##VIDEO ID:eTMgY5F8cgo## okay welcome everybody to the Monday January 13th 2025 joint select board and finance committee meeting of Conway call meeting to order um we're waiting on the uh finance committee we have one member so far um so we'll go ahead and get into the minutes uh vote to improve the minutes of December 30th Is that a motion um I will make a motion because I did look them over they look good as always Adam thank you very much for your due diligence on that second all in favor I I uh warrants also left over all the warrants very normal stuff so I'll make a motion to vote to approve Cil payable warrant an amount of $187,600 I don't fite usually sometimes on the pickle ball um second all in favor I I I uh me attended by select board members um none since our last meeting none since our last meeting I have grammar school meeting tomorrow night and negotiations on Wednesday um I had a meeting with um RT street street lights that went well yeah right it was not ever Source they're not ever Source um Von berque and I met about p and Bap Baptist Hill and I randomly showed up to the meeting at the First Responders building I wasn't technically invited to but I sat in for a little bit of it so all right public comments unfinished business none moving on to new business I just want to make sure there's nothing on here that the finance committee would need to be a part of no okay first on new business discussion on ATM warrant request from upper Pioneer Valley veteran service District okay so this is a request for something to the board to consider putting on the upcoming warrant for annual town meeting which would be adopting certain measures that would give more exemptions to Veterans such as um both on um the tax and also on motor excise tax and I confess I have not gone through all the ngls on this um but you should have a a bulletin that was put out by DLS that explains it it's called The Hero act the hero act M yeah and if these were to go in to affect the the municipality the town meeting would have to approve it so it's something that would have to go on the okay so currently disabled veterans based on the level of disability already get those discounts with um real estate and um first vehicle one vehicle so I assume this is just expanding it to all veterans with honorable discharge um well some of it is because there's three at least three different Mass general laws in here that are involved um so one of them would give it would have an annual adjustment an annual Cola for the amount of the ex extion um that would be built in and decided by do so if if the municipality adopts it say it was $400 a year exemption and it was a um 5% Cola then it would be 420 that year and that would all be determined by the state we would just you so um and then there was also the motor excise one and there's there's something here which I haven't quite gone through completely how it will double it there's a clause 22i and clause 22j and if you accept 22j it provides an additional exemption of up to 100% of the amount of tax which basically doubles it which I haven't quite figured out so the exemptions in this state aren't that great to be honest with you yeah so it says what would be the impact if the if a community adopts both clause 22i and 22j they would operate together for example Clause 22 would receive a $400 exemption and the community accepts 22i and the CPI increases by 5% the exemption would be 420 if the community further accepts clause 22j and increases by the maximum 100% the amount of tax exemption granted to veterans in this example the total exemption would increase to 840 so and then there was also one about the motor vehicle excise and how um and the state reimburses for the motor vehicle but not the other I believe if I read it correctly so so it's just about allowing them to add this to the warrant yes they're requesting that that municipalities um consider putting this on the warrant do we know how many veterans we have't done we're not allowed to know to the best of my knowledge a lot of that that information is private and privileged at least 100 secret why 100 why do you think at least all of us that showed up at the elementary school okay but again the state is not the greatest when it comes to VA benefits with reductions in taxes like other states again based on disability if you have 100% it's they don't have to pay any real estate yeah I'm here it's $1,000 I'm all for for whatever we can do for veterans put it on the warrant let the community decide I agree so I'll make a motion to put it on the warrant is this a vote or just a discussion it well I just had it as a discussion but I'm certainly happy to put it on the warrant and you all in favor I I I I mean yeah I'm f with that I'm just noticing that um the only city or town in the district that has voted and enacted these Clauses is Greenfield so I assume they're doing Outreach to the rest of the Town yes yes we're just fast Cutting Edge I believe well it's probably because Greenfield can do it through their city council whereas we have to wait for Town meetings so that's probably why and you know this letter just arrived so I'm assuming he's doing this so that all of the municipalities can adopt it okay um are you expecting more members [Music] probably not okay let let me just run through a couple more things it one more time okay so next on new businesses discussion and vote to sign the Tri-State fire fire Mutual Aid this up here think I had that here too don't I yep yep you've got it there I think yours is the only signature required Chief baker has already signed it um so it's just extending our mutal Aid agreement oh oh okay this is an extension no revisions subject is literally renewal of mutual Aid so I will make a motion to sign the Tri-State fire Mutual Aid Second all in favor I ious you oh oh yeah you said you seconded okay sorry I okay next on new business discussion and vote to sign change order on contract with GC for Pine Hill area assessment do you want talk about this do you want me to talk about this um up to you uh you can okay all right so um over the last let's see how long has it been I have it right here on the sheet but when we started with um GZA on April 8th of last year we signed a contract for a hydraulic and hydrologic assessment of the drainage system up in the Pine Hill area this was after the furog had given us their assessment and it was decided by the board that it needed to be um done by Engineers so the town the plan yeah the plan entered into the contract with GZA um after about I don't know six months maybe yes of back and forth and waiting and then getting a little bit of information the the upshot was um that it was felt that the information we were getting wasn't very different from the information that Ron had already provided and the fock had already provided um and so given the amount of the contract it was spel that it probably didn't make sense for GZA to continue so um we negotiated for an agreement to reduce the amount that we're paying them they would just stop work so that's what this agreement is about and they gave us a final invoice based on that and everybody was pretty much mutually satisfied I think with um that agreement based on the select board's appealing so it reduces the total contract by, $10,000 just a little above 10,000 yeah yeah and uh and so yeah there was a bunch of back and forth I'll just say um I wasn't I wasn't very pleased with the product that was coming out from GZA um we had multiple meetings with them where they were showing us their system and what they had been working on and there were multiple discrepancies and issues with it that were obvious and should have been caught as not very thorough as it was progressing it was very clear that it was basically just a carbon copy of what we had already received from furog which was almost to a te what our super had said needed to be done in the first place um so the extra 10,000 would had just been paid to basically finalize and the the final product no more work as far as engineering work right so that's why at the time we said this is enough stop it here so I did put together a timeline um for you of everything that's happened since the storm and what the town's response has been to it and then um Ron provided today his um plans now this is of course based on the town has applied for a grant with mass works we were granted it but then it was for something that had already gotten done under an emergency certification so with Incredible amount of assistance from the furog we reapplied with a change order and they allowed that and the change order is allowing the grant now to be used on in the Pine Hill area to make the changes which is huge yes it'll also um repave a portion of shelburn Falls Road put up some uh guard whale and also work on the Culvert on Emerson Hollow so it'll kind of take care of that they understood that it was all kind of related um so given that Ron has produced his um plans for the upper Baptist and Baptist Hill area that you have in front of you tonight and which we I'm sure someone in here is probably share around yeah it basically um consists of putting in some starting from where Kevin Downey's property is putting in either new or replacing existing catch basins and everything being piped down to um the triangle there the pipe that goes to your house and another one will be taken out and it will be piped directly to baptist Hill and go down Baptist Hill into the catch Basin that is already used Mass doot so that should alleviate they won't be removing any of the existing overflow that will stay but everything will be now piped and catch Basin going all the way down there and is Kevin the Lot 23 uh or lot n good question um do you know sorry can't tell from here it must be Kevin is 8.2 or wait is Kevin the one who just bought the new no no no oh and I shouldn't be using names but you know I that was me um 8.2 on the map here on drawing number one oh right okay and that's where it says catch Basin one so I'll pretty this up so I can disseminate it to people if if this like word approves this but um that's this is the idea for how to move forward and I'm particularly pleased that it will all be paid for yeah that's huge yes there are that many C catch Basin going up that road well there aren't there some of them are new quite a few were new and there's going to be a new drop Inlet basement Basin which I didn't know what that was but learned well that'll be huge the drop in that one yeah um that's the one that's going on the triangle triangle in the triangle and that should be able to take a considerable amount of water yeah well that's good cuz a considerable amount of water comes down P Hill sometimes yeah so do we need to vote on uh well I mean if you two have any other I mean I've obviously been yeah no I don't um we don't even anymore if they're not doing anymore yeah I mean right do we really think it's going to be completed by July first oh 20266 okay all right I it has to be based on the gr gr all right yeah I think this is great finally um so I'll make a vote to sign the change order to GZA for p Hill area second all in favor I I I okay 1 and that's where we expecting anybody else not that I'm aware of I think someone might be but I'm not sure okay does the finance committee mind if I speak with the sustainability committee first I okay I can well we have a lot to actually and George is here too with the for the DTA request he can speak to his yeah you want to do that too sure um let's move on to that then if you all don't mind we'll go to items not anticipate 48 hours in advance in the meeting discussion on new DTA request uh form and planning board request hello did you want this in front of our request is to continue in 2025 paying land use planners from the FR Cog to help us with our uh proposed River protection Corridor Zone overl Zone that we've been working on for the past year and other people in past years have chipped away um we're about a year away from wrapping this all up it's co and so this request presum the coming year count year I believe um will allow it to resume work with Kim M in February um pretty much worked out the proposed bylaw but now we need to kind of go back at the beginning and work our way through and then that gets followed with um public education campaigns and public hearings and so forth um we're still not sure if we can realistically try to get this before the June town meeting it's possible we might push it out and here so as not to rush things it's a big complicated and I'm sure politically sensitive kind of proposal and there were I did actually have two requests myself for the board to consider um one was the and these are all under the climate change adaptation and resilience one was the hazard mitigation Plan update our Hazard mitigation plan expires in March of this year I've been trying for a year to figure out how to get it updated how to fund it whatever because you can apply for certain grants without this in place and current um and everything got kind of delayed through FEMA so everybody you know we're not the only ones who are in this position um and you can if you you can see on here that we're only it's only available to certain towns and Conway is one of them so I would very much like because this is how it happened last time was through the fur C and just let them help us through the process to get this done again so that would be one of my requests and the other one was um the FEMA maps The Firm maps have just been redone um I have no expertise to comment on whether there was any changes that need to be made and the only changes you can make are actually have to be based on science well I certainly can't be you know so um that's one of the things they can assist town with with towns with is reviewing and submitting comments on recently rra released draft FEMA flood plane Maps as the flood plane administrator I could very much use their help in reviewing these and seeing if there are comments and just feeling like I've got the new maps under my belt so that was my second they can't offer an overlay an overlay of the old flood plane and the new well the old flood plane maps are all paper and the new ones are all digital which is going to make our lives much easier but um you know it would just be helpful for me because I'll be honest the paper maps didn't really make a whole lot of sense to me and I never really sat down with anybody said okay show me and I want to make sure that I with the new ones that I know AB every every single household that's already in there and how it might affect new house that kind of thing so yeah so those were my my two requests I did send it out to a whole bunch of people and I didn't hear back mind you you know didn't give them too long and you can you can vote on this next week I just wanted to because some committees may get back and want a different um priority but I wanted to be sure you had that information um before we leave this broad topic I I should have asked if you guys are familiar with the river protection overlay Zone idea I'm not sure how much you've been informed in the past about this effort not much no okay well should I just give you the thumbnail version oh please do the the idea is that Rivers especially the South um have their own idea about how they're going to meander over time and as they do that over time especially with high water events there's a lot of erosion that happens that would affect people's land um and affect the river system itself and the idea of the um River Corridor protection zone is that you would have a system of growth controls and land use protections that apply to this this erosion Corridor along the South River it overlaps but also extends beyond what we think of is the flood plane or river protection areas that already exist um and protections are specific to address erosion issues so Jack load was talking a little bit about it so yeah yes L that would fall into this this Corridor so this as with any kind of zoning there's a set of prescription prescriptions for what one can do in these areas um so that you want to build mansion right on the edge of the south river that we the town have something to say about that so that on the next big event ni Mansion wouldn't fall into the river and cause for the river system or for the Neighbors down stream May wants to throw out okay sounds very useful okay so I'll put that on the agenda for a vote next week sure two two weeks no we're meetings every week from now on oh next Tuesday next on Tuesday next week y this is the beginning first of many that's totally fine thank you George okay um back to new business update from the sustainability committee on the street lights project and date for a public meeting welcome thank you you're welcome so jod and I are here to talk to you about where we're at with this street lights project get my notes here um um so we have uh uh completed inventory and audit from um realterm energy that you all remember that we hired to do um just to make this as concise as possible so the next step Jody will you'll chime in when I'm missing the next step we think as a committee is for the select board and the committee to uh present information to the public about this specifically about potential elimination of Lights in town as well as kind of the entire what we're hoping to have happen with this entire project um the date we selected and that was based really on back timing from when we would need to submit a green communities Grant which is due by April 4th um so the date we selected was February 19th with a snow date of February 26th this is a Wednesday night here in this room we make it a zoom meeting of course we um I wrote a preliminary uh brief article about it for the uh Conway currents which the deadline for submission would be Wednesday I believe um and uh here's the here's like the draft it's a draft it's only a draft we're just waiting for you all to say yes or no we're behind you on this and um our thinking is that we're here to recommend and the select board are the people making a final call on this um prior to the information session we would be inviting people to go out in pairs and go around town and flag uh lights that you think might be okay for elimination a lot on Del elimination or elimination elimination good night to bring has a ton what did you see what happened out there no what so Chris's house is glowing yeah urce today decided to replace some street lights when we told them not to we told them not to lights or bul called bulbs I'm sorry um with the power of 40 Suns it is like lighting up in the one in front of my house is lighting up I'm my entire area insane okay well this gives us all a little bit of and they did it down Maple as well there's one down Maple you'll see and I think eyes up eyes all right well who wants to go so we're there it is can you see it from there that's one on it's like the North Star is it the full moon it's insane they're no you're notely bright sorry did this happen yeah I called my king immediately so he's yeah okay so um maybe was the bulb out I wonder if the bulb was it's one of those bulbs there's plenty around here which we had said on the RT and we had mentioned is all these a lot of these FAL phosphorus bulbs you'll see are like a pink purple color yeah and they'll turn on every now and again but it's like the opposite I'll go outside and the light turns off yeah so it's the opposite of motion sensor and I was fine with it cuz it's not a light we need anyway it's one of these lights that you know my neighbor and I are like why is it even here yeah um but now now you I you're going have a lot more backers after what they okay good well it may have worked POS so several of us have taken um a couple of spins around town with the map that um RTE was using to inventory and reconcile the inventory with eversource's inventory luckily there's very little discrepancy between the field audit and the and what they whatever provided to us so that's nice um and uh if you were just taking the guidance or the guidelines of perhaps we don't need all these lights if they're not in an intersection or if they're not in front of a public parking lot or if they're not in an area where a sidewalk needs to be lit for you know evening walking or something like that um we've got a lot of those that don't meet that criteria so um I think as a committee we're looking for uh agreement and the goahead and maybe somebody to come out with several of us and tie red yellow ribbons around the lights that we want to consider um so in addition to talking about what lights might be eliminated um uh we would also be talking about the type of fixtures and lights that we want to recommend switching over to and there's a lot to consider there I was pretty simplistic about it like oh smaller lot but there's a lot to consider color temperature how it appears um shielding the shielding we can do shielding so it's not you know spilling out uh and downward facing so um that's something to think about and we'll be asking if anybody on the S wants to come with we pair up and just go out and I think personally I think it would make sense to go and flag these a couple weeks before the give people a couple weeks to know notice or not notice um and so our plan is to put information the currents I can send out a press release we talked about maybe Flyers around town just so people know that this is coming up and if we had this on uh February 19th um then we have the uh We've agreed to RTE that we would give them a final list of uh what we're proposing to eliminate what we'd like eliminated from the inventory by what did we say early March SEL meeting is March 3rd so you know after March 3rd we' give it to them by the end of that week and then we would be more or less I hope ready to submit a grant a green communities Grant um by April 4th at the latest uh I have one and and C us Stuart and another member of our committee went to talk to Allison at furck who's been very helpful with the process for the grant and uh she found out today she just called me to say she said that if one of the things we would apply for the grant it would include um the cost of conversion of the buyout um this is the article that would be if we buy out ever we have to buy out the fixers if we want to go that way there another way to go but it might wind up with those lights that just in front of person's house um we need one of those in of ads so um we're going to request that tomorrow so it if we apply for the cost of um the buyout it makes your according to Alison it makes your Grant a little less competitive so what shelburn did was they included that in the grant but they also uh asked um for contingency money from town their town meeting so that's another thing to consider and but they wound up getting everything that they asked for for the same thing um but if we needed to ask for contingency money we'd have to get on the warrant yeah and as I understand it you can ask for less but not for more but we would want to have a somewhat accurate figure from eversource of what the buyout would cost what are the I think it would be helpful to know like what the standard is where they where a street light is recommended that's very interesting okay we asked a very similar question when we met with RTE on whenever that was a few days ago there isn't really exactly a standard okay there's engineering standards about what like the recommended amount of lumens per roadway type yeah per roadway type and our roadway type is all very low if you look at the inventory it will it there's a whole list of like pedestrian you know whatever they called it what they call it pedestrian use or something yeah we're just low all the way all the way down [Music] um there's some safety concerns that were flagged by the police and fire and First Responders about intersections so that seems obvious crosswalks and crosswalks right is an intersection like of like I'm thinking of I don't know if you know it like Reeds brid and Bridge and Graves Road you know it's a if you come off Graves you end onto Reed's Bridge now I don't think there's a light there but there's one up the street right there there's some places that make absolutely no no sense if even if you're going with that intersection like stand if you can I don't think every intersection in town has a light no I live off of um I live on HK Road yep so up a 116 onto onto Graves Road yeah there's no there's no light there oh there is no that would be a place I would think would be useful because of you come off and then you have the turn and you have the triangle so because there aren't standards like that and and because in because in our town it's been applied in a kind of halfhazard way uh I don't know how to I don't know how to okay realistically address that one thing we really haven't talked about at all and I don't even know there's any possibility of it is adding lights like you're suggesting because some people think there should be a light out here between here and the parking lot you know for example but I don't think that's going to be a possibility but as far as the money saving I mean we will save some money and obviously save energy by converting to LED bulbs and they last so much longer y but the main you know even maybe even a bigger saving will be eliminating lights we have 65 right now 67 okay 67 annual bill of $99,000 which I think barque pointed out was like equal to the yeah Ron said Ron told us just recently that the amount of money we spend for electricity in all the public buildings is like 11 or 1200 a month and the street lights are 900 so you think about it's like whoa that's wild yeah so we're thinking already we have thought of possibly like 20 lights that don't need to be there that'd be awesome but I just do they have solar street lights are there solar street lights yeah I'm sure there are solar street lights but I don't know that has not been part of our thinking okay um I know there's solar well let's not go down um one thing uh that I just forgot en ter what I was going to say well I would say as far as the choices and speak up please but um as far as the choices of lumens and Hugh um I would only offer recommendations that are in line with the dark sky yes right yeah we're we've brought that up every time that's certainly something that's front of mind for the uh RTE as well as the committee absolutely um one other thing that we don't really have an answer to Is um and and I'm glad that Beth put it in terms of offering information about the street lights because is what we do with feedback from people if they say I don't want this light that's in front of my house or I do want this light you can't take it away you know so we haven't really come up with an answer to what you do about that so I mean we are seeing it mainly as an information session to tell people what's happening hopefully they'll hopefully they'll buy in yeah yeah you know people to understand what it is and just and to support the general idea I think people will do well I'd be happy to ride around with somebody and see or put yellow ribbons out or whatever great so maybe outside of this bu us we'll do a little we'll do a little we'll do a little I'll go tag those even before yes because delar Avenue so many I know right that where was it that I most because of the mill and The Business a lot a lot of um a lot of what's out there as we've said before is really like an intriguing historical yeah map of our town Academy Hill Road has five lights and I was told the reason for that is because the school used to be school Farms dairy dairy farms you know it's it's poignant in a way actually yeah it is yeah they said that all all Farms used to have a street light in front of them yeah I don't know where there's still one on um is it bwell fairy there's still one that that might or might not be part of the inventory it might be just actually an independently owned one in Fr John H's house oh yeah that makes sense yeah um so anyway so we just need I'm we're asking for you to um be part of this information session um of February 19th with snow date of February 26th and um do the pairing up and traveling around thing sounds great and also the idea of we might have to ask for um contingency funding uh if if we don't get the green Community Grant is there anything else we're looking for from you today is there any questions you have for us thanks for doing this it sounds fascinating it's a little overwhelming I have to say as you're talking that street light is flashing one I'm feeling a lot more pressure than when I came like I said people don't think about the beautification of a town being at night but I think if this all goes through it'll make a huge difference that'll be noticeable to all us I think so too yeah and the committee I'm really grateful to the committee um Jody for doing a lot of preliminary um field work before this all started and um CIA Stewart and Pam Westgate who knows a lot from an engineering standpoint and Liv Bri Wyatt who knows a lot um from uh lights from knows a lot about lights it's it's really it's really that's cool um and I I mean I think we mentioned this before but we were very fortunate in that uh shelburn Falls has gone through this whole process they've shared so much information with us and we've been to several meetings over there that they had with their community so we haven't had to start from scratch yeah that's great critical really a okay that's great so much should we should we yeah you guys we you should you should approve the dates so how about February 19th at 6 we we had 6:30 well we just pulled 6:30 out of our out of our 6:30 to 7:30 we said okay we were hoping for that just cuz that's yeah they were thinking dinner time and when people get home yep so all right 630 February 19th if that's okay then we'll we'll I'll finalize that with you and Adam and can be sent to the con cards is okay if we make a flyer and oh absolutely yeah yeah yeah yeah all right oldfashioned Flyers yeah we can do that at all the usual places and I can post something on the Facebook and I can send out a press release if you want yeah okay all right thank you want call your me order no we don't have a you don't have a quum yet nope I don't have a quum I mean I know he's INX I'm not calling waiting on anything for us George uh I was going to sit in in case there were any questions about the plan board budget oh okay got it well we can start with that one yeah good ide um okay so let's move on to um the last new business discussion which is the discussion and vote on the cost of beer and wine license so what has it been oh and the highway sorry there is one more yeah that's on item sign oh wait wait wait yeah sorry all right so cost of beer and wine license which is I would assume the same license right there's beer and wine no just to give you I was looking through the files so for instance so right now bar has the inke keeper license and that's 250 uhhuh now these numbers are 8 years old let's say the State Maximum is 5,000 for that Package Store maximum is 2,000 and beer and wine only is $850 so somebody's thinking about Helen's thinking about possibly doing beer and wine up at her place yeah so you would just have to decide okay so if Barb is 250 you know if Bobby opens what's CU he'll have heart alcohol what's his going to be if Helen decides to do that then what's wait would Helen be serving or would she just selling just selling yeah what was what was L uh they charged him the same as bar I mean that's what I would do yeah just say straight across the board 250 yeah whether it's all alcohol or just beer in one I mean I think at this point it's not yeah I don't think there's enough of a distinction you know I mean we there's only one of these licenses so far in town right now but two we only have I'm comfortable with that so just keep everything yeah 250 I mean you want to make that I I make a motion that we um set the beer and wine license um alol and beer and wine alcohol at 250 I'll second all in favor I I I thanks Adam thank you uh last item on items not anticipated 48 hours in advance is discussion vote to sign Highway bid with the fur Cog okay see if there's any change to this so this the same thing they just they as you all know they bid on the materials right for us so no change so I'll make a motion to vote to sign the highway bid with furog second all in favor hi I thank you it says if required is it just me or all three of us it's just me but oh yeah I I guess it's yeah should your choice uh let's move on to TA updates oh you don't want to review the budget Oh I thought we couldn't with the you can you can revie there's no there's no vote okay let's do that then let's stop wasting georg's time so why don't we start with the planning board 175 sorry that's as big as I can make it I I don't really have any questions on this did you have any any edits to make to this George um no the um the amount of money that we' had allocated the last couple few years seem to be plenty it's something of a wild card in our case because we never really know who's going to show up in the course of the year with a special permit request which triggers legal ads which are beyond our control in terms of the cost to R um and and what I do know is that um we probably going to have public hearing about acccessory Dev units we probably have U public hearing about at some point about the river Corridor um and and I haven't heard anything lately maybe some of you have but there was talk at one point about a solar farm on Bo property yeah they we had some discussion here about so that would trigger some planning board special permit action and more legal ads and so forth so we could very easily run up some bills in the vicinity of $2,000 just for legalize um other expenses are much more controllable in terms of mileage and so forth most of us just kind of those things so the amount that that I see there for FY 25 could probably be fine to like 26 I have a question regarding trainings and meetings PL for a number of years are there any have have you been up what what type of training could you possibly think that Cas just went to sort of coger actually it's a regional planning agency um training and is about um actually put it crudely promoting uh zoning changes among the public right so it was kind of talking about strategies for for explaining to people uh what you're trying to do with certain kind of bylaw changes so she went to that was one of those morning seminar things um it cost her $35 she paid it out of her own pocket it's that kind of stuff the Franklin Regional Council government planning department from time to time time has those kinds of seminars sometimes it's the zoom related thing it's not like Roy going to Mexico for that is there a is there a group like a PL Comm associate the planning board or any kind of yeah this Massachusetts Association of planners and there's a county one as well that Cog is sort of instrumental organizing in and so those organizations all do provide various kinds of seminars and workshops over course of the Year some of which we attend some of which we don't bother yeah how much is the much is I don't have that number off the top I haven't actually seen them a fe but we belong to it right we pay the dues right yeah we wouldn't be paying the dues ourselves we would take someone has to pay because there's no money expended here this year so far you have no money expended in the budget yet someone has someone hasn't there a pass two Bill well for sure CU there's I know we paid $2 legal ad too long to show from this spreadsheet I'm work to so the other thing that came up um in the committee meeting The Joint one between Capital Finance and Personnel was the discussion about stipend so planning board and concom and this is not coming from planning board and concom just so everybody's clear but in looking at all the stiens and and reviewing which committees get them and um how increases are made it was brought up that Nei concom and planning board both have a phenomenal amount of work that they have to do and Board of Health and yeah but the Board of Health gets a stipend and the board of assessors gets a stipend yeah um so and this is you know planning board is certainly one that if there is no planning board that falls to the select board to do so it you know in in the interest I guess of fairness and looking at the amount of work in these committees that is required it was brought up to consider a stipend for um both planning board and concom so there are five member committees each so say you gave a stipend of $1,000 a year that's 10 grand so just to something I I'm not you know sure it's something well we can't vote it on tonight anyway with the finance committee but it's something to keep in mind that those are the only two that are um you know real heavy hitting committees that don't get us like that well they have administrative Powers which is uh this is an finance committee is an ANW committee we not The Advisory Board they have actual legal responsibilities administrative Powers your board of health concom planning board for successors because of their ability to change assessment rates and all that so those are important committees yeah I agree um one of the other things that came up during that meeting I'll just mention now and the board can vote on it I guess you were saying maybe next week was the idea of Jan had brought up that um she wanted some direction on how stipend increases were made and in the past some got Cola and some did not they had to make an actual request for an increase so the consensus or the vote from those three committees correct me if I'm wrong was that there would be no automatic Cola but that anything stien it would then that either person or committee would have to make a request for an increase um and to get a stand because there has never been a written standard to what employees um get paid hourly salary or stifen so we employees or the state in case there's no yeah so we wanted to um Define that and have a standard going forward I think so and definitely steon shouldn't get a cola yeah well it's you know this is just part of sort of cleaning up that you know yeah I think it makes sense to clean it up some departments did things something one way and the other it's just making it uniform so do people if people get a stifen do they get a1099 then from the town yeah yeah yeah okay excuse me you should never got this yeah you have well yeah you do it's just not enough to like no but I I thought I got a W2 I don't I don't do I fill out your W2 you should get A99 I I'm paying taxes on the yeah I'm don't know the names of all the forms I'm pretty sure I thought it was more like a I don't have you got a 10 I mean I probably just thought it was something else I P the taxes I SAR sure okay so I guess it $3 you're $3 in taxes on it so question so I guess we'll we'll put that on a later date for a vote on the common plan Board St okay yeah and the standard of and then no s no callon stien Y is that sorry no no the standard of which employees receive a stien which board members receive which boards receive stiens which positions okay as opposed to salary what we were just talking about right okay just yeah we'll discuss diens in future there's no other questions for the bo I'm thank youor okay so um the rest of these I think will be pretty quick because there aren't any changes if I remember correctly so the moderator no change S end of 350 no change um finance committee doesn't get a stipend that's right no change no but the membership do for the atfc is going up by a dollar has it do should I put in 301 no okay um res I don't have Reserve funds so accounting actually um so Mike tells me you know he's well he's good you you offs set his salary last time so this it's actually going to go down down and let me oh it's because of this right here uh oh no I already took it out there was a onee fee from MIP for the conversion and so that came out so that's why it's gone down um yeah it was right here the software and hosting so yep so that went down and what's next space 170 and so there was no change yep right 171 conservation and that's the one the other one to consider with the stipend and it went up by $4 for their dues okay um agricultural commission we just keep a dollar in there to keep it open um I did have somebody Express a little bit of interest in talking about maybe see if there's some other farmers who were interested in getting this going again so you never know so we it's good just to keep it on the books I suppose we did planning board so the last one is zba and yep there was no change in that one either so see that was a pretty painless budget review the nice start to budget season really well it always is the first the first yeah the first few we always start outline right yeah you get back to thep until we get to school committee back in the school on the question I had back in December December 17th the Personnel committee the Capital Improvements committee the finance committee had a meeting and what we discussed to was that the cap count grammar school stabilization fund at a balance of 227,000 approximately it's been since 2013 that the last update was given to the cost of replacing the boilers sure the cost must have gone up concern I have is you know I think we might have to take some of the free cash that we have and allocate it towards increasing the balance of the Conway grammar school stabilization fund so I think that the clock is definitely ticking on the boilers the boilers towards end was rated use for life and I think uh the the person in charge of Maintenance was updating that yeah good so that was please let us know between March because I'm going to propose that we maybe take a big chunk of money from the free cash to put it towards the stabilization at one point con gr School stabilization fund had a higher balance we joined it down over the last few years with the backup power generator the well situation so I think we had actually had we asked the sustainability committee to we were looking at the overall system you know because now you can have all this technology that you can remotely turn it down turn it on know if something's wrong all that kind of stuff so smart building smart building so I thought we were reaching out to the sustainability committee about helping us get that overall picture while we're in the process of this the only thing I know yes they have gotten that request the only thing I know that they're moving on right now is getting the energy audit for the grammar school and for this building okay well that's that's definitely a piece of it but yeah and I saw there there is a there's a what is it a BM something Building Maintenance something system that you're talking about yeah and there was an there was an estimate for that in the capital I think yes was hoping for that because my understanding otherwise it makes sense it doesn't make sense you put in this whole new system but then you have no way to they have mini splits in almost every room now so to to get the optimum of the mini split plus the boiler plus everything you really need an overall manage smart something to manage it yeah yeah check has anything changed with the because at some point they were talking about it doesn't make sense to replace one boiler you have to replace both because the building itself structurally needs to be changed yeah they work on different systems and we have to do duplicate system I mean separate systems won't be a duplicate after so I guess yeah the question is going to be is that going to be on the capital request for this year yeah I mean it's not ain't dead yet yeah I think it's like for the fire truck start money away so we don't have to borrow too much to full place right but I guess my question would be how quickly can they if they have to structurally change the building how quickly can that even happen that would have to happen over the summer oh might even take longer than that depending on some of the parts There's issues in the supply chain again switching GE the remaining life expectancy of the current boiler yeah well that bill and Bill would probably have to handle it oh yeah I mean I think it's it's oh it's do yeah absolutely it's rated for up to 25 years I think we're right around that time yeah you know a beautiful school there's only one small section of it that's sighting and they Pi the ugliest yellow color for it can we paint that I want yellow like uh maybe you should be on school local artist do a portrait or something it's that yellow do GoFundMe hire a local artist or did you see their article in the Conway CS which one it was about like if you have a specialty or something you to share with the school I hope people read that and like reach out about it because we have so much to draw on in this town oh yeah you know and I just think that's so cool and I I was going to actually point that out to Janet about the because she was talking about getting kids involved in the invasive species and stuff yeah um so which is right up some of those kids alley they said Kristen said that two two fifth graders I think did a whole presentation to her on invasive species on the school property wow and how they should remove them I bet there's plenty I bet there is yeah there's a lot of that's my wife say not we not we not we the evils of the world except you're a beekeeper quietly beekeepers love not really why is that big big poll really oh yeah interesting just add in tick burn it all down not we honey W um well thank you guys have anything else that's enough it's impressing enough talking about well actually not but the kind of way grammar schools the uh that that was my concern coming this year I mean we have a good handle pretty much everything else the highway garage up there is on budget people were lamenting at the cost per square foot of $280 and I say I'm looking at construction projects that are $500 and up easy that's why I was going to say that's why concom is not busy cuz new construction costs are yeah what are they yeah for a home go up from there yeah yeah yeah people just aren't aware of the cost of things now yeah since the pandemic you know it's been right well now if we get trade Wars it's not going to go down yeah no one's predicting to go down yeah so people are hoping we not enough well if Canada becomes the 51st St all of our lumber gets cheaper yeah that's one way to look at it thank you guys you're welcome thank you I'm to Greenland Danish know how to fight back moving on to town admin updates sure so one of the things that just came in today was a um a notice from the South County Senior Center again from Jennifer saying that she can actually she has enough funding to do another round of iPad lotteries for seniors in Congress so how many is it like five that that we no it's like uh 30 no we did 30 yeah oh I didn't realize oh yeah I had two boxes of there three or four different sessions you still have so I mean I guess that was my question we still have iPads hav away oh no no no no they're all G they're all gone yeah so I just want people that have them that are very pleased yeah yeah good i' think get more they're such great you know they're such a great SI yep okay great so I will affirm with her that Conway would be thrilled and thank you yes much did Barb get one yep oh there you go um so uh Ron and I will be meeting this this we uh actually Wednesday to finalize for the mass works because there's contracted documents that we have to get to them um I did put out to all the department heads to ask them to send me stuff to put in the TA update and then Lori did send me one which just says that she's working on the 22 25 Street census listing so and people need to really understand that if they don't turn it back in they end up getting dropped and then they can't vote and it gets to it's a real hassle SS turn it back in um and then I think I had already told you before I went on vacation but now I can't remember but that we got the $6,000 for a swap shop yes and another 3500 RDP funds so Jan and I need to measure the current Conway Mall and I need to talk to Ron about how much space is we need a bigger building but I think it needs to be longer and anyway right I mean and and is there like are we going to have to do any we going to take that one are we going to have to put a p i mean like that one's going to go fill out more it's yeah that one's that one's it's not even fixable like do we have enough um room there yeah property like we're going to have to move the electronics I think and we already moved the Porta poot so we should have enough you know we can we can finagle something and on the spring it's on the docket to do the fix the hole and then cave as you're exiting where the wood's been sitting pave three parking spots there for the mall specifically for the mall anyway so I'm excited about getting moving on that that's awesome they've been using a cash register and Mike our accountant is thrilled that they're using a cash register um and you know our Auditors will like that but the thing that um when uh Tim turned in the money to me he was like look at this the bulky which is usually filled every week yeah since January 1st it's only a quarter foot I went Sunday late um Saturday late Saturday late and I like so how people B really no problem he goes but look at the bulky it was like empty so and all it is is people finally actually putting things in bags and putting it in the compactor now it'll be interesting to see how the tonnage in the compactor goes up or what you know but yeah but it was interesting that it's really at least it's being regulated yeah yep um and have there been many complaints no I rate people calling you or well nobody's called me of course the tsas are the first line so I heard a I heard an earful from one of Erica's tenants on I did too yeah I know that was about it it's hilarious though um yeah I I've had a few people say something and I just curious why and I said you know because people you know were getting the work around to putting their bag in their stuff we don't want to subsidize trash for people that are throwing away a ton of trash the bringing stuff from other towns I know and I did hear that some people when they were told that the charge was they went home and got bags put in bags and brought it back to the compact good good yeah so system is working yeah I think my neighbor was he was he was annoyed that the I think the compactor was either broken or it was it was it wasn't it wasn't about it was full that was it had nothing to do with like it was after Christmas you know always after Christmas like the cardboard or usually the cardboard and it wasn't the cardboard this time I plan accordingly and then some people complain that they didn't know it was open on the Thursday after and we're like well it' been posted for two or three months so there's not much we not much else we can do people should also know we do get additional funding for implementing these I've said that yeah yeah well barque put it in the visit so yeah and we and we'll be getting a fair bit more because you all took it down to 52 stickers a year that's going to make a big difference well I mean maybe in theual in our the town report we can you know highlight I mean obviously it's that's going to be in the the section on the transfer station but I mean if we could I don't know pull out just some highlights you know executive summary first page the this is how much money we saved you know on the transfer station this year I can although my it's a fiscal year so I'm doing it for fiscal 24 so it stops as of last July 1st so I'll have to make notes for the following report it always messes with my head doing that um I don't need to tell you any more about the sustainability because they were here and then the last thing just to show you is we're getting one free air quality monitor that the fur Hog's going to put in it will be somewhere right outside this building and we're trying to figure that out right now with this is a monitor well that's so funny when I read when I read you thing I thought it was like the building I know that's what I thought too the same it's it's just our air quality and just in in town okay all right good that was that makes a lot more sense then I was like why like I'm going to steal smoke cigars all day and then you just totally reminded me I need to help set up a camera out here for Lori so I'll do that in the next couple oh oh yeah you just reminded me that Chris got the camera up at the transfer working yes it's on her account okay cool so y awesome the only thing I don't think we have yet is the live streaming right I don't know I still saw that wasn't doing I think we need to call them because I can see today I can see people that were there there's plenty of events but when I go to live streaming it still says it's unavailable yeah oh yeah unable to connect who's going to run the swap shop ver set Toba well so this is this is going to be the condr but I can tell you from past experience that until and unless something looks decent you know it's really difficult to decent yeah so what I'm hoping is that with the new um Swap Shop building that we can you know keep it looking nice but it will not be able to run if you don't have you can't have a swap shop open without volunteers to monitor it just does not people do not self could that also be a senior job possi ly but to date we still only had three applications you extended the deadline of the 31st I still haven't gotten another W so you know okay we'll see and don't forget it's only 100 hours yeah for that so that's not much time yeah um I'm what I'm really hoping is that we can get some people who are willing to do every other weekend or something you know just what what Kathy and I had talked about was just having up on the board there and I bought a new board for the front of it and just having a calendar and letting people sign up for their shifts you know and basically if there's some you could say that if there's somebody signed up it's open if there's nobody signed up it's closed and that's kind of how it goes yeah makes sense but you know okay I had yesterday I have anything from today it doesn't look like okay so that was all that I had great motion to adour oh we still have to go sorry uh comments concerns none mail none announcements none next meeting January 21st good Tuesday Tuesday Tuesday Tuesday tues Tuesday uh make a motion to Second all in favor I all thank you