e e e e e e e e he oh good afternoon everyone welcome to the
February 27 2025 meeting of the chadam finance committee pursuant to Governor Healey's March 2923 signing of the aive 23 extending certain covid-19 measures adopted during the state of emergency suspending certain provisions of the the open meeting law until March 31
2025 this meeting of the chadam finance committee is being conducted in person and via remote participation every effort will be made to ensure that the public can adequately access the proceedings is provided for in the order reminded the persons who would like to listen to this meeting while in progress might do so by calling
508 945 4410 again 945 4410 and ENT conference ID 948 520 354 pound sign 9 48520 354 pound sign or one may join the meeting online via Microsoft teams
through the link in the posted agenda well this is a live broadcast and sast on chatam TV despite our be best efforts we may not be able to provide real-time access we will post a record of this meeting on the town's website as soon as possible so with that we are going to
continue our March through prospective bylaw amendments and articles for town meeting and um I'll start the this by having a roll call Tommy D here Bar Madison here John papalardo here joanb here Andy young here CHR Andres here chy
Shields here Eric Whitley here chair is here we have a full house welcome everybody all right so why don't we start with a general proposed General bylaw Amendment for storm water management Mr chair can I interrupt you for just one second
please sure every year at this time I've mentioned when we talk about borrowing and uh sewer connection cost I have mentioned that there is a a way of recouping by tax credits uh used to be a
fourth of the cost now I just I handed to carry the new s schedule SC years ago when I did mine in 2010 it was schedule Z which is I've always mentioned it's no
longer Z it's SC and indeed a taxpayer who is mandated to uh renew their septic system or or rebuild it or mandated to connect to the Sewer can collect a certain
percentage and tax CR a certain percentage of the cost of connecting to the Sewer by tax credit over a period of four years I did it I showed I gave my 10,1 tax return to care
so it is possible but it's renewed and they've increased I believe the percentage of the amount you can claim as a tax credit and for everybody who knows this a tax credit is like real dollars yep so that's the last I have to say about it so now in the hands of the
town I'm sure it would be very helpful when we talk about the amount of money we have to put into our sewer and uh storm water whatever else we're working on thank you that's very helpful joh thank you very much for that appreciate it uh okay Carrie storm water management
who's on Deck storm water management I believe that is Rob failey Rob is approaching the podium good afternoon Rob good afternoon thank you Mr chairman Rob failey director of Public Works so I don't have any fancy presentations on this but I'll just uh talk through it
for a few minutes if you like um so chadam storm water discharges have been regulated under uh what we call the ms4 permit which is the municipal separate storm sewer system uh since its issuance in 2003 there were recent upgrades as
recent as 2018 and that's the current uh ms4 permit that we're working under uh under that permit it required chadam to develop a an up or update a post construction storm water management ordinance so to meet this requirement
chadam adopted chapter 238 in 2019 was part of the annual town meeting uh Charter and in December of 2024 recently uh chadam DPW promulgated storm water management regulations uh to comply and supplement
um to meet the needs of this uh post construction storm water runoff so basically the proposed amendments to chapter 238 are just adding a number of
definitions and I don't know if that I don't think the redline version uh was in color so I mean I could list the definitions that were added um it's a common plan of development on page two
that the biggest change with that is it identifies one acre of uh land disturbance and that's actual Earth disturbance not not if you had a 1acre parcel it's the actual Earth that you're disturbing but it also comes in to play
um subdivisions so subdivisions even if each lot was sold individually and developed by a different developer aggregately all of that land disturbance would be that 1 acre threshold that's probably the biggest change in the whole thing um on page two uh low impact
development definition was added I'm sorry page three um the maximum extent feasible definition was added and the new development definition was added going to the next page um
redevelop vment definition was added and soil disturbance definition was added and I think there is just a few more changes just very minor it is in
that section 23 238-1074 We Stand now with that December 2024 promulgation and I believe uh I believe that's it it's it's more of an administrative change and anything else to to come into compliance with the the needs of the permit comments or
questions Andy please rob do I understand correctly that this also affects um private land owners if they are altering more than one acre of land if the actual Earth disturbance is greater than one acre yes I mean they
need a number of other permits through the town for that but yes it would if it would have to be actual Earth disturbance of at least an acre okay all right that it just this is also going to overlap then with planning board
Conservation Commission if as applicable I mean a number of PL exactly y okay do we actually have to have an update to our Nifty permit do you know no this this comes into compliance with the current NEP uh well sorry the NEP permit
um I don't know so I'm going to rely on Greg Burman since he's here in the audience and and maybe he can bail me out of this question Dodge in the bus sure Greg Burman you're director of natural resources and so the nift's
permit isn't uh so Greg before we start can can you define what the Nifty permit is or for everybody's edification please nonpoint source National pollutant elimination elimination discharge elimination permit
or something like that between us we can get there close enough um so the state is undergoing an an update to the overall ms4 nipes
um will get there our current ms4 is coming into compliance now with the current system we for the next um annual review and Report we'll be getting up to the next level but right now everything is you know as it should
be thank you that's fine John please is there anything discretionary about the definitions that you've put in the document or are they just required uh they're required I mean they it's an EPA driven ordinance so we were just complying with what their
requirements are are there's no alternative language that could be offered up as a supplement I'm thinking about land owners property owners and the potential increased cost of developing land that they own so this was the bare minimum to
get us into compliance the other options were more restrictive okay and we did work with a consultant that has uh experience in many other communities and they and they helped us get these rules and rs where we needed to be so just to be clear I'm sorry Kristen do
you have thank you um I was going to ask who um helped with writing of the or the modification of the existing bylaw um one of the things that I just was noticing and I again didn't really um I it seems like it's really heavy on
pollutants and not so much on storm water so I'm wondering if there's another place in um Town regulations that we are um regulating or trying to take care of storm water and not um for instance um
uh asking Property Owners to keep storm water on their own property so that when particularly when new Properties or new driveways are developed that they're not um shedding more storm water into the public system um it seems to me that's right off the bat that's a a best practice and I it seems like um we don't
enforce that anymore and maybe it was never really a a regulation so that's one question I have why that's not appears in here well I think it refers to the storm water management regulations that were promulgated in December um and this is
just the the bylaw that refers back to that document and of course it's Massachusetts best management practices for storm water we refer to that in the regulations as well I think it does address it just not explicitly in this document yeah and for the smaller
Parcels this is really meant for the the larger uh greater than an acre of land disturbance Parcels I mean there are some other storm water uh not per se storm water regulations like as you know in conservation jurisdiction storm water
would certainly be looked at but you know that's one reason why the um storm water regulations were placed in DPW versus in planning or conservation or something like that because you know conservation doesn't have jurisdiction across town it's only in our resource
areas so DPW has a broader reach Sean please will this have any implications on the Commerce Park Lake yeah I don't know I mean it you know there's no land disturbance there you know it's an existing situation so we'd have to we'd have to look at that
and it is private property at this point Andy please yeah just briefly um quite a few years ago a previous Highway Department had was um adamant the new curb cuts under a Town Road had to be
such that they did not allow storm water run off onto the Town Road because too often uh catch basins if there were any or discharge shoots you were just getting overloaded with it and that has definitely not been enforced for at
least the last 10 years that I know of and there are quite a few places that are just heavy rainstorm they're flowing a tremendous amount of water off the private property onto the Town Road um I'm not sure you know what if anything
rob you can do after the fact uh to try to say you need to fix this um but I'd encourage us to try to do that well I would make an observation that one of the town's leading Engineers private Engineers is of the view that
the Lake and Commerce Park is partly due to the fact that the burm that used to be at the top of the park by 137 yes y it's just been kind of ground down and the infiltration off of 137 is significant um I can't speak to the accur accuracy of that assertion but
pretty smart guy uh Kristen please if I could just follow up and um affirm also what um Andy said I think that that is um I was sort of dismayed I was kind of all excited it's like oh we're going to have a new storm water bylaw in it um so clearly it's just the bare minimum um I
think as we look at managing storm water around the town um particularly from a community standpoint and we still have a lot of those discharge areas that are just a a paved um asphalt shoot down to a wetland um in most cases and um so as
a way to manage storm water it would be beneficial to the community as a whole and a best practice ecologically to have um to really try to have properties try to attain Net Zero runoff from their from their properties um also dismayed to see that um according to this it's no
big deal washing your car in your driveway and allowing all that soapy water and whatever else to run down into um public or private roads which then enters into either a catch Basin or or not um so I um I would encourage the
town to really whatever Department is supposed to pick this up to really um try to enforce that and improve our regulations in storm water management in the community thanks thank you christon other comments or
questions okay how do people feel about voting any reservations it seems largely ministerial to be clear these are to bring the towns bylaws to Christen point to kind of at a bare minimum into compliance with state requirements and
ultimately Federal mandates correct and maybe to follow with that just please to let you know um you know the bare minimum was to get us there as quickly as possible um we weren't in compliance before this and we were encouraged to
get into compliance as quickly as possible uh there may be room for additional things and and looks at regulations afterwards but this was uh the least we could do as fast as we could do it second okay so there a proposal to amend
the general bylaw chapter 238 revisions Municipal separate storm sewer system uh support Tommy Don yes Bar Madison yes John papalardo yesan yes Andy Kristen yes Tracy yes Eric yes
chairs in favor N9 to nil thank you gentlemen thank you appreciate appreciate that okay next up I guess I have Carriage it carries request yes General bylaw amend is a general byw amendment chapter 10 boards
committees and commissions uh the town moderator are appointing authority uh and I have spoken over a number of years about the historic prohibition against Finance
committees serving on other ad hoc working groups uh and the like and as I understanded from Bill litfield uh that language in the bylaws dates back to a time when the finance committee was actually responsible for
the budget was kind of a clear potential conflict of interest in serving on other commissions committees Etc and uh the was The moderator's View that having some flexibility in that bylaw to allow certain members of the finance committee
be appointed by the select board or otherwise uh would be a good thing so that's the Genesis of it uh happy to field any questions it um would not allow Financial committee members to serve on what I think are the 10
standing committees in the town um but again kind of ad hoc working groups uh and the like so I'm happy to field any questions generally there being none I'd be happy to field a motion to
support bylaw is drafted by the town moderator second and a second all right comments or questions support Tommy yes Barbara yes John yes Joanne yes Andy y Christen yes try yes Eric yes chair
supports n to nothing all right thank you home rule petition to allow associate members of the Conservation Commission the power to vote in the case of an absence by voting members Greg Burman hello again so this is a
relatively brief um article request we have seven members three Associates those Associates are right now not able to vote um so if we have a lack of a quorum a meeting would have to be cancelled this happened once in the last
year um very rarely happens but due to the relatively high frequency of meetings it was about 50 uh meetings in 2024 and you know if somebody gets sick for a month or goes out of town it does
get very difficult we thought it would be reasonable to have our Associates able to vote not if we have a full Quorum but in order to make up a quorum um this is done in some other towns in Massachusetts already we modeled the language after that and it's been through Town
Council Eric please um can you just Define for us the difference of what an associate member is in this case versus a regular voting member and and why there's been a difference in the past why they're not allow haven't been allowed to vote in the past sure so I mean the the the regular members what
you would think of is the conservation commission um commissioner uh the the full voting member the associate is present they you know can weigh in they can comment but they can't vote um right
now we actually don't have any associate members um it's been relatively difficult to fill it at least since I've been here I think if they had you know a little bit more reason to be as it were um that if
somebody was missing they would be able to participate and and serve a powerful use that might encourage more Associates to join and it's it's kind of like the farm league where you kind of start off in as associate um get a feel for the ropes and when an opening comes up you
can go up to a full Conservation Commission member further comments or questions Greg I'm curious why this needs to go to the state I would think this would be a local jour jurisdiction matter so it does have to go to the state I would have thought so too but
it's very specifically in the um I don't think it's in the one protection act but it's it Our Town Council told us specifically it had to I took him at his word okay than stat by Statute y okay terrific
other comments or questions John please did you say that Conservation Commission met 50 times last year those are just the public meetings there's also uh planning meetings and other meetings Associated but yes the public meetings
they're typically once a week maybe you know a week off for the holidays but other than that and S members hit all 50 I think all of them hit over 40 but you can just imagine with that kind of um frequency it can be difficult those are
volunteer positions yes doesn't that seem a little insane it so not every Conservation Commission on Cape Cod meets that often some go every two weeks I think part of the rationale was instead of having very long meetings every two weeks this is a
way to break it up and have slightly shorter meetings the there has been a relatively High number of notices of intents and hearing requests um for chatam compared to some of the other towns and I I believe that's why they
prefer doing it this way spreads it out is there never mind it's not really a finance committee question I'm just intrigued by go for it splitting the committee creating a larger committee splitting it and and splitting the the
work that people need to to cover I mean it's a it's that's a lot of work it is a lot of work but it it's you know it's a regulatory committee for the Wetland protection act in our town bylaw so it's not really conducive to
splitting like that and a lot of hearings will take more than one hearing more than one meeting I'm sorry a particular applicant might have to go multiple times and you need to have the same commissioner there for pretty much all the meetings in order to make it work so if you start splitting it gets
difficult that way I can understand that wanted to maintain the consistency of a particular set of Commissioners to review a project through the process but it sounds like there's a pretty heavy workload so I was just thinking I don't know what the number of
Commissioners is but let's say it's five and F five Commissioners and then you got five alternates which you said you're having trouble filling and I think it's because of the workload with no ability to actually have a impact on the outcome of the project that's being reviewed by the commission but if you if
you had ran two tracks so that half of the the sworn in members followed half the load through the year and half followed the other half of the project projects through the year that's just that's a lot of work it is it's a lot of
work they're dedicated volunteers right now it's seven voting members three Associates um so we would need if we went five and five we' need to get you know backups for the backups at that point and logistically it would be very difficult to you know maintain a trail
of one project meeting with those same Commissioners every time understand sometimes you know if you're alter weeks or something it would be it would be more difficult I understand thanks right Kristen please yes we've been notoriously been the busiest
Conservation Commission forever um we were I believe the first Conservation Commission at least on the cape um and in any event um we're we've got what 66 68 miles of Shoreline we have 37
ponds and we have flood plane so all of those areas um any work altering those places requires an application before the commission so it's just the nature of where we are and fortunately we do have these wonderful people who are willing to be dedicated to that um I
think the associates this would be a very helpful thing um so I you know I hope the state certainly approves it and we have to um support the Conservation Commission as best we can and again I note we have another commission that gets a stien still and these folks get
nothing and they are outgoing to site visits for all their applications in addition to attending the meetings um in addition to doing you know drafting orders of conditions and doing work outside so it's a it's an extreme commitment um and uh we're fortunate
that people served don't let that commitment keep you from volunteering especially as an associate well we have to get the B the uh the bylaw passed allowing finance committee members to serve on other committees um okay further comment or
question for Greg Little advertisement um okay there being none then I'll take a motion to support special legislation for an act relative to the membership of the Conservation Commission so moved than thank you Tommy support yes Barbara yes John yes Joanne yes Andy yep Kristen
yes Tracy yes Eric yes share supports nine to nothing thank you Greg thank you uh Carri you want to do any introduction to the proposed 25 M hour speed
limit um sure so this is a um General Law chapter 90 section one sorry 17 c um 25 M per hour speed limit change um this is to see if the town will vote
to accept the pro provisions of Massachusetts General Law chapter 90 section 17 C establishment of a 25 mph our speed limit in thickly settled areas or business district in a city or town um so this will change the 35 30 m
per hour to 25 mile hour in the thickly settled areas and we have um Chief Anderson and deputy chief Lou Malone here to uh go over this terrific thank you g you're welcome welcome gentlemen
good afternoon everyone Lum alzone deputy chief of police show these slides work here um just a little history of why are we here uh several months back some members of the community had um
mentioned at a select board um meeting about uh being able to adopt chapter 90 section 17 C which would lower the statutory speed limit in thickly settled from 30 mil an hour to 25 miles
hour the select board referred that to the Traffic Safety Committee um to look into the process the Traffic Safety Committee did their research and determined that the scope of this project um was larger than the Traffic Safety Committee and really outside of
what they're charged with they referred it back to the select board I I'm not going to I don't need to read this word to word for you but uh the in the thickly settled residential areas in business districts right now there is a
statutory speed limit of 30 mil an hour by adopting chapter 90 section 17c the town would be able to lower the 30 mph to 25 mph the state uh suggests that is done townwide but the town does
have an option to go road by road thickly settled or business district the territory cones to any way which is built up with structures devoted to business or the territory to any way where the dwelling houses are situated at such distances as as will average
less than 200 fet between them for a distance of a quarter mile as you can see the map um there's several streets in the town that are thickly settled um the only ones that the town really doesn't have control of is is Route 28
um it does say 137 but 137 is actually a town road so we put together some stats to share some data uh in 2024 there were 669 motor vehicle stops 520 verbal
warnings 149 citations were issued those included criminal applications civil citations arrests and written warnings uh as you can see there is quite a bit of discretion used by the officers in determining whether to issue a site or not uh there was also
1,866 stationary traffic enforcement cases which means uh when a Cruis is on the side of the road uh running stationary radar um there was several more radar cases usually moving radar the equipment in our Cruisers allows us
to actually uh monitor speed as well when the cruiser is moving 2020 to 2024 motor vehicle crash data there was 1,50 reported which include minor property damage major hit and runs and crashes with injury uh 850
of those were investigated the reason there's a discrepancy is that not all crashes are reported at the time of the crash um there are times where people come in to report uh accidents that have happened in the past so at that point it's more of an information uh change or
gathering 590 minor uh motor vehicle accidents the the difference between a minor and a major is that uh to be considered a major has to be $1,000 of damage or more uh as we know you know everything's $1,000 doll now so we're starting to see you know we're starting to see some of the minors turning into
Majors you know a missing Mirror On Main Street could be a major just because of the cost uh 186 were hit and runs those were most likely um possibly Main Street side roads uh 39 involved injury there were 11 rests made 20 citation issued 13
involved pedestrians and six uh involved cyclists some more speed data 2020 to 2024 uh 143 speeding citations were issued and this is just a breakdown of uh the roadways the the major roadways um where those site those sites were
issued uh there was also a lot of other areas in town but those are some of the major areas of traffic enforcement uh beginning of the summer the department received two new pieces of information uh both radar units one has a digital display which some of you may
have seen uh attached to telephone poles around town and one is a CT box attaches to telephone poles but there's no digital display on that um so we grabbed two pieces of information to bring for you so Ceda street from August 25th to
September 4th um the posted speed limits 30 m an hour over from the 25th to the 4th there were 7,518 Vehicles surveyed the average speed of the vehicles was 24.8 n
Vehicles over the speed limit were was 22 the maximum speed was 51 the minimum speed was 10 uh average vehicles per day 7518 and the 85th percentile speed was
30.21r the significance of the 85th percentile speed is if the state was to do a um engineer traffic study they go by the 85th uh percentile speed they go by um vehicle volume number of crashes
and that that's the number that they they go by when they set the speed limit on roads another area that's highly traveled is Stepping Stones road so from September 12th to September 18th uh there were 8,000 785 vehicle surveyed
average speed was 27.6 n uh 112 Vehicles over the speed limit max speed of 58 uh minimum speed of 10 um 1,464 point2 Vehicles average per day and 85th percentile is
settled as you can see there's quite a few um again the only ones that the town does not have control over is um rout 28 want to talk about this one sure hi again um so chadam has uh just
over 200 Town roads currently um you know if we uh if we say we open up the floodgates and we and we have to sign every road um you know there may be some dead end RS that we don't have to sign but there are the roads say like Old queenan Road that may have multiple
thickly settled areas so there'd be more than two signs on that road so on average I think we're talking about um 400 signs uh around town not to say that um cost should be a safety issue but it there is a consideration for cost so so
looking at um 400 signs you're talking a little over $80,000 just in materials uh the bigger impact of DPW is an hour and a half to install each sign uh you're talking 600 hours of Labor or 75 days of Labor to get this accomplished so so
there is an impact to town staff and to the to the budget thank you rob uh and Lou uh questions Andy Rob is that a number in your operating budget for this proposed year uh it's not my typical sign budget is $8,000 a year this year I've asked
for 12,000 just because we've been getting a lot of sign requests thank you other comments or questions Tommy Mr 51 this is valo I was only doing 50 and I and I don't drive on Stepping Stones
road so I just want to um mention the board hasn't voted on this one yet so if you want to hold off on voting on this one I think we're itching to vote on this one but I'll hold off oh okay uh other comments questions Tracy please um just a comment I think as time
moves on here and cars have greater technology and are safer the the T the trend is that it's safer to go faster I'm not a fan of of making it a slower speed limit and certainly not for this
price tag or for the effort involved by the hardworking DPW ER yeah I'm also not supportive of this and it feels like from the presentation that you know we're kind of fixing something that isn't broken even with the data that we that we have here
and uh you know I think that the police do a great job and and you know the verbal warning number there makes a lot of sense and it's just that would just go up if even change so I I don't think this is a necessary cost or effort that
the town should undertake Kristen please I'm wondering if um you have any statistics on those the signs that tell you how fast you're going and whether a few more whether they're effective because they get my attention I know and I'm driving to work there's some in
other towns that you know like slow down you're you're a couple miles over the speed limit um so I'm wondering if those are effective and whether there would be you know if that would be an option the feedback that we've gotten um about our
digital display sign that we put up in different areas of town that you know initially it does slow people down or makes them aware of their speed you know there are people that slow down when they see it and believe it or not there are people who speed up when they see them to see if to see if they're working
or um but people the like on Ceda Street there was you know some mention that some of the residents did feel like that it it slowed Vehicles downan please thank you Mr chair for 8 some thousand from my point of view it's
worth it to keep our people safe on the streets and I have noticed lately the new signs put up in front of the middle school and those are wonderful and I think they we've been trying to get those for a long long time but anything
like that that will do anything to make our people more safe uh Public Safety wise I'm always going to be for thank you thank you you other comments Tommy Please Mr
51 were you was the department surprised by any of that any of the data you received no no no I find it I I didn't realize that so many
people were going 30 miles an hour or below right and the data shows that the fortunately the average motorist is going the speed limit or below um I certainly wouldn't stand in front of you and tell you that the 22 with 112 going
over isn't a problem right that's a problem but that's why we have traffic enforcement so I would just observe if my math is correct of 20 22 uh incidents out of 700 7518 is
0.29% uh and 112 of 8785 is 0.1% uh so point I think we're trying to fix a problem that doesn't exist do we have any sense uh Rob of what the labor would rough out to for
this uh you mean in cost yes you know if I were to just take a 600 person hours yeah I mean say $50 an hour you know including benefits um what's the math on that 300
St Edie um yeah there have been what two public Forums on this last night was the first that was the first is there another one planned the select board meeting next
week next week okay all right um Y how many people showed up what was it like anybody beat you up nobody supported it I don't know I was just curious there were um there were both there were I would say maybe there was 10 or 15
people in the audience MH um some for it some not for it okay um and and also um like we mentioned last night you know there's always speed greater than reasonable yes so although the speed limit is set at 30 and the example that
we we continue to use is you know 30 m hour on Ridgeville road today it's probably reasonable 30 m hour on Ridgeville Road July 3D right when there's families and cyclists walking you know it it probably would not be
reasonable so we can also use speed greater than reasonable when it comes to enforcement okay I see selectman necastro has his hand up Dean observations thank you Mr chairman I just want to speak as an individual member of the select board as as um as
you heard we had the public forum last night and um there there are individual circumstances with respect to different streets like stage Harbor Road Cedar Street uh Old queenanne Road that were
were brought up by by some of the prop abiding Property Owners um one of the um aspects of the public forum that interested me and I've had a couple of conversations now with Chief Anderson and um I I think Kristen
alluded to this in her question is um the um the deterrent effect of of signage uh I'm not talking about a speed a a reducing the speed limit to 25 but signs like we have now on um um old CER Road
there is a speeding sign it's flashing I believe it also has red and green red if you're uh over the speed limit and green if you're okay uh and they do serve a deterrence and uh there really isn't any
money in the budget right now to buy some more of these signs and some of these signs can be fixed and some can be mobile so I just wanted to tell you and I haven't really unveiled this to anybody you know publicly before uh I am
contemplating um proposing an article for the warrant for this coming town meeting to appropriate a certain amount of money to be able to purchase some of these signs and I think this could be a a good um step to see if we can calm
some of the traffic and and there is speeding that does go on in these on these streets I think we all acknowledge that um and uh I just wanted to kind of give you a heads up we're going to be discussing this on Tuesday night I won't be able to propose that Tuesday night
because it would have to be on the agenda if I do propose something it would probably be uh For an upcoming select board meeting before we close the warrant but uh it seems to me we we could have that in the toolbox um to address some of the
concerns in particular neighborhoods as opposed to um having an overall um townwide uh change in our in our speed limit uh some of the some of the uh folks were recommending or requesting uh speed bumps which is something I don't
particularly care for and it does those do or can present problems for snow removal and so forth but I just wanted to give you that heads up I know you're not going to you're I understand you're not planning to take a vote on this so you might want to wait until the select boards thrashes this out thank you Mr
chairman thank you Dean appreciate that Joanne please thank you Mr chair uh our taxpayers don't always show up at night because they're tired they've been working all day they pay their taxes to make sure we do what's right for them
and I've always believed and shall always believe that it the government meaning our town government gets the taxes it is the government's responsibility to keep our citizens safe and it I don't think we should quibble
over $80,000 to keep each and every one of our citizens safe and their homes and their schools and particularly on our streets so that's my opinion uh um deputy chief does the department have an official perspective
on this one one thing I I will mention before the chief answers that question is that these new pieces of equipment we have we've really been able to leverage the technology um I just showed you a snapshot of some of the data we got that is that data is broken down by the hour
so the 22 vehicle speeding on Cedar Street you know we can see that there between midnight and in 4 in the morning and that you know during the day the average motorist is going 30 m hour or less so we're able
to Target those areas better by having by leveraging that technology we know our resource probably isn't the best place to use it you know being on Ceda Street at 11: in the morning when it shows that you know 3,000 vehicles are doing 27 miles hour so that was just a
quick snapshot but that really allowed us to um really Target in forcement that's helpful thank you and that was a very Artful handoff to Chief too so well well done thank you Mr chair members of the board Mike Anderson your police chief it is it is the Department's
opinion uh and the and the opinion of the department is based solely on the data um let me be perfectly clear that my department our department is committed uh to the public safety of
this community um personally and professionally uh but it is the opinion of the police department again based on the data uh that the current speed limits that exist in this town have not
presented any significant compromise on your Public Safety that's very helpful thank you John please yeah thanks um I think what would concern me the most Beyond the amount of dollars that
we've been presented with in the worst case scenario if you had to resign the whole town is that currently the data we have and there's probably a lot more shows we don't have a big problem with speeding in town we may have selected times and areas um times a day times a
year where there are issues um but I think if we were to go with a 25 mph speed limit townwide we would be setting up the majority of our drivers on a daily basis for an issue or a problem um having to
be much more mindful of their speed it it puts it it tilts the burden onto the majority that aren't a problem and I always have a problem with making a rule and managing to the lowest common denominator I don't think that's good
policy the second thing is that I know that if we were to adopt the 25 M hour wide townwide speed limit your office is going to get hammered you need to have a cop here you need to have a cop there they're speeding they're going over 25 it's not
reasonable and I don't support it can I just ask a slide be be brought back up on the board please that Stepping Stones Road this hold on right here this this no go back I'm sorry it's right there no
one more one more I'm sorry this one right when when we look at these motor vehicle crashes and whether what they would determine is a min major hit and run injury and those are the enforcement actions that we've taken from the results of those and maybe the 13
pedestrians and six bicyclist the overwhelming majority of those motor vehicle crashes whether they're minor major hit and run or injury the overwhelming majority of those crashes speed was not the
factor and and also also to your point um I think one of these slides so the average speed uh was 27. 69 um that would show that all those motorists are now traveling over the speed limit and
again just to go back to the speed greater than reasonable there's a lot of areas um that you know there may be a perception of speed and a speed problem maybe not a speed problem but if it's speeds greater than reasonable we are out there enforcing them and we will
continue to do that thank you for that Tracy please I was just going to add that I think I think we all share a desire for for Public Safety um but to me it would seem that certainly for the first quite a
while it would present more danger to have all the people that come to this town in the summer that are have been used to for years 30 m an hour and and then all of a sudden there people in front of them going 25 that that would
create sometimes at least my experience on the highway driving slower is not safer those are the people that I that tend to create traffic incidents in my experience and so um I think that this is an example where slower doesn't
necessarily mean safer and certainly not during the transition period it would be kind of a nightmare thank you Tracy Barbara thank you Mr chair if we're dying to spend some money on signs um I'm thinking that maybe a couple more signs in town that say it's a state law to say four feet
away from a pedestrian with a dog on the side of the road would be better spent right I know there is going to be a campaign um coming up to educate about the the 4 foot law for cyclists and pedestrians and you know I think that
will continue to leverage technology and you know as you will see by the you know the number of verbal warnings and written warnings that we get that we're we're trying to educate and some other traffic measures such as those radar signs might help to bring awareness and and educate people as to what their
speed is and hopefully slow cars down all right other there was some very good debate last night at the at the hearing if you haven't seen it I urge you to take a look at it we'll check that out thank you you know it's I've
been thinking about a lot about this and my my wife and I have been talking about this as we drive through town and she invariably drives faster than I do I just a fact she does uh you know I tend to drive the speed limit she tends to be five or seven or8 miles hour over the
speed limit I don't know that having a bunch of signs saying 25 is necessarily going to change anybody's Behavior I think if it's the middle of January and you're on troll Road people going to to to lose Point going to be driving a little faster than might be the case on
the fourth of July um I think to Rob's observation that is maybe $30,000 for in labor plus $81,000 for materials $111,000 to solve a problem that the data suggests we don't have um I there's
no way I could possibly support this so Barbara please thank you Mr chair however to Dean's point I do think that the signs like on Old Commerce Road those make a huge difference to me when I see the red it's like uh oh and the green it's like few I'm okay I think those signs are much more effective than
than just these little I didn't know they had green one of one of the things with Mary Beth too much one of the topics that that originated from last night was was just that somebody had asked you know well I
I I call the police and the police show up um and they and they do you know stationary traffic enforcement um when when we arrive roadside we've again I we said this last night we've got about five or 10 minutes before our cover is blown and and the
headlights get flashed and and you know people know that where we are or the resident who lives maybe in a neighborhood that is not on this list of where the frequent speings occur you know there are there
are streets in town like parts of South chadam that register on this data but they're fractions of a percentage but their complaints are still valid so when we go and enforce there's not a lot of violations
to either see or observe or enforce my point being that person who makes the complaint and then we go and put a a uh we we we assign an officer x amount of
time to do this assignment was that wasted time that visi of that police car might only be 15 or 20 or 30 minutes when we used to have that big
radar trailer that was a welcome site in people's neighborhood people would be put on a list because they want that deterrent device that is clearly visible and whether it's a a speed device monitoring device that has a a bright
graphic like the ones that we we've already installed with the red or the green uh whether it's a temporary speed monitoring device that we have that shows your speed limit that in absence of a police vehicle uh gives that
Resident I think an an an extra level of comfort uh of of maybe an extra measure of safety and it certainly advises the motorist but I I know that you know we we can't be at some of these remote locations for extended period of times
but if we have the enough if we have enough equipment to install permanently your temporary that goes a long way yeah I think Dean's ideas could be a very helpful compromise so all right other comments or questions all right we'll let these fine
gentlemen get back to work thank you guys thank you for your time beware of old cers croll and old Queen an um all right Carrie anything further that we want to do uh yes um so on Tuesday night the select board appr
approved um the operating budget and the capital budget so and we received a transmittal letter from the town manager as well um so if you want to vote on those and they also voted on the uh CPC articles as well so if you'd like to
vote on the operating budget the fiveyear capital budget and the CPC tic articles I can go through those for you that' be terrific I think what you all why not knock them down all right so thank you um I'll just read over this
the following is an update on the town manager's preliminary fiscal year 2026 budget summary and budget recommendations transmittal for FY 2026 um presented January 21st
2025 so FY 2026 operated budget is refined and is represented at 44,1 54,2 versus the 43 3,921 522 that's without the education
assessments and for an increase of 88.9% versus the 7.62% over FY 2025 the fy22 2026 operating budget with the education assessments is a total of
55,985 a combined increase of 8.25% over 2025 I will go over um there's actually only one change to the operating budget um and that was to the
retirement assessment in the amount of $232,000 and Carrie to be clear the only one change to the operating budget that was presented to the committee correct correct for that and that's for the town operating budget not including education
um the education changes were um but we won't be voting on education today but I'll go over the changes with you um monoy Regional School District um the assessment went up $ 89,000 um dollar compared to um the
original assessment was 11,130 1839 um which was at 7.97% and it's now at 11,2 2017,18
which is um an increase of 8.81% the Cap Cod Regional Technical High School actually went down around $116,000 um I had estimated an amount around 64,000 and their um assment came in at
587 their only their increase is 2.17% for chadam it wasn't much of a change as far as the capital um um there was one change to the capital and that was for um a replacement of a 2005 dump truck in
the amount of $220,000 um but it's actually being offset with an article that was uh approved last year for a rolloff truck in the amount of $361,000 so we're actually going to be
using less free cash for the capital article than what was previously the and getting two trucks or just a rolloff I'm sorry what and getting getting two trucks or just a rolloff so we're we're um we're using the funds
that were approved last year the 361 that was raised in appropriate in the capital to get the 2005 dump truck instead yeah and does that mean we're not getting the rolloff truck right so Rob
failing oh he already left um there is a rolloff truck that is currently being used and they use it for their transfer of sludge I believe that's what it is
um so we are not going to be using that truck anymore for that purpose we actually have we're going to be getting a contract that's actually cheaper with another company and they're going to be using their truck for the sludge good so
we're will have the rollof TRU available okay drif thank you I believe that was part of the presentation when it came to us yeah yeah yeah okay I missed that one sorry
um so the capital was um originally let me see do I have that change in here listed yes I do originally it was 2.9 Million and now was 3.1 million however we are using less free cash for this
we're using the rolloff truck in in place of that okay so I don't know do you want to take a vote on the com questions for Carri please I still would like to see
um uh a compilation of the in increase on the tax rate I know you said I could figure it by using the uh number dividing all that in I don't think so I think we owe the public who's watching
us idea so the operating budget um alone just for the 44 million is I think 288 on the tax rate okay 288 on the tax rate so what are we
up to by now what did we say for FY 26 so we have 288 Plus the I believe it was 14 cents that we voted the last time 302 so we're at a tax rate of 302 per thousand of um for everything
that's medium priced home yep so far so far okay thank you very much you're welcome um anything further Carrie I don't have anything further unless you guys okay any comments or questions Andy please gone through the CPC articles and
has approved all of them yes okay all right thank you and we'll we'll hit those next no I just I want to sort of keep things in my head lined up yep so sorry go ahead I I I'm perfectly ready to vote on the operating and the capital
can Carrie can you just provide the new figures adjusted figures yep so the uh Town operating budget for FY 2026 is 44,1 54,2 and capital please capital is
3,1 162,50 okay thank you so let's just start with the operating I'll take a motion to support the proposed operating budget in the amount of$ 44,1 54,2 second thank you Tommy uh support Tommy
yes Barbara yes John yes Joanne yes Andy yes Kristen yes Tracy yes Eric yes chair supports uh capital budget uh as presented 3,162 650 Tracy Mr chair um just as a
matter of confusion it it looks like like what what you were saying was that the capital budget should have decreased from what we had thought it was going to be but it looks like it was at 2942 so it increased by the
220,000 but the funding has decreased the so we're using the 361 for the rolloff truck from the rolloff truck and then we're going to use yet less free cash that we were going to use before does that so the the spend went
up the spend went up but the amount of a free cash that we're going to be using because we had something else that was available to use yeah okay everybody good motion to support the capital budget second second
thank you support Tommy yes Barbara yes John yes Joanne yes Andy yes Christen yes Cy yes Eric yes chair supports all right Carrie that's a quick $47 million thank you on top of the $32 million we did on Tuesday
yes okay so the CPC articles you guys have already um seen these um so we have the admin budget for 15,000 the 10% Reserve fund allocation and the amount of 420 affordable housing trust in the
amount of 500,000 um the um stall neck painting preservation for 48,000 Nickerson Family Association historic barn and the of 275,000 Union Cemetery restoration for
$50,0 35 fiill studies to preserve open space for salt marshes in the amount of 140,000 town of chadam 2025 open space in Recreation plan in the amount of 50,000 and little Mil Pond Pier reconstruction project in the amount of
500,000 for a total amount of 2,358 35 sorry car that number again to 2,358 35 okay so a question for the committee would you like to vote on these
individually would you like to vote on them in the aggregate is there anything controversial here that people want to call out I'm happy to go either way John please I'd prefer to vote on them as a package if a fellow member wants to call one out we can pull it out but be like
town be like town meeting the consent calendar any any OB objections to voting as a package from anybody don't be bashful no problem let's Barbara could I just ask what that stal neck painting preservation is I I
missed the meeting where we went over this you the this the Alice stall NE paintings at the Historical Society M Bar restoration and I have I have a call on to Kevin Wright as I said on Tuesday to talk to him about that and who the restorer is going to be so more to come in that front uh I think that was a very
important point that somebody raised so thank you for that um okay well if that's I'm sorry Andy I can than CER there we go Motion to support the entirety of the CPC proposed article and
allegations so move second thank you in support Tommy yes Barbara yes John yes Joan yes anyy yes Kristen yes Tracy yes Eric yes chair supports perfect thank you all right that's good sweeping the floor a little
bit so just a brief update we had an OPB trustees meeting yesterday with myself Dina Castro Carrie
Sharon drown the town Treasurer Jo was uh was there uh we were all remote uh did I miss anybody Jeff was on vacation so um it was a good meeting um I think this committee knows and I hopefully the the
town residents know that we've as a Board of Trustees have taken this matter much more seriously over the last you know half a dozen years or more um between dedicating half of the land bank S charge of 1 and a half% uh to it in
the annual overlay funding of $150,000 we are now up to just a tick over $7 million in the account um we have contributed 5.2 million since October of 13 when we
first hired Bartholomew to serve as our managers of these funds uh we've had a 6.21% total return over that time um which is good I mean historically equities in the United States over the last 100 years have
returned you know take over 7% but we had a couple of rough years between covid and 22 um our portfolio generally is 70% Equity uh 20% fixed income and roughly
10% in Alternatives uh we may have a discussion on a going forward basis about bumping up the Alternatives slightly um more to come on that but we are at a
41% funding rate which I think pretty easily is top desile in the State uh there are a number of smaller communities out west that may have you know 50 people and an obligation of $300,000 they've got 200 put aside but four kind of more significantly staffed
and um enterpris Enterprises were um were in a very good position relative to our peers so I just thought I'd throw that out there um Joan please Mr chair what are alternatives alternatives are typically non-correlated Investments so
historically stocks go up bond prices go down there's a correlation in the last few years these they both gone up uh alternative Investments can be raw materials could be Timber um mineral
rights um Commodities oil um and they tend to have returns that historically have been uncor relateded to the broader Market M so it's a way property real estate it's a way of of um again just enhancing your
return through an uncorrelated asset group thank you yeah um Dean anything to uh to add or carrye I was going to add inquire about something unrelated but yes I think you gave a good summary of the opep trustees meeting yesterday and I guess I would
just add that our plan is to have a quarterly um Regular quarterly meeting schedule of the trustees to review the Investments with our um with bar alamu thank you thank you De John please well I appreciate the report and I take
comfort uh in the fact that we've made a lot of ground on Our obligation I think the trustees should you know receive some congratulations from the broader Community because at least when I started here at this table that was a serious concern for me me how how far
behind we were so you seem to have pulled it off in a way that uh didn't cause us to wish we hadn't done it we we didn't foro anything that I can think of in order to accomplish that goal it just you focused on it and I think we're in a good position well we we had the support
of the community Through the the landbank you know vote and um I will note that U Dean is exactly right I we're fiduciaries of these funds um and a early meeting his best practices
we didn't haven't always done that we usually probably get together three times a year but we're going to Institute a more rigorous quarterly calendar the I I I think that said I don't necessarily anticipate uh and I'll defer to Carrie and and uh to Dean as well uh
significant movements in our investment profile in our portfolio structure uh you know after after the 22 Wipeout and covid we didn't make any changes to it and this is a long-term investment for a long-term obligation and um you know
slow and steady is the the way to go we started at a 50/50 allocation between equities and and debt uh over the first what three or four years of that we slowly moved to a 6040 and now to a 7030 and I think we're all generally
comfortable that if we can tweak that return profile a little bit by adding you know just a little more exposure to the alternates we may consider doing that but but the establishment of calendared quarterly meetings doesn't necess
suggest we're going to be you know buying fog horn Leghorn memorabilia and hoping for the best so all right anything further from my you anybody if not I'll take a motion to adjourn Steven Steven Dean yeah I just
wanted to ask a question but before before I do that um appropo of the the signage issue that you were talking about earlier with the the the two police Chiefs um the type of sign that's on Old kers Road that I was referring to
I got the information from Rob phy this morning it cost an individual sign like that cost $3,500 so I I'm going to factor that into my my um uh thinking in terms of um what I might be proposing um as a new
warrant article to be able to purchase some of those signs which I think are a good deterrent to whatever the speed limit is um I wanted to ask a question I I noticed that on your agenda for the fourth that
Carrie sent around this morning um are included several um home rule the refiling of several home rule petitions three of which relate to housing are you plan I'm asking this as an individual board member are you um planning to take
votes on those because I I think you should be aware that the select board will not be taking those up as it currently stands until the 11th of March yeah so the short answer to that will be no we'll vote on those after we'll vote on those after you guys
do right professional courtesy so um okay anything else anybody one more question Mr uh Carrie when you say Direct dor veteran services do you mean he's going to be
here and what is the new director's name I guess he's not new but it's not REM alard anymore um his name is um Greg is it Greg hold on one second let me get you
um I know his last name is quilty Greg quilty and does he cover the whole cake oh do you know who that is yes he's the regional veterans uh good yeah that that's great because he can explain to us some of the uh benefits
yeah I'm actually looking forward to yes I am too thank you thank you for having him thank you for arranging that yep you're welcome okay anything else from the right wing of the the podium the Das okay all right motion to adjourn so
move second second I second it Tommy yes Barbara yes John yes Joanne yes Andy yes Christen yes Acy yes Eric we have fun over here too just so you know yes chair supports thank you all very
much car we well done thanks