good evening and welcome to the Tanana Deerfield select board Board of Health sewer commissioner meeting of February 5th 2025 this meeting will be held in a hybrid fashion with the opportunity for both in-person attendance and remote participation please note that while an option for remote attendance Andor participation is being provided as a courtesy to the public the meeting hearing will not be suspended or terminated if technological problems interrupt the virtual broadcast unless otherwise required by law members of the public but par particular interest in
any specific item on this agenda should make plans for inperson versus virtual attendance accordingly the meeting will be held in person in the main meeting room of Deerfield municipal offices in accordance with Mass General Law chapter 30A anyone intending to record the meeting must identify themselves to the clerk Blake Gilmore and provide their name and address for the record so I'll call the meeting to order at 6:01 p.m. and um at this time I'd like to welcome anybody who has to it's worth of public comment uh to come up to the mic
and identify yourself and tell us what's on your mind or if there's anyone online that would like to make a comment please raise your hand and I see a hand raised so um recognize Lely Dwight thank you um I unfortunately have to run because of an emergency but I wanted to take a moment to um speak in support of that um MVP proposal for it I can't remember if it's five five PL
566 um speaking from the perspective of senior housing because um this is an opportunity to attract um even more developers I believe because it would lower the cost to the developer by putting impervious Pavement in the parking lot that they're going to have to have right so my understanding is that this could cover up to
75% of the cost of putting in the prvious pavement so we'd get like a twofer for the town where we'd be more attractive to a developer and we would have yet another large um containment of the flood waters from the bloody Brook so that's my comment thank you thank you Lily thank you thank you and also I would say you guys are really soft we will speak a little louder thank you you're welcome I know online it's
hard to hear we will speak up all right thank you leely um Mr [Music] Clark all right Jason Clark 81 North Main Street um last week I actually was able to attend I know a few of you guys were there to the bloody Brook uh meeting there um one of my concerns is one of the glaring things that was said at the beginning of that meeting and it was basically different preventions they
can take to actually get rid of or alleviate the flooding in the bloody Brook you know they went on about CTS getting State money to help fix that um I know we're talking now about permeable pavement getting State money for that but one of the simplest things that cost nothing was the change of the zoning okay and back in 2021 it was Article 8 there was Amendment to the zoning bylaws and it was specifically for the front of the M Municipal facilities and town own Lots M
my understanding is this was 50 ft and it was the intention was the leery lot unless there was further intentions down the road I actually think that if we're going to go on with anything with getting funding for permeable pavement this and that the first thing that should be looked at is we're sending that back to 200 ft for the town the town properties and that's the town property you guys are the ones developing on the bloody Brook so thank you all right thank you yeah thanks for your
comment anyone else online um I had my hand raised I this was just a comment on Carn just a second can you hear us than yes okay yes I was just about to recognize you so you can you can tell us what's on your mind oh okay I just want to say that um the housing units are going to be a friendly 40b so they're exempt from zoning just just to remind
you that thank you thank you um anyone else see no further hands um I would now like to uh move on to our hearings and appearances and I would welcome Allison mle from Treehouse brewing [Music] company thank you for the welcome always nice to uh up here in front of you guys
and I believe I do have a presentation I don't know if it's yeah give me just one moment up there is also a video in it but if we're we don't want to watch that that's okay we can pass that you guys can just enjoy it whenever you want okay was good to have promotional promotional material I enjoyed the video because it does showcase a lot of um different aspects of the town from the half marathons perspective so awesome you know we can put it on online or something if you want yeah
that'd be great and um to just let you guys know I'm here today to present about um the half marathon we are hopeful to uh have a third annual Treehouse half marathon on September 14th which is a Sunday um and is in the same sort of time frame that we would have had it last year and the year before that um and I'll get
into that a little bit further once uh the presentation is up um and I also know we are working towards a program to get pre-sale tickets for residents um for different concerts and unfortunately we're still working out those uh processes but we did launch Trampled by Turtles last week and JJ Gray um so if any Deerfield residents are interested in purchasing those they can head over over to the brewery and get those okay
um and hopefully before these happen I will have a system in place but we do have an announcement coming February 11th 13th and 18th um so if nothing else if you guys want to come over to the brewery and sign up for our mailing list you're more than welcome otherwise I will find a creative solution someday great thank you I think last time we spoke you mentioned that you might come up with a QR code and ask permission to post post that here that is my hope yep a QR code
so that you can put your information in y and it would that way it would be something between you and the residents and the would be involved which is a great idea if you can work it out that way we don't uh spam everybody with emergencies or concerts you know right one or the other right yep okay awesome well uh so without further Ado uh I am hopeful to again host treeh House's third annual half
marathon in September um and it once more the event is going to start and end at the brewery um and hopefully we'll take one of two previously designated courses uh some of that depends on whether or not we uh are successful with getting that Main Street Bridge back up and running um but thankfully we have two certified courses so we have uh an experience either way and um to ensure that this event goes off without a hitch
we continue to work with Deerfield Public Safety um I've met with police Fire EMS we are working with you all at the Town hopefully with the residents as well um and Dave mcgilvery Sports Enterprises which is dmse and they are the same people that host the half marathon and the things that they can do with hosting a road race are incredibly impressive so we are very lucky and fortunate to have them there um and then
you know myself and the events team at treehouse help on the back end and everything that happens at the brewery um to make this a community event for everyone um and we will have another community liaz on in 2025 so that way the residents throughout you know the time leading up to the half marathon and then on the race day have someone directly that they can contact which I think really made a big difference between year one and year two it really did yep and uh we can move on to the
next slide sure this is the course map um and this is the second Year's map that avoids that North Main Street Bridge um and it basically is a nice big loop except for that one section on River Road um and so that is our hope but it is a very pretty section of River Road so thank you to the River Road residents for letting us hang out up there
and finally I did just want to address um Community involvement so last year we donated around 177,000 to the frontier School uh we are going to maintain that 15,000 minimum and ask Runners to also contribute additional funds um to donate to the frontier school and different Athletics programs and um things along those lines within the frontier Regional Schools um there will be different volunteer opportunities we were very thankful to have all of our water
stations manned by different sports teams last year um I'm more than happy to recruit any other groups in town that want to help me volunteer that day so I don't have to do quite as many steps that would be great um so there are ample volunteer opportunities throughout the course and at the brewery and leading up to the event as well for bid pickup and things like that if you don't want to be at the excitement of race day great um and what we would like to offer
this year and I don't know the date yet that this would happen but whenever it is announced announced um outside of this room uh we would like to open up registration early for residents so again sort of the same mailing list like we have for concerts um and we would also like to offer 50 free spectator tickets to get on site um so that way that'd be fun you know it it is difficult to manage from a liquor license perspective the occupancy so we
want to at least make sure Deerfield residents can come and party with us awesome listen to music watch some Runners and cheer them on on site these are photos from the uh from the event and this is yes so we have some interior and exterior shots um and some from the road and that just kind of shows the different groups that came and wanted to hang out on you know what was our second good weather year so I'm hopeful I know uh that you know that Trend will
continue but I don't want to jinx it this this was from the first year these photos oh okay the um and you you've worked with the uh the date with like the craft fair I believe the craft fair is the following weekend which is why we kept it this weekend um but I did not confirm that so thank you for reminding me just double check yeah on that that be great good and that is all I've got for you right now very nice very nice so um are you asking for anything from us
tonight or uh I wanted to at least get the message out there um I don't know if there's any sort of formal processes you have in place for me to request anything um but you know um I ask for if nothing else your support in this um and we will continue to work with you to make sure the entire you know Community also has reason to support it so one thing um I would I would ask about is uh you know going through the minutes and uh I think
it was November 2023 I was reading the minutes I've got to approv tonight and we were talking about that second ESS Ingress entrance so I know it's been a long haul um and just wondered where you're at on that and what your thoughts are absolutely uh it has been a long haul on that one uh one that I'm very actively pursuing uh we do have engineer drawings um quotes have gone out to bid so we are you know accepting here's how much we
think it would cost um the next step is going to be um hopefully soon getting through the Conservation Commission because we do for that driveway have to go through Wetlands um and we will be doing a gravel road um so it's just a matter of trying to figure out the timing of I think slightly more soil samples which is a little tricky right now yeah it is pretty Frozen or wet yeah we L working on it uhk and when we
announce we'll have a better perspective on that okay that's awesome understand that that's one of the final things that the uh emergency action plan that You' been you update every year uh with the safety Departments of the Town that's one of the key things that they're looking at yes absolutely and I understand it from their perspective um I know in the long run it will make everybody's lives easier um just working to get it there through the process yeah appreciate that that effort you
mentioned also I think uh in a private conversation that you have a temporary fix if you don't get through the process of bidding and building and so forth I do uh but I uh in other conversations am going to continue to very strongly work towards a final solution because I think in the long run it will just make the most sense yep good great thank you so great news are you going to start advertising for this
now or you have you already we have not started to advertise it you guys are the first to know about it um and the hope is to advertise about it soon but I will make sure that you guys are aware of when that announcement goes out and whatever residents uh have signed up for that pre-sale pre-registration once I uh get on the ball and make some sort of process sounds good so just to clarify for if there were 50 Deerfield residents who wanted to run you're saying that they could get free admission or is it
just spectator just spectator tickets um early not volunteering to run I just no come on you can do it it's only 13 miles it's fine yeah nothing only if Blake with a really nice hail at the end okay I hear if you walk fast enough you could do it yeah yeah okay but yeah so no no official announcement yet I will keep you all in the loop as to uh when that is about to go out uh hopefully soon so that I have more time to plan but we never know sounds good thank you
all right Al thank you great have a good night you too thank you all right next up um is Joshua Sparks the chief of the uh EMS Department hi everybody good evening thanks for coming I am here tonight to request the write
off for uh archiv DMS receivables um that are in with ffr um who is our secondary um collection collection agent um for EMS billing uh in the amount of $526,000 uh $526 55040 40 yes so these uh amounts uh
we've come to you uh I came to you last year with this uh or earlier this year and uh this happened again in 2023 I believe it was November um Tim drum gold came to you at that time these are delinquent accounts that have not been paid so what they do is they go into collections and at a certain point they end up in different status uh in some
instances um the person is deceased uh there are several instances of bankruptcy uh in some cases there's no authorization to build them if they live out of state uh in certain areas uh and often times um there's a small number of them uh that have been written off because of financial hardship where they just simply don't have the ability to pay so what happens is poor Brenda uh has
spent countless hours here and at home trying to reconcile these uh and in consultation with the auditor um it was agreed that this would be the most appropriate move uh it's what we've done in the past is to write them off this takes them off of our books it does not take them off of ffr's books they continue to pursue the ones that they can pursue uh so there's always that potential for additional revenues uh but this lets us square up our books by uh
eliminating that deficit yep and do you have any information about the period that this covers I mean is this relatively recent debt or is this over a long longer period so the earliest ones in this batch uh and this will be uh a fairly regular thing we'll be doing uh at least annually if not more often uh in this batch they go back to 2018 the most recent ones are from February of
2024 so what's happening is these some of these accounts have been sitting collection and they finally get kicked back to you is that how it works because we already rode off 300 and something th000 already this year I think yep so earlier this year we did but what happens is some of them Reach a statute of limitations where they we can no longer go after them uh other ones are moved into a different status and so it's always in motion well
and I think if I remember right we wrote off from Comcast last time Comstar last time um and you know I was talking to Brenda a little bit about this before the meeting just to get get an understanding of it and um this cleans up the accounting process and it doesn't mean that we won't have an opportunity to collect some of this money it this this secondary collection entity other than Comstar does their
work and if they do get some payment from it they put it back on Comstar and then it gets wiped off so it there is still the opportunity of money to come back to the town it just cleans up the accounting part of it because Brenda has been trying to reconcile between Comstar ffr and our books and it's just been a nightmare but she's watched that number steadily for three months and it stayed the same number so it's we're safe enough to to kind of write this this portion of it off of and um get one thing off of her desk
precisely more eloquently than I put it no it's it's fine thank you um so do you need a motion yeah i' take a motion to yep do this I'll make a motion to um uh approve the write off uh through the accounting and uh on the recommendation of our Auditors to um uh of $526,500 40 cents from the
ffr um portion of the South County EMS um books second any further discussion hearing none all those in favor Trevor McDaniel I Blake Gilmore I Tim hilchie I thank you Chief thank you very much appreciate your time this evening thank you hopefully see you tomorrow if it's not too snowly see you tomorrow
all right next up um is paesi uh to discuss the town clock good evening good evening welcome so you you guys got the you've got the the invoice from Sean Kane okay so I guess I'm here just to I know there's been some accounting and whatever going on so I guess I'm here to if it's going to be approved and then I can get a hold
of Shawn and he can you know schedule the work to be done and uh it'll look nice it really will so just the just I I have is this the about time yeah one okay yep and that that's to up update the clock no this is this is to Pro the material and labor to uh replace the existing fluorescent the lighting the they're they're shot and the and going with LED lighting you're going with Led Led
around all all four all four faces thank you that was that was my question that's oh yeah so it's the stuff that's up there the ballister are shot right you know I think I tried flipping the I think like one I got to work right I thought about turning them on but just it would look sort of half biged so yeah no it makes sense and you'll have to climb up there all the time changing bulbs it's fun yeah if I may just interject if you if you would just um recap your uh the the maintenance as
opposed to the repair and just them you you guys ALS you guys also got the the um I asked um Sean to update the uh the the the contract for three years right which is is moving to twice a year correct yeah it was he had it at three and I said pull it back and um so it's number of visits in the contract for six visits for a cost of50 $550 each visit yeah and if you saw what he did to do what he has to do it's you it's quite bargain yeah so that that
will fall it's a bargain that will fall into your into your budget that currently currently exists and so what he's asking for is the consideration of the repair which is the 2800 from the last meeting in 12 uh December 18th right okay right so the 2873 is the back to your maintenance he does it twice a year yep at daylight savings time so he moves the hands as well well I I can I've done it now I mean I'm I he he did do it by chance it
was just matter you know matter of timing but I've done it um you know when when you have to turn it back then I just go I turn it off go away for an hour and come back and turn it back on and then uh we lost I still have yet to figure out about a month ago I went by one day that was during Christmas right after Christmas and it's 20 minutes slow huh and I'm like what so I went up and following the instructions and and you know how you how you have to do it and got it back
but to this day I don't know why huh it it it's it's in but it was running power out maybe something I don't know I want to ask because you go down in the basement at the church and it's got its own breaker oh okay yeah that was that was on and then I you know it both break nothing was wrong up up in the up in the uh up in the tower yeah I don't know huh so I made him aware of it but it's been fine since good so good good but now I now we'll we'll all be able to see the
time instead of you know driving by and squinting the 2800 to do the lighting is coming out of do we have an account I think that's why he came back is that we had left it open it's to find an account we discussed about possibly having it taken out of building maintenance yeah and uh and looking at it at you know possibly by the end of the year you do a transfer if transfer so you know if you want to move ahead with the yeah we do yeah and and DPW said that they had money in the
building maintenance account to cover it for okay but that uh yeah so why we have two motions we'll yeah so I'll make a motion to approve the service contract okay I'll I'll okay I'll advise Shan of that okay in the amount of $550 per visit for two visits annually annually a number of six visits y okay second all right any further discussion nope hearing none all those in favor Trevor McDaniel I Blake Gilmore I Tim Hill g i
and then um I would I will make a motion to approve the um contract of I be $2,800 even rough yeah 2873 yeah 2873 to to uh do the repair of the lighting to the clock yep second thank you any further discussion hearing none all those in favor trair McDaniel I Blake Gilmore I timg and I also feel like we're investing in that we I think I mentioned this to just Tim off the off the cluff
that um we really need to uh look at cost to refinish the paint on the steeple uh you do I mean when I there some carpentry to when I was a member of the church I mean you struggled I mean there's only so much we could do and that needs it really does now was that was there gr was there money aside for uh working on the um the steeple in terms of Shoring we did we did the two Rafters and I think when they looked at the rafter work when they replaced it they said that steeple is stable it's not going
anywhere but it is crushed a bit and he said if you're if I guess maybe Tim the short answer is that it it does need to be straightened um and the engineering firm um that took care of the structural defect in the roof structure um pointed out that wood has been compressed in one of the main yeah and that to fix it you need to grab it from the outside to the right position and then put in
essentially non compress sh sh or whatever yeah so um and I think Trevor was right that we need to look at uh the painting painting to make sure that there's no further deterioration of the wood structure um so um we will probably have to get I want get it in front of capital yeah I because Sean does this stuff throughout the I could ask him and say does he know any pain you know what I mean yeah well next to my office in Pella they uh this this fall they had a
company I got a photo of their truck and stuff and talked to the guy and he painted the steeple and the church and everything there so I got more theer more the marrier I I can ask I mean this is what he does for people must must know other people in the business so if you're in a steeple you probably know steeple you probably know what exactly love to uh love to get that on in front of capital and find some some money to do that just getting the face done lit up is one thing but if we could get that done which we always did in my years but
you know it's a lot of money it is so thank you very much for your work on appreciate you good night good night so um select board announcements Trevor are you going to do this wreck department stuff or yes I will uh I'll hit those quick and then um I just want to make a note to public that um we're wrapping up the feasibility study for the senior center um and there
is going to be a public um presentation of that feasibility study and the two options that were that came out of that uh for discussion and that will be held at Frontier because three town you know entity we felt the best place to do that would be in the auditorium at Frontier on February 9th excuse me February 19th at 6:00 um we have the the people who uh EDM who had done the done a lot of the
engineering work on it there's some schematics there's kind of background of all the other studies that have been done to kind of talk about why the needs of the seniors uh why why they need a space how much space they need you know how much money that cost uh came out with a couple ideas on where the where they could go and how much that that all cost it doesn't mean we're going that route but just gives the public a good idea of you know what the what the needs were that were found and how much it would cost to do with if we follow that route um but that that presentation
should be good we'd love to get as much public out um you know to just to hear hear the information and absorb it and ask questions um so that'll be February 19th at 6 o'cl at Frontier Auditorium um I've got a couple of things that Sue anelis asked me to read for the recreation department so the Deerfield recck uh 2025 baseball and softball registration will be open Thursday February 13th from 5:30 to 6 6:30 at the Town Hall here um baseball registration
is for Deerfield children in kindergarten to 6th grade um softball registration is for girls from Conway Deerfield weightly in uh 2 to sixth grade or you can print the forms off the website at ww. Dearfield ma.us and mail them to the recreation department or put them in the Dropbox in the lobby of the Town Hall by February 13th for more information you can contact Sue at 665 1400 her extension is 107 or you can
email the rec department at um rec department or Rec uh R CDE PT at town. deerfield.ma us and then um You Light Up My Heart luminary night so she's uh the rec department has been doing this which is really fun for the community uh for the last few years we have a uh special people in our lives that make us happy um be it family or friends that make us smile in good times and bad let's celebrate those we love with a show of community Spirit by lighting up our
walkways and driveways with luminaries on Valentine's Day uh date is February 14th 2025 which is a Friday from 6:00 p.m. to 900 p.m. uh Phil heart cutout bags or milk jugs with sand and votive lights and place along the driveways and walkways decorate your door and or yard with hearts and red lights uh drive around town and toot your horn to support all those who have decorated uh heart cutout bags and VOD of candles are available from the rec department there's uh 10 bags and 10 teen lights
for 10 bucks um to order bags and arrange pickup again call uh Sue antonellis at the rec department um or email her at Rec Department um at town. deerfield.ma or you call her at 413 66514 extension 107 [Music] um that's all I got I don't we have we been here since we did our MMA I was just going to talk about that so yeah go ahead I'll let you yeah great you got anything oh
good um so um as Trevor alluded to we uh had the annual annual um Massachusetts Municipal Association conference in uh Boston the end of January um several of uh well the select board went and um the Town Administrator and assistant Town Administrator and these conferences allow us to work with you know other state agencies directly um so we went to
various um conferences uh among them working with uh fiscal and economic Outlook um navigating difficult uh politically contentious legal matters in a select board or town meeting framework um also um talking about Accel accelerating housing production while addressing you know typical roadblocks
and um we also on the final day um had the opportunity to see our former assistant Town Administrator Chris Nolan and uh our current town I'm assistant and our current Town Administrator Christopher Dunn present a in a discussion about um the ly lot was actually a focus of this but it was focusing on federal funds now recent developments have call those things into question but uh um we
are we fortunate enough to benefit from the programs that were existing at the time um and we also reached out to the Department of Revenue and desie to talk about school issues um among other things and so we heard from our governor and our lieutenant governor uh about their plans for the coming year and um all in all uh we also attended um my backed um programming that gives us discounts
on our insurance our townwide insurance policies so um all in all it was good experience I think I for my first time being there I thought it was a great experience because we got to meet other um Town c um city councilors as well as other select board members Mayors and people were talking about the problems they had in their own cities and towns and the fact that excuse me but I've got a cold I'm trying to speak up so
um anyways uh it uh and talking to them found out that some of the problems we had that we have were we're facing they're facing as well but on a higher Grand uh scale grander scale than we do so I thought it was pretty interesting and some and they talked about some of the solutions that they used so I again I thought it was invaluable to go there to meet up with different people from throughout the state that uh could help us you know or just give us some ideas
of where we need to be going good and finally um I just wanted to mention that um I've been dis we're we're facing a every year is a every budget year is a tough budget year but um we are facing uh Confluence of things happening this year um the police and the um DPW and the schools are all out collective bargaining so they're working on their next three-year contracts um
and at the same time um our insurance costs are looking at escalating about 18% y so um it's a huge jump we typically ask our Department's Chiefs and and the schools to build a budget that anticipates level service which is providing the same service as you did the previous year um I'm asking uh Christopher to reach out to the
department heads and ask them to also look at level funding which is not spending any more money than you spent last year um not that we anticipate that we won't be able to make the budget work but this will allow us to understand the ramifications of if we have to ask departments to spend less or or spend the same what would they have to do in order to make that possible so um I just wanted to share that with everyone mhm anything else from the board all
right so now we'll move on to the minutes or is the Board of Health here uh I do we have anything from NED I think he just wanted to mention one thing yeah he shared a report give me one moment I'm just going to pull it up and and walk through it really quickly I'll do the you want me to do the minutes first oh sure oh it's up to you yeah go ahead yeah I'll knock out the minutes while you look look for that um so I'll make a motion there's a there's a whole round of them here and I can't thank um those enough for doing this ad
I know I think Adam's been working on it and others uh so hard to keep them all straight yeah or Al Alex has been working on yes thank you yeah there's a lot here um so uh went through them all there is one uh one adjustment I think that Greg already caught uh for the the date just needs to be changed on the top which was I think for the 8th um March 8 March 8th yeah so um other than that they're good to go so I'll make a motion to approve all of these minutes um so we
have an executive session minutes of um J uh January 22nd 2025 uh regular session minutes for January 22nd 2025 uh let's see uh for April 17th 2024 April 9th 2024 March 20th 2024 March 6th 2024 February 7th 2024 February 5th 2024 MVP um February 2nd
2024 January 31st 2024 January 10th 2024 January 3rd 2024 December 27th uh 2023 and November 30th 2023 make a motion to approve all those minutes thank you any further discussion NOP hearing none all those in favor Trevor McDaniel I Blake Gilmore I Tim Hil it's got to get us close to yep well it
looks like we're we're actually up to date in January of 2025 very nice that's a good thing that is a good thing and we vow not to get behind right thank you AI thank you Alex okay so back to uh the the Board of Health briefly sure and I'll just I'll just mention a couple things that Ned brought up um you know one obviously there's a an outbreak of GI related illnesses among schools and dayc carees and elsewhere so just he's um reaching out to school officials in regards to
that but just a reminder everyone you know be careful wash your hands thoroughly often um same way you would vote you know yes so um and beyond that I did want to mention Cindy uh our our public nurse is going to be out for a little bit um and master tataro is going to be filling in I believe she's done that in the past so I think people might know Ann a little bit from her work uh here and in Sunland and other places U but she'll be helping out for a bit um and uh in terms of inspections Ned uh
inspected the da and Eaglebrook uh ice rinks he did food inspections at bamboo Asian neighbors convenience Deerfield convenience Hillside Pizza and New Market Cafe uh he dealt with some some complaints uh on River Road and he also uh completed his tier 2 housing training oh good with the TP so um any any questions from board members or any thoughts on uh public health issues we want to bring to Ned's attention no I still I'm still concerned I mean it's
cold out and we do still have some homeless uh that are dealing with you know it it's difficult when you're when you're struggling and you're I I thought I saw like something on five and 10 it was you know what so I'm hoping that U police are involved in in that but we just want to try and find ways um I've been thinking and talking to fhog a bit about trying to find those res sources to help when when families are struggling and it's super cold out
and it's difficult to be living in a car right now um it's been a hard winter so for those that usually been used to getting through Winters that aren't so bad this one's been really tough and just really want to work on and think about ways that we can reach out to entities to help people in those situations so I I know the police department is well aware of what's going on on five and 10 M but the other thing is anybody driving by anybody else or neighbors of
somebody that's having trouble getting heat into their house I think that needs to be you know reported to the point where just get it to somebody so that maybe we can get some help for them so you know the old see something say something type thing yep and um just Greenfield does run um overnight um heating um program shelters for anyone who you know of who might be in a situation like that um I involved in
this Massachusetts uh rescue organization that flags up looking for volunteers to sit in you know make sure that the the shelters are safe for the people that are there so um anyone wants information about that we can provide it to them great thank you all right thank you Christopher on Ned's behalf um next up are we're going to put a
table on the sewer baits or did you have something else something I well so I I talked to Brenda a bit about this so we have a sewer baitman at the um Tilton because that's been shut down for this whole cycle and has not been using it so they had put an AB batement in but I didn't have the bill amount but talking to Brenda she believes it was that minimum um usage charge you know there there's still a um connection fee charge um uh but the the minimum usage I
was going to make a motion to Abate that um because they're at a spot where if it's not abated tonight then it's past time and then they have Sur charge on it it's just a waste of money for the town so um so I was going to make a motion to Abate the sewer abatement and then talk to Sarah tomorrow about it uh coming to just deal with that that way that we would foro that um the one at 28 Conway Street I just need a little more
information I don't have any um I don't have any sewer bill on that or usage bill but I think it's same same situation as as we did last week where um there would be a connection fee but but there's no one's been in the house and it hasn't been used for since 2019 I think so um we can't Abate previous years but we could help this year uh so I we will look at that but um and I just want to make sure that bill was paid because we can only Abate bills that haven't been paid so or have already
been paid do you want do we need to take action on North Main Street yes I would like to make a motion to um to approve an abatement of the minimum usage charge at um 75 North Main Street second for previous billing cycle all right any further discussion no hearing none all those in favor Trevor McDaniel I Blake Gilmore I Tim hilchie I and I'll talk to Sarah tomorrow on that uh to get that squared away
okay next up um are we going to have anybody in the audience presenting or um next up we have an award of land conservation assistance grant um for the survey of the pumic rock property in the amount of $3,730 um if there's anyone from the open space committee who wants to discuss this with us otherwise I'll have Christopher done talk about
it Christopher over to you yeah I'm happy to speak to it uh yep so just as a little reminder so this was prompted by uh back at around special time meeting we were looking at putting pum Rock under article 97 protection um you know we we're wondering given that there are you know utility Towers up there uh what the impact of that would be there so we wanted to have a professional land survey done just to make make sure we're absolutely sure that you know those uh
facilities are not going to be negatively impacted by permanently protecting the land um so Julie Caswell the open space committee took the lead on this um I provided a little bit of information around land surveying specs and they uh managed to get this uh this land conservation assistance grant in the amount of $35,000 so so it's great it's going to be um I believe we're going to have uh we got quotes from a few different surveyors and I think Berkshire Design Group who of course we've worked with a lot in the past I believe is the The Firm we're going to go with for the survey great um so that
that work may take a little time to kick off given the weather and the the state of things up on the Rock so to speak um but you know once it gets a little bit warmer um you know that that work can get done and um that'll facilitate the opportunity to once again consider placing that land in excuse me article 97 protection perfect so we need to make a motion to approve the reception of the award and authorize you to sign for the town couldn't hurt all right so I'll make that motion I'll second that motion
it sounded well thought out it was great um any further discussion no all right all those in favor tror McDaniel I Blake Gilmore I Tim hilchie I thanks thanks very much thanks Julie for thank you for the work I know you're not here tonight but no really appreciate it that's great news all right and then we the next topic is um was brought up uh briefly at the
screen at our select board meeting to interview um planner candidates um we are looking uh the the MVP Core Group which you know works on resiliency issues in town is um asking the town to um write a letter of interest in exploring exploring how the town can uh pursue help from the pl 566 water Pro water
protection and flood prevention act um office and uh so we have asked uh Christopher Dunn to write a letter about this we're going to discuss it of course so um Christopher do you want to talk a little bit about what you've done research on us for us yeah sure happy to to bring it up but I know Carolyn is obviously a great Point person for this effort and so she's a I'm sure available to speak to it as well but I would just mention um you know I did have an opportunity
after that meeting on Thursday uh where the board decided we wanted to look into it a little further before moving forward with the vote um I did have an opportunity to connect uh with someone at the uh conservation Resources office in Hadley um you know talk through what is involved with What's called the piffer the preliminary investig investigatory uh findings report um which is essentially where you figure out whether or not your Watershed is in fact eligible for construction funding
um you know through the federal government um for this kind of flood mitigation um and so they so I spoke with them a little bit about it sounds like it's a very light lift for our staff fortunately it's really a process that um you know they'll they'll it's prescribed and they'll run with it and essentially you know as I believe was mentioned in the MVP core group meeting given that we have this hydraulic hydrologic study the brook ready um you know there's an opportunity to sort of hand off those findings to uh
conservation resources and have them use that to build out the piffer um in anticipation of um you know findings in which we believe we'd be El eligible for for further Federal funding for construction great I mean my um my feelings on this a bit are that I uh you know is devastating for people on Bloody Brook who you know year in year out are dealing with the flooding that happens it dissipates you know few days later
but during the time they don't know how much of their house is going to be flooded or not um and it you know it's it's it's a strain on on everybody on that section and I'm glad that we're doing the studies um the other part of me is that I I I'm always concerned about staff time and how much we have going on in town and so I'm thankful to hear that it's not a big lift for us at the moment and it does kind of maybe opens up up the window to possible funding to help with covert covert work
uh in the future so anywhere we can get help to do that so those sound like both win-wins for me to keep moving on this without you know a huge distraction so I'm in support yeah and um I think that the MVP um informational session we were lucky to have people who live in the area for many many years who came out and um shared information with the uh field geologic survey uh services and uh GZA who are the two parties that are
helping us with both the bloody Brook and the Sugarloaf for Blacksmith Brooks studies um and you know that's what one of the purposes of the meeting was to elicit information from residents um because the project is really some of the field work is done but a lot of the science is still yet to be undertaken and the modeling of how the system works is in the works so
there'll be another meeting in the future to to share you know the modeling and and what they've discovered and so um do you have any thoughts Blake yeah um after talking to Christopher um and he explained a little bit further how this is going to pan out um I'm definitely in agreement with uh moving forward with this I'm just concerned again about you know the the method and how we're going to
get it done so after speaking to Carolyn the other night I will be attending uh some of your meetings coming up so I become better familiarized with the process great and understand what uh a little bit more about what's Happening Here r r MVP meetings yes oh good that'll be great um Carolyn did you have a I think you had your hand up you that by writing the letter um to um
participate it also opens it up for other stakeholders and other land owners um you know like Pelican can you know apply for say replacing their um parking lot with pervious payment and a holding tank um definitely bloody Brook Farm I um have been talking to to James heler he's already doing the paperwork so he'll be eligible to participate because that's obviously one of the choke points
already that most of us know about so but by participating all we're doing is is um identifying other Solutions you know all these holding tanks and the stuff that like Portsmith New Hampshire's been doing that I've observed over the years or what Cambridge has done those are just my ideas and what this will do is open it up and have in you know that's
part of the piffer is to identify other Solutions and who are the other players that would have a possibility of participating like the state we obviously know the covert by Fisher's garage is in ill repair so obviously that would be something that would be not Town owned or town responsibility but would be having the opportunity for the state to participate too so it's it's a kind of a win-win because it
takes the information that's generated by H our hydrology study but then it goes a little bit further almost to the design phase but again it's 100% paid for by nrcs the design phase should we choose to go on or we could pick projects that we as a town want to participate in that's paid for 100% as well as all the permitting it's then you go you have to decide what um you know
you're doing and that you do want to participate in that final solution and then it's paid 75% of the final solution great but those are different phases down the line this just triggers yes there's a flooding risk we have residents at risk our town is at risk nobody has flood insurance we want to mitigate it and what are the possible solutions that's all we're participating in at at the which is what most the information as Christopher alluded to will come from the hydrology study right
but I I don't know who um Christopher did you talk to Darren Davis yeah I believe it was Darren yep okay well Darren Davis is a state engineer and he is willing to work with both field geology and GZA because he's had a relationship with them and and of course you know they're the ones that are doing our ology study so it's it's a win-win for all of us really great great thank
you Carol thank you so do we have a motion yet I think um I'll make a motion if we haven't already a motion to support the letter of support to uh to the Dan Wright State conservationist National resource uh conservation service um for the piffer uh program second uh any further discussion um hearing none all those in favor Trevor McDaniel I Blake Gilmore I Tim hilchie I thank you great thank
you thank you very yeah thank you I thought she all right didn't we already accept Joan Carney's resignation we may have is that a redundancy or did we not take I think I think we got it right at the end of held off yeah yeah okay that makes sense I know I remember seeing it so I mean it's it's also a moderator's appointment so gotcha yeah
so we don't have to do anything with it okay just noticed and and I know Holly's Holly's here tonight and I know Holly had applied to fill the vacancy um and it sounds like the scheduling is not going to work out possibly Holly but okay yeah well I'll I'll follow up with you then yeah thank you appreciate your patience in any case we just like to thank Joan Carney um for her work on the Personnel Board as Christopher mentioned he was a moderator's appointment and he
will he will be the person who decides who will fill the vacancy gotcha okay so is there any correspondence we want to share I don't think we have any at this time um I'm happy to speak to my report at this point that uh really quick just want to put a plug in um Sarah Kimble our Treasurer collector has been going through um you know tax title properties and we've got a handful that have been identified as uh land of low
value um and so we we are looking to schedule an auction for those properties uh on June 3 of this year um it's just four properties right now um all of them vacant um and happy to share a list down the road so we can take a look at it they would normally go to the uh town meeting right for approval to be OED yeah I've got a I've got to check with Sarah on the exact process there but at another time seeing it go through and
then then it went on after yeah okay y good and I actually visited the one on Baker Street just to see and it's um as as we suspected it's it's a very Steep and it looks like an undevelopable lot um it's adjacent to two other lots that have a similar topography and uh two of those are owned by the house that is adjacent to it so um great all right okay yep and then I did
just want to speak really quick to the federal funding PA obviously there was a I guess I would call it a hollow is there is there not yeah so you know obviously there was a lot of a lot of executive orders and memos that came out in the last couple weeks um given that we have Federal funding for the L lot uh the 1888 building uh there you know was a loan for the South Deerfield wastewater treatment plant um and still water of course once we get there that
would hopefully be uh partially F federally funded as well um you know this was concerns the town of Deerfield um just it's all waste it's all waste yeah um at this point you know it's the the the pause is on pause um and so we received um you know notice from the doj basically saying you know at this point Federal agen are not supposed to be um are supposed to be dispers dispersing
funding as they normally would um and you know as a you know a a local political entity you know we're we're notified about that so um just wanted to kind of put put that to bed for the moment uh you know we're still expecting to receive all the funding we've we've uh gone out for um and then I did want to bring up the old Deerfield wastewater treatment plant I know DPC had provided a kind of one pager on a a possible phased approach yes um hoping to set up a meeting with them uh some point soon
um possibly is a special meeting separate from the regular select board agenda if that would work for folks that's that's an option I I talked to David uh I think last week and was kind of requesting at least just some sort of ballpark figures not not like put out a full RFP or something but just like what do we think electrical would what do we think the you know the the grinder and the pump channel would be and then like
what about the tanks just to have some sort of ballpark to talk about um not doing a major overhaul but at least mainly that electrical one because that would be phase one but yeah would love to set up a meeting whenever everybody's ready and then we can talk with all those involved great great so I'll reach out to Dave and we'll see if we can find a time uh possibly next week given that's an off week for the S board just warm body but you're doing the heavy lifting exclamation point thank you so
much oh um just want to add a comment about Federal funding um before the courts stepped in and clarified the situation um and uh we were I I participated in a webinar with uh Senator Mary in his office at which you know we're basically just clarified that the town is interested in working closely with the Senate uh our
two senators and our representative to you know address this sort of uh well the courts have said it's not it it's not the proper way to do things so um we'll we'll be working closely with them to protect our rights and you know the monies that the the Congress has allocated to Deerfield is money that Deerfield should receive so um you know we're going to be actively involved in as much as a select board can influence
the national government we're going the rubber meets the road where the rubber meets the road well and maybe get uh the residents involved and some of them could be writing letters as well yeah we'll see whatever um makes sense to do I mean uh these are programs that we act you know we in good faith acted acted on and were granted the you know this award these Awards and we just want to make sure that we don't expend money without
uh you know getting what we were promised um okay so I've got uh just a handful of other updates that works um so really quick on the Personnel front uh so we're we're very close to completing negotiations with uh who I hope will be our new town planner um so more good news to come on that front very shortly I believe Public Work superintendent uh our screening group uh that's bill hildr um Pete lankowski and
then also Chief PK and myself are going to be meeting this week uh to do some preliminary screening interviews we've got a good crop of candidates and I'm hopeful from that process we're going to get a new great superintendent as well um we did post a mechanic position um so that's out there and I believe we've gotten quite a few quite a few applications to date um that Chris Miller is reviewing um and then I did just want to highlight we also are hiring a new wastewater
treatment plant operator um Eric uh believe had a former employee come back and who's interested and we Happ to have someone who's retiring at this time um so that job is posted and out there um and hopefully we'll have that filled very shortly I know I know it's um Gary's G to be his last day I'm not sure exactly when but I just wanted to take a moment to thank Gary for his service to the town he uh when we we didn't have anybody but Gary to run both plants he worked TIR last name Gary Ben um and he
is um he's just uh one of those employees that you're really thankful to have in an emergency when you know leadership's gone and other people are gone and you can't get any help and he was there for us and making sure that um you know everything flowed so uh very very grateful and I wish him all the luck I know he's going down to a little bit warmer temperature uh down south so
very happy to have him uh serve Deerfield for all that time and I'm very grateful for his service yeah so back up a little bit Chris would be a mechanic and uh you've got the uh younger guy that's in there working on the vehicles now what's going to happen with him yeah Jaden Melnick uh yep so Jaden is uh has been offered the position of operator in training SL maintenance technician if we hire that mechanic position some of those maintenance duties would shift um but
he's aware of that and uh yeah he's been the a great addition to the team from he's going to stay on board we're not going okay thank you he's a great great ad to the town yep good worker um really quick I did want to mention Town common um so we're going to have rep play here next week it looks like um and uh and her staff um and I did let her know you know her staff know we'd be be interested in talking about the town common where that sits the relationship with Mast do and all of that particularly given the the Elm Street
complete streets funding we've received uh Still Water uh site visit with um executive office of energy and environmental Affairs was completed a couple weeks ago so we got to actually walk down to the the below the bridge with the hydro company and then also um the mitigation land we're looking at further up River um that the town currently owns uh and I also got a chance to meet with our ative delegation and mot and just discuss timeline it is a tight timeline from the legislator's
perspective um so we're going to be working really closely with them to try to get the article 97 legislation passed um in a timely fashion um you know the the challenge is just once you get into the fall they can't actually they can't they don't control the calendar and so um they're kind of at the mercy of the the Senate and House Clerk and when they schedule things so whatever if they need um you know uh testimony from us I mean whatever they need just let us know the date I'm happy to go to Boston or at
least get on a zoom yeah absolutely yeah um real quick also 1888 Hazmat bids are out um we did have a a pre-bid walk through the other morning and had a couple interested firms come by and and some who contacted me afterwards um so hopefully we're going to get good competitive bid on that project uh the cleanout is proceeding a pace um um and you know we should be I believe those bids are going to be in on February 12th
so might want to look at possibly that's a good date to schedule a special meeting and talk to DPC and check off some of these other items y um Greg you want to mention anything about how the bloody Brook Sugarloaf Brook meeting went the other night um I think many of us were there and I thought uh they they did an excellent job I mean Ros Ley and Nick uh you know did did a wonderful presentation on where they are and uh where they're going with those grants and the
hydrological uh studies that they're doing um yeah I mean I I think it led into the um the piffer grant uh which then became a conversation which I'm glad that you know worked its way through and and led to the recommendation of the letter so that's great um I mean the only thing I would add if you're done I just you know as far as on my end uh things I've been working on I mean the one that the the land of low value which I think is
actually it's very interesting free cash yeah yeah you know you're like what why is the town getting rid of that but I mean there's I think it's important to to say the town's people just because you're you're taking to auction does not mean it's going to sell because they're they're of low value for a reason riches often it's because no one wants them um it doesn't mean that no one will bid on them they might it might be wear something to in a butter or you know for whatever reason but uh but there's no guarantee on that uh and then the only
other thing I would um would say is that we're we're getting more information on the EV Chargers in terms of the uh what kind of Revenue they're generating and I think I think we're in good shape I think we are covering uh our monthly expenses in terms of the electricity versus the revenue coming in um I I do believe we're we were probably in the Black by about $200 um but I think we we do need to have another at least month or two just to see where things where where things
land but we're we're in good shape I think there was discussion at the finance committee a bit about you know not this year but maybe at some point talking about a revolving fund that way you can kind of track it a little bit better and but but there does need to be some time go by before we go ahead and do that yep great and uh I will just say um Elm Street I just did want to mention you know we've got a revised um proposal from tyan bond for for uh final design through construction
Administration it's it's still a bit high so I'm still going to keep working with them on that front um hoping once we've got the new Planner on board this is a project that they can really run with um because it's a really exciting opportunity for for someone in that field um beyond that landfill solar just wanted to mention the planning board did endorse an anr uh on Monday so that that single parcel rule can be conformed with that thep you has for net metering and um and then lastly just uh you know we
talked about uh we had our admin team meeting on Monday and talked about the town meeting warrant obviously we got to start working on that we've got a running list of items including that revolving fund uh for EV charging um but hoping to get a draft in front of this board uh at the February 19th meeting um so we can uh you know move that forward as well and I have one final thing that I I don't think we touch on but um the library received notification from the mblc that they're going to accelerate
their payments so we're going to get our fourth and fifth payments this year um which will benefit the town by reducing our short-term borrowing loans and we're also going to be working with the mlc to ask them if they could accelerate the fifth now that they've told us they're going to give this money this year we are locked into a bonding bonding cycle where we have to bond in November and we would like to get them the final payment
the fifth payment in October so we don't have to wait a year to take the benefit of getting this money early right so um and we have a good relationship with uh mblc and hopefully we can get them to see the sense of helping us in that way yeah it's only about 15 or 20 days yeah that be great keep everyone posted good de de anything else I'll make a motion to adjourn
second all those in favor Char McDaniel I Blake Gilmore I Tim Hil I thank you all very much thank you