yeah it's novel i have six o'clock so uh seeing at 6:00 uh the April 7th 2025 meeting of the Garter City Council finance committee will come to order the clerk will please call the role council Delaw
present council Heckler present on to the announcement of open meeting recordings any person may make a video audio recording of an open session of a meeting or may transmit the meeting through any medium subject to reasonable requirements of the chair as to the number placement and operational equipment used so as to not interfere
with the conduct of the meeting any person intending to make this recording shall notify the chair for all documents and exhibits used or referenced at the meeting must be submitted in duplicate to the city clerk has become part of the meeting minutes is there anyone recording other than staff there's none reading uh on to
section one the review and approval of meeting minutes of February 12th 2025 and February 26th 2025 mr chairman yes move to dispense with the reading of the minutes and accept as presented second motion by council Hegeland second by
councelor general to wave the reading of the minutes and accept them as presented is there any further discussion hearing none all those in favor say I i opposed the motion carries uh first time on the agenda item 11515 a
resolution of disapproval and opposition to the proposed building department fee increases submitted by President Tyros who is here present um like to come up and speak to your item thank you Mr chair prepared some remarks for this
evening it'd be fair to ask why I feel it was necessary to propose this resolution and I understand some people may think it premature however I think this is a serious issue this proposal put forward and sent to the council by the building commissioner is potentially
damaging to the image of gardener and as a matter of public record I feel we need to quickly and decisively reject this proposal before there's any inkling that we are going to give it any consideration building costs are already expensive permitting fees are already expensive and navigating city
bureaucracy can already be burdensome this proposal would substantially increase costs and give nothing additionally to the residents or businesses in return so again I realize this is not the typical way we would do this but I certainly have no intention of supporting fee increases there may be an
appetite for that i guess we'll find out in 2022 we raised fees for the first time in 14 years i thought then given the time that had passed it made sense to do so at that time we discussed conducting another review after five years had passed which put this proposal
at least two years ahead of schedule i am deeply concerned about the proposal requesting a substantial pay increase submitted shortly after the fee increase proposal these are two proposals which are included in our packet seem to be paired together as just a few hours after the fee increase
proposal the building commissioner put forward a follow-up proposal to substantially increase his own salary i do not want any of our constituents to think not even for one second that we would consider raising fees paid by residents solely to increase the salary of a department head such a scenario
would present a clear conflict of interest establishing a link between fees and fines collected by government entity and their salaries of those imposing them is undeniably bad policy this has been demonstrated time and time again frankly I'm disappointed that this
concept was put into words let alone presented on city letterhead the other reason we should deal with this issue now concerns the credibility of this council when we last took up this issue the mayor and the council at the time said it was best practice to review this every 5 years
which again puts this proposal at least 2 to 3 years in advance there's a lot of fee increases listed here far too many to take the time to list this evening but as examples this proposal includes a 50% increase to the minimum building permit fee a 28 1.5
increase to the fee by square footage for new single family and two family permits it nearly doubles the fee for signs and it triples the fees for fences just to name a few not just being talked about but written down submitted to the clerk made
public record how do we think our constituents will feel about this happening when we say we have to raise fees we say we won't consider it for another 5 years at least as a matter of best practice and then the time energy effort and resources are spent on this
for no good reason my hope is we will preemptively reject this that the mayor will also reject this out of hand and we can send a clear message to the residents and businesses of Gardner that we will not allow them to be squeezed to boost salaries this is a bad proposal for our
constituents i hope you will join me in voting in favor of this resolution to be clear a yes vote would support this resolution a no vote would oppose it i also want to be clear that I intend to lead the council through a fair and public publicly debated consideration of
the broader issue of non-union salaries that must be addressed when a complete proposal is put forward however this sort of scheme I think we have to immediately reject thank you Mr chair mr president Mr mayor thank you very much Mr chairman uh just as a means of
background so this proposal uh that the council president referenced was sent via email to myself and the previous council president at the end of December um department heads do periodically review their fees as a matter of practice uh in terms of the operations for the department but it's up to us for
the policym decisions of it uh and when those policy decisions get made there's a lot of things that have to be weighed out with it the uh state of the economy and the fees uh relationship to the rising cost of everything that's happening in the world right now uh I think the cost of uh building
construction the cost of uh just general we've heard of groceries we've seen fluctuations in the economy we've seen different things like that that's why you haven't seen me propose the uh ordinance to the council on behalf of the administration um because it's probably not the right
time to do something like this and this isn't something that I was planning to put forward and it's something that I don't think is the right time right now for this to happen at this moment um the practice of reviewing a uh fee structure every 5 years is beneficial so we don't get stuck behind like we were before uh
and that's exactly what I said in 2022 when those fees were increased back then um we are able to have fees that are commensurate to the operations of the department and do our building department fees cover the full operational cost of the building department budget no um but again uh
there's the operational side of things but there's also the policy side of things and that's the part that we take over when it comes to seeing the relationship between what those costs are with what we're already uh the financial burden that's already placed on the residents uh of the city here with everything that's going on um I'm
sure the building commissioner uh who is here can uh if there's any further questions with uh you know the reasons why what got us to this point um but like I said a normal practice I can understand why a review would be conducted in the longer term of things on but there's also the regular schedule
that we have set for that too so I am was not planning on submitting this item before the council and I'm okay with uh not having it go forward if that be the will of the council as well thank you Mr mayor anything
further questions thank you um you know thank you councelor Tyrros looking through the packet um I guess it was requested that this come before the council and where department heads don't have that option to put things on our agenda um I appreciate you bringing it up um so that it's not ignored i think
that part is important um I don't know if this would be best for the mayor for the commissioner for for councelor Tyrus but do we know does this connect at all to the working group who is also looking at I understand pay raises it does not yeah okay thank you uh I think that's it
for my questions okay thank you um as stated we are on a plan for 5 years um of reviewing these it's best practice um I'm not going to say we we would never go back beforehand there may be extenduating circumstances that would
arise where we may need to so obviously um wouldn't state that things can change there could be issues that could be changed in state law you don't know what could come up um however um we did say that I unless there's um anything further to add from the building
commissioner that there is a significant reason to raise these uh fees and it's not before us um I I I don't see it something that it isn't something that I'd be supporting um the um timing with the salary um whether or not on purpose is
troublesome um and um I know there's a separate item on our agenda dealing with that as well dealing with salary increases which we've discussed here um on multiple occasions um you know corporate world we would be increasing salaries um and um we don't have a
proposal for us in front of that u for that anyway um so that's all I have um there's nothing further Are there any further statements mr if I could add just one last thing Mr chairman um over the past 5 years I feel like the city has been more development friendly and
open for business than we have been in quite some time uh and that's one of the reasons why at least from the administration you know something like this would require a lot more thought hadn't been put forward yet where you know a lot more thinking that has to be done because we want to make sure that we continue to stay open for business
and friendly for development for new businesses coming in new housing developments and everything else in between just like I said during my state of the city address um so I want to make sure that that's clear too is that those are all factors that come into play when it comes to decisions like this um and it's not something that's lost on us either yeah additional barriers are not
uh not going to be a good thing um so appreciate that uh anything further one just actually made me think of this how are the because I was in New York 22 when this came up the last time how are the fees set is there a state cap is it up to us entirely is there uh Mr
chairman if I may the uh the fees are set by uh ordinance and those fees don't have a state cap it's uh based on whatever is set on the local level uh you do want to try to have fees that are commensurate with the services offered with the department and that's not just
salaries that's the other um it's the hardware and the software the department that's there with it the uh those costs that are there you try to at least aim for an 80% to 90% uh is best practice for what your fees lie over the course of a certain period of
time um when we looked at fees in 2022 that 80 to 90% on our end was closer to 15 to 20% uh so the bump that we did back then did bring us back up closer to where we needed to be uh but again even then uh the original proposal was higher than what was uh presented to the city
council because we do have to take those thoughts into account uh and that's why department heads do periodically review the revenue that their department head takes in uh excuse me that their department takes in the cost of their operations particularly when it comes to this time of year with the operating budget cycle
um but there's also times that proposals just don't move forward because there's other circumstances around the full picture that are outside of the department and that's where um our role comes into play so that's that's kind of the longer answer to your question that there's no state cap but those are the little factors that uh play into it that
was great thank you appreciate it that's for me i didn't entertain a a motion i would uh move to send the resolution to the full council for discussion and review uh second motion made by councelor Heglin seconded by councelor
Dowitz to send the motion to the full council for further to send the resolution to the um council for further uh discussion and review is there any further discussion all those in favor say I i opposed motion carries
item 11516 a proposal by President Tyrros at the city council discuss the creation of a special committee for the Waterford Community Center project president Tyros thank you Mr chair i'm proposing this item to task the finance committee with holding discussions and providing a recommendation to the full
council to the creation of a special committee for the Waterford Community Center project this project is now in a stage where I believe we have multiple entities operating at the center with more to come that we as a city will have to have established policies procedures
and have the ability to make decisions that are made in the best interest of establishing the operations of the community center this is something that the city has never undergone to this point before in its history i believe we have a great opportunity ahead of us and just like there was a school building committee for the uh elementary school
project i'm proposing this committee to almost be the same sort of building out the community center even though the building's already there there's a lot that goes with the building that needs to be decided and thought of and I believe a special committee of community leaders uh would be the best option i'd
like to test the finance committee with this you add anything to it at all sure thing Mr chairman uh building committees are actually common practice outside of just schools we had a building committee for the new police station um there was a
building committee in the 1930s when this building was constructed um and it's just to allow more eyes on a project uh as it moves forward um when the council president approached me to say that this was something that he was going to be putting forward um I likened it to the CDBG steering committee where
again it's just something to just make sure we have all of our eyes dotted and tees crossed and put more eyes on something and it also brings something into more of a public discussion too so that the members of the public at large um are able to see exactly what's happening on um here in this building for their benefit in their backyard um I
have no objections to this um no particular questions you answer the one I have is kind of with the makeup which community leaders I think sounds great i think it is a good idea as well um but I think it certainly we'd benefit some time especially if they counselor um to give it some more
thought i think so but thank you both i appreciate that i I want to agree with that that more time I think is necessary here just to think about who how we going to compose it who's going to appoint people um what's exactly is it going to entail um again councelor Max's
not here um I'm sure she would have been put on it this is a something the project itself that's exciting for the city um and we want to make sure it stays on track um and things um progress there we have you know tenants and utilize the building to um its maximum
um so a little more time on this i appreciate the presentation of the item by council Tyrros but um if there's no further object objection I'll keep this on our our calendar agreed okay next item item 11517 proposal by President Tyros that
the city council discuss the city's current sexual harassment policy president thank you Mr chair had recently come to my attention that the city's sexual harassment policy is 20 years old uh when I had spoken with the mayor and director uh human resource
director Morse on this issue I was pleased to hear that they had already prioritized this work and are working on updating this and many other policies in the employee handbook and u the mayor and I agreed i thought it would be a good opportunity for the council to get an update on this work and for the full
public uh to as well and I'd like to test the finance committee to lead uh that update with questions and discussions in your subcommittee to bring to the full council on this thank you President Harris mayor unanimous sure Mr chairman um this is another one that when the council president
approached me to say that this is something he wanted to put forward we had a very productive discussion on and that it's not just the city sexual harassment policy that's 20 years old it's the city's employee handbook that's 20 years old except for the social media policy that's 15 years uh years old at this point um so Director Morse actually
brought this up in her interview for the position and that you know there's a lot of policies that we just need a refresher on and it's not recreating the wheel but social media has changed a lot in the past 15 years there's new laws and regulations and uh codes and
guidelines and everything else that's changed in the last 20 years i was 10 20 years ago uh so it's one of those things that we've already begun the process there there's a lot of policies that are already done in fact I Uh we should be done with the review of the um sexual harassment
policy that the council president put forward uh I'd say by the time the finance committee meets next um it's with the city solicitors for a final review right now um so I'm happy to present this as well as any of the other policies that are in the handbook that we've begun reviewing right now uh forward to the city council at any time
uh we've looked at everything from uh hybrid working for positions to sexual harassment policies to social media policies to um time off notifications and everything in between um so if that's you know
while uh I while it's something that's been an executive function in the past I really appreciate the council president bring this forward uh and showing the collaborative work that's being done right now because there's a lot that is happening behind the scenes that normally doesn't make it to this floor um but maybe should and just to show that there's progress being made on
everything not just the bigger projects that you see the construction fences around in the community um thank you i think this would obviously this sexual harassment policy in particular being 20 years old um and it's already being worked on i know it's something that um the HR director had mentioned she was working on all the policies um this
being one of them was a lot to do um it takes time to do all these things you said it's with the um solicitor for review at this point um I think the other um policies would be helpful to see in front of the council as well and if the um council president is amunable
to it I would maybe widen the scope of this of getting just updates on on the policies HR policies and how they're going and what the how we're falling more in line with the current times um I I don't know if there's information you know who's in your top eight on my space that's probably not a great thing to
have um but I just as I think the oldest policy we had was the uh the dress code came from the early 1990s and listed out specifically which items or clothing were work appropriate and were not work appropriate um I didn't know half the
names on the list uh so it's one of those things that it's just there's a lot of work that just needed to be updated and we're updating no Jenos council thank you um no thank you both for presentation council President Tyres thanks for putting this forward and I want to give a some some
commendation to you know Director Morris as well um I was a little shocked that it was 20 years as well working for the school department the school committee reviews the policies I think annually pretty regularly we're trained on them as staff every year um and have to prove that we've done that training um so I
think her initiative to get this ball rolling and to update these things with your support Mr mayor um and the fact that you're willing to sort of include the council as well and what is an executive function um really appreciate all of that so thank you stated this is something we we leave
on here i may expand the scope a bit to to encompass all policies without highlighting though obviously this one because president brought that to our attention but with no objection we leave it on our calendar agreed uh next item item 11518 a proposal by President Tyrros that the city council discuss the
current state of facilities management for all municipal buildings thank you Mr chair um it had recently come to my mind uh thinking about the Waterford Community Center and certain operational aspects of it um that you know anytime we have a major change to
our city's municipal building footprint structure number of buildings uh and their use it's always a good time to take a step back and evaluate how things are currently being done if there's uh good reason to keep doing them that way and if there's efficiencies gained by changing the way that we manage certain
aspects of how we operate the city um you know mayor and I had spoke on this one i think it's good um from an awareness perspective to understand how sort of this is done today and if there's any opportunities for improvement with the the Watford Community Center being the impetus of
this one okay thank you anything to add on this one sure thing Mr chairman uh right now the city's facility staff uh is are are all union positions within the ASME union of the city uh aside from the maintenance staff that's lo uh
assigned to Levi Hwood Memorial Library um the way that the state law sets up public library systems is that the city is required to pay the operations expenses budgets and salaries of all personnel at the library um so that's why if you look in the non-union compensation ordinance you'll see
library positions that say facilities maintenance technician and other titles that mimic the titles that we have here at city hall for our custodial and maintenance staff uh they are not in the union when the initial cards were collected and the uh election was done to create the ask me union they were not
part of that initial uh uh process that was done uh for that so that's why they are not considered members of the ask me union uh any changes that we make in terms of baseline positions or even the uh manager positions here um at city hall
the senior center and the police station would be have to be negotiated with the union as those are union employees um however uh on top of them they report to the building commissioner um who serves as the city's uh facilities director uh there are other municipalities that have
standalone facilities directors that are paid um you know as their own full-time position there's facilities managers that are assigned to different department heads um but here in Gardener it's assigned as part of the duties of the building commissioner um again this is one that when the
council president and I spoke it was more just an explanation on what we currently have here and then begin saying does this fit what we have in the long term and I'm absolutely okay doing a study to check efficiencies is something that we've done pretty habitually uh in the past here when it comes to reviewing just is there anything else that we could be doing
different that we don't know that we're doing different than other places that's there um when I was in Rutland it fell under the DPW when I came here it fell under the building department i know in um the uh one of the towns closer to Worcester it falls under the planning
department it's really um depending on where you go to fit the needs of the of the community and what had just really been done in the past is what's happened here um what has union what doesn't have unions and everything else in between there too so I'm happy to um you know provide any further information that the
finance committee and the council would like to see in terms of how the structure of the system currently runs uh happy to conduct any investigations on the administration side on if there's any efficiencies that could be gained and if something could be done differently um and have that discussion along with the council thank you
thank you Mr chairman um thank you both again appreciate that information that's really helpful um I'm glad to be looking at this i think giving another school example too i know they're set up where they have their janitorial services contracted out but then they have Wayne who's their maintenance and facilities
director and then within that there's a team of people who are able to help with repairs on all the buildings so it does keep it a little more concise and fluid and they work pretty well coher cohesively together um so I think this is something I'm interested to see where it goes um I'm curious to sort of draft
more questions I think to bring to our committee and I'd be happy to do that um you know for instance what is our current structure and how does it compare to the schools and what are our current titles and roles and just some things off the top of my head um so yeah I look forward to discussing this more
if I could just add Mr chairman too city Hall used to have a contracted janitorial service um that was gone away with due to the um quality of the services we were receiving but also just the cost of that contract that were there uh I've been very happy with the janitorial staff that we have now in
fact our uh maintenance manager uh Phil has been um a godscent to this building over the course of the past several months as well um but then as councelor Heglin said too the schools maintained that contract and that's kind of where the split happened where those custodial staff joined the
city hall union here uh where the other uh the school department maintained their union excuse me maintain their contract that they had there too so there's it's really building dependent is what I'm trying to say by this so if it's easier to just see as a like comprehensive picture of this is where all the facilities maintenance custodial
and everything else in between for um any of our city facilities um from the schools to the animal shelter to the pool and everything um we're happy to provide that yeah I think a breakdown of each building or groups of buildings that are under whoever they're under and
how it's administered would be helpful here a great council head that um more time on this is um obviously we have nothing really to that we're looking into it so there's nothing really to to do yet um hopefully councelor Mack um
will then have time to you know see this uh meeting and formulate some questions as well um but I think this is something that would remain on our calendar unless there's an objection no okay um we'll keep this on the on the calendar um hopefully and come back with some
answers to a few questions ever asked about the organization management and um we can continue discussion at the future meeting thank you president thank you for the opportunity to present to the committee uh in subcommittee item
11477 discussions in regard to internal workings groups review of the salary set mr mayor are there any further updates to this uh a couple stuff uh Mr chairman actually this time um we do have you know what the working group proposed there too but uh as I've said in you know several of these meetings in the
past any proposal or changes to the salary ordinances themselves wouldn't come up until the uh FY26 budget uh is presented to the city council um just to make sure that we can afford whatever um whatever the ordinance amendment may look like moving forward
uh the city auditor and I have been meeting regular regularly to discuss the FY26 budget and it is something we plan to submit to the city council in May uh and that is um you know moving forward um with the same schedule that we said before when we said we were going to get
it to the city council at one of the two meetings in May um the you know salary study itself the proposal from the working group internal conversations between the auditor and I all of those things are still being you know looked at as part of the process here too right now we only have the governor's budget
for our local aid normally we get the house and senate and we normally have a more reliable number when one of those two numbers come out um but I just want to reiterate and just make it clear that uh any ordinance proposal to any of the salary structures for the city wouldn't come out until the FY26 budget comes out with it to make sure that we can afford
it and fund it okay so me and Lisa both longer um depending on some of them outside factors um thank you any questions council none for me tonight there's no objections i'll keep this item on our calendar sounds good uh next item is 11482 discussions regarding the
city's health insurance payments and trust fund um any further update or updates from the auditor i do actually Mr chairman uh the city's trust fund currently has a balance of about $1.4 million um that's taking into account the cost that we had from Blue Cross Blue Shield over the course of the last
month in terms of our shore up payments and our regular monthly deposits that we required to give them there too um again you want to be anywhere between$1 million and $2 million 2 million is your ideal healthy trust fund but you really just so long as you're over a million you're pretty good um the uh city
auditor the city human resources director the city treasurer and myself uh have reviewed different options for health insurance moving forward in terms of moving to the group insurance commission or the GIC if that's as referred to sometimes the Massachusetts Interlocal Insurance Agency or MYA as
that's referred to because we like to give everything acronyms [Music] um couple other different uh health insurance uh companies a couple different health insurance brokers that's there uh at the time uh at this time we're seeing that the lowest
um potential increase is actually coming from remaining with Blue Cross Blue Shield for this current fiscal year uh however in the longer term rather than doing a yearby-year look which is what the city's practice has been for the past 30 something years we're going to start doing a three or four or five year outlook with it to see do we is staying
with the same plan coverage that we have now really the best interest that we have um but a lot of the potential plan changes that we could look into and I say plan changes not in terms of substance but in terms of carriers uh the GIC Maya and anything like that do require a minimum six-month notice
before going into uh those systems particularly with the GIC that's in the statute uh that even if we wanted to go into the GIC right now the earliest we could get in is January 1st because they go on a six-month basis on a July 1st to January 1st uh notification system uh so right now the city's plan is to maintain
Blue Cross Blue Shield for fiscal year 26 uh we are going to have open enrollment for our uh employees uh from May 1st through May 30th or May 31st before the June 1st um start of the June month that way all of the rates are in
and employees are put in place before the new fiscal year starts on July 1st the reason why we have to do that in May instead of in June is because uh the school department gets a what's called a balloon payment at the end of the school year where the teachers and staff of the schools get their payment in a lump sum uh for the summertime at the end of the
fiscal year uh so with all of that those in play that's there uh in terms of rates and adjustments to rates we don't have those yet we just have proposed rates at this time uh we will have those before the May 1st open enrollment date uh but I just want to say that and we you know we've looked at I mean option A
through Z uh at this point so that's why we've decided to stay with Bluec Cross for this current fiscal year i can tell you we're likely going to be looking at the group insurance commission in the longer term but due to their timelines it wouldn't line up right now for the fiscal year thank you no any questions none thank you the updates I was looking
for um as we have in passion we'll leave this on the the agenda for future discussions sounds good and item 11507 if I just could add to that too um if it would be helpful to get the auditor and director Morse here once we get the rates in to further go into the process
I'm happy to coordinate that as well that would be great thank you um item on 11507 a report from the Ronald F cormier Memorial Committee um we had this in front of us previous time um and discussed um options i know there was
some information being gathered on cost um this has been a big part of council max obviously proposal um to do this um I don't know if there's any updates you have in regards to anything Mr mayor um so my my thought is to keep it on the uh
on the calendar unless there's an objection or any further discussion agreed all right so we'll leave it 11507 on the calendar with the rest um I will entertain a motion to adjurnn so moved second motion made by councelor Hagen
seconded by councelor Low to adjourn all those in favor say I i those opposed the meeting stands adjourned thank you thank you