##VIDEO ID:0pHFl3Sg6xM## right so open up meeting uh everybody's here um we are being uh recorded by area 58 and if you would join me in saying I pledge of allegiance I pledge of aliance to the flag the United States of America and to the repblic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liy and justice for all thank you uh first thing on our agenda is appointment with Mike Martin and uh Bob Valerie for the hemlock landfill repair updates or options I guess good evening uh my name is Mike minin I'm a senior program manager with TRC uh I've been working with I've been working at the land on the landfill since around 2008 with my started with my previous firm doing the monitoring which is still currently doing the monitoring um and then I switched over to TRC 2023 um around 2021 or so I noticed some additional erosion during the monitoring which has gotten a lot worse especially with that one summer I think it was 2022 with the rain was just was just absolutely crazy and it just started washing his TI slip away pretty pretty badly um so tonight we're going to talk about you know what kind of what we've done out there today a little bit of the history of the landfill uh go over some of the damages that we're seeing at the landfill um the two options that we have uh contemplated to fix the damage out there um based on those options what the next steps looks like and then opening up for discussions um so today uh last February we we completed a drone survey which was used to create an existing condition plan it was also uh second was used to create uh a surface topography so we could start um you know get new Contours to the landfill CU we didn't have any existing survey information um with that information we developed a conceptual plan for a repair we developed some cost estimates associated with that conceptual design um following discussions with the town we reached out to mass D to present the initial concept to get their input um based on some of the initial input they wanted to know what the Wetland limits were relative to kind of the proposed corrective actions that were taking so we did complete a wetland survey in June um in July following that information Mass DP came out and did a site walk with us to kind of review the site unfortunately at that time the Japanese not we had just taken over everything so you know it was very limited on what we could see as far as the damage was uh what kind of damage was out there um following that meeting D submitted a request for information which we prepared a response for in September um we had a follow-up meeting in November and re more recently I met I talked with Mark dakers on yesterday actually uh to go over um kind of get an update on where d stands on the proposed corrective action that we presented and some of um he's DP still kind of evaluating The Proposal themselves um they're probably going to Mark is probably going to schedule a site visit to walk uh lfi with me and Bob just so you know Mark D is a section chief of saw was in the Southeast region office so you know he's the ultimate decision maker on how to move that forward um we're hoping probably I'm guessing maybe end of January beginning of February to hopefully have Mark come out in sight and kind of see the landfill itself and you know what we're proposing to do and what needs to be done um so a quick history the landfill operated started in 1930s like most landfills and mass started as an open burn dump and then we actually um because of air quality issues they switched to just landfilling Municipal saw in the' 70s and ultimately closed in 1977 um in the 2006 2007 time frame under an administrative consent order from the state they CL cap the landfills so it's you know to make it the condition you see today um and then in 2008 was the first time erosion was identified at the landfill on the side that picture on the right you can see is one of the wash outs on the side St that head on the west side that goes down into the wetlands and essentially what they did was they stri back the material put in a beding layer and then a bunch of rip wrap with some checks um during that 2008 this is a snippet from a report that brownan Caldwell did this you know that identify the wetlands and some what was contributing to that um and some of it was you know the storm water runoff over topping the sale at locations along the landfill that is still occurring today that's what's causing continued maintenance issues of the Sid and that's you know one of the concepts that Bob and I were talking about is how can we do a repair you know one repair to fix the whole problem rather than doing some patch work like every 5 to 10 years just doing like a little patchwor repair work cuz you know that's going to be know it's either big project or it's that 5,000 cuts and it's all you know going to cost you the same and just spread out over a much longer duration um so this is you know the Drone survey that we completed back in February you can see um in this area let me see this like here you can see this is like the the cut right there where it's eroding this is an area where it's the whole sale is undermined and it's still going getting washed away this was the this area and this area with two previous wash outs so you can just see as you know these pathworks get done it's just moving moving moving moving moving further down to where the drain soil is you know so you know we know that we could do a easy temporary fix it's a lot cheaper but it's going to continue to happen because we're not addressing the overall problem and here are some of the pictures you can see this is the C that comes out go back so this is where this culbert right here is that you're going to see the next picture but you can see this culbert it's kind of buried it's filled with soil and sediment from the run up from the parking lot here's the erosion where the entire upper portion of the cap is gone and this this is the what they call the impermeable layer the flexible membrane liner so your top two fet of material is completely washed out all the stone is from the soil that's collapsed and here's that you can see where this is like the Geo fabric from the soil itself and that's completely undermine in this area and then one of the issues we see it also is this is a a perimeter SLL that's supposed to be pitched to a detention Basin that's located way down here that soil has either has settled so it's not flowing the storm water there's no pitch to that SW anymore so when St water when it rains there's no pitch to get it to where the Basin is it just hits it and goes over top and it's a steep slope and that's why we're contining to see that erosion occur over time one okay so um the options that we have this is the two options the first option is the limited repair that would be those two erosion areas kind of stripping back the materials down the geomembrane liner rebuilding part of the sale that's collapsed um putting down you know 6in drain play your Ving material and then you know kind of redoing the a rip W PCH and that way it will provide that temporary stabilization it will eliminate erosion in those specific areas um the cost associated with this is on the $40,000 range you know some of it will be depending on inflation for materials and labor um some of this could also be if the highway department could do the work that could help reduce cost if you know if they have the availability so but you know if if you're assuming an outside comp vendor is going to come in to do the work it's on the order of about $40,000 um the problem is is you know as I mentioned that it doesn't address the underlining concern of what's causing this so you know there's a high likelihood that this problem is going to just be persistent over the years and you know every single time it happens you're looking at a $30 to $50,000 or 40 to $50,000 repair bill you know in today's dollars that obviously as you go down in 10 years that's going to be more so you know that's you know option one that we're looking at and this is option two that we the concept we developed where you know we're kind of you know proposing to rebuild the entire side slope and then you know to offset those costs and also to look at the town's um look at the increasing of footprint for solar we would propose to regrade a portion of the cap landfill and extend that field there's a there's a little bit of a bowl down here at this the southern end of the landfill there's a depression where you have some Leaf in your yard waist and so forth we would also fill that area in to raise the grade to match the existing thing here so you'd have a platform at this elevation all the way down to here and then we'd also do some minimal regrading potentially on this area to to get storm water from not flowing you know when it flows to not have it flow into hemlock but to kind of capture it with a burn and redirect it onto the site so we would try to eliminate any storm water from this portion of the Landfield going out the Hemlock Lane during Heavy Rain events um that's what you know so that concept would be looking at bringing in about 96,000 yd of clean fill um we Char the town will charge a tipping fee to um you know to bring that material in to offset the landfill repair costs and we'll just go over that now and what this option allows us to do is do a bunch of different bmps would allow us um to kind of create some burms around the perimeter in the parking lot where you know to help kind of prevent siment from the parking lot to get into these culverts into the Swale so the swes would stay cleaner and require less maintenance um it would allow us to do overall bmps across the C again just to reduce the sediment transport into the SES which is causing some of these issues it would allow us to rebuild the sale so we can actually get the pitch that we need to to get the flow to take the stress off the side slope it would also one of the issues that I'm going to go back a couple slides here one of the issues we have is how the landfill is constructed right now is this perimeter this rip wrap sale goes all the way down so there's no easy way to get maintenance equipment to do the required mowing so under this concept we would be able to look at um providing access so you can maintain the side slope going for forward so you can mow it you can get all the tree growth on it right now that needs to come off you can you know minimize that potential going forward uh you'd have a larger base down here You' be able to control that and the other benefit would be you get to really expand the footprint of solar out here so you could have a over a megawatt system which would also increase revenue for the to from a renewable energy standpoint so you know serves three or four different goals um now as you can see the cost to do this based on engineering design construction oversight you know getting a contract out to do this adding a contingency about $1.2 million out out of this we could generate you know in the $1.1 million range to pay for it all and then it would you know out of pocket it would be about $100,000 for the town that being said I talked with Mark yesterday what the big cost driver on the construction is that there's a bunch of Japanese not weed that needs to be mitigated and I assume that it has to be be disposed of like excavated out and disposed of Mark said you know we can look at doing pesticide applications you know so I think it's about $400,000 to dispose of the Japanese knotweed at a landfill if we did pesticides application that's probably coming down to $40,000 so I didn't have a time to update this finances but if you take you know this 865,000 would be cut in half if you do that you could you know start looking at a revenue Surplus for the town of about $200,000 um so you know it could be a you know beneficial uh project if you can import CLE Phill charge a tipping feet and then you know have cou the long-term solution that fixes this problem once and for all so that you don't have to deal with this I think you know Bob and I were talking about how often has the erosion occurred it's anywhere between 4 to 10 years we we're seeing the erosion happening really depends on the rain like like we have the summer like the summer of 2022 all over again it's going to get really bad really quickly and even the temporary patch just going to move it to the next spot and just wash out the next spot so you know some of it's weather dependent you know with climate change and we're expecting these crazy storms you get two inches of rain in an hour you know that's a real problem that we're looking at and another good thing too is you know when we did the design is you know we were cognizant about the problem you know you have residents here you know and having a lot of soil come in with truck traffic when we Design This there's an access road down in here so we would be accessing the landfill directly 106 down here by the water tank and come up through that back side and we would not even put we would not even have to put a truck down Hemlock Lane where's the access point off of 106 it's almost a dated it's across from the Brockton store yes I didn't think that was actually a road though before the church it's an it's an existing acci drive you can drive in it y y y and the trucks will be fine on that road yeah mean we' probably build it up a little bit and put down some dense gr or something you know just but it wouldn't it wouldn't take a lot of prep work CU it's already an existing access road I think you it's utilized right now to bring the highway trucks use it yeah to bring all the down lmbs and everything else there's a lot of wood storage back there and the prep work for that would be included in the costs yes and the wood storage that the highway is currently using down there Maryland's Landing will accept us to just leave it on site until we figure out what you know what and how everything goes on and things like that if you not disturb Highway Department operations um and in the residence not C in the residence what cost us anything for it yeah and and when we when we develop this concept too we met with the highway department to say you know when we develop these things the fill what you have for storage like set aside what do you need for storage so we can you know work you know we work that into the concepts so we know that you need this much space for storage okay we'll set aside this much space for you and so so we have done some preliminary coordination with the highway department already um so depending on which route it goes you know option you know depending on what the town would like to do you know this lays out the options if we want to go with option one we would let M EP know that we would just proceed with a temporary fix for now and do the minimal permitting um as you can see that schedule's probably fairly quick that could happen um the other thing with the option two is if you want to do the long-term repair probably overall 18 months it probably take another two months of negotiating with with mass D to you know finalize the details of of the Phill Concept in the longer in the bigger repair concept and then once you get into construction you're talking about a 6 to 8 month construction period to allow for all the filling and Grading and so forth of the site um so that's kind of the that's kind of the big you know two options that we're looking at as an overview and with that it would I would open it up to any questions and I can go back to any slide if you you know um I had just a couple and I should know the an to this but why do we get why can we how how's it we can charge the the uh construction company to bring soil in for a for a government project um under Mass you know Mass back in 2013 and then in 2015 they issued some soil policies so in the Greater Boston area and some other big Transportation projects they have a lot of excess construction spoils out there that contractors have to get rid of so usually when the contractors go to get rid of it they pay a fee so they have these facilities now that take this clean soil and they'll charge a nominal fee depending on the level of contamination so for a clean fill you can get anywhere from $10 to $20 uh per ton of soil that comes in because these generators are looking to get rid of it and you know they need to get a home so you know this is one of the homes that they could so there's a lot of little projects like this where we set up a importation and then allows you know and we can charge a generator of soil $10 to get rid of it and you know there's a lot of them out there that will pay I represent a lot of those types of generators that will pay to get rid of material so this is a uh a fee not set by the town but by the state it would be a fee set by the town but it's something that's Market driven you know you know it's really what can you get at the time how much soil is available at the time our contract with the contractor would specify every time you're going to pay us so much money exactly yeah and and when I did these costs here you can see like revenue from the soil import what I assumed is like a lot of times you know that assumes like the net revenue of that is probably a lot higher but you know it's usually like the I assume that the contractor is going to get paid $4 a ton to place the material and then the proceeds would go to the town um the rest of the proceeds would go to the town so you know if you can negotiate yeah with the contractor say we want to hold you you know we're going you want to charge 12 bucks a ton then let you know then you could do that in the contract and how does he make money then if he if if we're balancing out the the money the money is going to be he's the money he gets is if it's $12 a ton he'll get $3 to $4 a ton for the placement cost to pay for all the op you know to play for pay for him the rest of the revenue you know is designed to go to the town to pay for the repair I see so mean a lot of these soil projects you know when they do them they're talking millions of yards so there's Millions millions of dollars of profit this isn't one of those projects um like I'm sure you're familiar with the Maryland Landing project where you know they taken a lot of soil in there you know because of the volume they have there's a lot more profit here this is a relatively small volume overall in the grand scheme of things so the contractor would be happy to pay us to take this extra soil the generators would be the contractor would be the generators yes they absolutely I represent a lot of generators and yeah they they 10 12 15 20 bucks a ton they'll pay to get rid of materials um I we're representing the client out Central Mass and Grafton and Dot for that giant I90 495 interchange rebuild they were paying $20 a ton to get rid of clean soil at a facility okay so there you know there is a lot of this material out there in the marketplace do we need to do uh an upfront um part of the contract like what what would our cash up front for you do we have to get a million dollar Bond no I think you know um no because I mean some of it the engineering cost up front I think are probably on the $50 to $60,000 range just to pay for the um you know initial engineering design work and permitting work you need a Wetlands permit you need to do the solid waste permitting stuff there might be some other uh you need to do a Construction general permit for Stull water and then once you kind of have those front costs you know then all the construction cost would be paid by the proceed of the soil so there's the way we would have to do it we need to would need to investigate because the way Mass General law works is you can't just use money that comes in for a specific purpose unless it's already been allocated for a specific purpose through like a revolving fund so we would need to work um a way to make it work we may have to appropriate the funds upfront and then whatever proceeds we received would kind of make up for those funds but we would likely have to make some sort of appropriation um because you the way the laws you can't just use the money that comes in for a specific purpose um okay I don't have any other questions well I had a h quick one so yeah I agree we want to make sure that the water you know doesn't run off into wetlands and into people's properties because it's a a former uh site what kind of soil would we be bringing in what we this is soil what you call an S1 soil so it meets the residential um risk criteria so it's just you know it's typically consistent with what Mass D Mass DP has a document called um natural background of metals and what they call polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons those are basically pH is what it's petroleum things that you find in Asphalt is the easiest way to describe it but they have a natural they have these natural concentrations it would be things that are consistent with what you naturally find in the environment okay um a little bit higher than that but consistent with that but protective of residential prot protective of drinking we're not looking at any sort of contaminated soil or anything like that okay all right and then and I I I understand you guys have put a lot of work into coming up with the plan and I don't mean any offense at this at all um I do like option two but is there any sort of like timeline warranty or cuz I'm sure when they designed the original plan they thought it was going to work right so so how I don't want to be a pessimist but how do we know we're not back here in 10 years doing this again is there anything to to at us a little bit I think when we look at when we put bid if we went out to bid for contractors we could probably put language in the specs to do that um to provide that warranty and you I think also you know one of the things that they looked at when they designed this they didn't necessarily their stor water model wasn't all-encompassing so I think when we look at that we do updated stor model modeling for runoff and what's going into the landfill what potentially could be sediment transport into the landfill you know we're going to take that into account you know address those problems that necessarily weren't addressed in the initial design okay and then the other thing too would be you know providing a way to do maintenance I mean one of the hard Parts is you you can't get you can't get equipment in there so if you have a way to do maintenance and you say okay cuz 3 one side slope you're going to sometimes get erosion it's going to happen but if you have a way to get maintenance in there and you can just say okay well instead of having this massive problem all we need is a couple wheelbarrows full alone to kind of just fill in you know and throw some seed down then that's a lot easier I've done that at Landfield where you know they see some minor erosion but they it's easily accessible and they can just bring in you know a couple wheelbarrows for LOM and seed and reestablish vegetation reestablish that vegetative support layer and it you know was much easier to mitigate than you're talking like 50 bucks okay and do it's water under the bridge now but do was excuse me was lack of Maintenance one of the reasons we got here now I think I think part of it is I think part of it like any landf when you have MSW and you put weight on it with like you know when you have to cap it and you're putting it down material and you SE charge it with some weight it's going to lead to differential settlement I mean there's part of that aspect too as well okay that's all I had yeah it's difficult going last cuz a couple of the things I wanted to ask were already uh spoken about but just a quick question so if and when we go with option two and there's an 18mon start to finish uh proposed you know timeline when do we sign the contract and what guarantees or what assurances do we have that the construction costs don't get worse if the summer is overly rainy and the concern of option one happens now well I think you know what we're proposing under option two is we're rebuilding the whole side slope so even if you have more erosion we're already rebuilding that whole side slope so the erosion the cost wouldn't go up if it gets worse before the build the rebuild happens okay and then just from an environmental standpoint I understand we're talking about a landfill here but from from the perspective of the people who want to preserve things the way they are we're not taking are we are we we're not Ren navigating the whole scope of the area we're rebuilding what's there we're not taking away more than is there correct correct in other words if this is the area we're not digging here here and here to make a bigger area we're not digging anything we're just we're working within the footprints and then and then in this this area down here we're raising the grade where the bowl is we're just bringing the grade up to Mass's grade but we're not expanding the you know this footprint right here is holding strong because you know you have all Wetlands here we we can't can't expand the land that's what I'm CL that's what I'm clarifying we're not we're not making we're not clearing more than what's already cleared no we're going to no we're revamping what's already yeah the rebuild of the side FL is going to match the ex you know the closure design grades and this Japanese Knotwood that I've never heard of is not a protected anything it's an invasive species and it's a problem just double checking just looked into that and uh I didn't think you could kill it with pesticides I thought dig it out and it takes a lot of applications you they said that they has been success when I talked to Mark you said they use it at two landfills it took about three to four applications about you know $4,000 or so per application you know there there's some other concerns though you're also spraying pesticides here next to a wellons I mean so you know that's why right now I carry assume that we're just getting rid of this is uh Tom it's that bamboo you see all now yeah yeah it's crazy just you can't get r no it is yeah and how is the pesticide applied is that like a that I'm not sure I mean that is usually a license applicator I think they have to inject it into the ground to kill the the root system okay so this isn't something from comes from the sky the residents would have to be no this would be I think very targeted into the ground to kill the those risal that go down specific areas okay yeah I'm just thinking about hunlock and the other neighbor I just want to make sure that we're covering bases there on on that vein Mike are we looking at increasing elevation significantly at all this Elation probably goes up 15 ft right here but it would just it would be match this Ridge elevation where the tree line is it would match this elevation kind of heading back towards the water tank so the elevation Rises you can't really see it from the public sphere okay so they're not going to look out their front yard and see a you know a four-story the only thing we're you know here would be uh in this area where maybe looking at building a storm water burnwood like you'd have like maybe like a 3T Mound right there along the road roadway but part of that you know part of that design was if you put solar here I would imagine if you're one of these residents you don't want to see a solar field by raising that you could then you know put a Decora something you could put a decorative fence in cuz one of the challenges like I've done solar projects on these landfills you only have about 18 in of 2T of cover so a lot of times when you have to build these security fences they're on these giant concrete ballast foundations you know if you can put a decorative fence up or plant some you or plant you know or have a chaining fence with some arm you know then then you take you address any visual screening aspects that a solar project could create right there is it that bottom section the cemetery this is the cemetery yes yeah most of those on people don't complain yeah they're quiet and I don't I don't think this matters at all but just just a quick question note number four why is it Germaine that it's a special flood flood flood Hazard area does that what does that what does that have to they have mapped the flood plane up to here yeah so we'd have to that's probably the well pering is we have to redesignate the flood plane because it's showing the parking lot in the 100 year flood plane which is you would need you know probably 100 ft of rain um to raise the swamp into the parking lot I mean that's so it's a female has just like they just do when they they do flood maps when they do their flood maps they're not in the field really looking at things they just like oh this is what it could be not taking into account the real elevations like we've mapped it before we've mapped it during the rainy season and in the and it just stayed right at the toea slope so but that would be part of the permanent process is to have to re you know reclassify red delineate the the flood plane area itself what are the next steps if we decide to go with number two or first before I ask you that question though when do we have to make this decision Bob it's really up to you guys it's the thing is we have that's why we're here tonight we have gone out to bid for solar at the board's request about a year ago town meeting approved the leas of this land for solar we are in contract negotiations with the solar firm um the obviously if you go with option two we would let them know we need to delay the project because it's going to take us probably about 2 years to do that if you went with option one we would allow them to continue but you can't move forward with option two once the solar's there once we put the solar there that you're not doing this scale of a project with the solar there but you know the time frame of 18 months doesn't start until we have the money to start the engineering and and into that vein some of the things you could do too is you know when you negotiate with the solar person instead of having to maybe allocate that you know if you have a lease agreement that's paying you whatever per lease and that's going to generate let's say $3 $400,000 over the lifespan you could ask for that lease money up front and then you have the allocation to go back and then you that and you can use that lease area to do that and this would also give you leverage to go back to the Solar Company and say look at we have this project it's a bigger area now you're going to have a higher thing and you know you're going to have more generation and that can increase how much you could get for at least from the solar mhm and the fix one um we'd have to do within the year I mean you know D is going to tell me let's go Bob you know that you had the leak and you've had time to work on it you put a Band-Aid on or and they're going to make you also have surgery and they'll also make you remove all trees that are currently growing on the side slope as well and then that's going to add more cost even on option one though we still need 30 or $40,000 probably 50 to be do we have that somewhere no we'll have to make a capital request this and go to town meeting um this this may and hope that you know that gets approved even the the the work of Mike was graciously funded by Marland Landing they gave us a $20,000 donation which has allowed us to hire uh Mike's firm to to move forward with this engineering work okay all right so it seems to me that uh we need to do some research first like um I don't know if if it makes sense to have some sort of public input on on this it seems like it's going to be a big project and people might start squawking once they see things happen they didn't know it was coming uh we need to figure out financing uh on either option um yeah when you say option two will address the underlying problem the underlying problem is you know sentence what um the erosion the it's the fact that you have too much storm water that's creating this over topping the Swale at you know at various locations that is creating this and and you bre here the town the town impact of the sitewide Hydraulics by increasing the area of contribution to the SL water thing so we would we would you know that increased area of contribution that's you know causing this overt and we would address that by you know creating BMP such as regrade you know simple thing regrade the parking lot highway back Highway dep parment lck and Pitch it away from the landfill just it's a dozer simple scraped soil them get things slop that way and get stowing water away from it put in some perimeter burms that have so the you know you know so if you do have a lot of rain you're not getting sediment into the Swale so the sale starts getting clogged up which is also you know contributing you know you start losing capacity of how much water the soil can hold and it would also then um you know we would have to figure a way out you know we' also fix the pitch of the Swale so if we go back to like this photo where the Swale is in pitching and so you know this is leading to the constant over topping you would regrade that Swale so you get it to pitch into a basin and get the water to flow into the Basin rather than over top the Swale so essentially when we where it's all um site work yeah essentially and that means that the the the grading is somehow wrong was the grading put in wrong in the first place or this is a event over time or I think it's probably I think it's a few things I think it's like they said you know they kind of the great know they under they didn't account for all the run out from the parking lot so there's more water going in there there there's probably some differential settlement because you're on top of MSW which had some compressibility um over the last 20 years that led to some of the settlement of the sweat um you know with with the Swale you how these are built usually there's a most landfill size so a 3 to one but when you build a sale up you have this like little thing and then it's 2 to one for a little bit and then it goes and then it transitions to 3 to one so you have this on the backside initial side of the slope you have this really steep 3 to one slope so that starts getting eaten away and then it just once it starts getting once that vegetation lay vegetative support L starts getting washed up and it just it just it just goes okay and Jonathan I think you mentioned about warranty I believe the first repair well before I was here was only 8 years after they first approved the construction spent a lot how it would go in and um since I've been here um it was it had just recently been repaired and then we did another repair already so well that's that's my thought is happening I don't want I don't want to I mean if we go with option two and go instead of kicking it down the road we address it at its core I want to make sure that the town we're not right back here years down the road that's that's why him and I have been working together say do the Bandit or just do it right do it want to do it right going forward yeah just I I actually I walk that area all the time just because I I need a minute out of work right so I go down the hill up the hill around the landfill and U I'm like wow this appears to be like the the Basin wasted area you know what what could be done with it and of course cuz I work at Maryland's Landing all the time um I said is it possible and that's what led us to today was let's just throw in front you know yeah nothing ventured nothing gained but on the other point you know whichever one way or another from the Board of Health you we will have to fix that one repair as soon as possible and and some of this is like I'm assuming we have we know kind of where this like these like stents are right here you know even if we fix this I mean you know this whole area right here that's likely going to erod or that we might have to include in the concept I mean we still part of the scoping once we walk with theep they're going to look at this and say well you know if you just do a temporary thing you're it might be bigger you know we might require you to do more reconstruction in here to kind of stabilize this area so you know we're assuming it's a you know similar to this where we just throw down some rip wrap and just like fill in the where the erosion is they could require more um we haven't had you know we've been hoping we've been kind of working more into the Assumption right now of focusing on the the concept two of the larger repair projects and haven't had those initial discussions with d and what a smaller repair would even require we're just making an assumption on that as well okay I would say uh it would benefit us the board to uh take a tour with at least with Bob uh and and maybe Mike if if he's available to uh actually see what we're talking about I know we also have quite we spent a lot of money on this over the years and I'm sure we have a big file on it somewhere that would uh helpful to take a look at just to see what we're talking about I mean I remember the controversy trying to get it capped in the first place and that was a big controversy so uh it would benefit the board I think to get that um background and then uh then we need to talk with um uh with with Cody and whoever to figure out if if we think that following uh the second option that uh we figure out how we're going to pay for it or you know how we're going to address paying for it whether it's if we have to come up with a million dollars up front that's going to going to be a challenge um if uh if we don't if you know like you said if we have to do a revolving fun I'm not sure how we're going to do that U so I'd like to know a lot more detail in that before I made a decision on it or at least uh I mean I think I agree I think I think we all seem to sense that the trying to fix it is the best way to go but I would like to make sure uh just like Jonathan pointed out that you know we want to make sure we do it right in every way so yeah no I think I think you raised valid concerns and uh while I'm I'm leaning again towards the second option here uh we got to we got to check out all aspects of it like you say the financial the um and I do think we should give residents a heads up you know they start seeing trucks coming in and maybe some sort of public hearing or something or and they're going to be involved regardless cuz once you do a concom file and you got to notifi going to be coming in than that we getting them on board beforehand would definitely be better yeah we're going to have if nothing else that when we get to town meeting at some point where we're looking for some kind of money whether it's $3 $40,000 or whether it's a million dollar I'm not sure you know what that's going to be but we better have answers for it can we do some sort of contingency with the solar contracts or let them know what we're thinking about and see if that's a possibility to front that yeah I can let them know I can see what their thoughts are um you know they might like Mike said it expand their Footprints they might be interested if it expands it a lot you know we'd have to look at what how much it expands it because if it does we'd actually have to bid the project out because now it's a different parcel and and other biders may be interested um but these are all things we can look into we just wanted to get the tenor of the board before we start investing a lot of time and and effort into One Direction y well it sounds to me like we have to do something I think everyone agrees to that and it sounds to me like the the wise way would be to try to fix it as opposed to just patching it but I think at least I feel else we want to make sure we don't feel like we really have a good handle on any the expectation wasn't for you to make a decision tonight it was just to get the information my goal was to just inform allow you guys to be informed um the town to be informed in general that um you know we we have a problem we can fix a problem or we can fix a problem and U Can I can I make a suggestion then I'll make it as a motion if you guys prefer but uh one quick thing too when you look at procurement you know there could be ways where you know maybe you know depending on the profit sharing where you could do almost like a design build thing where the contractor would pay for you know you put it up to B with contractors as a design build you know it might cut in more into your profitability depending on what is out there but that could be an Avenue to look at as well okay so can we um I would say the first couple of steps to do are for us to get yet um maybe even Bob can provide it I'm not sure but some kind of a a history a summary of the landfill like you know what what work we've done on it when it was done how much just to just so and I know these guys don't know I mean I I don't remember the details but I remember the problems so I'd like to get that and I'd also like to have us take a tour uh relatively soon I guess unless it snows I guess but this is the time of year to do it withis vegetation down so that's I don't think the tour would be long may an hour or so but uh not in this weather yeah but that would be my suggestion to the board I don't know if you want me to do it on a motion or if you want go that way or if you don't disagree whatever I I agree Tom what do you think I'm fine with that yeah okay all right so can we um if Mike and Bob if you want to send a few dates times that you're available I'll coordinate with the board and we'll get something for a visit to be in the daylight yeah and then better times day afternoon early morning uh matter that time doesn't matter to me maybe I just have I have daycare issues on Tuesdays and Friday afternoons okay Monday Wednesday Thursday anytime Monday Wednesday or Tuesday Friday mornings mornings are great whatever okay okay yeah just send me some options that I'll with the board and then robob and I will put together um historical documents get as well I think I think we should revisit that just because I know I know it was a big controversy and if you would like after this meeting I can tell m you know kind of give him a quick update on where where you know kind of the results of this meeting some of the next step that town they're looking into and hopefully you know drive them to actually make a decision as well keep them at B well I mean make a decision and kind of just say you know let's and push in this direction cu the more the good thing is with most of these projects when you go in front of the state if you don't have public support they don't care if we can get you know you get the public support on that's you know DP is going to come along with you most of the time so it's you know having that public support and you starting with Cody and then starting with then the board of lean and then as we move forward you know that's going to be critical to the success because when you do the permitting process I wouldn't be surprised if they put a permit out there with a public comment period you know to allow interveners to kind of comment on this I'm sure we'll hear about yeah sure all right very good well thank you for the good present any else has any other questions no no scwos to Bob Bob been overseeing this whole thing and doing an excellent job Mike he always does and um also Maryland McDonald McDonald Industries like I said they donated the money for us to even be doing this so if it weren't for them we would have been going to town meeting in may just to start a this process start this process already we did we already wrote her a thank you letter but just wanted to acknowledge and there might be an option there where she could be you know she might be willing to do some more gifting you know if you know with that relationship I know Maryland quite well but I know you don't want to abuse that relationship either she's been they actually have been great to work with no she's she's a wonderful woman transparent okay very good thank you thanks guys appreciate your time uh so Mr uh say it again guot thank you sorry for the delay uh although being interested in the conservation commit very interesting for you thanks so thank you again Mike y thanks sorry just a quick comment on this uh my prior employer the town Sharon has done the exact same thing with their landf and had great success had problems with Farm up there you love work up very okay so you want to um um your retired firefighter live on East Lane and uh I want to get what's your interest in the Conservation Commission just it starts with H living on the lake and of course you know when I have 250 Acres of water in my backyard it raises some interest in that but uh you know I've always been an outdoor person hike all the time I'm at bur Pond you know several times a week but uh it's both that my the outdoors and my concern for all the white lands around here um as well as the fact that um you know haven't been a firefighter for 23 years and serving the town I just understand that um citizens have to participate in in town government so as I looked at it um I said well what's the best place for the Conservation Commission actually is is kind of a good fit for me not I have a lot of experience with it but uh I recently joined the L P wed Association I'm on the uh board as the executive um um secretary on the mwa and uh I thought this would be a good fit you know sort of dtail together on both of them okay you're retired so uh timing not an issue for you in terms of meetings and whatever no not not a lot I do a little child care with a couple of grandkids uh I've been working parttime at Social Hospital as a paramedic as well but I haven't done a lot of hours there so time is not an issue for me all right uh you know Tom Hall who Tom Hall ball no I do not sir from from H Halifax no Tom um I'm sorry what's Tom's last name is it ball or over Tom Hall sorry yeah yeah he said h I'm sorry hear after 50 years my he gone too I completely understand you guys would have a good conversation the yeah Tom's been there for a while um so one of the things that the board's tried to do especially with these technical committees like the uh the conservation or zoning or whatever is try to get a lot of training involved because it's a very uh over the last years it's gotten very complicated and very difficult so you don't have any difficulty with or in uh wouldn't have any trouble with doing all in fact um almost as soon as I well I got Association they noticed that the uh Southern New England something or other was putting out I think about storm water training it was a great program but unfortunately it was put on by the university M up Bangor for this area uh and fortunately they had a lot of competition myself and um Caitlyn applied for it Alan may have applied for it as well but I know Kate blind and I got turned down roock got it they were looking for you know kind of bigger organizations uh for the training because the site the number of people they could take was very limited so but I've already tried that Caitlyn has already pointed me to um um it's the Conservation Commission like group in the in the state that runs programs for training for exactly that and uh as soon as you guys give me the okay we're going to start hooking up with that training as well we on that great um John no you stole my training question um no I I love it I think it's a great fit I can tell you're civic-minded you know your experience with fire um you seem like you care about the outdoors you seem like you're willing and able and hungry so I'm excited to add you thank you yeah thank you yeah same I would just Echo those thoughts always nice to have somebody volunteer to want to do the right thing uh do you have any personal relationships with any existing members of the conservation committee any close personal ties I do not the first time I met them was at the contct meeting okay all right uh I would just add that you know I think it'd be a good addition I would encourage uh independent thinking which I think is important uh for any border committee commission um some voices are louder than others and I would just encourage you to to stay the path and keep your own voice uh but thank you for your interest for sure you're welcome sir yeah thanks for taking the time and the interest in doing it and doing a good job for us that'll be great I'm going to try my best so I'll take a motion if someone wants to make it oh I will I will gladly make the motion to appoint John guod guod uh to our Conservation Commission and does he have an expiration yeah uh June 30th 2027 till June 30th 2027 I second that motion all right any discussion all those in favor say I I opposed unanimous congratulations you will have to well Pam will get in touch with you you have to go letter and I'm going to get C down to the town clerk and you just come and get swor in but I that will be in the letter we're good okay all right thank you appr meet sorry for the delay and getting really all right uh so we can go back to the beginning here and do the uh warrants and commitments I move to firm approval of the following warrants and commitments vendor warrant number 57 for $1 13,760 186 payroll payroll warrant number 58 for $461,701 9 3482 withholding warant number 60 for $158,800 30 ambulance commitments 129 2024 through 1215 2024 for $83,000 $30.60 ambulance commitments 1216 2024 through 1222 2024 for $ 39,6 18360 ambulance commitments 1223 2024 through 1229 2024 for $489 3620 second any discussion all those in favor say I I oos it's unanimous I move to approve the following warrant and warrants and commitment uh vendor warant number 61 for $ 350,677 52 School warrant number 62 for 99,1 18267 and mobile home park Fee number one for $516 second any discussion all those in favor say I oppos it's unanimous uh going down the selectman's minutes from December 16th and 17th I know Pam fixed the one the special town meeting so we it was a majority I don't want to mistake in there a majority um so do we have a motion to approve uh the December 16th I'll make a motion to approve the select minutes from December 16th 2024 and December 17th 2024 second any discussion all those in favor say I oos it's unanimous uh Town Administrator evaluation uh yes so it's hard to believe that um coming up on another anniversary here in Halifax um is part of of my contract I'm subject to an annual evaluation by the board um the way that this is conducted so we're in compliance with the open meeting law is each member is sent um individually an evaluation the evaluation is based on the uh goals that the board has established annually in addition it has several other areas um of evaluation that fall under productivity and thoroughness communication and personal skills leadership managerial skills um but what happens at that point is each member as you know sends me back their individual evaluation I compile the scores into a master sheet which you have in front of you tonight um so I you know again I just I appreciate all of your thoroughness through the evaluation um I think overall um out of a score of four my average was a 3.87 u which is very happy with I I appreciate the higher to most colleges um you I I the only thing I guess the only area I would like to discuss um which again still came in a 3.33 was uh the number four which is improve communication and transparency with the public um you know again I think a 3.33 is a good score but I want to make sure I'm doing the best that I can for Halifax so um you know I I can only do as much as the board provides me with and the information that the board provides me with so I know over the past year um I've introduced Cody's corner to help with transparency with the public um we have done website training with all of our departments so that our departments are better utilizing um the website we have also started the um monthly newsletter with our intern Eva Chapman um we started the town administrator's update on every board meeting um but I certainly want to hear from you guys on what you think we can do to better improve that because that's that's kind of what I took is that there was need for improvement there um so there's ideas I know one of the things that I had mentioned early on when I started here was YouTube live youtubing Board of slackman meetings there wasn't necessarily an appetite for that then but again I'm open to it but I just where it's the category where're at the lowest score again 3.33 out of four still is a good score in my opinion but again I want to make sure I'm striving to do what I can so I kind of Welcome everyone's feedback in that category in particular okay anybody have any suggestions comments yeah I can I can I'll jump in I'll start um you know I don't think you're doing a poor job um and I don't think it's necessarily anything you can specifically control either um you know so number four communication and transparency I kind of separated those out I don't think the transparency is even on the table I don't think there's any room for improvement there I think your communication is excellent there um I think it's clear to see what we're trying to do and how we're getting there I just think there exists some sort of mistrust between the public and the four of us in general I don't think it has to do with you or any of the three of us individually but I think the board of Selectmen and the TA get lumped in and I think there's a disconnect somehow and I don't think it's a transparency issue I don't think it's for lack of effort um in my comments I did mention things like Cody's corner and so forth I just think that we might need to somehow think outside the box to somehow either bring the public back to us or make an effort to reach out to get them and meet them in the mle I think one of the ideas that could be good um is what John suggested a while ago and I don't think we ever really did it uh was have meetings out and about in town um all the summer um go to the fire department go to nanies go to XYZ and have some sort of something there so we're more visible and I think when if you were to come with us I think that would be helpful um I do think you know your visibility on things like Memorial Day and Veterans Day and that sort of thing is not even in question you're always you always show up so my my grade wasn't reflective of effort or transparency it was more of a connectivity issue with the public which I believe in my comments I lumped all of us in on that it wasn't just reflective on you um and I don't really have any quick way to solve it either so I can appreciate where you're coming from and trying to say Hey What Can I Do Better I don't really have an answer I think we could all collectively try to do it together which I think would be more constructive um but that's kind of what I thought it wasn't transparency it wasn't an honesty issue it was more for connectivity I think no matter what we do there's always going to be a unfortunately there's always going to be a level of mistrust I mean just with government in general whether it's whether it's at the top whether it's at your Municipal level there's always going to be that inherent um mistrust unfortunately and and I think we do a good job of of trying to be as transparent as we absolutely can be you know whether like you say Cody's Corner Halifax um you know we've taken initiative to try to get you information out there um and I I I don't know I I think we're doing a very fine job I'm proud of this board I'm proud of the work that Cody and Pam do um I mean but to Tom's point if we want to try to think outside the box uh and get out our faces out more in the public I don't think that could hurt I I I think I think Tom raises a good point I don't I don't think it's a criticism of Cody at all I don't think it's his issue directly I think um I think I agree 100% that for whatever Reon reason uh the times now uh seem to have a real mistrust of government at every level from uh from the very lowest level which is where I think we are all the way up to the very highest level and I don't I I I don't know it seems to be a societal attitude I don't know how to connect better with our constituents um it's it's a that that that that is something that befuddles me at this point I don't really know how to do that because I don't I I really don't see and I haven't seen since since I've been back on this board now two and a half years I haven't seen uh anything that would cause a reasonable person to think uh that there was some sort of shenanigan going on I just don't see it I mean if it's there I'm blind to it but I don't see it uh and I don't see it anywhere in the government I mean the Police Department fire department High Department everybody has a a a criticism of some sort but I mean I I I don't I don't know why there's so much distrust to that and you know we saw it at some of our public hearings uh recently um so I I I agree with you I think that's an issue uh I think it's a terrible U black mark but not just on us I don't it's like it's everywhere uh and we should figure out a way to do better we did do um so two years ago we did we did do some Road shows over the summer um I thought they were helpful we should have done it this summer I I dropped the ball I should I dropped the ball too well part of it was you know when I reached out to departments that there was a lack of desire to host us um the only place that really we were able to was the library or the fire department which we we absolutely could have still done that but it was just um a lack of you know see away we w't a been able to do it there because of that as far as other places in the community I don't I don't know where we would do it outside of town facilities that gets tricky um but not just done that though I mean you the concept is you bring to bring the board to the people not that we go someplace and then tell people to come to us we don't want that that doesn't work but uh but what the idea was with the road shows was exactly that but we did run into some logist iCal problems like we wanted I wanted to do it down at the recycling center cuz I thought that needed a little bit more but then it the logistics of it were just not going to work uh we really wanted to do the Council on Aging but there's no facility so it was they came to the town hall and they talked was same with the police department like their facility doesn't really lend itself to um to that um think of the Margaret mayor Amphitheater maybe this summer that'll be fun to an outdor it's possible yeah I mean it's possible but again remember if you if you remember the one we were going to the day we were going to do the Council on agent two years ago was no tomorrow even though they had a tent out there it was still wasn't going to work so I I agree with Tom I think I think that is an issue um that is um a board issue really I mean I I do I do think Cody tries uh in what he can then he's he's right he can only do what we tell him to do right yeah and like I said in my in my my synopsis I don't think it's reflective of effort and I don't and I don't put him alone on it either I I kind of put us on it as well and I don't think it's a transparency thing I think it's just some sort of Disconnect um and that would be the literally the only thing that I think could be better somehow and I don't think he's alone in trying to find a solution which I also wrote okay so I mean so again I I I strive to provide the best service I can to Halifax so maybe we can put put this on upcoming agendas because I'm not content with just a score like that and then no solution so I'd like to come up with not saying we have a solution tonight but I I don't want to be in this same spot in a year and get a score where we haven't we've identifi the problem and we haven't made an effort to to make a solution I I thought I have been making the efforts and and I think we have but clearly hasn't been enough so um I want to make sure that we're we're continuing to progress in that category so do we want to do we want to make it an ongoing agenda item do we want to what does the board want to do I don't know if you need ongoing maybe we check in quarterly or something or if there's ideas I mean again I'm always available if any of the board members have ideas I'm not sure what um I mean right think about that I guess I got thank you Tom for for bringing it up actually cuz maybe uh really haven't thought about it much for two years uh in terms of in terms of that I I guess um I mean you you two guys have a little bit better uh ability in that regard just because of your life situations right so you're you're in the schools you're you know you're that kind of thing so you're kind of with the people a little bit more that way my demographics a little bit older not not that much but I but I see what Cody's saying I get that you don't want to be D he doesn't want to be D for I'm not sure it's a I mean I'm not sure it's a ding I mean well it's my performance evaluation and if you feel if you feel ding they're slighted I you know that that certainly wasn't the intention no no no I I again I I think the idea of this evaluation isn't isn't just so I get a rating but it's really so I I know where I stand and where I can improve I can always improve so it's good to to have these things identified um but at the end of the day it's it it is it's a it's you know you guys filling out an evaluation of me and um if it's a feeling that I can do better there then that's something I'll strive to do um over the next year or before the next year hopefully a better rating next time this year okay anything else on the agenda on the uh um evaluation uh let's go to the uh model host Community agreement for elevated Roots yes so you may recall we had a similar situation with flour and so um we entered into state law requires that we have a marijuana host Community agreement with any marijuana uh uh business in town so we had initially executed these host Community agreements with them the state had since changed the law that required um host Community Agreements are now reviewed by the Cannabis Control Commission and they also are not you're not allowed to have the community impact fee of 3% of which we had there previously so this is a template agreement this matches exactly what you had previously approved for flower and so um the only thing that really changes of substance is the no longer the 3% impact that's removed we still get the 3% local tax we kept the expiration date the same so it was their expiration date was 5 date 5 Years From the date of commencement uh their date of commencement was November uh let's see November of 202 I believe it was so this expires 27 yeah 2027 so again it really just makes us so we in we're both in compliance with the the state law and they submit this to the Cannabis Control Commission for um for their license renewal which is up right now questions no it seems like we're just continuing on what it was existing but being up to compliance with the the Cannabis commission as far as the um do we have a uh legal council involved in this at all yeah attorney C was involved at all and so he's all he's fine with everything that's in this new contract he is yeah so he he actually drafted the first one with flower and soul it's a state it's a template from the state you just fill it in and then this is exactly what flower and souls was just with elevated Roots okay uh so what do you need motion to motion to approve and for me to sign on your behalf so move we have the second I'll second that any discussion all those in favor say I I opposed it's unanimous uh Employment contract with Kathy Evans public health nurse so this was in your packet um in draft form uh our labor council did not have an opportunity to review it so I'm going to ask that you not approve it tonight but I do just want you to be aware of it and um we can certainly discuss it this is through the public health Excellence Grant so uh Bob Valerie runs uh is the Halifax is the host community of this public health Excellence Grant he's come in before the board and explained it before um it's six communities are part of this we get a substantial amount of money from the state that fully funds it and basically it allows for um each of the six communities to provide Health uh Public Health Services above and beyond the the bare minimum their requirement so we have a a coordinator who provides services uh the idea is bring is bringing in this public health nurse who would be a full-time employee and provide services to all six communities um again it doesn't cost us any money because it's funded through the state but um it's in the contract we only run through the funding which is through um next next fiscal year uh June 30th 2026 like I said there the labor Council hasn't reviewed it so I'm not going to have you a formally vot on the contract but um we may look to have the employees start probably before your next meeting so I'd have you approve the Contra backdate the contract I just want to make sure you're okay with it can I ask a couple of questions so uh if this person uh this nurse is an employee full-time employee of who the town of Halifax okay uh and so does like all these do all these other towns contribute on any of like the benefits and so on the state Grant pays for all that yeah yeah the state Grant pays for that so we what we do is the state Grant um provides reimbursement for the salary well not reimbursement they they give us the money up front it pays for the salary and then we have a fringe benefit rate that we use I believe it's around 30% right now and then we look at the employee takes health insurance we charge the grant the health insurance um so and so forth okay um and then again they're contracted employees through the the term of the funding so they wouldn't be we wouldn't be at a situation where we would have a a um an employee who would ever be reach the 10e mark which would allow them to uh be vested in the pension system so we have no pension liability next question okay and who is like the supervisor Bob Bob Valerie is yeah so he through the agreement we have with the state Bob serves as the um point of contact for the grant for Halifax okay and he would like if there was some issue he'd be the one that like we would be the ones to to hold whatever disciplinary actions assuming there was any such yep so they are are still our employees of the Town um just funded through a grant ultimately okay all right um I had another question I forgot maybe we guys I I can ask one John you need some more time um Kathy is a member of our concom so does that get sticky at all where she's on concom and would be an employee of the town she would need to submit it's called a um special Municipal Employee M so she would need to submit a form to be approved as a special Municipal Employee and the appointing body which is you on both fronts would basically approve the special Municipal Employee status how long has she been a member of concom a while quite a while yeah and what was the vetting process and her selection what did that look like uh just like all of our other employees the we posted the job ad for I think a couple months uh several several applicants were brought in for interviews and then Bob and the team as from the other communities um conducted interviews the other five the other five communities yes I don't know if all of them were involved but I know at least three of them were involved any idea how many applicants so I don't have that information no I can get that though so it's so really oh I know what my other question was um so uh given the vote on the MBTA is this a discretionary fund also we're contracted for the money right now um and it's not one of the discretionary grants that we anticipate being cut in conversations with Bob um but we we'll make sure there's language in the contract like there is with the other contractor employees where they'd be an employee at will subject to appropriation so all of our contracts are subject to appropriation this money is appropriated through a grant so for some reason that Grant did ever get clawed back that then your contracts only avoid because the money's not there anymore yeah that was Item B I think under the termination depletion of funds right right and that's worth repeating I mean if this this grant goes away the town is not on the hook for this for paying this employee no absolutely not no it's it's a good service to not only alax but um the other communities particularly where we're smaller towns we don't so Bob's Are One technical expert in the health department so if Bob is on vacation um in most cases we don't have a backup maybe we we have a relationship with another town what we could call them but this actually allows where if Bob's away we have someone in place right away and then same thing with the other communities so I think it was Rainham about a year their part one of the communities in it the year a year and a half ago they were without an agent completely and and through this program they didn't lose a beat because the team stepped up and was able to provide those services to the town so um it's good the Bob does an excellent job running it he's actually a model for the state the he has presented um he presented most recently at a conference a couple months ago on this um they like what what Halifax is doing uh I've been at conferences and I've been um we've been recognized kind of for what we're doing here so it's it's a good thing um it just you know there's always you know it's always more working in the host community and so this this kind of comes into it there are employees so the contracts go through the board have to be approved and also there are employees so we own them so God forbid there ever were a um disciplinary disciplinary action or something that it does fall under us I was wondering so this uh she's a public public health nurse I think that's the correct term uh but um so she's not really Bob Valerie's like assistant she has her own set of responsib yeah yeah completely own set of responsibilities um and what would those like what what does Halifax get out of that so um there's thing different um clinics that she may be able to offer um we we have a system where we have to report um I think it's called Maven where it's all of the uh communicable diseases have to be reported into a Statewide system so if someone it was big during Co so if someone in in Halifax tested positive for Co it was actually on the local Boards of Health to make sure that data was getting into the system we still have to do that so that's something that we're doing um we have a nurse that comes in a couple hours a week right now but depending on the volume you know it it might not be getting done to the to the level it should um different programs they've running a big campaign right now on or they were running a big campaign on ticks um and that they did some lessons with tick and the kids so they would look to do that again with the nurse um mosquitoes information on mosquitoes and just to having someone who is in the public health profession itself and being able to um give that kind of medical information I can I'll certainly when we have the final contract I can include a copy of the job description that'll be part of the I'm just curious cuz like this this person like doing V flu vaccine clinics and not no not really if we did that we would bring in still like a pharmacy that is who who would do those um but it would be used uh like I said an all six communities for a lot of the reporting uh aspects in in educational as well but again when we have the final contract I will include the job description as it should be part of theob uh contract anyways any other questions for anyone comments no okay so we'll table this for now uh let's see uh do we want to inter municip we want to sorry do we want to approve her pending because Cody you said she might start before our next meeting yes so I think as long as the board is fine with a backdated contract I mean it as long as nothing stands out to you like hey we we don't want to do this um if you if you feel that way I'd ask that you let me know but we'll look to bring her on um it was really just a mixup in myself and Jack do and getting this to him for him to review um so he wasn't able to and I'm not comfortable having you vote final contract so do you don't want us to take any action at all tonight or I think as long as the three of you are on the same page and we're good with kind of bringing this person on under the general terms of this what's presented I think we'll vote the final contract at the next meeting okay but if but if anyone is Thoroughly concerned with something I'd ask you let me know okay okay sorry I think I skipped over one intermunicipal agreement with Hansen yeah so this was I had mentioned this previous ly um our Building Commissioner is going to help out the town of Hansen um I was supposed to have the intermedia agreement last week and I just received it like right now during our meeting so I'm going to again ask you to table this one because um I didn't we didn't get it in time okay um all right nobody has any objections to that we'll move on to uh Paul capus yes so this is um the result of they Paul capos uh PK is the name of our assessing software and consultant um we do three-year contracts with PK so for instance um personal property we don't have the internal capacity to do that so uh we use a consultant who provides those values our solar fields that that's super technical for putting a value on what that is so um we use PK which is the Paul capino we also use the software the PK software which is like our assessing software um so part of that is we have to go out to bid every year we went out to bid um PK was the loan bidder again for the town of Halifax which isn't rare because it's um you typically don't change uh Consultants here so this would be a contract for fiscal years 25 26 and 27 um the rates align with what we would anticipate um it's what we already budgeted for the current fiscal year and you can see let's see the rates here um the first two years are flat at $14,800 and then the last year goes to $34,100 and that's because we that's a recertification year so every uh five years we have to go through a recertification um through the Department of Revenue with our valuations and so that it it requires more work um on their end so did they um I thought that was every 3 years on Pro on the uh real estate tax isn't that how we used to do it we do like one third of the town every year and on the third year you had to have recertified all the um real estate um that's a that's a different process so that's not this guy though this no no this is we have to recertify the every five we're in a fiveyear yeah fiveyear cycle for all for to be recertified so they're continuously anytime um building permits are pulled or anything they're going out checking those revaluing and then every year we do revaluations um to make sure we're you know sticking with market and that's why sometimes our tax rate goes up goes down because the valuations are always changing but we actually have to recertify through the Department of Revenue which is every 5 years which is why fiscal 27 is the additional $28,900 uh but then you're not doing the interm update every year so that the what I describ with all the other updates is we call the interm update so every year we just do the updates as needed but every 5 years we have to do a full recertification okay which is why you it's more expensive but recertification of what of the valuations across the town of real estate cuz you mentioned personal property at one point well that's one of the things that the consultant does he he prepares our personal property valuations as well but the recertification is BAS is Real Estate okay and but the personal property stuff is like boats and cars and stuff like that yeah yep exactly does that he does that for us annually um the solar is an example of that depending on how we're like we were negotiating we've negotiated a couple solar Pilots um uh PK provides us with the estimated valuations for that um if somebody takes us to um ATB the appell tax board uh we have to have prepared tax information of estimates of how we came up with these came up with this information he he assists us with that so he's really our all around assessing consultant in software um it's who we've used going back in recent history and again the only reason for this is it's it's a three every three years we have to do this through a new contract required by state law that we go out to bid okay any other questions no I know that uh in talking with Deb down in the assessor's office she speaks highly of PK uh in general and uh yeah I see no reason why not we should reup them especially since they were the only bidder we we kind of have to we have we have to have something in place um and the board of assessors did meet and also recommended that the board of Selman approve the contract okay so but you don't want us to do that tonight no you can do this tonight you can do this tonight the Building Commissioner one is the one I said hold on uh all right so then uh I will make a motion that we approve the contract with uh Paul S capist and assoc or caponis and Associates uh I'll second that any discussion uh all those in favor say I both is it just one page this yeah just the one page I'm top okay Lakeville animal shelter speaking of another old problem y so this is an mannual approval um this allows us to utilize the Lakeville animal shelter um you know really see many changes here we have an annual fee of $500 um which will be due July 15th so next fiscal year and then it's a $25 per day um for the animals and then typically the owner would pay that if when it's released in the owner this is the same as last year the $25 a day we pay or the the owner of the dog pays the $25 per day is payable uh when the animal is released to its owner okay we we do have to pay a $20 drop off fee for each dog that we bring to the Leal animal shelter which we pass off pass that on right y y this has been we've been using L for probably 15 years now we used to do it here when I've done Al road but that caused too many trouble okay any other uh discussion about the the contract with Lakeville if not I'll make a motion that we approve same second we have U any discussion all those in favor say I I [Music] oppos right Town Administrator update uh yes so besides what we've already talked um a few things the Council on Aging is beginning its phase three of the hybrid program Darlene had come in maybe eight months ago and given the board an update on the hybrid program that we awarded a grant through the town of Bridgewater we got a total of $200,000 $100,000 for Hala $100,000 for Bridgewater um this allows for it's like almost a hybrid social Day program where a couple days a week uh residents that are in need and qualify come into the the COA and receive um different learning and act activities throughout the day and then a couple other days a week they'll actually be hybrid we'll set them with the technology where they can take part in the program at home so we have a location here at Halifax there a location over at the Bridgewater Council on Aging and then there's also some um remote options so that's starting up again next week in our phase three which will be the last phase of that um so kudos to Darlene her staff and then the Bridgewater Council managing that's been a huge success so so far I'm going to ask you this a lot but is that another possible grant that wouldn't happen because of the MBTA I believe that is a discretionary Grant so it technically could be luckily we're at the tail end of it um and we've expended most of those funds but that that is um it's a discretionary grant that we applied for and it was competitive we were awarded it so that's certainly one that could could have be a Jeopardy in the future kind of try to keep a list of it's going to come up and we may as well know absolutely Buzz Kil Bruno over here um Thursday Thursday January 16th we um the all of the School committees will be hosting a meeting at the Kingston Town Hall um with myself uh the Kingston Town Administrator and The Plimpton Town Administrator we invite any members of the board of selectman interested in attending um finance committee a couple members will be there as well basically it's a kickoff meeting so I think we heard a lot of feed well we gave a lot of feedback as the town administrators of the process that we went through with the schools last year that we couldn't do that again this year um and we needed to but button up that process so part of that was we've met internally um and we've agreed to have this kind of kickoff meeting where we try to get everyone in the room and start talking things earlier and expectations so that's going to start this process did we do this we did one in February last year I remember similar meeting was I think we did it in like March once they already noticed that there was a huge problem but also that was more of like a school committee meeting and then they just invited us to it where the idea of this is really we had one here we did that with just our school comme we had the administrators y but this is for all the towns so to make sure all the towns are going in on this the same approach um and I think it's I think it's actually going to be pretty successful we're excited about it um and Halifax elementary school will be present the school committee will be presented with their preliminary budget this Monday uh so we'll start to get those figures in and hopefully start to plan so again um trying to work with them it's um the Thursday the 16th at Kingston Town Hall at 600 p.m. so that if anyone's available again I think it'll be a productive meeting I'll certainly um you should provide the board an update we should post that yeah post just in case I'd like to go I'm sure you're if you guys are all planning to go we can certainly post yes um yeah so that'll be very good I know a few members of the finance committee will be there um and then like I said I think the idea is is each of us Town administrators plan to give an overall kind of budget synopsis of where each of our communities are and trying to work um going in on the same page and and we are which is excellent because I think what's happened in years past is you know Halifax may be in One Financial spot but Kingston's in a different Financial spot and Clinton's in that spot so then Halifax for may be stuck as the lone lone wolf right and then doesn't matter at the Silver Lake level because if majority votes it you have to follow through with it so um myself Keith and Liz the town Administration ppon and Kingston we have a great relationship we're regularly meeting um and that has really helped going into this that's good so that that'll be on the 16th um let's see talk about the budget finance committee departmental budget meetings start tomorrow so we changed how we did the budget last year the finance committee really liked um meeting with departments oneon-one with myself and the town account so we've done that again this year that those meetings are starting tomorrow and then we plan to have uh full finance committee budget meetings in February and I think on the town side we'll have a budget done probably first week of March um pending the school budget so that's um good good we're certainly staying on top of it and then we can uh make changes as needed the other thing is um I sent this out to the board but I think it's important to mention to the community we are part of we procure electricity services for the town of Halifax residents so um we are not part of an aggregation so a lot of communities team up with other communities and then they go out as a conglomerate and buy electricity for their residents um at at kind of a bulk rate Halifax was not part of that and we considered when we renewed our contract last year should we join should we not join but um what I worked with colonial power and we locked in a rate of 15.17 cents per kilowatt hour which was a significant increase from it was a little over 10 before but um you know during Going Back 2 years electricity was almost 30 cents a Kow hour and um I'm happy to share that this past quarter we saved the community as a whole $71,000 and over the past five quarters we've saved Halifax residents $500,000 just by being part of this and the largest aggregation in the state which is made up of 26 cities and towns has a rate of 15.78% which um I always point out to Kathy our energy manager cuz Kathy is a big um heavily involved with that aggregation the 26 communities so I make sure L her know that we actually beat them with our rate it's not a huge difference but is this something that that uh the citizens in town see on their electric bill it is yeah so if you look when you get your electric bill um at the bottom it says energy supplier and right now it's I believe it's Constellation Energy um but it actually will say the name of the in but says Constellation Energy it should say Halifax um this is Halifax on the back side we'll say Halifax the Bottom Halifax Colonial yeah oh Colonial that's what it is colonial power mon yep and they called they said that they off it I said I don't know how you can get off you didn't out and what happens is that's why I'm always checking make sure you're still in it yeah and I check for our shed too that little concession our shed too is on it too so so that brings back to the point that we discussed a few few minutes ago about um distrust and so on and I would like to see this kind of information um better broadcast uh I'm not not criticizing you by any means cuz I'm no good at this but maybe the social media thing needs to have a little bit of this also to say look at Halifax you know by following these governmental your your local government has helped you save money on your El I mean I don't see anything wrong with that if that's the truth that's the well we can definitely post something you know the social media is something Morgan with Caesar on to condense and consolidate the problem right now is if you look up you name it uh Halifax oh yeah uh progressives cons yeah Halifax fireworks committee right everyone has a Facebook group and there's no way for us to regulate it so one of the things we're working on is consolidating all consolidating all of those taking all of those away and you have a ton of Halifax face group because the issue is and I hear it from the residents well I don't know where to go to find out about holidays and Halifax or this or that because there's so many groups or I don't know where to go to find out about our road closing is it the police department posting it is it the highway department posting it generally speaking in towns you have a town Facebook page and then a police and fire page that's it that's it that's not how it's been done here so it's a challenge to reel that in but that is the goal and then we can actually more effectively utilize face book because it's a central source and then people actually look to that Central Source because it's that's it it's that one page that people can look towards so I think that's great we can certain didn't realize you were doing that which is an excellent thing it's something that we again I think is uh an Avenue that can be uh explored to uh to to address the issues that Tom raises particularly something like this is I mean that's this is good news you have a lower Bill than everybody else so it's you it's because because your government's working for you so we should I mean you do have to Pat yourself on the back a little bit sometimes yes definitely no I think we we can certainly do a better job of getting the all of the good things going on cuz you hear so many of the bad but there there is a lot of good and and sometimes you get wrapped up in the day-to-day but that's just one example of it um and then the last item I have for an update is just regarding the Pine Street uh intersection Pine Street and Plymouth Street so at the last meeting the board voted to uh reallocate those arpa funds and it asked that you know I inquired with uh Steve Hayward our Highway surveyor um Steve and I were able to connect I actually forwarded an email he had just sent me this evening to to the board I'm not sure if you had a chance to see it um but we he the town has not made any progress on securing the services for the study um but Steve says that the highway department did paint some stop lines on the North and South uh portion of pine streets just recently and then he's um investigating putting in Islands on each side of Pine Street that would have a stop sign in the middle on the island and he provided um a little bit of an image there uh they've also put up two intersection of head signs on Plymouth Street and they're planning to install two um intersection of head signs in each Direction on Pine Street and then also there's an upcoming Traffic Safety Committee which um select MC Pratt is a part of and I've asked that it be included on their agenda to make sure that that's getting the attention that it needs so that's that's the update I have at this point I'll continue to make sure that you know we're trying to work with Steve and the highway department to um take action up there as much as we can but I just wanted to provide that update good sounds great um I had one thing I should have asked to put on there but um just um the board uh as does every other committee and board in town has to write an annual report typically it's the job of the chairman right that's me I don't mind doing it uh but what I would like is uh if you guys I don't know how we do this without an open meeting violation but somehow let me know what you think we should have that annual report good or bad and if you go back and look at the annual reports in the back they usually fairly Bland it says you know we did this we did that we did something else uh but before I write it uh I would like to have you know whatever input you guys might want to have uh on that and of course I'll give you the draft and we'll make our final after that so and I think Pam I have to have it done by first of them like everybody else 21st of January so if you if you want to draft if we we can work together draft something John and then um we'll have it on the agenda for the 21st for the board to review and then to provide comments I think Pam will give us a little bit of leeway what was it called a pass it's it's it's I I say it's a tough deadline but I I get them trickled in I still have a bunch that I still have to do but not that I have do I have to get but as they come in I just P at it and then I plug it into the page inated part it's it's like second it's a second thing to me like I I thought I thought it was doing February so my it's not because we have to figure out how we're going to do the printing and where we're going to do the printing and all that Tye of stuff too so we figure that out so do you want contributions from us or you want us to let you and Cody put the draft together and then bring it to us I I would like to get whatever you guys have if you got something on your mind should we send it to Cody and then individually best way yeah that's fine yeah me I think you're fine with the old meeting law cuz you're not expressing opinions you're just stating things highlighting things facts that you would like to see in the report it's not really an opinion based so you're fine if you want to send it to me and then John and I will work to do a do you want to um Pam can you send him our report from last year say I find something you it's it is this isn't this isn't great literature do you want yeah sure I'll WR it last year so I just change the date and move on we got to make it what we did this year it's a responsibility of the chairman so I don't mind doing it but but I do like to have input for just absolutely no you shouldn't have to do it by yourself okay and again I thought I thought we had till February so that's I should have we should have mentioned this oky dokie anything else that come before the board oh there was just correspondence Conservation Commission these are just three hearings that they have scheduled uh for next Tuesday no nothing really beyond that um just three different projects before the Conservation Commission all right cool uh do we have a motion to adjourn so moved second second any discussion all those in favor say I I opposed it's unanimous that 7:35 well whatever the official Tim keeper says that's it it is 7:35 you look at that b [Music]