##VIDEO ID:jPXJTMTKhw4## okay at being 6 o'clock I'll call to meeting this uh February 3rd 2025 meeting with the slack board and notify everybody that uh uh CHC T media is broadcasting it live and recording it for later viewing by the public so if you would join me in a pledge of allegiance the United States America and to the Republic for which it stand stands one nation Justice for All and un thank you so first up this evening uh we have Jen Benson Anon Watson Fred brusso and Deb serani along with some other guests I see to make a presentation is Pat on there we go Madam chair we go members of the board Town manager Cohen I'm Fred brusso I co-chair the age friendly Chum implementation committee and I'm here tonight with co-chair Debbie serani and John BS who's a member of the committee we're honored this evening also to be joined by Jennifer Benson who's the AARP Massachusetts state director and Antron Watson who is the AARP Massachusetts age friendly director thank you both for coming we appreciate the opportunity to present to the town an AARP that recognizes a significant milestone for our committee and allow me to present just a brief timeline just for context in July of 2019 chumford was awarded a five-year membership in a arp's network of age friendly communities and States our age friendly planning team we assess the town's age friendly needs and prepared an action plan to address those needs in March of 2021 1 we submitted our action plan that was approved by the town and subsequently by AARP in May of 2021 our age friendly implementation committee was formed to implement the action items in the action plan as per AARP request we recently prepared and submitted to AARP our 5-year progress report that summarizes the progress that we made over the last three fiscal years with strong support from town officials Town staff residents and business partners our committee has implemented as described in the progress report several age-friendly services and projects for seven domains housing Transportation community supports and Health Services outdoor spaces and buildings social respect participation and inclusion Civic engagement and employment and communication and information it's been truly a townwide team effort the progress report was reviewed and approved by ARP resulting in the renewal of our membership which is reflected in this plaque with that we like to present this plaque to the town and again express our appreciation for their unwavering and enthusiastic support that our committee has received from the very beginning of our age friendly Chumps initiative we look forward now to continue to make Chums even more age friendly so thank you any questions congratulations yes congratulations thank you that was loud do you want us to come out front and take a picture we love it and we also who are you presenting it to how are you George SC in there just went to [Music] sleep thank you so much first go ahead okay look at me now you can do a selfie yeah he's make me look skinny congratulations [Laughter] congratulations oh yeah no I I was joking acting okay were more no I've lived in har was I'll just stay up right yes yeah yeah and I just also do want to mention to the public you notice a couple empty seats here um select board member Pat Maloney could not make it this evening and select board member Aron Drew is joining us by Zoom so uh now Deb's going to update us on other great things at the senior center thanks so much I'll try to keep this brief um we uh were visited by uh Virginia and Paul and we had a meeting with u Fred bro and also our COA uh board chair Bob Schneider and we met with um to discuss the goal of expanding inclusiveness at the senior center which was discussed at a previous um select board meeting and so we we ended up with two different meetings we had a first discussion and then a followup and um after discussing it uh Virginia made quite a comment which was that she felt like we were already doing a lot to to have um a very inclusive Center so she wanted me to highlight some of the things that we've been doing at this meeting so thanks for having me um so some of the considerations uh when we're talking I mean I think the first job we have every day at the senior center and I tell all my staff this I tell all my volunteers this is we want to be welcoming so if we can make somebody feel welcome at the senior center that's our first job and everything else is easier that way um you know if if they need something then they know that they're welcome there and that and that we're there to help so um you know that's that's our first job so some of the considerations we discussed was U the use of the building for all ages to address loneliness and isolation among the population to increase program options for more diverse residents and the growing population of more diverse residents U attendance for men attracting younger seniors access posibility for all abilities lgbtq plus Transportation financially um accessible programs and mental health supports and caregiver support so those are some of the things that we discussed during our meeting um first of all how old do you have to be here to come to the senior center a lot of people ask and the answer is uh we don't card at the door so uh we do have some programs that are only available to 60 plus and that really includes the senior tax worker program there's a limit for age and our shine counseling which is serving health insurance needs for everyone so we have um Medicare and Medicaid counseling to give people kind of Whittle down the options available for folks and that's free counseling to let people know and that's 65 plus and then we have um many programs for a 60 plus and disabled adults including Meals on Wheels if you're from chelsford uh the transportation program is just for chelsford residents or um folks who are with our social Day program registered uh we have our nut nutrition program discounts for uh seniors but then we also have the program Open to others if they pay $450 cents for a meal so we have Monday through Friday meals we have the fitness room is uh limited to to 60 plus and disabled adults the garden plot Lottery um raised garden plots the social Day program and companion programs and the lgbtq uh plus social decided they wanted to be open for 45 plus other than that really many of the programs most of what um we have is an open building and I don't cart at the door I encourage people to bring their family members their disabled adults um children uh their grand children and unless we end up having some kind of weightless situation I really feel like that's just a better way to approach it so you can see all those other places um other programs that we have for many many ages so we also focus on intergenerational activities um actually we have people coming for everyday visits all the time we have Partnerships with Boy Scout Troops and high school and middle school and elementary schools we also have a lot of volunteer opportunities we have lots of kids who come by and need service hours so we place them and um you know they're a wonderful part of our community we have a few events coming up just this coming uh vacation week one is a game time at 1 1:00 on um I think it's the 20th is a Thursday isn't it let's see is that Thursday so we're opening up for um people to bring their family members to play uh board games and then we also have um got a dance Showcase from got a dance dance studio and they do a presentation for us and they come every year so we're really excited to have them back and those are open to the the public as well another population that we um we were focused on to try to make sure that we were including special programs for is men a lot of senior centers don't have a very high male population so we've worked really hard to make sure that we focus on programs that um are including them and encouraging them to to be part of the community including well they love the cafe um some of the more popular things for men are uh painting class and pickle ball clinics the fitness room uh the monthly veterans breakfast uh playing the in the pool room volunteering and um and oh they started a a chess chess club so they're they're teaching um folks how to play chess new new ones or uh to get how to get better so um that's been a really you know we we have about probably 30% are men who come into the senior center and that's high for a lot of places around in Thea area okay we're next next step so uh our goal is always to have our staff our volunteer base and our membership look like the um diversity the diverse community population in the community so that's our goal uh some of the things that we're doing to try to encourage that um is partnering with the Dei Committee just just recently uh to try to get some partnering grants some cultural Council grants we have uh this Wednesday we have a an event U celebrating black history that is uh a drumming Circle and that's open to 12 ages 12 and up and that's free that's this Wednesday night from 6:00 to 8 uh we have had Partnerships with the Chinese Bible Church with the low Catholic High School with Val collaborative we try to encourage folks um from the lgbtq plus Community by having socials we have uh two times a month we have lgbtq social and just recently started um a lesbian queer women's Meetup at the request of some of the residents uh we had a pronoun Workshop so people could learn a little bit about what what's up with the pronouns people were saying and so we wanted to give them an opportunity to just be in a space where they could ask respectful questions and learn uh and so I think that was really helpful and valuable um what else do we have here oh we so we have sensitivity training for all of our staff for our drivers our companions also and we have lgbtq training for all of our stud staff and Dei training through the state cuz we have Partnerships with um the Department of Public Health and um executive office of Elder Affairs which is now executive office of uh aging and Independence so we did talk a little bit about do we call our seniors Senior Center a senior center and what we came up with was that well what problem are we trying to solve like our our our parking lot is already full our weight like we have lots of people in the in the building every day and um so there is still a stigma though for you know in a lot of agism so we've had agism workshops we uh try to make sure that people understand a little bit more about like the value of seniors in the community all in all and that um we're just not bingo so some of that is just communicating and doing things like this to let folks know a little bit more about what's happening there um another uh accessibility um feature at the senior center is just being open to people who can't afford a lot of other things so they have limited incomes and so we have many programs to help folks who uh have um would like to save a little bit of money or need to save a little bit of money so we have fuel assistance of help we have snap food assistance we have um right now our activities are free for 3 months so January February and March with the support of the friends of the senior center they're paying all of our instructor fees and so the seniors don't have to pay for them for three months and it's a great opportunity for people to try new things or if they're already in the classes to have a little bit of extra cash in their pockets which everybody needs to pay grocery bills at this point um most classes are5 or $6 each um our lunch is $2.50 which is a donation based thing so if people cannot pay we do not turn people away that's seniors and disabled folks but if um but otherwise if you're under 60 you're welcome to come for lunch and it's $4.50 and it's a charge we have a podiatrist we have a free veterans breakfast every month we've got free medical equipment to borrow um free mental health support grief counseling Alzheimer's and dementia caregiver support group all of these things are paid through our um revolving funds and our budget that we get from you mostly the revolving funds and um our social and social Day program and our companion program are very reasonably priced so that caregivers can have a a little bit of help um they're they're rest bit driven to help family members we have a senior tax worker program to get people's tax bill lower we we've got free tax preparation for all ages through AARP thank you very much our work our our volunteers that come there and um we've got workshops and brochures about other financial resources available so the other um the other thing that we think about when we think about inclusion is people have differing abilities so we have um support for people with low vision with uh people who are hard of steing we've got um sound panels and more that we're working on right now we've got wheelchair accessible uh Transportation available to folks we've got Meals on Wheels for homebound seniors how much time do you have I'll keep it keep quick um and movement classes for people with Parkinson's disease and we have a program coming up this coming month for uh folks with uh um what do they call it uh low vision so they'll be able to come and do an occupational therapy is therapist is coming in to give some some support and some ideas to how to be independent um our volunteer and workplac opportunities for disabled adults enriches our whole community and gives them an opportunity for for a work placement and uh it's it's really wonderful so we work with um some of the the the Community groups in the area we have a buried in supports uh buried in Treasures support group for decluttering we have Technology support for those in need we want to make sure that people are are um still getting information even if they don't have computer access or if they don't prefer computer access and um then we also do a lot of printed materials so we have our newsletter and we have the town um manager's newsletter in print so that people can access the same information we're working on acoustic panels right now for Better Sound absor absorption to make the whole building a little bit more accessible so um coming soon we have this Wednesday our African style drumming drum circle and presentation open uh that's 6 to 8 Wednesday February 5th we have women's r in the military um a lecture on March 10th coming up and we've got a caregiver speaker series starting in the spring on Monday nights to expand some some services for folks who are actually um in work during the week so thank you very much I'm always looking for more ways to make it more inclusive so if you have any ideas you know where I am thank you very much very comprehensive thank you have a great night you okay so Paul you're why we're here tonight yeah thank you madam chair members of the board good evening um we're here uh basically to present my proposed um fiscal year 2026 operating budget um as we know in the provisions of the charter and the um Town bylaws required to be submitted approximately 90 days before town meeting which is at the end of April um let me just sort of start out and you know not going to read text but just s start just put in context we've we've known for quite some time almost about a year that this was going to be a challenging fiscal period you may recall back last February I sent out a report that I shared with this board the finance committee and the school committee looking ahead to to a three-year period about the challenges that were ahead of us um and basically at that early date we could see that we were challenged by inflation um move forward to fall town meeting the finance director John Souza who you know who's obviously very involved with me in the presentation of the in preparation of the budget and he's going to present the capital component of the budget later this evening um presented the update to fall town meeting we then had an update After Fall town meeting uh where it sort of gave an Outlook of major issues uh and then we had the tri board meeting in December with the select board school committee and finance committee which I think is fair to assess was one of the most uh challenging or difficult uh tri board meetings we've experienced in our recent years because of the the the fiscal uh constraints and tensions um at that time at the tri board meeting in December we sort of gave a our sense of what the CL landscape was looking like uh unfortunately since that time uh it only worsened uh and and I think the big message was the real driver on this inflation but the Big Driver inflation was Healthcare inflation um and and benefits um we had known because we reported basically back to you about six months ago that middle sex County Retirement had completed its two-year required Actuarial valuation and that our retirement assessment was going to go up by over 8% I think it was 88.4% this year and the second year go up by 6 and a half% and then we knew that the trends in health care as we saw what was happening with the Stewart Hospital closure what we what we were receiving from our reports on utilization and so forth was healthc care inflation has been a real sticky issue the early indications started at 10% then it appeared to be 12% and then unfortunately about 10 days ago when the chair and I and others were were in Boston uh for the municipal Association connect 351 which is the annual meeting of all cities and towns which includes the Massachusetts inter local Insurance Association um they presented the news that the trends in healthc care in terms of premiums uh were between 99.98% and 19.98% the average being 14.8 but that communities rated upon their uh individual claims experience and what was happening specific to chelsford because I spoken to our rep um into that time was that we our our claims were running at our premium level and and basically which means that they're we're running a deficit um and in fact the Whole Health Plan Consortium was running a deficit as is the group insurance commission which is the Commonwealth Consortium that deals with state employees and cities and towns who join the state Consortium um how this works is you set rates in February so we'll receive our actual rate with by next week for the period that begins four months later in July 1st and then runs the 12-month period till June 30th of the subsequent fiscal year what has happened here and has happened to the GIC and so forth is the estimates for this year were under and so the town and the plan and the GIC and others are running a deficit so now you've got to set the rates for the new period fiscal year period beginning July 1 and they're setting the rates to break even so in order to break even you've got to absorb the deficit from the current year and then you also have to forecast the increase for the upcoming year uh and yes the plans have reserves you know to buffer them cash flow wise to the process um so that meant that our claims were greater than the no the median which was 14.8 and we've been told it'll be closer to 17.5% why that matters is we're every 1% is over $130,000 to the town we're we're roughly for for we're spending over $13 million for employees and I'll get into the details so that basically made the hole deeper in the last 10 days not only did we receive that but the governor released her proposed state budget Governor he the administration state budget and we actually received what she was prop proposing to fund for cities and towns and that's the Benchmark that we have at this point in time because as we know the legislature won't finish the process till July with the start of the fiscal year and as we've known in recent years at tends to go past July uh but that's the that's the sort of the foothold that we have because the house will take up the budget in in April the Senate will take it up in May it'll go to conference committee hopefully it gets done in end of June or they'll do a sub supplemental budget and then they'll do the actual budget usually by the time the end of July before they recess um the governor's budget Statewide in terms of the base state budget was up only 2.2% so the governor proposed General government assistance to cities and towns at 2.2% the other piece of of state aid is Chapter 70 or Educational Funding and what the governor proposed was compliance with the fifth of the sixth year of funding schedule for Chapter 70 the student opportunities act and once again chelon is is in the position of being a minimum Aid community and what the governor announc is her proposal for minimum Aid communities would be $75 per student um that also is about 2.8% of the situation of of funding increase um over the prior year um and then we we we heard last Friday and I had been i' had been in touch with Thea superintendent last week about how are we going with the nooba tech assessment because that's a multi- toown nine Community School District re Vocational School District and you know therefore we don't have full control of that because of the way the district agreement works but in essence in this case because our enrollment was down the district enrollment was up um our increase is basically almost level funded was like0 44% or $133,000 so that was a good favorable news to us because we had thought it would be greater than that um and then as instructed at the tri boy meeting I have been in communication meetings um Finance director John Susan and I met with Dr Lang a week ago today um basically bringing him the news that we had received on the healthc care he brought us un unfortunately unfavorable news in terms of out of districts special ed tuitions increasing greater than he had forecast and then by Tuesday morning we settled on an allocation of funding and tomorrow evening at 6 o'clock in the school committee room uh at the um school administrative offices he'll be revealing the details of his proposed uh school budget for the upcoming year what we know is his forecast at the time of the tri board meeting in December was they needed roughly $3.5 million to level service level staff the school operations the end of the day in this budget he gets half of that so he has to absorb $1.7 million of reductions from from either reserves they have or operational aspects and Staffing and so forth uh and we'll hear the details of that tomorrow night uh at the school committee meeting so that's where we came into um so basically we finalized the process last Tuesday basically Wednesday was a day of finalization checking rechecking writing form and then Thursday the budget was released um and unfortunately because of the fact that 76% of the town's Revenue comes from the property tax which has a base cap of Two and a half% um we we basically aren't able to maintain the level of services and I think the best thing I can relate to is this is what our residents are going through and really even with our business partners in the community going through right we hear and see not only they they suffering from the increase in the property tax but they're suffering from the increases as we've discussed with our legislators from utility costs and we've seen now particularly in the last month the electricity costs and and natural gas costs yes it's been a colder month but even aside from that the rate increases in both Supply and transmission uh as well as grocery costs Insurance costs and the reason we can relate to that is we have the the same thing if we go and hire an engineer or a contractor to do work their you know their rate increases are are are coming to us as well and our utility costs as a community are going up so we we and we also realize that we can't turn to the residents and say gee during this time can you also increase your property tax Greater by an by an operational override and we know Chon's history in that uh has been very uh clear and telling it was last attempted um in 2008 um and then we haven't had a successful override basically since 1991 for trash um so we're talking you know 35 years um so that sort of sets the stage of where we're at and then unfortunately we had the painful separation of of of people that we work with on a daily basis and it was very difficult in this building and I have gone through every Department Department in the wake of that uh and and and answered questions and tried to explain and provide a context of what's going on you know it's a very difficult period because like any organization and a small organization it's a close-knit family of people uh and it's it's been very trying um the sad part is this is not really a correction this is more like a trend right there's no evidence that we can see at this time that inflation is going to Abate both to the traditional levels that we've seen up until the pandemic um when your two and a half increase was okay because inflation was running 2% there is no expectation that health care costs are are under control or will be soon I don't think the increase I it certainly won't be 17 and a. half% next year but it's reasonable to assume it's going to be double digit and it's reasonable to assume we know the number for Middle sex retirement is 6 point you know 5% and we can see by the fed's action is recently as last week that inflation is still rest a wrestling bear because they won't cut interest rates and then the then the whole uncertainty of what's going on out there as we saw this weekend with are we tariffing Canada and Mexico and then today we're not and just the volatility so it's a very challenging time we by law unlike the federal government have to balance a a balance the state a budget and our budget gets submitted and approved by the state and and verified before we can issue a tax bill so that's the check and balance we have to adopt the state ballot budget the state verifies it and then not only do they approve the budget they approve our property valuations and our tax rate so that's the process um so we have no choice we can't deficit spend um and we also know the consequences of that because if you were to draw off res reserves then you're going to reduce the town's Financial condition and then you're going to in incorporate greater interest rates for borrowing by a lower of the bond rating and so forth and we did see that happen in 2007 um and so again drawing upon this with the knowledge and experience that we have myself and John having worked together for 18 years and Darlene also in accounting and and department heads who've been some cases here longer than I we sat with every department head and said what's available like what can we do to address this situation um and basically what we tried to do is how can we mitigate the loss so let me give you an example we we we eliminated a position in the health department a health inspector um that's an important position we need two inspectors to make sure that we comply with the requirements to inspect every organization twice per year uh and make sure it's sanitary as well as address complaints why that position was eliminated was because when I spoke to the health director she basically said Paul I might be able to help because this is a position that we may be eligible we expect to be eligible for State funding because recently in the last two years the state has adopted an initiative because of the concerns with the um performance and workings of local Boards of Health where they they're providing grant funding so therefore that position was was was eliminated but the expectation is that that would be staffed um by the state Grant and furthermore the director said in the event we have issues she herself is a previous inspector in which Step Forward so those are the type of decisions we made um and then same thing with the police department we know and we've having difficulties with mental health responses on fire and medical calls as well as the calls over at the the Sheltering facility and just in general and so Chief Spence and his budget had a um Staffing for a mental health clinician in his budget that was eliminated and again the hope and expectation is is that state grant funding will again be there to staff that going forward um and then and then similarly we we literally looked piece by piece Department by Department building the budget up and then when it came into the Veterans office in speaking with the veterans agent we knew that the claims were down reimbursement levels were down um and and so the the sense was we'd have to return to the situation that it was up until about four years ago where it would just be the veterans agent as a sole you know operator in that office full-time um it's not desirous um we knew and Liv the fact and that that Regina has worked hard for this community and worked hard to obtain that F that part-time position and we also knew that that person was doing an excellent job and I would put her anywhere she was that good of an employee but we have we have to do that and then finally the most dramatic one and the one that's received the most coverage was our our community services coordinator a position that I established a half dozen years ago um see recognizing the need um and trying to help those who fall through the cracks but we we had we we as you where we're going to turn to at this point is how is is those other resources you heard some from Deb serani tonight the mental health and other services they provide at the senior center we we know the Board of Health has you know has has resources to help and and they will be the INB building resource that we'll turn to um so those are the decisions that we we've had to make in addition to the fact that we're the other issues are we're closing Sunday hours at the library once again situation we've had to do in the past we're not once again not going to have lifeguards at the be Town beaches that doesn't feel great either because nobody wants that call that something has happened at hard pond or Freeman Lake um it it's just a bad situation but then the question becomes well what's the alternative where where else can you go we know you know you look where this you know we're at Core Staffing levels and later on you'll see a slide that shows that and so you can't cut the core because you have to function you've got to be able to you know no matter what we do as a government entity we have to assess all the properties in conformance with state law because it gets reviewed and in fact this is the five-year uh revil year so that has to function we have to you know assess not only assess we have to tax and collect properties that's the collector and Treasury office and obviously accounting regardless of the town's fiscal situation has to process all the bills for the school department the town departments and and obviously have a clean audit um so you start looking around you know little by little it we got two it people serving the whole General government of the town you know just you just go through the building that's what we did go through the department Cemetery there's four people you got a director a a support person in terms of part-time to to help the director and then you've got the people who are basically out there working in the cemetery for the burials and maintenance of the properties nothing we could do there um and we know because we've we've lived the experience of the Great Recession in 2008 we we we also experienced the 2012 uh when when there were the years of the zeros when you know in times when people couldn't sell their house for what their property was worth and yes I'm not saying the world is the same as it was 18 years ago because the world is different um and the situation today is different and the biggest differen is is in the labor market we have a labor shortage out there um so unlike when in the Great Recession where where everybody took zeros for pay increases or in 2012 the year the years of zeros because it was a recession and downturn as you can see that's not the situation today we're seeing people as we seen in other communities with teacher strikes and so forth um who are basically a a valued commodity and they will they will move with their feet we know we saw that recently we we we had an officer who we paid to go through 24 weeks of the police academy upon doing his field training give us notice and saying I'm moving on to another Community for more money um we just know the climate's different we're also at the bargaining table with um with with our labor groups and we know from other communities and and and and Frank that if you don't pay a competitive wage you're not going to be viable it's going to affect your services so we have to provide a market Rage which is what we are we're service organization and therefore our biggest cost of all this particularly education is on payroll so that's the climate we deal with in moving through um we're not at the point and I hope that we never get to the point of of the horror of closing a fire station again we don't want to go there and we're not there with this budget because you say oh there's always Alternatives yeah the alternatives are bad and as we know on the general government side the department where the money is is police fire and DPW okay they all contribute to Public Safety in the town's operations we know the the the issues and we've studied them for years with the fire station study committee about inadequate Staffing levels the concerns over response time which is why you don't want to close stations and you want to have adequate sa safety and the needs legitimate needs that haven't been funded in this budget as you've seen in the presentation same thing on the police side the type of calls the nature of the calls the mental health aspects and so forth are more challenging than ever and we've we've been notified from our our labor unions that hey look we're concerned about Staffing levels levels and then on the DPW side you say oh it's a big department that's funding the challenge with DPW is some of those departments are siloed with their own Revenue sources and their own accounting systems so yes we have a sewer division but the sewer division is solely operated and accounted for from revenues from sewer fees so we can't use the sewer fees and and and go use that to balance the budget or raise sewer fees to get around 2 and a half and the same thing with the storm water so you start pulling out the sewer and the storm water what's left in DPW is basically your Administration your engineering and Highway and we did cut a highway employee um there wasn't a layoff there because there was a vacancy in that position but that's gone um and then as you know over the last couple years his positions did open up I often didn't fill them so when Steve serin our safety officer passed didn't fill the position um when Sue Roser Health director retired Donna grew her assistant was promoted to um Health director I wouldn't approve of her hiring an assistant because I said to her at the time and sadly it turned out to be true I said I'm not going to hire a person and then have to make a cut later on and have that person put out in the street it's not you don't do that to people in the hiring process you know hire them they leave a position secured and then all of a sudden nine months later they're out because and and then the same thing when when our Human Resources Director retired our um business development director applied for the position to my surprise and I remember talking to Jeanie and then talking to her afterwards I said why would you apply for this position and she said well one I'm interested in HR but two is I'm not sure that my position is going to be there and so when I talked to Jen manans last Thursday um I said Jen in all honesty lease our HR director if she was in that position today she'd be leaving today with you not because of anything about her skills or her value or contribution or what the benefit to the community is it's that it's that tough tough of a situation where we're down to the core so that's sort of an overview of what we we've gone through I think what you're going to see in the year ahead um is and and I've mentioned this at the last meeting uh and and you'll see it in the the draft warrant next week we've got to look at everything as a community there's no sacred cows and we've got to look at you know where can and we've done this as a board with their goals you know is it possible to raise additional fees so yes we're going to come in we're going to raise dog license fees is it possible for us to you know look at combining services with other communities and I can tell you that is as of this afternoon when I spoke to my peers in Westford and in and tuxbury we will be advancing with a regional sealer of weights and measures because Nim Cog was no a no longer able to provide the service but this way although you'll see it on our chart as an increase of one fto that's because we're the host Community but we'll be basically Staffing um you know 35% of that cost of that position and then trre will pay 35% and westf will pay 30% because together it's more efficient than each Community having a person even in a part-time basis and the equipment and training and everything that goes with it so that's what we're doing um and then and then similarly you know I know it's it's out there but even the marijuana question is should we we're GNA you you approve the question on the ballot and in April is should the town allow for the sale of recreational marijuana not because people think it it's a great thing to have in the community but the fact is it is in the communities that are around us many of the communities that are join us and are we leaving a revenue stream on the table that's probably $300 plus thousand those are the questions I think there's also some challenges as we've heard in in the process about you know our zoning and so forth in terms of what's viable um those are things we got to look at in the uh year year ahead and years ahead and I think the other thing you're going to see quite frankly because we saw it happen in Westford as this plays out further you're going to see even more dramatic uh Cuts in in in education because that's all that's left I mean obviously we value education it's two-thirds of our discretionary spending by the town um but as we saw in Westford last year when the override failed and they had to balance their budget that's where the cuts go and I I'm sad to say I think that's probably where we're headed um not only what what Dr Lang announces tomorrow night but if the trend continues in the years ahead and that's why when the governor comes forward and says we want Municipal reform uh to to help cities and towns cope well she made that claim last year it didn't happen you saw she filed the legislation again this year I think we've got to look at that again I know the the state house is not keen on new Revenue sources or taxes even at the local level but even if that component isn't enacted there's some other Municipal reform things that could help cities and towns be more functional um so forth so I appreciate your patience with listening but I will want to put this into context and what I'll tryy to do is go through the budget document I know you can read I know the public can read and I'm not going to sit here and read the document to you but I will go through some of the highlights to those who haven't had a chance to read the situation um the bottom line is the budget's $168.2 million that's what we uh that was The Benchmark that was established at the tri board meeting it fully utilizes the full Levy limit of proposition two and a half and as I noted um it's a reduction in services and we're going to explore Grand opportunities to help mitigate the loss um moving on to the next part is um again we're utilizing all all of the our our Levy um you know the budget Grows by 3.52% um here's sort of a little bit more granular detail the school budgets up 2.4% or 1.77 million to 75.6 5 million to show Tech as I mentioned earlier only a $113,000 increase to just over $4 million um the general government operating departments meaning that you know the police fire Highway and so forth um that's up by 1.7% so again schools went up 2.4 the general government 1.7 and again there's almost a two to two to1 funding ratio as you can see school budget 75.6 5 million General government's 38.3 million our increase is less than that of the schools um benefits and insurance this is what I've been talking about a $4 million increase of 12.4% overall um our debt service decreases which looks great on the surface level we're now down by 1.5% or $159,000 to 10.4 million however most of that is excluded debt so our non-excluded debt actually increases by over 99.62% or 68 6,000 so therefore what looks like a decline in debt service actually is a is a budget constrainer because our non-excluded debt excluded means excluded from the position proposition two and a half so when not excluded debt gets funded like the project for the fire stations or the previous DPW and so forth when that that debt is only approved and only funded in the amount for The Debt Service and then when it's paid off then it it you don't get to absorb it anywhere else it's that's why it's called excluded debt uh and then the assessments and overlay are basically State charges um and again this is a a summary of the list of positions that are in the current Year's budget that aren't in next year's budget as I mentioned business development director Highway labor community services coordinator assistant Health director health inspector veteran service assistant part-time part-time accounting clerk part-time Staffing for clerical assistance in the clerk's office and part-time facilities project coordinator at DPW facilities support and then as I mentioned earlier the Sunday hours at the library the lifeguards at the beaches we we're going to eliminate one of the two household hazardous waste collections days and we even got to the granular level of we're not going to print all copies of town report to every you know you know we bring those to town meeting pass them out and everything you know I I guess we we really don't need to do that in the year 2025 people can look at it online and again these are some of the things that were emitted again there's legitimate requests and long-standing meeting not just this year for additional police officers our biggest complaint as you know aside from Pooles is probably traffic speed and traffic safety there we know from the fire station study the the additional uh firefighters for Staffing levels as well as the lieutenant positions to increase operational safety um again we could use additional DPW labors in the highway division to help improve the condition of the road sidewalks and park lands and then again the safety specialist position is is not available to improve workplace safety so again this is sort of I want to harp on it again $4 million or 69% of the available new monies we have available to us get absorbed by the health insurance and retirement assessment you can see the health insurance 2 million to address the active employees we we provide insurance for 685 uh uh parties you know subscribers meaning they're the subscriber could be a family plan or an individual plan so that 685 eligible employees again town and school um and again the premium for that is is will increase to over $35,000 and the Town Fund 75% of that premium are over $26,000 now of course employees aren't thrilled because their increase of their 25% is also going to go up by 175% so in a case of if there's an individual employee who's on an HMO family plan they're going to pay an extra $1,300 um for their health insurance as the as their 25% contribution so obviously they're dealing with that and then clearly and just let me put the health insurance and context as I mentioned we're at The Benchmark meaning the lowest that we can go under the state law um unilaterally by the town but you're not going to convince the employees to take higher deductibles co-pays or other modifications when they're they're already absorbing a higher premium increase um and obviously that pay increase can't keep Pace with inflation um and if and because the fact that we're we're our our premiums are based upon our claims experience it's not like you say oh forget Blue Cross go find toughs or or you know another provider because your claims are your claims and the problem the the problem with the claims is it's a societal issue in terms of higher drug utilization higher Medical Care um you know higher costs as we said earlier the labor shortage in terms of nurses and so forth as evidenced by you know what we see out there from Stewart and so forth um and so there there's no Panacea there um and and each individual Community is rated on its own um so nooba Tech they're they're not having as big of a health insurance increase and that's for this year we don't know what'll happen next year with their claims but also I think they have a different population of of because they're again rated on their own situation um so that's that's the situation and then we also ensure a thousand retirees with Medicare supplement plans um so we got to budget another $950,000 because the town pays 60% of that premium so again the people who are on those plans they're going to absorb 40% of a 12% increase people who are on generally retirees and on fixed incomes um and then I mentioned enough earlier about the middle sex County Retirement System the $1 13.1 million assessment of which we know 12 million of that is to fund the unfunded pension liability um that we've absorbed from previous generations that that we've been trying to pay off and by state law we have to pay off by 2040 and the current schedule is to pay it off by 2036 so basically just over 10 years and that funding level as we know from that middle sex report is with just over 53% or so so it's not like oh can't middle sex do something about this no we're going to see significant increases almost up until and I would expect until the end of this situation of of the the final payoff um again um again not to harop on it but again we're constrained since three4 of our Revenue comes from the property tax that's not the case for for cities like LOL or Lawrence and so forth um the again the state increase uh again we've we've been discussed this in details not going to go through it but the how we we're you know being realistic with local receipts and so forth um again I mentioned about the $75 per student the 2.62% Chapter 70 funding um this is the historic level so there's data here that shows you that you know aside from the extraordinary year of 2024 um when they they brought us into full compliance with the formula we've been a minimum community and that's all we expect to see um there's also a capital Improvement plan what the town can't do and hasn't done we've made level funding in our capital budget uh out of $168 million budget we're funding 6 million of capital infrastructure for 22 infrastructure projects um and John sou is going to describe those later this evening and as I mentioned earlier sewer storm water Peg access which is covering this meeting uh ice Rank and Golf Course go through Standalone Enterprise funds and as you can see there it's not great news either the sewer Enterprise budget increases by 5.63% most of that's driven by the $200,000 increase to the low Regional waste water facility that treats are effluent um so you can see out of that 6.43 million 2.4 of that goes to the Wastewater Plant and L has nothing to do with what what we do in terms of pump stations and operations in chelsford St water budget increases by 6.5% to $2 million Peg access again that comes from the revenues from the cable SE charges for cable television their budget basically a nominal increase of 1.1% and then the Forum and the golf course are Level funded respectively um so again I'm not going to do the conclusion i' be doing enough of a soliloquy but the other thing I just point out is this isn't just the chood problem this is a problem that Min ofies across the state and obviously across you know the country and so forth they dealing with um and again we I think we do we have a partner with the state since they're we're a creature of the state and hopefully they will help us during this critical time to the extent possible again you know our priorities have been out you know strong standing for years it's education it's Public Safety it's infrastructure Public Health and Human Services this is detail in terms of the line items you can see missile Administration we actually reduction there um the ones that are bold show you where where does the money go it it goes to of the $5.7 million of budget line I'm changes you know obviously The Bigs that jump out to you 1.77 million to the schools 435 436 for Public Safety cut in community services notably the health department uh and um and community services coordinator uh and then benefits and insurance up 12% as we talked about $4 million and then again our nominal Debt Service and the ASC shouldn't be missed this does not include funding for unresolved collective bargaining agreements for Public Safety and Library employees so what does that mean that means that as I've say in the intro this budget is not final when those contracts come in and we don't know when they're going to be resolved they will have to be funded but a couple other things will change by then we'll know final state aid numbers we'll also know final um growth numbers for the assessors who are doing the revil and so I guess it's a long-winded way of saying that's how I Envision that's going to be funded is by these uncertainties um and hopefully they break in our favor if not then we'll have to come with a bridge to to deal with that um we you know that's that's the situation we're in so this isn't an overly conservative budget where we've you know sort of not allowing for contingencies that may break our way we're expecting that on the historic trends that that they break our way that'll allow us to fund the contracts unfortunately we've seen situations where contracts have taken multiple years to be funded and so forth um again on the revenue side a $5.6 million increase um again based you know so we're slightly in an a nominal deficit but within the margin of error I I often provide this of the five-year expenditure comparison to show you well where's the money been going over time and the next slide will be a 10 years it goes to where the priorities of the community are and where the bulk of the operations of they are schools 14 million over five years Public Safety DPW benefits and insurance up 41% in 5 years um clearly that's not you know sustainable we wonder and we were just talking about this in Boston at the conference at what point does it collapse right you know in terms of health insurance um but again the real in the reality of today 41% in 5 years uh fortunately our debt service is declining um but obviously that's precursor because the fire station has not been added to that and and when the town does consider a school project probably two within two years from now that will obviously change that Dynamic you know in a big big way um again 10year comparison same you see the same things in bold where the where the big changes are dollar-wise and percentage wise um facilities we've got an aged facilities of the town all of our buildings are are 10 years older U we have an obviously built you know a new building other than the fire station and DPW in that period um but our schools are our largest square footage and we know our school buildings are 50 to 60 plus years old and then benefits Insurance over 10 years up over 79% um again the proposed line item that I'm proposing is 1.7 million 7 million for the schools as I mentioned earlier their their the level service request was was double that 3.5 million this is historically how we funded the school so this 2.4% obviously pales in comparison to the 4 and a half% last year you know and what they've had in recent years um and and in terms of the funding in terms of what the state requirement is the most recent year that we have which is our current year uh budgeted versus required we're 31% over net School spending which is the amount the state mandates we have to spend on education when we were at nooba Tech last Friday morning the question was asked well how how what's the percentage of nooba Tech how are they funding over net School spending requirement and the answer was $1 so the nooba tech is running at net School spending requirements um and you can see what's happening is the net School spending requirement for the current year is 67 million for next year it'd be up over $3 million to 70 um based on the governor's proposed budget that's why you hear communities like dra and other places that are at net School spending saying hey wait a minute we don't have the revenue to from Chapter 70 education Aid and the other sources to meet the net School spending requirements that that's how you know challenging it is again to put it into context the last data we have which is two fiscal years ago it's costing almost $18,000 to educate a child in the chood public schools um that means if you look at any 22 student classroom it's costing you almost $400,000 for the school year um here's the enrollment for the CHC of public schools we're about the same enrollment as we were a decade ago at almost 5,100 students um you can see there's there's been growth uh in in uh teachers over that period but not so much in recent years you see how that's waned um average class size you see the growth in class size the most recent data we have is 18.8 which again you know is around where we were 10 years ago and you can see how that has fluctuated from 17.7 to 19.1 over that period this is the drivers that that we saw in December when we met with the school committee and finance committee of the school department the 3.5 that I've mentioned repeatedly tonight and the funding proposal is 1.7 of that which leaves them with 1.75 to absorb um the show Tech I mentioned it earlier it's you know again a nominal increase uh and again it's driven by the fact that our enrollment decreased by eight students when the district's enrollment increased by seven um we we we as the largest sending member to nooba Tech we fund at this point we're we're assessed and fund and and represent 27 and a half% of the uh enrollment at nooba Tech um and you can see how that's you know sort of we're over 200 students per year um so roughly five 50 students per class you know grade level for the 9 through 12 um you can see it's costing the most recent data of two years ago it's costing almost 22,500 so it's it's likely today it's over 23,500 to educate a child in the vocational schools and I think it puts it into perspective because people know what it cost to send the child to um college or or what their tax bill is in town and again the the average cost per people expenditure is is 23,000 plus or minus for Vocational High School student why the chouns schools is lesser is because you have elementary students and that pulls it down um in terms of your overall if you see that with regional whole Regional School Districts again the nooba tech drive as you heard back in December same as the chood schools and everyone else contractual increases special education Staffing services and transportation the ab Building Maintenance and capital projects the cost of technical M material uh programs and equipment and they increasing their vendor contracts and fixed costs again you know provides our we're still at 69 full-time Public Safety you can see they're responding to over 36,000 calls of which property checks are about 43% of those are 16,000 same thing on the fire at 63.5 full-time employees level Staffing we staff at 11 minimum per shift so we it's 13 down to 11: and therefore if people are on vacation or sick or are injured that's 11 is really tight and we've had instances um in maybe once a month or so where we have to close a station for a period of time because we don't have employees available to work the call volume as you can see for the fire is over 6,300 calls in the calendar year that we just finished and of those 68% of them are medical calls which obviously require a timely response which is the whole basis of how the town is a Ally kept five stations open is you want to be able to get to the scene to either assess for a fire or provide medical assistance as soon as possible and that's why the police respond as well as the private ambulance again for employee compensation for those without the contract settlements it's roughly $100,000 uh again we we've gone over the if we're here 10 years ago you know we go from 610 employees on health insurance and now 679 and we went from 857 retirees to 90 992 or almost a thousand um you know it one is yeah the number of retirees grows because of longevity and and so forth of people's lifespan and then employees people move in and out based upon if they have a spouse and available coverage for a spouse and so forth um again I've talked about the premium I'm going to do that again they've talked about the middle sex uh the 116 million un unfunded pension liability and and as I said here this is 26 again we have the data for 27 so we know that 860,000 we're going to need next year but for this year we need just over a million and we know of that $1 13.3 million assessment 11.3 of it is for the unfunded pay payment on the unfunded pension liability um because our normal cost is only 2 million Solid Waste and Recycling again contractual increases for the haulers and the and the Tipping go up by an inflation Factor so we have to factor in 114,000 for collection and increase Medicare your Medicare taxes are based on your payroll we're anticipating a 5% $62,000 again we've talked about our debt service again right now it's in a great position almost be fully repaid in the next 10 years but we know things are coming on that um and again the decrease of excluded Debt Service um is $834,000 or 75% decline in that to you know you know basically $300,000 um because of the reduction of the sewer project because we know that the latter phase of the sewer project are paid for from betterments and the cap and the sewer assessment fee but again it doesn't provide any relief in our operating budget um so again you can see 273,000 um clearly you've seen that fall um over time the non- excluded is the other story it's up as I mentioned earlier 7.8 million um for the town's capital investment plans this is the chart of the number of full-time employees on the general government and school department of you know it's a 20-year perspective so you can see in 20 years there's only been 8.6 or 3.4% % increase in general government employees and in five years we've added four employees or 1.6% so this I don't want to be any Notions out there in the community that we just hire people and we're just bloated and don't know you know what we're doing in terms of how to run an organization I don't have the final School numbers uh and we'll U as the time of preparing this um you can see obviously growth there from 695 and ' 06 to over 800 and the current fiscal year um and and again here's the detail on the general government employees so I gave you not only this year and what next year is but then look again look a look back 20 years ago uh and you can see you know I I don't want to war you with excruciating detail but the executive office which is basically the town manager's office and per in HR you know five people three people myself two assistants um and then two HR we at core in fact I know that if you go to other communities and look at the Staffing the managers and select board's office nobody is running at three people I know that for a fact um again finance department still at the historic level of 14 that's basically assesses you know uh treasure collector and accounting that's core same thing with town clerk four people and you know 20 years ago it was is three and a half but we know the challenges from the mail and voter registration all the other things that's core uh because of the workload is increase on that Planning and Development three people a planner a conservation agent and a staff person for a town of chelid size 36,000 people that says enough in itself again police same level as 20 years ago fire up slightly again why it goes up by four is it's an additional person per um per um you know per deployments there's four deployments at staff 247 um and that actually came out of an an arbitration order where we were ordered to increase by one person uh per deployment um inspections again four to five plus why you see the again the plus one that's that sealo and weights measures position that I talked about earlier so even though it looks like a plus one it's really it's really level because the ser Serv was paid for and from the revolving fund through ncog now we've had to absorb it because ncog no longer provides it and we're the host community so again that's why you know but anyway it is what it is DPW engineering six people pretty what what we were 20 years ago Highway roughly the same level as we we cut one this year from last year but roughly where we were 20 years ago there was no facilities Department 20 years ago you remember there was the pilot where the town and merg with school facilities um so again that's why you know it's it but it does show you we're at 17 and a half uh and we know how stretched they are maintaining all the school buildings and town buildings basically what happened when that conversion came over the employees came to the DPW from the schools combined operation sewer Enterprise again Standalone level staff storm water again there was no storm water back in 2006 because of the mandates from the federal and state government we're level Staffing that that's why that was created uh Parks is zero it got absorbed into Highway and grounds public buildings we used to have two that could absorbed into the um facilities um so right now we have a half which is basically the night attendance um DPW recycling Solid Waste still a half position Cemetery you can see level Staffing from 20 years ago and this year health and Community Services you saw we had we had ramped it up and then you saw the cuts for this year um Recreation yeah we used to have a limited Recreation Department that was cut over 15 years ago the zero Health we talked about that the two position reduction and the inspector and the assistant position and then the libraries level staffed uh essentially and slightly below where they were 20 years ago and we know the libraries activities in volume uh has not diminished um again you've seen the budget drivers we we talked about the revenue sources again we look at Revenue comparisons over five years to get a sense again you see how the property tax is over 76% um and what the increases in eight over that period the same for 10 years um this is our 5.1 and new Levy capacity the 2 and a half% is the mathematical increase from the prior year base Levy and then the estimated 2 million of New Growth which includes the first phase and component of the the old um UMass West Campus which we believe will be units will be occupied by this June 30th um so that's built into that number that's why you can say well why is it 2 million when in recent years you've only been 1.5 it's because we we project a million dollar increase from that project when it's all done half million this year half million next year and revil we'll see where we are uh again the 8820 average single family tax bill obviously it goes as you can see from our whole presentation when you see the P Chon public schools at 45% or 4,000 of that obviously that doesn't include the The Debt Service and and uh uh benefits and insurance that accompanies the schools if you factor that in you're closer to 60% um so they're included in the 19.7 yes they in the the the 19.7 is benefits and insurance uh it's roughly 2 to one if you really want to get you know we we've looked at this on the town side uh in terms of of uh active employees so that's where you get higher and then you start factoring in it um so again and again the other issue is is how it falls to the residential taxpayer because we know the residential valuation is residential property values are increasing at a greater percentage than commercial so if we went back you know go five years it was we've lost 2% meaning residents have picked up over 2% and Commercial has lost and that's because home values and residential values have appreciated greater than commercial and we're required by the state to assess that fair market value and they test it with actual data the the only good news is but it's that's no good news but gives a matter of perspective is the there's the growth in the average single family tax tax bill again it's increased by 19.8% or $1,458 in 5 years that's obviously higher than the compounding of 2 and a half% over 5 years of 13% um has begin because of the increase in residential values versus commercial the thing that I would note is we rank currently 84th and highest single family average tax bill across the state which is the one metric State gives us in their data one being the highest so the town of Weston is one and then you go to you know Dover sherban car and so forth the top we're 84 last year we were 79 and if you go back to 2020 we were high as 68 and if you go back to 2007 we were 61 so yes taxes are going up in chord they're going up everywhere uh I don't know where you escape it but and now but that's where we stand today in chelsford we've Fallen to 84 as opposed to the high 70s where we were in recent years which means other communities are increasing their taxes either from value appreciation and or uh overrides and debt exclusions um here's more granular data for where we are with Bara dra tuxbury and Westford our nearest communities and you can see again it varies but if you look over the three-year period we're not out of line in terms of the increases uh and you can see how they would fluctuate you know this year barck had a 6.23% increase in their every single family Bill ours was only just under 3% but yet last year we were four they were 3.89 you know you you can see barck obviously has had a higher growth in their tax bill in the last three years than chelsford um Drake it is obviously less um tuxbury very similar um in Westford and obviously the dollar amount the average single family bill in Westford this year is 10,730 whereas we're we're most them would are tuxbury and then they do it as a percentage of income anyway um again state aid we we've talked about this the big components General government Aid Chapter 70 again the general component AIDS up 2.2% the Chapter 70 again the $75 per student um and then why it goes up 2.62 is you get other assistance in terms of Charter tuition reimbursement school choice tuition school choice doesn't go to the town it goes to the school department same thing with Library Aid it goes directly to the library um and and so forth um there's the the fact that I was mentioning about the decline in veterans uh exemptions and so forth um local receipts again our biggest ones are motor vehicle excise which is roughly half of it um permits um second biggest 1.7 million and then obviously we look at meals tax we're almost getting we project we'll have almost a million dollars in meals tax uh and the the lodging tax um of 575 you can see how that has grown from 400 level um prior to the pandemic to 575 obviously there's a concern that if the state does follow through with its intent to pull the people out of the hotels that that revenue is going to fall we don't we we don't know when that's going to happen but we know the occupancy of the hotels isn't the same when they're not being used for Sheltering um so that's obviously a bit of a of a of a uncertain number available funds again just the offsets and such that go from the Enterprise funds again the big thing is inflation 3.1% through November the big killer was 7% in 2022 um you can see where we were in earlier years 1.6 1.5 1.9 occasional year of 3.3 2.5 but you start looking at the recent years and that's where you start people talking about the 20% inflation um over five years and so forth so that's the it a nutshell I don't know if you want to hear John present the capital plan and then take questions or if you want to stop on the operational budget at this point it's whatever you prefer why don't we just take questions now on on an operational budget if anybody has any how about you you have any questions for Paul on the budget no not right now thank you thanks good really it's I mean I think we had a pretty good idea of what we're going to see yeah we had the figure it is what it is yeah good do anything okay no okay all right thank you John do you want to come up and present the capital good evening Madam chair members of the board manager Cohen uh just to present you with an overview of the U FY 26 Capital plan this slide uh you may recall from the tri board meeting back in December this just shows all of the um a Breakout by functional area uh for all the different excuse me projects and you may recall that the capital planning committee voted to um recommend 19 projects totaling just over 5.96 million the next slide shows a financing summary so uh we well as we discussed back in December we have rough little over 27,000 the recaptured funds which come from prior year projects that were funded these are remaining balances after the projects are completed so we can recapture those and so that leaves just of about 5.94 million that will be funded through uh municipal bonds and then moving into the areas just to give you a better look at all of these projects uh first in community services is our senior center this project for 170,000 uh is the second phase to replace the flooring tile there uh the flooring tile is over 30 years old and is in need of repair the next three projects involve uh public libraries so the first project is a u repaving of the Adams Library lot it's the the current lot even though many of us think of the library is relatively new it is over 20 years old and there's been problems with the um the curb and the pavement and I did want to point out for this project and a pavement project for the police station uh Public Works director Clancy was able to um present that we would save um we could save $50,000 by doing this Paving project in at the same time as the police station parking lot just due to mobilization economies of scale things like that so that would have been a higher price tag without that the next project involves a computer replacement uh as you can imagine and in this age the library uses a number of computers and they try to replace them on roughly a four to five year life cycle uh so this funds 60,000 to replace computers for staff and patrons at both Adams and McKay with older units being repurposed to less intensive commuting uh Computing applications forever possible and then the next project that Adams Library involves uh this is the second phase of the HVAC system replacement you may recall from last year that the hbac system at Adams is at the end of its useful life and so this is the next phase and as was discussed at Capital planning meetings um there will be another phase to this but this funds 450,000 for the second phase of this this system replacement then we move into the public safety area um 405,000 is budgeted to repave the rear parking lot uh behind the the police station uh I won't go into a lot of detail there just due to time but the same thing here this would have been 25,000 higher without the savings of doing both projects together uh and then the project for the fire department involves a command um staff vehicle replacement for just under 112,000 uh this this is a mobile vehicle it serves as the um command post for the officer in charge at a scene and carries a lot of specialized equipment and then we move into public works so we have um your traditional infrastructure projects that we often fund every year um sidewalk improvements for 375,000 um that will be based on the sidewalk assessment and master plan and then 425,000 budgeted for roadway improvements which are also based on the pave uh pavement management database uh that that the DPW tracks and updates so those two together combined for 800,000 there some equipment that I just want to touch on 130,000 is budgeted to replace an older mini excavator that the highway division uses for a number of projects in town and the next piece of equipment is an older sidewalk snow clearing unit uh you can see it's a 200 2003 um this is this is a this cost 210,000 um this will be used not only for snow clearing but the new piece of equipment will be outfitted so it could be used for other uses on the sidewalk uh and then the next two vehicles involve Municipal facilities and you'll see that um this is replacing an older lighter Duty uh Chevy Colorado this one and the next one I just wanted to explain for a moment the reason that you see DPW uh upgrading from um lighter Duty vehicles to 3/4 ton vehicles that can have a snow plow is you've we've all read in recent years that fewer and fewer contractors unfortunately are interested in plowing for Town DPW uh not just in chumford but in surrounding towns so this is going to give Public Works more flexibility because they can have a a uh Municipal facilities employee of Public Works use these use these trucks the new trucks to uh actually plow snow where the the older vehicles that are being replaced are not capable of uh they're not heavy duty enough to have a plow then we move into um next under Municipal facilities there's 150,000 budgeted um for Americans with Disability Act improvements at parks playgrounds and open spaces and you can see as the Public Works director discussed these will be based on um when the town's open space and Recreation master plan um the develop the the recommendations that come out of that report will guide which projects will be funded for the 150,000 and then there's one project here that involves this building uh 180,000 is budgeted to renovate between two to four restrooms under the first phase uh just to replace aging uh restrooms uh with plumbing fixtures that may not be in the best of condition as well as partitions um floors things of that nature then we transition the school facilities so the first one uh you can see the the cost is just over 877,000 this is this project improves the security at the entryways to Four elementary schools Bome Center Harrington and South Row it also improves the um entryway security at Parker middle school and it also provides for the renovation of a um stairwell uh at chumford high school to provide better emergency erress you don't have um bottlenecking so to speak so if there was an emergency event you want you know you want the students to be able to um exit the building as quickly as possible and that's the reason for that the secure entryway uh the secure entryway project will be based on the project that has been completed at McCarthy Middle School same type of thing you see that it will have a containment area um better secure access um the have a checkpoint so that visitors to the school can be um will be able to have to be checked in and and you can have containment of someone uh if needed the next project involves Center Elementary School it involves the partial roof replacement for 130,000 you can see that it's um this is a section of Center school that has an asphalt shingle roof uh the roof is 25 years old and is beyond its useful life the next school project involves the replacement of a water heater and mixing valve at South Row school at a cost a 60,000 and the the goal here is to replace this before you would have a a a catastropic catastrophic failure so that's the reason for that then this project may sound familiar this is the second phase this is a partial roof replacement for million dollars at McCarthy Middle School the current roof is 23 years old um it is beyond its useful life and right now in this year's Capital plan fiscal year 25 you may recall that we funded the design of this so this is the first phase of the actual roof replacement there will be a second phase just because McCarthy is such a large School uh the roof area it it could not all be funded in one year so this will also allow it to be phased and then the final school project involves a boiler replacement at McCarthy middle school for $700,000 and you can see this project funds the replacement of four existing boilers that are approaching their end of um their useful life so that concludes the FY 26 Capital plan as we know from past years um the next step in the process will be um consideration by town meeting representatives in April and then what if um town meeting approves this then in June early July um municipal bonds will be issued to finance this work and then this the last slide is just the um summary of all of the Capital Improvements that you normally see for town meeting in the um in the finance committee booklet okay any questions for John about the capital plan no okay okay everybody shaking head thank you very much John thank you John thanks John one appointment okay um I'm seeking the board's confirmation to the appointment of the Town Hall advisory committee Donna dwit as for an unexpired three-year term ending June 30th 2026 so I'll make a motion to okay I'll make a motion to accept the um manager's appointment I'll second okay we have a motion in a second we have do a roll call vote Aaron hi George hi Virginia hi and I'm I thank you we do have a set of minutes when when they put your comments in I think they took out a couple of mine so it's just minor um in the attendance list under school committee the uh remote next to Diana's name should be stricken she was there in person and after Jay Lang I added Joanna Johnson Collins who's the finance director she was also at that meeting in person okay and uh Susan McKinnon happened to review these these minutes and she noted that under the the school Comm committee it it it lists her as she is it lists um Maria Santos as Vice chair but on both votes we took two votes that they want to uh set the on page four to set the funding level at 168.5 and in the vote it mentions uh Susan McKinnon being Vice chair and she is not and then on a motion to adjourn the same thing it lists her advice chair and she is not so if we could just have her listed as a school committee member yeah so with those edits I'll make a motion to approve the December 9th 2024 tri board minutes as amended second okay we have Motion in a second so we a roll call vote Aaron I George I jinia I and I'm I thank you do you want my changes sure yeah I'll get and you you got the ones that I mentioned okay all right if that is it we'll take another motion it's 7:34 I'll make a motion to adourn excuse me are we not allowed to make a comment not not at this meeting no it's not on the agenda when when are we allowed to make a comment if it's on the agenda you can make a comment if we have a public in general comment but it's not on tonight's agenda okay how do I make it on the agenda how do we make that can you ask us about this later no after we adjourn after we adjourn it's a public meeting and I'm a member of the community I'd like to know when I can comment it's not on the agenda to even talk about that so we will we will talk with you publicly about how you can get on the agenda or how you can talk at the general public input session of the agenda at the next agenda at the next meeting so we have a a motion to adjourn second and a second so we'll do a roll call vote Aaron I George hi Virginia hi I'm I zero thank you