I will open the um finance committee meeting at 50:6 p.m. for February 3rd 2025 um so review of minutes oh I I I'm gonna say one thing first I I hosed up the
email the day after we had the meeting I emailed everybody except I typed the wrong thing in so you didn't actually get the email but um when we voted South County Senior Center last week it did indeed pass the the rule is that it is
the majority of members who are present and voting somebody abstains they are not voting so the the the um vote was two in favor one against one abstained so two to one um passes that it's the
majority so it doesn't have to be a majority of the people present it's a majority of the people present and voting to have a for pres we did yeah we did so we had four people but you're right right you can have a forum quum you have to have a quorum present they
don't have to vote so even though one of them we didn't lose our Quorum by somebody abstaining I did send out a corrected minute in which case I move that we accept minutes
2 I think it was the 27th January 27 all right any discussion all those in favor uh against abstaining all right that passes three four
51 um anything else we need to cover before we get into our um the I guess the other point is that tonight there's a planning board meeting at 6:30 right here so we will finish by 6:15 620 something like
that um because we will be kicked out at that point so so with that um which one where do we want to start we'll start with the uh sewer budget so if you go to your tab 10 so the the first page you have in Tab
10 is just a quick summary showing what revenues we need to have in order to cover the budget that's currently being presented and I'm just right now just just showing a 100,000 coming from retained earnings um I believe our
retained earnings were certified at a million 299 something like that um just didn't wasn't sure that we should use any more than that especially since the increas didn't seem to be huge
so um I'll leave it to all of you to make that decision in the end but I think this looks pretty good okay so if you want to go to um payroll which is the very next page so actually didn't end up with a
new sewer Enterprise fund sumary some my old one um I I gave you uh two things right um no this is from Julie it doesn't matter we can look at the other ones they all add up so yeah
it it didn't change by much um it's okay don't worry about it let's move on sewer payroll okay so um so sewer payroll uh it comes to 483 , 382 if somebody would like to make a
motion then I can talk about it second okay um ready for discussion yes this will obviously change um between now and town meeting because we need to hire um a DPW superintendent um I understand interviews might be held towards the end
of the week um but the Top Line there where it says superintendent that has always been one sixth of the superintendance gross pay and uh that just carries over from
the um Highway payroll so that number will probably change between now and the end of end of um uh this budget season um Eric has signed a new contract for his payroll so we've plugged in that
information um he has put in a request to the Personnel Board for um and Christopher you can correct me if there's anything that needs to be corrected but he's put in a request to the Personnel Board to have a new
position for assistant chief operator um that has not been um uh totally approved at this point they're waiting for a job description right they have it they want they have it now yes okay so they will meet again
on their next meeting and make a decision but I plugged it into the budget because I I would assume it's going to be approved we can always make that change but right now we've plugged in an assistant chief operator position uh Eric has told me who he was going to
be uh selecting for that and Gary B is retiring in or excuse me he's leaving us in March and Eric is already um is filling his position to start when he actually he physically leaves like
towards the end of February yes yeah so all of those um employees are updated in this budget um assuming a couple of things like the Personnel Board making the final decision on
yeah yeah um so that's it I uh for what you if you have questions did you um did you base this proportion of the superintendent's salary on the existing um on the
existing full salary the formula has been the same since before I came on board okay sixth of the DPW superintendent salary has always been applied to the wastewater treatment plant I don't know if that needs to change I you know so this is assuming a total
salary of 8,848 salaries have not been worked on at all because they are are just now starting contract negotiations for the union um I did do a couple of little things today I I left I left it in there
as if Kevin Scarboro were still here just to have a number that was high hoping that it might be a little bit lower but that's what you're anticipating it to be lower than this number who knows I I don't know what what
uh what the final decision will be what what somebody will get hired at but I just thought if I had it a little higher to start with then we can always come down it's easier to come down well where the where the chief operator is salary
is at 1229 439 it seems as though there's going to be a big increase or or overall increase in the highway superintendent salary because I wouldn't imagine that the highway superintendent is going to be paid less than his chief wastewater treatment plant operator well
it has it is a quite different job but the superintendent is assumed here to be doing Administration for the wastewater treatment plant right what's the superintendent get paid not really Eric
oh go ahead you talk Eric sorry I'm doing all um make sure you're talking into the mic you need to speak into a microphone the people and the recording can work as far as the administration Eric takes care of as far as his what I call Deal
um the highway department DPW takes care of the collection system um all the piping all the man holes everything all the collection system from the houses that go to
Eric um so in the last couple years we've had Eric take care of his own budget pretty much we've overseen it but that's what we've been doing for the last and I mean that 16 or
$18,000 has been historically the same since three years okay okay all right I think the superintendent's job I'm just you know I'm just I think it's a I think the superintendent job is a big job that's that's that's my point it's not just
waste water it's right understood but my I don't have the licenses right at this time oh okay um so that's uh you know that's a we support I right okay can you um go
ahead grab the microphone assistant chief operator the increase is 155% which is so that is the new position so right now that individual is
being paid under a grade D step two but he would if this is approved would move up to a e step one he's as a class three or class four er correct no he's going to be step one
but yes he's going to be grade e and um he's right in line with the rest of the assistants that are in town along like the collectors all that so it's right in the same ballpark that's why we started them at that it's creative position that's the only reason it went up so
much because right now he's just an operator but we need him in his license for our permit and for D paperwork and such so can you spend a little bit of time explaining what the new position is like compared to the old
position what the additional responsibilities are there wasn't really an old position like this is a new position but he was a just a plain old operator so the difference between a plain old operator Gary was my assistant in name only like the the Josh can
actually do all the paperwork I've trained him to do the paperwork um if I'm not there he can make process decisions no problem um it's it's basically everything I can do um in my absence so if I drop off the face of the
Earth he's right there to pick up yes you guys aren't left in the does he have the same level of um licensing and everything or I have a grade six license but he has to our plant is a grade four so the assistant chief operator can be
either equal or one below right now he he passed I think it was four months ago he passed his grade for exam so he's in training right now grade four um he's just waiting for his time in so his time in will be up July of 26 but as a in
training he's allowed to be assistant chief operator I checked with DP just to make sure everything was good to go with that with losing Gary because Gary has his grade three so they said we're all good to go with that um I just would like the biggest reason I did this is
I'd like some kind of career path for these younger kids I don't want them to go anywhere yeah um you know the these jobs are hard to get people in and you know if they see that there's some kind of career path up and through when I'm gone if I'm setting it up that you guys
will be good for the next 20 30 years so that's the reason behind it go ahead and didn't I understand from your presentation at the Personnel committee that there's also some kind of a requirement to have this position that we haven't had and haven't been
operating with well we've had it but Gary was a name only like he wasn't doing paperwork and stuff like that um I want to make like there is a requirement through our permit that we have a chief operator who's equal to or greater than the level of the plant which was grade
four and then your assistant could be one below um so he could be a grade he could actually be a grade three but he's already put into work and took his grade four license and such so he's um and passed it so we're just trying to make
it incentivized where he wants to stay here and want to be with the town of Deerfield which they they do but shows a little bit of appreciation and for the job that they got to do whenever I'm not here and everything else so and then just one more comment looks like this um quite anticipated Savings
in overtime for next year is that because of better scheduling procedures so overtime used to be calculated based on Eric's pay and uh with the new contract he has
agreed um to be exempt so we've now changed the overtime uh rate to be on Josh's rate instead so big difference so are the number of hours
similar same hours same hours okay yeah because these are these are the hours that are required on the weekends oh okay and and Hol well the holiday time is is down here but 247 since 365 yeah so so then the following
question would be go ahead just so then the follow on to that is why why does the the holiday coverage and emergency service coverage uh jump so much uh based on Eric's calculations it appears that we've just been under budgeting those two line items okay so
it's just correct and same with like Highway payroll and Highway OT payroll those are just recalculating so there is one um Highway employee who's dedicated to the collection system and so he spends two
hours of overtime every uh every week or every yep every week every week um on on checking the sewer lines the collection system okay thank you anyway so I went back through and
just looked at a three-year history of what was spent and I thought you know now that um the sewer plant is totally um staffed like it should be I figured there would be less time for the highway regular people to be be there for any
particular reason because he's got a whole staff that does that um and and we haven't been using the highway as much so I just adjusted those numbers to what was being reflected in the last three years of actual
so for the 4.25% increase what we've done is everybody gets their step and we've promoted somebody from whatever a certified operator to an assistant
um but offset that with adjustments to overtime and whatever is that kind of the summary okay do do the health insurance benefits take into account the the large increases that you're now seeing yes
okay it should um we don't know what the new employee will take but we just kind of figured probably a single plan we don't know but um it it does give us a little buffer for that okay
y oh okay well I'm not sure if they're going to take it or not but it it should still be just fine I you know if it if it um they do you have it but two of my guys don't take it there's the one of their parents
insurance that and he doesn't take it and I don't take it because I go through the ba I get all my stuff through the ba so it's kind of we're going to have like one gu so so most of anybody turning 27 this year don't
answer that so so most of the health insurance cost right here right now is for retirees because we do charge the wastewater treatment plant for the the insurance that's taken by the the gentlemen that used to work here that
are retired and their spouses because they're not Medicare eligible no it has nothing to do with it it's just that they used to work for the wastewater treatment plant so the wastewater treatment plant should pay for their health insurance tell they
decease yeah most most of them are on Medicare yeah there's is there still a cost to the town for even if they're on Medicare um well uh yes we pay 50% so that 50% would be in this number
okay any further questions or discussion noic be pay for the supplement insurance the Medicare that's correct so we're not paying for Medicare we're paying for Medics which is the the supplemental correct and you're paying 50% of that
yes okay y just just like we would with any retiree we're paying 50% of the insurance no matter what they have are they pay are they kicking in anything 50 50% they're doing 50 we doing yeah that's yeah
okay anybody else no Christopher did you have anything to add to that no okay just wanted to make sure all right okay so it's been moved and seconded for sewer payroll at 48 3,382
any further discussion no all those in favor that's unanimous 6 yeah make a motion to approve you've already given your prangle we might come back to this later
oh no we haven't but you want to do that I gu sure so this one actually doesn't really fall into that because it's it's the Enterprise fund yeah make a motion to approve sewer payroll waste water treatment plants salary at $483
382 second any further discussion hearing none all those in favor I Gilmore I okay so we we might go back and revisit this after the the highway correct I would think we would yes okay
all righty so on the sewer expense which is the next page we've got a total of $ 81,500 I yeah let I move to recommend the sum of $881,000 for wastewater treatment
plants so expense we have a second so with this one um we'll see uh a final on this one as well because I I don't have all the budgets to calculate the indirect costs yet um so that one will
will change as well probably not by much but um I'll let I'll let Eric speak to the individual line items if there's anything you want to point out or you want to wait for questions I mean it's it's pretty cut and dry we didn't really go up on a
whole lot um what we did go up on we kind of made up on some other ones um our lab fees and assessments went up um simple fact is they require past testing now in last year's budget um we did not have a number for that and it's quite a
bit more than we thought it was going to be um but the chem budget came down uh that's from going to UV at the South Deerfield plant getting that online and getting rid of chlorine over there um so
that helped out and then the only other one we brought up was the uh sewer sludge um we got hit pretty hard had a lot of loads go out in November December um so we just figured we put a little padding in there just so we make
sure we had enough to cover it so we're not trying to scrape by try to move something into that later on so so has the cost of disposing of that sludge way it every single year they bump up a little bump up a little bump
up a little so it ends up it just it's crazy we're looking at some other avenues um some other haulers that may save us a little bit of money not like a ton but every little bit helps so and you're shipping to where now we only
ship to uh and with the couple of the new haulers there's some other options U which helps us out because when lull something happens down there um we're stuck we have to sit there and wait till they open back up before we can get sludge
loads out and that affects our plant and the quality of what we put into the river so we um the the new places they have more op or more options uh upper Blackstone um with Worcester area down
in Cranston Rhode Island they have a a plant that they take to up in New Hampshire um right now they're kind of going through the process of getting approvals for us for emergency loads and stuff like that so we can go into those other places if we have downtime with uh
where we go now so um and like I said they're a little bit cheaper so maybe moving forward and I've already talked to Jan at Franklin County Solid Waste district and she's she is speaking with them um for the next bid cycle for
sludge haulers so it would help us out a lot so you get involved into furog you kind of bound to furog and they're bid people and a lot of times they don't step up
and don't take care of what our needs are so sometimes we have to Outsource to other places so you're working with with Jan at the solid waste she knows this yeah um so she understands the Greenfield does it
they they have uh nun comes and pulls loads out of them sometimes and takes them to other places um like wall had the wall Trucking had some problems uh week ago um if they couldn't have got to me Jan said that that you know she was
going to give me the number to Nunan and the other haulers even though they're outside the contract but if you read the contract it pretty much says as long as you're not like pulling all your stuff away from fur Cog and and uh wall Trucking they can't really say anything
to you they're okay with it so um you know we have these extra loads our plant gets hit really hard another hauler would be able to help us out a little bit for maybe a little less money so you accept private septage at your at the
plant not right at this moment okay um I know there are haulers that are bringing it who have Turners and there's not a whole lot of places that take it any anymore so everybody has to I mean monu is one of the only places I believe around here that takes it um some of the
towns take their own um I'd love to look into in the future uh you know F figuring out something where we could take it just our towns at least to help the residents out so that would be pretty popular un
well we have some ideas we just got to figure out how to implement them so yeah that'd be great go I have two questions the audit you don't have anything in there for that that's right so um we've had to do
a single audit for the federals uh for for the feds um because of federal money but we've received our federal money for the for the wastewater treatment plant so the only um let's see the only Federal money
we're going to be getting now is um for the lot so I took the expense out of their budget because it's no longer it's no longer their problem Y and the operational
Reserve do we do we actually spend that that's required by USDA so that we keep putting more money into our into our retained earnings so they they want it to go into retained earnings that's right that so is there a goal for the
value of the retained earning is that going up or are we able to spend it each year um it's been hovering around a million three um can't a million three I want to say um this year was a million 2.99
right I think it was yeah um they'd like us to have a a a Year's worth of operating expenses in there so just trying to make sure we're covered is that what we have pretty close CL pretty close
because I'm I'm can if I may um the use of retained earnings went down $20,000 like I'm looking at the users the more retained earnings we use the less the sewer bills will
be um how many users are there approximately it's uh 900 and some right just around a thousand is it around a thousand now um so this is reflecting uh a 2%
increase I figured that was pretty reasonable on on the on a typical bill on on yeah on the on the revenues right okay that's yeah that's I thought that was I I thought that would um you know people
aren't going to complain about a 2% increase in their bill versus the 10% we've been doing yeah go ahead D um Brenda I apologize if I zoned out at the beginning of the meeting or missed something but on this sewer Enterprise fund the first page you
gave us tonight M the number for expenses is 87,000 and here we have $881,000 uh that's be because we have to account for the indirect costs on a separate line uh when it comes to um voting this at town
meeting so this really the main reason I do this summary page is so that I have the right numbers for town meeting so the 73,74 800 it equals the 81 whatever it is yeah where are these where are the
indirect costs oh oh the 737 sorry great gotcha yep so it's those two numbers together yep yep y yep okay how's the new truck working for plowing it's great yeah it's working excellent excellent don't have to do it you don't
have to do it so You' gotten some practice lately made for a very early morning this morning for him I bet but still nothing with these guys they've been up all night that's true so is this another one of these things it's an Enterprise fund we're
okay because it's in their budget or is this something we can what's that the the sewer expense thing it's inside an Enterprise fund we really don't have any issues with it um I mean so we still voted I mean we review it and vote it
but and we'll probably revisit it just because the indirects will change Y and the gasoline expense is because gas is higher now or because you're burning more because you have a higher powered engine in a new truck or yeah and plowing plowing does a lot of it just
you can watch it just go down plowing and so y and the engineering consulting stuff is that something that you just always have some need for an engineer yes they always um like they do our collection system report every year they do our
ionine or nitrogen reports as are all permit required um and anything else we may need them to do um like they do a lot of work with the budgeting for the town and that it gets built out of that for the budgeting for the sewer department and such and and we have that
Grant right that that will be covered through this bu budget as well the the the um costs that we're supposed to uh provide yeah match is it a match yeah yeah so so we're all that so that's all in there um so the DPC trucks that we
see around are doing this work now and and under a grant yeah may I so it's actually six give or take a couple of th000 60,000 retained earnings is being used to offset reeven
because you've got 100,000 on the overall budget and you get 40,000 as an expense right so I guess you could look at it that way crazy no not
yeah so what's the grant uh it's uh go ahead you want to speak to it it's for our um Asset Management plan for the studying the collection system we got a grant from the D for storm
water and for sewer collections so looking at all the manholes and piping we did it back in 2017 and we got a grant this year to pay for it which was great a couple hundred thousand from DVP for both Wastewater and um and Sewer it
won't cover the whole system like old a field we'll still have to look at we may buy for a grant again next year if we can for that but we'll get a good part of it any other questions we want to talk about that pipe that was failing and the
okay that I mean we'll talk about that during um Capital yeah is there do you guys want to talk about that at all not really okay that's fine that's not under this budget anyway so we're we're straying fire field any other further questions on this budget that we have in
front of us no all right so it's been moved and seconded for wastewater treatment plant expense at 8815 any further discussion all those in favor that's
unanimous 500 Beth is yeah not she's in the meeting right because she had to go to the rec she had to leave she'll be back but all right so that leaves us with uh the sewer debt I'm I'll make motion to approve the uh
sewer expense expense at $81,500 second um any further discussion hearing none all those in favor Fe McDaniel I Gilmore I Tim LG thank you sorry great
yeah no I apologize for uh forgetting um so if you move to the Sewer Debt Service um this is all Now set there's no uh short-term borrowings so we have two USDA loans and we have
our final bond that we took out uh in November so these numbers um will not change so is this um are we going to have the same exact dollar value every year or is this value
gonna it'll change okay y it's um um the principle pay the same principle every year and then the interest will drop well and actually you know what um with the bond that we took out in November we weren't we did not have it
in our budget to pay six months worth of Interest so there's going to be 18 months worth of interest in next year's budget so these numbers will all go down for fiscal 27 um unless we have to take out more debt for anything else
the okay so um just for clarity this um The Debt Service is the portion of this budget that all Deerfield taxpayers pay on correct that's right this is the 75% okay yes thank you for for
mentioning that okay we we need a motion anybody like to make a motion yeahor forgot I moveed to recommend the sum of it's unanimous 5 correct of the total debt Serv 75% of the total debt service is in this budget
the other um 25% you'll see when we go through those budgets on the 18th I'll make a motion uh for the select board for um to approve the sewer Debt Service at 8198 $22 second any further discussion
hearing none all those in favor sh Mel iore I Tim Hil I all right so I think we're done with Eric unless you had any other questions for him don't we need to vote the overall Enterprise fund because
otherwise we haven't voted retain oh good point yep thank you would you like to make a motion approve the sewer Enterprise fund total um expenses totaling
2,844 revenue of 28474 Revenue a revenue of 2, 8474 plus retained earning usage of 100,000 yeah oh yeah but I was so expenses would be 21847 yes I'll second with that
change any discussion all those in favor that's unanimous make a motion for the select board to approve the sewer Enterprise Fund in total second any further
discussion all those in favor mcel I Tim Hill thank you thank you for all your work you chill out for a little bit you are you okay
um so we'll go to his first budget which is the town Building Maintenance budget which is 196 it's in your tab one 196 d5400 oh yeah sor2 oh okay there we go thank you oh yeah yeah 196 is Insurance
yeah which we don't have yet okay all right do we have a motion I'll move to recommend the sum of $1 125,1 184 for Town Building Maintenance account 192 5400
second all right discussion oh I I missed I yeah missed what you just said so they just Mo motioned uh motioned it to get it on the table okay the biggest thing is the EV Chargers and until we know um if we
should be setting up a revolving fund for that right now it's just sitting here because the revenues go into the general fund and we got a bill of $1600 last month so for everything electricity and units
no that's just just the EV Chargers so where are we at with that I know that was a big topic of conversation the last budget cycle so I have not seen the only revenues I saw were in December because Sarah is just now reconciling bank statements so I don't know what we've
received for January but Greg um Greg our our assistant Town Administrator is is handling this and he's keeping track and he's said that right now we're doing very well we're we're we're covering it we are okay that's so I I trust that
he's he'll manage it he'll he'll watch it and if we need to make some adjustments we will yeah I just wish we had eight level threes instead of four because um the electricity expense from ever Source was about $800 $800 in
January and the pro the uh overall Revenue was 13 something so there's like a 500 plus difference and to the good side well the only caveat to that is is our electric well our electric bill is
is covers mid-mon I so I don't know what revenues are coming from what month of expenses but yeah so I actually asked Greg to look into trying to get eversource to Bill first of the month or the last of the month rather than in the middle of the month because it's just
too darn confusing I don't know this somebody just explain what this is this 1864 for next year though is that new Chargers being purchased and installed no that's just the electricity that's just the electricity
for them okay I'm sorry okay so so why is there nothing in previous years because we just put them in they just came to the L lot so this is just for the L lot yep well this would be this would be the cost of all of them at Town Hall and the L lot but the most
expensive ones are the level threes which are in the L lot okay yeah you may have to change the rates possibility going forward go ahead Jim snag a
microphone this doesn't include the revenues or that would be on the town revenues or whatever correct because I mean Greg was when I was trading emails with him but I forwarded everybody those right didn't I I thought maybe I just forward it to you you sent it to me do
you want to recap yeah sorry um I thought I had sent it to everybody yes I traded emails with Greg about this because I was confused about it too and um uh he sent me an email in response explaining that basically yeah we own
the Chargers the company which I cannot remember the name of uh you know operates them maintains them um we're paying for the electricity we're getting revenues there is a setup cost which is why the amount we have been getting from it
has only you know started out very low but has been increasing even though people have been using them because they basically are deducting their setup cost until that's paid off and he was saying that within a probably a few months that ought to be you know amortized I
guess if we own the charges where is the cost of the charges in the budget they were uh paid for through um Grant and and various other places and I think we're seeing some of it in not revenues that we're getting
revenues that we're not getting I think if some of those costs because the the subcontractor or contractor or whatever you want to call them that's operating them and doing maintenances and handles the billing and you know Financial transactions you know
when people stick all the money goes to them they subract expenses and for the rest onto US and the rest that we're getting is covering that's what electric that's what what I understood from Greg uh I don't know if Christopher knows anything
any more than I do but no that that matches my understanding as well so you mentioned revolving funds and I understand that this is not you know it may not be as simple as you know um revenues and expenses
um but has there been serious thought given to establishing a revolving fund for this and so it's it's been on our mind that it would fit a 53e and a half revolving fund because you've got
charges and then you've got expenses against those charges the question is will the revenues support all of the expenditures I don't know so I've put in a call to Tom scandin for some information just haven't been able to connect with
him I think the you know the benefit there is a downside to that obviously with the changing electric rates that we're all dealing with but um you know the plus side to that is that the revenues would be more transparent not that they're not transparent now they're just general fund revenues but they
would be more transparent and that they would be targeted or or earmarked directly for their revolving funds so it might make it would be easier for us to see right I I agree um and I don't like where I'm putting them I'm just putting them into miscellaneous revenues because up to
this point it's just been miscellaneous Revenue I mean what what we've received on the level two charges has been so minimal that it would never cover the the costs up to this point so feel like yeah by the time we get to next year we'll have the year's worth of usage
we'll know we're getting for revenues everything will be paid for iate probably worth having it so that residents or anybody PL can go okay weot because that's always the question oh you've got these Chargers but are they paying for themselves or how much are we subsidizing can I go to the highway
department to fill my tank with gas we've seen that seems like the right you know Source depending on they that cover at all I also believe that um I I think the level three Chargers are under a
fiveyear warranty agreement um is that right Christopher yeah that's correct they actually actually both the level three and the level two the new charge points that are in the L lot as well so so are we using any of the income
from the solar project to offset this income from the solar project don't we have income from solar was it um set right or was it the uh the one up
on River Road river River Road we get some sort of credits and when Chris Nolan was here the credits were off setting expenses correct yeah sorry um just wasn't making the connection uh yes it's on our schedule Z so um Diane and
Greg have been reviewing that we can change it every six months so she's been trying to keep that in line so that so that we're not getting too many credits on any one bill but we we've got a list of accounts so and it does include these
Chargers yes or not what's that and it includes the these Chargers are getting offset by that yes somewh okay y yeah I really want Clarity on this because I do believe that the level three Chargers are going to change the way we have regular users Now 60 some of them are in
Deerfield um there's an obvious benefit to Deerfield residents not having to drive to ammer and Northampton and adley to you know charge up their car fast so it would really in favor of a revolving fund so we can figure out what is this
actually generating or costing the town and it and it might be that we if we do set up the revolving fund we wait for the revenues to come in and then we we just offset the revenues by whatever expense we can I you know I do that with
some other things go ahead Jim um Brenda can you tell me where on the revenue detail this the the charger income would show up it's just under miscellaneous and I can't I I
can't necessarily I I didn't know what to put in for that so I really don't have anything in there for fiscal 25 and fiscal 26 I haven't really accounted for anything either so so would that be miscellaneous non-recurring or correct
like I said that's not not the place that I think it should belong so what's that well drilling yeah this and any other any other questions on the Chargers that just must have be increas
yeah okay um Chris do you want to say anything about any other as I mean as far as like the St James building it was a 2800 we put down to 1800 hopefully that's going to be taken over
by whoever somebody else right uh EMS building pretty much stays the same 1888 hopefully that's going to be taken care of very soon to us we knock that down to a th I mean probably have a few
little expenses uh 18 21 to to library right now um we bumped that up a little bit because of uh more a little bit more electricity and Fuel and not quite sure when they're
going to get out of there so they might get out just wondering like because that might go up a bit if we start using it more and it's not getting built to the library um I believe that they're looking at substantial completion on the
library in May right and then afterwards there's a there's a period of time when they do their punch list and and then they have a moveing day I believe June or July I think that's what Candace is planning on
right senior that's my memory too yeah substantial completion in May is so so this covers it says maintenance but it covers stuff like electricity and correct okay well not not for the 1821 building
right now because um electricity all the the um occupational expenses are covered by the library oh okay yeah it it would be any repairs um I'm trying to think what else oh the
um the pest control right yeah yeah forward though going forward after July of next year when this Bud it wouldn't be covered by liary you right right right and right I mean what's going in
there we don't know yet you know so that's a question a lot of unknowns yeah yeah all right okay and this all assumes that any actual maintenance on these buildings is
what done by your folks um POS you know contracted by your I me the amount of debts here it's I mean it's small repairs yeah okay talking why is the cost of maintenance
software um cut in half more than cut in half I think that me to which one's that now the maintenance software remember the deal with the software that came up this this week yeah um we put it up in the other part
though I think we did some uh so just just as a FYI um they had maintenance software through craic well you cograph right and the only people that access the system were Kevin and Chuck Willer and both of
them are gone so nobody was using the system and didn't know that we were still paying for it that it was under a contract so here we are right and so they're learning um right right and we're going to put that into the General Highway that's what
we're going to putting into well it's it's a large cost so it used to always be split between Town Building Maintenance um the wastewater treatment plant and uh the highway garage yeah we did put it together how we were going to because we were going to take some out
of the uh the sewer expense as well to to do that at the maps and that kind of thing and it's and it's included in the sewer right right any other questions yeah when is the assessment going to happen for the sewer infrastructure is that coming up this fiscal year is going to be
happening July for the manholes there's going to be an assessment oh that's happening this that's happening this year oh I was just yeah I was just wondering because obviously the cardgraphic software is probably the software that's going to be taken that information and you'll be
storing it in that software so there'll have to be a coordination okay okay all right thank you so question so the bulk of this um 177% increase is electricity and EV Chargers which we really don't
know about right so this could be really good or this could be really bad could change that or it might change Al together if we do the revolving fun we might be coming back and rev voting this budget yep but the EV
charger electricity expenses offset by a revenue that we also didn't see before well we're hoping it offset it with the users fees right right right yeah that user fee Revenue that we haven't seen before right yeah the other
complicating thing about is as Brenda said they we've got December and January and we get revenue reports from or bills from the eversource in the half month when these were first put together there was a period of time before they became
live but they were um autel was asking for them to be tested so like I plugged line in for 15 minutes one day to to see if the system was working and it was zeroed out um and I think anybody who
happened to come in after we opened the the the lot could could plug in and and get charged for like a period of four or five days I don't think it was and nobody really knew they were there so now that they've discovered them yeah they loaded them on the map
right y so the revolving F again would help us would help us be able to identify the amount you know the amount of so what I'm sitting here thinking is that we have 18,686 off of that so pretty much this
entire increase yep that EV charger because the 4,000 increase we see in electricity on the first line is offset by other decreases mostly yeah still I don't actually know to set up a revolving fund that would require a
warrant article yes that's right yes and a bylaw change does it yeah because it's now in the bylaw so the 53e and a halfs are all in a bylaw remember they made that change a
few years ago and what is the alternative to having them in a bylaw is there a way to get this stuff out of a bylaw so the enant can do these things or is this no this the putting it into the bylaw was to help towns so they
didn't have to revote it every year we do revote you you vote the the the the amount to be spent but I think that changes did that did that law pass where we don't have to do that anymore that's correct and and not only that it
doesn't it doesn't handcuff the select board in setting the fees the charging fees here it wouldn't do that right I just I just meant having to go to town meeting to ask for a bank account to be set up or essentially you know it's a it's a place to put money from a
specific Source seems like Overkill in some way it's it's not that you would just be setting up a revolving fund it's just a fund the the money still goes where the money goes it's it's just a fund a cute I guess we're saying the same thing setting up a fund and having
to have a town meeting vote to do it seems seems like something the accountant should be able to do to manage the funds that come into the town well I can do that with almost every other fund just not the 53 e and a halfs is that Char law it's it's it's so
the 53e and a half um uh law is set up for um revenues that we receive for services and expenditures that are related to those revenues it allows us to take it out of the general fund
basically like the rep Department right is it does it make your job easier to have a revolving fund why not just leave it like this I I think it would be nice to have a revolving fund to keep track of it all in one place it would be more manageable
but and it's blown up our operating budget a little bit here and yes we can we can we can reflect the revenues but but I see yeah so a revolving fund would basically we would be getting essentially the net from that after the expense of
electricity and the revenues from the Chargers sort of cancel each other out and whatever's left over would be be the Revenue Act and it make it clearer to see yeah and yeah Tim I I suspect the reason for that law is so that is for
transparency so that you know I'm sure there are some towns where like you know maybe town government doesn't like to reveal where all the money is going does the net amount that's left over automatically go to the general
fund or does it have to be voted so we had the excess if there was excess revenues over expenditures it would just remain in the 53e and a half account I'm sure at some point if we if that had buil up to a point we could vote some
out I I don't know right yeah that's what I was think you know when a solar field comes online you know we have revenue from that and it builds up over the years could we then funnel that to an opep fund you know what I mean like we've got to find ways to get
Revenue to start off setting our liabilities and and costs and so it would be great if the stuff built up in there and you could then funnel any excess to retirement fund or whatever some other liability I don't know so it wouldn't include solar what's that this
one include solar this is strictly thear fi that's money correct that's the whole idea yeah you're talking about the landfill solar yes exactly right yeah
there so there's there's a draft pilot agreement and we're just working on some updates to it um and yeah it would generate I think it was roughly $60,000 annually in Pilot fees so that's Plus plus some kind of rental fee as
well we field change our rental revenues then our rent Reven so back to the town building maintenance if we exclude the electricity for the EV
Chargers it's gone up almost not at all is that reasonable yes you're happy with that I mean this is the this is the energy cost for for
buildings let's the electricity in the first line who gets that electricity so that that's electricity for Town Hall the police station the common um that's it okay yep
so this covers maintenance and utilities for due to those other all of the buildings except the highway garage the actual Tilton Library correct anything
else no it's it's worth remembering that these are this is maintenance caus for buildings which are either not entirely used or not used at all at the moment right presumably when we bring them into use they will get more this building the police station right
um EMS building but what I mean is the they got a separate on their separate line but it's in that budget yes but I mean the itemized buildings down here presumably when those buildings get remodeled and brought into use those numbers will go up and hopefully someone else is paying
for it yeah well an electricity for the EMS building is covered by the EMS budget okay yeah no this is just repairs to the outside building or original appliances in the building we
haven't done anything not much bathrooms are a mess here oh here so much needs to get we say we got yeah and the miscellaneous repairs is set at 21,000 yeah we are running out of time
yes we are y okay I move to call a motion let's do it any further discussion all those in favor that's unanimous 5 z z make a motion to approve the uh Town Building Maintenance budget of 192 5400
at 125,1 184 second any further discussion hearing none before Blake gets back um all those in favor make Dan want to go General get this one done right yeah all right so
next to uh Tab four and uh General Highway uh payroll uh there's nothing to show you at this point U because uh Union contract still needs to be negotiated um so we'll go to the General Highway expense which is 422
d5400 for $337,400 do we have a motion I move that we recommend the sum of 337,000 for General Highway expense account number 422 5400 I have the discussion
yeah all right so the only real thing line painting um we got a budget of 25,000 uh it's got to go up to
28 um it was 27 actually we uh missed two roads can I ask a question on that one Chris um is there a rule that once a road is line striped it must be line
striped from Forever After uh that's a new one on me oh I don't well I was I I don't know the answer um that that possibility I know that we're not supposed to line like old Deerfield um
because it's a historic thing so we don't L that but every other Street in town we pretty much like mayie have to like literally like burn them off or something now right you can't just kind of paint over yeah they kind actually
they grind them down now yeah um what do you I'm sorry I don't want to get off topic but yeah what do you mean almost every other Street you line because I'm thinking a whole bunch of streets I know don't have lines um the only streets I don't think have
lines are M Village U Matthews we haven't done that again because we just Ted oiled it at the end of the year yeah um talking about lines down the middle of the road yep like our street doesn't
have lines I don't think so South Mill River no no no I'm sorry that's all right no I don't want to line I'm just was Curious by what you said roads like that are just a little too thin to okay so that's what I so sort of yeah so and
some of the offshoots off of Sugarloaf probably AR um right your side streets Road roads that are wider Main Road call your main road we're going we're actually doing like
300,000 feet of line yeah L yeah and parking lots yeah um crosswalks stop lines yeah all that kind of yeah no makes sense was struck by your comment
um the other one that went up safety and compliance safety and compliance um we normally took that out of building maintenance safety and compliance like our all our trucks
inspections um all our um fire extinguishers things like that have to be changed every year and redone that always came out of building maintenance um I'd like to put it into that safety compliance so it went up in
building maintenance too though just well it's it the cost has increased just a lot exponentially it seems uh for for those services at least that's what I no definitely noticed definitely main I mean I just had all
the floors done all the walls in the offic is all repainted that's how I feel the the building maintenance budget should be spent versus yeah it's patch materials for potholes uh yes because it
seems It's really pretty bad out there I'm I I'm not I don't mean I I don't mean that as negative against you it's so are we too low with the budget excuse me are we is the budget
amount too low no because things are worse than here you can't get the right materials to to patch it correctly um you now you're into what we call ironic coal patch right um and it just doesn't
suffice so I mean every week we're out there oh no I'm I don't mean nothing negative about other other things we put under that not just poot holes there's other you know um even like a trench or something like
that I put on that patch that type of thing but is that $8,000 enough in the budget that's my concern of why I'm bringing it up materials went yeah World materials went up to three
13,000 I'm looking at patch materials yeah I'm I'm good with that I'm good with that okay yep and um this is just a question so Sugarloaf is a state road but do you as a DPW go out and Patch
potholes actually they've uh they've stepped up pretty good uh this year um we're good to like Eastern a and then from Eastern AV on it's it's us any other questions on this
budget I'm just as perplexed as Tim if you don't mind answering this so we're maintaining the road into the common and up from there or is it the other direction we maintain from Easter nav to the Comm the state maintains from
Eastern na to 116 so if the state isn't maintaining it why do they have a say in what we do with it they basically they the town has not accepted that road are you saying that the state roads
stops at Eastern Avenue or are you just saying that that's where the state road stopped when they new new pave they stopped there from I understand that is where it it stops is at eastern half I can check into that I'm not unless you think it goes right to the center of
town I'm not sure okay well I know we've I they've never maintained anything beyond since I've been here eastern half yeah well the potholes are out in force right
now I mean we're lucky that he actually paved it a couple years ago so yeah that seems weird they should if they own it they should maintain it yeah all right any further discussion on this
item yeah one other question the newspapers showed that we're going to get a nice increase in chapter 90 money yes does that matter on this budget what that's what the governor is hoping okay you know that's what she's put forth but that doesn't mean it's going to happen
right right yeah but that doesn't affect this budget one way or the other not all not at all chap strictly chapter 9 and they haven't really set the funding for that extra 100 million either we're hoping that it's road miles only that would help rural areas but right wait to
see as of right now we got I believe 10 something with rural money that's defin 119 that's definite but I also heard that there's possibly 300,000 that could be coming to us as well Boon Road could
get paved no saying um yeah the uh we're kind of low on time so anything specific to this budget no any further questions um so it's been moved and seconded for General
Highway expense at 33720 any further discussion all those in favor against abstaining that passes 501 um we have like five minutes if the
planning board is kind to us so I how about we skip to I'm just gonna real quick motion I'll make a motion to approve the jle highway expense um 422 5400 at 37,200 any further discussion all those
in favor Tim Hill Mel timg thank you all right so I feel like winter snow and ice and Street lighting you could do with us so if we did transfer station okay that's to avoid making
Chris come back so I think Brenda can do those I mean snow and ice and in the um the street lighting is straight forward yeah transfer station because that one seems more complicated right we have a motion where is 433 5400
oh yes I move that we recommend the sum of $248,990 for transfer station expense account number 433 5400 second okay
so um I I think the biggest change is is we've we've been over budgeting for um bags for years I think right and I just and you realized it yeah I just landed another bag company that was going to half the price on bags also
so yeah that can definitely go down to 17 maybe 15 but we'll leave it at 175 um and then you've added um internet service and computer and printer yeah
we're going to we're trying to do a little something different at the transer station we're hoping to possibly put a Comcast line up there starting to do the slide cards as far as we get away from checks and that kind of thing um it's going to make it a lot
easier for us to manage as far as where it's going and just make it much it it's it's um not easy for Sarah though and I don't know whether she's going to not on board yet but we no and it I mean she
has a lot to keep track of in that in that account already so um I you two need to have um heavier discussions yeah I know it's not in this budget but I know that the um and I don't know if we own the
compactors or not but there's some there's some maintenance I think probably we need to do on and that might be in a capital thing at some point the compact we the compactors and actually we um like the compress you know even the cardboard ones are just hard to like
yeah no they're actually going to be maintenanced um within the next couple of weeks oh nice great all the oil is going to be changed and everythings parts possibly parts and then there's a few I don't know how much is we have in maintenance
for for this budget but there is some like concrete pointing and like making sure the railings are done and um some stuff around there probably needs to be upgraded a bit it gets used heavily and it's used in a miserable times of the year and um just for safety for people
and stuff the ramps and I don't know how much maintenance is in there but we definitely need new signage there's some work to be done how are we doing on dump sticker Revenue given that there are additional
haulers in town now private haulers so how are we doing on the The Dump sticker Revenue has that decreased or stay the same I don't think it's decreased no I mean okay no you know we're we're right up around 1,200 permits okay and oh okay for the
year yeah yeah because they sell most of theirs in May and June right so for this fiscal year it shows that we we've collected you know very very little but that's because we'll see the most of it at the end of the fiscal year but you're keeping track of the numbers so yeah
we're starting to really get on top of that yeah good just to see what's coming in with stickers you know you got to figure out between the $70 sticker and the $10 sticker yeah so so our our
revenues overall for the transfer station don't quite cover the budget not quite yeah we're just a little short yeah there is some discussion between Deerfield and Su and as well they're trying to figure out what they're going to do it very early and we
may not even go that route but if we did we'd need a major kind of redesign and then staff and maintenance that they would need to pay for yeah we've been in discussions for the last about a month between if it doesn't help Deerfield
then I'm going to say that right we should yeah Town own extra land around the um treatment plant for for a new no around the treatment plant if you're going to do something for both towns no we're talking the uh transfer station the
transfer station no I know you are oh you said treatment plan right I was just saying no there isn't there isn't Town land all around there yeah I'm just saying I don't know why I want all of Sunland driving all the way through town dump their trash know they
want to do that they probably don't either no we could throw some good tariffs on them tariffs on them all right so we're kind of straying for our field um any further discussion
relating to this budget no okay uh it's been moved and seconded for the transfer station expense at 248,000 Z select word do you want to do it make a motion to approve the transfer station expense U at
$248,900 $20 second any further discussion hearing none all those in favor McDaniel timg so we're going to have to adjourn because the planning board needs our space um is there anything else Chris
that you feel like you need to discuss with us do you need to come back at some point I think the only thing we have is the well monitoring in the street line snow and ice and snow and ice and I think Brenda can do those with us I think so okay beautiful not I back all
right thank you very quickly next week we do not have a finance committee meeting we have um the school committee meetings are next week we've got um Frontier on Tuesday and Deerfield on
Wednesday we had a we divvied those up right I'll go to the frontier one I think were you gonna go to the elementary it's on Wednesday Yeah Tuesday Wednesday I could probably hit one one or two of those too do do we have times on those 6 o' 6 p.m they're
both at 6 p.m and both in their respectives yes okay and then Wednesday is also the Franklin Tech budget public hearing that can be attended remotely um I will get a email to try and get a
link to that so I'll forward it to it in case anybody can attend that that would be great um otherwise our next meeting is Tuesday February 18th at 5:30 p.m. because Monday's a holiday right all right we have a motion to adjourn motion
to adjourn second second all those in favor motion to select Board second all those in favor Mel Cil CH I'm in favor thank you Christopher see see you
later