okay welcome everybody to the Conway uh Select Board Finance and Capital Improvement Committee joint meeting for Monday April 14th i'll call the meeting to order first item on the agenda to vote
to approve the minutes for April 7th feels good i'll make a motion i'll second all in favor i I Thanks Adam as always no warrants today uh meetings attended by select board members
um I had a meeting with uh GZA and the Pan Hill residents to talk about that dement that Friday Friday or Thursday thursday thursday um I thought that was a great meeting um basically GTA is going to walk the property with the
residents and their um engineer they've hired just to get a full perspective of the project bucky bucky buckyy's coming in common all right i'll read Buckyy's last oh I know sparkle what a name uh can I just say I referred to him
as Bucky in the meeting and his lawyer or where the attorney referred to him as Mr sparkle and I could not decide which was like more appropriate every time he said it he chewed up anyway uh Elaine any meetings i had a joint school committee meeting on
Tuesday and we had school negotiations for Union 38 on Thursday and that was both the TAs and the teachers are settled and I right I talked to a lot of people but I don't think I had an official
meeting i always forget we had that 50th birthday oh yeah yeah did you read your hands closely by the way all right we have public comment yes we do have public comment
um love to have public but um so just just briefly just trying to get the two grants underway the the tomorrow is the deadline for next month's inclusion current um which was a key
piece of publicity well they already have information that came to the newsletter but I thought you were writing an article how can I write an article if I can't give them a phone number to call for people that are interested they could always call me in town that was the whole purpose was to
set this up so that you are not over the member well they they've already have the information so it's up to you if you want to speak with Julia Carol who's our chair um about the article i think that would be good you want to get
I understand i have not heard back from Maya i emailed again today but that shouldn't stop you from [Music] completed not having a number to call that other
just take down their phone numbers and their name or email and say we'll get back to [Music] That was my public comment okay public we we all uh insurance companies well I mean that
you know we the pressure is on to spend as much as those grants by the end of the fiscal year right i understand but so much we can do better okay so what we get from that is don't be delayed
putting it in my keep in mind thanks Phil yeah um nobody else online i know unfinished business so that means we're going to move on to new business
we have quum do you have quum i I can call the finance committee meeting to order uh and then I make a motion to approve the minutes of April 7th a second all in favor
okay was Alan going to join or he's only Rose yeah so he called because he's a little delayed but he it's usually 6:30 so he should be here by 6:30 okay um then if you don't mind we'll just continue with new business okay discussion and vote to sign the new
contract with GZA what is there to discuss well um nothing really to discuss but what we talked about with the residents Thursday and and GCA agreed that there was no need for a contract amendment for
this but basically they have agreed that they will spend a couple of hours walking the property with uh the residents engineer with myself and Bar um just to basically you know make sure that the residents all of their concerns
and Bucky's understanding of the topography and everything um but that that is all that basically GZA has that information picture of what that project entails that's where I where the project
entails as it stops at the road right right that's and and I I think you're pretty clear about that that that's still you know I think it's nice of GCA to walk the property with them i just have my own concerns about
um the mindset of the owner that's whose property is being walked that the town is going to do anything on their property because they're not right and we and we talked about like a potential like phase two this is really just this is we're we have to finish out the GZA
contract um this is the best use of those funds that we had allocated given the million-doll match or the the million dollar grant funds that we can potentially get um if we get this grant application submitted i mean I don't think it hurts to hear their concerns if
we haven't heard their concerns already it's just we don't want to set up an expectation exactly i don't I don't think that there I mean we talked about it you know like this project is very clear like it's a limited scope that this
project has and that is to um attempt to minimize the effects of overflow of the existing draage system on private properties um so yeah I I mean I agree we should be listening to all concerns
and um getting them involved right and getting them involved i just want to make sure we're you know we have a deadline i just want to make sure that we don't get into a back and forth about when you get onto private property the issues on that private property
because then you're going to go through okay what's a reasonable amount of water that comes off the road and what's an reasonable amount of um infrastructure in a resident's property to deal with said water right and because that will be an argument that will never end it
will never end um so I hope that understanding is there and I hope they understand also you know we're also constrained by the budget and we're also constrained by what the state has in their infrastructure along 116
you can't build something so large that the infrastructure of 116 can't handle it um well and that was one of the concerns was that even with you know whatever remediation we do the storm water is still going to flow into the South River and that overflow pipe is
actually generally underwater when we do have these really heavy rainfall events right um so it's I mean my takeaway was that there was kind of a general understanding that this is a larger project that no one wanted to
um let the perfect be the enemy That's a good that we that we want to take this million dollars that we have the potential of of of getting in grant funds um and that you know looking forward there's always a potential for
the phase two but this is phase one is what we have to be focused on right now okay sounds like it was a trip i I thought it was a you know I mean I think really the you know residents wanted to feel like they were heard i have certainly heard them and I
mean GCA seemed perfectly amendable to you know doing a site visit with their engineer as well and we have someone in here who's affected by all this as well in that area um okay um I appreciate you
meeting with the residents um okay so if everyone is Oh wait i should just say that that the other the other um their other ask was that not only do um not only do we walk the property with them with GZA but that they have a chance to look at the final
grant proposal before we submit it with no expectation that they're going to have any input on that grant proposal but they will see it they can offer input that doesn't mean that we're gonna base it on what GTA is doing i think everyone was was very cognizant of the
timing of this okay so got it right well no there there is a big effect so I think I mean I think I I just I want to make sure that they feel included you know they can see the grant proposal but there's I I thought I was there's no expectation we're going to alter that grant proposal let's keep looking i know everybody wants it you
know to make sure that we're spending money the right way and like you said a great design although it might not be perfect for a thousand year 100year storm is still a good design for what is needed up there right in GTA one of the points that they made repeatedly was
that you can may think you're fixing one problem and you create a whole other problem for another open the pluggates yeah so somebody like we want to be cautious all right well um if you all unless
there's any other questions I'll make a motion to sign the the um to sign the new contract with GCA i'll second all in favor i I think but very slightly all right the next item on new
business and Roy Moy is here so I'm glad here too uh discussion and vote to sign the source pass proposal for Microsoft migration in MSP services so this is just the formal after the presentation and and Roy pointing out
the number of kiosk used licenses so they revised it the let me see um so the migration cost they still have Microsoft in the migration cost but that's not what's going to be in the
warrant it's going to be the$189 minus the 4848 for Microsoft so the warrant article for the migration itself which is a onetime cost with the Cisco and their services will be whatever that amount is 189 minus 4848 that will be a separate
for an article and then in the town budget will be the Microsoft plus their MSP but it'll be the different lines so it'll be contracted services for this amount and then the software line will have a 4848 for our Microsoft plus all
the other items so but I I think I think we're all good i think uh we all owe a thanks to Roy for catching this yeah that was a distant frame i'm still not 100% convinced they captured everything i haven't seen the
latest and greatest proposals that are also you know the VPNs are kind of hazing are they in there there is no VPN if people are logging straight in now there won't be a
VPN because everything's going up to the cloud so they're good yeah well okay yeah that's right all right i'll make a motion to sign the source proposal for Microsoft migration MSP service second all in favor i thank
you [Music] i hope I don't butcher this name discussion and vote on appointing Jameson either Laval or Lalei as a temporary highway department employee
wait is is Ron coming in for this no because we've had this we've had him before um hired he was hired through Smithville vote when he was actually there and then when he was done with that he actually came and worked for us as a temporary for um I think it was
June through August of last year or the year before no issues with him no no ron Ron is very happy with his work i will make a motion to appoint Jameson I'll make a motion to appoint Jameson Label as a temporary highway
department employee from midmay through August for $18 per hour second all in favor i I keep for coming back jameson uh next on new business is the request to use Blackboard Connect system to
elicit candidates for local offices oh my gosh I didn't print it oh you have the wrong agenda too i have the wrong agenda too isn't that funny um okay sorry this so um well it no that
that request came from our town clerk who had wanted to know because we have so few people on the ballot this time there's no contested racism there's I think four open slots um so she had come to me and asked for permission i said
"Well that's a select word decision of what you can use the Blackboard Connect for." So you know to say to people I don't know call them up and say you interested in serving we have all these openings i don't see anything all
that information right yeah i don't see anything i mean I don't have a problem with using it for that i just don't think it's going to be very effective i feel like I just Yeah whatever works or try if I mean the
message should be congratulations you've been nominated for the board of hilarious that would be hilarious you're now on top of room well we're writing you in i could get Lori to be the one to do the
message too yeah I'm sure Lori could come up with a very compelling I agree message okay so it's okay with the board if Yes solicit okay thank you all right last
item on new business is to sign post attestation for reertification of the big dawn chief base so this is um just something that he had to sorry I checked it out because I couldn't remember that I put it on the
agenda properly all right so it's the appointing authority who just has to attest to his morality is he a good moral character and a fit for employment and law on boards management i guess you would say
yes the whole box we can write so much stuff in there discipline and complaint reports negative we had to do this before well you know he's finding a lot of things that we never did before well yeah i mean post I mean this maybe
something new with the new training and stuff i I don't know we never did but yeah obviously I think Don's doing a fine job i'm think he's qualified to be law enforcement officer it doesn't say vote but I'll just make a
vote anyway i'll make a motion to sign post at testation at the test is so easy to say attestation uh for resertification of two baits second all in favor i Okay um while we move on while we wait
on show up we'll move on to mail stakeholder sessions on sitting and permitting changes to energy facilities what [Music] oh is that mistake
okay a bunch of departments uh invite us to attend stakeholder session to discuss city citing and permitting changes to energy facilities required by the 2024 climate act so that's here if anybody want to read it um there's also
DPU attachments and conduit access on public rightways i don't have that here that came in online i think it's in your select word packet okay i'm going to look at that later um because we did talk about fever source prior to this
and it was brought up about um trenching and putting lines underground and that's something I feel that the select board many years ago should have done on Main Street and if they ever do anything on the polls on Main Street again I would ask that whoever is in the select board
at the time look into burying those lines so one you know uh we don't have to worry so much about lines going out downtown but also it's just ugly it's just ugly so it would beautify our main street if
we didn't have power they were digging up all those sidewalks then I think they looked into it it was like another million dollars or something oh no a million dollars to make it look amazing they're responsible for everything that goes into Right yeah so
the homeowners would have had to spend because you did it when I rebuilt our house oh did you oh you did very Yeah yeah the poll is still there but you don't have to do anything okay um you want to go over TA updates
sure let's do that not that there's all that much but actually can I just add did you all get the the latest copy of the omnibus and the warrant i just want to make sure you were able to access it because I got it done so late in the day that I didn't
get coffees made so I was hoping um so I don't have a huge amount um I did meet with Barlo Excavation um up at the transfer station to we're looking at getting a quote to finally
fix the divots and the back pad of the transfer station um so I'm hoping to get a quote for that soon is that the paving company or is that a separate company it's excavation and paving so he would be doing both yeah yeah um so and I I understand that they're they're working
in row soon too on their transfer station so that's how I got the name so but I'll still have to end up doing the three quotes so but I I need to have an idea we use them for our Oh do you yeah yeah they he seemed great um but they were recommended by our
contractions okay that's good to know but what I'm waiting for is the quote to come back so that I know whether or not I can do three quotes or if I have to do an IFB so I'm really hoping that anyway
um we will be having our FY we do an a for the town every two years we're on a bianual basis so um excuse me we had one for FY22 FY24 is coming up and they're starting the week of May so basically
the auditors come in and they spend about a week with Jan and Mike and going through all the books and then they write the report on how well we've been doing so I'm hoping that with all the changes we've done at the transfer station that they're going to be happier
with us at least on that area um MVP 2.0 you know we had a great kickoff meeting with Ashefield and uh you know just talking about how the process is going to work this is a completely different type of
grant than we're used to um and so I put the overview of the process on on the sheet there for you because you spend five months developing your core team the whole point of well not the whole point but a huge part of this is all about trying to engage people who have
not been engaged in the process before um so we have somebody called an equity partner who will be helping us try to identify you know stakeholders who should be attending this meeting and we'll be setting up um between Ashefield
and Conway will be setting up a team of about 10 um it'll be Paul Mlache the third who's their town administrator and myself maybe one or two other municipal people and the rest are all going to be community liaison so we're going to be looking for people who are interested in
being part of this poor team and then excuse me basically then you kind of go through a process of they call it uncovering social resilience and revisiting community resilience priorities so this is part of where you get into the meat
of the discussion with the town about well what are the things that the town thinks are really important when it comes to climate change what do we want to address but it'll be new people coming in not necessarily the same ones who've been involved for the last decade or so and then they come up with what
they call a seam project so the towns can either do one together or separately they'll probably be together because that's why we're working together because we're all in the South River watershed so we'll see if that but that may not end up being what the team decides they want to work on so we will see anyway so I'm looking forward to
that and that's pretty much Oh I did need to get the board's permission to sign off and did I have it here somewhere to Oh here it is it's right behind you to sign off you know the gates down at the transfer station i've already signed it and had it notorized
but I need your permission um for me to have done that because it's this is for the release claim for the money from the insurance company to pay waste management to or to pay to have the gate put back up the waste management not so
I'll make a motion that our town administrator can sign the settlement and release form to replace the gate at the transfer station all in favor i I thank you very much thank you that's it
thank you we can move on we have move on all right lost yep let's go on to the joint meeting with finance uh with the review of the travel warrant and looking into free cash you know what I didn't do second
do you want me to call it up on the screen or does everybody have it yeah that would be helpful okay all right hang on a second are you going to start with the warrant or you going to start today um well I I start with the warrant because I did um
I sorry let me just slide this here oh has it not updated yet hang on my computer's got to get up to date there we go um because I did I did number all the free cash articles according to what the article number will be in the warrant so
you have to um And are you expecting to vote on the war articles tonight oh no no no no okay no no no no that's such a rough draft no no no no draft yes you know sorry why am I not finding this when did
I send it out to you oh for tonight's meeting there you go and half of the um half of the the warrant is the um the fur co yes is there any way that we can
I mean I guess we really do have to make that available to everyone yeah i know I could sum it up in two paragraphs i know it's a big it's a big charter change so let me just because it's it's
not it's just Okay get back here sorry about this i should have had that lined [Music] up okay got a little bit of Alrighty so
um All right so obviously the you know I didn't put the article numbers in there because the formatting drives me crazy when I'm adding and subtracting and trying so I'm waiting till the end but obviously the to the reports is article one our budget is article two
um article three is every year to vote the salaries so here we go article four which on the free cash as you see is and so what I did is I just took what everything that I'd heard all of you all discuss things you wanted to do and I
put them all in there so that was 100,000 to put into the grammar school capital stabilization um especially on the expectation that the boiler the funds are going to be depleted by the boiler replacement doesn't it make sense for us to talk
about free cash first i think so well it's up to you however you want to do these articles yeah let's look at let's look at the chart sure oh okay hang on then all right is that
sharing you know I'm gonna stop sharing sharing just because Okay got a little bigger all right so the first one was the Well that's our starting amount right
um Oops sorry about that so first one was for the grammar school then we've done an the firetruck annually ambulance stabilization is new because they really need now to buy a new ambulance so it kind of came up this
year you all talked about creating a new highway stabilization account then there's the excavator the tractor um the extra money that needs to be put into the police detail to cover because
the monies don't always come in that quickly i was told I could reduce the OPED down to $1,000 just to show that we're Mike our accountant I'm happy to put in whatever numbers you all decide like 10 there's been like 20
yep then we have the highway garage note the reval and then the IT oh there's the number that I was saying 141 or 14151 well some of these are optional and some of these are not optional correct so why
don't we like phase out the the nonoptional ones and then see what the balance is the other discussion I'd like to have is us maintaining a a free cash balance in the town of three and a half% which is about $250,000
so that that should be a goal where we strive as a bottom line I've been wanting that for a while that we have a set not ceiling but a set uh percentage percentage keep in there minimum
dividend yeah dimminimus deminimus yes so highway garage not is not optional correct revaluation is not optional it migration is not that's what we just voted on police detail we did change
that claim with that number right there we still need money in the web is is in that bylaw so that's not an option right but that's nice i just said my question on that one is
you know put 10,000 in the past 20 20 um what's the general con I mean we know this is every year we have the same discussion we're well underfunded i guess it doesn't really make much difference does anybody have any thoughts about whether we should put
in more money or less money so why was Michael Hayland such a drastic reduction this year honestly there's only one town in the whole Commonwealth that has fully funded their OPED um and I think the thought was that as long as it seemed that we're making a good faith effort
every year to get to that point but I think it's well over a million dollars right it's like 1.2 or something yeah so that's what our oped obligation based on that's a standard set of assumptions but it
changes every year it does change every year because interest rates change every year and people my sense is put the minimum in that it takes to maintain those good standings i don't know that a thousand is is
enough but maybe five or seven or something and the reason is I've expressed this before this is pay as you go I sense and yeah sure the state if if if our federal government was required
to do with social security and Medicare and Medicaid what they're asking us to do for op forget about it right okay And so I'm not I you know maybe it helps Massachusetts bond standing you know
bond rating altogether but I just my my feeling is put as minimal and as possible yeah so I would say stick with what our accountant was telling us yeah me too so if we add that lease detail into the requirement then we're up to
almost 84,000 and where did that number come from for the physio our accountant he he looked at all the details that Yeah the amount in the past year because there's been so much more work in the past year so this is what we pay out but
then we eventually get that back we pay more than that much more than that oh we do yeah yeah but we're kind of a pass through right yeah so um Yeah so he was like "This is the amount I want to have sitting in there
so we don't go into deficit." I'm gonna ask a very dumb question why are we even looking at all this as part of free cash because the fundings can come from stabilization from stabilization funds it it can our stabilization funds aren't that big
either i mean so it's up to that's completely your call i'm just kind of showing how this is how I've done it for the last three years and we kind of go through free cash first i want to say we have just over 200,000 in is it
highway about 240 maybe in uh I'm sorry in capital and about 240 in the grammar school maybe I can't remember and and then the general so we only have like about six or
700,000 in all of those so if you want to take out Yeah but I was kind of thinking you were looking to build up too well let's first I mean we already know five line item there five and six are just continuing
continuing to add to the stabilization for the pumper and the ambulance right so that is what it is so is the school fun right
so I did speak with Mike too about other sources where else could we you know I mean you can just put it in there and add it to the tax base that's another option it doesn't have to come from a stabilization fund um that's a choice of
what language will read in the warrant how you design it and but it would it would increase the tax base well that's not popular we do not so what does that leave at cash right now if we take out all
the nonoption items ah sorry not used to working on screen like that all right um are you looking at just these that you Yeah so if that's what we That's
nonoptional it's 84,000 83 what's the reserve what's three and a half% yeah% roughly two and a half 2 000 as an ending balance so if it's only those these five right
here then your balance is still 528763 want to get that around [Music] we have any estimate of u you know receipts from exercise and
drug license and all that stuff are we Are we using this year's as an estimate for next year sorry I missed that sorry are we using this year's receipts for the um not the revolment but I'm
thinking the excise tax new growth um well no new wealth is another deal but in other words the assumptions that we're going to make moving forward we base it off of what we have this year the assumptions of how much free cash
we'll have next year oh no if like auto exercise that goes into the revenues right the revenues so I did speak with Mike about that you know the DLS had come back with that chart for us and he agreed to up it to the amount that of the next year it won't be
234,000 I think was the amount for revenue uh estimated revenue he's upping it but it's not by much it's not by much but it's almost the three it's almost the free cash the the the free cash flow so
correct it is yeah you're right it is well that's good well and you also I guess I'm I'm not sure what the the the goal is of having the free cashache be this 3% because you
do have your general stabilization which wasn't that the one that was supposed to be about 3% so it's just a question it's a question no no right yeah but I'm I'm saying between the general and the free cash is there a reason for free cashache to be considered
general and free cash is there a difference what is a general stabilization stabilization but that requires a town meeting both right to put not to put it into to take it out there we go speak of the devils conversation for you
jeez we're talking about the three and a half% free balance that we proposing maintain [Music] oh my goodness that was good
yeah spend less well it's a good way i was just reminding that our estimated revenues come close to the three and a half% free cash which is not a bad thing of course
they we're not budgeting on it that's the problem so we're it's like maybe we're thinking it's going to happen but we're not showing it on paper right it's not reflected in the the
warrior right that's right and it rarely get it maybe in the uh text it's It's never It's never So if we funded everything it's almost $650,000 which is more than they're for cash
right right withgative 35,000 right i'm sorry how much is the general stabilization rated um uh I'm not sure i think it's somewhere between two and 300,000 [Music]
stabilization all all told is how much 700,000 let me see if I can find it i can bring it up so number in other words what's the best practice in terms of Okay so three and a
half% stabilization 11 million i I don't remember state I personally think that it it's more important to have it in free cash readily accessible cash yeah
so MMA MMA suggests um maintain a free cash balance of free cash and stabilization of one balance okay of no less than 5% total or in each no no uh
together total okay so that's where you came up two and a half because two and a half in each well three and a half way i wasn't thinking about the stabilization all right so here's the stabilization funds as of 228 general's 292
um ambulance 340 a capital's 220 grammar 236 firet truck 313 so we need a little over 350,000 if we're going to be at 5% oh if we're going to 5% 7.131 let's say
we only half the things we need another [Music] $100,000 70,000 more than that i'm I'm sorry I'm confused what was the question if you want to get 292 in general stabilization
then we need that plus whatever to get to about 350 to have it roughly 5% uhhuh and not remove any of it at town meetings that's the problem yeah that's the other Right that's the other thing
but you know we haven't touched general since I've been here we have not done a thing with general stabilization well so we're using the stabilization accounts as basically um savings accounts towards specific large item purchases i'm sorry
large item purchases large item okay so when the time comes to make that large item purchasing let's say we empty that out the stabilization is going to be is going to drop okay so which I'm just
processing okay so if the stabilization drops where we have that brand new thing then we can start building up towards it now it's not just one thing we have several items that pull so it gets kind of confusing but I think that it may not
be necessary to have a a level stabilization um it may maybe we need to get used to that it goes up then it goes down then it goes up then it goes down or the problem with a lot of these stabilization accounts here especially
the capital item accounts is that they were never created until it was too late right so you're dumping a 100,000 into a stabilization fund for a vehicle they thought was going to cost 350 when they started it that now cost a million and didn't start dumping into that until
they were like "Oh we're going to need one in three years." So once let's say the pumper truck once that stabilization fund is enough to purchase a new pumper truck that stabilization fund shouldn't go away they should start putting in
45,000 a year yeah right i'm not saying it goes away i'm saying that it it doesn't you could I mean if you you know let's say you're going to build up to what you're going to buy in five years okay so let's say you're 100 times here you're at
500,000 okay well sometimes you go 300,000 on stabilization 200,000 free cash and this stuff and the goal there was to kind of you know kind of note the stabilization i don't know i just don't know if we're thinking about it
correctly is my my point and I I don't know what's the right way to think about it i think this is the start of it is to say we shouldn't deplete either the general stabilization fund or free cash beyond a certain limit and that's where
we look at then we're going to look at the articles and if we go beyond that limit then we need to make some hard decisions so that's the way I see it do we have an ordinal ranking of the we were just working through yeah that's what we're
working looking at what was actually required and what was optional yeah yeah yeah so at the top we got what's highlighted is what this is required
[Music] one of the reasons we've had free cash actually main reason two main reason cash higher than what we had originally budgeted was estimated local receipts
have come in consistently high especially and also other assets on market increase so we get have tax and those are two main things so we And I don't really understand why other
assets are growing so so much so kind of flying blind there in terms of understanding what's going on in terms other assets increased by 75% in last year of the year
before assets according to the department of revenue it's gone from 30 30 million to like 7500 30 40 million to 75 million other assets yeah we don't know what
that is estimated local receipts you know that follows the economy electroly is why they consider having a special town meeting at the end of the calendar year depending on the outlook funding picture the state but the state's doing
well right now everyone is that maybe we uh we can highlighted items I think are beyond questions but the others we can uh we can figure out regularly what's what we need to do well and don't forget
the amounts that I put in there were just amounts I can put any amount you want me to play with yeah yeah the other thing that's not clear to me is this 5% recommendation i don't know that must include all the stabilization in which case in that which case we we should
have enough money between all of our stabilization right I don't know so general with not just general but we've got fire truck and we've got other stabilization yeah yeah july 6th the other thing I I should
mention is that I don't know that um the ambulance department is going to be ready to put anything on this warrant it may require a special town meeting a free cash gets certified in September October so it is possible that we could
have another meeting then and talk about ambulance just bring that up as a possibility i'm thinking this year more and more special town meeting probably would be a good idea given all the budget
uncertainties heading into so when you say that you won't put something on the board for town meeting request for vehicle purchase right well for more money to get to the amount they need for the vehicle purchase they thought they had enough
but it's not going to be enough so so in addition to that we're proposing equipment stabilization i'm sorry in addition to the $100,000 he's saying you were still going to have
on the article put 100,000 into that stabilization point that's not going away well I'm trying to understand what what you meant by they weren't going to put a warrant something warrant right because they Right because you'd have to take
from the ambulance I got the wrong one you'd have to take from the ambulance um stabilization fund so there would have to be a warrant article that said so yeah that would be a request to purchase a vehicle using and to take from the ambulance stabilization you're saying that we would on one hand be
voting to put money into the stabilization fund and on the other hand vote to to use that those funds to I I only put it in there because I knew there was going to be an amount was going to have to come from somewhere if they wanted it on this warrant so the wording of the warrant would probably
just be we'll take a hundred,000 from free cash and this money you know from stabilization although I might have to do it in two separate ones because one's a separate one's a one's a two-thirds vote one's not you know but you don't know if they're ready to ambulance purchase on the I I do not anticipate
they're going to have that ready for by the time we need to publish this warning oh they won't they won't know the numbers but correct okay correct so then another argument oh yes no we can't because they can't then we need a
special town meeting that's that's what I'm saying is that it might end up being a special town meeting for the ambulance well what if you adjust the numbers on the pre-cache chart to get us down to Yeah that's what I was like like just knock everything down to 80 like all
those hundreds down to 80 what happens well okay so the highway excavator I mean you can knock it down to 80 but Well no I'm just talking about just the stabilization oh okay first year's here i took it down to
17 that wasn't What about the school too i'm sorry did you want to hit the school too i did yeah that's 80,000 oh okay so that leaves us That's still not That's not 3%
[Music] you want to see what it is if they're all 50 yes we don't need an excavator so Chris so for highway stabilization since it's a good time is just sort of opening the so to
speak and we don't know if and when how it's going to be used right yeah and there's the potential it might not even be needed for what we wanted it for so my my own thought is to make that a very nominal amount of money just to get it
open the other ones have demonstrated me that everybody Yeah we have no way of knowing whether we have the estimated local receipts we only get that number at the end of the year the state doesn't give us
any midyear estimates it's it's Mike who does the estimates and tells the state how much he's estimating mike kind of estimations he He has already told me I'd have to find his email but it's not going up too much more i want to say it's like 245 or
something as opposed to 234 it wasn't a big or 259 it wasn't that big a jump for estimated Yeah so 2 and a half% is 178 okay i mean that if you add that to the general stabilization
fund we have that gives us well over the 5% mark and I assume there's no other funding sources for excavator trackers you could take it out of the um capital stabilization you
absolutely could let me go back because I mean that's what I would say we should be taking a purchase oops there it is 29 28 so capital is 220
so we should put we can put both of those from capital okay yep so zero those out all right look at that i mean that is kind of the point of it
is that's totally it's the problem is is you know the boat but Yep i mean we have to Is it going to make any difference to anyone whether we're voting it out of free cash or not it's going to be Oh it's the requirements
i forgot about that so I could put these back up again if you want to try yes for 75 oops 750 that fixed problem [Music]
whoops i mean you're getting there um and then I'm sorry and general is 280 292 292 and where do we need to be at uh about 350 total well it's 5% that's the the minimum recommendation yeah so we're
there we're there yeah okay i mean I think this should have always in the practice and I think we should do this going forward especially especially with the uncertainty of not knowing what we're going to receive from government
chapter being good stewards this is what it's about so this would be our current thought but we're not voting and so everyone's we did write a a to McGovern
about one of those items that we can have our fingers crossed but more than likely don't don't bet on it but yeah you never know i also did send um Senator Mark a list of Angela's fire truck you know everything that we were
greater all the stuff that we need to Yeah and our highway super has good ideas our highway super has a good idea about that where it would have to come out of these funds
so it would be a town vote though it would be yeah well vote it down you're not allowed to ever complain about if you live on gravel you vote no you're never allowed to complain i'll say that well did you want to go or you want to
go through the Yeah so are we good on free cash i think this is a good I think I like this a lot better oh I can take this out because they're they're all required great
don I'm glad you brought that up because I've been saying that for a while too have a verse okay um so do we want to just talk about capital item requests first and then go on to the warrant i mean there's not much to say
on the capital i request aside from what we're going to talk about with the grater is that um our highway super believes that he can get a very serviceable used grater for about 200 which is substantially cheaper than a new one which would cost close to half a
mill at this point maybe more what's he going to do with um that's a good question we're going to have to ask i thought he said he was he was trading it and because that 120 was a net might not be able to trade it if he's getting yeah we'll find out we'll
definitely find out on that but it would be to use the the bonds my question there would be how did you get to 120 request that's not for the greater that's for the excavator oh excavator yeah and then he would sell the old area yeah okay yeah the greater is definitely
Well I I will tell you this because I I had this excuse me that I put out this period to everybody which is is everybody adding in contingencies because of the tariffs do we know and so Ron said "Well I didn't put in my quotes to capital i did not put in for the tradein value." So that's his buffer
right there in case it comes in higher you just don't you know any but it would be to use uh some of the funds from the July storms um which makes sense because out of 64 miles of our road I believe 24
are gravel and they all need work after the floods so it would be to go obviously to help um not only fix those but maintain those roads that makes total sense yeah
okay so I I hadn't put that on the draft warrant yet but because it just I just got it tonight it's before you somewhere i don't know where it went so anyway and sorry oh and then the other capital items are
the ones we already spoke about um the grater and the tractor there were originally four requests we approved two yeah two that what's that those are the only two that are going to be anymore correct
how much is left in the storm it's about 400,000 now so and originally he had been planning to spend the rest on basically on gravel materials on materials but because the need for the greater is so you know mind you he still
won't even get it until now he's because if this did if we were allowed to do this we would still have to put out an IFB or an RFP to get a used breaker you know so it's going to be a while before it it comes through anyway touch even if it passes
at that meeting so it only be those steps we retractor and then the greater um only the funding from blood so that I think I suggested that we
can go on unless there's questions come out the draft warrant okay well that's where we are so there's there's the bottom line for article two which is the bright spot shining star so far um the 1.1% which is
last year was 2.96 so great yeah yeah really i know you know it's because of the schools yeah i was gonna say the schools the frontier look at this yeah frontier and no i mean sorry no Smith so
it's negative 161 for uh for the schools they were down but general fund is up and I'm sorry this does not include this does not include the uh cola yeah i didn't get there i didn't I haven't you haven't voted on it yet so I didn't put
it you know I haven't smushed the columns yet but anyway so that 1.1% without col5,000 so yeah it's not bad um okay so we've got we've got the uh 75 75 yeah I'm not
going to do it on this one i'll do it back but yes so 75 for the grim school 75 for the truck 75 for the ambulance yep and then 25 25 for the We're creat Yeah we're creating a new highway stabilization and then Oh this number
sounds so much better 25 how can anybody have a problem with that you'll see i know i'm joking these don't change you're being ironic that doesn't change
so this amount right here is what this is why the ambulance always tells us it's 25,000 on in article two for their budget their actual budget is 25,000 plus this number so um oops and this is I gota I got to fix
this one so you know I just had asked you all to authorize using more money out of the transfer station revenue fund which is it's a nice fund to you know but the limit had been $10,000 so the language here is actually going to be changing it to $20,000 of course you can't spend more
than than what's in there but at least in any given year that will give the town the ability to use all the transfer station revenue to fix stuff at the transfer station um so I just went over that with Mike today what's next uh there's the
10,00 i will double check with Mike and make sure that I heard correctly but um 100 $100,000 i said 100,000 i think I was put in more next year well
that and yeah that's um and there's the free cash debt service which we need to do um it's just this language we have every year we have notes about this yeah yeah we have notes about this and and the Revel work and the Field Memorial
Library um so there's the new one about Oh and I have a different number there from what was in the other one so I have to make sure which one is correct because they've changed the Microsoft cost a couple times so it's still 14 yeah it's still 14 something
um here's one that um you all will So we have we have a fund a special revenue fund called small cities and I think I mentioned this in my TA update okay so this is the article that Mike proposed for open
space if um the select Gordon Finance Committee approved the idea of putting this warrant article on per town meeting that they would take the whole of that amount it's basically just legally reallocating it so that open space can use it to
finalize the open space plan or use it to implement it and that's just $43,000 we have sitting in this account we have sitting in and I will just full transparency that you all could also decide that you're going to close that out and you're going to use those funds for something else like free cash like
cash um yeah you you if you closed it out then it would it would close out with free cash so yeah um you could decide to put in a smaller amount they could have so much out of it and these you do the rest of free cash so that's going to be one to think about
how you want to well this problem was the original purpose of we we can't find any paperwork this is the problem and the understanding from open space was the former town administrator said oh you can use that for anything you want for open space which
so that's why there's a bit of a tug here because something was promised that was should not have been promised and you know new sheriff's in town and we're like you know I don't have the authority to do that I can't tell you you can just use something that I have no paperwork on but is is is open space expecting I
mean do they know that this is money that's sitting you know that they Oh absolutely oh yes yes yes yes yes they have emailed me um and asked that this be put on so um but I just wanted to be transparent about everything that's going on there so you all can make your
decisions about what should go on behind have they made an argument for needing that level of funds um there is an awful lot of work in the open space plan that definitely needs to
be done and there's no funding behind it so now I haven't seen any kind of budget right line item budget that says we're going to do it you know I've seen general we'll use it for this you know um they have a plan a needs plan to
Yeah so So they they've actually done this twice I want to say the first one was in current plan it's like a 10-year plan so we it's a huge it's a huge book that we have um for open space so I mean and that's another thing I could go back and
say you know could you give us more of a detailed budget let me think how many people are going to want to know that Right okay if they don't have a plan then put in cash yeah
problem here for now you know I mean this leverage money i I don't know let me see if I can just find the email so I can at least read to you the what it was to be used on
[Music] okay um anticipated uses include mowing invasive plant control renovations for pollinators and planting at the Bigalow and South River Meadows invasive plant control and renovation for pollinators at other town
properties maintenance for new projects educational programs on habitat improvement how long do you want to give them it's kind of you've got two weeks to find that you might I I mean I what I could say there is
there is this plan and I could say just take the table of contents and give a budget amount for each I mean that kind of you know I mean yeah as long as they're not coming up with something just to spend money right and that it's part of a prior plan that they could
wondering how to fund and now they know how to fund it shouldn't be we have 43 we need to spend 43 It would be ideal too at this point when it could help that's true they could put that in there that's That's a really good point that they could use that funding to leverage
grants that have a match well if that's the case um under the town administration land there's already 185 in grant match funds so you know if you wanted to make sure which which could be used for any grants that are
coming through that need a match you know it just seems like a lot of the money to just give to the open space without some like definitive plan okay what's next here oh this one this is funny because we've had this in here
every year and then I happened to notice this year in the bylaws is a bylaw that says the select board may accept apply for acceptable blah blah but Donna said we keep them both in there okay we did that last year for the past couple years
we've had this year yeah and we have a couple that are and then I didn't realize the bylaw already but she said well at least this way you know no matter what yeah you all are allowed to apply you don't want to think of that
okay that's a cy that's cy yeah so there are lawyer so my question about this is can we just just for the sake of expedience at town meeting can we just combine all of those oh right you wanted to put the annual ones yes thank you and say x amount of
money to pay prior year prior fiscal year bills instead of voting on each individually oh I think you have to do the prior year bills individually because Yeah because it's going to come out of different places oh but you want you wanted all the regular the language that's
like we do this every year you wanted them all in one section yeah I think yeah it's $40,000 every 40,000 every year in terms of part of your incumbences it depends on No you mean
the reserve fund we've done 40,000 that's the reserve fund yeah what we're talking about here is if we want to pay bills that are due which we we've done like I think last year we had one that was like I don't know $1,600 or something but there was only one and now there's like three warrant articles for three different bills and one's for 150
and is that a question for Mike whether we have to vote them individually if they come out of I actually went over this because you can see the four-fifths majority he was the one telling me that actually the 150 is two bills for 75 that coming that they didn't they didn't get to me in the mail last year
yeah four fifths I think wasn't it four fifths yeah last year remember I said "Do we want to pay these bills that we already owe or pay late fees and interest by not paying on?" We don't pay fees or No
I know i I mean that that's kind of a no-brainer but I'm just thinking like if we could just you know vote on one more article instead of four for such faulty amounts of money if that's not I might be able to put these two together and just have two of
them because there's you can combine yeah we can consolidate mike says that's okay no don't worry so the other thing is Mike has cleaned up the whole community preservation fund he's gone over it he's gotten advice from the O that says you
know in these amounts you have to include the interest and blah you know anyway he's he's working with George Forest here who's now the chair um or letting you know anyway so we he's cleaned up all the language and so here's the new this is how it's total
one time make up special purpose reserves so he's he's figured that all out i trust him to you know is a road greater historical is the one we currently have hey open space
and recreation we give rides on the greater give people greater rides okay so there's the CPC trying every angle and then there were then there were the planning bylaws and then the um oh I'm sorry there's a few articles here
that have not been written yet but I know we're interested in for ADUs um yeah that's in there i got three planning board remember what got voted down last year yeah I know they were trying to That's in here okay
it's in here right here yeah and I did run through this with him back and forth before he even decided to go through with it because there were some definitely some revisions and I felt a
little better about this one it's still obviously up to vote and is an associate member or no associate cannot vote okay wait wait wait associate member cannot vote oh I thought the whole point was for them to
be voting members that if if a if a voting member moves out of town that they're allowed to remain as a voting member until their term is up until their term is up because they're no longer a resident but they previously were
I think or they could be appointed as an associate member but an associate member is not appointed member changes I don't know why they keep going after yeah but J wouldn't even be you still
wouldn't be able Yeah be appointed by a civil associate with the same board on which they serve so basically serve out your elected term or don't serve out your elected term but get appointed as an associate non- voted
member it doesn't say non- voting though that's but thing well that's Can we clarify that but that's what I thought like an associate member was a non- voting member it's also not a cap term so if it's not a cap term right they should put that voting number and I hope
he understands that this will in no way allow Joe to be on that board he's been a non-resident for coming up on a year i think the challenge is going to be to counter the argument for the reason why
I failed last year control should be in the town which is great theoretically but you know if you don't have people willing to be on board to be on board to have the expertise this is another way of looking at a solution is opening a door it's opening a door you do not want
to open yeah because when you get special interest involved and they can get on those committees and they're not a part of the town and I understand there could be special interests that live in the town but you're opening up a much wider array where special interests
could get into a committee and start voting there in their favor well if you clarify the issue whether it's voting or not that issue goes away that's true yeah exactly that's why I want to Yeah you're right we should say not voting
associate okay i don't mean to push us along but we're coming up on 7:30 um so there's the ADU i'll let you guys read that right it's all based on states yeah
um and here are the ones that um I do not have language for yet i can get probably something from Donna i don't know if you recall but the um Upper Pioneer Valley Veteran Service
District sent us something um quite a few months back um that was about giving different exemptions for veterans and whether or not I think it's called the Hero Act so I will I will get a sample language
um to put in then Chief Bates has asked about doing a home rule um age limit you call it D-restriction um for one person and then said maybe in
the fire department there's a couple that need that as well so I've got that chief Baker is but Helen's just a volunteer but is Howard is Howard volunteer or is he like is he well everybody gets paid on calls so the question is would they be covered
yeah yeah so I I yeah and then um uh language I've sent an email into Donna for doing language for doing the way with Marcus which nobody attended anyway I was
advertised at all you know what it was everywhere she really had it everywhere it was in the currents it was everywhere i know well she did have it in the current she did have it um on the board um
and the rest is for So I don't I just don't think people talked about it like they did last year because of Yeah we already knew that there were going to be You looked and saw it in the It was in the currents she said when I went back and looked she said it was in in January
as soon as it was decided the date it was in yeah it should have been every single one i agree okay thank you um so before you close your meeting I just
would like uh this is going to be part of the select board comments um I do think what we talked about today that safeguard of 5% of your budget to remain in accounts whether that's free cash
general stabilization or whatnot that we should as committees vote on that at some point in time that a vote needs to occur if they want to go below take more out than the 5% reserve
well isn't that the same thing as voting the budget anyway for our committees that our committees when they're looking at articles and they're looking at spending money that they have in the safeguard to not go al as a benchmark
benchmark exactly but that's okay so that I don't know whether you need you want to vote that it is kind of the same as as just voting but you could you could put it in we have a financial policy folder put it in there yeah because you know all of us might
not be on this committee or the following year the following year or somebody comes in and imagine but imagine like new people come in and they deplete all the fun and then the town's destitute right so I just want to make sure that
we're putting safeguards in place yeah so that doesn't occur yep reference that you association recommend the best yep how many towns do it
hopefully well probably a lot of we're A+ rated right i mean I would I would think a lot of towns that have that you know rating probably have something like that in place but we don't have fun with it um we're No the
uh what is it um the borrowing rating oh you want to talk about good credit well no state no so we go by the general general rating of the state right
okay well if you all are okay you can y adjourn your meeting make a motion to even notically I All right any other comments or concerns from our select board i had one just um
I know we almost had a fire in the um garage yes that should always make us like go back and look at whatever practices are going on to see what led to that what Yeah because nobody was there right is that
right okay but also to look at our insurance coverage that it covers not just the building but all the equipment in it oh yeah our equipment because we have to the the fire chief highway everybody has to go through the equipment list every year okay um but
yeah we were very very fortunate that Chris was there because if he hadn't been and he hadn't noticed it was a little hazy then that could have been a disaster fitting dump it was a Yeah it was a new one i don't know i don't know i just got
the Or maybe we hope and hope it was since it's under warranty but that whole garage could have gone up right yeah right so we know why it was overheated or No
but Chief Baker was working on his report okay all right we'll find out could be that's what causes okay all right good point
um so next meeting is the Tuesday it's Tuesday April 22nd i will not be there okay i'm gonna be I'll send you photos i'm on my honeymoon um all right uh no announcements next meeting like we said
it's April 22nd on a Tuesday um I'll make a motion to adjurnn all in favor i thank you