everyone it is now 1:30 and uh welcome to the Town of Highland Beach Town Commission meeting um and I'd like to call the meeting to order if we could have a roll call please commissioner Chinowski Commissioner Goldberg present
commissioner Peters present vice Mayor Stern present mayor Moore present town Manager Laby present town attorney Ruben present thank you thank you if we could all rise for the pledge the flag of the United States of America
and to the republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all so no invocation today no okay we'll skip over the invocation um any changes to the approval to the uh agenda no
changes if no changes we could have a motion please to approve uh motion to approve the agenda i second it all in favor say I i i moving on to uh presentations resolution number 2020
2025- Z005 a resolution commission of the town of Highland Beach Florida ratifying the selection appointments and term of office of members of the board of adjustments and appeals and so today we have um Rajie Aurora who has
submitted um uh uh for to fill the an application to fill the vacancy for a three-year term so Mr aurora if you wouldn't mind coming to this podium and just say a couple things about yourself and and why it is that you submitted an
application for this board now and you know in the US for over and I've been doing software
My last sold year before last I had to do my usual 12 months after you out that ended in December my uh neighbor
uh said that uh oh sorry uh said that you got to volunteer for this for the town now and do something so uh so I came in and and put in uh the paperwork uh for for volunteering for any of the things that you guys might need help in
and and talked to David Stern and uh he and I had a good conversation and found out that the board of adjustments and appeals is that the right one uh is the one that uh seemed like a good fit so uh so that's what brings me here and you know whatever I can do to help oh well
great well thank you very much we're going to go through each of the commissioners they may ask you a question sure um so uh Commissioner Shnoski okay uh so for the last 20 years or so I was doing education technology uh so back in 2000 we started a company called
Illuminate which did like a virtual classroom you know you probably use Zoom so it was like a precursor to Zoom uh and we would have students from all over the place log in and be able to do distance learning and all of that then we sold that company to a company called Blackboard uh which is a huge learning
management system company and then we did another one called Parchment which is an electronic transcript company uh and uh that one got sold uh maybe six years ago now and then I did a company called Capture uh which is a student
recruitment company so recruiting students and finding you know which ones would be the right match for a university and all that and that's the one we just sold thanks hello thank you for coming in today i I see you have very broad uh experience
excellent excellent resume very impressive uh and you were highly recommended by the chair uh of the of the committee uh were you apprised of what uh the board of uh adjustments and appeals do and I mean I can surmise what
it is that it does i have not been a part of one of their meetings okay uh to know all of that my assumption is it's homeowners and builders coming out and saying "Hey we need this kind of a variance from whatever the Well have you uh would you be available to attend the
meetings?" Oh yeah have you you have the time yeah so I So I'm like fully retired you know and now looking at other things so I'm the co-president of my my church uh in Bokeh and this will be kind of my second thing that I would be adding well
that's terrific thank you so much for coming sure i think that uh you would be a a wonderful addition uh to our team and to town thank you thank you Commissioner yeah Raja you got a great resume and it's a very impressive that
every um every company you belong to was a growth in that so that's an asset that we have here um and Fred Rosen said you're not only you're qualified you're highly qualified so uh I welcome you uh
and uh maybe you can help us the town with any kind of software that we have there thank you thank you for volunteering absolutely i usually end up doing you know some of that stuff cuz I I know enough about technology so eventually you know people start asking
me questions so beautiful thank you okay as we have spoken welcome addition thank you i would suggest that you go into the archive and look at the previous meetings of the board uh to get a real good feel for exactly the type of cases
what goes on and and uh what the role is so but uh welcome and thank you thank you thank you i I did you know go to the website and I think I don't know if I wasn't seeing it looking at the right thing but I saw that maybe the last meeting minutes were back in November uh
so it could be that there should be more uh but but I did read up the the November minutes thanks yes welcome and thank you very much for volunteering uh we really appreciate that and uh yeah we welcome your skill set for sure any any um observations of
anything you know any um ideas for improvement are are definitely welcome and uh yes I saw that uh you were well qualified um by the board chair and um hearing that Diane uh s you know suggested you to volunteer that that
also uh supports uh you know the the decision you know to bring you on so thank you very much for volunteering and uh if there is nothing else uh we'll well that's it you can sit down thank you very much thanks okay we need a motion yes uh move uh make a motion to
approve resolution number 2025-00005 second member Goldberg yes vice Mayor Stern yes member Chinowski yes member Peters yes mayor Moore yes thank you motion carries okay thank you
very much congratulations you're welcome congratulations uh next item B resolution number 2025-13 a resolution of the town commission of the town of Highland Beach Florida ratifying the selection appointments and terms of office of
members of the code enforcement um and providing for an effective date and we have Ross Muscalino um who has submitted an application for this board if you would please come to the podium uh state your name where you live and if you
could um please a few things about why you're volunteering for this board okay uh I live at 45 Ocean right up the street uh I've been a resident there for full-time four years a renter there for three years um I'm a big believer in community
service i spent 20 years in the fire department i do soup kitchens um been on a lot of different committees um basically I've been in the construction industry for about I think it's about 55 years now and um have a
lot of experience from everything from hospitals to high-rise buildings and thought that I could be some of assistance to the town and like get involved excellent thank you very much um Commissioner Shnatski curious to do
not go to the beach right at the door say again what is driving you back again community service and I like to keep busy i mean I'm still like I still do jobs here and there if I'm recommended for somebody but
hello how are you very good well um again I'm I'm I'm so impressed with uh our community coming out uh to serve and uh your qualifications uh much like uh Rajie is amazing it's great and I
understand also that we are in need of a chairperson for the committee okay mhm and uh if if um the the uh commission approves you would you be available to serve as a chairman yes you would okay
so I was very impressed uh you're a civil engineer and you have um uh such extensive experience in uh in related fields to what we need in the code enforcement um and I notice also that you have uh specifically you set forth
in your resume that you've been involved in construction of firehouses yes many so perhaps we can uh also leverage consult uh have your consultation and what we're doing a general contractor owned a company called Marquee
Construction i think it's in there and I built we because we did a lot of public work so I did several firehouses so you still u engaged in the business in uh any states that you were practicing oh yeah you know I get a call i just I built a house on Brooks Lane for
somebody i'm doing I'm doing I was at the uh what's the condo here uh Highland Beach Club i did uh So there may be some conflicts perhaps and uh bad as it comes up somebody recommends me I get involved but I like if I do two things a year
three things a year okay that's wonderful uh I don't see anything I I mean you volunteer and I think it's wonderful and you're quickly very engaged in our community i thank you for for coming out and um um putting your
your name in uh uh you have my support as chairperson as well thank you yeah ross you have you work for some big people in New York there capellis did you work on the Rich Carlton White Planes at all did you um they came out
nice and I see the medical center from Westchester and the airport new Rock City you're probably familiar with yeah with with that yeah yeah so they're they're great projects um but I I love the best you were a volunteer fireman for 10 years so maybe the I was 20 20
wow so maybe you can help uh uh our chief out there sitting back there and helping maybe design some of these or something like that uh thank you for volunteering also my father was a building inspector for 30 years really yeah so that's kind of in the
Thank you very wellqualified um a couple of administrative questions i'm looking at the application there are a couple of boxes that aren't checked off i just want to run them real quick make sure okay uh you're a full-time resident correct yes okay uh you're currently
you're not serving on Okay uh have you ever served on a town board or committee um no okay or committee or just town board committee town no okay uh are you willing to attend monthly board meetings
in person yes okay and uh and you understand that an absence of three consecutive meetings will be considered a resignation yes okay thank you just administrative thing um I'll ask you the same question have you had an opportunity to look at some of the uh
videos of past meetings because some of the responsibilities of the board have changed within the last uh Yeah I I looked there's not many I guess because the magistrate has been doing it or but so there wasn't that much but
I I'm a pretty quick learner great thank you thank you thank you for calling yes thank you very much for volunteering and welcome yeah uh one of the reasons why there haven't been too many meetings is because we haven't had enough people um participate in the board so uh so thank
you for volunteering and uh helping fill out that that board uh on your responses to the questions so far really impressive i think your qualifications are perfect for this position and and you definitely have my support so uh thank you very much you can have a seat
and we will move forward so we could have a motion yes i move to approve resolution number 2025 uh dash uh 13 i'll second that 13 member Goldberg yes vice Mayor Stern yes
member Chinowski yes member Peters yes mayor Moore yes thank you motion carries congratulations congratulations thank you very much for uh volunteering uh are there any public comments seeing no public comments
moving on um item eight ordinances there are none consent agenda any discussion among about the consent agenda or anything no okay if there's no further questions about consent agenda if we could have a motion to approve yes
motion to approve the consent agenda second that all in favor say I i motion carries moving on to unfinished business building department reertification program update good afternoon commission my name is
Katarina Jadawi here to present an update so since the last commission meeting we have reertified three buildings those buildings are the 45 Ocean 455 building Claridan and Ocean Pines
we have three buildings that have active code cases they are overdue on their applications two of them are overdue on the concrete restoration applications which it's actually one building it's the town houses of Highland Beach but
both buildings in that condo and Regency Highland the 3908 building is overdue on their electrical application we have 24 buildings under permit for concrete restoration and one building
under permit for just electrical to be reertified we have one building that's still within the due date to submit the phase one reports and three buildings are still too far to be notified so there's no status mentioned for them excuse me on the overdue is do we get a
uh projection of when it will be completed or when they'll comply on the one that you they have compliance date so for the electrical they have a compliance date of May 11th before a special magistrate meeting is is
scheduled for town houses of Highland Beach they already went to a special magistrate hearing and they an extension was granted and they have until May 8th to secure a permit katrina how many buildings do we have completed
19 wow it's good yes very good more than more than bokeh i was just going to ask what are the stats as far as how are we doing in comparison with other South Florida towns and cities well because of the building official Jeff he definitely got
a head start all props to him yes definitely got ahead of different municipalities and so I'd say we're more we're moving forward a lot quicker or we're more ahead I'd say
that's great he's covering i don't know what that said well great kudos to the building department yeah based on my other cities you're way far ahead so that's great news thank you excellent
thank you thank you very much moving on to the Florida Department of Transportation TripleR project update yeah I'm going to have uh Pat's been working closely with FDOT and the contractor so Pat if you can bring us up uh any questions i'm I'm here for any
questions that you'd like to me to answer for the A1A project yeah I guess I I have or I Okay maybe we all have the same one what What's the the one question is it the flooding the project that you drive down during a
raintorm on the west on the west side you would see the flooding okay and now that they've paid the roads etc very little flooding at the left side but I noticed as I was driving down towards Linton here there was quite a bit of flooding on the right side okay so it
looked like the grading was moving a little bit east and that was my imagination or it was just it was just a bad day no it's just a bad day here's here's the sol not the solution but here's the answer they have to do a lot more grading that's not the final lift
there's still another inch and a quarter lift which they'll crown the road so it goes this way so it runs off of both ways so right out there right now that's not the final that's not the final product and they have to come back and redo the swailes on the side of the street so the project is still has a
ways to go before the flooding disappears but they are aware of it i make sure they're that they're aware of it as well so yeah we the managers and other people get quick updates of what's going on for the weekend and so forth uh how accurate
are they i've noticed times when they said there's going to be work and there really wasn't uh on the weekends they normally let us know on like today's usually the meeting date they'll ask do we have anything going on that they want to work Saturday but now they don't work every Saturday but they usually do let
us know if they're going to work on a Saturday have there been any changes to the original plans relative to for example the turn lane on the only thing that really has changed is the height it has come up couple inches higher than they originally planned that's the only
change so far also my assumption is when they finished the west side bike lanes then they'll begin the they got to go to the east side they're taking about a foot off okay off on the west side i mean on the east side on the east side that's where
we'll have the situation where some people will have to remove their hedges and so forth all the hedges on A1A are supposed to come out everyone that abut everyone that abuts that was part of the project i think it's important we have clear communication to the building manager that's what not allows the water to run off when you have those hedges
right there then the water can't get off the road to absorb in so No I I understand that but I think we need clear communication to the building managers uh so they understand what has to happen and the approximate time frame so they can make the necessary uh
arrangements right and and just to be clear everybody was told at one time that all those hedges are coming out we've made that clear when the project first started all the hedges are coming out but if I I recall correctly they were also given the opportunity to
either have them discarded or have them kept by the uh by the individual that's if you check the notes i I understand that but it's quite costly and very for those Green Island fuses it's so much
easier to get rid of them and you can't put them back so all I'm asking for is clarity okay okay all right well we we'll get some clarity for you yeah we've been asking FD dot for clarity too yes and it's very cloudy out but uh Pat on the on the uh when I run
up to Linton I see the sidewalk and the new bike path they're put in is much higher than the sidewalk so they're going to grade that down I guess a bit yes they're going to do some grading they're going to raise it quite a bit in Highland Beach some of that has to come up some of the the the sidewalk will be raised in Highland Beach as well okay i
I'd like to go back to that bike lane on the east side and removal of the hedges i know we have to have some discussion on what's going to be allowed and not allowed because one of the reasons most people have put in the hedges is because tire tracks people parking correct so we
have to give some alternatives if we or discuss alternatives so it doesn't hit us the last section sure sure a and and I imagine of course everybody's gonna have to follow the rules this time and get permits from FDOT to plant this stuff everybody just did what they
wanted to in the past so and I imagine FDOT will let you put some hedges back so many feet back not right alongside like most of them are right on the edge that doesn't allow the water to get off that doesn't allow people to get off the road if they have to so I imagine once
they get a permit they'll be told where they can plant where they can't plant through FDOT okay i'll just say again we need clarity of what is expected what's going to happen so people can prepare for it correct okay sure sure
so hearing a lot of concern uh from residents about uh going through this big project and all the inconveniences and then we still have the flooding flooding issue so let's say hypothetically and hopefully this doesn't happen um there's still
flooding problems that that are observed close to the end of the project or after the project what do we do in that um here's the thing everybody still has to remember we're on a barrier island there's going to be times when there's
heavy downpours and it's high tide the water has no place to go nobody can do anything about that so there's going to have to be some patience as well with that it's not going to be a dry A1A constantly so we're going to have to accept some of that right but obviously
if it's total failure we will have to go back to FDOT and do what we need to do okay so you know potentially we may have to escalate our concerns at some point it could but again I think we're getting way ahead because the project's nowhere near over they they still have 14 or 15
places on the south end to do drainage so they're still not done with drainage and and like I say the slope of the road is going to help quite a bit okay once they put the crown in water runs this way and that way and gets off of A1A I think we'll be we'll be in a lot better shape okay so the project was supposed
to complete end of June or Juneish oh end of May sorry originally end of May i mean to chuckle but that's it that's that's never going to happen well they have 30 they also have 30 rain days that were given back so there's one month that it's going to be set back and
the meat of the project may be done that but it it's going to be the punch list the driveway tie-ins that's going to probably slow them down i myself thinking the end of August end of August okay that's my that's my projection okay good to know i think that's a good estimate yeah okay that's a reasonable
it's still in the summer before everybody comes back they should be buttoning things up it won't be too disruptive yeah I think the minor punch list stuff isn't a big deal right unless it's your driveway right yeah unless it's your driveway if it's your driveway then it's something different then it's
annoying yeah right okay so anything else we should know that we didn't ask that you think we should know about nothing off the top of my head but if you ever have any questions don't hesitate to call me okay that's for sure well thank you very much for the update really appreciate Sorry go ahead the with
respect to the greenery in in certain areas uh I can't discern you know will we have greenery between uh the path the bike path and uh and the sidewalk it seems that so in some of the areas it's tends to get very narrow and right now
it's cut pretty deep on the west yeah I'm still not following the question but u the we have the bicycle path and right now we have greenery and trees and a little more greenery and we have a a sidewalk so once all we take more and
more from the west side are we going to have some greenery some grass before we have a sidewalk well that's all going to depend on on on the area and and where you're talking about but I mean like I said anything else that's planted in a rider is going to have to go through DOT
now so yeah i mean in all purposes I would think so yes you you could you should be able to plant greenery on that side of the site there was a plan correct there was a plan that showed all the greenery and Yeah everything that
was coming out yeah dot is not planting anything yeah but um sod was it were they planting um grass well I think they'll do some restoration correct right so definitely no hedges or and I think some of the trees were being moved there's a couple of trees that's been
removed and a few more that have to come out right but there was a whole plan that was shown to us and that still it's it still holds and I think what getting back to what Pat said that's important there's a couple of spots that's going to be really constrained in that right away where the greenery might be a right
a width of sod cuz I don't see how that grade transition can occur when you go from uh the edge of metal or the edge of that uh bike path and you've got a foot drop to the current grade but you only have uh a run of say 12 feet right
that's pretty steep so it's going to shrink and we have to raise the bike path up um and mayor I know we had spoken i I have some concern for some residents that when that bike path comes up to have a nice transition grade in the rightway from the road to the sidewalk their driveway is still going to be a foot short so there's going to
be some drop offs and I don't know how FDOT's going to handle doing work on private property they're not obligated to but boy their projects and I don't say that's throughout there's a handful of spots where it's going to be really difficult and and I've brought that up
transition that project from current conditions to previous conditions and just simply tie it together there's going to be some some stuck crate in there i I've brought that up a few times and I've been assured by some of the engineers that don't worry we we know what we'll take care of it we're going
to So I I I've been try they've been trying to reassure me but I have the same uh the same concern yeah so there's one spot we have a a sewer structure that's got to be elevated probably 2 feet and a half and it's 2 ft off the edge of the road so I don't
know how that's going to in that and it's in a driveway right so I don't you can't that's going to have to be somewhat flat to meet the great lid and then drop off so there's it's going to be a little bit tricky in a few spots and I think those are the detail work that's going to really bog the project down that the contractor's not we also
paid for that we paid $175,000 to raise all of our sewer we probably should have relocated it probably would have been a better use well well yeah we that could have been but we might want to talk anyway yeah yeah we we'll talk about and and Pat the sidewalk some of the
locations that they damaged when they were working they're going to fix them i'll make sure all of that is fixed up and eyes are dodged and teas are crossed i think we should have pushed harder for the Pat Roman plan just have them redo the entire I'll try i thought at the beginning they wouldn't do it but I'll
I'll keep I'll keep needling them yeah because the whole because once they start doing patches it's not going to look that good so I think the whole path needs to be redone i'll uh I'll keep needle on that see if we can't get something done there beautiful okay excellent well thank you for keeping on
it and for giving us the update thank you very much moving on to new business uh designation of the town's voting delegates to Palm Beach County League of Cities for 2025 2026 is this uh Marshall are you going to Oh
yeah uh so we need I got to get the number our current delegates I think Commissioner Goldberg is our voting delegate and then I thought uh Evelyn David was the backup currently was that the current arrangement we have it's 118
but we we just need to designate uh for that Jason yeah uh I don't think we need that many alternates but uh a voting delegate and a alternate um and again that's usually at the League of Cities meeting in
August so uh whoever will be attending or is assured that they're going to attend would be the the group to start picking from think is it appropriate to nominate the individual well I have my my name in for you know the again for
voting delegate but we do need a second yeah I would nominate Don Peters i'll second that how about you all right how about Well thank you for accepting all right okay so um we need a motion yeah simple
motion post okay i fine i move that we designate Commissioner Goldberg as the um voting delegate and Commissioner Peters as the alternate second the motion seconded oh can I second uh I
think the vice mayor second we can have a roll call please roll call or um all in favor say I i motion carries thank you very much for volunteering um resolution number
2025-012 a resolution of the town commission of the town of Highland Beach Florida terminating the town's 401A defined contribution plan and providing for an effective date so we did this before uh submitted this back to Mission
Square to close out our old 457 and 401A plans they said we had to change a little bit of language so we're here yet again again only shows why we left Mission Square but um so this is just to close out the uh the existing accounts
there's three folks four folks I think that still remain uh we are an active contact for those individuals to liquidate their accounts if they don't they will be migrated over to Lincoln and provided with a comparable matching program and there's no contributions
going in but they're not going to lose their money and we'll this will kind of force migration if they don't close it out cuz uh one has passed and three are retired two are retired and one has left employment so we've been in contact they should be actively moving if not we will
move it for them and put it into a Lincoln account for which then we'll have to go through that process but this should formalize that switch how how many people are currently uh in the pension program in the retirement
program um in the 457 we probably have around 30 35 employees 401A uh that's me hi um so I'm the only one in that it's basically the town manager program and there's one officer that's in it that um
can't go into the FRS and then all remaining employees outside of two of us are uh FRS uh members so they're all in the Florida Retirement System so our 457 is a voluntary program the 401k
basically was just me is since I'm not in the 457 it's a kind of a mirrored 401k kind of since I don't get pensions I get the 401k so new hires would be okay yep they're
all in the pension yep okay it's a compulsory program it's not optional they're all employees are forced to to go in outside of me under statute I had the ability to withdraw okay that's good i'm curious who's
managing the define that plan um that is Lincoln Financial under the uh guidance of Sage View which is a basically our our fiduciary uh advisor who basically does a series of municipalities uh we were doing quite
poorly at the employees in general were doing quite poorly with the products that were offered by Mission Square it was kind of a stagnant and they started offering their own programs and own uh options like the mission square 2040
or mission square you know large market but they had high fees and poor performance no one had the ability to monitor so we went and got Sage View thanks to the commission and still thank you on behalf of the employees to have Sage View guide us through that so they
quarterly look at all of the investments that are available they rate them based on a series of metrics and performance measures that we see as suitable to perform and get results for our employees if they are bad uh Sage View will work with Lincoln remove that find
a substitute and move those dollars for us into your control what sage View uh no i know they have to get our permission to do those things except for you know really bad stuff but we're going to want them to move out of these
uh certain uh investment options which are poor performing or their fees are too high or they just consistently lose money we don't want employees putting their money there so we will pull them out and put them into a matched or a more appropriate product with the same
risk uh tolerance if you will for that any other discussion i'm certainly in favor of this so hopefully everybody else is okay if we could have a motion i move to approve resolution number 2025-012
do I have a second i second it all in favor say I i motion carries moving on to town commission comments commissioner Chadnoski any comments very impressed and it's really exciting to
see more volunteers so thank you very very much that's been my greatest joy to watch thank you very much you Commissioner Goldberg well I wanted to thank um and
acknowledge our town manager uh for a magnificent party once again the commission is spring fling it is uh it was it was a a great party everyone enjoyed it so so wonderful that we're able to do this for
our community so bravo for the planning the the food the music the attendance uh everyone enjoyed and I look forward to um our next uh convention the annual convention at the Florida League of Cities it's
always very beneficial to all of us um we have an opportunity um um we we do get along very well and it really makes for it helps the board be the commission become even more cohesive and and we get a lot of out of it the programs are
wonderful very informative we do our ethical um credits at that uh uh occasion so we really look forward and that's in uh August that's it okay yeah i I want to echo those same words everybody's asking me we can't
wait for the next year for the food trucks and that so I don't know how we're going to overdo it every year we had about what you said 7 800 people that that was good um also I'm amazed we got such good talent in Highland Beach
and I'm proud like uh Ros and Raj volunteering and I'm I'm very happy that people come and help us out in our town and uh thank you again i also would like that they're a great event everything went very well uh I'd
like to congratulate the new people on our boards can we afford the 20 no may have to take a cup for that thank you very much nothing from me uh moving on to town attorney no ma'am thank you town manager
um again uh thank you for the comments my wonderful team madison Scander thank you for helping me pull that off you guys are really growing into your roles and I appreciate everything you do for me and this town and this commission um again you'll see some emails coming through we're kind of in uh racing up
against uh the end of session uh but there are some bills that are are getting some traction uh sovereign immunity get ready it's going up uh I think we lose on this one um right now it's at 500,000 a million and that's growing from the 200,000 per person
300,000 per incident cap on sovereign immunity is now going to go to 5001 million there are some legislators wrestling to have some some other riders to have an automatic increase yet again at a part of the way through hoping that amendment doesn't go through we
anticipated some uptick maybe not this high but again this will hit our insurance uh we will work with our insurance brokers um the other one that's really moving quickly which I'm a little bit surprised um is the one on recovery homes um kind of preempting local government from
doing zoning as it relates to uh recovery residents and sober homes um I know our neighbors really have wrestled with that issue over the last geez probably 20 years in Delray um that they can just go anywhere nothing we can do about it and we're totally preempted so
a little bit concerned uh if that keeps on going through I don't know that we are a prime market for it um but our residential neighborhoods maybe I I mean those are some maybe some high earners want to set up something because it's the cost but uh surrounding us uh that
bill was kind of uh surprising the preeemption uh as much as we say at the Florida League of Cities meetings you know uh you know our local heroes you know uh local matters it does and the preeemptions that keep getting hammered
by the state um again only been here for seven years I'm still quite surprised at how strong and how much they want to move towards it but those are the two big ones some of the other ones that are out there uh don't get us maybe on um the uh the enterprise fund transfers is something else we're going to have to
keep an eye on which limits our ability for our uh utility to cover uh we do what we call a cost recovery or cost allocation model where basically the water department they don't they have to pay the town for land things of that
nature your time my time so um we have to be a little bit uh cautious on how that goes so we're keeping an eye on it but we're moving towards the end um and we'll see as you may have read in the the post again our discretionary sales tax that we've been using for capital acquisition
um that ceases December 31st so we've going to have about three months into next year so that's probably another 70 grand and then that program that moves all the capital back to us so um with now that we have fire and police we we're going to have to be a little more
mindful during budgeting that we're not going to have that discretionary account we're pretty close to closing it out uh based on our emergency uh repair of the generator we had to do uh that took a big chunk out of discretionary so we didn't hit the general fund so we'll uh have to figure out how we do that moving
forward but I know police has worked on some items uh with the task force to start getting dollars in uh that'll help with capital so hopefully that'll um take a little bit of the sting out of it again uh we start meeting uh next month we're going to get closer towards uh
budget season um I will be writing the managers monthly unless you guys give me a weird reaction right now that we are holding to our uh commitment to our residents of not changing our mill rate not increasing the millage rate and that's going to be my main theme that
we've been moved to uh we're meeting uh the finance team here uh is going to be meeting this week to tie down the last of the 5-year and we'll get that to you before we start getting into budget so we could see how we're trending and projecting forward and uh then we're just going to start into budget season
our our fun time in the summer uh and that starts uh your June meeting we'll be making our preliminary presentation but again our goal and commitment is to not raise the mill rate uh so we're still holding to that i don't think we have anything to worry about than in a
couple this year or possibly next year but depending on how the economy goes we just have to be careful and mindful on the the out years where it's harder to project and a little more uncertainty when do we get the estimate from the county about the That's at the end of
May we get the preliminary estimate the final estimate comes in July like 1 and then on by the July 17th meeting we will be uh doing our not to exceed millage rate which is the rate that we currently have we're not changing that if anything
we might go down just a touch because of the water debt so um we're we're in pretty good shape the differential in the discretionary fund did you say is around 70,000 that's about what we got left i think if we were the you know the first quarter of next year we usually
get around 400,000 sometimes a little bit less depends on sales tax generated so you know 75 to 100 I would guess would be the first quarter amount um I think we're going to finish this year flush so that's about what we have left
um next year so we we'll be we'll keep an eye on that but again we're still Yeah financial health here as strong as it gets we're just wildly conservative so we can make and honor our commitments to hold in tax rates and improve capital keep uh public safety at the highest
regard keep employees employed uh preferred employer all those things we're good it's just we're we have to be cautious as we do that that's all okay moving on uh we still have I guess a few
more uh vacancies uh a couple vacancies on the code enforcement for board still uh the natural resources preservation board and the planning board upcoming meetings and events our next meeting of the town commission is May 6th at 1:30
on May 8th at 9:30 in the morning we have the planning board regular meeting and then on May 13th at 1 in the afternoon we have the special magistrate hearing and there are no board action reports