to thank the other members of the committee um who participated um in this uh in producing
these recommendations. Um, I did have one question. In section C, uh, under staffing, it says 20% cap. Um, and I noticed that that 429 293 is more than 20% of the total request. So, could you just elucidate for the committee what
that uh number consists of and and what the 20% actually applies to? >> Yeah. Well, the first highlight here is that so this staffing level is going in three full-time positions and they are scattered across city administration,
the housing division and the comprehensive planning. So in order to understand to fully understand this we have to u disagregate some of those cost um which uh they are going to make it for the 20%
uh cap. So for instance, do you do you want to talk about this? I appreciate that. Good news is that we have one position uh not fully dependent on CG funds now
and it's being covered by housing trust funds. So that line item actually lowered down when compares with previous years. >> Good evening. Thank you. My name is Iana Linda Smith. on the housing and community planning director. Um that 20%
we're talking about, what happens here? We combine any administration cost um besides a specific um a specific application that we're going to be working with project that we're going to be working with. So in order to carry
out things like um the doing monitoring on our affordable housing um lottery that come in and so forth. We do have a the housing staff that's their part of it, but we're able to take that money um
from the 80% the 80 is it 85% 64 65% I'm sorry. Um we're able to take some of those funds from that 65% to fund that staffing because they're directly working with the rehab projects or um
the the other housing capital improvements that we're doing. The 20% however covers um the administration of the grant along with the comprehensive plan also falls under administration. So we cover the the person or our community
planner and our CD administrator there the 20%. However, because it's covering staff, we put them together and say to you this is staffing cost because we can't. That's just what it is. Okay. Thank you. >> No, no, I explain that. Well,
>> and please feel free to call us anytime. We we're so happy to answer questions and to clear whatever it is that you gentlemen or anyone in the public needs to know. We're happy to clear it up. So, >> anyone else have questions? Paul, >> I have one comment. First, thanks for
all that you do. I'm going to miss you. Um, for folks, staff members like this that work all day long and then they stay up until 11:30 at night so they can give us a presentation. It would be so great if
we actually frontloaded the pre the day for staff if they're going to give presentations like this. They should be earlier in the agenda and not last as we're approaching midnight. That just be my my suggestion. I know you've had a long day and you've had a long night and you're going to get up tomorrow and do
it again. So, >> yes, >> just a just a suggestion for uh for future agendas that maybe cut our staff a little slack. >> Thank you. >> Anyone else? >> All right. Well, thank you very much for
your presentation. >> Thank you. >> You're most welcome and have a good night and thank you for having us. >> Take care. Thank you so much. >> All right. And with that, we will now go to overlay surplus request. Question of authorizing the town administrator to
transmit a letter seeking certification of any available overlay surplus to the board of assessors. >> Yes. Um we're looking to certify an overage. Uh we think that there is an overage in the uh overlay account. Uh we think the assessors will agree. Um, if
that money is certified, we will use it for next year's budget to um uh do necessary capital projects and improvements. >> Do we need to know the amount? >> Um, we're asking for a blank amount. I think it will probably be around $1.8 million.
>> And remember, >> that's a lot. >> Yes, the reserve fund, the reserve fund this year is busted. We're tapped. Um, so this is to fund projects like the um uh transfer station. >> Okay. So I move authorizing the town
administrator to transmit the letter. >> Discussion. >> Second. >> Second. >> All right. Bernard, your vote. >> I. >> John. >> I. >> Paul. >> I. >> Michael >> I. >> And I also vote I.
So, next we have annual town election question of approving the following actions related to the May 2026 annual town election. Vote to issue the warrant for the annual town election for May 5th and vote to appoint a new Democratic
register of voters as presented in the town clerk's memo. >> I move both items. >> Any discussion? >> Second. All right, Bernard, your vote. All right, I'll come back to you. Sean,
your vote. I >> Sorry. I >> All right, Bernard also votes I. Paul >> I. >> Michael >> I. >> And I vote I as well. Is there anyone who wants to make public comment? Seeing none, that concludes our meeting.
Oh, sorry. Looks like Bernard say go ahead, Bernard. >> Yeah. Uh Paul had got a big laugh out of the fact that I voted staying on the um um Medicare for all warrant article. I just want to explain to the public. Uh
for the last week, I've spent most of my time in uh a medical facility. Um so I've been able to catch up with a lot of the materials, but not that. So, I didn't feel that I really had the basis for saying yay or nay on that um on that
warrant article. So, Paul, I may still vote with you later on. >> I merely I was said I was merely touched, Bernard, by by you voting with me. I was honored. Um my wife, as you know, is in medicine. She'll give me some grief, but I'm reserving that vote for town meeting. I'm probably going to
abstain on most articles uh the remainder of my tenure on the board so I can vote cleanly at town meeting. >> So very briefly before we adjourn I guess a public comment of sort I will make. It has been brought to the attention of several of us I believe that there's some concern about the tax
calculator >> for the uh override campaign. >> Sure. And I'm wondering where staff currently stands in terms of possibly reconfiguring the calculator to also show the built-in increase from our debt
exclusions. >> So I think the problem there is one for the last several overrides we've done it this way. And so it's a would be a change in practice to shift away from how we have current how we have done it. And remember it's it's hard to calculate someone's full tax bill. I mean, it's
easier to do it for 27 than it is for 28 and 29 because then you're really just extrapolating out. But you've got to remember that there is the 2 and a half% increase. There's new growth, but new growth is not spread evenly. What if, for example, your your building, you put up a new fence, say, and the assessor
catches it and all of a sudden your property value has gone up. That's new growth. That winds up getting factored in. Um, it wind the the bill winds up being more complicated. You know, is it a primary residence? you have residential exemption, all that stuff winds up being factored in. The cleanest
way to get a number that is clear to folks is how much is it going to go up because of the override. That's the easiest piece of information. Once you get beyond that, you start getting increasingly speculative about what that is. And so, right now, what it says is
here, you know, we've tried to make very clear on the website every on every page. It says if you use this calculator, just be advised. This is not how much your taxes will go up. it's by how much extra they would go up if an override passed. Um we will obviously continue to have discussions based on
the feedback you and the public provide. Um but it's a tough situation to be in, right? Because you don't want to be accused of providing fudging the numbers, providing inaccurate information, guessing low, guessing high. Um that number winds up being much clearer in terms of what what can
and can't be what's what's kind of a source of truth. Michael, >> I I think I think there there's two separate questions here and I and I appreciate your your explanation of the complexity of of the number. Um I'm wondering whether the
label for that number is is the is part of the source of concern because I think there was some reference to the use of the word total as part of the label of that number which led to the misinterpretation of that number. And so it's just something to check. I'll make
sure when we go back to the website that that we clarify the label as much as possible as well because yeah, we tried to be very comprehensive in the disclaimer that we put on the website that this is a this this is a a tool that does not tell you the full tax burden that you may face in FY27 because
we don't want to be in a situation where someone then takes that and goes to the assessor and says, "Wait a minute, wait a minute. Your calculator said I was going to pay this and I'm paying this." Um because it's an estimate. Um >> so I first thanks for bringing this up. I I'm glad because I know I thought you were going to bring it up and you
didn't, but um >> that's okay. Um I I share the concerns, Jazz. You and I have spoken about this. >> Yeah. >> My concern is um is that if we don't do it, >> someone else is going to do it. Yes. And we're going to have three sources of
truth. The campaign has a calculator. That no campaign is going to have a calculator. And by the way, I know they're working on this. They're going to come up with a three-year estimate. Um, I would prefer that that that the select board and town administrator do it. Uh, we publish it. We publish
what our assumptions are. We're assuming a 3.1 between 2 and a half plus new growth. Um, and you know, all things being equal, this is what your tax bill would be for 27 28 and 29. Uh, without
the override and with the override. And without the override, it would include the two and a half growth pierce fire stations and whatever else is in there. And then right below it is, and this is how much more it will go up. If we don't do it, someone else is going to do it.
And we're going to regret if they inflate it to the point where their assumptions scare people. It may scare people anyway, but >> let's do this. Let's put this on for next week so that you can have we can continue to have this. >> We got to do it, but we have to do it quick because >> I and I have your I have your feedback.
I'm gonna try and I understand where I understand the urgency of it and so we'll >> people are now going to the calculator. >> Yes, people were going to the calculator before it was officially live. So, >> people are very engaged in Brooklyn. >> Yeah, I want to just apologize if that's the right word. I did I did indicate I
was intending to bring this up and then I got distracted with the issue of signs on tree lawns. But, um I'm glad, David, that you remembered that a couple of us had have had conversations with uh people who have written to the board. Um, and I I want to sort of underscore
um what what Paul has said and I think what what others are are thinking right now. Um we we do actually know a lot. We I mean we know we're it's going to go up two and a half for starters year after year. >> Y
>> the actual the commercial growth which is not all that predictable nonetheless has nothing to do with this. um it's it's going to be a good thing to have, but in terms of the impact on people's tax bills, it's going to be the two and a half percent. It's going to be the
impact that we're carrying uh exempted debt either for school projects or or we're carrying a previous override from 2023 and it's going to be the known impact carried forward of this override. So, you know, sure there's going to be,
you know, a little bit of variation perhaps depending on a little bit of this factor and a little bit of that factor, but we know the basic numbers. We, you know, we we've spun out and we've talked about these numbers and we've we even had estimates at prior meetings of the um of the select board
and of the uh expenses and revenues committee. um you know it's going to be x% in the first year, x% in the second year, x% in the third year, cumulatively this. And for us to be in a position of handing people a calculator and saying
this is what you're going to you be able to use to figure out, you know, what you're going to be paying in taxes three years from now at the end of this period of the override. And then it turns out, it tells you, oh, it's only going to be $100 a month when in fact at the end of
three years, it'll turn out their tax bill, if it's like on a median property has gone up. And I hope I remember the number correctly. U you know, something like $6,000. I'm pretty sure Paul, you might know better than >> No, I So again, I So I Let's be careful with floating numbers right now. I think
I think Chaz has heard the feedback. I know you met with the team. >> I >> We're working on if it can be done, he's going to do it. I just would strongly encourage we do it because someone else is going to do it and we're going to go damn that thing's not right. Like we're just going to be unhappy about it.
>> I but I will say right you know I think that's going to happen anyway. I think people you can make an optimistic projection and you can make a pessimistic projection. You can make projections that you know for example compound the compound the you know make an assumption about where the total levy is going to be in 28 and then compound
it in 29 and say our numbers are too low. You could say you're not calculating the residential proper residential exemption properly. The number is too high. Um people, you know, what is it? Lies, damn lies, and statistics. Um people are going to spin this no matter what. Um I
I want us to balance, you know, giving giving the most information we can with being fair and accurate. Um and if we don't even make the effort, it looks like we're not being as transparent as we should be. And I understand your explanation, but as Paul and John mentioned, we have some
idea as to what the increases will be independent of an override. So there's and even if we explain what those assumptions are that build this new model, I think that's a safer approach than automatically having our calculator discounted.
>> Okay. >> Right. Right. I I would second your remark about assumptions to just enumerate all of them in terms of the valuation of the property etc etc etc. >> This is helpful feedback. Thank you.
>> Well and and if if just to finish Michael's thought there um there is always a known median property. So sure, I mean, everybody's tax bill is going to be different, you know, and it's going to be different for condos as it is for three families as it is for single
families, right? But there's that median and, you know, you can use the median, which is a known, you know, quantity. You can use the known exemption on the median and, you know, pretty pretty much get a a number for what the tax bill will be three years from now for the
median property. >> The calculator, you don't need to do it for the the calculator does for your property. You plug in your address, it does it for your property, >> right? Right. But it doesn't it doesn't sort of give everybody one number that is kind of a generalized number. >> You don't want a generalized number. You want the one for your property. >> Well,
>> that's what you want. >> That's that's the purpose of the calculator. >> Yes. Okay. >> It'd be great to go home. >> Yes, it would be great to go home. >> All right. We can continue this >> and I and again and as you said, I know time is of the essence here. We will continue working on this and we'll have an update for you next week. >> Thanks, Jess.
>> Thank you. All right. Ajourned. Yeah. >> Bye. >> Get well, Bernard. >> Recording stopped. >> Thank you.